Coloquio Sur 2016 - Part 1

I mentioned the Coloquio (Colloquium) in Busy, one of my first posts this month. Well, the Coloquio is over, and it was a success. But there was plenty of trouble along the way to that success.

Our first issue to handle was money. The pastoral office of FyA 44 has none, which makes it difficult to pay for 5 people (4 students, 1 teacher) to travel across the country and participate in an event that has a registration fee. I talked with Pd. Eddy about money and he informed me that the school has no extra money lying around. So we turned to the biggest source of income for Jesuit projects in the Cusco region: tourism.

Thousands of tourists come to Andahuaylillas every year just to see the Sistine Chapel of the Americas. The Peruvian tourists pay 10 soles, and the foreign tourists pay 15. That money adds up to a lot of resources for local projects. Much of that goes to fund the parish social programs that Erin and Lauren work at, but Pd. Calilo is a savvy enough businessman to know to have funds on reserve. Hna. Rosario and I talked with him and he told us that he could cover the costs as long as the students put in some effort to raise money.

We decided to do a raffle. Every student in the high school bought a ticket for 1 sol. Three prizes were given out: a jacket, a new leather soccer ball, and 100 soles. The jacket and soccer ball were both claimed, but the winner of the 100 soles must have lost their ticket because they never showed up.

The week before the Coloquio, a new challenge presented itself. There are a limited number ofpeople the Coloquio can accommodate. Each Jesuit project is assigned a certain number of spots* parish of Andahuaylillas had 2 extra spots. Remember the 6 practicantes (student teachers) that I sometimes mention? Well, if you had forgotten now you know. 3 of them help with pastoral work at the parish. 2 were offered the extra seats and all seemed well until some serious politics got involved. I'll skip the details because there are many. It's enough to say that the invitation to the 2 practicantes was rescinded. It was decided** that 2 students from FyA 44 who also participate in the parish's pastoral work would be chosen to go. The coordinator of the parish's pastoral work and I picked 2 students thrilled to be invited.

So, with 7 days to go before departure Hna. Rosario and I had to figure out how to stretch the money we'd raised for another 2 people. How fortunate for us that the grand prize for our raffle was never claimed.

The next challenge was the permission slips. Taking 20 students to Cusco for the weekend is one thing, taking 4 to Arequipa (which is a 10 hour bus ride away) is another. Peruvian law requires notarized authorizations signed by one parent in order for a minor to travel without a parent or guardian. I collected IDs from the 6 students and Hna. Rosario took care of getting the forms prepared at the notary's office. The day before we left, all the mothers went and signed. I got the completed forms on departure day (Thursday, October 27).

All the pieces were in place, and we were ready to go to Arequipa.

*FyA 44 got 4 this year, JVC usually gets 1. Besides me being the coordinator of pastoral work for the school, me going as the chaperone meant 1 more student could go. If I hadn't gone, one of the 4 FyA spots would have gone to an accompanying staff member.

**I'm using the passive voice because I don't know who decided it. Certainly not me.