Visiting Groups: Dallas Jesuit

It summer vacation in the United States, which means the parish is hosting lots of different groups. Last week, one of our favorite groups came. It's an all boys high school from Texas called Jesuit College Preparatory School of Dallas. We refer to them as Dallas Jesuit.

Dallas Jesuit is such a great group because they come prepared. The chaperones meet with the students multiple times during the school year. This year they also had readings they had to do before the trip. The idea behind the Dallas Jesuit trip to Andahuaylillas isn't direct service (like building homes, painting walls, etc.) or language acquisition (I'm actually surprised at the fact that there's no groups that come purely to improve their Spanish). Instead, the boys come to connect with local people, to learn about a different reality. It's about the students' growth as individuals, as boys becoming men.

Here's an overview of their visit:

When the arrived, they got the tour of the parish from Erin and Lauren. On the second night of their stay, we had dinner with them. It was a chance for the boys and teachers to ask questions about daily life here, social realities, and our personal experiences as Jesuit Volunteers.

On Sunday morning, Lauren and I lead them on a 2 hour walk from Andahuaylillas to Urcos, for shopping. The chaperones instructed the boys to all buy a few things for sharing at a picnic down by the lake, and then set them loose on a packed street filled with vendors selling strange food and speaking a foreign language. I can confirm from my own high school experience shopping in places where English isn't the common tongue - the Dallas Jesuit boys will enjoy this memory.

Being the parish volunteers, Erin and Lauren have much more contact with visiting groups than I do. But I did bring the students over to FyA 44 for a tour. Afterwards they split into two groups. Some helped out in gym class while some came to the classroom with me for my first religion classes of the year in Primaria.

You might think that having 4 American high schoolers in my Peruvian classroom would be a distraction, and you'd be right. But I like when I have visitors. It's easier to keep the students in line ("We should all behave extra good today, because otherwise they'll go back to America and say that we don't know how do things"). It's a lot of fun for the students. And it means less attention on me during the part of the class where the students work individually. We sang and prayed in English and Spanish. The Dallas Jesuit boys helped as best they could, though some were so excited to interact with my students that they proved a hinderance during the few minutes of explaining the directions. But all in all it was fun.

Funny story: One of the third graders asked me if I had brought them along to help me replace Profesora Rachel, as if she is so good at this job that she could only replaced by a team of 5. I assured him that since I did the job last year, I feel up to the task myself.

Check out Pd. Eddy's fancy pocho!

This kid got tons of love from the students. It's easy to forget, because I come from an American city, how racially un-diverse Peru, and especially this region, is. It's very possible that these students had never interacted with a black person ever until last week. Major props to the student for taking it like a champ and accepting the t-shirt stretching love.

The boys also went with Alfredo to various rural communities to participate in the catechism classes he gives. In Secsencaya (where I go with Alfredo on Tuesdays), the Dallas Jesuit boys surprised some local teens by winning 2 out of 3 soccer matches. The boys were a lot of help to me during the catechism class. Alfredo had to talk with the adults of the community and left the very rowdy children to me. I put the Dallas Jesuit boys to work running small group skits about the parable of the talents. It may have been overwhelming for them (definitely for the boy who is taking Latin instead of Spanish), but don't walk into my classroom and expect to just sit there. If I can use your help, you're being put to work.

It's not clear from the picture, but they're singing "Firework" by Katy Perry

On Wednesday morning (which was a holiday for Día del Maestro), the three JVs lead the whole group of 9 students and 3 chaperones* up to the cross on the side of the mountain. Once there we lead a group reflection about how to get the most out of fleeting experiences. It's so easy to spend a week in a poor area and decide you will go get your training and then come back to help. It's so hard to keep that fire going a month, a year, a decade, after the experience is past you. We weren't telling the boys to come back to Andahuaylillas - that's probably not what God has in mind for them - we were trying to help them think of ways to let their short time here touch them deeply.

The most fun part of their trip for me was Wednesday afternoon, when we went to a neighboring town to eat cuy (that's guinea pig). There was lots of playing with food, dares to eat gross parts, and chest thumbing when cuy brains were devoured.

I know they enjoyed the trip. I hope they were moved. I hope they live better lives because of it, and because of many more experiences. But for me, a key part of the joy of having them here was observing American teenagers, and getting thoughts/advice from their teachers, whose ranks I plan to join soon. asdf

Laughter is universal.
By the way, the tan uniform you see on the right is from Escuelita, the public school in Andahuaylillas.

*Compare that to the 46 students and 4 chaperones one the 3 country trip to Eastern Europe I did my senior year of high school.

All photo credit to the Dallas Jesuit chaperones.