More Volunteering in Huancayo

It´s been a bit since we´ve written. Although we haven´t been traveling the continent, we continue to have some really great experiences here in Huancayo. So great, in fact, that we´ve decided to fore-go our trip to Brazil (we even had our visas already!) and stay for the month of March as well. Through the end of February, our time was spent working or preparing to work with the guys at Inabif and the girls at Fransica Mayer, in addition to having Spanish lessons daily. Now in March, we are going to focus our volunteer work on literacy initiatives with the girls at Francisca Mayer.


Our Daily Schedule

Jeremy has Spanish class from 8:00 to 10:00 so he is up early. Sarah has Spanish at the same time in a different location on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Through the month of February, we headed over to Inabif to work with the guys at 10:00. We worked with them on some hygiene instruction, greetings, and basic literacy. Since March began, we´ve been running errands in the morning. Noon is lunchtime, so we´ve been heading home to eat and to finish preparing for our second volunteer placement in the afternoon. We catch a combi at 1:30 so that we can be at Francisca Mayer for 2:00. We were starting at 3:00, but have since added an hour so that we can spend more time teaching there. And sometimes Jeremy is there at 1:30 to help the older girls with their homework. We´re usually there until about 5:30pm and then walk back home so Sarah can make it to her other Spanish classes from 6:00-7:00. After Sarah´s Spanish class, it´s time for dinner. Then we plan for the next day, relax a bit, and head to bed. As you can tell, each day is quite full!


Highlights at Inabif

Some of the recent highlights at Inabif included making paper wind socks in an art class with the boys, having a party for the day of friendship with dancing and snacks, playing soccer and other games, and doing some planting together in their garden. These guys are lots of fun to hang out with as well!

Hanging Out with the Boys at Inabif


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Planting at Inabif

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Group Photo on Our Last Day with the Boys!

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Highlights at Francisca Mayer

Sarah has been working with two girls one-on-one to help them to develop basic literacy skills. She´s been able to put her special education skills to use! After administering an assessment of basic reading skills for each girl, she got to work. One of the girls (Rosa Luz) has made a great deal of progress after only 2 weeks. 2 weeks ago, she only knew how to name and write a few of the vowels. Now, she is reading sentences that use up to 12 different letters! The other girl (Karla) is not quite as motivated to learn, so Sarah is working on different ways to include her artistic interests to motivate her. So far, they´ve used modeling clay, letter and number stencils, and different colored markers. Next week, they´ll try some new things as well.

Jeremy has continued on teaching Spanish literacy to the more advanced students. He works with the secondary (high school)students from 2:00 until almost 3:00 and then he works with the younger (middle school) students from 3:00 to 4:00. He is helping the girls develop their reading comprehension skills. They´re reading a book that Jeremy had bought for himself to improve his Spanish literacy and supplementing the book with other non-fiction reading materials he finds on the internet. They´ve also been doing alot of geography instruction lately.

Besides all the work we are doing with the girls, we have been spending a lot of quality time with them, from 4:00 til about 5:30. All the girls are really sweet and really enjoy the company. There are three little girls named Yoana, Yenni, Mariela, and Karla plus a little boy named Kelvin who require a lot of attention. Having two other adults around (especially ones that they aren´t with 24 hours a day) helps. We spend a lot of time holding them, spinning them around, dancing, putting together puzzles, etc. Up until the end of this week, a volunteer was working with the girls doing a lot of different art projects while we taught the older girls. Hopefully a new volunteer can take on that role.

Jeremy plays soccer and volleyball or whatever game that the older girls come up with. Sarah usually joins the games for a bit, but ends up spending the last part of the day playing mostly with the younger girls. We´re both pretty tired by the time we leave, but we´re loving it just as much as the girls.

This month, we had a few parties at Francisca Mayer as well. In addition to the Day of Friendship celebrated on February 14th, two of the girls had birthdays. We bought cake, candles, and soda for each party because, unfortunately, the orphanage can´t afford things like that for the celebrations. Maria turned 12, and Elizabeth turned 15.

Carnival was also this month which means we also got wet quite a bit. Sarah got hit more than a couple of times by water balloons boys threw at her in the street. The tradition is to get the opposite sex wet by whatever means. One woman in our volunteer group got drenched by a boy with a bucket of water. Actually, it was an accident because she ran into the boy carrying the water while running away from a group of boys shooting water guns at her. Jeremy got his turn at being wet when the girls at Fransica Mayer had a carnival party. He managed to recruit some girls to be on his team so it wouldn´t be just him against 16 girls. That day everyone got really wet and it wasn´t just because it happened to be raining at the time.

Playing with the Girls at Francisca Mayer

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¨El Dia Del Amistad¨ at Francisca Mayer


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Elizabeth´s 15th Birthday!

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