As of last Friday I ended my volunteer experience and I can hardly believe it's over. The last week and a half were very eventful and to say the least, I'm going to miss being with those kids everyday.
The week before last was quite interesting. The director of the school, Nancy, upon seeing my resume and information when I first arrived, was so thrilled that I had a Business degree and marketing experience. For the entire two months that I was there she kept bringing up the possibility of me imparting my extensive, endless knowledge of business to the administration at the school. I talked about this with the director of my program who, luckily, said he would join to help explain to me exactly what it was they wanted. We put together some information to give to and discuss with the administration and it went quite well. Our international business summit lasted for about two hours and we talked about how they wanted to use marketing to help their program. Had my program director not been there I would have been lost. He was able to explain the workings of the community and how the principles I understand in terms of the U.S. economy differ from those in Peru. Although I was only able to meet once with them I hope they can find some application from the things we discussed.
The following week (my last week) was quite eventful as well. Last week, the kids at the school all started back to their regular schools after their summer break. School here is quite different as far as the hours because they only attend for about 4 or 5 hours. School days are divided into two sessions, morning and afternoon. So...kids that go to school in the morning come in the afternoon to the program I was working with, and kids that go to school in the afternoon attend the program in the morning. Normally I only work from the morning until 12:30 but this week I wanted to stay for a full day to see all the kids before I left. However, I started getting sick on Sunday and it lasted all week and I am finally getting over whatever it was. I had to stay home from work two days this week but luckily I was able to stay all day on Thursday to see all of the kids.
This ended up being quite an eventful day. Some of the kids were upset that I was leaving and I had to explain to them that I wouldn't be coming back. The kids and the teachers put together a little going away party. They decorated the white board with some drawings and some of the kids put together little presentations to say thanks and give me a few small gifts.
On Friday it was more of the same, saying bye to the kids and explaining I wasn't going to be coming back on Monday. It was hard to leave and on my way out I said goodbye to the administration. It was quite funny because, as I was saying goodbye, they all looked at each other like they should be giving me a present of some sort so they grabbed whatever was close by. In the lobby they sell crafts the kids have made and one of their products was a wooden magazine rack from a carpentry class. They pulled the magazine rack from the shelf and gave it to me. Although I was/am very thankful, I kept wondering how I was going to travel around with a magazine rack (I don't know how but I was able to fit it into one of my backpacks and it shouldn't be too burdensome).
Yesterday was Sunday (which means today is Monday) and it was my last day in the house. I left last night after dinner and am now staying in a hostel in Miraflores. I have a few days of down time until Thursday when I will meet up with Alanna who will be flying into Lima from Cusco. From there things will pick up quite a bit as we will be traveling for about a month or so. The plan, as of now, is to leave for the northern part of Peru on Saturday. We will spend about a week in several cities and beach towns like Trujillo, Huanchaco, Chiclayo, etc. although we're not quite sure yet where we are going. After this we will make our way back to Cusco and get our Macchu Picchu on. Then, we will go southeast to Puno and Lake Titicaca. Once in Puno, we will take a short trip to Bolivia to renew our soon-expiring tourist visas. After all of this we will finally end up back in Cusco where we will be looking for work.
That is the tentative plan and it feels like it is finally underway. The first two months have gone by faster than I expected and I am now on to the next stage of my trek. My time here so far has been very structured and this next phase is very unknown and should be very exciting. I'm sure it will go by faster than I expect and I'm looking forward to doing more traveling.
On another exciting note, we now have an apartment in Cusco!! I haven't been there yet so I don't know what it looks like or exactly where it is but it's a 3 bedroom place not too far from the center of town. It was mostly furnished until last friday when I received my magazine rack which now makes it completely furnished. So....now that you have a place to stay in Peru, start planning your trip!!
Again, I can hardly believe how fast my time has already gone and it will start speeding up as I start the next part of my journey....
