Third Time's a Charm

And, I’m back! Back to the blog and back in Cocha!

I’ve officially been here a week and easily found my way back into the Cocha groove. Although, to be fair, I have been doing an extraordinary amount of sleeping due to a nasty cold and congestion that I’ll chalk up to the change in weather (at least that’s the Bolivian excuse).  It’s officially winter here in Cocha, which has me a bit confused because its 35 degrees out when I wake up but 82 my 1pm – and no indoor heating!! But that’s what the two weeks of adjustment time were planned for – being sick, moving in the apartment, starting my visa process, and, of course, visiting my babies.

For those of you who do not know, this time around I am working at the American International School of Bolivia (AISB) as a sixth grade teacher. You may be thinking, what credentials do you have to teach?! And the answer is….none…other than being a well educated, English speaking, creative thinking foreigner – which, apparently for them, is enough.

I’m renting a small 2-bedroom apartment that sits behind the house of another teacher from AISB. It’s centrally located, which is really convenient considering last time I was here I lived waaaaay down south and it was a pain to get anywhere. This location definitely adds to my ability to walk everywhere (except to work, which is about 20mins away on the north-west side of town).  It’s mostly furnished and I’ve been working on adding some personal touches – a painting, pictures, flowers, etc – and slowly but surely it’s starting to feel like a home. Diego has been a great help in accompanying me on my shopping trips, helping to move furniture around, and acting as my negotiator when the Bolivians want to try to hike up their prices for the gringa.

I’ve also been able to take some time and visit the babies at Solomon (who are no longer babies and talking, running, and growing more every day!), the boys at Nazareth, and the main office of Amanecer. I find that I’ve come at quite a crucial turning point for Amanecer as they struggle against the economic hardships and the change in labor laws (that have increased salaries by 30% since 2010). I’ll be sure to comment more on their situation in another blog, for the sake of keeping this one short, but I’m excited about using whatever downtime I have to help them brainstorm how to increase outreach and communication to former volunteers and involve them in helping to save the cause that is so close to all of our hearts.

I have no doubt that this year will bring it’s own challenges, adventures, and frustrations – as any first year of teaching will, but with a special Bolivian flare. And it will be interesting, seeing Cochabamba from the upper echelon’s perspective…I’m secretly hoping to win them over and convince them to give their money to Amanecer….but maybe I shouldn’t be admitting that quite yet. 

Hasta Pronto Bolivia!

My first weekend in Bolivia back in August of 2010 was the weekend of the 2^nd biggest parade/festival of the year here in Cochabamba. My last weekend December 2011 there was also a big parade of all the university dance clubs to celebrate the end of the school year. Today, Sunday, is also Dia de Peaton (Day of the Pedestrian) which means no cars (not even public transportation) from 9am to 5pm. Although in some ways the lack of transportation today made Fri/Sat a bit more stressful, I really can’t thank Bolivia enough for sending me off on a weekend full of music, dancing, culture, and tranquility – everything I’ve come to love about this country and more. I’m still not quite sure how I’m going to handle heading off to Santa Cruz tonight all alone or my trip back to the States tomorrow – but I couldn’t have asked for a better despedida (goodbye) from this beautiful country.

Hasta pronto Bolivia (See you later/soon Bolivia)!

But they're just like any other baby...

It’s a well-known fact that I’ve absolutely fallen in love with my babies. I think they are quite possibly the cutest kids in the entire world, they’ve completely stolen my heart. But over the last few months in the process of falling even more in love with them I’ve forgotten the cruel worlds they’ve come from – to me they just seem like any other happy kid most of the time, but my last week Christopher gave me a stark reminder of the harsh, challenging pasts they all come from.

There are always a good handful of volunteers working at Solomon, more recently than I’ve seen almost my whole time here. When I first arrived last August I was the only volunteer and now there seems to be a surpluss – which I consider to be a great thing. However, about 90% of all volunteers at Solomon are girls – there are currently two men – one in his 20s from the US and another in his 50s from France. Juan, the French man who comes every year with his wife Vivi for 3 months, is the handyman around the house – always going from one sala to another looking for broken door handles, water pipe problems, and any thing else that needs some fixing up. The other day he was working on something in the comedor (cafeteria) while Sala 2 was eating lunch and Christopher spotted Juan and started screaming “Papaaaaaa!” with a look of pure terror on his face (just like all women are “mama” all men are “papa”). This repeated the following three days – every time Sala 2 was eating and Juan would pass by Christopher would go into hysterics. It about broke my heart. There are other men who come around the orphanage – the gardener, one administrative staff, and visitors – and I’ve had Christopher in my sala for over a year and never seen him react this way to a man before. There are some kids who have a general fear of men (especially in the newborn sala and Sala 1) – but Christopher was never one of them. The mama’s working said not to give Christopher the time of day because one day they had taken him into the sala to calm down and he didn’t want to come back out again – apparently if I held him and removed him from the table I would only be encouraging him to do it again in the future. They all said it was just due to his wanting attention, but the look on his face was one I’d never seen before, like he was having a flashback of a memory of a man who looked similar to Juan who had maltreated him in his past. Knowing that Christopher most likely had this bad memory just broke my heart. So, seeing as it was my last few days anyway, I ignored their advice, picked him up, hugged him, told him it would be okay and took him into the sala to sit with him while the others finished lunch. Maybe it will make it more difficult for the mama’s in the coming days, but I just couldn’t resist the urge to comfort him. After all, every kid deserves to be spoiled every so often.

MIA

So I’ve been terrible at writing recently. Most of my lack of updates are due to the fact that there haven’t been any updates to give. I’ve spent the last two weeks being ill with some sort of stomach problem – still yet to be officially diagnosed, but mostly likely parasites of some form or another. It’s been a bit of a bummer because I feel like I’ve lost out on two weeks of being with the kids – but I just found that I never had the energy to put into work. There were days when I went crazy spending 24+ hours in the apartment, most of which in my bed, and wishing I could muster up the energy to go say hi to my babies or go swimming with the boys at Nazareth. I guess this is what I get for bragging that I’ve never had any stomach problems in Bolivia! Looks like I’m not super-stomach-woman after all!

But after seeing three different nurse/doctors who can’t seem to quite pin-down what’s wrong with me I’m going to get some blood/stool tests done on Monday morning which should hopefully give me at least enough energy to make it through these next three weeks before I head home. Wish me luck!

Spending a week with my Alums

Although it's been a bit rough getting back into a routine this week, I've had a nice change in routine to keep things a little different...

Since Jen was still on vacation this week and there is another volunteer in my Sala, I worked in Sala 2 this week with all of my babies who have grown up: Gonzalo, Lucas, Blanca, Edson, Adriana, MARTIN and many more. It was wonderful to get to spend the day with them again - usually I'm resigned to just saying hi when they pass by - but this week I got to be with them all day long!

It's amazing how much they've grown up. They're so freaking smart! I know Jen tells me all the time about how they talk and the different things that happen in the Sala - but getting to see how they've grown and matured since leaving Sala 1 was absolutely incredible. How some of their characteristics have stayed the same and others have completely changed. They're truly becoming little people.

However, although I LOVED spending the week with my alums, I did miss the babies in Sala 1 - even if they are newer, they've managed to capture my heart just the same. I have no idea how I'm going to say goodbye to either group in 5 short weeks. Last time was hard enough and I only knew about half of the kids and I knew I was coming back...

Cell Phone #3

Bolivia is the place where my cell phones come to die and get lost.

If memory serves me correctly, I've only ever broken or lost ONE cell phone in the US (small incident on my birthday freshman year of college where i decided to go swimming in a puddle...) and in the 14 months I've been here I've lost/left my cell phone in a taxi/trufi 3 times and, today, put one in the washing machine. Luckily it was returned 1 of the 3 times I left it somewhere - but, today I had to buy my third cell phone in 14 months.

Good thing this bad cell phone seems to hit me in countries where my cell phone only costs $15.

Salar de Uyuni

So it’s back to work today after 5 days of vacation. From Tuesday to Sunday I was traveling with Jen and her friend, Chris, who had come to visit her from England. (Note: Friends you have approximately 5 weeks left to visit me…) Tuesday was a pure travel day – 5 hours on bus to Oruro and then 7 hours on the train from Oruro to Uyuni where we spent three days traveling the Salar de Uyuni and surrounding areas. The Salar is the largest salt flat in the world – absolutely beautiful. But let’s go to the very beginning…

Going to the Salar is a very, very popular stop on the tourist route – if not THE most popular in all of Bolivia. There are a bunch of different companies with whom to do the 1, 2, 3, or 4-day tour with. Most people pick their group as they get off the train or bus because it tends to be cheaper. However, because we have had a few friends with bad experiences (crazy drivers, getting ripped off, bad accommodations, etc) we decided to book ahead of time with a recommendation from a Bolivian friend of Jen’s. Each tour takes approximately six passengers – being as we were already three we had three spaces for other travelers. Originally, according to the list of the company, we were traveling with two Canadians and a boy from Holland…that then changed an hour later to three Mexicans…and, when we finally loaded up the car, it turned out to be a boy from Holland, a girl from Belgian, and a woman from California. Typical Bolivia. And, also true to Bolivian fashion, although the company claims to have Bilingual services, our guide, Abraham, did not know any English and thus Jen surrendered to being our translator for the tour. (Note: Although I could have also done it, Jen was lucky enough to be seated in the middle row of the car – while I was upfront – giving her a better position to be heard by the rest of the car. And did some amazingly animated translations at that.)

However, of the many Bolivian-isms of the trip, the best was that after the first day, of a three day tour, part of our car fell off…well, a bolt went missing. And I don’t know much about cars so I can’t be absolutely sure, but I think it had something to do with the suspension. And in the US they would have panicked and called back-up to come with a spare part or something, even in the middle of no-where. But no, Abraham tied it on with part of the rubber cord that strapped all of our bags to the roof. He was embarrassed when Jen took a picture of his solution, but we assured him it was just to celebrate his creative solution. And celebrate indeed, because we made it all the way back to Uyuni after two days of it being broken, with no other problems.

All in all though it was an absolutely beautiful trip. A bit on the cold side, considering I’ve been escaping winters both in the US and Bolivia the past year and a half, but definitely worth it. How our driver knew where to go still astounds me, there were times when I couldn’t make out one path from another or even guess in which direction we should go – but he always knew. Granted, he has been doing tours for the past 15 years, so I suppose that could have something to do with it.

It was one of those trips that after a while I just had to stop taking pictures because everything around you is picture-perfect. The white of the salt flat creating reflections so that it looked like the mountains in the distance were floating, the bright pink of the flamencos on the lake in contrast to the crisp blue water, and the stunning mountains that you can see for miles around. The only thing I couldn’t capture on film were the most amazing stars I’ve ever seen – going outside at night was like being inside the dome at the science museum – incredible.

I know there are stunning sights to see in the US as well, but the range of different geographical wonders I’ve seen in Bolivia astounds me. And I still have more to see!!