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I´m finally here!

Iquitos, Peru


I finally arrived in Iquitos yesterday at around 6 pm. I had not realized it, but Iquitos is actually one of the places Che Guevara stops at during his travels in the movie Motorcycle Diaries, which if you have not seen, you should. Iquitos, according to wikipedia, is one of the largest cities in the world that is not accesible by land because it is surrounded by water. People here don´t really have cars, so the primary mode of transportation on the streets, other than walking, are mototaxis, which are basically two passenger carriage things attached to the back of a motorcycle.
I am about certain that I will not have a way to upload pictures, at least not regularly, until I get back to Lima, so I´ll talk about a bunch of stuff and add pictures to the text.. eventually. Promise.

My last couple of days in Peru were very good. After going to CHS to talk about the work I would be doing here I went on a tour of the city. It was beautiful. Since I

uploaded those pictures while I was still in Lima I can show you those. Here on the right is the Bar Maury, where the Pisco Sour was invented. It is located pretty close to the plaza mayor, where a lot of the government buildings are.
We also passed by St. Francis´church, and since he is the patron saint of animals, once a year people bring their pets to the little plaza out front to be blessed.
We also went to the Parque de la muralla, which was built where a large wall used to exist to protect Lima from pirates (since it is located by the sea). In the back is one of the mountains that have slowly been populated by poor people that don´t have anywhere else to go.

We went up the mountain to a place where you can see the city, at least on a clear day, which it was not that day. The ride up was scary.. a very narrow road where only one car fits that winds around the mountain... the view was pretty though.
We also went to a place where there used to be a statue of Pizarro, the conquistador of Peru. One of the presidents decided that a man that caused so much pain to the nation should not have a statue in his honor, so it was brought down, and a fountain now stands in place. I really love that they took the statue down.
Later that day I went out to dinner with another one of the volunteers, Cathy, a super cool girl from Northwestern. We ended up going out dancing and this is me being twirled.


I already miss the place I was staying at..


But I really really miss Te. She became my little companion while I was home.


As for Iquitos, it is incredibly hot. I have not stopped sweating, and I have been covering myself in bug repellent.. The office where I work and where the kids´ workshops take place is a five minute walk from my pension, so that is nice. The pension itself is pretty nice. I have a bed, a mini fridge (bigger than the ones at school!), my own bathroom with a shower.. and there is even a place to wash my clothes right outside, though I doubt I will be washing more than just a few things myself. I even have cable, which is nice, because I have been able to follow different things in the news.
About seven blocks from my pension is the Plaza de armas, and the place I will be taking my meals is right there. I think it´s pretty ironic that the owner of the restaurant is this guy that went to UT in the 60´s and now has the whole place decked out in burnt orange and white. Even the waitresses sport the colors.

The first night I was here I took a walk with Ana Cecilia, my new boss, around the plaza, the area where most tourists are, and where most of the approaches for sexual tourism happen. It was unnerving to even see a girl waiting to find a client as we walked by. I felt helpless.. but there are processes we follow in order to gain their trust so that they actually want to come work with us. Because the approaches all happen by eye contact and other body language, I was adviced to not be too friendly, or I could be taken for one of the girls looking for a client.

Today I went with David, one of the social workers that works in the program, to do field visits. We first went to the home of a young boy, of 15, that has stopped comming to the workshops, and we wanted to find out why. Turns out his parents finally bought a mototaxi, so he has been working. Since he is a minor and can´t work legally, he has been working nights, sleeping in the mornings, and barely doing homework and going to school. He was not home though, so we couldn´t talk to him. Alll that information we got from one of his siblings.

We then went to a settlement, pretty far away from Iquitos itself, to talk to the head of a gorup of workers that go to dumps to sort through trash to find material to sell. Their kids tend to work with them, even though, if you ask them, even if the kids are right by you digging through the trash, they deny it. These kids are called recycling kids.. gives it a whole new meaning, huh? Anyway, we talked to this man who organized a bunch of families that work like this. They now work for contractors that are paid by the city to clean up. The problem is that the new people they sell the trash to are not paying them anymore.. rather than giving them everything up front in exchange for the trash, they give them a little and end up owing them the rest. This is a huge problem because without that meager pay the workers have no money for transportation back home, or even to feed their own children. Moreover, this man we talked to was especially worried because his mother was having a lot of medical complications and, since hospitals are not working in protest, he has not been able to find medical care for her. Anyway, we came to try to work with him on getting the children of the families in this group to come to workshops we are setting up in the area. The good thing is that he was very willing, very interested in getting the children into these workshops that teach the children important skills, even self esteem. I think we´re meeting with the whole group next week to get the parents involved as well. After our talk we walked around the settlement. There were houses that have gone up in literally the last three months. It was a bleak sight. But I need to find beauty even in those grim circumstanes right? I thank my friend Jack for reminding me of this, because on our little walk we encountered all these children that looked so happy, just playing with each other. They could teach us so much about finding happiness in the smallest things.. Anyway, I pulled out my camera and they got super excited, asking me to take pictures of them so they could see.

Afterwards we went to a school in the middle of a red district where a lot of kids at risk for, or already involved in, sexual and labor explotation go. We met with the sub-principal (I guess that is how it translates?), who was extremely helpful. It was invigorating to find that there are allies everywhere, because he contributes a lot to the program by facilitating the follow ups on kids that don´t show up to the workshops for whatever reason. We keep him informed on what is going on so he can talk to the kids and see what´s up. While we were there we talked about a girl that stopped going to school altogether because, most likely, she makes so much money in prostitution that going to school seemed pointless. There are so many cases like that. But there are others that prove to be the motivation.. like a girl that was at risk and now, since attending the workshops, is doing much better in school, and even her family is supporting her.
A lot of the work we did today was to find out why certain kids were not coming anymore, and if possible, talk to them and get them to come back. But in the process I found out a lot more stuff. Like the fact that this school, in the mirddle of the red district, was closed today in protest. Why, you ask? Well the government has to provide contracts for the different teachers, and it has not. At this school it was something like five posts in really basic areas like math that do not actually have a paid teacher. Some teachers work elsewhere, coming in for free to make sure the kids don´t get behind, but since they don´t get paid it´s hard for them and they can´t come all the time. This place though, has come a long way. It used to be made of wood, just like the school at the settlement, which looked like it was about to fall over. It used to be in a ditch. Since it is in such a dangerous place, people would come in at night and steal things. Now they have a great looking bulilding that they are very proud of. It isn´t huge, but it is something. And it´s inspiring to think how far they´ve come.

It has been a long day, and tomorrow I will be doing my cultural activities as planned by Nexos Voluntarios. I´m excited about that, because the guy they set up for me is really cool, and he was telling me what we´ll be doing and.. let me tell you.. it will be amazing.

If you actually read this whole post, I´m flattered. Sorry it´s so long, but I had a lot to tell!

permalink written by  poweroflove on May 15, 2008 from Iquitos, Peru
from the travel blog: PERU
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You write wonderfully--as always--and really make it come alive...and what you're doing and seeing and being is amazing...thanks for the updates.

permalink written by  Eric Selbin on May 15, 2008


There are a ton of people in Argentina who dig through the trash every night also with their kids, presumably like the people in Peru. It's a pretty sad sight, but its reality adn you can't just ignore it...I think its awesome that you're acting to help and solve some of the problems that the people in Iquitos are facing...hope you can update often!

permalink written by  Spenser P on May 15, 2008


that wasn't so long, it went by fast

te extrano come homee

permalink written by  Andres Parra on May 16, 2008


im glad you're loving Peru, the work you're doing sounds INCREDIBLE

permalink written by  vivian on May 17, 2008


The volunteer work you did in Peru is commendable, hats off to you!!! The overall experience of the place also sounds fascinating.... amazing mountain pic.

permalink written by  Gertrude Young on April 14, 2009


The volunteer work you did in Peru is commendable, hats off to you!!! The overall experience of the place also sounds fascinating.... amazing mountain pic.

permalink written by  Gertrude Young on April 14, 2009

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