¡Teambuilding en Peru!

---

---

Hola a todos,

Yet another country full of color, struggle and beauty.

You may or may not know that I have been in Peru for one week with the intention to travel, hike and do some volunteer work for a month. My job is in its off season, and I could stand to refresh my spanish speaking skills.

I am traveling with Erika and Amanda, who I have worked with at Hulbert recently. We arrived on January 5th, staying in the capital of Lima before traveling seven hours on a hot, sticky bus that climbed 4,818 meters over the Andes into the city of Huancayo. The intense altitude difference caused both headaches and nose-bleeds as we passed through small mountain towns of different varieties. Some contained many small farms and occasionally we´d see alpacas standing along the cliffs edge, looking lost. Others had bustling steep streets that were filled with garbage. Some time after dark we entered Huancayo and met up with Leslie and Pilar who escorted us back to the house we were to live in for the first week of our trip.

Our time in Huancayo was certainly a new experience. Each morning Mary and Gloria served breakfast to a table full of volunteers getting ready to greet more than thirty kids. Huancayo is a large city of over 400,000. We lived at it's edge and each day walked twice to and from the community building up a steep hill that left us craving oxygen. Our reward was a group of children waiting to say ´hola miss´ accompanied with a quick kiss on the cheek.

The hope was to practice some teambuilding, but for the first day we simply observed the kids and the way things worked. Tinkuy Peru was begun by Tino and his family and are the sole reason why this service exists for these children. It is neither a school nor an orphanage at the moment, but they have hopes of eventually turning it into one. Presently they rent one level in a small building which has five small dusty classrooms. Each age group splits up and you simply choose a room to be in for each period.

Once we got up the nerve to give some activities a try, (and to give my Spanish a try) in front of a restless group of nervous children, there was no turning back. We spent five full days introducing new games to the entire group of children and well as attempting some fun challenges with an older group of kids (ages 11-15). We also took them on a hike through a gorgeous bit of land named ´torre torre´ where we all learned the Spanish and English translations of what bits of nature we saw.

After an exercise on the second day we learned that many of them did not know each other’s names and most were very shy, (especially the girls). If I asked a child a question most would hesitate as though they were not use to such attention, and answer you with a quiet mumble. This got us thinking and our hope became to leave their community knowing each other a little better, and a few new games they could play with each other.

We began a few trends alongside other volunteers. Each started each session with an all community game, usually one which involved learning another’s name, or maybe their favorite color, country, fruit or animal. We did some activities that involved both small and larger random groups of kids working together towards a common goal. This would either extend into an all group challenge or activity (such as hiking), or we graduated into teambuilding exercises with the older kids while the younger ones (ages 4-8) went inside to color or learn English. Even though my Spanish and their English, was limited, we were able to establish an environment where most of the kids felt comfortable playing games with one another. Teambuilding with the older kids was also great, because they each eventually contributed in some way to the challenges we gave them.

Of course there were many challenges. Language barriers made it difficult for me to lead reflection afterwards, although they all patiently listened to what I said and most contributed. We were also challenged by the fact that we didn´t always have the same group of kids. It is up to them to show up and you never knew who you´d get. This made progress difficult as some had been there from the beginning while others had not.

Over the weekend we saw a bit of local live music that wasn´t what you´d call traditional music, but was fun to dance to. Saturday we loaded a local bus up with bikes and headed into the mountains. We spent hours biking through small villages which boasted local arts and crafts and went through fields of potatoes and other crops, cows and pigs. For lunch we had ´pachamanca´, a local plate which is cooked under the ground over hot rocks. We got some funny looks traveling as a group of five ´gringas´with only two peruvians. It was an amazing way to see how the local mountain peruvians live.

Our last morning was a ´fiesta´with the kids for our goodbye and involved many tears and whispers of ´te amo´(i love you). It was hard to leave after only one week.

That afternoon we hopped in a car heading south on a winding, narrow dirt road through a giant valley of agaves and cacti running alongside a river to arrive in the very andean city of Ayacucho. However, that should begin my next entry.

Gracias a todos. Deseo que estan bien. Hasta el proximo tiempo.

Elizabeth

---

Photos

Huancayo
Adorable faces

Huancayo
Playing with all ages at Tinkuy Peru

Huancayo
Teambuilding with older crew

Huancayo
Teambuilding with the older crowd at Tinkuy Peru

Huancayo
Reflecting with the older kids at Tinkuy Peru

Huancayo
Sharing

Huancayo
A desirable thing to play with...