Villa Tunari

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I got to Villa Tunari yesteday. The road from Cochabamba was alright, there were just a few stretches where they were working on, nothing unusual for Bolivia. Also, looks like they didn´t get affected by the rain as much as I thought. The foundation is only about 3km outside Villa Tunari (pop. 2,000, elev. 300m). Looks like I got here just on time. The children have been on summer vacation for a while and will return Monday. The volunteers have mainly been cleaning the facilities, painting chairs and tables and other things to get ready for the big crowd. The last volunteer coordinators left a few month ago because their baby got sick. In a few weeks, someone else from the USA is supposed to arrive. In the meanwhile an Irish girl, who left today, and a Dutch couple have been in charge. Other than that there´s a guy from Isreal and a girl from Germany. I have the feeling we´ll get along great. The volunteers have their own building, with a big hall, a kitchen and bathrooms. There are no windows, no laundry facilities and some leaks in the ceiling here and there (including in my room), but it´s still pretty nice. The climate is very tropical - warm/hot and very humid. So far it has been raining almost constantly but I´ve heard it´s not always like that. Apart from the volunteers, the foundation staff (doctor, nurses, teachers, cooks etc.) are all locals. Because of some issues with the founder, the foundation is on shaky feet right now. There are meetings going on to discuss the next steps.

Here some links to more info:

http://www.freewebs.com/creciendo-juntos/
http://www.volunteersouthamerica.net/vsa_podge_cunnane.htm
http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/Villa-Tunari/blog-14084.html

p.s. As you can see, there´s even internet here (slow, but it´s working!), which means I´ll keep you guys updated.

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