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Published: November 10th 2011
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Balcony
Sitting at the desk, looking out my front door and onto my spacious balcony: I’ll try to make this short but there’s already so much to tell, and you know me and details…
Upon finally arriving to Manos Amigas (the volunteer house), all of the kids excitedly greeted me with a hug before I could even get one foot in the door. (We volunteer with hundreds of kids all around the city, but there’s a group that are always here during the day.) One of them, Anderson (he's such a ham), took it upon himself to introduce me to each of the kids by bringing me to each of the 20 or so kids saying as we get to each one: “
my name is Maria...
.My name is Hector....
My name is Laura….” etc. Guess I got some work cut out for me on this pronoun situation!
All of the four volunteers are leaving this weekend. A few have been here for the past 2-3 months now. They look enormously exhausted and have scared me into thinking that I may not make it too much longer than the three month mark, esp if I’ll be the only volunteer at times (bigger work load). They have given me the low down on all they could. Lots of really important pieces of information I need to know about how the organization really runs and what not to do (ie. sleep with a window open unless there’s bars on it), or where not to go. I’m very eager to go out and see it all; their stories sound unreal!
Since I’ll be the only volunteer for a few weeks, the cooks were already concerned. So they asked me if I like carne (red meat). Score! Guess they're gonna make up for it with steak. I'm just thinking this will be really great for my Spanish, since the staff doesn't speak any English.
I also don’t live in the volunteer house (score #2)! The rooms for the volunteers in the house are much like a hostel and wildly uncomfortable. I live right next door in a two bedroom apt. It’s quite nice, clean, and I have a comfy bed....Well minus the shower situation. They weren’t lying when they said the showers would be cold (there are no hot water taps in most Colombian towns). And my showerhead? It’s one that you would attach a hose to, located on the side of your house. I took my first cold shower today, aprox 2 mins long. I even waited until I worked up a bit of a sweat as to enjoy the cold shower. Fail. But thank God for 2-in-1s! The girls have started boiling a giant pot of water as a treat to themselves to shower with. I'm thinking that I might follow suit pretty soon too. Especially after learning that I’ll most likely get lice working with the kids (grrrreat). I don’t know why that thought never crossed my mind, but it’s completely understandable after walking through one of the slums a few blocks away. We took the kids for a walk there as the staff likes to show the volunteers where these kids actually live. Remember Slumdog Millionaire? Yes, slums like that. Tin roofs, bamboos sticks, pieces of plywood, anything you've got to make some sort of a habitat and stick it together. Some walls don’t even reach the roofs. The slum is located right next to a muddy, rushing river, complete with chickens, dogs and ducks moseying around.
The town of Ibauge is nestled in a small valley of these lush green mountains. Upon arriving at the tiny airport, I felt like I was in a movie. Landed in some far away destination about to go on safari. The town is pretty poor, but after seeing the slum today, I live in luxury (though I’m told we’re in a poor part of town), esp considering my little pad I've got! I have a beautifully large balcony, and it’s great to sit on and admire those mountains as the radio sings salsa (they gave me an option of having a free day which I took as highly suggested by the volunteers). The buildings are colorful, and as Max, my current British roommate, puts it “a functional town.” Nothing's for show here, everything is built for a purpose.
This weekend will be lots of going away parties (woohoo dancing!), and we (a few of the volunteers and I) are going to do a steep, 2.5 hour hike to a nearby mountain top. I’m looking forward to the view and interested in experiencing what we have to deal with at the bottom of the mountain. Max says we should cab it to the base as there’s another dangerous slum in the way and everyone walks around with a machete. Though if he comes, he’ll show us a way to get around it, which is only a 10-15 minute walk from here.
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Vanessa
non-member comment
:)
Wow sounds like quite the adventure! Love the blog keep it up so I can live this experience through you :) hehe