Mi collegio en la montana

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Dear all,

today was my second day teaching in Urqusiquie. Behind this beautiful names lies a number of rather basic tiny classrooms at 3000 metres in the Andes with no running water. The toilets that are so dirty that even the children prefer to go into the fields...(as do I!)

A pick up truck takes me and the other three teachers up into the mountains around 7.30 am. It is so cold in the mornings on the back of the truck that I am going to buy a woolly hat on my way back from the Internet Cafe. I might even consider teaching with gloves at least during the morning. The sun shines all day but with no radiators in school it is always chilly. The children, however, don't seem to mind at all. They turn up for school in T-Shirts and shorts.

Nicola, a student from Edinburgh, and I have only had up to ten children per day so far. But the ones that turned up today were completely different to the ones we taught yesterday. As today´s bunch was much younger, all the worksheets and activities we had planned went out of the window. As you can imagine, it takes me absolutely ages to do an activity sheet in Spanish! I am a little disillusioned as I am finding it difficult to remember all those new words and phrases in Spanish and this obviously has an impact on my ability to teach and explain! The children speak Spanish quite well - considering it is their second language after their native Quichua. They are very helpful as well and I often rely on them helping me out with vocabulary.

The children are so poor, it is heartbreaking. The ones who came to school today were incredibly dirty and smelly. Their clothes are all torn and their faces are weathered from the wind and sun. I wish I could pour a bucket of E45 over all of them upon arrival! Their skins look like they are 70+ years of age, when in reality, they are merely over 12 years old. Some bring their young baby siblings with them - attached with a scarf to their back.

Los ninos are generally eager to learn. They are very touchy, too, and it is impossible to turn them away when they want to sit on your lap or jump on you. Just be careful that you don't end up with their snot on your face! What amazes me most it how happy and cheerful they are. It doesn't take much to make them happy: a football for their lunch break or a dice to play a board game. We give them some fruit and a plain bread roll for lunch and it makes me sad to see how excited they get. They literally eat everything you offer them and I am sure that they obide to the principle of "Eat as much as you can while there is food available!"

Despite being generally well-behaved, we have had a few incidents of, let's say, interesting behaviour. The following rules had to be installed on Day 1 (although with me doing this in Spanish, I am not sure how much I did bring across): Don't run out of the classroom the minute you think an activity might be slightly "boring". 2) Don't lie on the table picking your nose during lesson time. 3) Don't throw rubbish like banana skins simply behind you on the floor and 4) If you bring your horse to school, please don't let it poo in the middle of the playground. Oh, and 5) Don't fart if Senorita Steffi is standing right beside you!

On top of all this, we have had numerous visits in the classroom from the local animals. It is quite normal for a dog or occasionally a fox to just stick their head into the building. Only when a massive cow appeared at the window did I get a bit screamish! Luckily, it stayed outside and kept the chickens and Humbertos horse company on the playground.

Everything is so completely different that I don't know where to start. Hopefully, I will be able to download some photos soon which should give you a better impression (if you are a visual learner, that is!)

Hope all is well wherever you are. Steffi

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Photos

the classroom
this is our classroom, looking quite clean and big in this picture. Just remember, there is no electricity (ie no radiators) and water once in a blue moon!

los estudiantes
We have had differnt children turning up for school almost every day - these ones here, however, are the core estudiantes!