The 1 month milestone

As of yesterday, the 25th of February, I have been here for 1 month. I really can't believe it!

I have gotten so used to life here. A beautiful landscape of dark mountains and clouds every morning, with a huge moon if you get up early enough. All the best fruit in the world. Strange weather that changes all the time. Apart from the little incident with my bag last week I have been really lucky, felt safe pretty much all of the time so thank you to everyone who has been praying for me. 

I was talking to my host mum Chuly about it and she said it felt like I had been here forever, which was  a lovely thing to hear! I am really glad I chose to stay in a host family, I have been able to do so many things that I wouldn't normally, like family barbecues, the trip to Chapare, and also a couple of weeks ago I went with my host mum to one of those events where they introduce a new product, health supplements in the form of a coffee flavour drink, and persuade you for ages that it's great and you should buy it. Which... was interesting. I didn't buy it but it was good for my spanish. That's another thing, it has forced me to speak spanish all the time and I can really see the improvement!

I watched an Almodovar film from Spain the other day, and I realised how different the language is. Instead of 's' for 'c's they have 'th's which makes it sound like they all have lisps. I think I spoke like that when I first arrived though...

Work at Proyecto Horizonte has been the main part of my time here. I'm really enjoying it. 

Hand prints

This is my normal day.

I leave the house at half seven after un desayuno de fruit salad, tea, and toasted cheese sandwich. It takes me about an hour to commute to work through the city in 2 trufis. But that's pretty unreliable. Yesterday there was a blockade on the road to work (which is the answer to everything in Bolivia) which means we have to take a huge detour. I think there's one tomorrow that will be worse, which will mean walking 6km or... taking the day off...

Working with the children is sometimes really fun, sometimes really exhausting, sometimes really rewarding, depending on what mood they are in and what mood I am in. I would say 80% fun and rewarding. First thing in the morning they play with lego or wooden blocks or plasticine. Then they have breakfast, go to the toilet and wash their hands. 3 year olds are messy. The worst toilet experience I had was a kid, Jhassed, who had a really bad nosebleed whilst we were doing the toilet run. There was so much blood, it was everywhere. Then all of a sudden he just vomited blood. There was a lot of that too. It was really scary! He's been to the clinic and got sorted out now though I do believe. 

Then in the mornings we do all kinds of things. Drawing, colouring, making lolly stick puppets, we have dressed up like little children and taught the kids about sharing and not fighting, we have put on puppet shows, we often go for walks, to this little church down the road to sit and have a snack, or once we walked up to the school where the whole school were having a huge water and foam fight as part of one of Proyecto Horizonte{s campaigns about violence at carnival. The kids loved it. We{ve played musical chairs, we dance with the kids, and go over the days of the week, months of the year, numbers, colours, fruits, vegetables etc once a day.

Something else which we have started to do is teach them how to brush their teeth. The majority of the kids have really bad decay on their teeth, and some of them don{t have top front teeth because they don't look after them. It must be so painful! 

On Mondays we sing the national anthem and raise the flag with the whole school. Although at the moment it is just the profes singing, I'm sure it will come.. On Wednesdays we do physical education where we have races and do mini assault courses and play in the park. Hours of fun.

Then we have lunch, which for some kids is difficult. Some of them just don't want to eat!

Then they have a little sleep, we clean the room then that's my morning done!

In the afternoons I ususally stay in the offices for a few hours doing my work, I get all of Lidia's work off her and just rearrange it into an article, I interview people about things, upload articles... Now there is internet at the offices it makes everything a lot easier. 

Aline and me working super hard

Although sometimes we retire to our town office, Molino Blanco cafe, where we do work over tasty coffee and sometimes a slice of cheesecake de maracuya, passion fruit. Mmmmm. 

There is always a lot of work to do and I really feel like I am doing something that is making a difference. You can see all of the news on the google+ page  https://plus.google.com/100622138417357461791/posts and also on facebook https://www.facebook.com/ProyectoHorizonte

Also through the project I have had the opportunity to start a photography course with some other volunteers, twice a week which so far has been really interesting. I have learnt a lot about the technical side of photography and am yet to put it into practice whilst still camera searching, which my photography teacher is helping me with. (www.stevecamargo.com).

Today I also started yoga at Ushpa which is at 7.30am twice a week. It's interesting. I've not quite made my mind up about it yet. Haha..

So usually I work with Aline till 7ish, then either go to photography, or watch a spanish movie at home, or go out for a drink. 

Last weekend I went to the jungle to Villa Tunari with some friends, the journey which was meant to take 3 hours took 6 because of landslides because of all the rain! We went to the Machia national park, which was absolutely beautiful. Saw so many new things, plants insects, had a shower in the cold waterfall at the end of the trail which was well deserved, and when we were losing hope of seeing any monkeys they crept up on us from behind. They are really amazing creatures. Whilst we were there we also had fish, which is really uncommon in Cochabamba, but here it was so delicious, I have really missed it. I bought a cocoa fruit and am going to make my own hot chocolate, and also tried star fruit juice. It's tasty. Here are some pictures!

the jungle

Mmmmm Surubi

All very sweaty at the top of the mountain


Also I am really happy I cut all of my hair off. I would really reccommend it .  It makes life so much easier and is som much more comfortable. However it has got to the point where I am considering getting a comb.