Week 2: Arequipa Strikes Back meets Wednesday Night Fever

It was bound to happen. New country, new climate, new food. And while GVI has put many great health initiatives in place, many of the kids are exposed to lots of germs and are often carrying colds, etc. So on Wednesday night, Liz and I began our acclimatization process (i.e. fell sick).

On Thursday, we met our first Arequipinean doctor. I can honestly say that without the help of our host family, we would have been completely lost. But Martha was really great, and we were able to effectively communicate our symptoms. And now, all is well.

Speaking of communication, ours is steadily improving. English, art and PE aren't so challenging for us, but the other subjects can be pretty challenging to teach or to help with. But we're definitely getting there. Maths is coming along particularly well. We understand most of the relevant vocabulary, and we've been able to explain multiplication, long division, fractions, etc. pretty well.


This week was a full week (i.e. no public holidays or celebrations), so we taught 2 English classes, 2 art classes, 2 PEs, and assisted with plant composition (we know all the parts of plants in Spanish now!), several maths classes, dictation of things that we didn't actually understand, and lots of other things. It was a good week!


We also had a couple of new students. This is always a good sign, because the combined efforts of the teachers and volunteers in improving the quality of education and literacy has given the school greater credibility, and this means that the kids will hopefully have greater opportunities post-Maldonado. Someday, we'll have to tell you how the Maldonado school came to be in the first place - it is a pretty amazing story.


This weekend was pretty quiet, due in part to me shaking off my symptoms. But we did visit a local cathedral, which was very nice, and also a very large monastery that dates back to the 1600's. Not that we're spefically hunting down all the local religious sites, but they are profilic in Arequipa.



We've just finished about 3 hours of lesson planning, which will hopefully give a good head-start for the upcoming week. And now we're going home for some rest. Stay tuned.


Chris