Brave New World: Exploring Peru, May 17

I woke up the sounds of birds chirping around seven and after showering made my way to the breakfast table. We were fed very well on our trip, this morning we had eggs, buns and cinnamon tea.
Raoul explained to us how we would tour Lima to see the culture and visit the schools we would soon be teaching at. But first, we made our first of many stops at Wongs, a large grocery store in Lima which would be the equivalent of a Walmart here in Canada. I definitely bought quite a bit of Sublime Chocolate (found only in Peru) from that store.
We stopped first at the school Brock would be teaching with Ramiro Priale.

The schools honestly treated us like celebrities. We were greeted with "Good morning" and hand shakes and given pins, flags were waved, children were lined up cheering and teachers were all smiles. After words were spoken on a loud speaker and the greeting ceremony was finished, the kids swarmed us all giving us hugs and kisses. I have never had such a warm welcoming!

We then made our way to the art classroom where students enacted a little show for us incorporating acts like guitar playing and singing, and a traditional Peruvian dance in costume. As the dance proceeded, the students welcomed us in the circle and attempted to teach us the steps, but they were much too quick for us!

We climbed back into the bus super excited for our teaching experience to begin. When we arrived at the second school, where Guelph, the other University joining us on this solidarity trip, would be enacting a Right to Play program, would spend the majority of their time. Again we were greeted so warmly. The students were super excited to see us and you could tell there was much pride in their school as we were seated around a projector showing a slideshow of the school and its events. We were presented with pins and children spoke adorable speeches. Once again, when the ceremonies had ended and we could see the kids, we were swarmed by hugs and kisses.

Next, we climbed into the bus and drove to the shanty towns, were the students at the schools we visited lived. When I initially saw the homes I felt a little overwhelmed at how different my living conditions were in comparison. But, as Raoul explained, the people here have pride and hope, they save their money and continue to build and improve their homes and way of life.The students I had just visited had been so happy and welcoming.

Afterward, we made our way to the centre of Lima and saw the beautiful square where the President, Mayor and Cardinal lived. It was quite a change of scenery. Our first stop was to see the spectacular monastery of St. Francis. Touring the choir loft and the old library, I saw books from the 14th century on display. But the most spectacular part of the tour was walking through the catacombs. It was eery to see the bones and skulls displayed, and our guide said that around 250,000 bodies have been unearthered there.

(a post card since we were not allowed to take pictures of the library!)

We had free time to tour the square and see the spectacular architecture before making our way back to the retreat centre. For dinner, we had a Chinese/Spanish meal.

After a debriefing session at 7, we toured a modern looking mall and I chose to spend most of my time there looking out on the deck at the beautiful Pacific Ocean and in the distance I could see a lit up cross combined with the tiny twinkling lights from the mountain shanty towns. It was quite the view, and quite the adventurous day.