What I learned at work...

Up until recently, I was quite unsure of what my experience at Adopta un Herman@ had taught, much less what I had been able to offer them. I had gone through my duties pretty well, working at the schools twice a week and writing memo's afterwards. It wasnt until after the week in which I experienced that enormous conflict in Lampa, that everything started to click. I wrote a pretty critical memo of, what I perceived to be, the lack of discipline in the Adopta program. Not surprisingly, this memo caused a bit of worry among my supervisors. I was called in for a meeting with Vivi, the regional director, and Caro, the one in charge of all of the Professional Assesors.



I went in expecting my head to be bitten off...



and I left with my head still attached...



The point of the meeting wasnt to criticize me for the things I had written, but rather to explain to me the reasoning behind the "Informal Education" model of Adopta. Primarily, they explained to me that, the kids we worked with were the kids who were getting expelled and suspended from every institution imaginable and that, Adopta sought to be that one thing whic managed to include them. More importantly, however, they almost took an apologetic tone with me, implying more than once that it was their mistake that they had decided to strategically place me in their most problematic commune. Moreover, they asked me not to dismiss the possibility of me working with kids in the future because of my experiences there. I was shocked, that had never been my intention in writing the memo (perhaps this opened my eyes to the fact that my spanish writing skills still need some honing). It was in the process of explaining to them my intentions that I begun to realize the impact my work in Adopta had on me.



But it wasnt until two days later, when I was interviewing my coordinator, that I finally realized just how much I had learned and changed in the last few weeks. After the interview, she expressed the same concern that I had heard in the meeting, so we sat down and talked about it.



What follows is, roughly, what I told her, and sums up many of the things I have learned and realized in this work experience



I chose to work for Adopta because I had plenty of experience working with kids. I had coached kids in two different sports, acted as a mentor, and even spent a summer as a counselor at a sleep away camp. I knew how to deal with kids, I knew it took patience and understanding, and that, in the end, it always turned out to be rewarding work. The reality that I understand was a starkingly different reality than what I experienced here. That's not to say that it hasnt been rewarding work, because it has, just not in the way that I am accustomed to. However, I feel that the reality of working with kids in situations of poverty and abuse (and here I am referring to a poverty more extreme than what I have encountered personally) is entirely different and that it takes an entirely different level of confidence, patience, and determination to make sure that your work actually makes a difference. In ways, I feel that my efforts here were fruitless because it took exactly two months to understand just how patient and determined I have to be to be effective, however, the pure fact that I learned that lesson is in some way significant. Working with kids, I have found out, is much more than being cool and hanging out with them, it's a job that takes dedication and an ability to recognize that there is no set strategy that will guarantee success.

Needless to say, I had the opportunity to work with an excellent coordinator, truly an expert in her field, whose approach to her kids was awe-inspiring. The kids respected her, but liked her. They listened to her, but also understood that she listened to them. And despite all of the problems we had, they kept coming back to the program because it gave them a space in which they could belong to a group that wouldnt ostrasize them. They loved Adopta not because the coordinator made it fun, but because they knew that they were welcomed and treated with some semblance of respect at every session and, for them, that was something they were unaccustomed to.

Finally, contrary to what my coordinator or bosses think, this experience has left me more willing to work with kids than before. Particularly, I realize the importance of working in an educational context to better the problems of economic inequality that plague our world. Education is the path not only to material enrichment, but to achieving a more well-rounded, understanding, and sincere human being. Money comes and goes, but the abilities to think critically, to set objectives, and to have the capacity to carry out your goals stay with somebody forever. Ultimately, these abilities are the ultimate cure for poverty.

Buenos Aires and the past work week

Buenos Aires was...an entirely different type of fun than Rapa Nui and, although we didnt get to visit much of the city (I only managed to go to like 8 of the 48 communes), we did manage to visit the most important touristic sites of the city. What I did see and experience of Buenos Aires was extremely cool, I really enjoyed Caminitos, the Boca Jr's stadium, and, of course, the delicious meat that was served everywhere. The Argentinian people themselves were, for the most part, very friendly and open-minded, although the people, like the city itself, had a distinct European feel to them.

But after a week of travels, it was time to return to work. I came back to work last week, expecting the Ceremony of Initiation to have transcurred at Polonia, only to find out that due to another professor's strike, the Ceremony had been pushed further back. Furthermore, the kids were now on winter vacation, so attendance at the TG's was expected to drop significantly.

At Polonia TG on Thursday, we showed up to the school to guide the kids to a different school in which we could work (The director wouldnt lend us Polonia during the break). Only three girls, out of the 16 kids signed up, actually came. Needless to say, with only three kids present, it was fairly easy to accomplish all that we had planned for the session (the first time this has happened since I've joined Adopta). The kids worked well, with a few minimal issues, and managed to write up a list of norms they wanted to follow and a system that managed to reward the kids for good behavior and punish them for bad behavior.

The story at the friday TG in Lucero was entirely different. Knowing that the kids would not show up, we decided to go looking for them and bringing them with us to the school. Right away, this seemed like a bad idea. The whole point of a TG is that its voluntary, our actions in picking them up went entirely against the voluntary nature of the program. Additonally, one of our kids had friends over at his house at the time and decided to bring them along. Not only would these friends provide a distraction for our boys (the friends spent their time playing soccer), but also for the girls because, among them was one of the boys who all the girls had a crush on. Additionally, our school was occupied by a group of 100 or so scouts, which forced us to carry out our activities in an entirely different room than the kids are accustomed to. All the signs pointed to a very unsuccessful endeavor and that is exactly what happened. Barely after an hour into the session, the kids had not accomplished anything other than maintain shouting matches between the genders. Claims of boredom attacked us from all sides and every kid expressed a desire to leave. Finally, they decided to stop listening to us and just play outside. Out of frustration, we packed up and left the kids at the school, only to come back half an hour later and see our kids kicked out of the school by the scout headmaster. The kids, obviously, blamed us and stormed off to their homes. We stayed back and talked to the headmaster, who told us he had received exclusive access to the school from the director (which was an obvious lie because we had also received access to the school). We asked him why he had kicked our kids out, to which he replied, "I found it strange to see one of the girls climbing out of one of the windows...Ultimately I'm the one responsible".

Had I seen a girl climbing out of a window at a school before this trip, I also would have thought it to be strange. However, upon hearing the scoutmaster's comments, I found myself thinking, "This dude lives in an entirely different reality...". I've become accustomed to seeing these types of things, which would strike many people dealing with different types of kids as strange, and take them as a part of the everyday life of working with children. The truth of the matter is that, a kid climbing back and forth through a first story window at an after school program is much better than that same kid out on the street doing who knows what. A girl climbing in and out of the classroom through the window is a minimal problem, and is not in any way strange (if you know these kids).

Reflections

After reading over Mario's last post on Isla de Pascua, there is very little I could say to add on to that. All in all, it was an unforgettable experience. Easter Island was a very interesting mix of both the expected (the moai, of course, lots of hiking, incredibly small town) and unexpected (the amazing beaches, catholic service in espanol/rapa nui, stunning vistas, some of the unfriendly locals, and the incredibly expensive food). I can honestly say that while I have off-roaded before, I've never been the one driving the SUV. And all that takes on a different meaning when you are driving the vehicle about to get stuck in a gigantic mud puddle about 2 1/2 hours walking to the nearest civilization. (although, fortunately, we got unstuck) However, as we've been describing to Daniel (director of Puente Alto AE center) the meaning of baller, I would have to say Isla de Pascua fulfilled every definition of the word.

Our project with the female microentrepreneurs in Puente Alto is also going really well and I have to say that I am getting exactly what I wanted out of it. I came to Santiago and into Accion with the hope of working personally with the microentrepreneurs and talking with them and getting to know more about them. And, I would say interviewing about 10 female microentrepreneurs would fall into that category. I have eaten lunch in their houses, spoke to them about their children and parents, seen them cry when talking about both of the above. In that respect, this project at AE has been an unbelievable experience.

More than that, I am proud of finding a way to help these women. I believe that beyond our interviews, which were cathartic for some of the microentrepreneurs and fun for others, we came up with an idea that achieves all of the goals we had for the project. Having meetings for 6-8 female microentrepreneurs every two weeks provides them with a venue to discuss their businesses and families and problems they may be having with both. It is hard for four gringas to provide Chilean working women with advice on how to better manage their time and resources but other Chilean working women will certainly have insights. And at the first meeting, that is what Katie and Emily witnessed. I am extremely excited for tomorrow's meeting (the second one) and seeing the result of our work in play. (Definitely one of the perks of this project... being witness to the birth and life of our ideas)

RAPA NUIIIIIIII!!!!!

Yup, you read correctly, I went to Rapa Nui (Easter Island) this past weekend (from saturday to tuesday to be exact). It was an absolutely amazing experience. For those of you that may not know, Rapa Nui is the most isolated place in the world, an island which is famous for the thousands of maoi (giant heads) that are scattered all over the place. Nobody knows the exact purpose of the maoi, although most say that they were representatives of prominent island members who passed away, but one thing is for certain; these maoi are a unique testament to a civilization and culture that destroyed itself.

In fact, the plight of the Rapa Nui carries with it extremely important lessons for our world today. Due to its remoteness, the island's inhabitants had to sustain themselves using the resources available to them on the island. They were extremely good at that, particularly when one realizes that they found the time to build thousands of statues (each about 50+tons) all over the island. The problem is that, due to an enormous pride (embodied in the moai), they depleted their resources, cut down every tree, and overpopulated the island (at one point 10000 people lived on the island, compared to the 3700 that live on it now). Sound familiar? What happened in Rapa Nui centuries ago is a microcosm of what is happening as we speak. Our forests are dissappearing, our resources are running out, and our population keeps rising. Where will it end? For the Rapa Nui, it ended it extremely bloody civil wars that left the once prospering island with a population of 111 at its lowest point. For us, we dont know yet, but given the nature of our predicament, wars in the most impoverished places will almost certainly happen. The lessons of the Rapa Nui, embodied by the testament they have left us in the moai, are extremely relevant to our situation, it would be unwise for us to ignore them.

What's left of the Rapa Nui culture is very little. Nobody can read their writing, nobody knows for sure how the moai were transported from the Rano Raraku volcano to their finally resting spot, and nobody knows where the first Rapa Nui people came from (Polynesia, South America, or New Zealand?). Theirs is a culture of mystery, which is part of the allure of the island. Even the natives themselves have a very vague idea of the culture of their ancestors.

Needless to say, the natural beauty of the island is outstanding. At each corner of the triangular island sits a dormant volcano, with the Rano Kau having the most impressive crater (it really is a breathtaking crater, I couldnt believe how amazing it was). Most of the coastline is cliffs made of volcanic rock, but there are two pristine beaches near the northern end of the island. A lot of flowers adorn the place, but very few trees (remember, they deforested the entire island, it used to be chalk full of trees). At night, the sky lights up with stars, in fact, I saw more shooting stars (3), this past weekend, than my entire life.

But, at the end of the day, what Easter Island is famous for is for their mysterious guards, the moai. Being in their presence leaves one with a feeling of uneasiness, as if these silent sentinels have witnessed the history of the entire world on their own little piece of heaven.

I GO TO BUENOS AIRES TOMMORROW!!!!

Crazy work week

Last week, I had the opportunity to witness the ability of a great mediator while working in my Thursday TG (Tutoria Grupal) in Polonia Gutierrez. The kids had to prepare for their Ceremony and, to do so, they had to prepare something: a show, a promise, etc...Because it was our last TG before the Ceremony, the kids opted for a promise, so, we helped them prepare artistic promises which they would read out loud on the day of the ceremony (A promise is something like: I promise to come to all of the Adopta gatherings, etc...). It was going pretty well until, the monitors and I decided to get a bit ambitious and create a poster with the Adopta logo splashed all over it. One of the girls in the group, a very shy but well behaved girl, immediately offered to help us (for the purposes of the story, we'll call her Ashley). She did a great job on it, but two of the girls in the group (one of which is her aunt...weird) became extremely jealous. They started mocking her for being a goody two shoes and for always wanting to help the monitors (its true, she always offered herself to help and always participated in the activities to her fullest extent). It started getting out of hand, these two girls stopped working and started chanting "We want Ashley out! We want her out!".

As monitors, we tried to difuse the situation, but to no avail. They kept up their mockery and then, one of the monitors overheard the girls scheming to wait for Ashley after the session and beat her up. Obviously, we couldnt let that happen so, when the girls all of a sudden took off after Ashley, we sprinted into action. We forced the two girls to leave, and waited for the coordinator of our school to come back and drive Ashley home. On the drive home, we ran into the two girls again and our coordinator pulled over and orchestrated the most effective mediation I've ever seen. By the end of it all, the girl who was Ashley's aunt was crying uncontrollably on Ashley's shoulder, asking for forgiveness. It was a truly touching moment in which, these two girls who didnt like one another (even though they were family and neighbors) wound up being friends for the rest of the ride (I'm not sure if it carried over to the next day, I wasnt there to find out).

Then, the next day at Lampa, we ran into another extremely serious affair. The TG at Lampa is famous throughout the Adopta program for its disfunctionality. I hadnt witnessed it yet, but Friday certainly gave me a taste of what it was all about. The problem lies in the basic fact that the boys and the girls of the group cannot stand each other. Even worse, all of the kids in the TG live right next door to each other so that, problems from home get brought into the TG constantly.

I dont recall exactly how it all started. We were trying to calm the kids down so that we could begin the first activity of the day: evaluating the Ceremony carried out in the last session. We never calmed them down. One of the girls, angry that the guys were making fun of her for liking a certain soccer team, stormed out of the session. Obviously, the rest of the girls followed. Since we couldnt let them leave, I went out with the girls and tried to convince to come back, but they wouldnt listen to me due to the fact that I was a newcomer and the fact that I had a Mexican accent. Oh well, I gave up on them and went back inside the classroom. The boys were working extremely well, doing everything we asked of them, until the girls came into the room and started throwing oranges at us (this was entirely surprising to me, usually its the other way around: the boys throw the oranges and the girls work dilligently). The boys, feeling the need to defend themselves, got up and chased the girls around. There was a lot of shoving and pushing going on for about an hour, one girl was slide tackled to the ground by a boy and started crying, we couldnt get her to stop and we couldnt get the guy to apologize. Eventually, we, the monitors, would manage to separate them, and then one boy or one girl would say or throw something and it would start all over again.

Finally, we separated them completely. The girls stayed inside playing games while I took the boys outside and played soccer. The TG ended like that and, when we were leaving, we tried to get the guy who had slide tackled the girl to apologize, which he never did willingly (because he claimed she was faking it...which it was obvious she sort of was). While we tried to convinve this kid to apologize to the girl, some of the professors of the school went to a neighboring lettuce patch and started stealing lettuce, an activity in which most of our kids accompanied them. We couldnt do much about that because, ultimately, the professors have authority over us and if they allow the kids to steal lettuce with them, then we cant do anything about it. Anyways, after a half-hearted apology, we allowed the kids to leave and we headed back to Santiago, absolutely exhausted by having to break up fights.


I constantly ask myself why there are so many problems within the groups. Is it the poverty, the conditions is which these kids live? Could it be that they dont have anyone looking out for them? Every job I have ever had has been working with groups of kids and never have I seen such problems within a group of children. Even more surprising, I have never seen kids so unwilling to ask for forgiveness (most of them claim that asking for forgiveness is equivalent to humiliating yourself like a dog). To me, that indicates the type of dog eat dog mentality these kids have adopted in order to survive in the poverty in which they live. It really is a sad story, because all of these kids have shown flashes of brilliance, politeness, and open-mindedeness, only to have that glimmer of hope erased by a mocking comment from a classmate. But, what has surprised me the most is what I conversed with my coordinator after Friday: the boys in both schools are more willing to work than the girls, they are the ones that are less problematic and, in fact, are more invested in the program. In both schools, my coordinator said, the girls create the drama and expound any problems that exist. My previous experiences had taught me otherwise, I had always found it easier to work with girls than with boys, but the opposite is certainly true in Lampa. I guess its only fitting that this be so because working in Lampa has turned my perceptions of education and working with kids upside down.

La Mañanita

This past weekend we headed off to Las Robles, a beautiful country town (although it wasnt much of a town at all) for a weekend of...eating. I say eating because, aside from horseback riding and drinking, thats all we did. We ate choripan, vacuna, chicken, potato salad, salad, beans and onion salad, amasada (extra dense bread), blackberry jam, cazuela (aka caldo de pollo, hearty chicken soup), eggs, cheese, ham, corn, creamed peaches, sausage, chips, and nuts. There wasnt a moment in time when we werent either eating something, or being offered more to eat by our extremely gracious hosts.

Speaking of which, the warmth of the family we stayed with (Marlen`s uncle and aunt) was absolutely astounding. They attended to our every need and want, they welcomed as guests of honor, even though we barely knew them. They were extremely friendly and loving people and, because of them, our weekend in "el campo" will be beyond memorable.

Of course, we did much more than just eat. The scenery that surrounded the humble home in which we stayed was breathtaking. Tio Alejandro (the owner of the house) cultivated apples and wheat, but among the rolling hills that surrounded his property, beyond the bare apple trees, we could see sheep, cows, chickens, and ducks wandering around in absolute tranquility. The trees were covered in leaves ranging from orange to yellow to green. A dense fog hung about the place, covering what many people told us was a beautiful view of La Cordillera. They told us that Las Robles was a million times more beautiful without the fog, which I found unbelievable because I was of the opinion that it was gorgeous even with the fog.

A couple of us (Priyanka, Annie, and I) decided, after lunch, to walk around and explore the area. We walked for hours, jumping off tires, trying to touch the cows, and attempting to climb a mountain along the way. We were in search of a specific vista, which we had been told was a bit down the road. We spent hours looking for it, only to realize that the entire trip had been the vista we had been looking for. We came back as darkness settled in, only to realize that everybody was looking for us. Then, we sat down to eat once, despite the fact that none of us was hungry.

Sunday morning came, and after a breakfast that everybody ate (despite our stomach's protests), we rode horses! Don Raul, a local who had lived in the area for years on end, brought us an army of horses, one for each one of us. He helped us mount, told us three instructions (pull back on the rope to stop, left to go right, and right to go left) and then led us on a 2 hour trip around the area. Some of us, like Jared, had crazy horses who would not follow any sort of directions. Others of us were lucky enough to have horses that, after an hour so, started responding to our commands. La Mañanita, my horse, was one of the ones that learned to follow my orders: she trotted when I kicked her sides, turned left or right when I wanted, and stopped immediately when I pulled back on the reins. I felt like an expert horseman by the end of the trip, although still far from the expertise of Don Raul. Speaking of Don Raul, we talked quite a bit. He was extremely excited to hear that I was Mexican, and asked me to sing a corrido or norteña (classic Mexican types of songs). I was surprised to find a fan of traditional Mexican folk song in such a secluded part of Chile, until Don Raul told me that, among the population of campesinos and rancheros Chilenos, traditional Mexican songs were the most popular form of music. Don Raul's favorite group? Los Tigres del Norte, but Vicente and Alejandro Fernandez were definitely up there.

That was the weekend, I am now back to work at Adopta. I have a planification meeting with the monitors of my respective schools tommorrow, and then TG's on Thursday and Friday at Polonia and Lucero respectively. I never mentioned this, but I am glad to be back to work. Two weeks ago, there was a teacher's strike that led to the suspension of all the TG's. Thankfully, that ended and I was able to work last week (see post on June 24th)