Peru Water Supply Project (3)- Olyvia Raymer

This is an entry from my journal on July 5th:

July 5th, 2018

• Yogurt at breakfast! No coffee though
• Came to the site and they’re still making the cage
• Finishing the script for education
• After lunch me, Semaj and Hannah got the supplies ready for the lesson and what we need
• We went to leave and we were locked into the Polideportivo!
• We decided that one of us would wait for Evan to come open it to put out the trash and bring the materials
• Hannah and I left while Semaj stayed but then realized the outside door only led to the backs of people’s homes and lots of dogs
• So then we just waited until Evan got there and took a moto down after we bought cakes and animal crackers!(after I found 2 soles in the bottom of my backpack)
• All the places we went to print were closed so then we went to Jorge and remembered he talks a lot (we only had ten minutes)
• We printed and got out of there in ten minutes thankfully but then we ran into Eliseo and he waved us over
• But he was offering us ICE CREAM, how could we say no?
• So then we all got Lucuma drumsticks and ate them hastily in the bumpy moto before the kids could see us
• We arrived 5 minutes late but it was fine
• The lesson went well, we made trash cans and taught about pollution in water then played soccer at the end
• They asked where we were from and we said California and Semaj told them Georgia and they asked if it was in New York. (hence why we will have a lesson about geography)
• They also asked how many siblings we have and said I have “muy pequena” since most of them have 4 or 5
• They also asked how many names we have because they have two last names, one form their dad and one from their mom
• After dinner, we got chocolate and sat on the roof and looked at the stars

When I said “cage”, I was referring to the rebar cage that was being made to support the walls of the reservoir. Evan, one of the group members, had to come open the gate because he was at the site that was about ten minutes away and was the only one with keys. A “moto” is a type of taxi that they use in Peru, except it only has three wheels and is the size of a golf cart, it usually costs 2 to 3 soles when we’d take it. Soles are Peru’s currency. When I said earlier that it can be difficult to make plans there, one example is when we tried to print the items we needed for the lesson that day. All stores are typically family owned and closed from 12-2 pm, however the hours they post in the window are suggested, to be frank. We definitely went past 2 since we were running late. Lucuma is a popular orange sweet flavor that Peru uses a lot in their ice cream. The trash cans we made at the lesson were made out of string and plastic bottles that the kids filled with trash on the playground. It is very typical to see people throw their trash on the ground there so we felt pollution was a vital topic.

The lessons with the kids were one of my favorite experiences in Peru. They were so open-minded and wanted to learn English and listened to us even though we were tourists coming into their country and giving them instruction. It allowed for a better learning environment and they were also super cute.



Pictured: This was the rebar cage I was referring to. The base of the reservoir was already poured and solid. Volunteers had to put up planks in order to reach the top of the cage to tie the top rebar ties. They were very resourceful when getting things done for the reservoir, very different from how the US would do this.



Pictured: Picking up trash with the kids in order to make the trash cans for the lesson!





Pictured: Semaj showing the kids he can count to 1,000 after the lesson because they asked him to.




Pictured: The view from inside a moto! There’s also two motos in front of us, they have two wheels on the back and one on the front. They can usually fit up to three people.