Smiles and Tears

The rest of the week I continued to help Steven with the English classes. My days began at 8am with the three morning classes then lunch at around 12pm and finally the afternoon classes at 2pm till 4pm. The morning classes were with the little ones from Transicion (pre-kindergarten). The classes were 30 minutes each and then afternoon classes with the Semilleros, the 7^th graders. I helped professor Steven with all the pronunciations and just keeping the little ones focused. With the afternoon classes, I mainly assisted in the dialogues or with any questions that they had on their assignments.

This weekend, July 20^th, I went to Planeta Rica, a small town about six hours from Barranquilla in a car. I bought a bus ticket that costs 50,000 COP (about 25 US dollars) that dropped me off in Monteria, which is 45 minutes away from the town. I met my grandparents and some family at the bus terminal. One of my cousins was getting married on Saturday and my grandparents were celebrating their 50^th anniversary on Sunday. They actually got married in Planeta Rica 50 years ago in the same church that still stands today. I felt honored to share this important moment with them. After the transportation terminal we all decided to go eat seafood since the fish here is amazing. I had Bagre (I think that was the name, either way it was delicious).

Saturday came along and the wedding preparations began. Every Colombian woman needs to look her best at all times. It can be 101 degrees outside but they will wear make up, nice clothes and heels if they find it necessary. You can just imagine how it was on the actual wedding day. Everyone was up bright and early ready to get pretty. The house they live in is shared by most of the family and it is separated into several apartments. Three women came to the house to do hair and another one to do nails. Yes I took advantage of this too; I got my nails and hair done although I was aware that my hair would not last too long in the scorching heat. After a long day of preparation, it was wedding and party time!

Hora Loca! 

After much partying and picture taking it was time for party number two. Sunday preparations began early for my grandparents’ wedding. They basically re-married in the same church they did 50 years ago. Beautiful. The church was full of people. The whole town was probably there. I had the honor to give them the rings. When they were placing the rings on each other’s hands, they started tearing up which then caused everyone in that church to get teary eyed as well. Tears of happiness. They couldn’t even speak! It was so cute and such a happy moment for all of us. The feeling was indescribable.

    

When we got home after the wedding, tables were set up and a band waiting for us! The band is called Papayera, a type of band that plays music originating in the Caribbean region of Colombia. We were not expecting that at all! 

Everyone settling in.

Back to Barranquilla I go! 

Teaching for the First Time!

The weekend was filled with family activities. I spent it with another cousin named Paola and her family. We went to a small town near Barranquilla named Sabana Grande and had an amazing lunch at a restaurant/farm. I had a great time with the kids, they are so energetic, and once they pop they don’t stop. We also went to see the port called Santo Tomas.

After a relaxing weekend it was time to go back to school! I never thought I would be so excited to go to school. I went to the pre-school area that is attached to the big school and met up with the professor that I met last week named Steven. He usually goes in at 8 am and teaches three pre-school classes some basic English. Then he teaches children in second and third grade and then seventh graders in the afternoon. The seventh graders are a group of kids called "Semilleros", they are in training to become part of "Jovenes Forjadores". My role while I am here is to help him with the English classes in any way possible.

We entered the first classroom and some of them jumped off their seats just to come say hi to us. They gave me tight hugs and kisses on the cheek as if they already knew me. They call the teachers "profe" which is short for "profesor/a" or "seño" which is short for "señor/a". They were adorable! Some of them asked if I was the professor’s wife or girlfriend which was a little awkward. So innocent those little ones. So with the pre-schooler’s we just went over basic English words such as:

• Mother
• Father
• Grandmother
• Grandfather
• Sister
• Brother

Steven drew the characters on the white board (pretty good drawings I must say) and we played a game. We separated the class into several groups and had one member from each team come up. They were lined up on the other side of the room across the white board and stood behind a line. We called out a family member in English and they had to run to the white board and touch the family member that we said. We did this several times with different people from each group, we tallied the points and the winning team got applauses and high fives.

After pre-school, we went inside the main building and to the second and third grade classes to teach similar English vocabulary but a little more advanced. It all went well. We went to have lunch and then Steven decides to tell me that he has a doctors appointment this afternoon so I would need to take over the seventh grade English class! I was totally caught off guard! I spent my lunch preparing for the class. He kept trying to put me at ease by saying that it will be easy and not to worry. We went over what they already knew from previous classes. They use a very good English/Spanish vocabulary book from which they work with most of the time.

I waited in the classroom for my students to arrive and they were confused to see me there because not only was I not professor Steven but I looked too young to be a teacher. I had to reassure them that it was the correct class, English with professor Steven. I looked and sounded confident but I was so nervous inside. I know, it’s silly but it’s the truth. After some time, as they all spilled into the classroom, I started feeling comfortable. We reviewed what they had learned last class and explained the activity. They were to make a dialogue between two or three people with everything they have learned so far such as direction, food and ordering food. I recorded them of course so here they are! 

Jovenes Forjadores del Bilinguismo

I slept in today, which normally in the states it means I wake up at midday but in Colombia it means 8am. Since I’ve been here I have not been able to sleep past 9 am and I think it mainly has to do with the wonderful heat creeping in through your windows, doors and walls. So needless to say, I was ready for the meeting way ahead of time.

We all met in the school library, which has AC by the way. Lovely. There were about 15 kids or so plus the English professor Steven. Like I mentioned before, this group of kids are all in a club named Jovenes Forjadores and they all learned and are still learning the English language. I didn’t know what to expect but wow, I was amazed at how well they spoke the language. The majority of them were fluent and they had so much fun speaking it. Usually kids get shy speaking to someone that knows English very well but they were just going at it! I felt proud of them and I didn’t even know them.

Basically the meeting was done to gather some thoughts and ideas for the next few weeks for some projects that they have in mind. One of them, and the one they are most excited about, is forming a rock band. Some of them play instruments but they were missing a drummer so they were discussing that and which songs to play, most of them were English songs. They also discussed budget and equipment because the school can only give them so much so they were thinking of talking to several universities to see if they can borrow equipment just for the concert.

Another project they want to run is going out to the community and teaching people some English. It would only be basic words that they would be using on a daily basis. Some were thinking of going to restaurants and maybe adjusting their menu from Spanish to English and at the same time teaching them how to say it. We were thinking it would be nice to have a camera to record the whole thing, which I totally volunteered for. After much talking we all went our separate ways back home with very exciting ideas to look forward to.    

Le Culture

Today was the day! I had my presentation ready on a small hard drive that I had to buy at a local store across the street from where I am staying. I arrived at the school first thing in the morning and went into the main office to obtain the equipment. The women from Creciendo en Amor helped me take everything to the classroom. 

As soon as I started setting up the laptop for the presentation, the kids wanted to touch everything. They all surrounded the laptop and were so amazed. Once they were settled in their seats I realized how nervous I was! My presentation was about the culture in the United States but with a focus on Florida. I talked about the weather, the types of people and its diversity, and different tourist areas. The presentation was a success! The kids were focused the whole time while I was up there, I would ask them questions to keep them involved and had them ask me questions too. My slides consisted of all pictures and I would just talk about each picture, this way they were focused on the screen at all times. I took a couple screen shots of some of the slides.

 

After the presentation we passed out the letters for the intercultural project. We asked that those that did not receive a letter can open up their notebooks and draw something from my presentation. It seemed the only slide they all remembered was the one about Walt Disney. Even the children that received letters disregarded the instructions and also drew Disney stuff as you can see below.

 They were adorable! Now they all have dreams of going to Disney and I told them it’s possible but that they had to stay in school. I went back to the main office and put away all the equipment and met with the volunteer coordinator. She introduced me to an English professor named Steven whom I will start working with. He is one out of the three English professors in the school and we briefly touched up on the projects that they are running. He told me to come to a meeting tomorrow for the club called “Jovenes Forjadores” to learn all about them and their purpose. All I know so far is that they are a group of older kids in 9^th grade and beyond that speak English well. I guess tomorrow I will see what they are all about.   

Day Two as a Volunteer

My second day at Pies Descalzos! Yay! I never thought I would actually be saying that, it makes me so happy and proud to be here. Which by the way, Shakira's first music album was named Pies Descalzos 

Today I arrived at 8 am, a little earlier than I did yesterday to get things started. I met another volunteer who is from Chile and graduated with a degree in Psychology. She has been here for a couple of months emphasizing psychology exercises on the children. I went with her to a second grade classroom to check out her class. She made a presentation on PowerPoint about her country and its culture. I was observing her presentation as well as how the children reacted to the presentation and each slide. I was advised that I had to do a similar presentation about my culture for another classroom this week. Since children have short attention spans, I wanted to be sure I created a presentation that would have them focused at all times or at least 80 percent of the time.

Even the puppies go to school here. Hehehe.

Recess. They eat their snacks (merienda) at about 11:00am.

The little girl is explaining a dress that her aunt gave to her. 

After her presentation, a group of women came in the classroom to do another project that was related to culture. These groups of women are the mothers of some of the children that attend the school. They created another foundation within Pies Descalzos called “Creciendo en Amor” translating to Growing in Love. The purpose of the foundation is to also educate the parents about child development and education. It is very important to have the parents involved because they need to encourage the children to go to school and get an education. The women in Creciendo en Amor regularly have meetings to discuss situations at home and sometimes people come to speak and educate them such as psychologists and lawyers. Today they went in the classroom to have the children work on a project where they have to either draw or write about their country and their culture. One little box asks them to draw their family and in the other one it says to draw the most beautiful thing in their country. These letters are then sent out to other students at another school in Spain. We worked on this project for the rest of the afternoon in different classrooms and I assisted with providing instructions and helping the kids with ideas. We then went to the main office and sorted the letters out and organized them in different groups.

I spoke to the volunteer coordinator and she told me to prepare the presentation for tomorrow! Although it was very short notice, I was excited to do it. I am currently working on the presentation but I took a quick break to write my blog. They are only in second grade so some of them still cannot read therefore I want to involve a lot of pictures rather than words and I will just talk a little through the slides. My objective, like I stated before, is to have them focused on the presentation the majority of the time. Let’s see how it turns out! 

Fundacion Pies Descalzos

Today I decided to go to Fundacion Pies Descalzos, which translates to the Barefoot Foundation, in Barranquilla to see of an opportunity for me to volunteer there. I have always wanted to volunteer there ever since Shakira opened the foundation and if you didn’t know, I love Shakira. She has been my favorite artist since I can remember.  Apparently, I went to Colombia with my grandparents when I was about five or six years old and my parents told me that when I got back, I was singing her songs and they had no idea who she was.

I hopped on a bus first thing in the morning, paid 1500 COP and went on my way.  I think I am definitely getting better at this bus thing. Today I held on pretty tight and I only almost fell twice rather than fifty. It took about 30 minutes to arrive at the school. It's located in the village Eduardo Santos- La Playa. Pies Descalzos is a non-profit, non-governmental organization who accept children whose lives have been disrupted by violence and poverty hoping that someday they will grow up to be something they never thought could be achieved. There are currently six schools run in the diverse Colombian regions of Barranquilla, Altos de Cazucá and Quibidó. The school in Barranquilla opened in 2008 and provides quality bilingual education for 1500 impoverished children. “The school is also a center for community life for a neighborhood suffering from poverty and displacement”. The most important thing to do for children living in poverty is provide them with education. 

All I have to do is close my eyes and I can imagine their faces; I know that each child has a name, a heart, a dream; I know that their lives are just as valuable as yours or mine. Yet many of these children die every day in total abandonment. -- Shakira

I walked in through the gate past the guard and could not believe my eyes. The school is beautiful! It’s a very big school with children in pre-kindergarten to high school students (high school in Colombia is only up to 11^th grade). All the children wear uniforms and it’s the only thing that the parents have to spend money on. The boys wear khaki pants or shorts with a white polo that has the foundation logo on it. The girls wear the same uniform or a pink dress with a white polo. I walked towards the main office and spoke to the director, psychologist and volunteer coordinator. There were two other volunteers also wanting to participate. We all went to a conference room to discuss our ideas or goals. After much chatting, the director asked us if we were all interested in starting today, I said yes of course!

They gave us a brief tour of the school and we saw the music room, the cafeteria, the auditorium, the gymnasium and the library.

The Auditorium

The Gym

In the music room, the professor gave us a little demonstration of what he teaches in his classes. He mentioned he likes to teach typical Colombian music such as carnival music, cumbia, and more. The professor then asked us to participate and he let us play the big drum. We struggled with coordination but we managed. Unfortunately the videos are short because I was running out of memory.

 Music class

After the music class we went to a second grade class and we spoke to the children in English about our country. I spoke to them a little bit about Miami such as the weather and culture. The other two volunteers were from Boston. The children were amazed at how we spoke. Although they had no idea what we were saying, they were listening very carefully. We would translate what we said and then asked them questions about their country and cultural practices.

After today there will be a change of plans, I will volunteer here for a month and then two months at the foundation I was originally going to. The more the merrier!