Laura Harvey's Experience in Ayacucho, PERU at Hogar Luz Orphanage

VFP Volunteer, Laura Harvey spent a little over two weeks in Ayachucho Peru on an international voluntary service projects with VFP's partner organization VIVE.

This project was organized in cooperation with the local organization Hogar Luz in the city of Ayacucho Peru, the volunteers worked with children from 1 month old to 17 year old, by providing home and food as well as promoting good habits (hygiene, education, etc) with the objective to give them better possibilities for their future.

Lauras testimonial below was taken from her Peru Blog that can be found on her new organizations, I Heart Humanity's website (http://www.ihearthumanity.org/)

The cutest that kids ever are (besides when they are sleeping and on Halloween, before the candy high) is hands down at a swimming pool. At the beginning of the project, volunteers were signing up for extra responsibilities. For instance, a few people take some of the boys to dance classes. Pequeno Amy and I signed up for pool duty. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, we’d take 4-6 of the boys on a 15-20 minute walk to the community pool for swimming lessons. Because of random illness, etc. there were many days that it was only I who went with the Professora but (except for one infamous day) it was always a blast. I would stare into the beautiful clouds which perched along the scenic mountaintops surrounding Ayacucho. One day, I read from a book I stole from the bookshelf at our volunteer house: Lady Chatterley’s Lover (pretty good, so far). However, most days, there would be at least one boy from Urpi who wouldn’t be swimming, for whatever reason, and usually he would sit next to me or in my lap and we’d thumb through my English/Spanish Dictionary. The last few days, it has been little Gabriel. He finds words he can read in Spanish and sounds them out in English. His accent is adorable and for some reason, even though he doesn’t know what the word means in Spanish, he finds the ones that make my face turn red and I have to pretend to be bored and flip to another page.

The rest of the attendees of the swimming lessons are a smorgasbord of adorable Peruvian ninas who run around in their older sisters swimsuits that sag in the butt and ninos with little Buddha bellies and floaty devices on their arms.

If your Spanish isn’t stellar, just pretend that everything you say is a current happening and never discuss anything that happened more than 30 seconds ago. This is sort of a tip that I high jacked from my co-worker Lindsey who told me that when taking the short answer portions of her college Spanish tests, she commonly states opinions that she doesn’t actually hold, simply because she has the Spanish vocab to profess likings for stuff which she actually finds lame.
Yesterday, all of the volunteers went up and did a presentation for the boys on where they are from, local customs, music, food, how or why they came to Ayacucho. There are six Koreans: Min (m), Marco/Jin (m), Kelly, Jane, Song and Ing-Hay (f). They went up with homemade posters covered in photos they’d printed off the internet of Korean singers and other celebrities and also a map they’d drawn of Korea, divided into North and South. Alex (who speaks the best Spanish of all of us) later told me that their speech was a bit political in nature but heroically described the responsibility they feel to live in a united Korea.

Alex did an overachiever presentation about how her school (Lehigh in CT... she is about as opposite of the other CT girls as you can get though) paid for her to travel to El Salvador and Guatemala on these projects. Alex is my favorite type of girl-from-a-well-off-family. She is a hippie. Her parents own tobacco farms in the Dominican Republic and her stories of comparing and contrasting herself to the rest of her family have us in stitches. She has an awesome heart and a brilliant mind and doesn’t feel satisfied unless she is changing the world.

Alex is one of four Americans: Her, myself, Grande Amy (or just Amy), and Pequeno Amy, who has the same sense of humor as I and enjoys my obscure movie references. Grande Amy didn’t do a presentation but she is a server at Cheesecake Factory in MN and she really connects with the kids well. Pequeno Amy did a presentation about where she lives in Chicago. She is a server there as well and she’s the only one of us smart enough to make Google Images her friend. She held up photos of her actual apartment in Chicago and photos of the Sears Tower (which I wont number as a lesson) but is apparently the 3rd tallest building in the world.

The last two volunteers are Emile(m) and Juliette from France. They are both dolls and they did a great presentation on France, complete with a skit that took place in a French Discoteque and required Juliette to dance like a Go-Go dancer (sans skimpy outfit) and she was really great. They also taught the boys some French phrases like: Hello, My name is..., I am from... There’s was very popular, as well.

I went last. I didn’t go the route of printing photos etc. I stood up and in my pretty-good-for-six-days-of-classes-Spanish, told the children about I Heart Humanity. They were interested and thought it was cool I’d go to so much trouble to hang out with them. I also got amazing footage on my camera at the end, of all the boys in unison shouting ¨Yo Corazon Humanidad¨.

Before I told them about I Heart Humanity, I explained that I was currently a student at a Universidad in San Diego, studying History... yes, I got my BA in ´07 but this goes back to my hour-ago point that if your Spanish is limited, you never ¨were¨ but only you ¨are¨. I think they got the point. I also told them that I know American Sign Language and that sign language in Peru is different. I taught them to say Te Amo (I love you) in three signs and also on one hand. I explained that the reason on one hand it’s an outstretched thumb, pointer and pinky all represent the first letters of I (the pinky), Love (the thumb and pointer) and You (the thumb and pinky). They were delighted with their new sign and although I have realized that some signs (or gestures, should I say) that are universally understood in America, are also used in Peru... a certain single finger, outstretched... but for the rest of the day yesterday and a few times today, a boy would catch my eye and give me the gesture I taught them yesterday...
I am really very sad that tomorrow night is the last time I will see these children.
Yo Corazon Los Ninos de Hogar Urpi.
Laura

Vietnam VieVpv04-09 Thuy An Orphanage 12-Jan-09 to 23-Jan-09

I am very happy and satisfied with my volunteer experience at the work camp through Volunteers for Peace Vietnam (VPV). I sought the volunteer experience to dive more deeply into Vietnamese culture, to meet new friends, and to find a meaningful way to contribute to a worthy cause in Vietnam. I found that all of these goals were achieved.

The volunteer work described on the VFP website was to help make traditional cakes/food for the Tet New Year, and also to help decorate the center and work with the children at this center. This first task, to help make the traditional Chung cakes that are the most important food in the New Year holiday, was immensely rewarding. Before arriving at the work camp I’ll admit that I was skeptical that there would be enough work to do for 10 volunteers in making these cakes. But there was so much to do! We worked alongside the cooking staff at the Thuy An Center, who helped demonstrate and show us how to prepare and fold the leaves, and layer the ingredients and the most time-consuming part was wrapping/binding these cakes with bamboo twine. Periodically during the 2 or 3 days we worked on making the cakes, I would realize I was getting to glimpse a unique part of the Vietnamese culinary traditions, and I felt so lucky to have this opportunity.

Another rewarding feeling was spending time with the children. The children were so happy to see us, and it was so evident that the attention and love that the volunteers gave them really made their day. On the 5th day of the work camp, 75% of the children left the center to return to their hometown to celebrate the Tet holiday with their families. This day before they left was a particularly special day. We organized games and activities with the children, and the children were in really high spirits. All of the children went home with their very own Chung cake, which also felt really rewarding.

Probably the most rewarding aspect of the work camp was the cultural exchange between the volunteers. We grew extremely close over the 12 days, and learned so much about each other’s cultures. We learned many expressions in Vietnamese, and learned to cook Vietnamese spring rolls. We also learned to cook Korean food and learned a lot about Korean history and politics. At the beginning, I worried that we didn’t really have a distinct “American culture” that we could share with our friends - but quickly this worry dissolved as we found no end to topics and dove deep into exploring differences and similarities in our respective relationships with family and friends, spirituality, music, film - we even taught our new friends some American popular slang.

I want to end by saying that overall my experience was great. I really appreciate the opportunity to volunteer through Volunteers for Peace, and hope that I will be able to do another work camp in the future.

Allison Keller, Vietnam