One Week!

Yup, we've been in Peru for an entire week already, but it feels like we've been here forever. The group gets along great, minus the random arguments betwen Ryan and I, but you know gotta keep it interesting for everyone else.

The past couple of days at work have been super interesting. With Milo directing the group around he often singles out jobs as "man jobs" and will only ask the guys to come help. Which leaves the female participants feeling bored and frustrated. But usually the girls just get up and help anyway. The other day Milo said he needed "two guys" to bring up more wood, and Matt corrected him and said he needed "two people." He's taken the hints we give him but doesn't do too much to be inclusive, he's mostly concerned about getting the job done as soon as possible.

Then he was concerned that we wern't going to pay him enough for the time and work he's put into our project. Milo, Dora and I had a conversating where I established with him that he was only needed for translation since I have participants who've paid to be here and work but often end up sitting around while he takes over. Milo style of working is he'll do the job and you get to hand him the screws, nails or drill that he needs. We also talked about who would be paying him to stay on board as our translator. From my understanding DWC was going to be paying him but Dora seemed to have heard that if he was to be paid it would be coming out of our budget. Communication at its finest. So that afternoonn he gave us direction only, and then went and sat down at the school. That afternoon is the most I've seen the entire group working together so far.

When we got home I sent off and e-mail to DWC explaining what happened and then told me I could use the "communications" part of the budget to pay Milo for translation. As a group we came to the decision  that we can get by without him, and that since we are here as volunteers who've already paid to be here, someone else should not be making money off of our situation. Someone who would otherwise be sitting at home all day. When I e-mailed Milo explaining our decision he said that he had not signed up to be a charity or work for free and that he was misunderstood on our goals of the project.

As our group had discussed, we're here to work with the people of Villa Maria and learn from them, not go in there with our Western ways and power tools to get a job done as fast as possible. We want to work, but we also value the interaction and times spend with the kids and residents of the town. If that's the way we wanted things to get done we would have stayed home and worked in Canada. This project isn't about a building, but its about appreciating another part of the world and working together with them. We can't kid ourselves that we're going to go into that town, build a few rooms and save the world. They've made it this far with little help from the Western world, and when we leave they will continue to make progress on their school. So much has changed in a year since I was last here and who knows what its going to be like in another year or two.

On another note-

My second Peruvian birthday was amazing!

In the morning I had 3 cards to open, two from home and one from the participants. I skyped with my parents and they sang me happy birthday, complete with a cake and candels..which my mom blew out for me. During the day we went to the park and to cafe Z for lunch for the second time, where we had our first pisco shots of the day. We walked by the water and then headed back to get ready for a night out.  I wanted to go to a restaurant called Mangos, but couldn't remember exactly where it was, so of course Ronal walked us there. But he blanked on where it was too and took us on a ten minute walk in the opposite direction. We soon figured it out and took cabs, for 6 soles, (roughly $2) to the restaurant. When we first got there they said it would be a 20 minute wait, but we ended up getting a table in 5-10 minutes, right on the balcony outside, overlooking the water! How lucky hey? After dinner we took cabs home, without the help of a Peruvian for the first time, Matt was a stellar barter and we got them for 6 soles again.

I got home to find the roof of casa rodas decked out in birthday decorations, complete with a mini bar! Balloons, streamers, flashing lights, and of course a Peruvian flag next to the Canada flag that last years group signed for Ronal. Next came the cake... no it did not get shoved in my face, Jorge and friends had not arrived yet so it was just us Canadians and Ronal there. But everyone was stuffed from dinner so we made the decison that it would be eaten for breakfast this morning. Around 10 our Peruvian amigos arrived and then around 11 or so we went to a bar located right on the beach. Jorge had put us on the guest list during the week, so no line no cover. Overall, it was an awesome birthday!! Oh ya, and Suud made videos of the pre party with my camera with I have yet to watch, should be interesting!