Well, even though I was only back at El Alfarero for four days, I think that it is fair to say that it was not an easy four days. The Saturday that I was gone was a particularly dramatic day, as after the girl who left on Friday (lets call her Jane) confessed that she had been bringing drugs into the home a lot more confessions came up. Salustio and Yany found drugs stashed in at least five places around the home, including in the rooms and on the volleyball court. It turns out that four girls had been taking drugs up to three times a day, one of them ever since she arrived in the home over a year ago. Jane had been selling drugs on for her dealer in school, and exchange for this he gave her drugs for her own personal use which she then shared with the four other girls. It turns out that even on the nights when one of us was sleeping in their room they were smoking drugs, completely without us ever noticing - the drug that they were smoking has no particularly distinct smell, and if we were sleeping then they were careful not to do anything to wake us up. Although looking in retrospect, there were nights in that room where I woke up every hour seemingly for no reason: I'm now beginning to think that there may have been a reason for that that I didn't quite twig in my half asleep state. Basically what Jane has done is jumped ship, leaving four drug addicts behind her: it all becomes even more poignant when you realise that she has not yet turned fourteen, and also left ten habitual drug users in her class at school.
It is unbelievabley disapointing, especially for Yany and Salustio who have been here for so much time, because despite all the time and energy that has been put in for them, the girls quite consiously deceived us. One of the girls who was using would literally be dead if the ministry hadn't paid for her operation and taken care of her during her recovery. Jane had been in the home for two years, and Yany and Salustio had placed quite a lot of trust in her, which she just threw back in their face. Although I obviously still do really love the girls and want to help them, this has left us all with little desire to organise activities and do things to help them. Especially since despite the fact that only five girls were taking drugs, its fair to say that all of the other girls knew about it, and some of them actively helped them to hide the drugs and conceal their behaviour.
Obviously, all actions have consequences, and the discìpline for the three girls that remain is quite strong: none of them will go to school next year for the entire year, they will only learn from the teachers that come to the home. The reasoning behind this is obvious: the ones who were already in school were taking drugs in school, and the ones who weren't are not trustworthy to go to a place where there will be temptation to take drugs. As a discipline for all the girls, we as a home are not going to go to Kids Games, a sports day event that they normally go to every year.
In other news (sorry that I can't bring you anything happy!) Another girl (we'll call her Val) left the home on Tuesday with her one year old son, to go to live with her grandmother. In some ways it was actually a good thing that she wanted to go, because if not we were going to have to throw her out of the home because of her unbelievable manipulative behaviour with the other girls. But on the other hand, we are not sure how long she will stay with her grandmother, as she alawys struggled to control Val, and was the victim of her manipulative behaviour. What Val used to do, was if her grandmother told her to do something she didn't want to do, like wash her babies nappies, she would go tell her uncles (her grandmothers sons) that her grandmother was beating her and wasn't giving her anything to eat, which they would react to by going to her house and beating her grandmother. Clearly not a great situation for her, but she's willing to take Val back, if only to ensure that her son is well taken care of.
To close, I would like to tell you all that I am sick! This has not been the happiest of blogs, so I might as well finish on a piece of unhappy news. I've had a stuffed up cold for the last few days, and I had a fever last night. It is rubbish, but don't worry, I am taking plenty of paracetomal! It does make everything seem a little more rubbish though, when having a cold takes away all your enery. You need to send me loving messages to cheer me up!
Thursday, 20 November 2008
Sunday, 16 November 2008
New things
Well, I seem to somehow have built up quite a collection of things to say, a mixture of good things and bad things, in the eight days that have passed between my last day off and this one. Before updating you all on the rather long list of things that have happened in that reasonabley short space of time, I want to share one more wee thought. I was thinking of the normal perception of what is missions, what is development work overseas, and what the average British person would think of when they imagine what I am doing here. What the images would be that would role through their mind. So often what we associate with 'charity' work are those kind of videos that they show every year for Comic Relief, with smiling African children who are ever so grateful for all the help that they have received. You know, they receive a pencil and a toothbrush and keep them in some treasured place, thanking God for them every day and bein affectionate and loving with the person who gave it to them. And perhaps nothing could be further from the reality of working in a home for street girls. The truth is, that just as we are not always super grateful for the unbelievable help that we receive from our families and from our governments, neither are the girls who live in the home always grateful for what they have received. They can be aggressive and incredibley rude to the people who live with them 24 hours a day without pay, they lose the things that we give to them (especially pencils!), they demand and expect more than what is already given to them. Of course they are wonderful girls with many gifts and talents and good points, but in no way are they easy - but I don't believe that help should be denied to them for being ungrateful when I have had everything I needed without even thinking to stop and write a letter to the government to thank them for paying for my education and health care.
Well, enough of the semi-deepness and on to other things! One of the biggest bits of news is that the construction work which has been being planned for a while at the home is finally started. If I remember correctly, the new building will have a kitchen, a food store, bigger classroom and a new toilet block, office and dining area. The dormitories are also going to be extended, and the old classroom and office will be there as more mother and baby rooms. The work seems to be getting on fairly well, as they start with digging the foundations. The main challenge comes from having men around all the time, and trying to stop the girls from flirting with them.
The main piece of sad news, is that of the three new girls I told you about last blog, two have already left. The one who is still here is getting on reasonabley well, she has quite a strong personality with a huge dislike of being told what to do, but her faults are correctable. On top of these two girls having left, two of the older girls also left. One left after being extremely unsettled when her brother ran away from El Camino (the boys home): she has gone back to her mothers home, but it is not an ideal situation that she has there. Probably the worst departure took place just before I left for my day off on Friday, when I girl who had been in the home for two whole years suddenly decided that she wanted to leave, and on top of this confessed that she had been bringing drugs into the home and giving them to the other girls. After two years, you would generally think that she was going to be ok, and would stay until a time that it was appropriate for her to return to her family, or to move on and do her own thing. But this is something that they've learned over the years at El Alfarero, that incredibely quickly the girls will be willing to throw everything away: the years they've spent at school, all the things they have at the home that they won't have if they return to their troubled families or to the streets, the friends that they have made, the things that they have learned. She threw it all away for drugs and boys, and she's only thirteen: that makes me sad. Another girl almost left that same morning, because she was so angry at one of the other girls for telling Salustio that she'd been making herself throw up in the toilet.
The weekend that Sandra and I spent alone when Yanyt and Salustio went away for their free day was as difficult as it normally is, but not too unbelievabley dramatic. The real drama began on Sunday evening when most of the girls went to a special service in the city to present a dance, and I drew the short straw to stay with the four girls who had to stay as a punishment for fighting over the weekend. They were unbelievabley badly behaved! As part of their discipline, they had to clean up the birthday meal that we'd had before that, and two of the girls just flatly refused to help so i had to force them. The four girls formed themselves into two groups of two who were fighting against each other, two of whom were actually behaving reasonabley well, and two of whom were not. So after all their anger and bad behaviour I left them to calm down for a bit, I spoke to both of them individually and then there were tears because they both missed their families! (I really don't understand why on earth they miss their abusive families, but there you go). Just when everything had calmed down nicely, the two other girls developed horrific stomach pains (too much birthday cake.....) and one of them was sick twice! When I had finally managed to put them all to bed, I went into the kitchen and found a poo on the worksurface! So there was all the drama in the space of a few short hours. :-) I'm thinking that the poo was the stray cat that has been wandering about the home lately.
Well I think that that was all the main news really. Yesterday I went over to the reintigration house to spend the day with Erica and her family, and went to see her son play football. It was all very jolly but I still can't understand why other people get quite so excited about sport! I can never bring myself to yell or anything, and I get quite easily distracted! Oooh, I forget, there is one other piece of big news: there is now officially no school until February... Terrifying! Any suggestions for things that we could do would be greatly appreciated!
I hope that everyone on the other side of the world where I used to live are doing really well, and I would love to hear some of your news. I'm sending love to you all. :-)
Well, enough of the semi-deepness and on to other things! One of the biggest bits of news is that the construction work which has been being planned for a while at the home is finally started. If I remember correctly, the new building will have a kitchen, a food store, bigger classroom and a new toilet block, office and dining area. The dormitories are also going to be extended, and the old classroom and office will be there as more mother and baby rooms. The work seems to be getting on fairly well, as they start with digging the foundations. The main challenge comes from having men around all the time, and trying to stop the girls from flirting with them.
The main piece of sad news, is that of the three new girls I told you about last blog, two have already left. The one who is still here is getting on reasonabley well, she has quite a strong personality with a huge dislike of being told what to do, but her faults are correctable. On top of these two girls having left, two of the older girls also left. One left after being extremely unsettled when her brother ran away from El Camino (the boys home): she has gone back to her mothers home, but it is not an ideal situation that she has there. Probably the worst departure took place just before I left for my day off on Friday, when I girl who had been in the home for two whole years suddenly decided that she wanted to leave, and on top of this confessed that she had been bringing drugs into the home and giving them to the other girls. After two years, you would generally think that she was going to be ok, and would stay until a time that it was appropriate for her to return to her family, or to move on and do her own thing. But this is something that they've learned over the years at El Alfarero, that incredibely quickly the girls will be willing to throw everything away: the years they've spent at school, all the things they have at the home that they won't have if they return to their troubled families or to the streets, the friends that they have made, the things that they have learned. She threw it all away for drugs and boys, and she's only thirteen: that makes me sad. Another girl almost left that same morning, because she was so angry at one of the other girls for telling Salustio that she'd been making herself throw up in the toilet.
The weekend that Sandra and I spent alone when Yanyt and Salustio went away for their free day was as difficult as it normally is, but not too unbelievabley dramatic. The real drama began on Sunday evening when most of the girls went to a special service in the city to present a dance, and I drew the short straw to stay with the four girls who had to stay as a punishment for fighting over the weekend. They were unbelievabley badly behaved! As part of their discipline, they had to clean up the birthday meal that we'd had before that, and two of the girls just flatly refused to help so i had to force them. The four girls formed themselves into two groups of two who were fighting against each other, two of whom were actually behaving reasonabley well, and two of whom were not. So after all their anger and bad behaviour I left them to calm down for a bit, I spoke to both of them individually and then there were tears because they both missed their families! (I really don't understand why on earth they miss their abusive families, but there you go). Just when everything had calmed down nicely, the two other girls developed horrific stomach pains (too much birthday cake.....) and one of them was sick twice! When I had finally managed to put them all to bed, I went into the kitchen and found a poo on the worksurface! So there was all the drama in the space of a few short hours. :-) I'm thinking that the poo was the stray cat that has been wandering about the home lately.
Well I think that that was all the main news really. Yesterday I went over to the reintigration house to spend the day with Erica and her family, and went to see her son play football. It was all very jolly but I still can't understand why other people get quite so excited about sport! I can never bring myself to yell or anything, and I get quite easily distracted! Oooh, I forget, there is one other piece of big news: there is now officially no school until February... Terrifying! Any suggestions for things that we could do would be greatly appreciated!
I hope that everyone on the other side of the world where I used to live are doing really well, and I would love to hear some of your news. I'm sending love to you all. :-)
Sunday, 2 November 2008
Thoughts
I thought that I would centre this blog, as well as telling you about the recent events in El Alfarero, to focus more on what I have been thinking about and what I have been learning. To put it another way, what God has been teaching me. Theres two bits of the Bible that have come to have a greater significance for me in the last few weeks:
‘Enter through the narrow gate. The gate is wide and the raod is wide that leads to hell, and many people enter through that gate. But the gate is small and the road is narrow that leads to true life. Only a few people find that road.’ Matthew 7v13
‘Sell your processions and give to the poor. Get for yourselves purses that will not wear out, the treasure in heaven that never runs out, where thieves can’t steal and moths can’t destroy. Your heart will be where your treasure is.’ Luke 12v33-34
One of the things that I’m being reminded of, as things are not always easy for me living here, is the importance of sacrifice. This life is really not that long in the light of eternity, and I don’t want to fritter it away. A lot of the things that I have been missing from home are essentially shadows and dust when compared with what it might actually mean to build up treasures in heaven. Mining gold and silver from the earth, as many Bolivians know, takes much sweat and toil, but the end result is worth it. Treasures that you don’t have to work for, that don’t involve sacrificial love, are almost never as powerful.
So many people, Christians or not, spend their whole lives avoiding the narrow way because it is just so much more difficult. But the narrow way is the only way that will lead to true life – Jesus said that those who give up their lives for him, will find true life – I left my whole life behind in Scotland, and I like to think that what I’m doing is finding true life.
Anyhoo. Enough of the (hopefully) wise thoughts, moving on to another wee update on how life is chez El Alfarero. One of the main changes that there has been in the home over the last week no more, has been the arrival of three new girls! Unfortunately, none of the three girls made it to the reception house because it was always been occupied by boys at the time, but it has still been very interesting for me to see how things operate when new girls arrive. The three girls have very distinct personalities – one of them I really don’t know anything about yet as she arrived late on Friday night, and I left for my free day early on Sunday morning. So I shall find out when I get back how the weekend went: please try and remember this in your prayers, as we’re up to 17 girls again now, and Salustio says that whenever the home starts to fill up people start to leave again.
One of the good (great) things about the last week has been that I am beginning to feel a little bit more connected with the other people who live at the home. I’ve had a few good chats which allowed me to open up slightly more to them, and I’m beginning to feel that we are working more as a team. On top of this, after having been at the home for six weeks now, I feel that I’m ready to begin making comments about the way the home is run. I’m glad to have stayed fairly silent for so long, because there are things that at the beginning I didn’t understand or disagreed with that I know understand the reasons for and can see are for the best.
The main issue I can see with the home, and I’ve discussed this with Sandra, is the lack of actual consequences when they do something wrong. This came up particularly one evening when Sandra and I were on our own with the girls, and during the reading the girls were just horrifically badly behaved. Sandra ended up having to pull the youngest girl away because everyone was hitting her – and despite the older girl’s conviction that she is the root of all the problems at the home, their behaviour did not improve when we took her away. About an hour after all this, two of the older girls started fighting over practically nothing – fists and all! It is the first time in my life so far that I have had to pull one grown woman off another one – although I did have some help in it! And what were the consequences of all this misbehaviour? Essentially nothing, except for a lecture in the morning. So I have begun to think of potential things that we could to discipline the girls, privelidges that we could withdraw that I can suggest to Yanyt and Salustio: after all, real love is not afraid to correct bad behaviour.
I have had a fairly good weekend off so far, I’ve been avoiding my slightly horrific habit of spending all of my time off sitting about in Casa Alfa, as it is quite tempting to be lethargic! I went to Sandra’s house yesterday to visit her family, which was much fun, and then we went out for ice cream with her friend. Mmm. On my days off I try to sneak in a little bit of western food, as I really am eating very traditional things at the home. Despite the fat and carbs content of this food, I have somehow managed to lose half a stone since arriving – very weird. In other good news, I have an extra day off this weekend as Monday is a national holiday for the day of the dead.
Another highlight of the week was going to Patty’s house for the meeting of the senoritas (hee hee I am one of those!) who work with Operation Restoration. It is definitely making a difference having people around who I feel like I can start to call friends: because it is not good for man (or woman) to be alone.
‘Enter through the narrow gate. The gate is wide and the raod is wide that leads to hell, and many people enter through that gate. But the gate is small and the road is narrow that leads to true life. Only a few people find that road.’ Matthew 7v13
‘Sell your processions and give to the poor. Get for yourselves purses that will not wear out, the treasure in heaven that never runs out, where thieves can’t steal and moths can’t destroy. Your heart will be where your treasure is.’ Luke 12v33-34
One of the things that I’m being reminded of, as things are not always easy for me living here, is the importance of sacrifice. This life is really not that long in the light of eternity, and I don’t want to fritter it away. A lot of the things that I have been missing from home are essentially shadows and dust when compared with what it might actually mean to build up treasures in heaven. Mining gold and silver from the earth, as many Bolivians know, takes much sweat and toil, but the end result is worth it. Treasures that you don’t have to work for, that don’t involve sacrificial love, are almost never as powerful.
So many people, Christians or not, spend their whole lives avoiding the narrow way because it is just so much more difficult. But the narrow way is the only way that will lead to true life – Jesus said that those who give up their lives for him, will find true life – I left my whole life behind in Scotland, and I like to think that what I’m doing is finding true life.
Anyhoo. Enough of the (hopefully) wise thoughts, moving on to another wee update on how life is chez El Alfarero. One of the main changes that there has been in the home over the last week no more, has been the arrival of three new girls! Unfortunately, none of the three girls made it to the reception house because it was always been occupied by boys at the time, but it has still been very interesting for me to see how things operate when new girls arrive. The three girls have very distinct personalities – one of them I really don’t know anything about yet as she arrived late on Friday night, and I left for my free day early on Sunday morning. So I shall find out when I get back how the weekend went: please try and remember this in your prayers, as we’re up to 17 girls again now, and Salustio says that whenever the home starts to fill up people start to leave again.
One of the good (great) things about the last week has been that I am beginning to feel a little bit more connected with the other people who live at the home. I’ve had a few good chats which allowed me to open up slightly more to them, and I’m beginning to feel that we are working more as a team. On top of this, after having been at the home for six weeks now, I feel that I’m ready to begin making comments about the way the home is run. I’m glad to have stayed fairly silent for so long, because there are things that at the beginning I didn’t understand or disagreed with that I know understand the reasons for and can see are for the best.
The main issue I can see with the home, and I’ve discussed this with Sandra, is the lack of actual consequences when they do something wrong. This came up particularly one evening when Sandra and I were on our own with the girls, and during the reading the girls were just horrifically badly behaved. Sandra ended up having to pull the youngest girl away because everyone was hitting her – and despite the older girl’s conviction that she is the root of all the problems at the home, their behaviour did not improve when we took her away. About an hour after all this, two of the older girls started fighting over practically nothing – fists and all! It is the first time in my life so far that I have had to pull one grown woman off another one – although I did have some help in it! And what were the consequences of all this misbehaviour? Essentially nothing, except for a lecture in the morning. So I have begun to think of potential things that we could to discipline the girls, privelidges that we could withdraw that I can suggest to Yanyt and Salustio: after all, real love is not afraid to correct bad behaviour.
I have had a fairly good weekend off so far, I’ve been avoiding my slightly horrific habit of spending all of my time off sitting about in Casa Alfa, as it is quite tempting to be lethargic! I went to Sandra’s house yesterday to visit her family, which was much fun, and then we went out for ice cream with her friend. Mmm. On my days off I try to sneak in a little bit of western food, as I really am eating very traditional things at the home. Despite the fat and carbs content of this food, I have somehow managed to lose half a stone since arriving – very weird. In other good news, I have an extra day off this weekend as Monday is a national holiday for the day of the dead.
Another highlight of the week was going to Patty’s house for the meeting of the senoritas (hee hee I am one of those!) who work with Operation Restoration. It is definitely making a difference having people around who I feel like I can start to call friends: because it is not good for man (or woman) to be alone.
Thursday, 23 October 2008
More girls
Well, as promised, I'm back on my next free day (I do love them) to give you more wee bios about the girls I'm working with. Someone did point out to me that it might not be such a good idea to give out so much information about people, so rather than giving you their actual names, I'm going to call them girl number 1, girl number 2 etc. Slightly more impersonal but hey-ho!
Girl number 1 (!) has been at the home for coming up to two years now, and is so one of the girls who might be seen as having been more settled. However, often it seems to only take one thing to shake everything up and for a lot of issues that seemed to have been resolved to come back to the fore. Because of various issues that have been going on at school, that I don't really know about, she's been feeling a bit shakier lately. This is the main reason why the girls are kept out of school for a bit when they first arrive at the home, because of all the things that come up there which are precisely the challenges they are facing: mainly things like drugs and boys. These are not, after all, girls who have managed to have any kind of healthy relationship with the opposite sex. She does get on well in school, and seems to be really intelligent: I was helping her with her English the other day. She has some of the character defects that thirteen year old girls everywhere have i.e. the tendency to be a wee bit of a whiner, but then, didn't we all have that tendency at some stage? Or was (is) that just me? She is also one of the three girls who sometimes goes out in the afternoon to accomplish various things. They're not allowed to go out alone, for obvious reasons, so sometimes its been left to me to go with them when they go to study with their friends and things like that. I do understand the reasons why they don't want to leave them alone, but it is also slightly awkward being in a situation where you know that nobody wants you to be there.
I recently had the challenge (!) of helping girl number two with her school work when the school was closed for the day. Another one of the younger ones, she’s probably the one I have the most difficulty understand: not only because she speaks Spanish at quite such top speed, but also because in so many ways she is so closed off. The teachers who come into the home are really close to refusing to teach her anymore because she is so disrespectful to them and, as I learned, when she doesn’t want to do something, she will just close off entirely and refuse to do it. When I was working with her, she refused to admit that she even knew how to read (she does) or that she remembered anything of a story that we read less than a minute ago. Like the other little girls, she has a background in sexual abuse, although in her case I’m not sure if it was in the family or in school. She has a great sense of fun which is always a good thing, but, like some of the others, she doesn’t seem to have the capacity to know when to stop. For me it is very difficult with all of them to know where playing stops and fighting begins! I would really like to be able to talk with her more, because I hate the idea that people are already giving up on her when she is still so young, even though I understand how difficult she can be.
Girl number three recently wanted to leave the home, to the extent that Salustio took her all the way back to her parents house before she decided that she wanted to come back. She told me a bit of her life story when we were washing clothes together – I can’t say that I understood all of it, but enough to know that she used to regularly run away from home to go to the street, where she was part of a prostitution gang. It’s always hard for me to imagine the girls as prostitutes, minus a few, because it just seems so unlikely! She was in school previously, but she was pulled out because her behaviour was so unstable. Shes a lovely girl, very affectionate etc, but I would say that her main real flaw is a tendency to be lazy and to form cliques that exclude other people – certainly a strong sign of insecurity in a young girl.
Girl number four has one of those ‘bright lights big city’ stories that will be familiar to anyone who has ever watched television: she came to the city to get away from her family and to find a job, and ended up being forced into prostitution. Her pimp was unhappy when she fell pregnant, and so sent some thugs to beat her up, to get rid of the baby. It was so bad that she ended up having to have an almost total skull reconstruction and can now feel nothing on one side of her head. She’s only just stopped wearing headscarves because her hair has started to grow back in. Like many of the others, she does have a front of just getting on with life and being happy, but you can occasionally see that her past does come back to haunt her and bring up issues in the present. She also has a four year old son who presently lives with her mother, and may at some point be coming to live in the home.
Significant events of the last week:
1. I have a friend! News indeed. A Bolivian girl called Sandra has also come to work at the home, and I already feel like its making a difference to have someone my own age around. Well, she is eight years older than me, but it still kind of counts as my own age!
2. There was a meeting with the girls relatives (some of them) last weekend, which seemed to go pretty well, and its always good to touch base with them.
3. I went to my first staff meeting yesterday and the chat was mainly centred around the problems that are coming in finances through the lowering value of the dollar, and the poor quality pound to dollar exchange rate. They’re losing a huge amount of money not because their support has gone down, but because the support that they have is worth less. On top of this, because of the credit crunch in the uk, people are becoming much less likely to give. So, for those of you that are into prayer, it would be really good to pray about that!
Girl number 1 (!) has been at the home for coming up to two years now, and is so one of the girls who might be seen as having been more settled. However, often it seems to only take one thing to shake everything up and for a lot of issues that seemed to have been resolved to come back to the fore. Because of various issues that have been going on at school, that I don't really know about, she's been feeling a bit shakier lately. This is the main reason why the girls are kept out of school for a bit when they first arrive at the home, because of all the things that come up there which are precisely the challenges they are facing: mainly things like drugs and boys. These are not, after all, girls who have managed to have any kind of healthy relationship with the opposite sex. She does get on well in school, and seems to be really intelligent: I was helping her with her English the other day. She has some of the character defects that thirteen year old girls everywhere have i.e. the tendency to be a wee bit of a whiner, but then, didn't we all have that tendency at some stage? Or was (is) that just me? She is also one of the three girls who sometimes goes out in the afternoon to accomplish various things. They're not allowed to go out alone, for obvious reasons, so sometimes its been left to me to go with them when they go to study with their friends and things like that. I do understand the reasons why they don't want to leave them alone, but it is also slightly awkward being in a situation where you know that nobody wants you to be there.
I recently had the challenge (!) of helping girl number two with her school work when the school was closed for the day. Another one of the younger ones, she’s probably the one I have the most difficulty understand: not only because she speaks Spanish at quite such top speed, but also because in so many ways she is so closed off. The teachers who come into the home are really close to refusing to teach her anymore because she is so disrespectful to them and, as I learned, when she doesn’t want to do something, she will just close off entirely and refuse to do it. When I was working with her, she refused to admit that she even knew how to read (she does) or that she remembered anything of a story that we read less than a minute ago. Like the other little girls, she has a background in sexual abuse, although in her case I’m not sure if it was in the family or in school. She has a great sense of fun which is always a good thing, but, like some of the others, she doesn’t seem to have the capacity to know when to stop. For me it is very difficult with all of them to know where playing stops and fighting begins! I would really like to be able to talk with her more, because I hate the idea that people are already giving up on her when she is still so young, even though I understand how difficult she can be.
Girl number three recently wanted to leave the home, to the extent that Salustio took her all the way back to her parents house before she decided that she wanted to come back. She told me a bit of her life story when we were washing clothes together – I can’t say that I understood all of it, but enough to know that she used to regularly run away from home to go to the street, where she was part of a prostitution gang. It’s always hard for me to imagine the girls as prostitutes, minus a few, because it just seems so unlikely! She was in school previously, but she was pulled out because her behaviour was so unstable. Shes a lovely girl, very affectionate etc, but I would say that her main real flaw is a tendency to be lazy and to form cliques that exclude other people – certainly a strong sign of insecurity in a young girl.
Girl number four has one of those ‘bright lights big city’ stories that will be familiar to anyone who has ever watched television: she came to the city to get away from her family and to find a job, and ended up being forced into prostitution. Her pimp was unhappy when she fell pregnant, and so sent some thugs to beat her up, to get rid of the baby. It was so bad that she ended up having to have an almost total skull reconstruction and can now feel nothing on one side of her head. She’s only just stopped wearing headscarves because her hair has started to grow back in. Like many of the others, she does have a front of just getting on with life and being happy, but you can occasionally see that her past does come back to haunt her and bring up issues in the present. She also has a four year old son who presently lives with her mother, and may at some point be coming to live in the home.
Significant events of the last week:
1. I have a friend! News indeed. A Bolivian girl called Sandra has also come to work at the home, and I already feel like its making a difference to have someone my own age around. Well, she is eight years older than me, but it still kind of counts as my own age!
2. There was a meeting with the girls relatives (some of them) last weekend, which seemed to go pretty well, and its always good to touch base with them.
3. I went to my first staff meeting yesterday and the chat was mainly centred around the problems that are coming in finances through the lowering value of the dollar, and the poor quality pound to dollar exchange rate. They’re losing a huge amount of money not because their support has gone down, but because the support that they have is worth less. On top of this, because of the credit crunch in the uk, people are becoming much less likely to give. So, for those of you that are into prayer, it would be really good to pray about that!
Saturday, 18 October 2008
The girls
Well, now that I've been in El Alfarero for a month it seemed a good time to introduce you to the fourteen girls who live here in the home, so you can get a better idea of who it is that I am spending all my time with!
The challenge of course is deciding which ones I should introduce you to. I'm going to start with girl a, because she's one of the girls whom I have a particular affection for - I know that I'm not supposed to play favourites, and I don't, but I think theres always going to be some people who your hears goes out to more. Although shes twelve, she only looks about 10, and she varies between acting slightly young for her age and much older. Shes one of those girls whos on the cusp of childhood and adolescence, so is still playing kids games but is also interested in the things the older girls too. Its funny how even though cultures and places change dramatically, some things about people, especially children and teenagers, are the same everywhere. One of the most tragic moments I've had while being here was when Lupe accounted her life story to me, because its just so horrific. She was abused sexually by her stepfather (as was her sister, who was raped by her step father when she was eight)and went on to work as a prostitute and take drugs, all before she arrived at the home when she was eleven or twelve. The vast majority of the time shes a complete pleasure to work with, and is very affectionate and always wants to play. But like a lot of the girls, she does have an anger problem, and when she gets angry tends to lash out rather, especially with the other younger girls. The thing that always surprises me is that when the girls get aggressive with each other, they hit each other really hard! The kind of kicks and punches that hurt you just to hear about them.
GIrl b is the youngest, whos only nine, and she was sent here from Tarija (a southern province of Bolivia) by a day centre she used to go to there. Her family situation was pretty bad, her mother and her stepfather are both drunks, and although she doesn't like to talk about, she was probably abused by her step father also. Tomorrow Yanyt and Salustio are having a meeting with the girls parents, and noteabley shes the only one without some kind of family member coming - a representative from the day centre is coming instead. Theres been quite a few problems surrounding Lidia at the home lately, as she does have a tendency to not want to do her chores etc, and (especially when she thinks no one is looking!) is really rude to the older girls. In response, this means that a lot of the aggression of the older girls is directed towards her, and we are stuck between wanting to help her improve her behaviour and repeatedly telling the others that under no circumstances are they allowed to hit her, regardless of what she said or how annoying she was being! Plus, as far as I can see, occassionally the things that irritate the other girls are as much to do with her being nine as her saying horrible things to them! Other than that, although she can be lazy she is also extremely smart: she put it off for ages, but when she eventually sat down to learn the nine times table she had it conquered in one day! Her reading is a lot better than that of some of the other girls.
Girl c was pregnant when I arrived, and gave birth before I moved all my stuff into El Alfarero. Her baby sone is tiny and extremely cute, but it amazes me how fast he is growing already! I have already learned how to change cloth nappies - although that was on the bigger kid, Marcos. She always impresses me by her commitment to her son, which does rather vary from the other mum, who inclines towards letting the other girls take care of her child. I was joking with ehr that she never stops washing clothes, because every time I see her she seems to be at the washing sinks. She is genuinely a really nice girl, whom I know had drug problems before she came to the home, and I hope that we can be friends. Shes had a few health problems lately, as the people who stiched her up after her cesaerian left some thread in there (very clever) which meant that it kept opening up and getting infected.
One more girl and then I'll leave it there for now! I may do some more tomorrow and on Thursday when I have another free day. I'm going to go for girl d, as shes perhaps one of the most unusual girls at the home. Shes extremely dyslexic and can barely read or do her times tables, and doesn't really have the motivation to overcome her dyslexia, nor do there really seem to be the facilities to help her. It looks her parents just gave up on her learning because she found it so difficult, and as a result of this shes reached the age of 17 barely literate. On top of this though, I think that she must have some kind of other learning difficulty, as she is extremely young for 17, doesn't have a very good sense of boundaries and has no idea of when to stop. I can't really explain it properly, but if you met her, you would know what I meant! On the plus side, she is extremely capable in other ways: shes really good at taking care of the little ones, for example, and cooks really well. Shes quick to apologise whenever she does something wrong.
On a personal note, this last week wasn't really easy for me, although things are looking up know after I had a chat with Salustio. I was feeling quite strongly the isolation at the home, where i don't see that many people my own age, and I only speak English when we have visitors. (I know that technically that is a good thing but it doesn't make it easy!) I was also feeling slightly unsure of whether or not I was doing a good job or not, which always makes me think that i'm doing a bad job, because if I wasn't, they would say! However, I spoke to Salustio who says that I am doing fine, and on my part, I'm going to try to make more of an effort to be friends with them as a couple. Its funny, but it never actually crossed my mind to do that - maybe because I'm not used to having friends who are so much older than me!
Until next time!
Paula
The challenge of course is deciding which ones I should introduce you to. I'm going to start with girl a, because she's one of the girls whom I have a particular affection for - I know that I'm not supposed to play favourites, and I don't, but I think theres always going to be some people who your hears goes out to more. Although shes twelve, she only looks about 10, and she varies between acting slightly young for her age and much older. Shes one of those girls whos on the cusp of childhood and adolescence, so is still playing kids games but is also interested in the things the older girls too. Its funny how even though cultures and places change dramatically, some things about people, especially children and teenagers, are the same everywhere. One of the most tragic moments I've had while being here was when Lupe accounted her life story to me, because its just so horrific. She was abused sexually by her stepfather (as was her sister, who was raped by her step father when she was eight)and went on to work as a prostitute and take drugs, all before she arrived at the home when she was eleven or twelve. The vast majority of the time shes a complete pleasure to work with, and is very affectionate and always wants to play. But like a lot of the girls, she does have an anger problem, and when she gets angry tends to lash out rather, especially with the other younger girls. The thing that always surprises me is that when the girls get aggressive with each other, they hit each other really hard! The kind of kicks and punches that hurt you just to hear about them.
GIrl b is the youngest, whos only nine, and she was sent here from Tarija (a southern province of Bolivia) by a day centre she used to go to there. Her family situation was pretty bad, her mother and her stepfather are both drunks, and although she doesn't like to talk about, she was probably abused by her step father also. Tomorrow Yanyt and Salustio are having a meeting with the girls parents, and noteabley shes the only one without some kind of family member coming - a representative from the day centre is coming instead. Theres been quite a few problems surrounding Lidia at the home lately, as she does have a tendency to not want to do her chores etc, and (especially when she thinks no one is looking!) is really rude to the older girls. In response, this means that a lot of the aggression of the older girls is directed towards her, and we are stuck between wanting to help her improve her behaviour and repeatedly telling the others that under no circumstances are they allowed to hit her, regardless of what she said or how annoying she was being! Plus, as far as I can see, occassionally the things that irritate the other girls are as much to do with her being nine as her saying horrible things to them! Other than that, although she can be lazy she is also extremely smart: she put it off for ages, but when she eventually sat down to learn the nine times table she had it conquered in one day! Her reading is a lot better than that of some of the other girls.
Girl c was pregnant when I arrived, and gave birth before I moved all my stuff into El Alfarero. Her baby sone is tiny and extremely cute, but it amazes me how fast he is growing already! I have already learned how to change cloth nappies - although that was on the bigger kid, Marcos. She always impresses me by her commitment to her son, which does rather vary from the other mum, who inclines towards letting the other girls take care of her child. I was joking with ehr that she never stops washing clothes, because every time I see her she seems to be at the washing sinks. She is genuinely a really nice girl, whom I know had drug problems before she came to the home, and I hope that we can be friends. Shes had a few health problems lately, as the people who stiched her up after her cesaerian left some thread in there (very clever) which meant that it kept opening up and getting infected.
One more girl and then I'll leave it there for now! I may do some more tomorrow and on Thursday when I have another free day. I'm going to go for girl d, as shes perhaps one of the most unusual girls at the home. Shes extremely dyslexic and can barely read or do her times tables, and doesn't really have the motivation to overcome her dyslexia, nor do there really seem to be the facilities to help her. It looks her parents just gave up on her learning because she found it so difficult, and as a result of this shes reached the age of 17 barely literate. On top of this though, I think that she must have some kind of other learning difficulty, as she is extremely young for 17, doesn't have a very good sense of boundaries and has no idea of when to stop. I can't really explain it properly, but if you met her, you would know what I meant! On the plus side, she is extremely capable in other ways: shes really good at taking care of the little ones, for example, and cooks really well. Shes quick to apologise whenever she does something wrong.
On a personal note, this last week wasn't really easy for me, although things are looking up know after I had a chat with Salustio. I was feeling quite strongly the isolation at the home, where i don't see that many people my own age, and I only speak English when we have visitors. (I know that technically that is a good thing but it doesn't make it easy!) I was also feeling slightly unsure of whether or not I was doing a good job or not, which always makes me think that i'm doing a bad job, because if I wasn't, they would say! However, I spoke to Salustio who says that I am doing fine, and on my part, I'm going to try to make more of an effort to be friends with them as a couple. Its funny, but it never actually crossed my mind to do that - maybe because I'm not used to having friends who are so much older than me!
Until next time!
Paula
Saturday, 4 October 2008
A day in the life of me
I thought it would be a good idea to run you, dear reader (I've decided to go all Charlotte Bronte on you all) through a day in the life of me as that way its easier for me to give some details that otherwise I would probably forget. I've decided to go for this Wednesday past, and I'll give you all the details that I can possible remember! It may just begin to resemble a rough outline of what happens in a normal day but hey ho, I'm sure that will still be interesting.
Tuesday evening was my turn to sleep in with the little girls so I was woken up at 5.45 (it no longer feels as horrific as it did to begin with) by Salustio knocking on the window to say that it was time to get up. I called out to wake up the girls, shook a couple of them, and then padded over to the other block where my room is to brush my teeth and change. Most people here seem to sleep in the clothes they wear during the day and then change after showering, but I'm still a defiante fan of pyjamas.
At 6.10 we have devotionals which either one of the girls or one of the staff members does, where they read out a little bit of the bible and give there thoughts on it. After that we have breakfast, which is occasionally suspiciously deep fried to count as morning food! After breakfast the girls do chores, and I normally go and do my quiet time at this point. Half of the girls, who are in school, leave at about half seven quarter to eight, and I stay with the ones left behind.
The first task of the day is generally for the girls to do the homework that they've been set by the teachers who come to the home in the afternoon. A lot of them are really quite behind on their education, and one girl is so dyslexic that at seventeen it is almost impossible for her to understand the concept of tables, let alone be able to learn them. I'm remembering a lot of the maths that I had forgotten (especially long multiplication!) but a lot of the things they do I learned how to do a different way, so I try not to help them to avoid any possible confusion!
When they're finished their homework there's not a huge amount for them to do, which is why I sometimes wish the teachers would give them more work to do! But they do have reasonabley short attention spans so its probably a good thing. They do handcrafty things, making bracelets and cross stich. Theres normally some kind of exciting Christian reggueton background to these activities - yes, you are jealous, my cool music loving friends. Normally everyone (or almost everyone!) helps with cooking lunch as well, and it is quite a lot of work to cook for about 20 people every day. Its interesting to see all the different things that they eat here though, and to get to help making them. I did slice my thumb open the other day though, as they don't really use chopping boards.
We eat lunch when the girls come back from school. (In case you haven't already noticed I haev completely forgotten what happened on wednesday and this is just turning into a specimin day!)After lunch they go to do more cleaning, and I normally go take a nap. I do love napping! Especially when I have to get up at such a ridiculous time of the morning. :-/ The afternoon is normally pretty quiet, the teachers come and take different groups of the girls at a time, and the rest of them play sports or do more cross stich activities. The way I'm writing this makes it sounds like every day is so perfect and calm, but as with every family, each day brings its challenges, especially if the girls are feeling particularly aggressive. Probably the first time I've ever had to pull someone off someone else was here!
The girls go to shower at about six o'clock, and then I have to do exciting things like go fetch shampoo for the little ones from the store cupboard. Quite a lot of my day does seem to be spent locking and unlocking doors, and fetching soap, shampoo, sanitory towels, pens, paper and numerous other things from various places! After that we eat our evening meal which is normally something quite small, like bread with a cup of tea. The tea they drink here, along with the coffee and hot chocolate they drink, is mainly just sugar and water but, you know, theres definately worse things you could drink!
After dinner, Yanyt goes with two of the older girls to evening classes in the next village. In the evenings we either read the Bible or an extract from a book, and sometimes we spend some time praying or singing. Concentration levels vary! After that, and before bed (at 9)is just relaxing time, listening to music, maybe watching a film. Yesterday, partly in an effort to combat the total lack of exercise I've been getting, I played a game that I forget the name of with the little girls. The one where you have a long piece of elastic that you have to jump in and out of. It was much fun, and they thought it was hilarious!
Good news that I've now reached a stage where I'm not so tired when the girls have gone to bed that I feel the need to go to bed straight away as well. This is defiante progress. :-)
Now away and leave me comments! It makes me feel like people are actually reading my ramblings....
Tuesday evening was my turn to sleep in with the little girls so I was woken up at 5.45 (it no longer feels as horrific as it did to begin with) by Salustio knocking on the window to say that it was time to get up. I called out to wake up the girls, shook a couple of them, and then padded over to the other block where my room is to brush my teeth and change. Most people here seem to sleep in the clothes they wear during the day and then change after showering, but I'm still a defiante fan of pyjamas.
At 6.10 we have devotionals which either one of the girls or one of the staff members does, where they read out a little bit of the bible and give there thoughts on it. After that we have breakfast, which is occasionally suspiciously deep fried to count as morning food! After breakfast the girls do chores, and I normally go and do my quiet time at this point. Half of the girls, who are in school, leave at about half seven quarter to eight, and I stay with the ones left behind.
The first task of the day is generally for the girls to do the homework that they've been set by the teachers who come to the home in the afternoon. A lot of them are really quite behind on their education, and one girl is so dyslexic that at seventeen it is almost impossible for her to understand the concept of tables, let alone be able to learn them. I'm remembering a lot of the maths that I had forgotten (especially long multiplication!) but a lot of the things they do I learned how to do a different way, so I try not to help them to avoid any possible confusion!
When they're finished their homework there's not a huge amount for them to do, which is why I sometimes wish the teachers would give them more work to do! But they do have reasonabley short attention spans so its probably a good thing. They do handcrafty things, making bracelets and cross stich. Theres normally some kind of exciting Christian reggueton background to these activities - yes, you are jealous, my cool music loving friends. Normally everyone (or almost everyone!) helps with cooking lunch as well, and it is quite a lot of work to cook for about 20 people every day. Its interesting to see all the different things that they eat here though, and to get to help making them. I did slice my thumb open the other day though, as they don't really use chopping boards.
We eat lunch when the girls come back from school. (In case you haven't already noticed I haev completely forgotten what happened on wednesday and this is just turning into a specimin day!)After lunch they go to do more cleaning, and I normally go take a nap. I do love napping! Especially when I have to get up at such a ridiculous time of the morning. :-/ The afternoon is normally pretty quiet, the teachers come and take different groups of the girls at a time, and the rest of them play sports or do more cross stich activities. The way I'm writing this makes it sounds like every day is so perfect and calm, but as with every family, each day brings its challenges, especially if the girls are feeling particularly aggressive. Probably the first time I've ever had to pull someone off someone else was here!
The girls go to shower at about six o'clock, and then I have to do exciting things like go fetch shampoo for the little ones from the store cupboard. Quite a lot of my day does seem to be spent locking and unlocking doors, and fetching soap, shampoo, sanitory towels, pens, paper and numerous other things from various places! After that we eat our evening meal which is normally something quite small, like bread with a cup of tea. The tea they drink here, along with the coffee and hot chocolate they drink, is mainly just sugar and water but, you know, theres definately worse things you could drink!
After dinner, Yanyt goes with two of the older girls to evening classes in the next village. In the evenings we either read the Bible or an extract from a book, and sometimes we spend some time praying or singing. Concentration levels vary! After that, and before bed (at 9)is just relaxing time, listening to music, maybe watching a film. Yesterday, partly in an effort to combat the total lack of exercise I've been getting, I played a game that I forget the name of with the little girls. The one where you have a long piece of elastic that you have to jump in and out of. It was much fun, and they thought it was hilarious!
Good news that I've now reached a stage where I'm not so tired when the girls have gone to bed that I feel the need to go to bed straight away as well. This is defiante progress. :-)
Now away and leave me comments! It makes me feel like people are actually reading my ramblings....
Thursday, 25 September 2008
The Big Move
Once again, sorry for the delay in updating this blog, its partly because I am useless (sob) and partly because I haven´t had much access to the internet. Mainly the later. I have now been officially living in El Alfarero home for a week and two days and it has so far been an up and down ride of challenges and good times, which I imagine is the way that it will continue.
I thought I'd begin by just telling you a little bit about my living situation. I'm sharing a room with the daughter of the people who run the home, which is extremely nice of her, and together with Yanyt (who runs the home along with Salustio) I sleep one night on, one night off in the room where the younger girls sleep just in case anything happens during the night. Probably the most challenging thing about that so far has been my epic attempts to lock the door: its so stiff that I managed to turn it so hard that the head of the key came off, leaving the rest stuck in the door. Possibley the most embaressing moment of my life so far (of which there have already been many!). I've resorted to asking one of the girls to do it for me - there really is nothing like asking a ten year old for help to make you feel good about yourself!
The daily routine is reasonably quiet, although it does involve getting up at a heinously early quarter to six. I can honestly think of no reason why that could possibly be necessary! I'm going to come back to Scotland superdisciplined and an early riser. I got up at seven today and actually felt like I'd had a lie in - weird timess. We have devotioals at ten past six, then chores and then breakfast. Most of the girls go to school in the morning, and the ones who stay in the centre do a mixture of handcrafty stuff, tasks set by the teachers who come in the afternoon and cooking lunch. The food is reeeaaally good, but I have lost all my previous capacity to cook as everything is so different here. Hopefully I will become super cook!
I'd say that we have time for a few highlights and lowlights now! Yesterday was the day set aside for celebrating santa cruz, so we went on a trip to the sand dunes which was lots of fun until it came to be time to go home and the car got stuck in the sand, and then again, and the again, so it took us several hours just to move it - but everyone was extremely nice and so many people offered to help us which was lovely!
I spent some time with Yanyt talking with the younger girls so that they would be able to tell me some of their stories, and I would actually be able to understand. I wouldn't say that it was a highlight, as its never good to hear such distressing stories, but it helped me to understand them a little better. One of the girls, who is now 12, has already been a prostitute, and it just makes me sick to think about it. I feel so much love for them that I can't really put into words, and that love is enough to cover an awful lot of things, because they do have a tendency to be quite aggesive when they're not being extremely affectionate. Its understandable really.
Monday I went with Sergio to help him with his dentistry, because most of the girls have fairlly horrific teeth. I felt very important, and I did all the sunction things that dental nurses normally do. Future career? Possibly not, but it was lots of fun!
Low lights since the last time I wrote basically just involve me being tired all the time, as I am working quite long hours and I'm only beginning to get used to getting up this early! Sometimes I feel a little bit useless bcause I'm still not that sure how everything works, but hopefully that will pass in time.
THe poltiical situation here is still not great, I forget if I mentioned that in previous blogs or not. The only way hat its really affected me has been that some of the roads are being blocked off by protesters, and I haven't been able to continue applying for my visa as immigration is closed. But Bolvia could really do with your prayers right now!
I fully intended to put up some pictures this time, but like a dunce i remembered my camara but forgot the lead for the computer. Whoops! So sorry about that, and hopefully there will be some there next time.
I thought I'd begin by just telling you a little bit about my living situation. I'm sharing a room with the daughter of the people who run the home, which is extremely nice of her, and together with Yanyt (who runs the home along with Salustio) I sleep one night on, one night off in the room where the younger girls sleep just in case anything happens during the night. Probably the most challenging thing about that so far has been my epic attempts to lock the door: its so stiff that I managed to turn it so hard that the head of the key came off, leaving the rest stuck in the door. Possibley the most embaressing moment of my life so far (of which there have already been many!). I've resorted to asking one of the girls to do it for me - there really is nothing like asking a ten year old for help to make you feel good about yourself!
The daily routine is reasonably quiet, although it does involve getting up at a heinously early quarter to six. I can honestly think of no reason why that could possibly be necessary! I'm going to come back to Scotland superdisciplined and an early riser. I got up at seven today and actually felt like I'd had a lie in - weird timess. We have devotioals at ten past six, then chores and then breakfast. Most of the girls go to school in the morning, and the ones who stay in the centre do a mixture of handcrafty stuff, tasks set by the teachers who come in the afternoon and cooking lunch. The food is reeeaaally good, but I have lost all my previous capacity to cook as everything is so different here. Hopefully I will become super cook!
I'd say that we have time for a few highlights and lowlights now! Yesterday was the day set aside for celebrating santa cruz, so we went on a trip to the sand dunes which was lots of fun until it came to be time to go home and the car got stuck in the sand, and then again, and the again, so it took us several hours just to move it - but everyone was extremely nice and so many people offered to help us which was lovely!
I spent some time with Yanyt talking with the younger girls so that they would be able to tell me some of their stories, and I would actually be able to understand. I wouldn't say that it was a highlight, as its never good to hear such distressing stories, but it helped me to understand them a little better. One of the girls, who is now 12, has already been a prostitute, and it just makes me sick to think about it. I feel so much love for them that I can't really put into words, and that love is enough to cover an awful lot of things, because they do have a tendency to be quite aggesive when they're not being extremely affectionate. Its understandable really.
Monday I went with Sergio to help him with his dentistry, because most of the girls have fairlly horrific teeth. I felt very important, and I did all the sunction things that dental nurses normally do. Future career? Possibly not, but it was lots of fun!
Low lights since the last time I wrote basically just involve me being tired all the time, as I am working quite long hours and I'm only beginning to get used to getting up this early! Sometimes I feel a little bit useless bcause I'm still not that sure how everything works, but hopefully that will pass in time.
THe poltiical situation here is still not great, I forget if I mentioned that in previous blogs or not. The only way hat its really affected me has been that some of the roads are being blocked off by protesters, and I haven't been able to continue applying for my visa as immigration is closed. But Bolvia could really do with your prayers right now!
I fully intended to put up some pictures this time, but like a dunce i remembered my camara but forgot the lead for the computer. Whoops! So sorry about that, and hopefully there will be some there next time.
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