Colibri Children are my favorite

I am having trouble posting pictures on here, but for those of you with facebook, they are all posted on there and I will continue to try to figure out how to get them on here for others.

Tuesday during the day I went shopping with my housemate Michael and bought a few gifts for the family. Things are surprisingly cheap here for it being such a large tourist area and the vendors are easy to bargain with. I still have much more to buy but I got some good prices and figured I would get them now before I run out of money! We went to a market called El Molino that was more like an outdoor shopping mall and then after went downtown to the many shops there.

Later in the day I went to Colibri for work and met more of the volunteers that I will be with this summer: Annie from Washington, Helen from Oregon, Laura from Australia and some others whose names I don’t remember from Holland, Germany and Israel. I have to walk up extremely steep alleys from the main Plaza to get to work where I am welcomed by the kids screaming “amiga, amiga!” and running up to give me hugs. The older ones give me the customary kiss on the cheek that is a common greeting in Latin America. The kids are so much fun and brighten my day when I see their smiling faces. I do homework with them first and then we play games, draw and goof around. Around 6 or 6:30 pm they are fed a cup of warm milk and rice called “luncha.” Yesterday, Wednesday, we went to the park which was a long walk up even steeper cobblestone stairs. I saw two llamas on the way and the streets were scattered with numerous stray dogs of course. The kids played on the swings, monkey bars, see-saws, and slides and insisted on me taking pictures of them doing everything. My favorite little boy is Juan who is 4 years old. He pees his pants daily and then wants me to hold him, carry him everywhere and sit on my lap at all times. Normally I would be grossed out but I can’t resist his adorable little face when he puts his arms up and says “arriba” which means up. I want to take every kid home and feed them, bathe them, brush their teeth and give them new, clean clothes. Every child is unique in his/her own way and it makes me so happy to get to know each and every one and spend time being a positive influence in their lives. I have been speaking only Spanish here and I have gotten a lot more confident with it just in the 5 days I have been here. The only time I speak English is with the other volunteers but even then most of them are taking Spanish classes and want me to help them practice. Last night we all went out dancing at a bar called Ukukus that was mostly locals and played Latin music. It was a lot of fun and I ended up meeting a nice Peruvian guy named Mario who I danced with most of the night. He showed me how to salsa and today he met me after work and we went for a walk around Cusco. Today at Colibri the boys were crazy and were jumping all over me the entire time! Juan wanted me to spin him around and his friend Jose was throwing himself on my shoulders and flipping over me. Then Liza wanted to braid my hair and I helped a group of kids put together a Disney princess puzzle that entailed searching through a huge cardboard box of pieces from probably 10 different puzzles.

We go to the Sacred Valley and Machu Pichu this weekend which I am very excited for. Next week we are going to try to go white water rafting one day, then next weekend possibly Lake Titicaca and Puno on the border of Bolivia. Later in June is my Amazon tour with two other volunteers. Adios!

-Hillary-