UNTETHERED: Davy College

Today I had the pleasure of visiting a school with children who are in poverty. The school is called Manthoc. The "h" is silent. We went on the intention of creating a relationship with the children in Manthoc and our more privileged children from Davy. The morning was wonderful. The school welcomed us with open arms and the children played ice breaker games, had a snack together and went on a tour of the school. As you will see in the pictures if you can read spanish which I am improving everyday. Their mission is about teaching children, young children, how to work and gain skills that will provide them a job in Cajamarca or another Peruvian community as well as teach them the other basics. In this school they have a garden that they tend, a cuy farm that they manage, they are building a greenhouse, they have a bakery, and a wood-shop which isn't doing very well because they are unable to find enough materials.

My first week at davy college has been great. The whole Davy community is warm hearted and welcoming. As you can see from the previous post, I start my day with a brisk morning hour long walk which can include dogs chasing me and avoiding burros, chickens and cows. I begin the walk in the dark and walk through sunrise. The sun on the mountains is beautiful and the dogs chasing me get my blood moving for the day to come. It is a very inspiring way to begin the day. If not a little chaotic.

I arrive to school in about an hour. The school grounds are an oasis in the middle of a little chaotic city. It´s quiet, manicured, and calm. My secretary usually beats me to the office by minutes, I get into my office and get the music playing and get things ready for the day for about 20 minutes after which I go out to greet the parents and children arriving to school. The city has such a heavy taxi culture that a lot of the children arrive in taxis and combis, many also have their parents bring them in normal cars. I would say that there are as many taxis as there are private vehicles. I try to greet every person saying "Buenas Dias" to the parents and "Good Morning" to the children as we are an english speaking school. The school is made up of about 99 percent peruvian national children. The school was more of an integrated international school but many of the expats that worked at the mine left and now the mine has mostly peruvian nationals working at it and the school is financed by the mine.

After the morning entry I go and visit all of the classrooms and begin to make connections with the children. The children in this school are no less mischievous than their American counterparts but they are much more polite about the mischief when they get corrected. After visiting classes, I do my regular routine of checking email and other administrative things as I did in American schools. My day in that respect is about the same except that all the hallways are outside and we are surrounded by mountains. The scenery is just beautiful!

Recess is heavy on the soccer, and can these kids play! I watch the second graders, running around in their dress shoes and uniforms slide tackling, head shooting and kicking the ball with almost complete accuracy. Interestingly enough, they all understand their positions on the field. They are spread out, the goalie and the other defenders wait on the other end of the field until the ball invades their area.... And these are the second graders, the level of skill increases dramatically as the grade level increases.

The older girls are a little left out on the playground as they mostly walk around and talk or play some jump rope game until it diminishes into pull each other around with the jumprope. Very similar things going on on the playground as in the states. This week, one of the girls asked for a volleyball. They don´t give out playground equipment to the classrooms so I had to check one out to my office where the girl can retrieve it and return it at the end of recess.

Lunch is prepared fresh by a family that owns a restaurant in town. The food tastes very good but I have been told it will get a little redundant. Of course like every good peruvian meal it comes with both potatoes of some sort and rice.... But usually with fresh juice of some variety that I usually can't identify. It is sweet, thick and tan colored as well. As usual, I eat with the children and work on developing those good relations with them.

The afternoon can consist of many different meetings and such. I have had a principals meeting, and I have to say that I am very pleased with our management team. They are thoughtful accepting of ideas and willing to debate thoughts and ideas with respect and professionalism. I can´t ask for more than that. I have also spent a lot of time with my teaching staff. They are all very hard workers and willing to entertain some of my sometimes unusual quirks.

The day ends with me saying goodbye to the parents and children. I then finish up in the office and hire a cab for the ride home.

Yesterday, I had to negotiate a reasonable price with the driver. He tried to charge me 15 soles instead of the standard 10, I got him down to 12 which is about a .90 cent difference in price. It doesn´t seem like much in the dollar equivalent but the soles are spent much like dollars in so I basically got 3 dollars off my fare. The cab ride home is always a different path. Most of the time it is through different dirt roads than I take in the morning, last night it was through the rush hour traffic of the city. Driving here is another story for another blog post. It is best to leave the driving to the professionals

Yesterday at work we had an "old school furniture" sale. They pulled all the old furniture out of the warehouse and sold it to the employees. We got a large teacher desk to supplement our office furniture at home. You might wonder how I expect to get that home without a car. Well I told my secretary and she arranged to have someone go to school tomorrow afternoon and hire a cab who will somehow fit it in or on their cab and deliver it to my house. Actually there are two desks, one for me and one for my neighbor so they will bring two desks over here. All of this cost me 30 soles which is a little less that $12.00 USD and all I have to do is wait for it at my house. It´s not a pretty desk which is why they are selling. Imagine the quality of desk our schools would sell before they threw them away.

Now time for some pictures.....