Beginning of Week 1 (Monday)

Monday morning we woke up, had breakfast and got a chance to meet the new volunteers that arrived over the weekend. Approximately 10 new volunteers arrived at the house from who were enrolled in the CCS “Insight” program bringing the total to approximately 30 people in the house.

We then headed to our placements promptly at 8:00am after eating breakfast. Today was a slow day at Fe y Alegria as the English Teacher Julissa did not have classes and there was no physical education class. I was placed in the computer lab and provided assistance to students that needed help researching their homework assignments.

I spent my first day in the computer department and found it to be boring as the students are familiar with and know how to use computers. One of the students who introduced themselves to me were two girls named Maryt and Angela. These two stood out to me because they were studying to speak either Japanese or Korean. I found this to be very unique and they seemed to have a good grasp of the language. Maryt also asked me for help with a USB disk drive that she had. She explained that It did not work and became hot when she tried to use it in a computer. I told her that I would try to see if I could fix if she brought it to school with her.

After that class was over I spent the rest of the day with the computer lab teacher Mario. We spoke about various issues at the school politics and education. He told me that He is working on his masters degree and needed to practice English because most information concerning his degree program was written in English. I then showed him how to use www.sharedtalk.com and he instantly fell in love with it.

Meeting on Villa El Salvador

We had a meeting with Kique and one of the CCS Staff members Tony who is from Villa El Salvador. Tony told us about the history of Villa El Salvador and how the people turned it from a patch of desert sand into what it is today. Villa El Salvador began in the 1970s as an area to provide urgent housing needs for people coming from the mountain regions in search for life in the city. The community was largely self organized and was recognized for it. The city was organized into residential, commercial and recreational zones. Many of the habitants were descendents of the Incas and its evident in the way they organized the city. The zone was also hit hard by terrorism from Sendero Luminoso or the Shining Path during the 1980s. The history of Villa El Salvador is relatively short but was found it to be very interesting.

Inca Market

After our placements we went back to the CCS House had lunch and headed to the Inca market to do shopping. The Inca market is located in Miraflores and is a market where people sell souvenirs and jewelry targeted at tourists.