Con mi hermano...

For the last few days I´ve been babysitting Gabriel, my "little brother" because his school has been cancel and Dr. Haydee has work and/or class. I´m getting better at cooking Peruvian style, and have been "adopted" into the family. I´ve promised to return (probably in the Summer), so everyone, start booking tickets to come with me!!

I LOVE third-world amusment parks! Unfortunately, I only have my disposable camera now, but here's a mental image: for roughly $0.33 Gabriel and I could play all afternoon on really high, dangerous, fast playground equipment that would never pass inspection in the US.

The plans for the jungle have been canceled (the location they wanted me to go was too dangerous), but I´m not disappointed; I´m such a part of my family here now, that an extra week in Cusco won't be bad at all :)

Arequipa y football

Some photos of Arequipa. Although you can´t always see them in the pictures, sourounding the city are snow-capped volcanoes. If you have facebook, photos from the full adventure are posted.

The volcanoe behind a small lake in the country side.

Our group in the main square. Note the palm trees in front of a replica of the Notre Dame Cathedral. Beautiful!

Horseback riding in the countryside!!

Because it was the anniversary of Arequipa, there were tons of parades (below) and fairs . Rhiannon and I got a free make-over at one of the fairs (right). They were so excited to see our skin and eye color. During the process, the Avon girls kept remarking about how beautiful the makeup around our eyes turned out. Although it photographed well, we ended up looking what Americans would consider a little over-done and/or trashy. However, the stylists from Peru considered it an exotic look and we were photographed for a long time before we were let go.

Below: part of our group at a national soccer championship between the local team and Uraguay. We won 2 to 0. I´ve been told by a lot of my friends who didn´t go, that we were on TV. I´m still looking for the video on Youtube.

Mas que 30 dias...

Thanks to everyone who has been following this blog! I´m so glad that so many of you want to help!! At the end of this blog, you can find the address, etc. for donations.


It´s a long one, so for those of you who just want to skim, here are the highlights of the last few weeks:


- Climbed a mountain
- Went to Arequipa
- Partied with the locals
- I´m living in a new house
- Rode on an over-crowded bus for 11 hours
- Learned some spanish, worked at the hospital, etc.
- Going to the jungle in September?



This month I've moved into the family home of one of the doctors at the clinic. Even though all of the doctors in Peru have the same amount of education and experience, if they choose to serve the poor rather than the wealthy, they make less than a quarter of the salary of doctors who serve the rich. Dr. Haydee (below on the right) is a single mom who was having trouble making her rent on a doctor's salary. One of the volunteers donated some beds for a spare room so that she could rent it out to volunteers at the clinic.


We're still continuing to work on improving conditions at Belempampa. This week we are constructing shelves so that they can re-organize their patient histories. Originally, the forms were stacked in piles arranged numerically by the last two digits of a seven-digit number, separated in two piles of the same number... sometimes, maybe... (???) While it would take over a year to re-organize the thousands of files alphabetically, we can at least arrange them numerically, vertically, in order, and in one place. (Pictures coming soon.) We are also installing seat belts in the "ambulance" which right now is a just a truck with a backseat for the patient. I think the next step for the ambulance will be medical supplies of some sort...



For those of you who are curious, here is link ([URL=http://travel.webshots.com/photo/2749123230105416534yMdCgG][IMG]http://thumb14.webshots.net/t/55/555/1/23/23/2749123230105416534yMdCgG_th.jpg[/IMG][/URL] ) to pictures of the delivery room in Belempampa (considered the most sterile and high-tech in the hospital). One of the requests from the obstetricians who work there is for a sink or any kind of access to water for bathing the babies, cleaning, and hand-washing. (As of now, we constructed a mobile cart with a basin and water which they use in some of the exam rooms- also missing sinks. )

The other pic is of us volunteers at an orphanage. The child in Courtney's lap is one of many that have been found wandering alone in the jungle.


Also: pictures coming soon!!!!! - This weekend we went to Arequipa, one of the most beautiful places I´ve ever seen. Snow-capped volcanoes, elaborate churches, and palm trees. It was the aniversary of the City, so the weekend was filled with parades, fairs and parties day and night. (Apparently, 7am is a normal time to leave a discoteca if you´re Peruvian). However, my purse was stolen along with my camera, so pictures from here on may be a while in coming.








HOW TO HELP:


I´m still helping my teacher make the bilingual website, but you can mail donations for the street children (such as candy, used clothes and shoes, toys, toothbrushes, etc) to:


Jorge Alberto Huaman Condori
Tandapata 676-B
San Blas, Cusco- Peru


Keep in mind that it can take up to a month for the package to reach Peru, so you would need to mail items by October to make it here by Cusco. If you would like to become more involved, let me know and I can make you a contact for the website.


If you would rather donate money, I can ask about a paypal\ bank account for the Street Children. To donate money to Belempampa, we are currently working with a rotary here, but you can also paypal funds directly to the volunteer organization at payment@maximonivel.com. Just make sure that you make sure the message says Belempampa.


And you can always email me with questions!!






There is so much more that I´ve experienced here, but words on a blog site just aren´t enough. I don´t even think pictures are enough. If you have a free afternoon sometime when I get back to the States, maybe I´ll try to tell the story and do it justice.

September 12th

I have decided to extend my stay until September 12th.

It may be hard to understand unless you are here, but let me tell about the projects I'm working on.

The new program created by Daniel, another volunteer at Belempampa, has really taken off. Basically it's a way for outside organizations to donate to the hospital and also for us to make sure that Belempampa has more of the nescessary supplies it needs. I've had the privilage to be a part of several meetings with the Ministry of Health here in Cusco to update health standards in Belempampa and sourounding hospitals. Yeah, within the last week it's turned from an idea to help the hospital into a reality involving more organizations than we imagined. You can check out Daniel's preliminary website at www.friendsofbelempampa.org.

For the last few days, I've been studying pharmacology with a doctor here so that she can update her notes from 10 years ago. They do not have any access to medical information when questions arise, and books are really scarce. I'm trying to work with my school, the medical school, and college of nursing to establish a rotation for students here. So far, my school will be sending books and it looks like they're really interested establishing a connection with Maximo Nivel and Belempampa. The meeting with the deans to discuss the new rotation is August 17th-ish...so keep your fingers crossed.

My spanish teacher, Jorge, and his family try to feed and clothe all of the street children in their area every Chirstmas. Ninos de la calle, or street children, are a big problem in Cusco because families cannot afford to keep their children and most orphanages are over-crowed and have a time limit of a few months and then the childeren must be turnned back into the street and cannot go back to any orphanage. Ever. I'm helping Jorge start a bi-lingual website to bring awareness and try to network for donations such as clothing, shoes, food etc. Right now his family helps about 60 children ages 6 to 13 every Christmas, but it's a stuggle to help out on an average Peruvian salary. Eventually, the website will be www.navidadencusco.org, aka Christmas in Cusco.

If you or anyone you know would like to help with any project in anyway, shoot me an email. It can be anything from just giving me the contact email of an interested church, to mailing some toothbrushes or even a pack of pens.

It seems unreal the impact that just four or five of us volunteers have made at Belempampa and beyond in just under three short weeks once we came together.

Ask around.

:)

Valle Sacrado

Into my third week in Cusco. And there is so much to write about.

Sunday was spent touring the Sacred Valley of the Incas with some of the new volunteers. Therefore, some more amazing pictures of Peru and its ruins. I still can't get over how surreal the landscape is here.



Once again, everything is a lot bigger than it seems in the pics. These terraces (above) are each about 4 feet high.




These steps, too close to the edge for comfort. But we still climbed them.



Below, a cross in Chinchero against the night sky.