I've had quite a few of you ask me what type of work I'm actually doing here with Juconi. Which means, and this doesn't surprise me, that I've been less clear than I thought I was being. So, to clarify, here's what a typical week looks like for me.
Monday: I'm out of the office and doing house visits. I meet another one of my co-workers at 7:30, and we take a bus to the northern outskirts of Guayaquil, to a barrio called La Balerio. We spend the day visiting three different families, and, because we're both new to Juconi, we conduct "Operación Amistad" with the eleven children we see over the course of the day. Operation Friendship. Jenga and Uno and Pick Up Sticks and coloring pages and princess cutouts and storybooks and more coloring pages and dancing to Marc Antony's latest hits. Little by little learning favorite colors and family dynamics.
Tuesday: I'm in the office today, more thankful than I'm willing to admit for the break from the dust-covered barrios. The air-conditioning blows sweetly, and I pull a cardigan out of my bag before going downstairs to the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee that isn't instant. I spend the day planning the home visits that will come later in the week and the girls' group that I run each Friday. Pinterest, a website I once naively mocked, is open on the computer screen. I look through pages and pages of ideas, a parasite feeding on the creativity of others, searching for the recycled art project that will win the affection of teenage girls.
Wednesday: Today is my favorite day of house visits. I meet one of my co-workers at 6:45, and we once again head North to the barrio, Lomas de la Florida. I accompany her on her first two visits of the morning, and while she talks with the mothers, I meet with two teenage girls, ages 14 and 17. We make friendship bracelets and listen to Reik or Miriam Hernandez. I ask questions, probably too many, but they answer them, more willingly this week than last week. In the afternoon I'm passed to another co-worker for our afternoon visits. I build lego castles and color alphabet pages with a 3 year old girl who doesn't say a word in the hour and a half I'm with her. And I finish out the day working with a 15 year old mom and her 1 year old son, wondering how many resources it would take to disrupt these patterns of living.
Thursday: I'm doing house visits in the North again, this time visiting nine children in three different barrios. It's a long day; my co-worker and I spend almost as much time on buses as in the homes. Most of kids I work with today are six years old or younger. And for as much as I burnt out on working with this age group in the past couple of years, I know how to work with them. They're not as mysterious or jaded as teenagers, and, at the end of the week, I'm thankful for that.
Friday: I'm in the office today. I bring out the brownies I baked last night, part of my own Operation Friendship here in the office, and offer them to my co-workers. (Shameless integration tactics.) I spend the morning gathering materials for my afternoon girls' group and attending office meetings. By 2:30 somewhere between ten and fifteen girls show up, and we spend the next two hours together. This week we're embroidering our names on home-made paper journals. As a group we're definitely still in the first hour of Stand & Deliver, the part of the movie when the teacher's patience is tried again and again and again. The part everyone forgets about by the end of the movie when the inspirational teacher has drawn all of the positive potential from his once unruly, misunderstood students. So I do a lot of deep breathing exercises and try to let go of my love for rules and order and logic, comforts that have not been afforded to these girls.
I hope that gives you all a better sense of how I'm spending my time with Juconi. Right now, the house visits are a really great way to get to know the population that Juconi serves. In upcoming months, I hope to trade in a day of these visits to start a group for adolescent mothers with their children. Juconi seems really open to any ideas I may have, and I'm looking forward to taking advantage of that freedom.
Thanks for reading and for caring about what my life looks like here. All my love from Ecuador.
Tuesday: I'm in the office today, more thankful than I'm willing to admit for the break from the dust-covered barrios. The air-conditioning blows sweetly, and I pull a cardigan out of my bag before going downstairs to the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee that isn't instant. I spend the day planning the home visits that will come later in the week and the girls' group that I run each Friday. Pinterest, a website I once naively mocked, is open on the computer screen. I look through pages and pages of ideas, a parasite feeding on the creativity of others, searching for the recycled art project that will win the affection of teenage girls.
Wednesday: Today is my favorite day of house visits. I meet one of my co-workers at 6:45, and we once again head North to the barrio, Lomas de la Florida. I accompany her on her first two visits of the morning, and while she talks with the mothers, I meet with two teenage girls, ages 14 and 17. We make friendship bracelets and listen to Reik or Miriam Hernandez. I ask questions, probably too many, but they answer them, more willingly this week than last week. In the afternoon I'm passed to another co-worker for our afternoon visits. I build lego castles and color alphabet pages with a 3 year old girl who doesn't say a word in the hour and a half I'm with her. And I finish out the day working with a 15 year old mom and her 1 year old son, wondering how many resources it would take to disrupt these patterns of living.
Thursday: I'm doing house visits in the North again, this time visiting nine children in three different barrios. It's a long day; my co-worker and I spend almost as much time on buses as in the homes. Most of kids I work with today are six years old or younger. And for as much as I burnt out on working with this age group in the past couple of years, I know how to work with them. They're not as mysterious or jaded as teenagers, and, at the end of the week, I'm thankful for that.
Friday: I'm in the office today. I bring out the brownies I baked last night, part of my own Operation Friendship here in the office, and offer them to my co-workers. (Shameless integration tactics.) I spend the morning gathering materials for my afternoon girls' group and attending office meetings. By 2:30 somewhere between ten and fifteen girls show up, and we spend the next two hours together. This week we're embroidering our names on home-made paper journals. As a group we're definitely still in the first hour of Stand & Deliver, the part of the movie when the teacher's patience is tried again and again and again. The part everyone forgets about by the end of the movie when the inspirational teacher has drawn all of the positive potential from his once unruly, misunderstood students. So I do a lot of deep breathing exercises and try to let go of my love for rules and order and logic, comforts that have not been afforded to these girls.
I hope that gives you all a better sense of how I'm spending my time with Juconi. Right now, the house visits are a really great way to get to know the population that Juconi serves. In upcoming months, I hope to trade in a day of these visits to start a group for adolescent mothers with their children. Juconi seems really open to any ideas I may have, and I'm looking forward to taking advantage of that freedom.
Thanks for reading and for caring about what my life looks like here. All my love from Ecuador.
Thanks for sharing this, Helen! Love having a picture of what your week looks like. Sounds like such a great fit for you -- I'm so excited you're able to use the skills and gifts you've been blessed with. I'm sure some days are tedious, challenging, notawholelotoffun. But that's life, isn't it? And the joys, too :) Proud of you.
ReplyDeleteI love that you have your own "Operación Amistad" en la oficina! Es un idea fantastico!
ReplyDelete