It is cold en raining

Brrr...last few days the weather changed. It is raining all the time and it's cold. When it's raining here it takes forever for things to get dry again. I been working in the mornings in the orphanage. The children are getting accustomed to me, and I'm starting to feel a lot for them as well. The other day, I had to tend to 10 children in the house, as Martha (the Mamita) had to leave for a couple of hours. So I found myself with a baby of 2 months and 9 other childres till the age of 15. I think it went quite well. Only twice I had to stop everybody from hitting each other. Changed some dipers, played some games and we all had fun. For the rest a lot has happened. Last saturday (Last day of the year) I went alone to some ruïnes above Cusco. Very beautiful, I've been walking for 4 hours and I saw a lot of nice things. I can´t show the pictures of this nore of the last week, because my camera got stolen. New Year's passed very well in the beginning. Me and Sandra bought a bottle of champaign and we drank it on the Plaza der Armas. Cusco is known for a very festive ending so the world had decided to come to Cusco. The whole Plaza was filled with people from allover the world. It was amazing. So at 24.00 hours there was a lot fireworks, very beatiful. Everybody was drinking a lot. We kissed hundreds of people for the NewYear. Later we went to a house of a Peruvian friend to celebrate some more but everybody was really drunk and it was a bit weird so we left to find some other Peruvian friends in a discotheque. There somebody fell on me and I think at that time my camera got stolen. So that's a real bummer. Been to the police, have to buy anoter camera, cause Friday we are going to Macchu Picchu and you can't go there without a camera! So I was feeling a bit low yesterday, but it's only a camera and like 100 foto's ;-( C'est la vie. Hope to be able to show pictures again soon....

Last three days

Saturday afternoon, I went with Sandra (on the picture) to te market in town to buy some presents. I'm feeling brand new and I'm happy to be "up and running" for Christmas. We bought lots of gifts for the family and we deserved some hot chocolate (which everybody drinks here with Navidad).. If you look through the window you can see how busy it is outside. It was amazing. Little stands everywhere, incense (wierook) on the whole market which gave the whole place a magic atmosphere. I've never seen anything like this before. Natives (Indigenas) selling everything possible. We had fun in bargaining on the market. But later we felt bad for all the children we've seen without shoes and the dirt on their faces, just like on television, but now within reach.... Later we went our own way and I celebrated Christmas with the family (9 people). At 24 hours we ate the Turkey and more food and it was very lovely. Jokes, games, presents......we went to bed around 03.00 hours. This time I really slept like a baby and the next day I slept till 12.00. And if you know me, this is rare. Sunday evening I met my friends from Apeldoorn and later we went to eat with a bunch of friends in a good restaurant. It was a very nice weekend. Feeling good instead of sick changes everything.
Next monday morning 09.00 hours I went with a group of all nationalities to a childrens home in Cay Cai, a little village in the mountains. All the gifts were taken here, because there are much more needy children. After 1 hour in the bus we arrived in this town without real streets. There were a lot of children. We played some games, they sang us the Cai-Cay song, they danced a traditional dance and then they got all their presents. Later, when the children were gone, while waiting hours for the bus, we played football and Peruvian ballgames on a square in this village. A very different but beautiful Boxing Day (2e kerstdag).. (Fotos will follow of these children, have to upload them). To be continued.....

Some fotos

Miriam, not ill yet in Cusco town
another foto of the orpanage.
foto of the musicians on the plaza.
foto of the Peruvian dance in the theatre

Another week in Cusco

Well, after a very good first week, the second week couldn't have been worse. That's why no messages on this blog for a week. So proud I was not getting ill nor suffering from soroche (altitude sickness)....but after my climbing trip, I found myself waking up that sunday night with stomack aches and feeling weak and dizzy. In the morning I wanted to wake up to phone to the orphanage that I couldn't come. Luz (the mother and lady of the house) asked me how I was feeling, I wanted to reply, to sit down and.....fainted, twice in a row. Total panic in the house, but I had medicaments (salt against dehydration and other stuff). Stayed in bed for two days, didn't sleep the third night, still went to work half a day, fourth or fifth night I hardly could bare the cramps in my stomach, it was like Worldwar III in there, felt very queezy friday, but there was this happening in the orphanage for the children and I wanted to attend so I woke up anyway. And I'm glad I did, because it was a real treat for the eye. All those children in their best clothes was very touchy. There was candy and toys and Santa Claus and special treats and music........Only, I forgot my camera so I can's show the fotos yet. But others will send me some to publish here later. Bless all the volunteers. There was this Dutch girl (Marloes) and she raised money on her webpage and with this money she bought new shoes for all the children in the orphanage. This was a real good idea. Later when everybody was happy and satisfied and the children were tired, I went to town and brought the 10 kilos of toys I still had to a family. They have a project in a little town (Cay-cay), also an orphanage. In this area there are hardly any volunteers and the children are more needy then in Cusco-town. So Monday we are going with a group of 8 people to visit this place and to celebrate Navidad (Christmas) with them and then the children will get the toys. But I think it's a very good idea to raise money and to buy here whatever is needed. I will do the same in Ecuador. I have been offered already some money by a company before leaving, and I will use that money to buy stuff as well as soon as I get it. You couldn't believe how happy the kids were with the shoes. The things I bought already (and were given to me, special thanks to Margot and Lara) will be very welcome as well. But if anybody wants to donate something please email me for details. So, this celebration made me feel much better. Later in the evening were I brought the bag of toys, in the house of the family there were some salsa lessons as well, and I met new people, which was very welcome to me. Later we went to La Muse, a very nice bar and I met some friends that I've already been out with once before. And I started to feel better and better, so I even went dancing in Mythology, the place to be here in Cusco, together with Mama Africa. Going out is like everywhere in the world, same music, more salsa, same alcohol, same motives ;-) if you catch my drift. Oh, one very bizar thing happened. Wednesday (I think), whenk I wanted to go to town, to change a bit of air, because I felt so horrible, I was in town with Mariana, and in the center I thought I saw some friends from Apeldoorn. Oh, god, I'm starting to hallucinate now I thought, but I really was Ellen and Anne-Maarten from Apeldoorn.....That's like amazingly bizar. We are going to hook up soon to have a drink or some food. I really look forward to seeing them. Can you believe it, in Peru, in that minute, is not like you meet in Arnhem or Utrecht.....
Another interesting fact; after I left the nightclub to find a taxi I found the center of Peru filled with Indigenas. They were all sleeping in the streets and blocking the roads. It is very common with Christmas that all the Indigenas come from the mountains and from whereever to get free meals and hot chocolate and bread. But it's a bizar scenery, all those people with blankets and baby's in the streets. The foto I made is not very clear but I hope you can get an idea of what I've seen. Later today I'm going with Sandra (my french friend) to town to buy a few gifts for the family and it is nice for Christmas to meet friends. Because I do miss you all!! Tonight they (Peruvians) celebrate Christmas night at 24 hours. We will eat turkey in the middle of the night and it will be a special and new experience. First I thougt I would be better to celebrate with my new tourist friends, but I can see them Sunday and more. This is something that I won't experience soon again. So Peruvian turkey it is..now I will add some fotos of the scenery and some other fotos of a night when I went out and some singers on the streets sang for us. Oh, and one night this past week, I went with Sandra to a theatre for the benefit of the orphanage and they showed Peruvian ancient dances. It was wonderfull to see. It was in the theatre Municipal of Cusco and there were only like 5 tourists (all volunteers). Bye the way, there are so many Dutch people here supposedly. I haven't met that many, but they have already special signs, with text like, no need to learn Spanish here, everybody speaks Dutch, or Dutch Cusco...Well, I haven't found out why, but I will and I will let you know. For now, it is impossible for me to wish everybody separatly through email a very good and special Christmas, so I will use this site to send you my Love and warmest Christmas greetings. A lot of you are doing wonderfull things (Paris, Switzerland, Tenerife and more). But where ever you are I hope you enjoy what you do and I wish you all a wonderful time. Be healthy, be good, but mostly be nice. I love you all, miss you all and speak to you soon. FELIZ NAVIDAD Y UN BESO DE MIRIAM PARA TODOS.

Climbing

Sunday 20.00 hours. Today I visited the market of Pisac which is quite famous and big with a new friend, Sandra from Paris who works with me in the orphanage. . As this place is also in the mountains the road to the market was, not to say the least, quite scary for me, as I am really afraid of heights. But the road was really geourgeous and the market was really nice. They sell all kind of Peruvian specialties like handmade clothes of Alpaca wool (an alpaca is a kind of Lama) in all colours, hats, silver, bags, beer that's made of mais. In earlier days when hygiene was not so highly estimated the woman would chew the mais and spit it in a bowl. The beer would be made of this, but this is all in the past now. After this we went to visit the ruins of the Inca's. From the valley you couldn't see exactly how high this was and I thought it would take like 20 min. of walking. We found ourselves walking 2 hours uphill (and I really mean uphill) and by every step we were absolutly exhausted (it is 3400 m high so you can't really breathe al that well). But the view at the top was magnificent, over the sacred valley of the Inca's, with the ruins beside us. Later we found out that hardly anybody climbs this route. All the tourists take a taxi to the top and then they descend the route we have been climbing ;-) So I was very proud of us. I was like a prewalk to Macchu Picchu. Then we took a taxi to some small villages in the valley. The countryside is so beautiful. It's like a completely different world. We ate something in a village where there were no tourists at all. I fighted a bit with the taxi driver and then we went back to Cusco. All and all this was a lovely day. I will sleep like a baby tonight...

Working, setteling and some facts about Peru

After one week of work I can say that I'm setteling in. I look forward to see the children every day and they seem to get used to me. I brought some gifts to them and we have been playing the whole morning, as you can see. After "working" I go to my Spanish lessons in the centre of Cusco where I first have some coffee and juices. There is a system in the week and I feel at home. I know more people now, I've been going out, my Spanish is improving and I learn facts&figures about South-America and Peru in particular. Time to share this with my readers... Did you know that hardly anybody smokes here? Not that this makes any difference for your health, 10 minutes in town will have the same effect on your lungs as one packet of cigarettes I supose. I'll have to detox in Davos (Switserland) after this trip to get clean inside. Oh, and almost everybody is a taxidriver here. 80% of the cars that you see on the streets are taxis. It really doesn't matter if you have a driverslicense or not (in my opinion). Next to Tunis this is the worst "style" of driving I have ever seen. It is sheer survival out there on the streets, but it makes my laugh all the time. Peruvian people are not fat. I hardly seen anybody with overweight. Life here is (for foreigners) incredibly cheap. For example, one hour of Internet costs 1 NuevaSol and that is like 0,25 eurocents. A coffee costs 4 NSoles (1 Euro) and this is in the centre, where everything is 3x as expensive as in the rest of the town. For example we ate a big sandwich on the street in a village today and this costed like 1 NSol. Well so far for the fact. One piece of advice. If you ever eat a fresh papaya, bring dental floss. I could have knitted socks with the threads hanging from my teeth..

After 5 days Cusco

It is as if I have been a lifetime here already. Today was the first day that I started to work in the orphanage. I will spare you the details of the difficulties I encountered trying to be placed in this orphanage. Appointments without anybody attending but me, so no result. Calling for appointments and being replaced 6x in one day. Yesterday I already went to another project just to see how it was. But there were more volunteers than children. Today in the orphanage I was shown around on the premises. They have like 7 buildings and each buildings places 8 or 9 children. They are being looked after by one woman (mami). Most of them are abandoned children or children of addicted parent. In the house where I worked there is this baby of two months that was found on the street. I have been tending to two children today, Marcia (3sh) and David (2sh). I went to play with them the whole morning, like that the "Mami" could do other things. I have no idea if it's of any use what I'm doing but the "Mami" expressed a lot of gratitude which made me even more uncomfortable. I hope it make's some difference. I did teach the little ones how to catch a bal and we laughed a lot, especially when I fell from the stairs ;-) Foto's will be added soon.
Yesterday I went out with some other students and volunteers. More about this another day.

Cusco

I arrived in Cusco yesterday morning. The youngest daughter of the family that I´m staying with picked me up from the airport. She´s very sweet as is the the rest of the family. Later that day we went to the center of Cusco and it´s lovely. Very small and ancient. I did see a lot of poverty yet, mostly the "Indigenas", the name of the natives which ancestors were Indian. As soon as I find out how to post photos I will include them in the message. I went to the school to introduce myself. Tomorrow I will hear in the morning where and at what time I will be working. Because they had many volunteers already in the "niños de calle" project, I asked for something that was less popular. And in an orphanage a bit further there are less volunteers, so I guess that´s more useful. So I hope they will place me there tomorrow. Today there were elections for the congress of Cusco, and as the family that I live with is politically very active, we went to the elections, so I got a good view of how those things go in Cusco. Verry funny detail, after voting they paint your finger very pink, like that you can´t vote more than once :-) Yesterday I decorated the christmas tree with Mariana (the youngest daughter of 22). They celebrate Christmas even more like us, in their own way. With small things and less money than the west, they make it just as cosey and sweet. I do miss Holland a bit but as I start working and learning Spanish tomorrow the days will pass quickly. Keep you posted about the orphanage.

First day in Peru - Lima

After a very, very long trip from Amsterdam-Madrid-Lima I finally arrived tired but safe at 23.00 hours Peruvian time at my lovely hostal "Mami Panchita" (www.mamipanchita.com) in Lima. It was a very chaotic, during more than 26 hours, trip in every sense. But no harm done, all the lugage arrived and still in one piece. Today (9th December) I explored Lima with its 10 million inhabitants. It has beautiful sites (Plaza Mayor and Miraflores) also because of its position, slightly descending into the Pacific, and it is obvious that the government is trying to keep the touristic spots clean at all times, but I stepped out of the obvious and I saw very poor circumstances. The smell of the exhaust(pipe)gases of the cars is almost insupportable. This, the slums and the clouds gave this metropolis a sad and grey cover at times. But the people are very friendly and in the first three hours of my stay I was in the proud possesion of no less than 5 telephone numbers and emailaddresses. And all this for free. Imagine at the end of the day ;-) Tomorrow the 10th I´ll fly to Cusco where I will start working on Monday. So another early start....

Last days in Holland

As thursday the 8th of December is coming nearer and nearer, I'm feeling more and more restless. I try to read as much as I can about Peru and Ecuador to make myself familiar with the countries. More important, I have obtained through friends and by buying them, a lot of gifts for the children and I'm very happy with these items. I just hope I can carry and bring them all. Furthermore I have had contact with the organisation in Ecuador as well and my contactperson told me about the children and they need all the support they can get. The organisation can be visited on the internet as well (www.ecuevp.com). Maybe it's nice to have a peek to see what they do. I can say that it really needs a whole lot of paperwork and preparation but then you're off to something so wonderful, that it's been worth every grey hair on my head.

Preparing

As the days pass, I feel that time is pressing. There are so many things to think of, so many items not to forget. But I'm becoming a real backpacker now, who would have thougt that!
After a few weeks of nightmares including waking up in the middle of a strangulation by an anaconda, or a tumble down from the top of the Andes my mind has eased down a bit.
I have been informed about my whereabouts in Cusco. I will stay with a local family for four weeks. So they will be my family for that period. On the website of the contactperson for the volunteerwork in Peru (which is probably a Dutch man www.spanishschoolperu.com) you can see how lovely the town is.
I will work with children in the age from 5-10 in the town itself. After working, in the late afternoon, I will follow Spanish lessons to improve my communication skills.
So it all looks very beautiful and safe. So no worries here anymore. Preparation for moving forward.

Introduction

Hello Everyone. What do ye now, it worked! The girl can blog.This will be my webpage for the coming three months. It might look a bit simple but I hope it's readable for the interested. My name is Miriam Ferraro and I am going to travel to South-America for various reasons. Main reason is to volunteer in a streetchildrens home (ninos de calle) in Cusco (Peru) and in an orphanage in Ambato (Ecuador). After working in Peru I will have to travel to Ecuador and I hope to be able to see a lot of Peruvian life and later about Ecuadorian life. While doing this I will try to post many messages about this exciting trip but mainly I will share my experiences about working with the children.
Hope you will enjoy reading it. There is a possibility to comment on this page. Feel free to do this.
I would like to thank the ones who have made this possible for me by their support in whatever way. Muchas gracias !!