Week one/Weekend one

March 10th, 2010 by Sarah Henderson

I have been pretty lazy with keeping up my journals. I know some volunteers do daily updates but I’m more of a weekly person!

So last week ended up being pretty hetic. The boys orphanage was outstanding! They are so education focused with farming programs, sugar cane juice production, cooking classes, sewing classes, wood working and metal work classes, the produce their own honey and they have an actual school. Its good to see they are empowering these boys with skills for the rest of their lives. Some of the boys go onto university and have really successful careers. Its great! So we realised some progams we can implement there such as the ReAL Boquete recycling program, introducing a music program and helping with their computer lab which is currently collecting dust! The possibilities are exciting and working in collaboration with them will be rewarding I think.

On thursday Kaytee and I went to a meeting with an American expat who helps to run a big mission church up in Volcancito to try to organise some free English classes for anyone who wants them really. Pretty much we decided then and there to start on Monday and we worked through some of the logistics. He seemed really keen to start as it is impossible for local people to learn english because its expensive but they need it for a lot of job opportunities. At night we had the Charity Quiz night where the amazing volunteers raised $140 for Casa Hoga Triska. It was a fun night and the turnout was great!

On friday we headed up to the church at Volcancito and took a look at their facilities which are seemingly endless. They have a medical centre and a dentist that is fully equipped and constantly used by local people. They also have some great classrooms that will be perfect for the english classes. Its all come together so quickly and there seems to be a lot of interest in the classes which is good.

Saturday meant it was time to head out to the Handicap Foundation to spend some time hanging out with some of the most adorable kids. We spent a fair bit of time outside where it was crazy windy so despite the fact I had heaps of sunscreen on, I didn’t realise I was getting burnt. Not the best look later that night! A few of the volunteers and I went down to Las Olas for the weekend. Its a black sand beach on the Pacific about an hour and a half from Boquete. It was an good relaxing weekend where we ate lots of amazing fresh seafood, did yoga and spent a lot of time in the water. Well and truly worth a visit if you make your way over to Panama!

Monday morning meant a lot of prep work for the English program starting that afternoon. It was a busy morning and the first classes went well with a real mix of different levels of English present. Tuesday I devoted the entire day to making the trivia questions for the charity quiz on thursday night and my brain was so full of useless information that my Spanish class was interesting to say the least!

Well it has been a crazy week but I’m looking forward to 15 crazy more!