Two saturdays ago I successfuly flew from Raleigh/Durham to Santiago Chile, in a little over 24 hours (including a short stay in Tampa Fl). Yesterday marked 2 weeks that I have been living in Santiago, Chile.
The first week was spent in orientation, and I barely had a chance to breath. To give you a brief sketch of the week, myself and 13 other volunteers arrived from all over the world, US, England, Austria, New Zealand and Norway and spent the week living in a hostal and getting to know eachother and the organization of which we are now members: VEGlobal (Voluntarios de esperanza global, www.ve-global.org).
Everyday we woke up and took the metro to the office in the center of the city and spent all day in charlas (talks) with the directors of the organization. We've learned about childrens rights in chile, chilean culture, we've bonded and played lots of get to know you games, eaten lots of delicious chilean food, visited the institutions were we will be working and LOTS more.
First I was going to be working in a home for girls, but the new president in Chile, Sebastian Pinera, is speading up a process of trying to change the current system, moving away from group homes and towards increased adoption. Major funding has been cut and homes are closing, so I have a new placement. I am working in a "jardin", a nursery for children ages 2-4.
This jardin is very unique because it is located in a "Toma", a piece of land where people with out homes have come and set up temporary housing, shacks really, made out of whatever they could find. It is illegal, but the government is currently letting the people stay there because they are supposed to be looking for permanent housing while living in the Toma. The Toma is enclosed by a fence and there are probably a couple hundred folks living there, and lots and lots of children.
Speaking of housing, I am quite lucky to have found a wonderful little room in an apartment in an area called Bellas Artes, (in the centro of Santiago) one of the nicest parts of Santiago (I think). There are a lot of young people here, lots of art, cafes, bars, etc and it is a very safe area as well. My room is tiny, and there's no closet and only one shelf, but i almost moved into an apartment with no kitchen sink...
I live with 2 chilean boys and one girl from California. They are all super nice and helpful in terms of speaking lots of spanish and telling me about Chile. I also live within walking distance of all the other volunteers (some volunteers live with each other and some live with other chileans like me) and the VEGlobal office, so the location is perfect.
Thank you all so much for your support, I love getting facebook messages, emails, etc. Love you all so much, missing you and thinking of you. More pictures to come soon.
