Hi
My name is Joseph and Iam from Ireland. I arrived in Trujillo on Thursday 10th January to begin volunteering for SKIP. I actually began on the Monday as I spent a few days with friends in a place called Huaraz.
I have been teaching English to approximately 30 kids but not all at the one time. Its part of SKIPs summer program. On Monday and Tuesday I teach 7-10 year olds and on Wednesday 10-12 year olds. Thursday and Fridays I take about 20 boys for football in a football court beside the SKIP center in Porvenir.
I didnt know what to expect when I arrived although my friend had already volunteered and told me a lot about it already. The SKIP house where the volunteers stay is in Trujillo. The house is excellent I feel as I was expecting very basic accomodation. Porvenir is approximately a 5-10minute taxi ride from the house. Porvenir itself is very poor. The people have very little and houses are pretty dire, well thats from a western point of view.
Having said that, the people seem happy, well the kids do anyway. The kids arrive to the SKIP center smiling all the time and they greet you as if you were a celebrity, it certainly helps your self esteem!
Teaching them is amazingly rewarding because they are so keen to learn. They would often say "mas ingles" (more english) at the end of a lesson which is nice.
Trujillo itself is a nice city. It has a lovely city center and has plenty of places to eat. Next to the SKIP house is a restaurant which does delicious chicken, rice and chips!
The summer camp will be continuing for another six weeks before we the volunteers will go to the state schools to teach English. The SKIP kids get a reduced rate because a volunteer is teaching in that school I think.
I will be updating this blog regularly and if any potential volunteers have any queries, you can e-mail me at
m1572202@qub.ac.uk I will be happy to help.
adios
joseph
