Chocolatadas

Chocolatadas, Christmas 2010, by Matteo Lewent

Although the actual number of days of the chocolatadas numbered only 8 the preparatory work for them, done mainly by Leander, had taken various months and by the time i arrived was in full swing involving frequent trips to Cusco and negotiations with various suppliers and other NGOs. The aim was to provide chocolatadas involving hot chocolate, fruit bread, entertainment and Peruvian made presents for upwards of 2000 children based in the Sacred valley (although it turned out to be a lot more than this!) in associacion with 3 other charities based in the sacred valley; Living Heart, Paskay and Awamaki.

Our first 3 chocolatadas were done in partnership with Living Heart, a charity providing nutritional projects to remote rural communities. The first chocolatada location was in a field between 2 villages in the mountains above Pisac .We set out early in the morning with a sense of trepidation not quite sure what to expect where our first order of business was to pick up the clowns from their house (to my disappointment they did not live in a big top!) and got a baby and a small child into the bargain!! We picked up Rita who loaded our combi up with over 200 plastic balls and other presents, between these and the number of people we had in the van it was no wonder that we got stuck in the mud on the way up! Following our arrival the chocolate was put on the fire to heat, despite some difficulty getting the fire started (probably because I was poking my nose in trying to ´help´!!), and the clowns put on their show which they seemed to love despite inital fears that some of the children may not understand a show in Spanish! We gave out the plastic balls, presents and red noses in a none too orderly fashion as well as random donated clothes which was interesting as giving adult mens shorts to an 8 year old girl might not seem to be all too useful but they would get distributed to friends and family.

The children seemed to love the finger puppets, seperated at length by Helen, Leander, myself and a small army of helpers, and the older children loved the T-shirts designed by Abel Torres an artist based in Lima with Cusco and Mysmallhelp symbols dotted all over them! Kids were pushing to get presents, coming back for seconds of presents and hot chocolate and parents inventing children they did not have all in their eagerness to get presents. A great introduction to chocolatadas and it was nice to see the kids wearing their red noses and playing with their presents on the ride back down, despite the biting midges and crying babies!

Chocolatada number 2

I was always dreading this chocolatada with a 4am wake up and a 4.30am departure. The journey up to the village took over 5.5 hours and involved going over a mountain pass in excess of 4300m and it was absolutely freezing probably because of the snow outside. We breakfasted in Lares before heading to to the village which was precariously perched on the mountainside bathed in sunlight basking in amazing views of the valley. We were given a very warm welcome by both the headmaster and the kids and did the chocolatada for the primary schools kids as the school was split into into primary and secondary. Following the clowns show and distribution of the presents and the red noses to the primary school kids, and a couple of cheeky secondary school kids we were treated to lunch in one of the classrooms, which when sitting on the mini chairs certainly bought back memories of school!!! The headmaster kindly took us to the main plaza in the town to show us the inca ruins there and explain a bit about the history of the area and it was great to see the kids playing with their presents about the ruins, a great mixture of the old and new!! Our journey back took well over 7.5hours because apparently it is a good idea to only open the road for 2 hours a day, one in the morning and 1 in the evening so Helen and I took the opportunity to do a small hike which was not easy at that altitude combined with running into Llamas it was an interesting experience!!

Chocolatada number 3 with Living heart

Was very much looking forward to this chocolatada as we had been promised that it was nowhere near as far away as the previous one and we had 2 additional helpers in the form of Scott and Meg both from England. We had met Scott the previous day and very quickly had got him involved in sorting out tinger puppets, red noses and t-shirts! What an introduction! As soon as we arrived at the school our van was surrounded by children looking to help us carry the presents and bread down to the school! We distributed the presents and hot chocolate to over 500 children, mothers and teachers and attempted to play a rather energetic game of football with the kids which was really hard at that altitude!! After this we were treated to a tradtional Inka ceremony including pan pipes and blessing Pachamama (at least thats what i think was going on!) as well as a crazy trumpeter who Abel for some reason quickly befriended and serenaded us throughout the clowns show and the games with the kids. Our lunch of quinua soup was really good and we headed back to Ollantaytambo feeling as though the last 3 days with Sacred Heart had gone really well and we had bought a lot of joy to the kids! Would the next one with Carlos be any better? We were about to find out!

Chocolatada with Carlos

In previous days we had been visiting only one village and doing 1 chocolatada per day so it was going to be very interesting to try to do 8 over only 2 days especially considering that each chololatada previously had lasted over 4 hours. Would there be enough hours in the day! Intially a bit disorganized with the bread not turning up until at least 10am despite our 8am plan to leave. Our target villages were those affected by the terrible floods in January and our first stop was the village of Paucarbamba where we were greeted with hugs by about 20 beaming children. A new school building was being built next door higher off the ground so as to avoid a repeat of the floods should they occur again. Whilst Scott and I entertained the kids with our rubbish football skills, Helen and Meg started a game of Jump rope whilst Leander was assisting the hot chocolate. The next 2 villages followed a similar format both at schools with a particularily memorable visit in the village of Ancopachar where Scott donned a Ben 10 outfit, a karate cartoon character,and spent the next 2 hours being hit by the kids whilst 2 Americans who donned santa and dinosaur costumes suffered similar fate. Our final location was at the village of Paucarbamba which was in the shadow of Ollanta, where loads more kids had turned up from the larger town than we had presents for. At this point the heavens opened to compound problems especially with the hot chocolate which due to communications breakdown had not been made and Meg and I handed out the hot chocolate, fruit bread and presents in a reasonably organized fashion!!

Awamaki

The final chocolatada for Mysmallhelp was in partnership with the organisation Awamaki and took place in the remote village of Patacancha. Mysmallhelp took the presents in the Christmas mobile with the faithful driver Ruben and met the Awamaki team up in the stadium where they had hot chocolate which was prepared the night before by a Peruvian chef! The children all lined up for their hot chocolate and panetone and the presents were handed out in an orderly fashion!

In the end, Mysmallhelp provided chocolatadas and presents to over 2000 children, in excess of 1000 adults and one particularily friendly bloke with a trumpet!!! Although long hours and lots of preparing presents )especially blowing up those dam plastic balls seeing the children walking awat from the chocolatadas with big smiles on their faces playing with their presents definitely made the experience worth it!

HUNDREDS OF SHOES!

By Helen Osborn, Mysmallhelp Peru volunteer, 20th December 2010

Two months ago I was saying see you soon to Leander, as I left to volunteer in Trujillo. Now that two months is up. Here I am again back in the beautiful town of Ollantaytambo. My original reason for coming here was to help Leander with the Christmas Chocolatadas she had planned to organize for over 3000 people, in the villages near (and far) from Ollantaytambo. However, when I arrived the week before the start of the Chocolatadas we had another pretty huge project to complete. Mysmallhelp had received a donation of 72 boxes of shoes from America by Desana inc. on behalf of Buckner international. A big thank you goes out to everyone involved especially to Sonia and
all of the volunteers at Living Heart that helped by receiving the delivery of the shoes and the movement of them from the Living Heart store room in Ollantaytambo to the Paskay volunteer house on Patacalle.

Mysmallhelp had a list of approximately 350 people due to receive the main portion of the shoes donated by Desana Giving and Buckner. In addition, Mysmallhelp received funding from Australian friends Victoria and David to purchase an additional 80 pairs of traditional sandals to be donated to members of the more remote communities
(Tastayoc and Patacancha) that had also been measured for shoes during the August health campaign. Matt and Leander had already travelled to Cusco and purchased the traditional ojota shoes and delivered them back to Ollanta. David, is the podiatrist that examined, treated and measured the feet of patients in villages surrounding Ollantaytambo. David and Victoria raised funds to purchase the traditional shoes for the remote communities as they agreed with the belief of Mysmallhelp that it wasn´t appropriate to donate Western shoes to these traditional communities. The shoes were donated as a Christmas present and way of saying thank you to the people that came to the health mission in August 2010.

Approximately 800 pairs of shoes were donated to Mysmallhelp! So yes we had A LOT of shoes to sort... Matt another volunteer who arrived here before me had already devised a system of allocating the correct sixed shoe to the right person, the system was brilliantly organized and with the help of Liliana (a member of the NGO Paskay) and Nelly (a volunteer from Desana Giving) we sorted the shoes reasonably quickly labelling each shoe with the name of the owner and separating piles of shoes to be distributed in each village. The shoes were distributed at five different village schools. The first was Phyri. We arrived at the school and organized the shoes into order; we then
called out the list and distributed the shoes numerically. It sounds like it should be a perfect system, however we all agreed Phyri was the most frustrating of all the schools. We repeatedly told the children to not touch the shoes as they had been laid out in order; however it is hard to control the children when their parents refuse to listen as well. The lack of education and discipline of the parents is unfortunately a reoccurring theme in the poorer areas of Peru. This then generally means that the discipline of the children suffers as well. To make things just a little trickier, unfortunately some of the people wanting shoes in Phyri were on the list for shoes from the next location Caticancha. It would have been a nightmare to unpack all the shoes for Caticacha in Phyri so we decided to take the people from

Pbyri due to receive shoes in Caticancha in our little mini bus... Needless to say the bus was pretty full! In Caticacha things were much more organized, the Director of the school took charge of our list and divided those who were on the list from those who were not, and this made distributing the shoes a great deal easier. When we arrived at the Pachar school there were no children to be seen as it was a fiesta so we had to resign to return another day...

The next day, on arrival up in the remote community of Patacancha the school was closed, however as always there were a

few children hanging around; one of them happened to have the keys to the school. Most of the children only spoke quechua, but luckily we had Ruben our trusty driver on hand to translate! Patacancha appeared to be an extremely traditional yet unfortunately poor town. The children were wearing clothes that were in some cases pieced together. The people of this village had requested traditional sandals, as the Director of the school was not around we went on a hunt for the next responsible adult to leave in charge of the shoes. We very luckily stumbled across the President of the community. He very happily took over our list and the shoes for those who were not at school that day. The President had been at the Dentist project and knew all about why we were giving the shoes so we all felt highly confident leaving distributing the rest in his hands. The remainder of the shoes were distributed to the allocated people at the schools in Pachar, Rumira and Tastayoc.

However, we still found ourselves with a large amount of shoes that needed distributing so we decided to make a donation to two other local projects in need of shoes for their communities. The first partner project was Awamaki, who are working to help the flood victims of the Huayroncoyocpampa community where many people lost their homes
in the January floods. We also made a donation to The Sacred Valley project which helps provide secondary education to young girls from families in the surrounding mountain villages.

Mysmallhelp distributed the remainder of the shoes directly from the Paskay volunteer house. The word spread quickly that we had shoes for distributing as we had given away a few pairs to our next door neighbours Chuchi and Libertad and their alcoholic mother. It didn’t take long for an extremely unordererd queue to form at our front door. The shoes went exceeding quickly, which is fantastic as they went to people who really need them.

Many thanks once again to everyone involved especially to George and Kathy at Desana Giving and their Buckner friends!

Bring Christmas Cheer to the Andean Highlands: Mysmallhelp Peru’s Chocolatada

by Camden Luxford

Attentive readers will remember that back in February I was in the Sacred Valley for a day helping out at some of the communities badly affected by the heavy rainfall and flooding of earlier this year.

Image: Camden Luxford

Recently, I returned to one of them, just outside of Ollantaytambo. It was wonderful to see the newly constructed houses going up in solid brick instead of adobe, and to see the children again, swinging from the shoulders of tall English volunteer Matt and racing into position for photos.

Construction is slow, though, and several families are still living in tents as they piece their lives back together. And the rains have begun again. Christmas here will be cold and wet.

I was in Ollantaytambo visiting a friend, Leander Hollings, who is one of the organisers of a Christmas Chocolatada for this community, among others. I’ll be joining them on the 20th and the 21st, to distribute hot chocolate, panatones and small gifts to the children. We’ll be travelling with clowns and musicians, and having watched Leander dashing back and forth between Cusco and Ollantaytambo under the weight of endless pairs of shoes and finger-puppets, slowly going mad trying to get quotes for hot chocolate for thousands, I can’t wait to see it all come together for her, for her volunteers, and for the communities we’ll be visiting.

There is, however, still a lot to be done, and a lot of money to be raised. Please, I would love it if you could find a few dollars or pounds or yen or reales or soles to buy a cup of hot chocolate for an Andean child this Christmas. You can donate over at JustGiving.com, and I can vouch that all the donations are going straight to a worthy cause.

Image: Camden Luxford

Alternatively, if you’re going to be in Cusco or the Sacred Valley during the next few weeks and would like to help out on the day, get in touch with me via the contact page and I’ll be happy to let you know the details.

Leander takes a break. Image: Camden Luxford

And don’t forget to pop back here to see the photos of how it all came out on the day!

Children offer gift of hope and optimism

There was an abundance of festive cheer at Marybert School and Orphanage on Christmas day as more than a hundred people from the local community joined celebrations and entertainment at the church based in the school grounds.

The Marybert youngsters played a pivotal role demonstrating their singing and dancing talent, and generally spreading joy with their smiling faces. The church service, whilst a total mystery to me (because it was in Nepali which is not native language of Scotland!) was captivating. As I sat warmed by a huddle of girls from the orphanage (males and females tend to be segregated at times of worship) it occurred to me just how different this celebration was from my own days of regular church going. As a child I would sit in a church almost too cold to bear where complicated words and passages from the Bible would be shared with the congregation, but most of which I didn't understand. Here in Gwarko the stage is awash with animation and gesticulation. There are many smiles and knowing laughter. The congregation (and audience as we switch between concert to preaching) is energetically relaxed. There is clapping, and singing and much arm swaying. It's a beautiful atmosphere to be a part of and it reminds me just how special it is to have faith in your heart.

It's this faith that keeps us going when times are tough. It's the old saying that 'it's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness' and that candle is what My Small Help lights day after day,and hopes to keep burning. We exist to help underprivileged children to carve a brighter future for themselves through education and satisfying their welfare needs. We adopt the festive 'It's better to give than to receive' adage. That said Christmas day is my birthday (Jo Young, MSH volunteer) and so the children take immeasurable delight in showering me with handmade birthday cards and drawings before singing Happy Birthday to me three times in English, and at least twice in Nepali. We share a beautiful heart shaped birthday cake together and I watch them smile and intently compare presents with each other (a generous gift from previous volunteer Kate Baker, UK). Thousands of pounds haven't been spent on these children, nor have hundreds; the gifts they received on Christmas day probably don't even amount to £10. The difference is that they have real value, and the feeling I had when spending time with them was priceless. Any happiness they have comes from within, and that is where MSH knocks gently at the door. We have faith and love for these children and so we invest your emotional support (that of course comes in the form of finance) in the children, and in return we watch them regulate their school attendance, improve their school grades, and have trust in what we can offer them.

As the sun begins to set in Gwarko everyone basks in what's left of the winter sunshine to enjoy their festive Daal Bhaat. The children and I watch them from the rooftop (we were front of the queue!). I glance around and see a desolate and inhospitable space. There are no toys, no playground equipment; just a few dusty and dirty pipes, concrete blocks, pieces of torn fabric and empty metal drums. It's hardly a playground and I want more for them. I ask one of the girls who brought me up here why it's her favourite space. Her answer is a lesson in perception, and one that I'm happy to retain: "Because the air is fresh and it's beautiful to look at the mountains [points to snow capped peaks]. You can see for miles from here and you can watch what's going on downstairs." I smile quietly to myself. She's got it in one; regardless of what surrounds you in life it's what you choose to see that really matters. My Small Help chooses to see the bigger picture, just like this young girl, and just like all of the sponsors and people who make donations. It's a vital reminder that I'll hold close, and one that I'm more than happy to share.

Festive Gifts for school children

New stationery, festive gifts, and checking on the progress of sponsored children have been the most recent focal points for the team at the My Small Help office in Nepal. Two youngsters living near the tourist hotspot Thamel were bought new winter clothes, sponsored pupils at Sanjiwani Boarding (English medium school) School were given toys and stationery by their UK sponsor, and around 150 pupils at Shree Balprakash Secondary School were issued with new school jotters, pencils, erasers and pencil sharpeners.

Watching the faces of the children at Shree Balprakash Secondary School (Kalanti Buumidanda VDC - 1, Kavre), aged between 5 and 12, when they received their new stationery was a privilege. Who would have guessed that six school jotters and some pencils could create such joy? As Pramila (My Small Help Accountant) and I (Jo Young, MSH volunteer) toured from class to class any onlooker would be forgiven for believing that we were celebrities. We were pursued by youngsters eager to maximise the time that they could see or hear us. As we visited each classroom a small entourage peeped through the bars (to allow ventilation, not imprisonment) on the windows, popped their heads round doors and a couple of the more mischievous ones managed to assume a position in the class before being spotted by the teacher.

The classrooms at this remote village school (45 kilometres outside Kathmandu valley) are a far cry from what we would like to imagine as an educational hub; spartan is too generous a description, whilst bare, empty, basic, and soul-less only go a tiny way towards painting a vivid picture. For many of the rooms the concrete walls are the blackboards, the stone floor becomes a table and a chair. The only thing giving these rooms any warmth or feeling at all is the teacher, the smiling faces of the children, and the donations that enable My Small Help to make a difference. The playground is ground, not a toy or goalpost in sight.

In the colder months, such as now, many classes are taught outside because the winter sun is the main source of heat. Stationery, it would seem, is also a source of heat because it planted a little seed of warmth and delight in the hearts of these children, and that heat radiates far more than any state of the art heating system. Thank you to all of the My Small Help sponsors who have made this contribution possible. Anyone who wishes to donate can click onto www.justgiving.com/childreninnepal or access the sponsorship page on the My Small Help website by clicking here; your compassion and kindness cross more than rugged terrain. Is there something you’d like to know more about in the lives of the children that My Small Help supports? If so please write a comment below and we’ll do our best to grant your festive wish…

Children in Nepal gain superhuman powers!

If a place existed where new jackets and trousers made children believe that they had superhuman powers then that place would be Marybert School and Orphanage, Nepal. With winter temperatures setting in the hours of darkness are currently around four degrees Celsius. If we’re nesting at home with central heating, double glazing and a wealth of cashmere then this temperature is not harsh, it’s a lot colder when you’re without basics such as heating and hot water. My Small Help has been shopping for wind and waterproof outerwear to ensure that the children at Marybert are warm and comfortable. The 18 children obediently queued up to receive their new clothing; each one beamed as they found the perfect fit, whilst some of the younger ones tested out the flexibility of the clothing with wildly entertaining arm and leg movements. For a moment I had a flashback of the many clothing stores I’ve visited around the world where we see youngsters pulling faces, wriggling in the outfit they’re trying on, and protesting to a harassed parent that it doesn’t fit, before asking for (occasionally demanding) a designer label. At Marybert these children beamed because the clothing, regardless of colour or style, fitted them and made them warm. Afterwards some of the younger ones (notably Prince and Kamal) spent a great deal of time folding their jackets and trousers neatly back into the original packaging and patting it down, as if to say ‘thank you for being mine and I’ll wear you tomorrow.’

Some of the young people supported by My Small Help are at secondary school and live at home (or with another support family) so we visited them to ensure that they were progressing well, and to check that MSH funds are being used in the best way possible. These visits also allow us to send updates to their sponsors, and enable more personal communication. Two of the young girls we met, Anjali and Alisha, had just returned from school to a dark stone built home (the

power outages strike again). Their mum was sitting astride a large wooden bench weaving a rug by hand. She told Raju (MSH President) that the rug will take her approximately eight weeks to complete at which point she will be paid around 6,000 Rupees (approximately £53 or $83). If she is late in finishing the rug she will be paid around 5,000 Rupees. I’m struggling to imagine anyone in the world (as I know it) carrying out such detailed, intricate and creative work for eight weeks for the sum of £53 or $83. Think back to the last time you spent £50-60 on an item (a sweater, pair of jeans, DVD box set, aftershave gift set) and then consider if you would still have bought it if you’d had to work eight weeks to fund it. For Anjali and Alisha’s mum this payment is their food and rent money. There are a lot of stark contrasts to consider here. For me it’s not about feeling guilty or curbing my spending habits, it’s about understanding and helping to make small but significant steps to a better future for the underprivileged families in Nepal (and work is on-going in Peru).

My Small Help sponsors are making this difference through their dedicated pledges; whilst I’m on the ground in Nepal I am their eyes and ears. The money is making a difference, and I can see that it is very much appreciated. The work that MSH carries out helps to empower these families by alleviating the financial pressure so that the children can be educated and create a better future for themselves. It’s about academic learning, and learning from the harsh experiences of their parents and elder siblings.
If you would like to help by donating a few pounds please click here http://www.justgiving.com/childreninnepal

New Volunteer Jo Young meets children of My Small Help...

It’s with a high degree of trepidation that I begin the bumpy and hazardous 40 minute tuk tuk journey to the My Small Help Office in Gwarko in Lalitpur, Nepal; the practical aspects of what I will do when I am here don’t concern me, but I can’t help but wonder how much of a difference I can actually make, and how I will feel when I burst the bubble of the Western world.

It’s one thing giving money to charity or tithing 10% of your income as those working towards ‘greater good’ so readily suggest, but time and vis a vis efforts might prove to be a bigger challenge for me. I expect smiles and tears, but it’s the unexpected smiles and tears that really meet your heart.

The smiles came quickly as I met the dedicated My Small Help team to discuss how best we could maintain and build on their current success. The small but functional office is just a few minutes walk from the Marybert School and Orphanage, where almost half of the pupils are financially supported by the charity.

As we approach the school I can already hear peals of laughter and giggling which, although I didn’t have any real expectations of how it would be, aren’t what I expected to hear at an orphanage (if that makes any sense!). The youngsters are cavorting around on the chute and climbing frame, lined up like chattering sparrows on a telephone wire, or gently tugging each other’s pigtails in good humour. It’s a beautiful sight. At least three of them rush towards me to say ‘namaste’ whilst earnestly pressing their palms together. ‘What is your name’ and for some reason the name ‘Joanna’ is suddenly the funniest name they’ve ever heard and they clutch their tummies whilst giggling. From this point onwards I decide to use my spiritually given name of ‘Jyoti’, which has more meaning to them, and this part of the world.

There are no tears here, only happiness from the children and I’m already forced to reconsider my self-built images fuelled by Oliver Twist. The children are thrilled to see Raju (My Small Help President) and gather around our feet like ants to a jam pot. As we ask the children questions so that I can write up colourful profiles for the website I’m struck by the beauty of each of these children. They have little or nothing of material consequence but they each have spirit, hope and love and rapidly pull out letters and photographs of people who have helped sponsor them. They gleefully report ambition to be doctors and vets and teachers; listing a desire to help as the reason for their choice.

Help is the keyword for the next few months that I will spend in Nepal. I am fortunate to be able to dedicate time and attention by physically being here, which I know isn’t possible for many. So, if you would like to help by writing to the children, donating a few pounds or taking up a more regular sponsorship of a child please click here: Christmas is coming and your donation would enable the My Small Help volunteers to create a memorable day for the children by buying them necessities and treats.