Never a dull moment at Escuela Katitawa

So last Friday, similar to the Friday before, was quite eventful. In the morning I was standing next to Antonia (the preschool teacher) looking at the beautiful view when she turned to me and said, ¨look, the tour bus.¨ I had no idea what she meant by that until I saw a bright blue tour bus coming up the dusty road. At the same time, one of the kids yelled, ¨los francesas!¨ (the french!) and all the kids started running down to take a look. Evidently everyone knew what was going on but the volunteers.

The French Tourists

We were quite surprised as about 50 older french tourists exited their bus, cameras in hand. The preschoolers and I had been searching for rocks that day to make concrete to stabilize the chicken fence posts so I continue to search for rocks with 4 of them. (Note: here the preschoolers are called kindergarteners though they range in age from 2-5). We then decided to chase each other around, as kindergarteners like to do, and as I was chasing little Elizabeth, an elderly French lady stopped us to take a picture. I can now say that it feels very strange to be on the other side of the lense, being the oddity that tourists are curious about and want to capture on film. Luckily for them and us volunteers, the little children LOVE posing for pictures, putting their hands on their hips and sometimes even singing for the camera.We showed the French people around and those volunteers who could speak a little French helped with some translations.

From left to right: Hannah, Lora and Hayley

The British girls, Lora, Hayley and Hannah have been tending to the garden and were eager to show off their work to two women who had made their way down there only to find out that the women were not necessarily admiring their handiwork but taking advantage of the secluded area for a bit of an outdoor leak.

The kids singing and dancing for the tourists

After a short tour around the grounds the children all made their way to the second floor ´balcony´to do a song and dance for our guests. In the time we´d been here, we had never seen them get in a line much less a participate in a coordinated song and dance. Some of the older kids were then asked to speak some of the English phrases they know (note: these people did not speak English). How are you? Where are you from? and my personal favorite, What is your name? to a group of about 50 people. The school solicited some donations and then they were on their way again.

Evan and the puppy (Yanif)

Elisabeth and puppy!

The following week at school Yanick, one of Matt´s faves had an adorable little black puppy at school. We asked around to see who it belonged to but nobody would claim it. Although many of the kids and even the director named people who they thought owned the puppy. At the end of the day Oli brought it home and put it in the bedroom of Alex and Hannah, who were gone for the week. The volunteers can´t keep the puppy because we already have Blaze and Blaze is a rather jealous dog who upon seeing little Yanif (we named the puppy) attacked her! I slept with the puppy that night to keep it from whining all night and it was a great reminder that having an infant would be a giant pain in the ass.

Chuck and some chickens.

The same day we had an incident on the farm. I was on library shift that day which is about 30 minutes away from school when the power went out so I decided to head up to school rather than stay in the dark library with nothing to do. When I arrived I found out that Chuck, the duck that thinks he is a chicken, attacked one of the real chickens and split open the chickens head! Since we have been there Chuck has been quite aggressive, forcing two ofthe chickens to sleep under the coop in fear of his wrath, but this just took it to the next level. The other chickens, seeing the blood on their fellow chicken´s head and neck started pecking at the poor chickens gaping wounds. Matt then put the wounded chicken in the coop with some food and water until we could decide what to do with it.

Lunch

We all decided that this runt of a chicken wasn´t going to survive and did what we thought best for it. We killed and ate it. Mario, a volunteer from Mexico/San Jose, California nominated himself to take care of the chicken. He grabbed some gloves, took the chicken by the feet and took it to the kitchen for Marta, the cook. Mario tried to break her (the chicken´s) neck but she just wouldn´t die so the cook gave Mario a knife and he took it outside and sawed the neck until she was dead. It was quite exciting! And for all those curious, no she did not run around with her head cut off. We then had chicken soup for lunch! Delicious!!!

Our last day at Katitawa was a sad and lazy one. We layed one more post for the fence and Matt and Robert, with a little help from me, put up one side of the fence. It was satisfying to see our hard work pay off even if the entire fence is yet to be finished. Everyone who worked on the fence took a picture together to commemorate the moment.

Also during the day the director´s son, Omar (nicknamed by the volunteers: rat-features) pooped his pants until they were quite saggy and stained his pants brown. Luis, the director, didn´t notice for quite some time but when he did his solution was to just take the pants off and let his little man parts hang out. I don´t know if we have told ya´ll how dusty it is in Salasaca but lets just say little rat-features may have now have a rash from the waist down.

Francisco with the school picture we handed out

About 30 minutes before school let out, Francisca, one of the girls from the youngest level fell down and cut her forehead open on a rock. We grabbed her and rushed her to the workshop where Hannah had a first aide kit. I sat Francisca on my lap and David (dry sarcastic British guy / volunteer) started wiping up her forehead. Many of the children gathered around which made her cry more and even worse her sister began to cry in sympathy. Once we were able to get all the children out, two of the teachers, Antonia and Rufino, came in to have a look. Rufino is a curandero, which in the dictionary translates to witch doctor but is more like a shaman. He gave us some aloe to put on her head and we wrapped her whole head in a bandage. I don´t exactly know what happened after school but it looked as though she really needed stitches.

Kevin

Our goodbye ceremony was great. We had our favorite kids give us our medals so Yanick, the preschooler, gave Matt his and Kevin gave me my medal. It was a bittersweet day at Katitawa but we hope to visit again on our loop through Ecuador in December. We also gave all the kids group photos of the school and lollipops on the last day.

We are now heading to Machu Picchu and then we will travel back north towards Ecuador to do a big loop of the two countries.

We dedicate this blog post to all our friends at Katitawa: Alex, Alex, Hannah, Lora, Hannah, Hayley, Evan, Mario, David, Oliver and of course, Robert and the kids!

Cake and True Blood night

***Oh and Antonia´s burns have healed up now and she is doing just fine.***