the Amazon part 2

I slept very well the first night in my wooden bed. Had to get used a bit to feeling my hip bones while moving around. Went to the school (very close to my house on a big field) around 7:30 after breakfast. It turned out it was "dia del mar" (the day Bolivia lost the sea to Chile) and an official holiday and there were no classes, but a sports day instead.

Saw Ben (who turned out to "live" on the other side of the village about 30 min walk from me) here again. All children (around 50) had to stand on the grass and sing the national anthem while the flag was raised. And then their was a historic speech about how Bolivia lost the war from Chile and the access to the sea, but that they will get this back one day.

Then the children had to get changed in their sports clothes to play soccer. In the heat!

Ben showed me the place where he stayed and so I got a chance to see the rest of the village as well. To get to his house we had to cross a little ditch filled with water by a tree trunk (didnt fall off!).

In the afternoon, after lunch, I went with Hermosinda to work in the field. There is a reforestation project on cutting down old trees/plants and plant new (fruit) trees. The whole village has to participate, even older people or pregnant women.

We went by boat (a small wooden motorized canoe), everybody with his own machete. We worked in a kind of sugarcane/bamboo field. I stayed down with the elder people and a pregnant woman and had to bundle new little trees and paint these with something

It was hot and humid and so many bugs! Hard work, even sitting down. I was sweating so much! The rest of the village worked uphill cutting trees or carrying bundles of branches uphill.

They told me that the day before they saw a big caiman of about 5 meters I the river. I didn't see it that week but met a Greek couple that did and had pictures.

That night I unfortunately for very ill, kind of food poisoning, had to throw up and had diarrhea, so had to climb out of bed, out of the mosquito net, put flip flops and head light on and walk to the toilet in the pitch black night (many beautiful stars!) many times.

Not nice and I was completely exhausted and dehydrated the next day, so stayed in bed. My anti-diarrhea pills finally worked and I could sleep a bit. Hermosinda was really nice and made me tea and soup. So no teaching today. I felt so sweaty and hot, but no shower..,

Next day (Wednesday) I felt fortunately better and could teach English together with Ben; 3 classes, each for one hour. The little ones were difficult. They were running around, shouting and the teacher didn't do anything. But the last 2 days this went better and I even managed to handle them on my own.

The second class: 7-10 year olds, had a nice teacher who helped us and since they were older they could read and write. Nice to teach them. And the eldest (11-13?) we only had to teach one day. They were a bit hard to teach to, but we made then work and have conversations in class and that worked!

School finished at 12. So home for rest and lunch.

I have to say, I ate delicious food all the time and varied food. So that was nice! I even learned how to make chocolate and then had hot chocolate for breakfast (the most delicious I ever had and the most fresh and pure) and even one time a kind of chocolate soup, with rice inside, which they ate with crackers.

After the cacao pits are dried for some days, they are toasted in a dry pan over fire. Then the peels of the pits have to be removed: basically by hand, so lots of work! After this the pits will be put in a little handmill to make powder. And this powder I had to make into a greasy dough. This is dried overnight, till you have a hard "ball" and this is rasped into powder and put in hot water. Add some sugar (otherwise it is very bitter) and voila: hot chocolate! I made a little dibujo (drawing) to show the progress.

I made various water color drawings since I had a lot of free time to this. The children of the village came to watch my draw and came by everyday to ask if I already made a new one ;-)

I also taught Brenda (the daughter of 9) how to paint and she loved it. Sometimes at night on the table she was painting by candle light, while I was writing my diary. I also taught them how to play the cardgame shithead.

One day we also harvested the cacao fruits from the trees in the backyard. The kids (Yoan and his 2 cousins) climbed in the tree with a machete and just cut of the fruits and thee these on ythe ground. There we had to cut these open (difficult!) and eat the fresh flesh of the cacao (really fresh and tasty!) and spit out the pits to let these dry.

An another afternoon I went with Yoan, Brenda and their cousins and a guide (the neighbour) in the small canoe to the canyon. Last part over land. When we arrived the canyon was full of water. But with bare foot and our trousers rolled up we went in. Very small (you could hardly fit). Saw some bats. And then we saw a poisonous snake!!! on a wooden plank in front of us. The guide try to kill it with a stick, but the snake escaped in the water.

I was afraid it would swim back towards me. That fortunately didn't happen or we didn't see it, since the water was very muddy. Since the nearest hospital is 40min away by boat and we were barefooted in a muddy pool with probably lots more snakes, we decided to go back.

On the way back we saw a turtle drying itself on a branch in the river.

That night heavy rain, wind and thunderstorm. Knowing what damage such weather can do in the jungle, I was a bit afraid in the beginning (and don't like thunderstorms anyway) but it went well, except for some rain in the house. It was kind of nice too, playing cards by candle light.

The last day, after school, it rained basically the whole afternoon and even was a bit cold. I put on my sweater. So, didn't do much that day: writing my diary, playing cards, re packing my bag and painting.

Oh I discovered a shower by the way, a cold one and not the best, but at least I could wash my hair one time and take a shower. Last day not possible because of the rain (had to walk through mud and rain to reach it).

One day went it was very hot (Ben and I could not even stand in the sun too long without melting) the kids had sports and had to run laps and do jumping jacks et cetera. Even the smallest kids!

What was also cool, when they get thirsty (for example after the soccer match at sports day) they just climbed in a tree and take a lot of oranges. They cut these a special way so you can drink the juice out. Their was of a drink. They also made lemonade of the juice for the whole school.

Also had a few times a fresh coconut straight from the tree. So cool, fresh fruit everywhere!

I will stop writing now, I probably forgot half of it, but it's a long story and I am also getting tired and imagine you too. Most photos I took with my real camara, so you have to wait to see these.

Oh and even with the DEET and a mosquito net, I literally have insect bites everywhere. They even bit me under my foot and on my eye lid. Nasty little animals!

The last day, the father and the 3 youngest kids brought me at 7:00 am by boat to Rurre from where I took a and back to Sucre via La Oaz and Cochabamba. Will write later more about Sucre and the volunteerwork here. So much to tell!

Tonight on walking back home I bought a little bag of popcorn of a woman selling this on the streets, for 20 bolivianos (13cents!), even if she sells all her popcorn she hardly makes any money. People work hard here but earn so little. We live in a crazy world if you think about this.

Buenas noches!

Love from Sucre
Chantal