Week 9 - Peru / Cusco - 12th-16th May 2014 ** please DONATE!!**

Project: Peru For Life, Kyuki-Do Wasi. 

https://www.facebook.com/PeruForLife?fref=ts 

"The KYUKI-DO WASI house is a social project created by PERU FOR LIFE – a non-profit organisation in Cusco, Peru. We provide a home for teenage mothers and their babies to give them the opportunity for a secure and happy life.

Becoming a mother when you are between the ages of 13 and 16 is not easy for any young woman living in any country. Now imagine you find yourself in that situation, with no financial or emotional support from your family, often times abandoned and in the worst of cases your soon to be child is not the result of a consensual relationship. This is the situation that far too many young girls in Peru are facing. In a country where abortion is illegal and sexual education is hardly present, young mothers are in search of an opportunity to change and better their lives and the lives of their children. KYUKI-DO WASI exists for this very reason. Our vision is to provide a house to create a family environment, education and socialisation for teenage moms and their babies. We want the mother and child to be opened up to the opportunities in this world so that they can live a typical life of a middle class Peruvian family during their time in KYUKI-Do WASI and continue to do so in their time after."

Contact details:

Ms Angelika Schmidt 

Skype: peru.cordinator

rcdp.cusco@gmail.com

Tlmv: 0051 986233815 

KYUKI-Do WASI 

Calle Mariano Tupac Amaru 

C1-21 de la Urb. Tupac Amaru, 

Distrito de San Sebastián, Cusco.

Donations:

BANCO CONTINENTAL 

Name: PERU FOR LIFE ASOCIACION PERU FOR LIFE

Account No: 00110200020117191938

CCI: 011 - 200 - 000201171919 - 38

SWIFT Code:BCONPEPL

Angelika was the first coordinator I felt was truly making a difference. She's working with hospitals/clinics, orphanages (boys and girls) and a house for teenage mums (and most probably, many other projects I wasn't aware of). She is tireless, and gets everyone around her involved.

Additionally, she is super friendly, has a golden heart along with her sweet smile, and goes above and beyond to make sure we have everything we need and are happy. Same applies to the orphans and teenage mums.

They kindly asked me to spend the week at Kyuki-Do Wasi instead of the orphanages, as they had just recently started the project, with very little support, and needed someone to help them run the mums, while they were managing all the other volunteers for the orphanages and clinics, and make sure the girls had disciplined daily tasks, on top of teaching them English lessons.

I could have not been happier with this project!! I spent 24hr everyday in the house, and this was by far the project where I felt I was actually helping to make a difference with my skills. 

They depend completely on the help of volunteers, no governmental help here whatsoever, and the projects she runs are truly in deep need of our financial support so they can pay the bills at the end of the month. 

So, in case you'd like to make a donation to any of the projects I worked on during this journey, this would be the one I would recommend the most.

Once I'm back on my feet and in a normal routine in Barcelona, I will make sure to organise some sort of event to help gather funds as well for the project, so stay tuned for more news!! :)

And in the meantime, thank you very much for your donations!!

Below, you will find the photos of the Kyuki-Do Wasi house, built to home the teenage mums and their babies who get abandoned by their parents, and where I was staying for a week. Lovely new place, with new furniture, hot water, fast WiFi, warm new quilts and blankets, an in-house cook so you don't have to cook, and everything you could wish for to have a comfortable volunteering stay in Cusco.

We even had the cutest pets!

One of our teenage mums to be, keeping the belly warm ;)

Teenage mums working with volunteers from Canada, creating bracelets

With baby girl, Milagros

With her mum, Fernandita

I was leaving the project to continue with my journey on a Friday, 16th of May - which happened to be the day before my birthday. The girls wouldn't want to let my B'day go by without a cake, so they made me the most wonderful surprise I've ever had. Totally unexpected, I come down for dinner and found a B'day cake on the table.... tears of course.

It just goes to show how kind people can be, even if life doesn't treat them well and even if they are left with nothing - they still give you everything they have and don't have. It's the little things, these beautiful moments that make it all count, and all sacrifices worth it.

Thank you so much girls!!

With volunteer doctors from the US

The doctors did guacamole too, bliiiiiss!!!!

With Doña Alcira, our amazing cook! Huge kind heart.

Doesn't get any cuter than this!

During the week, I also had the opportunity to go visit the Orphanages for the girls and the boys. Amazing beautiful joyful children, but living in very very poor conditions. It was very sad to see the conditions they were living in, as they have very little support. The biggest support they receive is from the efforts of Angelika and her team, hence I really urge you to help with donations if you can.

In the girls' orphanage, there were girls from all ages, from babies to 17-year olders. There were also some mentally challenged girls with special needs, but not able to receive the proper care. They still had smiles on their faces nonetheless every time they saw us.

I was helping some of the older girls with their English homework, and was telling them about the office pet we had at the TransPerfect's office in Barcelona, our fish Boludo. And so, they presented me with the following drawing:

(you wouldn't believe the resemblance!)

The girl who coloured this would like to become an artist when she grows up

At the boys orphanage, we encountered the same difficulties as the girls' one, possibly a bit worse conditions even. We went there to take a few gifts from a Peruvian friend:

             Baby and his teen mum

Other volunteers from different countries (mostly doctors), also came to visit them with us - they were playing with the kids like mad, you should have seen how happy these children were to play with them. 

One really doesn't know how much happiness you can bring to these children until you see their bight wide eyes opened, full of happiness and their contagious laughter!

Cool dudes with their secret handshake

The doctor from the UK gave this boy his Ray-Ban, you cannot imagine how excited he was!

The coolest & the gang!

That's the hug he got as a Thank You for the shades - see, doesn't take much to make children happy

The contagious laughter I was talking about!

Best buddies!

Playing super-heroes!

We are at 4-thousand metres altitude, gets tough to breathe! Bless their cotton socks!

Playing hide & seek

**Not sure if you noticed the background of the pictures, you will see some of the needs...

It was very difficult for me to leave this project, really got attached to everyone, not only the kids, but everyone else helping too. I missed my dear friends Simona and Steve here, they would have been so very helpful playing with the kids too!

I was also deeply moved by their poor conditions, their needs. I will definitely continue to help remotely in whichever way I can, as this is the one project that doesn't receive any governmental help whatsoever, or any consistent valuable support from any other entity.

Thank you, Angelika, for all your persistence, hard work, for leaving your family behind in Germany and come to Peru to help this cause. You're a Hero along with these kids. Great work!

See you soon and send my love to everyone!!

Next destination: Copacabana, Bolivia!