First Day of Work

Today was the group’s first day on the project site. After an early awakening we took off for the job site on foot and arrived around 10am. We had been told that we would be meeting the children that attended the school today

but no one expected the warm welcome and sense of fellowship that a school full of excited children could create.

After a lengthy play session with the children at the school, the contingent settled in to work on two goals on the school ground: to lay the foundation for the new classroom and to clean up a poorly maintained play area and open it up for use. The play area group spent the day disposing of rocks, broken desks, scrap metal, glass and old tires to ready the area for development. During this time the others moved sand, brick and cement mix in preparation for the foundation.

Our workday was brief but productive and before long we were on the road again to tour the Peruvian parliament buildings and sight see around Lima. The tour lasted the last half of the afternoon and into the evening. In that time we witnessed many historic monuments and sites around Lima and we eventually found ourselves at the Parliament buildings. While we didn’t get the amount of time we wanted at the Parliament buildings we did get to extend our tour into a nearby plaza and got to experience many of the less popular sights of Lima.

The tour ended with a hearty dinner at a local restaurant where everyone got to eat up and refuel after an exhausting day. Although many of us were exhausted the bus ride back to our compound was filled with singing, dancing and camaraderie. We finished off the day exhausted, dusty but ecstatic about the potential our project could have on the local community and we had a new found drive to create a better world.

Written by Eric Davison