El Bichito: Getting started

August 18

We have just arrived in Peru and at El Bichito. For the kids here, school has just started again after their winter break. We are just getting to know each other, so we have been playing games after lunch, encouraging homework (of which there has been just a little so far), and getting to know each other. Many of the kids are around our daughter, Sierra’s age and she has already made a special friend. Milagros comes a little later than the first wave of kids, so Sierra waits to eat lunch with her. Milagros is good at bringing her homework, so Sierra and Milagros work on it together and then play together, even though Sierra hasn’t learned Spanish yet. Some of the boys have started teasing Sierra by calling her name and then when she looks they say “costa, selva!” These are the three regions of the Peru—the mountains, the coast, and the jungle. The boys of El Bichito seem to really enjoy our teenagers, Kai and Renen, which are also both boys. Kai and Renen don’t speak much Spanish yet either, but they are all enjoying playing together. We have been playing Jenga, Uno, and Bingo, doing puzzles and coloring pictures. One thing we have been trying to get each child to do to help us learn their names and who they are is to write their name (or have me write it if they prefer), color it, and write 3 good things about themselves or things they like. Then we take a picture of them holding their name, and by the next day we have it on the wall. As they see others with their pictures up, they are more eager to go along with this assignment, but we have many still missing. One of my favorite things to do is get a picture book and read it to a few children as they are eating lunch. They are a captive audience then, so I try to catch the kids that I have noticed leave right after lunch. Usually several others crowd in to listen as well. Next week more children will be coming as some of them were still on winter break this week. We’ll see how we do at getting to know even more kids!