Day 27: The end is near

Today is my last day here at Mission Mexico. I leave first thing tomorrow morning and arrive in Dunedin late Friday afternoon. After the chaos of getting everyone ready for school this morning and waking up at 5am again, I am looking forward to going home. I have quite mixed feelings about leaving. I have started to get to know a lot of the kids and it will be a little sad to say good bye. However, I am hoping to sponsor one of the boys to go to a better school and so will be able to stay in touch with everyone here.

It has been a challenging expereince but has surprisingly gone quite quickly. Although it does seem a long time since I hopped off the aeroplane at Tapachula airport. I really enjoyed my first week here and my last week here. The couple of weeks in the middle were lots of hard work and the behaviour of the children was very upsetting at times. The highlight has been the beach trips. At the beach, just about everyone is happy. We have such fun surfing with the kids and mucking around in the water.

I am pleased to say my spanish has improved quite a bit. Although I don't know how "Aora, por favour" (now please) or "quatro de ilempia" (clean your room) can be used outside of a home environment.

Thank you everyone for all your emails and comments on the blog. It has been quite an adventure and it was so lovely to hear from everyone. I still have lots more stories to tell so look forward to catching up soon.
Adios for now,
Petra.

p.s. Whilst I am crawling with some friendly head lice, I am hoping to get rid of them all this afternoon!

Spin Racer

Last week I walked past several women in gym clothes waiting outside a building that said ¨Spin Racer.¨ After a bit of investigating and practising some more spanish sentences, I found out that they were waiting for a spin or RPM class. So yesterday one of the other volunteers and I ventured out to have a go. There were about 10 people in the class that was led by a mexican man who was wearing full lycra pants and top. He was sweating so much that each time he pointed to indicate stand up or turn the gears up, sweat went flying across the room. I am not one to sweat myself but I was so red in the face and thoroughly dripping by the end of the class. It was a little different to usual RPM classes with some bizarre moves that involved riding the bike whilst doing what seemed like push ups on the bike handles. This move was also referred to by the instructor as ¨The Eagle!¨ So today I went back with another volunteer and was quite pleased to see that I am adapting more to the extremely hot exercise conditions!

Only 5 more days here and then on the plane home... I have mixed feelings about this as I know it will be hard to say good bye to the kids here. However I am looking forward to getting back to see all the smiles in Room 12.

Day 23

Beans and rice ... and meat toay!

Feeding time at the zoo

Day 21 (I think)

Today I worked a morning shift. As I rolled out of bed at approximatley 4.45am I was greeted by an amazing breakfast! One of the other volunteers has started dating the girl living in my flat (they are both from Manly, Sydney). He is always doing lovely little things for her like buying her chocolate or taking her to interesting places. Anyway, as she and I were working together this morning, he decided to make her a delicious breakfast... and I luckily got to benefit from this! I am not quite sure what time he got up, but he had walked into town to buy fresh coffees for us, bought crepes from somewhere else and made a bowl of amazing fruit salad. Usually my breakfast at this time of the morning consists of a rushed muslie bar so I could not believe my luck. On top of this he then let us relax for an extra 15 minutes whilst he started the morning shift. It totally made our day and certainly made the morning shift much more exciting!

Skype call

Today I skyped Room 12. It was so lovely to see everyone and know that you are all safe and well. Meche really enjoyed talking to you in English and the other kids liked seeing your faces. It was a bit difficult for us to answer all your questions so if you have a question for me just send it to me as a comment on the blog.

Keep up the great work with your production practise!

From Mrs. Ohlrich.

Meche and Yoni talking with Room 12

How many people can you fit into a car?

How many children can you fit in one car? This is just the girls car and only captures a little bit of them getting out of it. The 25 girls fit into one car with all the surfboards and the 30 boys fit into the other car. A very funny experience really. My leg was so numb from the journey that I couldn´t feel it from my knee down!

Beach trip: Day 19

We went to the beach again yesterday. The waves were gigantic and the sun was hot. We had a great day though. Sadly one of the cars got a flat tyre on the way home so this was a little annoying. We also enjoyed some more hamburgers last night - I think Sundays are definitly my favourite day of the week!

How am I feeling today?



Playing with the puppets made by GSNS kids.

Perhaps now that I am feeling closer to the end of my time here I can begin to enjoy the experience a bit more for what it is. There are 57 children at the orphanage and the volunteers main job is to make sure that everyone gets everywhere they need to be with everything they need. Obviously we also make sure that everyone is fed, showered and have completed their chores. I have felt so bothered by the way the kids have treated me at times that I think this is what makes the work so hard. However, today I heard another reason why one set of sisters are at the orphanage. Their story is so horrible that it really makes me stop and understand why the children behave the way they do. Despite everything they have been through in their lives, they all still manage smiles, laughs and a good bit of joking around. So I guess I just have to understand that when they are speaking awful Spanish words to me that this is not my fault and all I can do is just move on from it and look for the smiles instead.

Chilli Dips

To farewell one of the volunteers last night we went to a Mexican restaurant. As part of the service, they place 20 different dips, ranked in order from mildest to hottest. I am pleased to say I tried the hottest and quickly decided to stick to the more mild chilli dips.

Day 17 (I think)

It is Friday afternoon here and it is stinking hot! I did a morning shift this morning. As I was exhausted from the 5am start (and only 5 hours sleep) I rolled into bed at the end of the shift. Even with the turbo fan pointed perfectly at my second level of the bunk, I woke up in a pool of sweat. So I walked to the only air conditioned place I know - the Italian Coffee Shop. This place reminds me a lot of Starbucks or somewhere similar. It is not the sort of place I would usually enjoy sitting however the air conditioning was too welcoming. Not to mention, I had a coffee frappe with lots of cream and other bad things in it!

I have been sitting and reading my book and this brings me to my next point. As some of you know, I have been reading Shantaram. I am now at the exciting end part of it and have reached page 756 of 927. There was a paragraph in a recent bit that I read that reminded me of my own travel experiences. It mentioned how in India (where the book is set) people love to really stare at foreigners. The author described the staring as not just a curious look but a really big open eyed staring.

This is exactly like my experience in Tapachula. Even though the Mexicans see Americans and Europeans regularly, they still stare to the point that it becomes very akward. This morning a man driving past, slowed his car right down, put down his window and then in a loud voice called "Buenes Dias!" (Good morning). The fact that he actually slowed right down just to say good morning to me is something that amazes me. People love to say hello to me here and love it more if I respond. At the coffee shop, the girl serving me pulled out my chair, pushed my chair in for me, took my order and then stood and stared at me whilst I drank the coffee. It was very uncomfortable but after a sufficient amount of staring she managed to get back to her job. I can only imagine what it must be like to be a famous movie star or similar!

Half way!

I am officially now half way through my time here at the orphanage. In 2 weeks I will be boarding the plane to come back to New Zealand. Knowing this is making my days more manageable!

Day 13 and Day 14

Today is my day off. I enjoyed a lovely sleep in and then a trip to the market to get some fresh juice. The markets are very interesting, full of lots of food, clothes and other items. Then I went off to the pool for my usual swim. When I got home, I decided it was time to check my hair for lice! Sadly I discovered 1 massive head lice and lots of black beach sand! I am hoping there are no more. Do not worry Room 12 - I will get rid of them all before I come back to school.
I also went to the movies this afternoon and saw Gahoole. It was so nice to sit in the air conditioning and take my mind off things. The main characters in the movie spoke with Australian accents so it made me feel right at home.

Yesterday, I made quite a few mistakes during my shift! I was in charge of organising the bread for dinner. We have to make sure that each age group gets the same amount to keep things fair. Even though I locked the kitchen, I left the trolley with the bread on it close to the door. As you can guess, some little boys managed to get their hands on the trolley and steal some of the bread! Of course, nobody owned up to it! Then when one of the other volunteers and I made the milk to go with the bread, we used the wrong ingredients. It looked like the milk powder but certainly did not smell like it! The kids still drank it and even told me they though it was el delicioso!

Here are the children reading the new books that we gave them. I bought them the Wonky Donkey and they really love it!

Hello M2B

Hello Model 2B children! Thank you for your questions and comments. I am having a great time but am finding the work very tiring!

• Ella and Bridie - the best thing I have seen so far was the beach. The beaches here have black sand and the waves are really big! We took all the children from the orphanage to the beach. Many of the older children surf really well. Even some of the younger kids are better surfers than me.
• Rita - When I first got here it rained most days. Now it is the end of the rainy season and it is very hot. Today it is 33 degrees.
• Tevita - I am trying my best to look after the kids. Some of them are very naughty and do not do what they are told!  

I hope you have had nice weather for your sports day.
From Mrs. Ohlrich.

Day 12

Yesterday we were off to the beach. This was such a fun day. Everyone surfed, played in the sand, explored on the rocks and generally had a great time. When we got back one of the older guys cooked an Australian style BBQ. It was so delicious!

The day was just what I needed!

Saturday: Day ?

Thank you so much everyone for all your comments and messages! It makes me feel happy to get kind messages and to know that you are enjoying the blog.

I was feeling quite down on Friday and very homesick but after a fabulous surf on Saturday morning (in dirty, black sand water) I felt much happier! Highlights from my Saturday shift in which the children were very hyperactive and quite naughty;

• One boy locked in his room after refusing to do his job.
• Two 7 year old girls having a physical fight. They pulled rather large chunks out of their hair.
• Another 2 boys in a fight and 1 sent to his room.
• More children talking back to me in Spanish words that I could not understand!

However, rather than become bothered by all of this (and admittedly I tried to ignore it and leave it to the other volunteers to deal with) I decided to grab my camera and take a photo of the great things happening that day. Who can resist this little Harry Potter? Junior wore these glasses all afternoon! So cute.

Off to the pool

I am just about to head to the pool. The pool is at the country club. Sounds fancy but take a look at the photo! I really love going though as it is quiet and peaceful and gets you away from the noise at the orphanage. I guess the pictures show that Tapachula looks very poor. To some extent it is, although there is a lot of nice cars on the road. Sadly, crime is a huge problem here. That is why most of the children live at the orphanage. It is because their parents have gone to jail for horrible things, or their parents may have run away from them.

Anyway, off to take my mind of things at the pool!

Day 10

It is now Friday and the beginning of day 10. Angus wrote in his comment that I could perhaps write a bit more about what I am feeling. Up until now, I have felt quite settled and enjoyed the work. However as of yesterday I am now feeling totally exhausted and very homesick! I have finished my morning shifts and now begun my late shifts. This means I start work at 1pm and finish anywhere between 9pm and 11pm. Yesterday was the first day I begun to fell really fed up with the children and with the work. It is very hard at times to get them to do their jobs and to follow instructions. They can be so kind and happy but then if you tell them off they can be so mean! They curse and argue with you and it is a very unsettling feeling.



Celebrating a birthday.



Yesterday, the kids were also very hyperactive. I did some painting with them, which went reasonably well. However, then one boy just decided to be silly and put paint all over his hands and arms and refuse to wash them. Everytime I tried to speak to him, he would run away. Then he would sneak back and put more paint on himself. It is little things like this that just ruin it for everyone else.  On top of this I have got a cold, as do most of the volunteers.

I am feeling much better today and have had a great sleep in. I am about to head off to the pool to relax and get away from the orphanage for a couple of hours. I am working with some different volunteers tonight and I think that may help my mood. The weekend also should be great. We are going surfing on Sunday. They do this most Sundays - all the kids and the volunteers and the owners head to the beach for the day. I am also going on Saturday morning with some of the older boys. They are allowed to go on Saturdays and it is a good opportunity for the volunteers to get away too. I had to really fight for my place on tomorrow¨s beach trip which has probably added to my bad mood! I do not like confrontation and usually just give in to others. But this time I decided that it was my turn to go surfing!

This has been a very long post, so will leave it here and hopefully write again in a day or so. Petra x

Dinner

After work sometimes we head for dinner at the local street quesidella place. The food is delicious and very filling. You just sit on the side of the road and they have a stall where they cook the food. The people here make their own tortillas so it makes the food extra tasty.

This is not the best photo of us all and I am not quite sure what is happening to Alex¨s eyes in this photo! Some of the volunteers are missing here as they are working.

Day 7

This morning was a more successful morning than yesterday. Perhaps I just enjoyed the chaos more! We managed to get everyone to school despite many tears and screams. One little girl ´lost´or ´hid´her uniform. So when I told her she still had to go, even in her pyjamas, she found some clothes. There was the usual lost socks and undies and I can see it will be my never ending nightmare.

I finished at 2pm today and went for a drink with some of the other volunteers. We went to a place that serves food when you buy a drink. At only $2.00 I think this is a good deal. You just have to put up with the stray animals running around - dogs, cats and chooks. See the photo below!

The Park

After dropping off the two youngest children at the kindergarten, some of the older ones stop at the park. It is all made of hard metal... not good for accidents but lots of fun!

Off to school!

Yes, I did send Yoni to school with a green face.

Doing a bit of last minute homework before we leave. The hats cover up the terrible hair cuts we gave the boys when we did the lice treatments. If you look closely on the boy leaning down, he has a huge chunk of hair missing. Alex, one of the volunteers who did the haircuts, was not very well liked after this. He bribed them back though by giving them chocolate donuts for their school lunch.

Day 6

Today I had to work another 5am morning shift. I know that I do not like getting up on Mondays, so I should have realised there would be several children who would not want to get up this morning. There are just 2 volunteers working in the morning. It is no easy job getting 55 children showered, fed and to school on time. Today it seems I missed a few....! Whoops! I was just leaving with one group when I noticed 3 girls missing from the group. Whilst my spanish is not great, I managed to find out that they were not coming to school because of a stomach pain, a broken shoe and a missing uniform. No amount of reasoning and pleading would change their mind. In the end, Mo, who is in charge when the parents go away, somehow got them out and dressed. The children get into huge trouble with the owners if they do not get to school. So hopefully they will not be pulling this trick again tomorrow.

On top of this, I seemed to give out too many sandwhiches for lunch ... many children are good at managing to get more by telling little lies. And I will not even begin on the pain of finding all the right socks and undies for those who seemed to loose theirs along the way.

Let`s hope tomorrow morning is better!

The orphanage

The casadena where the children eat.
Our room is just to the left of this, up the stairs.

The verandah of the orphanage.

Day 4

Cleaning the shoe cupboard

I am now into day 4 of 29 and have so far successfully survived this trip! Today I went with the younger children to supervise them at church. The people that ran it were so lovely and I practised by broken spanish-english with them to have a reasonable conversation. We got picked up in one of the vans and managed to cram all 40ish kids in! Quite an experience really and again indicates to me that road rules here are a bit different. Back at the orphanage the children are testing the volunteers as their "mama" has left to go to Mexico City for a few days and meet her husband. Pam and Allan are the couple that run the orphanage and rarely take time off. However, Allan has been away for 6 weeks so they are meeting in Mexico City for a few days off together.

Tapachula



These are the streets of Tapachula.



Shoes

Before the children are allowed to eat, they have to put shoes on. There is a shoe cupboard full of old shoes that the choose from. It is very funny, especially when the little kids put on shoes that are far too big, or soccer boots, or mismatched shoes.

I find mealtimes here a little bit sad as the volunteers have to watch the children like hawks. Many of them will try to steal from each other or trade their food for things. We have to keep the kitchen locked and have to supervise the washing up. Some children are so used to being so hungry that they will eat out of the bin or the sink.

Room 12: Next time when I´m nagging you to finish your food just think how lucky you are!

Day 3



Waiting for food



Today I had a 5am - 1pm volunteer shift. I can´t remember them ever saying we had to get up at 5am on the website! Anyway, this involves waking the children, getting them into the showers, beds made, children dressed, fed and off to school. Luckily, I actually don´t have to make the beds or do the dishes. The kids have chore lists and the volunteers just have to oversee that everything gets done! This means a lot of nagging and a lot of children talking back to me in a language I can´t understand.



Getting to Tapachula

Mexico City airport is quite lovely - much nicer than LA. I had to get finger printed in LA just to get through customs. Anyway, as I was waiting in a little aeroplane bus shuttle to get onto our plane for Tapachula, a European man got on the bus (remember that everyone looks very Mexican here!) He guessed what I was doing on the bus and introduced himself. He lives right next door to the orphanage and used to run an English school here. He sold that and used the money to buy the land that the orphanage is on. I ended up getting a lift with him from the airport which was great as he was able to tell me a lot about what to expect! He also helped me out when I got interrogated in Spanish at the Tapachula airport and my bags were searched etc!

Mexico City

Now that I have a bit more time, I thought I would update my blog on some of the adventures so far...
I stayed just one night in Mexico City in a hostel in town. I didn´t arrive till quite late and left early the next day so I only had a chance to have a stroll around town. This itself was an experience. The mexicans obviously don´t see many blondes around their part of town, as I had lots of stares. This must be what it is like to be famous!
The taxi drivers are very insane and drive so fast! After practising for several hours on the plane how to say: Is this taxi free? and How much to take me to...? I discovered that you just had to buy a ticket to match the zone you´re traveling in - kind of like a bus trip. I think we should adopt this idea back home as it would make things much cheaper!

Mexico city