Foto da Semana 8

Ellen Oleria, great musician, she performed at the Feira da Musica this past Saturday....LOVE her songs

Centros comunitários, fazendo a diferença

Along with attending meetings with Sarah and Portuguese lessons, for the past two weeks we’ve been working at Emaus’ Casa do Saber. There they run a sort of afterschool program for the children to get help with their homework, as well as improve on other subjects like math and portuguese. The children are split up into two classrooms based on their ages, 6-12 and 13-16. Along with homework help, the children are provided with snacks and access to books and computers. During our first week of observation, one of the girls had asked me to help her with her history homework. She had to read two pages and answer questions related to the text. Mind you this is all in Portuguese, a language I am still learning. I made her read the text out loud and we went through the questions together. Honestly, at this point Portuguese is easy to understand when it’s written down, but I can’t say the same when it’s spoken.

Besides from helping them with their homework, we are also responsible for teaching them the universal language of MATH! Numbers have the same meaning in every language, who knew (sarcasm). Teaching math in a different language can be difficult at times but the great thing about kids is that they are patient. Our lesson plan consists of teaching the younger group math and the older children English. For the first English lesson with the older group, we had planned to teach them the words of English songs they knew. We first made them listen to the song and write down any words they recognized. “Love” seemed to be the most recognizable word. We gave them the lyrics to sing along and a breakdown of the meaning in Portuguese. I think whenever I hear Bob Marley’s “Is this love,” I will forever think of that first English class, since we played the song repeatedly.

On a personal note...

Many aspects of Casa do Saber reminds me of my childhood growing up in Ottawa’s Debra Dynes neighbourhood, a low-income community (by Canadian standards of course). At one point in time the neighbourhood had gained the reputation for being “Ottawa’s primary drive-in drug store.” The Debra Dynes Family House was opened in 1995, shortly after my family moved to Canada and into this community. Simply known as the Family House, this community centre served the community by providing services such as food banks, computer classes, English classes, summer camps, and homework clubs, just to name a few. Considering the fact that the family house was located right beside my house (we literally shared a wall with them), I grew up going to the homework club, attending day and summer camp, and taking part in community activities. I eventually started doing volunteer work and working in the same day camp programs I used to go to when I was younger.

I can reflect back and see that I wouldn’t have had some of the childhood experiences I had without the Family House and I am very much grateful to the dedicated people of Debra Dynes Family House. From my personal experience, such community centres do have a positive impact on the communities they are meant to improve.  Emaus is one such community center working towards improving the Pirambu neighbourhood.

Foto da Semana 7

One of the girls at Emaus drew a picture of Amber and I, we even have matching outfits lol

Foto da Semana 6

"Now that the holidays are over, we can jump into some work"...I guess we spoke too soon because now the IF is on strike <_<

Estamos em Greve

This has been a very interesting week. Last Monday was the first day of school and the IF was filled with students starting the new semester. However, a few days later it was announced that the professors would be going on strike. Despite this, there has still been some Mulheres Mil work for us. This semester, the project will be taking place in a new community. We tagged along with Sarah for a meeting with Father Sydney, who runs the church and community centre. This community centre provides support for three low-income communities: Brasilia, Traveva Matadouro, and Santa Terezinha. Following the meeting, he showed us 2 of 3 community centres that were large yet empty. There are no programs running, hence there are no people working within the building. It is clear that this vast amount of space that this community has is being underutilized.

On Friday we went to Pirambu to meet up with the staff of Emaus Casa de Saber. We were shown the classrooms where children are taught and assisted with their homework. We were given a tour of the community centre, which is made up of 2 floors. At the moment, they’re fundraising to build a bigger community center. The place is bustling with life and activities. The contrast of activity between Emaus and the community centers we had seen a few days ago is shocking. Emaus is a French NGO that has been running in Brazil since 1986. (See Amber’s blog about Emaus). Emaus has had time and commitment on its side, allowing for it to become an internationally recognized development program.

This week, Amber and I will be sitting in on the classes at Emaus just so the children can get used to us. This should be an interesting week indeed...

Foto da Semana 5

We went grocery shopping and found this interestingly shaped squash, it is indeed heavy.
Photo taken by Grant

Um dia longo...

Grant, a student from Niagara College, arrived on Monday. Since our other roommate from France doesn't arrive until August 7^th, we thought we might as well make use of the spare room we have. I’ve heard horror stories about living with boys but so far so good. He cleans after himself, he takes showers, and he likes to cook. He’s also really good at making sushi. I’ve only eaten sushi twice in my life and I didn't LOVE it but let me just say, sushi might be added to my list of top 25 foods...might.

Hhhhmm sushi

Yesterday was probably the worst day we've had here in Fortaleza. When we got our Brazilian visas, we were told to go the Policia Federal within 30 days of our arrival to get our visa stamped. What we thought was going to be a quick errand turned into the longest day. Ok, bureaucracies vary in efficiency all over the world, I get it. But this by far has made my top 5 worst bureaucratic experiences, definitely beating out my past experiences with Ottawa’s MTO (Ministry of Transportation).

Although we were at the Policia Federal since 6:30am, we didn't get out until 4:30pm. The only good thing that came out of the day was meeting Florian, a German who has lived in France, UK and is currently travelling Latin America. We filled our day exchanging stories of our travels and random cartoons we watch. This traumatizing day at the Policia Federal left Amber, Florian, and I tired, hungry, and frustrated over the whole process. But it’s over now and I don’t have to do this again, hopefully. Since Amber and I are working on a package for the future interns to get around Fortaleza with ease, yesterday’s experience will definitely be included in the package.

Amber, Florian, and I reunited a few days after our ordeal at the Policia Federal
Photo taken by Grant

We got bored waiting at the Policia Federal, so we started playing futebol with coins.
We giggled like little girls while people stared...
...yes we went mad

Our days are still occupied with learning Portuguese but the holidays are coming to an end. I’m excited for next week to finally start doing work for Mulheres Mil.

Foto da Semana 4

This is what happens when a pescetarian and a meatlover live in the same home,
we cook together but eat separate delicious dishes.