Again, sorry for my tardiness with the blog. We were in Argentina and Uruguay for seven days straight, had two short days on ship and we are just leaving Rio. Anyway here is Argentina:
The first day in Buenos Aires (BA) we were so happy to be back on land again after the long crossing that we just walked around pretty aimlessly all morning. We found an ATM and went to the touristy district and found a starbucks :) but yeah, we were just excited to see anything that wasn’t the ship for a while. Don’t get me wrong---we love love love our ship but after ten cloudy and ickyish days we were glad to be off and walking around in the sun. That afternoon, however, Danielle and I got to go to this really cool after school program for kids who live in the slums or shantytowns in BA. Basically, when they last hosted the FIFA World Cup they were embarrassed about the poor areas of the city and they literally built walls around some neighborhoods so that they would not be seen by the visitors. That has left its mark on these areas and so they started the L.I.F.E. program for the children in these areas. I don’t remember the English translation exactly but it’s something about improving the lives of children and giving them hope and security. Anywho, we went to one of their locations and literally just played with the kids all afternoon and it was soooo fun! I speak very limited Spanish but I got along well enough and the kids just loved that we were there and that we were giving them attention and playing with them. We painted masks and colored and played play-dough and legos and made bracelets. The program brings all of the supplies to the building they have and the kids just come in and out. It is located on a random street in the middle of the neighborhood and the kids just come when school is done. They get to play and hang out and get a snack and some attention and it gets them off of the streets and out of gangs or other illicit activities. The best part was that after awhile most of us went outside and started playing football (soccer) in the street. They were screaming and laughing and directing us where to go and how to play and it was hilarious. There was one little girl who was just directing people left and right and dragging them into position and it was super cute. After that we were taking a ton of pictures and playing little games and swinging them around (that was their favorite part) and giving piggy-back rides and it was just awesome. Then, we went back in and they were looking at the masks we had painted and decided that the one my R.D. Isaiah did looked like a baby so they started following him and chanting “baby face” in Spanish. It was hilarious and he had fun with it :)
We actually ended up getting free trip tickets and went the last day as well. Unfortunately we did not go to the same location and there were less kids because we had to leave early to get back to the ship but we still had fun playing and taking some pictures and painting so it was well worth it!
More later
~Colleen
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