Friday April 5th 2013

It has been a busy week in LaPaz, Bolivia. We had hoped to be in Aucapata by now but we are still waiting to leave. The first few days were easy as we had time to acclimatize to the altitude. Even climbing the three flights of stairs up to our hostel room left me gasping for air. We saw a wonderful procession for Good Friday with many people dressed like colourful KKK and carrying huge statues of Jesus and the ever weeping Delores. These were decorated with truckloads of fresh flowers. Our immense height compared to Bolivians is a big advantage when viewing parades. Monday, we started long days of work at the Ivar Mendez International Foundation Office. We start at 8:30 and leave at 7 unless I can think of some way to sneak off early. We've made lots of lists with Yumey, the director and had lots of meetings (today with two school officials in LaPaz). Our project this time is to try to get the art project on a sustainable footing. To that end, we will have two mature, well respected Bolivian artists, Mario Conde Cruz and Havier Fernandez visit Aucapata for a few days while we are they. They will teach with me for one day in a school that has never had any art and they will paint with me in the market of Huanco and at the spectacular Mollan ruins of Iskanwaya. These artists will be part of a volunteer Bolivian Art Committee that will come up with ideas to keep the art programs effective and ongoing. Much of this week has been spent shopping for the art supplies that I will need for my Saturday classes and for my teaching in the schools. This year I have a translator, Cynthia, and we will have transportation as we are intending to do an inventory of craft that is being done in the Aucapata area. We have also made arrangement for the school children to visit their local museum which houses a vast quantity of ceramics from Iskanwaya. Several weeks ago, I came up with the excellent yet hairbrained idea of having individuals of all ages in Aucapata take pictures of themselves and their homes and work and then put these into an emailable format that we can share with folks in Canada and in Africa where Danica is teaching. To that end, I did one photo book last week just before we left and the Bass River Elementary school did a book but not in an easy e mailable format. For the past couple of days, whenever I can grab an hour, I've been trying to reformat their book in the basic six pages so that I'll be able to help the Aucapata folks do their books. It has been entirely frustrating as the programs are unfamiliar and the computer is all in Spanish. I took a break and typed this blog and then tried to insert photos before publishing it. Everything disappeared and so I am sorry to say that this blog likely will not have pictures until a later date. We will be out of touch until we return to LaPaz on May 1 but I promise to catch you up then. Thank you for coming along with us. Hugs Joy Posted by Joy Laking at 6:26 PM No comments: Post a Comment Home Followers Blog Archive ► 2013 (1) ► March (1) ► 2012 (26) ► December (2) ► March (13) ► February (9) ► January (2) ► 2011 (2) ► December (1) ► March (1) ► 2009 (36) ► March (2) ► February (16) ► January (18) ► 2008 (3) ► December (3) About Me Joy Laking View my complete profile