One of the reasons I think many kids join the activities I do in my community is so that they can participate in the trips that go along with the activities. For the “Escojo Mi Vida” program (the group of youth health promotors in my site) every couple of months Peace Corps puts on a conference where two youth from each group are allowed to go. We also arrange what we call “intercambios” (quite literally, “exchanges”) where groups from different communities meet up for a day or two to focus on a new topic that they haven’t learned about, or review the information that they already learned. This past weekend, we had a group of seven youth and their volunteer come and visit our community for two days and one night, and I am pleased to say that it was a success!
The volunteer who came to visit wanted her group to see what a batey was—none of them had ever seen a batey, and many of them live a somewhat cushier life than the kids here live. The plan was to have them arrive at lunchtime, eat, do different icebreakers with the group here, give a presentation about gender inequality, and in the evening do team building activities and have some time to hang out with the youth. The next morning we would do a short workshop on public speaking, and then some closing activities. I was very stressed in the days following up to the event because we had to arrange for someone to make all the food, figure out the sleeping arrangements, prepare the center, etc, etc… And, as we all know, it’s usually hard to get teenagers to do everything you ask them to do, so I felt as if a lot of the preparation burden was on me.
The day of the event, despite the fact that one of the motorcycles that was carrying two of the visitors broke down, everyone arrived safe and sound and was very happy with their food. During the icebreakers it was obvious that both groups were still feeling very timid, and there was little chatting in between the two, which got me nervous. As the day went on, however, the kids warmed up to each other, and by the time we sent them off that night to sleep in my kids’ houses, I was pretty convinced that there wouldn’t be any problems. My favorite activity of the day was a scavenger hunt that the kids had to do together in the batey; they had to ask around and find out how to say several “Escojo” themed words in Kreyol, as well as find some random items (including an animal--see photo!)
In the evening the visiting group gave a presentation on the concept of gender inequality, which I hadn’t talked about with my kids in so many words. My youth loved thinking about gender roles in our community and the girls especially liked the idea that their brothers should help them do chores around the house!
That night we had arranged for several team building exercises; we did one but then realized that what the kids really wanted to do was sing and dance, so we let them! My group played the merengue songs they composed about Escojo, the other group danced to the songs, and then they continued on well into the night singing and telling jokes (we tried to make sure they weren’t too inappropriate, however sometimes us gringas still don’t understand everything that’s said, and I’m pretty sure some jokes went over our heads!). It was fun to look around the room and watch all of them enjoying themselves and getting along.
The next morning we did a short presentation on public speaking and had them practice tongue twisters, then let them sit around and ask each other questions about one anothers' communities. They asked each other some really interesting questions and were able to learn a little bit more about how the others lived. Everyone was sad that the event was ending, but the kids were all planning the date when our group could go down south to visit the other group!
I was especially happy with the way the event ended because, after constantly nagging the kids to help me with everything the first day, as we were finishing we assigned responsibilities for the clean up, and EVERYONE did what they were supposed to! That was maybe the most successful thing I’ve done all year—a 100% success rate!
