Awesome Field Trip

The first 6 months or so of 2007 I spent a lot of time organizing a 'gender camp' for some of the boys I work with. I solicited a little bit of money from the Peace Corps' Gender and Development committee and used a raffle and some other fund-raising to get together around $200 total for 9 people (if that sounds like a low budget for a 3 day, 2 night trip to the beach, keep in mind how big of a change you can make by donating a little money to kids in the third world). Finally, in July my camp came to fruition. A number of kids pulled out in the last week or so, but overall I am really happy with how the camp went. I gave a few talks on gender with the kids and did a number of gender-focused activities.

One of the big gender activities we did with the kids was focused around our meals (which also kept cost down). The kids had to wash the dishes, clean the kitchen, and cook the food, all of which are acitivities generally relegated to women in all sectors of Ecuadorian society. We discussed why men are just as responsible for household chores as women.

Another cultural issue is the lack of concern about littering. People love to throw their garbage on the ground as soon as they are finished with it, many times even inside their own homes (not so much in urban areas), so we tried to teach the kids the harm that is done to their country visually and environmentally by littering.

More cooking.

Me...on the beach at sunset. We took pictures like this one of all the kids and we're going to do a project soon to mount them on a piece of wood with some sea shells glued to it.

Teaching about Stereotypes...notice that almost all of the boys are pushing up the skin on the back of their arms...

Teaching about the difference between 'sex' and 'gender'. Do you know the difference? You should.

All in all, I feel like the opportunity for these kids to get to the beach (somewhere not a single one of them had ever been) was the biggest success of the camp. They may forget what we talked about, but they'll always remember their first time at the beach and the first time José Manuel got stung by a mini jellyfish. For me, one of the biggest problems for these kids is their disillusioned parents who think they'll never be able to do anything bigger or better than what their parents have been able to do. I don't know why, but beaches seem to be good places to dream about the future...Keep dreamin', kids, keep dreamin'.