Bantiox Astrid!

Astrid left Mercedes on Friday and it’s rather sad here now.

Few words from Astrid before leaving Mercedes:

“The beginning was a bit difficult for me as I wasn’t speaking Spanish fluently, it was my first experience in volunteering and spending so much time outside France. There were so many people, hot weather and I felt lost. The first week I had to get used to hot weather, food and I was really afraid of animals/insects, especially spiders. But now I know that you can get used to everything (even if you have arachnophobia you can live with spiders under one roof). The children did a very nice welcome and accepted me from the first day. The people in general were very nice for me. Little by little we started working together with Ewa and we got used to living here and every day life was just continuing naturally.

It was nice to work with Ewa, share ideas, feeling as a part of the team and doing things together but also being responsible for some activities.

The best moments were when seeing the kids laughing. Even though they are lacking many things they seem soooo happy. The most incredible is that they spread the happiness easily to everyone around like an “air diseases” and even if you were angry for them a minute ago now they make you happy and you love them with all your heart.

There are some issues/things to improve in Li Ch’utam as it is still a developing organization. The good thing is that it’s a small, grassroots organization and works with people directly and we can see effects of our work quickly (sometimes we see the kids progress even week to week).

I liked to see that there are people especially young people here who want to be involved in the life of their community and I liked a lot to talk and spend time with them.

For me in general it was a very nice experience to meet people, other culture even though it was sometimes difficult to get used to some things like always waiting for people. J But finally I will have a very nice and only positive memories out of this experience. “

Astrid

Thank you Astrid for your presence in Nueva Mercedes, your excellent work with kids, patience, ideas and commitment to the organization. 

I really loved to work with you as I could always count on you and share my thoughts. Living together and spending free time with you was a great pleasure. I hope that you’ll be in touch with Li Ch’utam and can come back one day to see the changes in the community. I remember when at one of the meetings one mother said: “Dile a Astrid que no se vaya!”. Debora, one of our young volunteers said today that she couldn’t sleep Friday night and was crying because she got used to Astrid so much and she treated her like an older sister.