An Adventurous Trip into Guyana's Interior

Hey Everyone!

Sorry for this delayed post but we have had a very busy past week and a half that we are really excited to share with all of you right now!

Enjoying some lemonade in between classes

Last Monday, we returned to Newmarket Primary School and No. 59 Primary School and had our first lesson at Massiah Primary School. We taught our intro Values and Goal Setting Lesson at Massiah and the first part of Anatomy and Puberty at Newmarket and No. 59. Massiah was really welcoming and Newmarket and No. 59 were as excited to have us back as we were to be there. In the morning in between our Massiah and Newmarket lesson, our wonderful new local friend, Geeta (who has been helped us network with the schools in the area), brought us to the Tagore Secondary School (also in the area) to meet with the head mistress there. The meeting went really well and we were invited to come teach there every Monday morning...so our Monday's are now jammed pack with 4 different schools as well as Geeta's after school Youth Friendly Space that she runs! This being a pilot project in only its second year of existence, we are very excited with all these new connections.

Beautiful drawings at the Letter Kenny Youth Friendly Space

On Tuesday we went to the Letter Kenny Youth Friendly Space and ran an activity on Nutrition. The kids, who we normally play cricket with behind our house, were really into the activity and made some beautiful drawings on paper plate with foods from all the different food groups. We then decorated the Youth Friendly Space with all of their cool artwork. We were really happy to see some of the parents come out and participate with their kids as well.

Playing hop-scotch in Letter Kenny

We went to the Letter Kenny Youth Friendly Space in the afternoon on Wednesday as well since the kids had a half day of school. We chilled with them for a few hours, playing fun games like ninja, hop scotch and tag. Hopefully if the rain stops, the field outside the Youth Friendly Space will dry up so that we can practice our cricket skills once again! In the late afternoon we went to the Port Moraunt Cricket Club to run a Leadership and Teamwork Workshop for one of the club's adult teams. We were excited to apply our curriculum outside of the classroom and had a lot of fun working with this team.

On Thursday, our day began at 5am, packing our bags to head to Baracara, an afro-guyanese community located in the interior of Guyana off the Corentyne River. After a stunningly beautiful three and a half hour boat ride with some other volunteers from the Ministry of Culture Youth and Sport, we arrived and were warmly welcomed by this amazing community.

Cruisin' down the Corentyne River

After settling in, we helped run a fun afternoon of friendly games of cricket and football (soccer for our North American readers). After the games, there was a nice award ceremony and the winning teams were awarded trophies. After the games we had the opportunity to speak to both the athletes and spectators on the importance on Leadership in our everyday lives. This was an awesome a group to work with and they participated enthusiastically. We then went back to the boat to head across the River to the local Health Centre, where we were staying for the night.

Some of the Baracara community members after the award ceremony

We shared a room with five other volunteers, and had a lot of fun hanging out and making new friends. In the evening we all sat out by the River underneath a starry sky lit up by the beautiful full moon. The next morning, two of the women we were staying with made us a delicious home-made breakfast of Roti and lime leaf and sour-sop leaf tea. It was really cool getting to see how Roti is made! After a fun volleyball tournament with the community, we headed home in our motor boat back to New Amsterdam. It was refreshing to be able to get out of the city and see another part of Guyana. It was a truly unique and exciting experience and one that we'll never forget.

Watching how the pro's make Roti

When we got  home Friday evening, we went straight to bed to rest up for our weekend in Georgetown with the rest of the team. Stay tuned for a blog post on our Independence Day Weekend festivities.

A stunning Baracara sunset

Much love as always,
Kev and Kate :)