High But Not Dry

Even the chickens took to higher ground

You may have been following the news and know that the Amazon River has reached historic flood levels this year.  We've just finished delivering all the Adopt A School supplies for 2012. I had a large group of volunteers here and things went well, despite the hardships most communities are experiencing.  Fully 3/4 of the villages in our program (about 45 or so out of 58) are completely flooded.  We had to change our system this year where instead of doing 58 separate deliveries, we set up central delivery sites at the few villages not under water.  Communities were asked to come to us for pick-up as we used a floating barge for a storeroom and delivery site.  We didn't know what to expect since not everyone has the appropriate boat or canoe to make the trip. Well, we were overwhelmed with the response and thankfulness these folks showed.  Not only did the community leaders make their way but most of the children did, too.  Our normal policy is that we do not hand out a supply packet to any student who is not present--unless unforeseen circumstances come up such as a health crisis or injury.  This year we decided that if at least the teacher and/or a community leader showed up with the list of registered students we would simply hand them the number of packets they needed.  However, that was rarely necessary--except a few times as all the children and parents came.  What a great showing of commitment to education! We have been reassured that what we’re doing is making a difference in their lives, As we now move into the 20^th year of Adopt-A-School, we look forward to whatever challenge Mother Nature might throw our way!

Sunset on the Napo River

It was great fun for me to see many returning faces and friends who came back to volunteer again this year--and new friendships have been formed along the way, as well.  Our second group of volunteers arrived at the end of week one deliveries. They handled mop-up deliveries then we next moved to community service projects.  This year we helped rebuild a community playground, a new concrete water plant, and we did many fun craft projects for the kids along with games, songs and dancing.  One of our favorite songs which the volunteers sang this year for the community was “Take Me Out To The Ballgame”.  I don’t know what they all thought about that but we sang it as a group several times and I know we had a blast!!

Lynn with a student

In total we welcomed 23 volunteers recruited through the Detroit Zoo. One volunteer who came was my dear friend, Lynn Cluskey from Brighton, Michigan. As you know, I don’t get much company from home so it was a rare treat to have a good friend come for a visit.  She arrived a few days before AAS started so we had quality time to catch up with each other and enjoy the nuttiness of Iquitos.  Then we headed down river and Lynn was quite concerned about mosquitoes and other unidentified flying objects but she was quite the trooper and managed well even with cold showers 6 days in a row. It was great fun to have her along and I hope she took home a souvenir of memories she’ll never forget. Thank you to all Zoo volunteers, Pamela and Nancy, CONAPAC and Explorama staff, guides, boat drivers and department of education volunteers for making this year so much fun!