October at Clara Luna by Phil Davies

This month the volunteers at Clara Luna were:

Tessa (Holland), Manuela (France), Jane & Phil (England), Dana (South Korea), Jenness (US), Darren & Fiona (Scotland), Steffen (Germany), Viviane (Canada), Claudia & Christian (Germany) and
Picker (Taiwan)

Working at the Foundation: Caroline (France)

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We were also visited by a friend of Clara Luna, Gary Vance from Tennessee in the USA. Gary not only cooked us all a meal (¡muy rico!), but also entertained us with songs he sang and played on his guitar. He then generously left his guitar for students at Clara Luna to play. ¡Estupendo!

Caroline, Manuela, Viviane and Jane have been reading stories at Sindicato de Choferes School. This included “Somos diferentes” a story about diversity which was written by Caroline and Manuela.

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Fiona continued to visit disabled people in their houses to show them and their families how to do physiotherapy exercises, ably assisted by Darren. Sadly for everyone, Fiona and Darren moved on at the end of October and Jane and Phil went on visits with them to learn how to work with one seven year old boy, Ulises. Jane and Phil will leave in mid November and will pass their knowledge on to other volunteers so that the work can continue.

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Activities:

* English

English lessons have continued of course, with Jane & Darren teaching students from Servicio Civil Cuidadano. The students are planning to find work in tourism and so an ability to speak English gives them an advantage.

The volunteers continue to give lessons to a range of local school students, ranging in age from 6 to 17 years old.

There are also lessons on Saturday mornings for adults from Jipijapa and Puerto López.

* Club de Niños:

Reading: The children can always read stories independently and there has also been group story reading by Jane, Manuela and Caroline, in particular La Oruga Hambrienta (The Hungry Caterpillar)

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Countries:

Tessa gave a presentation on her home country, Holland, featuring windmills and clogs.
Dana presented South Korea and taught the children how their names appear in the Korean alphabet.
Darren and Fiona presented Scotland. The many highlights included the Loch Ness Monster and teaching the children Scottish country dancing. This was very authentic and popular, with Darren wearing a kilt.

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Games:
Chess and Scrabble are regularly played in the house and various outdoor games such as volleyball in the back garden.

Yoga:

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This month we have had Viviane from Canada with us who is a qualified yoga teacher. As well as offering yoga classes to the volunteers and adults from the local community, Viviane has held taster sessions at the Club de Niños and they have proved highly popular.

Intercambio / Language Exchange:
Paolo, Steffen and Jane have been the leading lights, with Fiona, Darren and Phil joining in.

Other activities:
By popular demand, we returned to read “La Casa de Alberto el Pez” in the plazoleta and in Central Park we read “La controversia entre los colores” by Jenness. The highly appreciative audience of kids and parents would like to see us back soon:

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