mikeShriver

So far on this visit, I have spent most of my days relatively leisurely. We usually go to bed before 10:00 and get up after 9:00. Many days have been spent without leaving the house, merely lying around in hammocks, reading or writing, sometimes waiting for Torin to return from some meeting or interview, sometimes with him as my accomplice in sloth.

Today, though, we got up early (7:00 AM, even) and headed out to a middle school where we acted as honorary judges in the “Festival of Sweets.” It was a lively affair, with middle schoolers everywhere, pushing their sweet concoctions upon us. The sun was hot as ever, and we took every opportunity for shade we could find, but were often crowded out by the children. The long day included a lengthy walk to and from the school, and I don’t think I have ever sweated so much in my life. As usual, I understood very little of what was happening around me most of the day.

Upon our departure we were passed by a group of seven or eight boys at a full run. We turned around to see children flooding from the schoolyard, and hurtling towards us. We just reached the corner that the first group of boys had rounded, when Juana, one of the teachers at the school, frantically beckoned us back that direction.

Somewhere in the space of our departure, and one-block walk, a fight had broken out between some of the school kids and a group of people that lives up the road. The wave of children over took us and reached the corner, all shouting and screaming with excitement. Occasionally the wave would reverse and run frantically back towards us, only to return to the site of the action a few seconds later. Juana advised us to leave by a different route, as fights here get out of hand pretty quickly. The teachers mostly stood around helpless, as the volume of children in the spectacle was far too large to even have a hope and controlling. As we walked the other way, we could see the kids starting to throw stones, some larger than baseballs.

Tags: South America, Travel Journal