The Ayacucho Zoo

On Fridays the CCS volunteers are allowed to take the kids who live at the prison with their mothers outside to the city. This was the first Friday that we were able to take the kids out to the zoo.

It was a very eventful morning! As we enter the prison to pick up the kids we were waiting to find out which kids got permission to go with us, but the paper had be "lost." Marisol, our program coordinator

, ran all over the prison trying to talk to all the different people who ran the prison to find out what happened to this. She couldn't find any of the officials in their offices. We later found out why. There had been a disturbance of some sort that morning which caused the prison to go into lock down. A whistle was blown and the ladies all lined up in rows in the courtyard. We were not sure what was happening and were escorted to what I guess you

would call the entry way. While the women were getting accounted for we were left waiting a speculating what was going to happen while we were all locked in. In the end my imagination was far more active than what really happened. The women had to wait in the courtyard while the guards checked each cell. Marisol saw an opportunity to talk to all the women while they would be forced to listen (or at least pretend). In the past week I had been having a hard time getting kids to come to the Cuna. Und

erstandably so, a strange white girl has shown up and all of a sudden takes you away from your mom for the morning, I think I would rather stay with my mom. Marisol stood up on the patio platform and started lecturing all the women in the prison on the importance of sending them to school and not promoting violence in the prison. After telling all the women that they need to lead by example and teach the kids how to behave in the real world, or these same kids will be back in here when he/she is older, we were bombarded with kids.

There are 13 kids who live in the prison between the ages of 1 and 4. Of those 13 we had 10

that wanted, or their mothers wanted them to go to the zoo with us. 45 minutes after walking in the prison to pick up the kids 8 volunteers were finally walking out with 10 kids. I ended up with 1 year old Jonas on my hip and 3 year old Davis holding my other hand. We all piled into the van and were off to the zoo. It was so much fun to see the kids reactions to the little things in life that I take for granted seeing everyday. The kids loved sitting on our laps and looking out the windows. They would yell to each other "Mira los perros" Look at the dogs. There are hundreds of dogs that roam the streets of Ayacucho. I never thought that seeing that would be so foreign to someone. I forget that these kids technically live in the city, but never can leave their current home. It brought a smile to my face just watching them basically watch the world turn and enjoy every second they got to experience.

Once at the zoo we all had our kids and took them around to see all the different animals. It was so much fun and funny to see how these kids interpret what they saw. It took a couple of animal exhibits for them to understand that not all animals are cats and dogs. They would stand memorized at the animals for hours I think, if we let them. After visiting a condor,

parrots, monkeys, penguins, alpacas, llamas, vicunas, deer, and a taxidermy elephant we bought the kids some cookies and juice and said goodbye to all the animals. We loaded all the kids back into the van. After babysitting as my only source of income for so long I got

into the habit of strapping kids into the safe and secure car seats, which normally sat in a huge tank of a car, just incase of an accident the kids would be fine. You could imagine the heart attack I was suffering when we just had the kids sitting on the seats or in our laps as we drove in a country where I say a prayer before stepping of each sidewalk to cross the street, hoping I will make it across safely.

The car ride back was almost as fun as the time we spent at the zoo. The ride to the prison is only partway paved and the rest is really bumpy dirt roads. The two kids sitting in the back with me, Miriam and Davis, figured out that if you open your mouth while driving over bumps you make quite a funny sound. Well if that wasn't enough entertainment for one ride we were treated to more by Davis. While he was trying to make his funny sounds, it simultaneously relaxed him. While he was in this state of relaxation his eyes would roll back in his head, head tilt farther back and he would fall asleep until the next bump that would jostle him awake and then repeat the cycle again until we got to the prison. I think that we had 4 of the 10 fast asleep when we return them to their mothers. I myself needed a nap after lunch to recuperate from the excursion!