Mother's Day in the Prison

It has been 2 months since I have set up the Cuna preschool program in the prison. I have finally gotten the kids to not hit, bite or throw things at each other with the help of Liliana (the inmate teacher) and a few volunteers to learn a song and dance. I have spent the last 2 days making animal coustumes for the kids. One of the main songs we sing is called La Ronda de Animales, the animal circle. I made ears and tails for 7 different animals that the kids have learned the corresponding sounds too. We have been practicing and practicing our song and dance to put on a little show for the women during our Mother's Day Celebration.

Lets just say that the kids practiced and practiced but when show time came. They all got stage fright except one girl and the teachers. The video that one of the new volunteers took of our stellar performance just makes me look ridiculous. The little girl, Sadia, who

was the only one who remembered the dance is unfortunately blocked by my big bum. Oh well what we do for the kids, I guess. after dancing to a few songs with the kids it was game time. We had the kids and moms play balloon relay races and stomp your moms balloon (not as successful as we were thinking it would be.)

After we tuckered out the kids it was let Alexandria make a fool of herself part 2 start.

Marisol had a "great" idea that we would have a dance competition between the moms for a prize of chocolate candies. Well this wasn't just any dance competition....I had to dance and

then the mom that was able to follow me the best would win. One would think that this competition would last a song and no more. Oh boy was that wrong, 5 songs later and I was completely out of moves we finally ended the competition.

We also had clothes to give away to the ladies. The ladies who won musical chairs got to pick out an outfit. All in all it was a fun day. The kids danced, the women danced, we all danced together. We were able to pass out clothes, candies and sweet bread to celebrate Mother's Day. It was a bitter sweet day though, the ladies were able to have a fun day but you could tell all of them were a little depressed that they would have to spend Mother's Day alone in

prison. Most of the women who are in prison are in there for drug tracking. They were forced to make a tough decision to not be able to provide for their families or take the risk of carrying drugs out of the jungle once to make enough money to live on for a year or two.