A SMALL school in a remote village outside Cusco in Peru is about to get new resources, thanks to St Pius X School at Salisbury.
St Pius X principal Lorraine Walker and Prep aide Barbara Burns are spending a month volunteering in the poor mountain community, doing everything and anything the village school needs or wants done.
The pair left Australia on March 30 bound for Santiago and return on May 8.
St Pius X School Parents’ and Friends’ organised a Peru Ladies Fiesta night that raised $800 and staff held a raffle to raise another $60 that the women have taken with them.
The money will be used to buy any resources the school needs while the volunteers are in Peru.
The trip was organised through Peru’s Challenge, a not-for-profit charity organisation working with volunteer travellers to improve child education, health and hygiene standards in indigenous mountain villages.
It was started by two 24-year-olds Jane Gavel, of Australia, and Selvy Ugaz, Peru, in 2003 and since then has helped almost 1000 families and started to educate more than 500 children in four different communities.
Several Brisbane Catholic Education staff have volunteered their time during the past six years.
In communications back to St Pius X, Lorraine said nothing written in the emails could give any idea of what life was really like in Cusco.
“The women will find a street corner in Cusco in the morning and there they will sit on the concrete all day and into the night doing their craft and trying to sell their wares,” Lorraine said.
“They stay until all hours often with young children.
“We feel very lucky and privileged with all we have.”
Lorraine said that as well as teaching, she and Barbara would also be helping to set-up a drip watering system for the basic vegetable garden at the school.
The system will enable the school to start providing some of the food for the children’s lunches.
Lorraine said Easter celebrations in Cusco were much larger than in Australia.
She said their welcome dinner in the city on April 6 clashed with one of the city’s major Easter celebrations that attracted more than 200,000 people.
“When we got to town we were met by a crush of more people than we have ever seen in any of our lives,” she said.
“Apparently a hundred years ago there was an earthquake on the Monday of Holy Week and the people ran to the Cathedral of St Francis, one of eight cathedrals in Cusco to try and save the enormous crucifix by carrying it into the street and to the largest cathedral and so the tradition began.
“The crucifix is so large that 40 men carry it in shifts, with 200 needed to complete the procession to the main cathedral where the Archbishop blesses the assembled crowd.”
Lorraine said while it was staggering to imagine so many people coming to a religious occasion in one city, the experience was rather traumatic for the visitors.
“We were caught in the crowd and were jammed in and at one stage we thought that we were being dragged under, (we) couldn’t keep upright,” she said.
She said that, because almost all vehicles on the road were taxis or small, unsafe mini-buses, most of the estimated 200,000 people would have walked to and from the procession.
