Team Nica: Los Quinchos and Granny’s Week on Stiltches

After our few days off, the team was very excited to begin our next project at Los Quinchos in San Marcos. It has been quite a challenging week for me and all began during our performance to the Los Quinchos children on Sunday afternoon when I twisted my foot. I would love to say it was doing some really amazing, difficult trick but in fact I was leaping across stage like a goofball and just landed badly. Luckily it was in the last act, the audience didn’t notice and the team managed to improvise the finale without me.

Due to this injury, I have spent the week trying to still be involved with the team but unable to walk. I have learnt various ways of hula hooping whilst sitting down or standing on one leg with a stool under my other knee. Conveniently, I found that I could use the wooden stilts that a previous PWB team had left here as make-shift crutches by putting my hands on the foot plates and the team have dubbed them my ‘stiltches’. I have been particularly lucky because where we are staying is at the Centro Cultural where the kids come daily for the workshops so I can hobble a few meters and sit in on the activities that are less active. There is also a comedor (small cheap local restaurant) onsite so most of our food is cooked for us and I don’t have to go far. What a blessing. The thing I am most grateful for is my incredible team who have looked after me and been very patient with my limitations, particularly while Andy, my partner-in-crime, had a stomach bug during the week as well and we were affectionately nicknamed “Team Down for the Count”.

On Monday there was a group of health workers at the Centro Cultural. A nurse in the group examined my foot and reported that it probably wasn’t broken but I needed to take care and might need an x-ray to be sure. By Thursday my foot was blue and swollen and after reading too many horror stories of misdiagnoses on Dr Google, I had convinced myself that I might need surgery and should at least go to hospital for a proper diagnosis. I was very appreciative when the Los Quinchos director, Zelinda, offered us her car so that Jake could drive me to the hospital. There was a catch however, as some of the other workers also needed to use it at the same time… Who is coming, staying, going, playing?  After a fairly comedic 30 minutes of to-and-fro waiting, we left with 2 PWB crew to help me translate, 3 painters, a cheque and a request from one of the other guests staying with us to buy a giant garbage bin. Maybe the bus would have been quicker to travel 7km?!

We arrived to the hospital for an ice-cream emergency. Racheli is on it. Stat! I have Jake and Racheli, my trusted translators with me to help, but I figure the emergency admission is easy. They ask for my name. I can do this part. “Rachel Peters”, I spell it for them.
“And your fathers name?”
“Graeme”, I spell it out as well. An odd request, I thought, until I saw my admission slip said my name was ‘Rachel Peters Graeme’ and I realised my cultural faux pas: people often have 2 last names in Spanish countries, one is their mothers, and one their fathers. I decided then to let my translating friends do what they had come for. We passed the 1.5 hour wait with Spanish lessons, drawing odd looks from locals, chatting to a man with a juggler tattoo and watching the stray dogs wander in and out of the emergency department. Jake had a shining moment as Team Mum when he saved Racheli from bleeding on the floor with the procurement of an emergency plaster (aka bandaid). I was Team Mum in Leon but this role has officially ended now that we started a new project and Jake wants to call me Grandma, which is particularly befitting given I am currently hobbling around like one. In fact, a walking frame would be fabulous! After a quick x-ray and examination, the Doctor gave me the wonderful news that my foot is only sprained, wrapped my foot up in a 1 inch thick bandage and told me I am not allowed to walk for another week and no circus either. I decided the last part was debatable…

Our days here are structured around 2 workshop sessions: 9-10:30am and 5:30-7:30pm to suit the children’s school days. The kids arrive at various times depending on their chores. For the first few days they were up to 1-2 hours early but then they got in trouble for not doing their chores and having dirty rooms so they have since been arriving later. They were also late for school after morning circus finished so we had to finish earlier. For these kids circus is everything. They love it! And they are very talented.

From day one, the team has all been impressed by their skills. It is great to see the children giving everything a go and we have noticed a refreshing lack of gender bias with the props, for example there are almost equal numbers of boy and girls doing hula hooping and unicycle respectively. This is the fourth year that PWB has worked with Los Quinchos and many of the children have been here for every project. PWB also pays for Nicaraguan performing artists to do monthly circus workshops with the kids so they keep up their skills and interest and it fulfills the objective of creating a sustainable difference.

Los Quinchos organization has several aspects around Nicaragua but the main focus is here in San Marcos where they have 2 homes for street kids and children from abusive families. There is La Finca (the farm) where the boys live and Yahouskas, where the girls live.  Each can accomodate up to 30 kids living there at one time. At the moment there are 22 boys and 16 girls living there. The children are aged between 6 and 16 and Los Quinchos provides food, accommodation, sends them to school and provides vocational education such as cooking, sewing, hammock making, baking bread, farm work, carpentry, and barbery. I have to say, these kids have extremely cool hair and here in San Marcos there are more Barber shops than restaurants. These boys love their hair!

After the children turn 16 and finish school, if they want to stay, then there are some jobs within the organisation that they can get paid for, such as looking after the younger children or teaching activities. They can also go to the Los Quinchos Centre in a nearby city of Granada where they have a trade centre and the children can learn other skills. Several of the Los Quinchos have gone on to university which is a great example for the younger kids to aspire to.

Los Quinchos staff find kids, both boys and girls, living on the streets in Managua and look after them at their Filter House in Managua, Nicaragua’s capital city. Street kids here in Nicaragua are often addicted to glue or solvent based inhalants as they stop feelings of hunger and are easily accessible. The Filter House offers an opportunity for the kids to stop the drug addictions and demonstrate good behaviour for several months before they can move to San Marcos. Previously the street kids were able to live at the Filter House but in the past year the government has changed the laws and although we don’t have the full story, we understand that now the children can only get help and food during the day and they have to leave at night time to go back and sleep on the street or in their home, if they have one. The children are only allowed to stay if it is a ‘crisis situation’. Apparently, according to this government, family abuse and/or living on the streets depending on drugs to stop your hunger does NOT qualify as a crisis situation?!?! Some of the kids that show good behaviour are able to come to San Marcos to stay on the weekends and this gives them an opportunity to get away from the rough city streets for a few nights, integrate with the other Quinchos here and give them an idea of the opportunities they are working towards. We got to meet some of the Filter House kids on the weekend and the feeling from them was more reserved and a bit rougher but still respectful of us in general.

Some of the children, particularly some of the girls, have not come from the streets specifically but instead have been in abusive family environments, whether it is physical or sexual abuse. These girls are referred through social workers to Los Quinchos or some are siblings of others who have come to Los Quinchos for help. In general and where possible, the organisation needs permission from the parents/families to bring the kids here and this can be difficult in many situations.

Sometimes it is hard to imagine what these children have been through when they are smiling and laughing with us but there are small reminders of their past all around. When we arrived we were told by the staff that we must keep our valuables secure and there is a complete ban on solvent based products around the children due to the history of addiction. Many of the kids also have lots of visible scars and their behaviour at times hints at the troubles they have known. Despite all this, on the whole, the kids are very sweet and I have been humbled by how attentive they have been regarding my foot as they ask me every day how it is going. Maybe this is just their way of connecting with me due to my limited Spanish, as it is very clear that connection and attention is something they crave.

This is where PWB comes into play – Connection and attention is what we are here for. Part of the aim of the project is to give these kids some fun and games that ‘normal’ children take for granted as part of their childhood. There is a lot of research around the benefits of play, not just physical, but emotional, social and cognitive development of children, particularly with an aspect of risk and here is an article about the benefits of social circus and how it can address this.  We structure our workshops to include both focused lessons and games together, as well as caja abierta (aka Open Box) where the kids can free play with the props or dance. Some of the kids are very focused with this time and will go to a teacher and ask for specific help or demonstrate some tricks they already know. Enseñarme! Enseñarme! Mira me! Mira me! On the other hand, some of the kids seem to enjoy hugs and correcting our spanish while we chat with them as much as the circus activities, which is an equally important part of our time here. Because many of these kids have some great skills already, we are focusing our attention on getting them to work together and focus on routine building and performance presentation. This is quite a feat but our team is all excited to be doing this already at the end of the first week. At the end of the month with these kids, their show will be truly spectacular!

In between our scheduled workshops, the team keeps ourselves busy with Spanish lessons (taught by Team Mum, Jake), meetings, playing with Quinchos who are hanging around the Centro Cultural, practicing, teaching each other, blogs and video making and repairing broken equipment. One day Alex and Andy were whittling wood and were wowed by the word ‘whittling’ as much as the wonderful whittling work. (now say that out loud really fast 5 times).

By Friday afternoon we were all ready for some R&R so the Fun facilitators, myself and Aileen, arranged for the team to do Karaoke. Aileen and Cesar had been practicing a gender-swapped Spanish duet for weeks and were the first to take the stage. It was a funny performance but Andy stole the show by rocking out to the Beatles “I saw her standing there”. For anyone who has seen Andy’s unicycling ukelele act, it was just as good! He then supported me with some dance moves to ABBA’s Dancing Queen, as I was restricted to sitting on my stool. The locals loved it!

On Saturday, half the team went for a hike in a local National Parque to find waterfalls and fields of pineapples and the rest of us stayed behind. Jake and Cesar spent their day off at La Finca playing football with the Quinchos and I tried to make the most of my immobility by passing the time in true Nica style by resting in my hammock. It turned out to be a good opportunity to meet several more Los Quinchos characters and learn their stories.

After a Sunday sleep in, Cesar lead a clowning workshop just for the team. It was quite a challenge for me with one foot still out of action, but my ninja and ballet improvisation tasks were made all the more amusing by participating on my stiltches. The week ended, much as it had begun, with an afternoon circus party at La Finca. The difference is now we know the kids better and they are practicing new tricks that we taught them this week. Watching from the sideline, I cannot wait until I can stand and walk again to try and keep up with these amazing kids!

Granny (aka Rachel) xxx