Peru, Lima: Bodwell High School - exploring and building

Exploring Lima

On our third day, we had a break from construction work. In the morning, we visited a local fruit market where we met people from Ato Colibri, an organization that helps teenagers like ourselves to have better working conditions for their jobs in the market. We bought various fruits including mangoes, watermelons, pineapples and oranges, which were very cheap and fresh.

After lunch, we took a 2 tour in downtown Lima. We visited two of the main churches in the city. We discovered that religion is a very important aspect of the culture in Peru. The churches also had cemeteries underneath it called the “catacombs”. Some found it exciting while others found it scary.

Building walls

After a day of relaxation, we went back to the days of construction work which lasted roughly the whole day. After we finished building a particular wall, we signed it with our names and country, as seen done by Naho.

Once the work was completed, we were warmly welcomed by one of the founders of the school on which we are working. She helped us to understand more about the causes of our work and the lifestyle of the general community.

Bianca Ferrajohn 
Assistant Principal Bodwell High School

DWC Team Member
Peru, April  2016

Peru, Lima: Bodwell High School - project starts

The adventure begins

First day of the project in San Jose Obrero

1. On the first day of the project we arrived at the elementary school that we are helping. We went into each classroom to greet these adorable children and their teachers. In the old and rough classrooms, the children were excited about the coming of new visitors and tried their best to say welcome to us in English. At the end of the greeting, they sang a song in Spanish and played a game with us, what a treat!

2. In order to give the children a better place to study, we began our first work that was building the new classroom. Although the work was pretty hard for us at first, we still enjoyed the feeling of helping others. For the children’s safety and to make room for a new addition, we moved the rocks away from the nearby of the classroom. These rocks were very heavy to move, but we still tried our best to help each other to move the rocks. At the end, we understood the importance of team work.

3. At the end of our first day, many children came to us and we sang a song, took pictures and danced together. Also, they asked for our signatures to keep the memories, and we promised that we are going to meet them again on Monday. They were really friendly and cheerful even though we could not understand their language.


Bianca Ferrajohn
Assistant Principal Bodwell High School
DWC Team Member
Peru, April 2016