PWB Nicaragua – Final Blog

By Rob Thorburn

Many parts of Central America are like a paradise on earth and Nicaragua is certainly no exception. From lazy hammock sunsets over the Pacific ocean and jungle treks to gently smoking volcano craters or beautiful rivers punctuated by waterfalls and gorges all the way to sipping piña coladas on the boulevard while being serenaded by mariachis or tasting hand-made organic chocolate made by the person standing right in front of you. Between the members of PWB Nica we’ve managed all of the above and more on top of 9 days of boot camp, 60 days of teaching and 30 shows in less than three months. We’ve seen the country from the far north to the far south, and from the Pacific west coast to the Caribbean islands off the east. We didn’t quite make it into the rainforest, but we have spent time in the 3 biggest cities, many smaller towns and villages, with a few trips into the middle of nowhere for good measure. Of course it’s not all paradise, and we’ve seen some of the darker side of life too – it’s one of the things that is unmissable on a PWB tour as it brings you in close contact with those who are pushed to the edges of society, even in a land that is fertile, beautiful, friendly and open. There’s a incredibly high poverty rate and many children live on the streets, either earning money through begging, crime or prostitution or escaping the realities of life in a bottle of glue. Even for those with homes, a lot of them have very little to look forward to in life beyond menial jobs, crowded living quarters and poor sanitation. It’s heartbreakingly sad, and all we can hope is that we bring a little seed of joy into the lives of those we work with.

From our perspective the tour has exceeded expectations across the board – in each place the children and young people astounded us with their appetite for learning new skills and with their friendly attitude and openness towards a group of somewhat eccentric performers who descended on them with a very British sense of punctuality and structure. Fortunately there were two quick realisations on our part which made everything run smoothly. Firstly, we adjusted our Britishness to a more Latino outlook – as flexible and open as possible, and letting the tour happen to us rather than pushing to make it work exactly the way we had planned. Secondly, as we spent more time in each place we came to realise that eccentricity is not just for circus performers; the organisations we were working with were headed by individuals who are incredibly passionate, fun, intelligent, driven, absolutely in love with music, theatre and circus, and just a little bit crazy to top it off – exactly what we were looking for!

Our mission was slightly different in the three places we focused upon. In Granada at La Escuela de Comedia y el Mimo we were working with children and young people who already have a knowledge of circus, and we were looking to give them new skills, as well as helping the school with some new ideas for how they can work as an organisation. Although we wish we’d had more time with them, it was still a great success – the young people in the core and learning groups showed a progression that was astonishing in the short time we had with them, and the organising team were very open to ideas of how to develop their festival and their funding strategy. We wish them the very best of luck for both in the future, and can’t wait to come for another edition of El Berrinche Ambiental.

El Barrilete in Léon was an entirely different prospect –  it’s a youth project working with around 120 children from 3-18, with one lonely unicyclist among their number. Although they have some cultural activities, their main focus is as a homework and vocational skills centre; taking kids off the streets and away from child-labour situations. They took to circus incredibly quickly, and by the time we left were already incorporating it into their regular performance group – they now have stiltwalkers, acrobats, hula-hoopers and jugglers to present alongside their beautiful traditional dances, comedy sketches and giant puppets!

In San Marcos, it seemed as if all of the things that could go well for a PWB project turned up at the same time in the same place – including hugely enthusiastic partners from Asociacion Los Quinchos as well as focused and dedicated kids, eager to soak up as much as we could give them in the time we had. The climate there was a little friendlier too, and we all revelled in the semi-rural beauty of the Barrio we lived in – after a month of Léon’s hot and bustling streets, a 2km walk to a 14 acre finca where you can pluck ripe mangos from the trees certainly puts you in a good mood to teach! Once again, the speed at which the young people learned was incredible, and the skill on display during the final show was mind-blowing after just 3 short weeks. In the time since we left, we’ve been really happy to hear that they are regularly having circus practise, and have plans to put on several shows with their new-found talents.

A PWB project isn’t just about the work we do with our main partners – on this tour we performed in many schools and projects in and around the areas we visited, and made hundreds of connections all over the country and across Central and South America. One of our big goals was to find out more about the national social circus scene, and to try to help it to develop and connect up in whatever way we could. This aim is more long-term than the instant fun we can offer through shows and workshops, but it’s also one of the best ways we can share the PWB vision and get as many kids from every walk of life involved in something we love. We’ve made some great steps both on- and off-project, connecting up various different organisations, donating and fixing equipment in project locations as well as to a few other groups, and generally making as much noise as we can about how great circus, theatre and music can be for kids. In total we taught around 200 children and performed for closer to 4,500 – a good target to aim to beat for future PWB tours!

We’ve made a lot of friends in the last 3 months, and to tell the truth it’s proving very hard to leave this wonderful country. It’s just the beginning of what we hope to be a long and fruitful adventure for Performers Without Borders in Nicaragua, but it feels like the end of an era – already most of the team is back in the UK, and I have just one last visit to make to all of the projects before leaving the country. As Tour Co-ordinator, I’d like to say a final huge thank you to all our supporters far and near, to all the members of the team, to the PWB founders for beginning the whole thing, to all the organisations we’ve worked with over the past three months, and most of all to the children and young people we’ve met and shared with – you make it all worthwhile.

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PWB Nicaragua 2013 – Escuela De Commedia y Mimo, Granada

By Jess Herman

Finishing the project more-or-less where we started in Granada at the school of Comedy and Mime (La Escuela De Commedia y Mimo) has an appropriate full circle feel to it. Returning to the festival site of El Berrinche to enjoy once again the Palapa play space and the ecologically built ‘Casa De Botellitas’ is the perfect end to this project. We have been in Granada for a week and half, doing what we do best – workshops, shows and playing!

We arrived in Semana Santa – the week leading up to Easter. This is the big summer holiday week in Nicaragua before the rainy season begins. Granada was a hubbub of activities, christianity and tourists. We performed a show in the Cafe Theatre of the school on three consecutive nights to raise funds for the school. The first two shows were PWB Cabarets and the last was an amalgamation of routines from us and from the young performers of the school as well as performers from a new project ran through the school in a town called Esteli. The boys from Los Quinchos were a great help by advertising the show on stilts, and not only joined Bags and Tilly for a routine, but also took part in the massive acrobatic finale to the show!

During the days of Semana Santa we were based in the school and had time to teach and play with these very talented groups of kids. Just to put things into perspective, 13 year old Brian can do back flips, juggle 5 balls and can pass 7 clubs on singles (juggler geeks out there you know how hard that is!)! It was a treat to have little structure for three days and to teach what the kids wanted to learn as opposed to having a syllabus. Skills these young performers chose to learn included poi and partner poi, slackline, hoop, club passing, 3 to 5 ball juggling, double staff, contact ball and acrobalance!

We had two days off during which some of us went to Laguna Apoyo – a volcanic lake not too far away. As seems to happen in my time off – we found a project called ‘The Peace Project’ where they work with local kids – the leader of the project just so happens to be an ex-student from the School of Comedy and Mime! So yes, Jake and I managed to fit in another show and workshop in our time off! Wouldn’t have it any other way. We did manage to kayak around the beautiful Lake with the wonderful Matt from PWB – his fresh white skin from the UK was totally over roasted, burnt red knees despite the factor 50! Ouch!

At the beginning of last week we started a new program with our days split into three. In the mornings and late afternoons we would teach the young professional performers from the school and boys from the new project in Esteli. These four boys came to Granada for the week to learn more circus to take back with them and pass on. They were introduced to circus only 7 months ago and already have an acro-clown routine and can pass seven clubs to name just 2 of their talents! It is amazing – I am learning to juggle clubs and I just cannot believe how quickly these guys progress! Or perhaps I am particularly slow – it did take me 7 years to conquer 3 ball juggling!

In the afternoons we would teach approximately 40 kids from the local neighbourhoods. These same kids come to the school of Comedy and Mime to eat lunch, do homework and play 5 days a week. This meant that they already had some circus skills for us to build on. At the end of the week the kids presented a skill that they had learnt with us and we had a small and very entertaining show by a group of hungry Spanish Clowns!

To finish our time in Granada and indeed on the project we had one last show at the Cafe Theatre of Comedy and Mime. It was a great show with contributions from PWB (acro-staff, The Hip Hop Hoop Off, contact ball, acro and slack rope) and the young performers from the Escuela (comedy, mime, poi, unicycling, magic, acro-clowning,) as well as a combined diabolo act – Jake from PWB and Francisco from the school. The act that totally and utterly stole the show was the finale by the young people! We are talking various three people high pyramids and other shapes – one person basing 5 people at once (a 6 person dragon – does that mean anything to you? Let your imagination run wild), jumps and backflips over and under other people doing rolls and tumbles and handstands! Remember these kids are aged from 8 to 16 – I have been having some small lessons in acrobatics from them!

This brings us to the present moment – it is the last day of the project – we are organizing the equipment to donate and packing up the PWB Nica Box. Tomorrow the strangest thing will happen to me – I will be a tourist. I am lucky as I will not be returning to the UK until June. My original idea was to go and see and travel and do and be in Columbia or other countries nearby(ish). Volunteering my last three months has been epic and profound on different levels. Obviously volunteering is a way to really connect with the society you visit and an opportunity to give and therefore receive. A chance to understand more deeply the culture and make human connections and friendships.

I have little desire to chill for the next two months (although those who know me know I am not very good at relaxing!). I have already organized a show and a workshop on my way south to Costa Rica on Tuesday! I have been looking into more volunteering but in reality I think practicing some circus on a beach will be good for me – for a short while at least! I will visit some of the other social circus activities in Central America and might look at working on farms too.
Volunteering abroad as opposed to traveling – that is a whole different blog!

PWB Nicaragua 2013 – it has been an epic experience. It is all too true that you get out what you put in. This trip has sparked a relationship between myself and Central America and it is powerful to know that I can gift circus wherever I go. I hope that PWB Nicaragua will long continue, as from where I sit and sweat, this has been a tremendously successful project that has completely encompassed what PWB is all about…Seeing children grow in confidence, develop not only circus skills but teamwork and creativity, watching them achieve things they didn’t think were possible and through this become empowered to try more new things. We have left them with the opportunity to further explore their potential through circus and have heard that children from both Leon and San Marcos have already performed or have performances coming up…I can’t wait to see what the next year brings, watch this space for Nicaragua 2014 news!

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PWB Nicaragua 2013 – San Marcos – Los Quinchos, The End!

By Emily Ball

After spending the last few weeks teaching all the Quinchos were more or less ready to perform the first ever ‘Circo Los Quinchos’. The previous 2 days we had been preparing and working with all the children on their various acts, everything from a well rehearsed and impressive acrobalance act and human pyramids right down to the youngest boys practicing their plate spinning and hand held stilts skills. The Italian colored circus tent at the back of the Los Quinchos pizzeria was busy with kids arriving, last minute rehearsals and getting glitter onto their faces.

Starting about half an hour late – right on Nicaraguan time – the children were ready to perform to each other, the staff of Los Quinchos and some visitors from the US. After warming up the crowd, we kicked off with a hoop act by some of the girls…followed by so many more talented and amazing acts, about an hour and a half show in the end! It was incredible to see the kids perform after so little time learning circus, and there was some great and professional behavior – one of the boys who was on pizza cooking duty managed to perform two acts and still cook pizza in between! We had one student who had learnt to unicycle in approx. 6 hours of constant practicing and performed a great act even though he had hurt his foot the day before, and one of the boys who had fractured his wrist playing football performed his staff number with one hand! We also were treated to a dance number from some of the older boys ,and finished in fine style with a tumbling and pyramid number from all the girls.

After some emotional thank you’s, goodbyes, and presenting the children with the circus kit we are leaving with them, it was time to pack up and get ready to leave. A few of us managed to squeeze in a last trip to the boys’ home to say a last goodbye and eat a last mango or 3…and then we were on our way!

Although we were all sad to be leaving such lovely children, we were equally excited to be able to give two of the older boys the chance to come with us to Granada to the school there. Lazaro and Miguel showed an awe-inspiring enthusiasm for learning circus as well as an astounding knack for learning very quickly! Being two of Los Quichos’ educators already (for bread and hammock making) they were an obvious choice to give this opportunity, and they leapt at the offer of 3 more days of learning circus. So when the bus from the Escuela turned up to collect us, they were ready to go and helped us pile in our (seemingly never ending) bags and kit…and off we trundled towards Granada and the Escuela De Comedia y Mimo.

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PWB Nicaragua 2013 – San Marcos – By Steve Bags

We’ve been in San Marcos for about three weeks teaching circus to a group of kids from an organisation called Los Quinchos who work with street kids from Managua. Their skills are developing incredibly fast. We taught at the Boys’ farm today and I watched Jake show a kid a trick on a slackline called a seat drop. The kid then practiced it and an hour later he successfully performed it on his third attempt in front of all his friends. His enthusiasm for practicing the trick relentlessly and then the massive grin on his face when he performed it makes me think he feels the same way about circus as I do.
 

Kids don’t tend to need much persuasion to want to play with circus toys. There is something intrinsically fun about circus that is pretty much irresistible. That’s what makes social circus so enjoyable to teach and so rewarding to be involved in. Social circus pioneer Reg Bolton puts it like this:

“It is gratifying that an activity which is so strongly recognised as fun, should also present developmental, intellectual and physical challenges, encourage social behaviour more creative and co-operative than competitive, and which has as its end product, an act of donation – of generosity.”   Reg Bolton – ‘Why Circus Works’ PHD Thesis

It really does feel like these kids we’re working with are benefitting from doing circus. They have been putting together routines for their show which demonstrate creativity and talent. Jill Maglio and Carol McKinstry concluded in their paper “Occupational therapy and circus: Potential partners in enhancing the health and well-being of today’s youth” in the Australian Occupational Therapy Journal (2008) 55, 287–290 that circus has the following benefits:

1. Provides a fun, motivating and intrinsically reinforcing experience.

2. Increases positive risk taking both physically and emotionally, in a safe and supported environment.

3. Promotes physical health and body awareness through activity.

4. Enables participants to acquire a broadened skill base relating to circus as well as more generic ‘life skills’.

5. Increases self-confidence and self-efficacy.

6. Improves social connectedness, teamwork, and leadership skills within the group.

7. Provides opportunities for calming rhythmic activities, increased sensory feedback, a focus on balance, and coordination.

8. Creates a space in which participants feel a sense of belonging.

Performers Without Borders has a number of goals in mind when we’re doing these sorts of projects. Firstly we’re attempting to give vulnerable children the opportunity to explore their potential in a safe environment. We’re hoping they’re going to get many of the benefits that are outlined above thus improving how the children see themselves and their place in the community.

Also the project has to be sustainable. We’re not just going to teach them circus and then leave. We provide them with circus kit and try to create an environment where they will continue to develop their circus skills and hopefully teach them to others. Each year a team will come back, check on their progress and top-up their skills.

I’ll finish with a lovely quote which sums up the benefits of teaching kids circus from a book called “Circus for Everyone” (Mountainside Press, USA, 2001):

“By turning you upside down, we teach you to stand on your own two feet. By dropping objects we teach you to catch them. By having you walk all over someone, we teach you to take care of them. By having you clown around, we teach you to take yourself seriously.”

I would recommend doing this sort of project to anyone. It is immeasurably rewarding to be involved in and I know I will be talking about all the happy memories I have from working with these incredible children for years to come.

Follow PWB Nicaragua:

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PWB Nicaragua 2013 – San Marcos – Life With Los Quinchos

By Emily Ball

Our days here in San Marcos begin with various wake up calls – the morning sweeping of the yard, the first bus to Managua honking its way up the hill at 5.30a.m, or children popping their heads in to say hi on their way to school at 6.30 a.m – school here starts at 7 for some of our students. It’s early to bed and early to rise in countries like Nicaragua – and India – where the middle of the day is so hot it makes it hard to do anything, and PWB’s volunteers adapt to this lifestyle throughout the tour.

The PWB team roll out of their cocoon like hammocks or clamber down from their bunks and find their various ways to wake up properly – coffee, tea, breakfast, a stretch…Our ‘team mum’ reminds us we are leaving in half an hour for the first session of workshops, and we gather kit together and recap on the plan for the day before dividing up into 2 teams and walking opposite directions along 2km dusty dirt tracks to reach the girls and boys homes respectively. As we arrive we are greeted with smiles, hugs and ‘buenas dias, hola!’. Children make their way to the yard and join in our warm up games as they finish their morning chores of sweeping and cleaning and then workshops commence for the next 2 hours, with skills improving daily, and at quite an impressive rate. The kids have to get ready for school after our session – some have afternoon classes – so we finish and pack up, say ‘hasta manana’ (or Tom’s version, ‘pasta banana’, which some of the children have adapted with gusto) and make our way back to meet up with the other team of teachers. We regroup and exchange notes and experiences of how our morning sessions have gone, who’s learnt what and which progressions would be good for the next day.

We have some time to ourselves to train – 5 balls, hula hoop, the splits, whatever takes your fancy – relax and eat lunch and then its off to our afternoon sessions for the children who have been at school in the morning. We meet back in time to de-brief about the sessions, chat about the plan for the next day over dinner and relax (or write blogs or edit videos!) for the evening.

Weekends here are slightly different as the Quinchos who live in Granada come up and visit at the weekends, so we have some extra students and everyone gets to learn circus and play together at the boys’ home on a saturday. Last saturday we were lucky to be visited by Diego and 2 of his students from the Escuela de Commedia y Mimo in Granada, (we visited them at the start of the tour and we will also visit again at the end) who taught alongside us and then performed a show for all the Quinchos. It was received with many laughs and smiles, much clapping and even screaming from some of the girls who seemed to take a particular liking to Francisco who having attended the Escuela for 4 years is rapidly becoming a very multi talented 16yr old. Saturday evening is when the pizzeria is open, and we were asked to perform a couple of acts for the cliental- Francisco, Rob and myself were happy to help out, and I believe it is the only time I may ever perform to a remix of a Vengaboys song….

On sunday there was a further treat in store, as a small nicaraguan family circus had arrived in San Marcos and Zelinda decided to take all the Quinchos to it – and of course we came along too! The general verdict from the children was that the show was ‘Aburrido’ (boring), and that there were too many clowns. Indeed, half the acts were clown acts in rapid spanish which we understood in varying degrees depending on individuals grasp of the language! There were also some aerial acts, singing and dancing – but the children wanted to know where the juggling was and declared that our show was better – lucky us!

As for me, I have to say that going to see a circus with 70 children is one of the highlights of the trip so far for me, it was so much fun. In spite of their verdict of ‘boring’, they were laughing and clapping for the whole show and I think it would be impossible not to have fun when you are surrounded by so much of it! Other memories that will stay with me and make me smile are some of the shows we have done where we have been asked for our autographs afterwards, which is funny, touching, and a slightly weird phenomenon. Lastly, after performing a show in the school that many of the quinchos attend, I overheard one of the girls proudly telling a friend of hers that she was learning circus from us…and that’s just some of what makes me want to carry on being a part of these projects! I’m very excited to be telling the children tomorrow that they have the chance now to make their very own circus show, and can’t wait to see what Zelinda thinks of it – she said it has been a dream of hers for quite some time to have a ‘Quinchos’ circus, as she herself is originally from a circus family…well, I hope maybe we can help that dream come alive for her…watch this space!!

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PWB Nicaragua 2013 – Los Quinchos – San Marcos – Blog 1

By Moira Morrison

We arrived in San Marcos at noon on Tuesday the 5th of March.  It was a high energy PWB re-union after our mid project break – all fresh faced and still buzzing after witnessing the awesome skills of the young circus performers of El Barrilete.  What next?

First we were introduced to our new home, the Chechio Bum Bum Cultural Centre, and what a bonnie house it is!  Next we were introduced to a surprise co-resident of our casa nueva – Memo, a juggling and poi teacher based in San Francisco, who has been working with Los Quinchos for several years and couldn’t quite believe his luck when the PWB circus descended upon him!

The Los Quinchos project is the brainchild of Zelinda Roccia – a larger than life Italian superwoman.  Founded in 1991 the original idea was simple: to offer help and hospitality to the abandoned and mistreated street children of Managua.  On the streets children can be exposed to violence, abuse and sometimes torture.  Drugs, mainly inhaling glue, are also a problem.  Los Quinchos persuades children to leave their lives on the streets and helps re-integrate them into Nicaraguan society.  The motto: Nunca mas un niño en la calle! (Never again a child on the streets!)

Since sewing the seed, Zelinda and her amazing team of madres (mothers) and padres (fathers) have nurtured the growth of Los Quinchos and it is now an amazingly intricate network of homes and support.  The branches of the project stretch across the country and it operates without a penny of Nicaraguan government funding. Awe inspiring.

‘El Filtro’ (the Filter House) is the root venue; situated close to Managau’s Mercato Oriental the house offers children food, washing facilities and medical treatment.  The children are also encouraged to participate in sport and cultural activities and are signed up for school.

After some adaptation time in ‘El Filtro’ children come to ‘La Finca’ (the farm) and ‘Yahoska’ (the girls house) in San Marcos or to ‘La Casa al Lago’ (the house on the lake) in Granada, again they are enrolled in local schools.

Until this month Los Quinchos also ran a project at La Chureca, the horrific 7kmsq dump by the barrio of Acahaulinca on the edge of lake Nicaragua.  La Chureca was the largest open-air landfill in Central America – with 50% of its 1,000+ inhabitants said to be under 18.

Mercifully the clearing of the dump has just been completed.  It has been replaced by a recycling plant, offering employment, and 258 newly constructed cement houses provided by the Spanish Agency of International Cooperation for Development and the City of Managua.  

PWB are working at ‘La Finca’ and the ‘Yahoska’ until the end of March and what a joy it has been so far.  At the moment there are are around 30 boys aged 7-13 living at ‘La Finca’ and 24 girls aged 8-16 in the ‘Yahoska’.  The children have rolling responsibilities for cooking, cleaning and general maintenance of their homes. 

What Los Quinchos has done for these children is immeasurable – providing security and companionship as well as education, responsibility and opportunity.  Zelinda has built a micro community for her children in San Marcos.  As well as the two houses there is the Cultural Centre, Chechio Bumbum and the Barrio House which consists of La Biblioteca, a library with internet café, and La Osteria, an Italian restaurant with performance space.  When they are old enough the Quinchos are able to work in the pizzeria and in the office, earning money that is put into savings accounts for them. Older Quinchos members, educadores (educators), help with the running of the ‘Finca’ and ‘Yaoska’ and act as mentors for the younger and newer members.

Los Quinchos has done so much for these children but has also brought so much to the local community. Any strain that an extra 50+ children might have put on local education resources was instantly abated by the genius idea of building the Barrio house opposite the school – the library and restaurant are frequented by locals and Quinchos together.

Since arriving PWB have taught workshops and hosted open play sessions in both venues every day. We have also managed to squeeze in a show for Los Quinchos in La Osteria and 5 other local school performances. The children visit us constantly at the house, just to say ‘Ciao’, and it is emotional to see them growing in confidence and determination in just one week. Their positivity is awe inspiring and also humbling and it is a privilege to be part of their lives for this brief period. I am really excited to see how the project will pan out. Watch this space.

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For more information and for reference please check out:

http://pronica.org/projects/article.php?id=lachureca

 http://www.losquinchos.it/index.php?language=eng

 Follow PWB Nicaragua:

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PWB Nica. 2013 – Between Projects

The Overview

By Jacob Hirsch-Holland

We have just started project number two, in San Marcos, and having spent the last few days marking the halfway point of PWB Nica. 2013 with a little break, here is a bit about my time ‘off’ with Jess, in Ocotal . . .

Anyone who has worked and lived simultaneously with a group of people who you’ve never met in a country that you’ve never visited, teaching children who speak a different language, will know that it can be fairly intense at times. So having a few days in the middle of the project to appreciate some alone time, reflect on what has been, and prepare for what’s to come, is not only rather enjoyable but also fairly necessary!

Some members of the group experienced the tourist life for a few days, some took the chance to have time with partners, however for me there was a mission on hand. In England I live (and have done for my whole life) in a town called Swindon. This town happens to be twinned with a town in Nicaragua called Ocotal and the two have a strong link through the SOL project (Swindon Ocotal Link). So this was my mission and at the last minute Jess decided to join me. And with neither of us having any idea what to expect but packing plenty of circus kit, we set off from Léon on a 5:20am bus to Ocotal.

What awaited us in Ocotal was a surprise and a delight. It turns out that over the last few years the town has been visited numerous times by a group of circus volunteers from Germany and in their wake was a hive of skill and equipment. The project, called Biblioteca de Las Abejitas (Library of the Little Bees) initiated by the German volunteers, included a library and study space, and a circus prop room (full of amazing circus kit!) and training space. It is a place for any child/teenager in Ocotal to study AND practice circus!

Apart from the wealth of circus Ocotal presented us with, we were also welcomed open-armed by the local SOL ‘family’. They took us under their wonderfully hospitable wing and offered a place to stay (with a former Mayoress, our new Nicaraguan Abuelita), took us to parties with families and friends, and showed us the ways of Ocotal. If anyone ever wants to visit Ocotal, just say you’re from Swindon 😉

Our time off PWB proper was relaxing, invigorating and inspiring. We spent it doing shows and workshops for Nicaraguan children. I guess you could say it was time ‘on’.

The Gory Details

By Jess Herman

I never thought I would ever be representing Swindon of all places and now I actually feel honoured and proud to have had this epic opportunity! On the bus to Ocotal Jake and I commented on how we literally had no idea what was awaiting us at our destination . . .

Our host Jorge had told us that when we arrive at the town we can ask anyone for him as he is a local Doctor and well known in the community – he was not wrong! The first person we met pointed to his car (which was driving away) and called him for us! The people of SOL welcomed us to Ocotal and into their homes, they fed and watered us (with rum) and showed us some of SOL’s projects as well as Ocotal’s nature and night life.

SOL is a great project that helps with humanitarian aid in Ocotal. We visited a local health centre in the community which provides a great deal of care to over 5500 patients. We also saw a ‘comedor’ (eatery) in a school which provides free food for some of the children. As well as helping children and families, SOL also helps older members of the community with much needed care.

Jake and I were amazed and exited to find OcalMena Circus (Ocotal Hive) – a place where young people in Ocotal can practice circus 4 afternoons a week. These same young people are youth leaders in the community as they run circus workshops at ‘Casitas’ in different neighbourhoods around Ocotal. How incredible to find social circus in this small pocket of the world. It was very exciting for the young people and for me and Jake to be able to share our various skills with the kids. They soaked up the new skills and tricks we had to offer and were very grateful for the enthusiasm and inspiration.

Jake and I wanted to ‘gift’ a show (this is a translation from Spanish back into English – and how beautiful it is) to the community (in the main park) and to one of the local schools where the comedor is located. We decided to call our little two person street-style show ‘Circo De SOL’…hehe! After the show in the park we passed a hat in support of SOL. Both shows were received very well, with the children at school being a particularly good audience! It sounds nauseating and cheesy but through the workshops and shows – as in PWB – we spread smiles, giggles, and inspiration and so when we came ‘home’ to our Ocotalian Grandmother-host we felt we had really earned her incredibly delicious food and coffee!

One night we were taken for a family get-together by a new SOL friend. This was such a positive and cultural Nicaraguan experience including dinner, poetry recitals, rum, beautiful singing about Ocotal and Nicaragua, and story telling jokes, many jokes! I even managed to get the family harmonising one of my Jewish songs!

Our hearts were filled with warmth by the way they opened their town to us and how they treated us like family – initially because of the Swindon link but eventually because we formed warm human connections.

As this was our time off you may be pleased to know we did manage to fit in a trip to the local mountains were they grow and make coffee. We also spent an afternoon at the Somoto Canyon where Jake slack-roped above the water on the very same place as the picture on Nicaragua’s 50 Cordoba note! However, the height of excitement was when Jake got bitten by a dog – but don’t worry – he has had his vaccinations (I am referring to the dog)!

If anything, the trip to Ocotal enthused us even more about how circus can spread joy, ambition, teamwork, confidence, smiles, communication, and forge strong links and friendships. We feel ready to embark on the second project here in San Marcos to spread the PWB joy and we are sure that we will be returning to Ocotal one day.

Follow PWB Nicaragua:

PWB Twitter: @peauubee

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PWB Nicaragua – El Barrilete – León – Blog 3

Outreach Work – León

By Jacob Hirsch-Holland

One of the most commonly used words so far on this trip has been ‘project’.  We are on the ‘PWB Nicaragua 2013 Project’, which involves working on three projects in three towns/cities, each project is based at already established projects, and within each project we have many opportunities to do outreach work at many other projects.  You get the picture.

As most of our time and energy is spent focussing on the place where we work continuously for 4 weeks, it is quite refreshing and exciting to venture out to other groups of children around the city (Léon) to share our skills with them.  In our daily routine of traveling to El Barrilete to work with our regular group of children, we have (or at least try to have) a certain amount of structure and various systems in place to make an attempt at getting the best results possible.  And this is what I mean when I say it is “refreshing” to do outreach work.  

Workshop-wise it is a chance to have a bit more freedom with the way we teach; an opportunity to maybe try out new stuff or teach a skill we don’t get a chance to within our daily teaching regime.  Sometimes we might just play for an hour with the children having a go at juggling, hoop, staff, songs, and silliness.  But sometimes it can take you by surprise, as yesterday did.  We (Bags, Emily, and I) visited a centre for ‘niños desfavorecidos’, called Las Chaviladas, where we were greeted excitedly by a group of boys aged between 8 and 13, who were desperate to show off their already fairly competent juggling and diabolo skills.  Many of them could juggle 3 balls and most of them could confidently throw and catch a diabolo.  It might not sound like much but it was fantastic to see such rapid progression in our hour session with them, which was possibly down to the amount of practice they had had at the basics, without the opportunity to have any tricks taught to them before.  

Part of me feels a bit sad that we don’t get to spend more time with more children (one month with one group, when there are so many) but obviously it is important to have a significant amount of time with some to be able to leave them with something that will last.  And this is an important part of PWB; the legacy.  Which is another wonderful thing about the outreach work.  At first glance it can seem that this extra work is just a fleeting moment of excitement for the children involved but our experience at Las Chaviladas shows anything but.  They already had a small amount of equipment (homemade juggling balls and some broken diabolos) and some basic skills.  So off the back of that, this ‘fleeting moment of excitement’ has brought them far more.  A few more tricks is one thing but there are two others that are far more important and, to me, demonstrate what a big part of PWB is about.  One is that the children were clearly hugely inspired and this is something that can last for a very long time.  And the other is the connection between Las Chaviladas and PWB.  

We came to Léon to work at El Barrilete and we knew nothing about any of the other groups we have seen.  Now there is a connection with so many more children and if PWB is ever in Léon again, places like Las Chaviladas will definitely get return visits, hopefully with more organisation and more time.  

So I feel like I should come to some sort of conclusion at the end of these ramblings, but I can’t.  All I will say is that I am pleased to have written about all of this without using the word ‘project’.

 

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PWB Facebook: www.facebook.com/PerformersWithoutBorders

PWB Nicaragua – El Barrilete – León – Blog 2

By Jess Herman

Last year and the year before and the year before that, I watched the videos of the PWB India team and felt the familiar pangs of ‘ahhhhhh I really want to do a PWB project’!!!!! But I knew that I had to wait until the time was right for me and to see if I would be accepted. Another of my dreams was to live in a Spanish speaking country for about 3 months. You can imagine how excited I was to have been chosen for the PWB Nicaragua team fulfilling two life ambitions in one trip!

It is easy to get carried away here with the small and unimportant things that group living brings such as ‘who’s turn is it to do the washing up’ and ‘why don’t people change the bin in the toilet more often? (toilet paper does not go down the toilet here…)’. I had a reminder to put things back into perspective recently when someone was filming us teaching. I am here now, I am the person in the video teaching the children! Life can pass you by too quickly if you fail to appreciate the moment. Ahhh perspective…

We have now been in Leon for three weeks and have been teaching at El Barrilete. It is great to see the kids now honing their attention in to their favorite circus toys and improving their skills in these specialized props. In the first two weeks every child at the project had the opportunity to play with hula hoops, staffs, poi, juggling, music, acro-balance, diabolo, stilts and unicycling. These were taught in small age specific sessions with an ‘open box’ session at the end of the day involving some ‘unstructured learning time’ as they say (‘they’ in this case is Bags and Emily).

This week has been a different experience for the children as they have had the opportunity to choose two props and delve deeper into learning and playing. We finish the workshop with the open box sessions so that each child can play with any prop every day. The most popular sessions from this project appear to be acro-balance, hula hoop and diabolo.

I have been lucky enough to teach my favorite prop this week which is of course…that amazing plastic circle – you know, for kids! As well as teaching more moves with one and two hoops, we have also worked on a few partner and group moves that we may perform in the kids show which is to be performed at the end of our time in Leon.

As this is our third week here, it is noticeable how our rapport has developed with the children at El Barrilete signified by the various hand shakes and verbal greetings when we arrive and depart from the workshops. My favorite, inspired by Tom, is ‘hasta banana!’ – are we teaching the kids bad English or good Spanglish?

We have been networking here in Leon, exploring which children’s projects exist and if we can do outreach in the form of shows and/or workshops. Last week we performed our show at the first day back at school for the ‘Escuela Especial’  – a school for children with various disabilities. After the show we watched the students take turns to bash open a bunny rabbit pinata – bashing open paper mache characters and then getting high on sugar is a pretty regular occurrence over here! We had our own turn at this on Emily’s birthday – take that Mini Mouse!

The show has undergone some changes recently in terms of character and story development, we now all have characters accentuating certain parts of our personality – you could say – these characters include geeky, ditsy, cool, a natural leader, shy and vain. Very vain. This is me. Great. The characterisation has enabled us to maintain personas on stage and fits into the story, which is set in a school. This revamped version of the show was very well received and I now get to put lipstick on whilst hooping – then Emily gets to copy me and fail resulting in lipstick all over her face! Hilarious I hear you say…

Later on in the week we performed a more improvised Cabaret show at ‘Ninos del Fortin’ – a project that supports disadvantaged children, most of the children are from families who earn money via collecting rubbish. These children are given the opportunity for further support at the project especially focusing on education. The Cabaret show was a success with many giggles and laughs from the children and a worthwhile experience of performing in the midday sun on a scorching hot floor – certainly added a level of urgency to my hopping hoop routine! This week we will be returning to Ninos Del Fortin to do some workshops with the children.

At the weekend we performed two more shows; one was a Cabaret show at ‘Aldeas Infantilas SOS’ – Children’s Villages SOS, an international organisation which helps families to care for their children and provides quality care for children who cannot live with their biological families. The team enjoyed the added improvisational and clowning element of the Cabaret show including dealing with problems on stage like low ceilings and kids running on stage repeatedly.

On Sunday we performed our show in the main square in Leon. This was an opportunity to get PWB out to the people of Leon and show them a bit of what we do – although we are already getting noticed as we rehearse, practice, play and train in the local parks, not to mention walking around town with a stack of hula hoops or on the unicycle!

This week we have more shows and workshops with other various children’s project in Leon. I feel it is good to be making contact with so many children through outreach, performance and play whist delving into more skills with the children at El Barrilete.

On a more personal note I am finding teaching a great learning experience. By this I mean the challenges that come with teaching in Spanish and teaching children who often want to learn but want to play more. It is very important for us to be flexible and to use the energy of the children to their advantage as opposed to being rigid and disappointed not to teach what we have planned for them.

One of my personal goals was to use and improve my average to ok Spanish – this is of course being challenged every day in the teaching and whenever I find anyone Spanish speaking to have a chat with! I found a family of fishermen at the beach recently and ended up staying in my hammock in their ‘front porch’ on the beach, which was a fantastic opportunity to understand Nicaraguan culture, food, language and family relations. They whole family lives together, the grandparents, the mother, father and three children. At night they were relaxing together on their ‘porch’, chilling out in hammocks, chatting and joking. The youngest child was rocked to sleep in a hammock with the father, a really relaxing and beautiful sight. I practiced my Spanish with the family, my handstands withe the oldest child and my throwing and innovative game making with the youngest two!

They were a kind family who fried me a fish from the next mornings catch! All seafood is hereby ruined for me as that was the freshest fish I shall ever eat!

On other levels of personal development I am learning to ride a unicycle (and am developing muscles in strange places due to this), i have finally, after 8 years of not trying particularly hard, learnt to JUGGLE (balls and rings!!) and I am really enjoying having time and space to practice and improve my hoop, (90’s) poi, double staff and handstands. Come on 5 hoop split!!

This will sound cheesy so feel free to drink wine for this concluding paragraph:

I am constantly feeling appreciation for the fact that I am here, finally, in Nicaragua, on a Performers Without Borders project and I feel lucky to be in the position to be able to teach kids circus and other performance skills and to perform shows with this colorful bunch of ………….. (insert appropriate word here).

 

Follow PWB Nicaragua:

PWB Twitter: @peauubee

PWB Facebook: www.facebook.com/PerformersWithoutBorders

 

PWB Nicaragua – El Barrilete – León

By Emily Ball

Having wanted to teach social circus in central america for a very long time,ever since i was first interested in circus in fact,  I am over the moon to be in Nicaragua with PWB, my favorite charity, doing exactly that! After leading the project last year in India I was ready for a new challenge and this particular one i had been looking forward to for some time.  So what is it like….?

Well, apart from being hot and dusty, it is nothing like India!  The national cuisine is rice and beans, accompanied by a choice of chicken, pork, beef, eggs, plantain, fried cheese and tortillas and a spicy salsa or two.  The national language is spanish, although with a different accent and some unique words that are very different to european spanish.  And teaching circus? Well, some things are the same the world over, although teaching in spanish is proving to be a bit of a challenge.  English is not taught as much here as it is in India, so we are teaching in basic – but ever improving – spanish and mime – perfect for circus and theatre skills!

On a personal note i am finding it is great to be able to speak more than just a few words of the national language (unlike India where fluent hindi is quite the challenge) and I have had great fun being able to talk more freely with cafe owners, market traders and people on the bus, and it has made me very happy to have been understood first time when asking for old inner tubes to make staff grips with, or tube and tape for hula hoops…I still got curious looks, but i could explain what i was up to at least!    Circus is well known in latin amercia and has a strong tradition, although it has experienced the same decline that circus in the uk and europe did.  Hence, the general population has a good understanding of circus and what it involves but people are still very surprised and amused to see someone – especially a foreigner – unicycling down the street, or carrying hula hoops around. 

We arrived here in Leon a couple of weeks ago, and performed for the children of El Barrilete, with whom we’re working with this month.  The children from this organisation range in age from 4 to 18 and have varied and often difficult backgrounds.  Most are involved with the charity for extra curricular help and general welfare support.  A couple of the children can already juggle a little and even own a unicycle, down to the ingenuity and enthusiasm of one student in particular.  We spent the first week introducing the variety of skills we will be teaching over the month, and were soon reminded of those things that are the same the world over – children’s love of diabolo and hula hoop for example, the 5 year old’s love of collecting juggling balls into a pile and the teenagers seemingly casual indifference to most things, especially when you are watching them!  As time’s went on the children have got more and more involved in the games and warm ups and we’ve begun to notice the different characters and friendships.  Every day the team are greeted more warmly by the students, names are starting to stick in heads, and games are played with increasing enthusiasm and understanding.  

Our journey to school has gotten smoother, after trying to work out where the various buses and camionetas (covered pick up trucks with seats in the back) pick up from (anywhere, no-one agrees on one place but now we have a favorite corner to wait on) and wondering at the routes they take (never in straight lines, normally the long way round plus the centre of leon is ALL one way streets), we have some understanding of the way travel works here.  The looks we get as 8 foreigners try to cram themselves, a unicycle, a bunch of hoops and a bundle of staffs into the back of an already ‘full’ (a relative concept here as in India) camioneta – whilst some of us try to remember a new spanish phrase to teach with or look up a new word in the dictionary  – are amused and curious, what a sight we must be!  

As we prepare to start into our 3rd week here, I am excited to see how the children progress, they have already learnt so much and favorite skills are clearly emerging.  My spanish continues to improve, aided by the more outgoing students who correct pronunciation and help with new words, and we all are starting to remember names and faces.  The camioneta drivers wave to us, and the staff of our local ‘comedors’ (cheap eateries serving local cuisine) welcome us with smiles.  The local market is fantastic and a few of us have favorite stalls we visit for fruit and veg, slowly learning the names of the things we want to buy.  We have also made contact with a couple of other local organisations and performed two shows, one in a outreach project similar to El Barrillete, and one in a school for differently abled students, both received with much laughter, smiles and applause…so i can’t wait to see what else we get up to whilst we’re here!