Peru June 2010

In June 2010, Imaginations received its first group of volunteers to the continent of South America. The Peru program was launched 6 months early when the summer program in Thailand was canceled due to political rest throughout the country. Seventeen brave souls followed Imaginations fearlessly to a completely different region to the country on what came to be Imaginations' pilot program in Peru. Upon arrival to Trujillo, a coastal city 8 hours north of Lima, volunteers learned to cook Peruvian cuisine, dance salsa, sandboard the sand dunes of the Peruvian coast and visited the historical colonial city of Trujillo and the ancient pre-Incan ruins surrounding it. There were quite a few doubts upon arrival, especially since this group of students had been reading up on Thai culture and some hadn't opened their Spanish books in years! As orientation finished and volunteers began to work in their volunteer sites, they learned to maneuver the informal Peruvian transportation system with ease, screaming baja!!!! when the combi sometimes left them not so close to their actual stop. Within the first two weeks, they became independent traveling temporary citizens of Trujillo. They amazed us with the ease in which they moved around the city, both to and from their work sites during the day and out to the malls, to dinner and out dancing at night. At the campaña médica at the end of their 5 weeks in Trujillo, they truly showed how well adapted they had become to this foreign city in the southern hemisphere. Imaginations medical volunteers interviewed patients one on one in Spanish, took their blood pressure and vital signs and presented their patients to their doctors to be attended. They had a direct impact on a community that had never before had a medical campaign in their community, staying late and working overtime to attend more than 140 patients from the impoverished region of El Progreso. They made friends with each other and the people they lived and worked with. And they left a mark on the children and adults in El Progreso. Thank you, volunteers, for making our first trip to Trujillo such a success. We hope to see you again soon!

Medical Campaign - El Progreso

After a month of preparation and volunteering in sites in and around Trujillo, a city on the coast of northern Peru, a group of 17 Imaginations volunteers worked together with a team of 5 Peruvian doctors and nurses to put on a medical campaign for the people of the extremely impoverished community of El Progreso. This event was the first of its kind in the community (and the first of its kind for Imaginations!), and over 140 patients received checkups and medical attention during the event.

Dr. Edward Linares Tapia worked with the volunteers for the past 4 weeks as part of the Imaginations Peru program, teaching them about common illnesses in impoverished communities in Trujillo and preparing them to give physical exams, take blood pressure and vital signs and interact with patients in Spanish. He was accompanied by Dr. Diana Lip Sosa, Dr. Jorge Paredes Albarrón, Dr. Estefanía Mora Chávez and Nurse Angélica García Rodriguez, who worked together with the American volunteers from University of Arizona and Arizona State University.

Funding for medications and the event itself came from volunteer fundraising efforts and long-sleeved shirts were donated to children of the area on behalf of the organization as well in an effort to keep these kids warm during the colder winter months (it's winter in the southern hemisphere!).

Thanks go out to all the volunteers and the Mother's Club from El Progreso who prepared the hot chocolate and sweet bread for the children and patients attended at the clinic, as well as to the NGO Mundo de Niños for their support in reaching out to the community and organizing the event. We hope to do many more events like this in the future!