Tantakuna, spread the word!

Although slightly delayed, I finally share my volunteer experience at Proyecto Horizonte with you here. As the proverb says, better late than never. Having spent six months in South America the Latin spirit of ‘mañana, mañana!’ might have turned out to be somewhat contagious.

In this period I travelled with my friend Manon van Paaschen from Colombia to Argentina. Having prior experience in development work via the Dutch Kembé Foundation (http://www.kembe.nl), we visited a number of running NGOs in South America in search for new inspiration, experience and simply to give our trip some added value. This is how we ended up at Proyecto Horizonte.

Last February we stayed in Cochabamba and made our way to Avenida Petrolera Km 10 by shared taxi for two weeks. I was impressed by Proyecto Horizonte and the things achieved since it was founded. During our stay we mainly helped out in the kindergarten, where the spontaneity of the toddlers entertained us every single moment. I never expected working with young children would require such a high level of multitask capacity! At the end of each day I was shattered from singing and dancing to Spanish songs, feeding the children, wiping bums during the collective baño visits, playing in the playground and running after every child who dared to escape from the (most of the time non-existent) queue. I gained deep respect for la profe who always managed to have the children behave as she liked and exhibited a level of patience to be jealous of. As we wanted to improve our Spanish, we took classes from Carla, who gave us some private lessons at the hostel (Hostal Jardín, Calle Hamiraya #248) we stayed in. She organized her classes in a very playful and informal way, which made it fun and educative at the same time. I would recommend her to every future volunteer!

As we both have a background in business, we were especially interested in the microfinance activities and the Tantakuna group. These women make truly beautiful handicrafts but as there is an excessive supply of them in Bolivia, it’s often hard to sell for a reasonable price. In order to support, the Kembé Foundation made some money available to give their business a little boost. Together with Sirley, the coordinator of Tantakuna, we designed a keychain with the logo of Kembé which will be used as donor gifts in the future. This month we expect the first 200 pieces to arrive in the Netherlands! One step at a time, we hope to attract the attention of other organizations overseas and in this way spread the word of Tantakuna. Because they’re worth it.