Kusi

The first thing you'll notice when you get to Kusi is that it's absolutely beautiful.

Kusi is a Scripture Union boys' home in the Andes, near the town of Yungay, which is not too far from the larger city of Huaraz. However, Kusi is more than just a boys' home, it's planned to be a small town to itself, with a main square, a hotel for tourists and mountain climbers, a small shoe factory, a bakery, a school, and I'm probably not remembering everything...

Today, Kusi has about 25 boys living there with the house parents, Angel and Rosa. Angel and Rosa also have two children of their own that live with them, Yosepe (sp?) and Alexia. The school at Kusi is fully functional, although they're working to expand it so that they can accept more students. The school is open to the boys that live in Kusi, as well as the children of Yungay, especially those children that cannot afford the school supplies required to attend regular gov't schools.

Technically, the school at Kusi is a government school, like all schools in Peru, except that the gov't has given administration of the school to Scripture Union. This is a pretty big deal - I'm told the school in Kusi was the first public, Protestant school in Peru. All Peruvian schools were previously Catholic.

Here's a random shot of some of the buildings in Kusi.

Carmen, who originally sold this land to Scripture Union Peru, manages the construction. She told us that the cost of Kusi is approximately half of the other SUP boys' homes because they use adobe mud bricks for the houses, and the mud is taken straight from the land.

Hence most of the week was spent digging mud, mixing mud with straw, and making bricks in molds. Oh yeah, we moved the bricks too - they weigh about 90 lbs. Luckily, I got to be sick half of the week and was unable to work (I'll get back to that later), but here's the fruit of a week's worth of work - about 1200 adobe bricks.

So day 1 I worked in the morning moving bricks, and in the afternoon, intern Gillian says she wants to cut my hair. Jared says "Sure, I'm sure absolutely nothing could go wrong with you cutting my hair." Gillian grabs some of those scissors that the kids use to cut construction paper and comes after me like Edward Scissorhands (may he rest in peace). After a bit of initial resistance I let her give it a shot, because in the worst case scenario, I can just shave it all off like I did last time...

So Gillian grabs a chunk of hair, and cuts it in no way parallel to the side of my head, down to the scalp. I was a bit shocked, and wished that I had given the scissors to one of the 5 year old boys, because each and every boy in Kusi could have surely given me a better haircut than intern Gillian. So in great disappointment, not so much in anger, I took the scissors from Gillian, threw them aside and walked into my room to get my clippers.

The rest of the afternoon, I had a team of Scots taking turns with the clippers on the back of my head, trying to give me a decent trim and repair the damage done by Gillian. The Scots did a decent job, but I was surprised that they still left me a bit shaggy and uneven in parts. I don't know how you do that when cutting someone's hair with clippers. So after a bit of time in the mirror I managed to give myself the haircut seen in my pictures on flickr. Gillian's missing chunk was visible when I cut my hair, but I think it's grown inconspicuous by now..

Here's me and the butcher herself. She's on her way back to Scotland by now. Bye-bye Gillian. Her Zoolander is good, but needs a bit of work.

Back to the kids. The first night there I had more fun than I've had in a long time. They do choreographies, which are pretty much dancing and singing as a group to some different songs. I have no idea why the choreographies are so much fun, but they are. And every night it was a joy to get carried away with the boys and dance like a fool.

Our second night there, we had a bonfire where some of the kids told there testimonies. One of the standout testimonies was Jhonatan, who is 18 and has had a tough life. He grew up homeless, doing small jobs on the street to survive. He told how through Kusi he found a family, and a place for God in his life. Jhonatan wants to go to seminary and become a pastor. He really is an exceptional guy when you meet him because he's very responsible, sets a good example, and is a leader among his brothers. The last few days of the trip he spent a ton of time with the Scots trying to learn as much English as possible. His determination and quickness to learn was impressive.

The greater highlight of the bonfire night was Yosepe's testimony. Yosepe is the biological son of Angel and Rosa. He lived with his folks in Lima before they decided to go to Kusi. Yosepe was in high school and had lots of friends in Lima. He was determined to stay with his grandparents and not go out into the country with his parents. He said that he spoke with his father about the importance of staying together as a family, and decided to go to Kusi. He said it was the most rewarding thing he's done in his life because now instead of having one sister, he has a sister and 23 brothers. He has a passion for the life they lead in Kusi and has really accepted all the boys as brothers.

This is the thing that everyone who goes to Kusi immediately sees as something so special. The boys call Rosa and Angel, Mami and Papi. Yosepe and Alexia treat the boys as brothers, literally. The boys in Kusi are a real family, and being there to help them and spend time with them is something really special.

Other fun activities at Kusi:
Traditional Andean dances in costumes. Jhonatan is on the right and NOT in traditional wear.

Here's Yosepe and his girlfriend doing a different dance, which was quite impressive. A bunch of the boys are great dancers and can do crazy flips and stuff.


Sorry that these pictures stink - I cleaned the lense of my camera that night.

How generous were the Scots... They bought all the kids jerseys, either rugby or soccer.

AND as a spur of the moment thing, they bought them 6 bicicles in town. The kids went nuts.

With our last full day in Kusi, we traveled up to a lake near the mountain in the previous pictures. It was one of those trips where you had to stop yourself from taking a photo of every mountain and vista along the way.

On our way out, we hiked down this valley for about an hour.

And on the path there are these creepy looking trees that look like something evil out of The Lord of the Rings. The look like they're made of red tissue paper...
On our way back we stopped for some great shots of Kusi from above. Kusi is the cluster of white houses in the middle-left of this picture.

Here are some of the boys - Royer on the left, I think Raul in the middle, and I'm not sure of the boy on the right...

And last of all we say goodbye to interns who are leaving.

Goodbye intern Christy from Charlotte, NC. Christy is returning to teach 2nd grade.

Goodbye translator-extraordinaire and intern Billy Greenman from Michigan. Billy is returning to finish his senior year of school.

Goodbye adorable and dirty Tati.

Ok, I already said last of all, but here's a funny shot - this guy posed for this mugshot himself. He's in his snazzy church attire.

Goodbye Kusi - seeya in a week... ;-)

Stayed tuned for the next episode entitled, "Parasites!"