Training of Trainers

This past week we held a ¨training of trainers¨in the village of Burela, Salta Province, which is in the north of Argentina. A few months ago a ¨vision seminar¨was held there which showed a lot of interest in community change. A ¨seed project¨was completed last month which brought a lot of community issues to light. They elected to have a psychologist come in to their community to do some teaching and see patients. This one-day event exposed the severity of some problems that were known to the community but not recognized before as so wide-spread: abuse within families, school drop-outs, sexual abuse, and excessive alcohol use among young people.

Above you see Rosa, a 17 year-old girl who became a Christian a few months ago. I love this photo, because it shows how much fun the training was. The participants, or ¨trainers,¨will be equipped to be a team to train workers in holistic transformation for their community. They will also facilitate the village choosing a committee of respected leaders who will choose the community workers (CHEs) and select what projects they will pursue.
In this photo you see Don José, the owner of a grocery store in the neighboring village. He just learned how to do a project (making a paper airplane!) and is teaching this to others then teach others. The training is very practical and participatory. This way, when the trainers train the CHEs, who usually have less education than the trainers, they will be prepared to teach them in a way that works well for adult learners.
Above is hot water, which was kept ready all day long outside the training site for those who want to make mate. As those in the Outer Limit at Epic know, mate is the green tea drunk in a communal cup in Argentina (and southern Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay). Several guide books call it ´´an acquired taste.¨ The good news for me is that in this part of the country they add sugar to it, which really improves the taste!
This is a photo taken during one of the sessions. Don José is passing some crackers (made with lard, yum!), Irma is nursing her baby, Gabriela is drinking mate, Daniel looks forward to the crackers, and the daughter of one of the participants slipped in for a peek.
Above is a photo of one of the training´s facilitators, Estela, discussing one group´s project. Each group had several slips of paper with characteristics written on them. They then placed them in the categories of what would be a good, bad, or neutral characteristic of a community worker. This not only helps the group to realize what they know, it also helps them to learn to discuss their rationale and work together.

Estela is from Costa Rica, but is currently working with her Haitian husband Develt in Bolivia. Develt is also in the photo above. They each worked in their home countries for years, then together in Haiti until they moved to Bolivia six months ago. When they moved there they were outfitted with an oxygen tank to get used to the altitude!

I am getting to know them well since they drove back with us to Cordoba yesterday and are also staying with the Lopez´until the urban training of trainers in Buenos Aires next week.
Yowza! Above are the 220 empanadas (and a pizza) made by the pastor´s wife´s mother with ingredients gathered from several participants. Empanadas are made throughout Argentina, and they have different ingredients depending on the province. These are salteñas, meaning they have beef, potatoes, herbs, and raisins. They were made over a wood oven, which is the only oven currently used in the small villages. The pastor actually had to leave the conference a few times to tend the fire when his mother-in-law was unable to. A lot of foreign companies are coming into the area. One of the positive benefits of this is that one of the companies is having pipelines placed to bring gas for its factory. The villagers will then be able to tap into this line and convert their wood-burning ovens to gas.