Aaron Habbad volunteers at CAIC

VOLUNTEER VACATIONS SUBMISSION

Aaron Habbad, Toronto, Canada

Volunteer at Centro de Apoyo Integral Comunitario (CAIC)

June 13 to August 24, 2007

I stayed in the city of Cochabamba, Bolivia for four months, arriving April 26 and leaving August 24, 2007. I lived with the Quiroga family in a middle class borough located in the northeastern part of the city for the entire time I was there. Shortly after arriving I began what became four weeks of intensive Spanish language education, taking two private one and half hour classes everyday from Monday to Friday. After several bouts of illness and short-term traveling I began my work-study placement at the Centro de Apoyo Integral Comunitario (CAIC) on June 13, 2007 and continued volunteering there fulltime until the day of my departure August 24. Like the homestay and Spanish lessons, the placement was secured for me by Volunteer Bolivia, a Cochabamba-based organization founded and co-directed by Lee Cridland and Javier Molina.

CAIC was founded by two Spaniards and a Canadian in 1994 upon their discovering that kids were living in prisons with parents. Thirteen years later, CAIC’s stated mandate is to serve as a positive alternative space for the youth aged 2-18 either living in the neighborhood or in the women’s or men’s sections of the San Sebastián prison in Cochabamba or the San Pablo prison in Quillacollo. Staffed by two cooks, an auditor, an accountant, three educators and a director, all of whom are Bolivian, CAIC strives to meet the psychological, educational and nutritional needs of the 50 or so youth it serves. Among other things it provides before and after school homework support; breakfast and lunch; computer, sports, dance and arts education; field trips; and workshops for youth and their parents. CAIC is a not for profit quasi non-governmental organization that is currently sustained by funds from the municipal government of Cochabamba, left over funding from Europe-based nongovernmental organizations, private donations, self-imposed staff pay cuts, and inconsistently paid fees by the parents of youth. My major responsibilities included anything and everything that had to do with CAIC’s overarching goal of providing meaningful support to youth. This translated into various combinations of homework support; cooking and cleaning; serving food to youth; playing sports with youth; talking with youth about their personal issues; and escorting and supervising youth on field trips.

My time in Cochabamba and with CAIC was coloured by personal issues related to vulnerability and attachment. By vulnerability I refer to the initial anxiety before and upon entering Bolivia that I felt as a person often identified as Latin American who could barely speak and understand Spanish. Though the haziness of my identity for myself and others was not something new to me, I had never entered a space where I could not easily articulate my thoughts and understand what was being spoken and written around me. I very much felt exposed and compelled to learn the language as fast and comprehensively as possible. Facilitated by my advanced knowledge of French and English, diligent work, one particularly great Spanish teacher, and what may be a general penchant for language acquisition, I was able to become quite fluent in spoken and written Spanish, which relieved me of my sense of vulnerability and without question correlated with my becoming more and more engrained in the lives of the people I interacted with everyday. I became increasingly attached to the people in my home and especially CAIC staff and youth. I had never been in such a personally affirming environment. As an emotional, people-oriented person, I could -- literally and figuratively speaking -- touch and be touched, something that I have never really experienced in Canada except in a few relationships I have had with specific individuals. Furthermore – and this was perhaps due to being perceived as Latin American in an actual Latin American environment where I was using Spanish fluently – for the first time in my life I did not feel like I was being chronically marginalized by other people. I felt accepted and affirmed. Yet, come August 24 I left everything that I had become so attached to and returned to frosty Canada, something that did and still does give rise to very complex feelings and ethical contemplations. The summer of 2007 was without question a watershed in my life. While in Cochabamba I created a diary of poetry that allowed me to grapple with thoughts that after the fact now act as cherished recuerdos (memories). I close with the first and last excerpts of the diary, as I think they summarize the essence of my experience as only poetry can:

April 26, 2007

skying and polluting

my way

from the real

to another real

wondering,

supposing,

waiting,

when I am

going,

going,

gone?

August 25, 2007
I’m leaving that which I can never leave, that which will never leave me.
Such is the physics of love.

Thanks to Volunteer Bolivia, the Quiroga family, CAIC staff, and especially, CAIC youth –you made possible what was one of the best periods of my life and will always inform my actions. Hasta la proxima amigos (Until the next time friends).

Aaron Haddad