Walpole Island -2012

Learning Anishinaabemowin from Jenny Blackbird

                          Dream catchers made by Jeanie and Earrings made by Debb                                                                          Talent!!!!

Pics from M Ahmed

Uncle Tom's cabin

Josiah Henson and his wife

 Josiah Henson's home

The Altar where Josiah Henson's preached

At the Chatham-Kent Black Historical society

Ajay cutting onions for the daal he made for the potluck

We agther around to made the drums speak

Amanda sounding the drum

Near the lodge

Meherene, Gail, Nighat, Dody and sherry

Gail with the beautiful quilt she made.

Early morning view at the hunting lodge

Pics from M AHMED

This is the picture of wheel chair which was used by one of the students of the first integrated school in Canada.

Finally I can un-pack (by Reinaldo)

It’s weird being back in Canada.  I know it has been only two weeks but there are certain things I miss and don’t miss in Cusco, for example I don’t miss waking up to the fresh smell of dog  feces  (there is an excessive amount of stray dogs in Cusco), or the smell of diesel from all the trucks and cars. I miss breakfast, lunch, and dinner from Pricillia (the house cook), and the smiles from the kids every afternoon when we arrive to work at the school -- especially Fernando; the only word he seemed to know was “chupete” (sucker/lollipop) -- as he constantly followed me around the work site asking for “chupete” -- I'm sure everyone who knows Fernando will laugh at that below is a video of the song one of the kids sang for us with Fernando dancing in the green shirt (he wasn't even part of the act he just decided to dance).  Yeah, these are a few of the things I miss.

I’m happy to be home, but it just feels strange.  My views on life have definitely changed, from the amount of water I use in the shower here at home to just generally being grateful for whatever I have -- knowing that others have little and still are happy or aren’t angry at life.

I finally feel like I’m home my suit case arrived like 5 minutes ago yeah it’s 12am and they just delivered it but it got here all in one piece.

Finally home...sans-luggage!

We arrived back to Toronto early Sunday morning after travelling through four airports, three Countries and what seemed like dozens of check-in counters and security checks! Thankfully we had anticipated problems and arrived early at the airport in Cusco, and thankfully had several hours of layover time between flights, which made the complications a little less stressful! Even though we made every effort to check the status of our bags at each leg of the flights, we arrived in Toronto with what we were wearing and could carry...our main luggage having decided to visit Bogata for a few more days!

We will spend the next few days getting back to our regular routine, but check back here in the future for special updates, including links to videos, additional commentary etc. We have all decided that this isn't the end of this story!

The Peru 2012 Team,
Armel, Ava, Francis, Heverly, Kevin, Matthew, Michelle, Reinaldo, Rob, Rosanna and Sanghmitra