United Planet volunteer Katie Watson recently returned from a 10-day volunteer Quest in Cusco, Peru, where she and her friend Morgan worked with children at an after school program. We caught up with Katie, who was kind enough to share some of her amazing experiences with us!
Katie, who is 19 years old and attends the University of Virginia, was a world traveler and volunteer before embarking on her United Planet Quest. When she was 16, Katie founded a nonprofit called Let Them Shine in order to raise money and supplies for children in Uganda, and has raised over $15,000 so far. When asked what prompted her and Morgan to choose Peru for their next volunteer trip, she answered,
“You know, it’s interesting – we knew we wanted to go to South America just because neither of us had been there before. It’s very different from the other places we’ve been, and then things with Peru really just seemed to fall into place – it was kind of like, alright, here you go, this is your path, and so we went for it!”
Once in Peru, Katie and Morgan stayed with a host family in Cusco. Says Katie,
“We were with a wife and husband and their two young daughters, who were four and six. It was actually really great because there was another volunteer in Cusco at the same time and he was living with our host family as well, so the three of us got along really well, and it was nice to have another American to hang out with. Our host family was absolutely amazing. They spoke almost no English, but they were so great. They cooked us only traditional Peruvian foods so that we could really get a taste of the culture, [and were] always asking questions and telling us things about what was going on…it was wonderful.“
Katie and Morgan volunteered every day at an after school program in San Jerónimo. Upon arriving at the project site at 3:00 pm, Katie and Morgan would help the children with their homework for an hour before heading outside for free play. Katie tells us that the kids absolutely loved learning English jump rope songs, and she and Morgan spent hours outside jumping rope with them. By the end of the week, the kids were all singing the English songs and were very excited about their new pastime!
The remainder of the day at the after school program was spent reviewing English lessons with flashcards, organizing sports games, and doing other activities to keep the kids engaged. Then it was time to pack up! Since many of the kids were not able to brush their teeth at home, Katie and Morgan helped the children brush their teeth before leaving every day. They also provided the kids with sunscreen to protect them from the strong sun in Peru.
When they weren’t volunteering, Katie kept busy exploring Cusco, learning Spanish, and meeting new people. We’ll let you take it from Katie:
“We had Spanish lessons every day in the morning, which was great because we were only there for ten days. So we’d have our lessons early in the morning and then we were free to kind of roam the city until around lunch time, when we’d go back home and eat with our host family. Then after lunch we went to our project and worked until dinner time, and then came home. A lot of times at that point we were too tired to do anything other than go to bed because they eat a pretty late dinner. But some nights we would go out and explore a little bit. We made so many friends at the Spanish school we were taking lessons at, and we would hang out with them at night sometimes, and watch movies or go out to the Plaza de Armas and do things like that, it was really great.
Being in Cusco as a whole was so cool, I mean every day we were doing something different and we were seeing new things…one day we went to the cathedral in the Plaza de Armas and a little old Spanish woman came up to us and said, oh, do you want a tour of the cathedral, and we thought, okay why not? She ended up giving it in English and her English was so good, and she told us the most interesting things about the cathedral – it turns out it was the first church built in South America – it was so cool! And there was stuff like that that happened every day…”
Katie and Morgan also visited Machu Picchu and climbed Huayna Picchu, the big mountain behind the ruins. She told us the climb was harrowing at times, but the view from the top was out of this world:
“When we got up to the top, you’re standing up there and you’re looking over the valley below Machu Picchu where Aguas Calientes is, and the hot springs there, and this long river, and Machu Picchu’s tiny below you…it was one of the coolest things I’ve ever done. It was amazing.”
Katie definitely had her share of new and interesting experiences while in Cusco, including trying the Peruvian delicacy “cuy,” or guinea pig! But she described her time in Peru as just the right distance out of her comfort zone. She was struck, especially, by what she described as ‘Peruvian time’:
“Everything is much more laid back, people care so much more about personal relationships in the moment that it’s happening, not so much about, you know, the next step, and the next, the next, the next. That’s a really nice feeling, because you’re talking to someone and you feel like they’re really listening to what you have to say, and they really genuinely care about what you have to say. That’s not always the case in [the United States].”
Katie’s Quest didn’t end with her return to the United States. She has kept in touch with her new Peruvian friends, and plans to stay involved with the community at the San Jerónimo after school program. She and Morgan have decided to start a branch of Let Them Shine to benefit the children at the after school program where they worked, and hope to start sending supplies this fall.
Katie and Morgan truly embody the spirit of United Planet, and we’re so glad we got to hear about their wonderful experience in Peru! Thank you for sharing with us, Katie!
Are you interested in an experience like Katie’s? You can volunteer in Cusco, Peru at an after school program this winter break! Click here to find out more about United Planet’s Winter Break Quests – if you enroll by August 31, you’ll save $100!
ABOUT UNITED PLANET
United Planet is a non-profit organization with a mission to create a global community, one relationship at a time. Established in 2001, United Planet offers volunteer abroad, virtual internships, internships abroad, gap year volunteering, and global virtual exchange in more than 40 countries.
