When I decided to travel with the Sagrado Corazón de Jesús group, which consisted of 14 teenagers –I only knew Nicolas Chavez from all of them-, 3 priests and one churchman, I didn’t know what to expect and I was really scared of going out of my comfort zone to meet teenagers of different backgrounds than mine. Nevertheless, I was sick of doing the same thing in Lima, I wanted a change in my ordinary routine, and so I took my leap of faith and left behind my worries. Since the beginning, the group was very warm and friendly; they joked around and made everything funny, hence I rapidly acclimatized. After getting to know every member of the group in a more intimate way, I concluded that we all had the same objective for the mission: to give everything we could to those persons suffering in poverty. However, at the second day in Huaraz, I concluded that this objective was totally mistaken… How much could anyone GIVE in four days? I realized that instead of giving we where actually RECIEVING. Here are some of the things I received/ learned in this mission.
Climbing the Huascaran with a trunk that weights around 30 kilos is no easy thing. In the way up I wanted to sit down and rest, but my partners were still escalating and that motivated me to go on -I didn’t want to delay the group. From the beginning, the purpose of this walk was to reach our limit and overcome it. The altitude, weather, fatigue and lack of water generated me a lot of pain, but I was determined to go up and overpass my 100%. When we secured the first cross (about 4,000 meters above sea level) I had already given my 100%, but I kept on. We hiked at least one hour more; a team member began to vomit and the resting stops became very constant. We decided to secure the second cross and repose. Even though we didn’t touch Huascaran’s snow, we climbed, as a group, to a height that no other group of Sagrado Corazón de Jesús had reached before.
This experience was significantly rewarding for me. I understood that when one reaches its limit, one’s personality, character, and Mindset comes to light. If one has a Fixed Mindset, laziness and pessimistic thoughts impulse one to rest and to give up, but with a Growth Mindset the desire to reach the top, to help others and to be the best, motivate one to follow along the group. In this kind of situations having a leader is very important; the group needs someone to motivate everyone to continue. Nonetheless, the most essential thing is teamwork. The idea is to climb as a group, and to do so, everyone needs to use their skills to reach that goal: the leader needs to motivate others; the physically strong needs to help the weak; and the weak need to give their best to stay with the strong.
When I interacted with the children of the village (Ushno) -who had their faces peeled due to the heavy sun and strong winds, and there hands frozen because of the cold weather- I noticed something peculiar in their sight. Their eyes were pure, their smile was authentic, and they walked with an indescribable peace that everyone who came from Lima envied. I realized that such look could not be found in Lima, the happiness in it was natural. Although the people of Ushno had no commodities (they had no potable water, the bathroom consisted of a hole in the ground, and, in the three days I was with them, they didn’t change their clothes) their hearts were pure and real. It is amazing how in Lima we lack that sense of authenticity. Our smile has become forced and rigid; it seems we do it for obligation, and not for joy. Facebook, for instance, creates some type of false happiness: the ones with more “likes” in their pictures and more friends are supposedly the happiest, though I belief that it is all over around. Nowadays, the ones who put pictures with less clothing are the ones with most likes, and also, the ones with more internal problems. How low can our self-esteem be to expose our bodies to 400, or 2,000 people that are technically our “friends”? We can afford any commodity we wish, but we don’t have authenticity in our hearts.
Sleeping in the floor, being truly thirsty, drinking soup every day, washing my plates, and not being able to take a bath, where some things that made me appreciate what I have. After 5 exhausting days in Ushno, laying down in my bed and eating whatever I wanted was mere paradise. I could take a bath, shave and be clean again, though not internally. After a week or so in Lima, the peace and pureness I had earn in Huaraz had been clouded by the lack of love that Lima’s society presented.
It is evident that this trip to Huaraz was really tiring, though very valuable as well. It was a trip full of new experiences; here is a list of some things I did for the first time:
1. Travelled in a bus
2. Drank Mate de Coca
3. Ate Pachamanca (with a spoon)
4. Hiked in the Huascarán
5. Walked for more than 5 hours
6. Bathed in a sink
7. Bathed in a river
8. Slept on the floor
9. Have a hole as a toilet
10. Eat many typical vegetables of Huaraz (which I don’t remember the name)
11. Broom an entire room.
12. Act in front of more than 100 people
13. Many more things!
Climbing the Huascaran with a trunk that weights around 30 kilos is no easy thing. In the way up I wanted to sit down and rest, but my partners were still escalating and that motivated me to go on -I didn’t want to delay the group. From the beginning, the purpose of this walk was to reach our limit and overcome it. The altitude, weather, fatigue and lack of water generated me a lot of pain, but I was determined to go up and overpass my 100%. When we secured the first cross (about 4,000 meters above sea level) I had already given my 100%, but I kept on. We hiked at least one hour more; a team member began to vomit and the resting stops became very constant. We decided to secure the second cross and repose. Even though we didn’t touch Huascaran’s snow, we climbed, as a group, to a height that no other group of Sagrado Corazón de Jesús had reached before.
This experience was significantly rewarding for me. I understood that when one reaches its limit, one’s personality, character, and Mindset comes to light. If one has a Fixed Mindset, laziness and pessimistic thoughts impulse one to rest and to give up, but with a Growth Mindset the desire to reach the top, to help others and to be the best, motivate one to follow along the group. In this kind of situations having a leader is very important; the group needs someone to motivate everyone to continue. Nonetheless, the most essential thing is teamwork. The idea is to climb as a group, and to do so, everyone needs to use their skills to reach that goal: the leader needs to motivate others; the physically strong needs to help the weak; and the weak need to give their best to stay with the strong.
When I interacted with the children of the village (Ushno) -who had their faces peeled due to the heavy sun and strong winds, and there hands frozen because of the cold weather- I noticed something peculiar in their sight. Their eyes were pure, their smile was authentic, and they walked with an indescribable peace that everyone who came from Lima envied. I realized that such look could not be found in Lima, the happiness in it was natural. Although the people of Ushno had no commodities (they had no potable water, the bathroom consisted of a hole in the ground, and, in the three days I was with them, they didn’t change their clothes) their hearts were pure and real. It is amazing how in Lima we lack that sense of authenticity. Our smile has become forced and rigid; it seems we do it for obligation, and not for joy. Facebook, for instance, creates some type of false happiness: the ones with more “likes” in their pictures and more friends are supposedly the happiest, though I belief that it is all over around. Nowadays, the ones who put pictures with less clothing are the ones with most likes, and also, the ones with more internal problems. How low can our self-esteem be to expose our bodies to 400, or 2,000 people that are technically our “friends”? We can afford any commodity we wish, but we don’t have authenticity in our hearts.
Sleeping in the floor, being truly thirsty, drinking soup every day, washing my plates, and not being able to take a bath, where some things that made me appreciate what I have. After 5 exhausting days in Ushno, laying down in my bed and eating whatever I wanted was mere paradise. I could take a bath, shave and be clean again, though not internally. After a week or so in Lima, the peace and pureness I had earn in Huaraz had been clouded by the lack of love that Lima’s society presented.
It is evident that this trip to Huaraz was really tiring, though very valuable as well. It was a trip full of new experiences; here is a list of some things I did for the first time:
1. Travelled in a bus
2. Drank Mate de Coca
3. Ate Pachamanca (with a spoon)
4. Hiked in the Huascarán
5. Walked for more than 5 hours
6. Bathed in a sink
7. Bathed in a river
8. Slept on the floor
9. Have a hole as a toilet
10. Eat many typical vegetables of Huaraz (which I don’t remember the name)
11. Broom an entire room.
12. Act in front of more than 100 people
13. Many more things!