It´s officially been 4.5 weeks since I first came to Bolivia. If asked to look back on the expectations of where I would be now in this internship vs. where I actually am, I would say I am miles from where I expected to be. I expected to be taking on more initiative about my project, but frankly I came in with unrealistic expectations. To think that I could just go to la cancha, a market spanning 50 blocks and convince the merchants there to give the food they were unable to sell for free to the center to feed the children after they left the center was blatantly naive. I have been to the Cancha more times than I can count now and I can attest that nothing is free here. While in CBB the sense of community is incredibly strong, the markets are another story. Profit, naturally, is the main thing in each merchant´s mind and any effort outside of that is a waste of their time in their eyes. That is, they have mouths to feed at home too. My other idea, sustainable farming, one of my more difficult ideas, is almost impossible given the time of the year and the fact that no one would be capable of willing to start and take care of it.
If anything, I am hoping to spend more time working with the nutrition students for the rest of my internship to help them make effective classes for the moms that will leave a lasting impact on them going into the future and make sure they learn what is necessary of them. Moreover, contributing new ideas for more ways to ensure that the moms are fully taking care of their kids with the instructions given to them by the nutritionist and making sure that they can translate their classes into their daily lives would be, if anything, the most that I can do with my time and resources that I have left here.