This past Monday marked one of CMI's most productive, if zany workdays thus far. The team set out a full two hours earlier than usual for their trip to the Prisma offices in Juliaca, anticipating the day's 20+ borrower meetings. By sunset, the team had completed over 70 individual surveys (a record!), purchased two egg-bearing Quails, and doled out free marshmallows to Juliacans everywhere. Just another day in the life of the CMI second session volunteers.
Working like a well-oiled microfinance machine, CMI is ahead of schedule in achieving their goal of collecting 250 borrower surveys. Once processed, this data will yield a wealth of important information about the micro-entrepreneurs in the Puno region. All of CMI's hard work will culminate in a report to be finalized in the coming weeks. To boot, our video documentary will bring all the action of microfinance in live color and sound to all of CMI's fans and followers back home.
Finally, the city of Puno is still frigid and developing, but CMI loves its lakeside home in the highlands. At night, cool air from lake Titicaca breezes through city's sprawling concrete grid. Spires of tangled rebar and mortar make up Puno's peculiar skyline, and the city almost blends into the hills of brown grass sloping high and treeless around the town. More overly dramatic descriptions of Puno to come...
Joey
Monday, July 23, 2007
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Surveys, Spreadsheets, and Longing for Summertime
Eight days have passed since the final members of CMI Second Session arrived in Puno, Peru, and much has been accomplished by the new Micro-Crew. Working efficiently all week in Juliaca, the group has managed to complete close to 60 individual client surveys, conduct several group interviews, and reel in some great footage for a CMI documentary. In addition, two profiles of PRISMA borrowers have been added to KIVA.org, and both received their full requested loan amounts within 24 hours of uploading! A huge success!
While CMIers aren´t working hard, time is spent teaching english to college students, eating at local bakeries, and basking in the warmth of CMI´s newest member, a 1200 Watt space-heater. The weather is cold in Puno, but the people are friendly, and there is plenty of nescafe to go around. All in all, CMI is on track for completing a highly productive summer of providing microfinance to Peru!
While CMIers aren´t working hard, time is spent teaching english to college students, eating at local bakeries, and basking in the warmth of CMI´s newest member, a 1200 Watt space-heater. The weather is cold in Puno, but the people are friendly, and there is plenty of nescafe to go around. All in all, CMI is on track for completing a highly productive summer of providing microfinance to Peru!
Ben
Friday, July 20, 2007
First Day at Prisma
After a week and a half of exploring Cuzco and the surrounding area and waiting for the strikes to end, I am very excited to be in Puno. After hearing so much from other members of CMI, it has been nice to actually meet the host family and work at Prisma. The host family could not be more welcoming. This past Saturday, Jessie and I celebrated our birthdays. The host family went out of their way to make it a wonderful, memorable day as did the other members of CMI. Our peers cooked a fabulous Mexican dinner and our Peruvian hosts taught us several games. It was one of my most memorable birthdays. I have enjoyed having the connection through the host family and receiving insight into the Peruvian culture and every day life. In addition, I had a chance to be a tourist and visit the floating islands which were fascinating. We spent a relaxing afternoon touring the island settlements built of beds of reeds. The houses had solar panels for electricity and the tourist area even had a hotel! The views of Lake Titicaca were beautiful as was the view of Puno from the boat.
Today is my first day at Prisma. After having studied and read so much about microfinance it is incredible to actually be able to participate in the work. I have enjoyed taking surveys and talking with the women about their businesses and their lives. Each woman has a different story and I cannot wait to keep working here. I am so glad to be in Puno!
Lauren
Today is my first day at Prisma. After having studied and read so much about microfinance it is incredible to actually be able to participate in the work. I have enjoyed taking surveys and talking with the women about their businesses and their lives. Each woman has a different story and I cannot wait to keep working here. I am so glad to be in Puno!
Lauren
Sunday, July 15, 2007
New Arrivals to CMI
After a week of intense strikes and several failed attempts to arrive in Puno members of second session CMI finally arrived. Five AM on Friday morning Carmen, our host mom, awoke me: ¨Jessita, Jessita, tus amigos ya llegaron.¨ They were outside in a taxi. Juliana ran down to meet them and took them to the apartment so they could try and get a few hours of sleep.
In the morning we had a final meeting with Juliana before she left. Then we showed the new group around town where they were welcomed by thousands of puneños shouting in the streets. Unfortunately they weren’t shouting welcomes but ¨El pueblo unido/ jamás será vencido!¨ (the people united/ will never be divided!). That afternoon and Saturday morning we had a slew of meetings, getting everyone up to speed on the details of our work, the next steps and dividing tasks among new group members. I am so excited about this new group and the great start we’ve gotten off to. CMI has so much to do this week and the rest of our time in Peru and our new members have already shown dedication and energy. From the puneños we’ve questioned striking should not pose a problem for transportation next week so we will be continuing with our Kiva Interviews, Satisfaction Focal Groups, Charlas, Client Assessments and Joey will be starting our documentary film. Next weekend we will also be starting on our final report, which will be based on the data gathered from Client Assessments.
Jessie
In the morning we had a final meeting with Juliana before she left. Then we showed the new group around town where they were welcomed by thousands of puneños shouting in the streets. Unfortunately they weren’t shouting welcomes but ¨El pueblo unido/ jamás será vencido!¨ (the people united/ will never be divided!). That afternoon and Saturday morning we had a slew of meetings, getting everyone up to speed on the details of our work, the next steps and dividing tasks among new group members. I am so excited about this new group and the great start we’ve gotten off to. CMI has so much to do this week and the rest of our time in Peru and our new members have already shown dedication and energy. From the puneños we’ve questioned striking should not pose a problem for transportation next week so we will be continuing with our Kiva Interviews, Satisfaction Focal Groups, Charlas, Client Assessments and Joey will be starting our documentary film. Next weekend we will also be starting on our final report, which will be based on the data gathered from Client Assessments.
Jessie
Good-bye Juliana
After working through many hardships to provide CMI with a great start Juliana has decided to return to the US and continue working to support us from there. She left Friday at 1pm. We were all sad to say good bye to such a great friend and leader.
After brainstorming ideas for special good-bye dinners we were lucky to get food at all due to two days of ¨Paro fuerte¨(strong striking) in which no stores were open, no vehicles ran (or they ran at the risk of being pelted by stones – I saw this twice) and schools were closed. We ended up at the homestay, playing games with our wonderful and loving host family and eating a cake Carmen, Tyler and I hunted down amidst strikers (we saw a woman in the street with a cake and rushed to ask where it was from, it turned out Mercedes bakery was operating ¨with doors closed¨ so as not to be targeted by strikers).
The next day, after leaving us with lots of advice (and her Spanish-English Dictionary) Juliana departed from the bus station. We received an email Friday night and Juliana is safe and well on her way to Lima. We will miss her!
Jessie
After brainstorming ideas for special good-bye dinners we were lucky to get food at all due to two days of ¨Paro fuerte¨(strong striking) in which no stores were open, no vehicles ran (or they ran at the risk of being pelted by stones – I saw this twice) and schools were closed. We ended up at the homestay, playing games with our wonderful and loving host family and eating a cake Carmen, Tyler and I hunted down amidst strikers (we saw a woman in the street with a cake and rushed to ask where it was from, it turned out Mercedes bakery was operating ¨with doors closed¨ so as not to be targeted by strikers).
The next day, after leaving us with lots of advice (and her Spanish-English Dictionary) Juliana departed from the bus station. We received an email Friday night and Juliana is safe and well on her way to Lima. We will miss her!
Jessie
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
What a week!
Hey everyone!
Its been a while I know, I´m sorry for the delay. Last week was crazy here. There was a strike inbetween Puno and Cuzco that prohibited us from getting the second session back to Puno to start work. Luckily they are ok and on their way! While Juliana and Jessie were in Cuzco with the other half of the team, the rest of us were still hard at work at PRISMA. We met with Michelle of Kiva.org and submitted PRISMA´s application to be a partner with them. The bulk of our work on this project was in providing pilot profiles of some of Prisma´s clients to Kiva and giving them the interviews we had conducted. Michelle was incredibly helpful and a lot of fun. We took her out to dinner in Puno after the meeting and had some pretty impressive pizzas. It was great to finally send off the work we had done on this project with Michelle and hear what she has to say about our application. From what I can tell, things look really good!
Other than Kiva, we finally got the excel program set up so that we can enter in all the data we are collecting in our surveys. This is all thanks to Chelsea of course. Me and Toby sat down at the computer last week and entered in the first wave of data we had collected. Chelsea made it as easy as possible for us and the time really flew by entering in all those surveys.
The charlas are still going strong, though last week we hit a small bump in the road. Either because of the strike going on or because PRISMA´s first week of every month is always slow, nobody showed up to our two classes. The Charla team was really bummed of course because it was a really exciting business chat, but we´re carrying it over to this week so more clients will be able to hear about it and come on time.
Friday was a sad day as we had to say goodbye to some of our first session members (Chelsea, Valerie, Emily, and Toby. We´ll miss you guys!). The PRISMA officers took us out for one last final lunch together at one of their client´s restaraunts and we had an amazing time! Lots of food, and tons of dancing. I couldn´t have come up with a better way to send that group off. But now its time to look forward to the new group we have coming in. I´m so excited to get started on showing them the ropes of everything we have accomplished last session. It´s a tallented bunch so I´m sure the next 5 weeks are going to be intense and productive!
Tyler
Its been a while I know, I´m sorry for the delay. Last week was crazy here. There was a strike inbetween Puno and Cuzco that prohibited us from getting the second session back to Puno to start work. Luckily they are ok and on their way! While Juliana and Jessie were in Cuzco with the other half of the team, the rest of us were still hard at work at PRISMA. We met with Michelle of Kiva.org and submitted PRISMA´s application to be a partner with them. The bulk of our work on this project was in providing pilot profiles of some of Prisma´s clients to Kiva and giving them the interviews we had conducted. Michelle was incredibly helpful and a lot of fun. We took her out to dinner in Puno after the meeting and had some pretty impressive pizzas. It was great to finally send off the work we had done on this project with Michelle and hear what she has to say about our application. From what I can tell, things look really good!
Other than Kiva, we finally got the excel program set up so that we can enter in all the data we are collecting in our surveys. This is all thanks to Chelsea of course. Me and Toby sat down at the computer last week and entered in the first wave of data we had collected. Chelsea made it as easy as possible for us and the time really flew by entering in all those surveys.
The charlas are still going strong, though last week we hit a small bump in the road. Either because of the strike going on or because PRISMA´s first week of every month is always slow, nobody showed up to our two classes. The Charla team was really bummed of course because it was a really exciting business chat, but we´re carrying it over to this week so more clients will be able to hear about it and come on time.
Friday was a sad day as we had to say goodbye to some of our first session members (Chelsea, Valerie, Emily, and Toby. We´ll miss you guys!). The PRISMA officers took us out for one last final lunch together at one of their client´s restaraunts and we had an amazing time! Lots of food, and tons of dancing. I couldn´t have come up with a better way to send that group off. But now its time to look forward to the new group we have coming in. I´m so excited to get started on showing them the ropes of everything we have accomplished last session. It´s a tallented bunch so I´m sure the next 5 weeks are going to be intense and productive!
Tyler
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