Xacxamayo

Xacxamayo Episode2

I recently posted on my fb page about a visit to an small-remote town called Xacxamayo in the state of Puebla, Mexico.
Basically I was a volunteer for 3 saturdays,
I wanted to teach about other existing options on compute software, and also wanted to show them there is a world outside commercial and common programs, One of this options called Linux is currently helping in science, medicine, education and even in movies and games to not mention alot of different daylife stuff, I believe all of the kids were excited about the way I made my point. :)

While driving with the guy in charge to coordinate efforts and make things happen BalamEk an interesting idea came up .....

"We are going to spend 3 weekends with this kids, why we do not try to do something different?"

The main idea was to get the attention of this kids at the same time participate as a team in off-school hours, and also "we" as volunteers will be able to understand more about their community.

The brillant idea.....

We bought four disposable cameras (we were a bit reduced on budget) the ones you can get on a convenience store, not really high end cameras, but it will help us to spread the kids in different teams, they will be able to work together and show their community to the world. :)

Roger gave them a 7 minute course introduction to the whole new world of photography, showing them how to use the cameras, they were pretty excited to play for a week with the "new toys".

We also setup right away a photo contest, so the team with the best picture will be a winner of "--" ... we actually didn't mention the real "prize" we just leaved it like that.

During the second basic Linux class we taught them how to create a blog with Wordpress,
and voila! they can speak up to the world!

I believe it was also a good idea show them that there is no frontiers on the net, with this new tools learned they will have other options to be listen outside their community, Mexico mommentum is pretty bad, too many government crap, represion, and so on, at least they will have an "option" to fight back if things suddendly changes, maybe radical ideas.....

They actually have internet access on the school and the access is open during the day and afternoon, the wifi is always on, and a couple of them have laptops given by the government.

Anyway the main idea was based on start posting their own photos, on their own blog,

Let me share the stunning results, (just few of them)

Beautiful, isn't ?

Unfortunately here is when the Mexican movie starts....
Couple of days after the second course, the community school financed by institutions (private and charity institutions) was taken over by SEP (Government institution for public education), and suddenly we were not able/allowed to go over again and finish with the third class, there is a lot of politics and crap that I do not understand, hopefully BalamEk get that sorted out soon.

At the end is amazing how the kids see the world, and for two weekends I felt I was doing something right,
Spread the word about Opensource, Linux and technology, it was a great personal experience to me.

BTW, If you are interested to help us in a volunteer journey, please do not hesitate and mail me, is a great way to give back something to the community.