Day 12: Centro Cultural El Obrador

Today we started the day by packing our bags after our one night stay in Rosario.

Centro Cultural El Obrador was our next stop. This cultural centre provides social programs for Indigenous people mainly from northeast Argentina. The programming includes activities to preserve their culture by sharing their crafts, native languages, stories and woodworking.  All ages are welcome with activities for children during summer vacation. With a 50% high school drop out rate and high teen pregnancy rate, the centre provides access to medical care, helps young mothers sew baby clothes and provides teens with a place to get off of the street.

The centre sells the craft items that are made from donations of recyclable products such as plastic pop bottles, fabric and wood pallets. The class excitedly shopped for items to take home as well a couple items that will be sold at the 2016 AALP Dream Auction.

Our visit concluded with one of the ladies sharing a story in her native language 'Qom', where if a young man gets a tail feather from a Tonolec owl he will soon meet the woman he will marry but if the wind catches the feather he will have more women chasing him!

On the bus we travelled back to Buenos Aires. The four hour ride gave us some time to complete some group learning activities. We practiced everyone's favourite off-the-cuff speaking, had a sponsor spotlight presentation and played a game of group story telling.

As we approached Buenos Aires it was apparent the Boca Juniors are playing tonight with buses packed full of football fans heading to the stadium.

-Class 15