The Day I Helped Donate Toys For Christmas

I spent the day sorting toys into groups and then distributing them to the orphanages within my city…I think I did enough to get on Santa’s good list this year >.<

Within my city there is a train that is driven by father Christmas; okay so it’s not the real father Christmas ( cause he lives in the north pole so brazil would be too hot for him right? >.<) but all the children though he was real. But this was no ordinary train oh no, this train was spreading Christmas cheer to the less fortunate children. Because this train was being driven by Father Christmas obviously all children wanted to ride the train. But unlike other trains you couldn’t just buy a ticket, you had to donate a toy and or / some type of Christmas food. Upon donating the toy you were given a ticket to ride the Christmas train. All of the toys / food donated by the children who wanted to ride the train were donated to the local orphanage. So it was my job as a willing volunteer to sort through all the toys to see which enough condition to be given to the children was in a good.

There was a room full of boxes packed to the brim with toys for children. It was my job to sort through them all and put the toys into their designated boxes. There were boxes for Barbie’s for girls; cars for boys and little soft toys for babies to play with. There was also a massive box full of footballs ( because you know how the Brazilians like to play football) 



me and the boxes



 After about three hours of unboxing and re-boxing I had finally separated all the toys, which my fellow volunteers then put in separate bags and marked them ready for delivery. The first stop was “casa da crianças” (children’s house) they are full of children who don’t have parents or relatives able to look after them. We dropped off three boxes full of toy cars, toy aeroplanes and toy trucks to the house. As soon as the toys were on the table all the children crowed round and calling me “tia” (it means aunt but that what all younger children call people older than then) trying to get the best presents that were available. After all the children were given their presents it was time to move onto the next house. This house is a place children can go if they have problems which means they can’t stay in their own house anymore. We dropped off another three boxes full of toys for the children living there and a box full of Christmas cakes.

me and the children :)

 A day of playing Santa made me realise how another’s man rubbish can be another man’s treasure. This kids have had such a hard time with their lives and the smallest Christmas present made them very happy, which in turn made me happy :D defiantly think I’m going to keep up the charity work once I return back home.

The Day I Went To A Graduation...Of A Six Year Old

“So what is she graduating from?”  
“Kindergarden”
“…I’m sorry, what?!”

Living in brazil for nearly four months had made me realise a lot of differences between my host country and my home country. One of these things is the education system. For one they have to study EVERYTHING, until university level, they study more subjects out here that I did back home for my GCSES, AND they have to study it for longer! Second thing is that different year groups study at different times of the day. 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd college years (which is years 11, 12 and 13 for people reading in the UK) have to study from 7am to midday. The younger year groups all study in the afternoon from 1:30PM till 6:00PM. For me who is used to studying from 9AM till 4:30PM, trying to get to school every day for 7AM was close to impossible. The third (and secretly I think the coolest) difference between British schools and Brazilian schools is graduation. In the UK. You graduate ONCE, from university and that’s it. But here in Brazil, woaaaaaaaaaaaaah, over here they graduate FIVE TIMES, yes that’s right five times, the first time when they are just 5/6 years old. My host cousin had just graduated from kindergarden (yes they get a party from graduating from kindergarden, how unfair is that?!?!?!) and I just had to see what this was all about.

When I think of the graduations, I think of teenager’s / young adults people wearing long gowns with those square shaped hats jumping in the air with massive grins on their faces, (like the people you see in the movies? ) and this graduation ceremony similar. It started as each child was called one by one to walk across the stage while wearing a royal blue gown with a frilly white bib. Once all the children had been seated, various teachers took it in turns to explain what the children had been learning and what achievements they had participated in over the past year. It was then time to thank the teachers for their hard work and endless support over the year. No surprises so far…until this, all the mother of the children who were graduating were called forward and asked to sit in the seat of their child. The children then started to sing a song about how much they love their mothers and how they appreciate them. The fathers were then called forward and the same song was sung just replacing the word “mae”(mother)  with “pai” (father) By the end of the songs there was not a dry eye in the audience seeing as all the mothers and fathers (as well as aunts, uncles and cousins who were watching) were on the verge of crying.  After the song presentation came the awarding of the certificates. Each child was called separately and collected a huge white envelope with their name written on it. After this it was time for one final parade as they were led out. As soon as they were out of sight there was a massive cheer and I could just imagine them all jumping in the air in slow motion with massive grins on their faces ( I’m such a day dreamer >.< )

You would have thought that was the end of the ceremony (don’t worry I did too; I was ready to go eat and everything! >.<) but no, it was just an interval; seeing as there was a part two! All the newly “graduated” children came back into the main presenting area wearing different arrays of gymnastics costumes. Half of the girls were dressed up as watermelons while the other half were dressed up as little sweets, and the boys were dressed as little Christmas trees (well that was my interpretation of the their costumes =]) They did a cute little gymnastics presentation with some pretty impressive pyramids and everyone gave them a massive round of applause at the end. Their ceremony ended with a homemade video made up of pictures demonstrating their final year of “infant education” While this was going on a massive shower of confetti fell from out of the celling which sent the kids running and screaming as they tried to collect the flying confetti, while all their family members stood watching them and crying. And in the middle of all this hullaballoo the only thing that could come out of my mouth was “how can she graduating? She’s only six! I have to wait until I’m like 20 something!” (okay I admit it; I was a little jealous :p)  but I guess that’s one of the weird things I will never understand while staying here in Brazil. :’)