EIL Intercultural Learning

Happy Children’s Day! And what a great day it was. Children’s day in Argentina is on the 11th of August but we celebrated it in the comedor on the 16th of August which was yesterday. It was a special day. Families from the neighborhood came to the comedor to eat nice food, play party games and get a present before they went home.

There had been a good build up in the days previous to the celebration as we had to get everything ready. The workers in the comedor all came in to do extra work on the Saturday afternoon. We had to pack loads of sweet bags for the kids, so that took plenty of time but we had a good laugh while we were getting everything ready. We also had to blow up a whole lot of ballons which gave the place a party feel.

Finally Sunday arrived. All the workers met up in the comedor at around 9.30 to start getting things ready. Some students from the local university came down to give us some much needed help. The food for the day was “Chorizo y pan” given the abbreviated name of “choripan”. Chorizo is like a kind of salami sausage and pan is bread. The chorizo is boiled in water for a while until it is well cooked through and then it is put in bread. It is a bit like a hot dog I suppose. There must have been over 1000 chorizo sausages stacked high in the kitchen. People started arriving at around 11am and then the place really started to fill up. I reckon there was about over 500 people at the community centre on the day. The chorizos were all boiled and then put with bread, a tomato sauce and mayonnaise. All the workers formed a big work line and got the food ready. The local priest came and gave the pre dinner blessing and then the food came out. Everyone seemed to love it and we used up every chorizo in the kitchen.

After the food there were games all day long. We had some football games for the kids and there were also tugs of war, musical chairs, karaoke, egg and spoon races and many more games throughout the afternoon. The local kids have a kind of musical band called the “murga” who have four or five big drums which they play. They are accompanied by kids who dance to the music and wave colored flags. It is quite a sight and quite a sound. They came along yesterday and certainly made themselves heard!

In the evening time everyone was given hot chocolate and croissants. Before everyone left, small sweet bags were given out to the kids and toys were also given out to as many kids as possible. The comedor finally closed up around 8pm.

It really was a special day. So many of the families that come to the comedor struggle to provide food for their families and have countless other problems. Having fun days like that put everyone in such good humor and helps them take their mind of things for a while. People of all ages came, from babies to grandparents and everyone had fun. Fair play to the Argentineans, children’s day is a true success. Since we have Father’s day and Mother’s day in Ireland and in light of what I have seen in the comedor I think it would be a nice little idea for us to start having a children’s day in Ireland as well !