In the end of December FairMail founder Peter den Hond left for a 3 week visit to FairMail Peru. Read all about his highs, his lows and his dilemmas:

“For me the three weeks where filled with respect for the endurance of the teenagers, dilemmas about cultural differences and fun during the travelling and shooting pictures together. Experiences that recharged my “FairMail batteries” to get back to work on FairMail in the Netherlands.

Respect

One of the goals of the trip was like always to tell the teenagers who their cards are being received by consumers in the west. Only when they know which cards sell well and for what type of images there is a demand can they adapt their product to the wishes of the market. And of course that way earn more money!

Besides strengthening the ties with the teenagers is very important for me. During the rest of the year we always miss each other greatly and you feel that even more when you speak to each other again. I have heard many personal stories again. Like one of the girls who is being beaten by her step father and had to ask police protection. Or another teenager whoms irresponsible dad  hasn’t been sending money home to his family for a number of weeks. The family is now in debt just to buy food to eat. And the story about one of the ex-street children who now leaves in a boys home but is very worried about his mother because his family members at home are fighting alot. Sometimes even attacking each other with knives!

Luckily there are also good stories. In December Patricia, Mariluz and Yuli finished secondary school and have started follow-up education. Cinthia actually graduated to become a tourist guide (click here for more pictures on her facebook!). She is the first FairMail teenager to finish a multiple year higher education! And Juan Carlos is doing his practical period in a pizzeria. We once started FairMail to break the chain of poverty, so the teenagers can later establish families in which their kids will have better oppertunities then they received from their own parents. The sale of their cards is important for that, but their own perseverence keeps being the source of it all. That is why my respect for them is so big. Even inspiring!

Dilemmas

Over the whole of 2010 the profit for the teenagers in Peru grew by 30% compared to 2009 to a total of 12.500 euro. That’s great, but it can always be better! Dat caused by biggest dilemma. With my western view of things, oriented at efficiency and keeping strict rules, I saw that FairMail Peru was doing well, but could do a lot better. Should I accept that things are less efficient compared to when we where still living in Peru? Or should we move back to the strict and efficient base we had when Janneke started FairMail in 2006? And in that case would we be able to get more out of the concept of FairMail? Or just ruin things created by our local team?

A good example is one of the teenagers who takes pretty good pictures and because of that has a reasonable income from FairMail and also importantly has a lot of joy by being part of the “FairMail family”. But he is often late for classes and sometimes behaves very irresponsibly with the camera we lend him. Our local manager doesn’t always correct him in a disciplinary way and thus FairMail is not providing this teenager with the possibly valuable work experience we would like to offer. Also with respect to personal guidance there is still a lot to improve so he spends his earnings efficiently and effectively in his plan for the future which he still doesn’t have.

Fun

I could observe these kind of “problems” very well during the 9 day photography trip to the Peruvian Andes. During this great trip we worked really hard on new pictures for the 2011 Christmas Card collection (view the first results here). But we also got to know each other a lot better. For example during the 6 hour walk to a mountain lake at 4.620 meters where we literately had to drag each other to the top. (click here for more pictures on Facebook) Also the teenagers got to know new cultural aspects of their own country by staying with a local farmer family high in the mountains for 5 days. Especially when your parents can never take you on a holiday this is a great oppertunity for the kids to increase their world view.

After three intense weeks of being together the hard and emotional good bye that followed was predictable. At least we could say “See you in July”. And to Elmer we could even say “See you in May” when he will be coming to Europe for a 3 week promotional tour for FairMail!