This Monday and Tuesday I spent creating the flyer and the rough draft of the program for the video presentation event. Then on Wednesday we had our second-to-last classes with the Hombres Contra Feminicidio groups. Again we did Healthy Relationships and Signs of an Abusive Relationship, but reversed which class did which. Again we had lively conversations about violence and personal limits as well as healthy communication and what we value in a partner.

On Thursday we held the graduation for the majority of the students. All of the students from all the classes that could attend came except for the Wednesday morning class with whom we would be holding a separate graduation. It was a really lovely day-many of the students shared what they planned to do to make change and some even said how they would help MIA in the future. Then Lucia facilitated a review of what the students learned each week and the students remembered and reflected upon the material from the past weeks. Lucia said some words thanking MIA’s volunteers David Inczauskis, Yohanna de Aguila, Daniel Velasquez, Chris Hill, and myself. Then, as each student graduated she told a short anecdote about each student and there were smiles and laughs all around. After I took photos of each graduate with Lucia and their diplomas I grabbed some of my students from the Saturday project and took their photos for the program. Later that night I went to Trova Jazz again with Yohanna and some of her friends.

The Saturday course didn’t meet this week because it was the National Primary Elections and many students had to travel home to vote so the mentors and I decided to have a small “mentor party” where we could spend quality time outside of the course. One of the mentors, Olga, offered her house and 3 out of 4 of the mentors and myself went and cooked and ate and drank and got to know each other. It was really great because we were all coming from different backgrounds and experiences so there was a lot of learning and teaching going on as well laughing and even some crying as people discussed personal problems.

The next day Paulina and I walked around and bought tissue paper, yarn, and poster board and made flowers out of tissue paper to put on the welcome sign we were going to make for the big event.