Imagine eating only potatoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner every single day! Day in, day out! Imagine the bone-chilling cold you would feel in the sub-zero temperatures of the Andes with only a simple poncho and traditional sandals made from car tires to clothe you!Imagine being beaten for being pregnant
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 Imagine eating only potatoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner every single day! Day in, day out! Imagine the bone-chilling cold you would feel in the sub-zero temperatures of the Andes with only a simple poncho and traditional sandals made from car tires to clothe you!Imagine being beaten for being pregnant again or not wanting to have sex with your husband in order to avoid repeated pregnancy! Imagine going to school for two hours on an empty stomach in a freezing morning and not being able to attend class because of the lack of a pen and a paper!Imagine being locked in darkened rooms or chained to bed by desperate parents who know no other way to care for their disabled child!Imagine being 3 years of age and having to survive alone on the street, day after day, because your mother abandoned you and your father is an alcoholic! Living Heart struggles to support more than 2,500 vulnerable children and women in the most disadvantaged highland communities of the Sacred Valley.For centuries, these remote communities have been marginalized and ignored. Living Heart advocates the right of every child to health, education and a brighter future. Our aim is to develop holistic, sustainable projects that work together with the community in the areas of Nutrition, Health, Education and Sustainable Agriculture. Through working collaboratively alongside the most disadvantaged local people we aim to create a more sustainable, long-term solution.We are currently working in 8 different areas (nutrition, health, dental care, education, contraception & family planning, disability assistance, organic agriculture and Children’s Home) in 4 rural highland (over 3800 m altitude) communities as our main projects whilst actively supporting several smaller sub-projects.Project 1: Nutritional support for children in highland primary schools Living Heart supplies nutritional food for around 300 children who has suffered from malnourishment. We build school kitchens with basic equipment and improved stoves; train local cooks to prepare 21 specially designed receipts twice a day, every school day of the year. We provide local medical and aromatic herbs to combat parasites. We give workshops in nutrition, hygiene and cooking to the whole community.The parents and school teachers are responsible to provide fire wood from sustainable sources, pick-up the food, provide a clean storeroom for the food, collect local herbs, oraganise to volunteers to help out in the kitchen on a daily basis and attend the workshops. Since the beginning of this project, Living Heart has benefited more than 2500 children and provided over 100,000 meals. Additionally, we have provided 8 local people with permanent employment in the school kitchen. Project 2: Educational Greenhouses and sustainable agricultureTo expand the benefits of the Nutrition program to the whole community and ensure all children have access to nutritious food within the home, Living Heart started educational school and community greenhouses in 2011. This involves the construction of a large, specially-designed thermal mass greenhouse built from local stone and mud, and insulated with plastic roof, close to the school, allowing the community and the school children to organically cultivate their own fresh vegetables, salad and herbs.The key to Living Heart’s sustainable agriculture project is long-term education and practical, on-the-job training for the children and adults of the community. The members of the project will receive monthly training workshops, and weekly theoretical and practical classes on nutrition and cultivation.We have successfully completed one educational greenhouse, have started a second one in another community and are expecting to start a third one before the end of 2012.Project 3: Basic Health, Dental Care, ContraceptionLiving Heart’s aim is to improve the overall health of the children and reduce domestic abuse in women in the communities.Living Heart collects new and secondhand clothes and provides regular donations of warm items to the communities to wear beneath their traditional clothing to help fight off the biting cold and whistling winds. Living Heart provides a basic first aid kit and medical supplies to the school director, for the benefit of the children and the wider community, with instructions on usage and dosage. We also organize a yearly itinerant medical clinic with the help of foreign volunteer doctors and nurses. In addition, in 2012 we introduced dental care prevention in all the schools we work with. We hope to be able to provide regular dental treatments with itinerant dental clinic.Living Heart conducts annual weight and height checks to monitor the growth of the children, and track their development. We provide a contraceptive program including sexual health, hygiene and education workshops and offers pill and injection-based contraceptives to all women who request them.Finally, we donate multivitamins to pregnant and lactating women to prevent death and common illnesses of the newborn babies related to malnutrition in early stages of life.Up to date our Health program has benefited over 3500 community members.Project 4: EducationLiving Heart provides all our community primary schools with discretional basic educational supplies to ensure that every child can attend school for the full scholastic year and receive a basic education. We also provide volunteer teachers to teach art, drama, physical recreation activities, music and environmental conservation. We incentivise earlier enrolment and consistency of attendance through the provision of school meals.Living Heart has also launched a lending-library campaign where we make suitable books available to children who are interested in extra study. We work in association with the school directors and provide books in both Quechua and Spanish which are delivered to the remote villages with the regular food supply deliveries.Our Education Program has benefited over 450 children and over 25 school teachers in 8 communities. Project 5: Disability AssistanceLiving Heart’s local Quechua speaking nurse has been professionally trained to provide one severely disabled child from impoverished family with the physiotherapy and medical attention it requires. In her weekly therapy sessions she works with the child on basic movement and communication skills, and provides occupational support for the family members.Hearts Café, a social business in Ollantaytambo and long-term supporter of Living Heart, also supports the gifted family of the child by selling their handmade, natural-alpaca-dyed weavings – with 100% of proceeds being returned to the family, to go towards providing all their 3 children with a nutritious diet to improve their overall health.Recently, the weavers’ family took the brave decision to give back to their community and set up a weaving school in their house for the orphaned and abandoned children from the community to teach them life skills. Living Heart supports this project by providing fresh and nutritious food to all the children during the classes, as well as promoting the project locally and internationally and fundraising for its continuity.Project 6: Children’s Home in a Permaculture designOne of our long term visions for a Children’s Home has finally come to the fore. We are actively seeking the right plot of land around the Cusco area which will allow us to liaise and integrate with the right community, creating a strong relationship with them whilst also creating a permaculture; a self- sustaining home working in harmony with nature and the neighbouring community. We aim to build a Children's Home for around 35 abandoned and orphaned children from the Andean highlands, where they will live in an ecologically sensitive environment, will be treated with much love and affection and will receive essential life-skills. By incorporating permaculture principles the home will benefit not only the children but the community as a whole. We are keen that the children, as they grow, maintain their traditional roots, respecting their culture and are socially responsible; core values of ours. Our aim is to educate professional and culturally sensitive people, who will be the first generation of change makers and community leaders in the remote highland communities, we currently work with. We wish them to be full and active members of their society wherever their strengths may lie. To this end we will employ local people with the necessary skills supported by us to help the children reach their potential.Full details of each individual project and the situation in the communities we work with can be found on our website www.livingheartperu.org