ASCENDER Peru on TV

A few weeks have flown by and series of important events have occurred here in the headquarters of ASCENDER Peru in Lima.

This year, the staff of ASCENDER Peru took a different approach to launch its gala. The locale chosen for the event is known for its festive and exciting social events. For this reason, we wanted to invite Peruvian civilians from different social and professional backgrounds to come contribute to the improvement of their communities, while enjoying themselves with the entertaining show we programmed.

In the previous months, we focused on building a relationship with professional members of the corporate work force here in Lima in order to attract prospective long term sponsors for ASCENDER Peru to our gala. In the past weeks, however, we focused on getting the word out to the general public. With the press conference that we held at De Rompe y Raja (the location for our gala) we were able to announce our event and its purpose to the Peruvian public. Next to the nationally acclaimed singer Bartola, our events coordinator, Erasmo Cardenas did a fantastic job at presenting our organization to Peruvian spectators. A few days later, our press conference was aired on four different local television channels, which not only helped us communicate our message to Peruvian civilians, but made Erasmo famous for a day.

Although our press conference did not create publicity of the magnitude we had hoped for, it definitely helped to boost more members of the Peruvian public to attend our gala.

El Dia Se Acerca

Wow how the time flies!!! The Gala is approaching rapidly. Only 10 days remain before the big day and there’s still a lot to be done. We had our first opportunity for all of us to go and see de Rompe y Raja, the place where our Gala will be held. The image I had of a Gala was completely transformed as I entered this classy Peruvian night club. The atmosphere wasn’t one you would typically associate with an elegant US Gala. It wasn’t a grand ballroom but a swanky music hall with bars, dim lights, and a stage where local artists have been performing for years. Yes, it may be different from how things are done back home in the states, but we’re not in the states; we’re in PERU!!!
The visit to Rompe y Raja got me excited for the visits to the different businesses to invite them to the Gala. We’re still working hard to get people to come and participate in the Gala. We’ve been running all over Lima to get the word out.
We met today with some of the young volunteers that will be helping at the Gala. They are students at a school for flight attendants who have volunteered to be servers and hostesses for the event. The meeting was held in order to inform them about Ascend and why we needed their help. They all seemed very excited to help and will be a great addition to our team.

Anchoring the Work In Peru

Networking among businesses and local non profit organizations is an essential part of the success of our work and we had a great opportunity to do just that with members of the Padrinos del Hogar San Antonio group this past week. They are another non profit group that provides spiritual as well as temporal help to orphanages throughout Lima. We were invited to a small dinner they had and were able to swap ideas and experiences with members and donors of the group. We made a lot of great connections and sparked some interest in the work we were involved in and generated interest in the Gala. It was humbling to hear that there were over 700 hundred orphans in many of the orphanages, all seeking someone to love and care for them. This just stressed the fact that there is so much work to be done here in Peru and that many people are waiting for our help. This fact helps keep us motivated as we continue to make countless calls to local business, hoping for a chance to meet with and invite them to our Gala. This process has actually picked up quite a bit in the last few weeks as we have learned more effective ways to approach and explain our cause to the people we meet with. We are hopeful that we will fill the events center we have rented and will generate more than enough funds to continue buidling the programs we have running and expand to others in order to help more people.