mi trabaja / my job

I had my first meeting with my supervisor, Diego, on Monday; we talked about Argentina's community, how JDC fits into the community, and the type of work I will be doing.  Learning about the Argentina Jewish community is probably more fascinating for me than for you but in order to understand the scope of what the organization is accomplishing in Argentina and what I'll be doing for the following year, I'll give you a brief overview of Argentina's (Jewish) history:

In 2001, there was a huge economic collapse and many people went from upper middle class to poverty overnight (think people in Armani suits going to soup kitchens because they couldn't afford food anymore). The JDC office at that time had about 20 people and quickly began to grow as they started welfare programs for the ¨new poor¨ of Argentina's Jewish society. From 2001 until last year, the JDC office had between 60 and 70 full-time staff. However since the community has now been rebuilt and is back to the similar level they were at before the economic collapse, the office has undergone large changes in the last few months and are now back to about twenty people in the office doing a variety of welfare, community development, and educational programs. 

Half of my time will be spent in the JDC office helping with a variety of community development programs and the other half will be with a Jewish teen group called Hebraica. For now I am only working in the office and after the Jewish holidays, I will begin my work at Hebraica.

My time at work the past few days:

-Monday was spent meeting everyone in the office and getting acclimated. The director's assistant Mara has extremely long beautiful curly hair and she told me that her hair is like Medusa and she keeps all of the organization's secrets in it. Definitely going to get to know her better...

-Tuesday I was given my first task of finding photos, videos, interviews, and texts about Rosh Hashanah that could be used for their social media feeds. I thought this video was great...

-Wednesday my colleague Kevin explained to me the whole scoop about Argentina's Jewish community. Some fun facts:

• There are around 250,000 Jewish people in Argentina (WOW!) making it the 7th largest Jewish population in the world
• 6 out of 10 Jewish children in Buenos Aires attend a Jewish school

-Thursday I helped another colleague translate a report in English into Spanish...awesome practice! 

It has been a great first week in the office...looking forward to more!

ps. This is what my desk looks like...