During Pre-Service Training (PST), and during our service, we’ve gotten a lot of practice participating in, and organizing, dinamicas. Dinamicas are ice-breaking games that groups of adults can play in order to facilitate working together, such as the dinamica we played called “Dragon’s Tail” during the September 2016 Behavior Conference which was attended by both Peace Corps Volunteers and their work partners (such as nurses, health educators and othes with whom we work side by side in the health center). The head of the Dragon tries to catch the tail of another Dragon (post-it on the last person in a line of people) which is represented by a post-it note. As you can see a bit of strategy came into play! Here is a video of the Dragon’s Tail dinamica:

Dragon’s Tail Dinamica from 2016 Behavior Change Conference

As you can see, everybody enjoys doing a dinamica!

A Peace Corps Response Volunteer who is doing research in my town recently hosted a special snack at the local restaurant, or comedor, to celebrate the completion of house surveys by a team of Guatemalans he hired. As I likely will be working with this group of Guatemalans again I decided to play one of my favorite dinamicas in which everybody says their name and their favorite food. As you can see everybody enjoyed this dinamica, and I will be sorry to not be working this group until January, they were so hardworking that they even finished their work a day early. They enjoyed a chocolate smoothy and a special type of vanilla and chocolate cake called a ‘Magdalena’ which is fairly popular in my town. Here is a video of this impromptu dinamica:

Impromptu Dinamica at Comedor

They wanted to know what my favorite food was, and I had to say that hands-down the best food I’ve eaten during my time in site is a local dish, a Pepian made with turkey which is an absolutely wonderful comfort food, though I wish it was served with more vegetables, it does taste fantastic! Every region in Guatemala has their own distinctive take on the Pepian, and variations in spices can make a big difference in flavor. Here is a picture of a chicken Pepian dish:

Dinamicas are so important for Peace Corps Service that each volunteer gets a PDF handbook that has 100 different Dinamicas for Adults!

Here is a video of a dinamica used at a health commission assembly/Father’s Day event, ballons were taped onto pant legs and whoever popped the other person’s balloon first wins!

Balloon Popping Dinamica!

I had no experience with Dinamicas before starting Peace Corps training, (is a Dinamica a super hero like Ginormica from Monsters Vs. Aliens?) but now use them as ice-breakers in small group settings, and to get people relaxed and interested before giving a health talk.

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