Things I'm Thankful For

Updates

It's been more than a month, which means a new blog entry is overdue. Here's a summary of my life since I last updated.

I've adopted another dog! Or rather, he's adopted me. He followed Samina and I home about a month ago, and never left. I call him Buster, because the first thing I said to him was, "You'd better stay away from my dog, buster, or else!". I'm glad he didn't listen to me.






A few weeks ago I attended an "inter-parish encounter" in Quito, along with members of the local Nono government. All of the rural parishes in the Quito Canton advertised their best features for two days, with a show Saturday night involving dance numbers from each parish. About 30 people from Nono attended, which was about 15 more than were expected. We stayed at a camp run by a couple from Holland. Each parish had their own cabin. Unfortunately, we were not informed beforehand that blankets were not provided. In order not to freeze to death, we borrowed the costumes from the theater group and wore them as pj's.

We were the warmest bunnies there!







I have now experienced an authentic quincieniera, and it lived up to all of my expectations; food, drink, dogs, and dancing. The invitations stated the party would start at 6, then I found out that there was a Mass at 7 which came before the actually party. Of course, the Mass didn't start until 7:45. The ceremony was lovely, so much so that a local mutt decided to drop in. He checked out the priest, the alter, the birthday girl, then headed back out on his rounds. At one point I found myself humming "the Sound of Silence", which didn't make any sense until I realized the priest was singing a hymn (or something...) to the melody of "the Sound of Silence". Afterwards we walked the block to the community center, which was decked out in pink and white balloons and streamers. We danced, we ate, we danced some more, and sometime around 2am I decided to call it a night. A very good night.






On Nov. 2 Ecuadorians celebrate the "Dia de los Difuntos", or Day of the Dead. They eat colada morada (a hot thick drink made from rasberries with chunks of fruit- it's supposed to look like blood) and guaguas de pan ('bread babies'), and some visit the cemetery to pay respects to the deceased. My landlady's entire family visited for the weekend, and the house was overflowing with people. Her daughter made an enormous pot of colada morada, and we ate nothing but bread babies and drank colada for two days.

Not a Bad Day

On September 30, 2010, the police of Ecuador staged a nation-wide protest. In Quito and Guayaquil, streets were clogged with traffic, students were stranded at school, stores were ransacked and stripped clean. And in the closing hours of that Thursday the military evacuated the president from the police hospital in Quito amidst a dramatic gunfight. Meanwhile, in a little town not an hour away from the dramatic events which unfolded in Quito, this is how a certain volunteer spent (part of) her day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwryUc7fdFe

All in all, not a bad day.

Birds! Revised

For all the birders (and everyone else!)
The newer entries are all under Nono.

COTOPAXI
Andean Lapwing
Andean Teal
Andean Gull

MINDO
Quetzel
Cock-o-the-Rock
White-capped Dipper
Masked Trogan
Golden Olive Woodpecker
Cinnamon Peccard
Squirrel Cuckoo
Choco Toucan
Ornate Flycatcher
Black-cheeked Woodpecker
Wood Creeper
Spotted Wood Creeper
Palm Tanneger
Lemnon Rumped Tanneger

Nono
Rufous-collared sparrow
Southern Yellow-grosbeak
Rufous-naped brush-finch
Glossy Thrush
Tropical Kingbird
Sword-billed Hummingbird
Tropical Mockingbird?
Cinereous Conebill
Black-tailed train-bearer 9-19-2010

Changes

7 months in Ecuador. Almost a year spent in a foreign country. The first five months of my life as a Peace Corp volunteer were spent in constant transition, moving first from the (relatively) flat and english speaking state of Nebraska to the mountainous and spanish speaking country of Ecuador, then from hostals to houses and back to hostals again; saying goodbye to my warm winter fleeces only to unpack them a month later, moldy and smelling of my concrete room in the coast. Though I can´t describe my life now as normal (though in reality, there is no such thing as a normal life), the pace has slowed, and routines are developing. I can take time to celebrate and appreciate the small changes, which is something I had not quite mastered when living stateside. So, I am unofficially dedicating today, September 27,to the small things of life.

ST #1: My kitchen is finally painted! After three months of dirty white and moldy green walls, I came home after a weekend away to find my kitchen had been transformed into what appeared to be the inside of a peach. It´s quite cheering to eat breakfast in every morning, especially with the slug trails gone (albeit temporarily).




ST #2: I have a garden. Though I did enjoy pottering about in the yard and flower gardens in Nebraska, my passion never did equal that of my mother, who produces colorful and abundant gardens every spring. My landlady loaned me a strip of dirt to experiment with, and after she saw how the seeds I planted actually grew and have the promise of flowers, she ceded all of her yard to my garden whims. Now some of my favorite parts of the day are spent in the garden, weeding and watering and waging war with the slugs. It´s very therapuetic.




ST #3: My roof doesn´t leak anymore. Which is important, since I live in a region where the rainy season lasts nine months of the year, and even in the ¨dry¨ season it rains about twice a week. I do feel I should point out that during the process of replacing the roof, specifically when the old roof had been demolished and the new roof was not yet up, it poured buckets, which unfortunately found its way to my bed.

ST #4: Her name is Samina (after the famous Ecuadorian painter Guayasamin), she´s ten months old, likes to give high fives, and won´t sleep past 6 am. I originally wanted to call her Quetzal, but none of my Ecuadorian neighbors can pronounce that, so Samina it is. She´s small, but that doesn´t mean she represents a small change in my life. In fact it´s quite the opposite.

Birds!

For all the birders (and everyone else!)

COTOPAXI
Andean Lapwing
Andean Teal
Andean Gull

MINDO
Quetzel
Cock-o-the-Rock
White-capped Dipper
Masked Trogan
Golden Olive Woodpecker
Cinnamon Peccard
Squirrel Cuckoo
Choco Toucan
Ornate Flycatcher
Black-cheeked Woodpecker
Wood Creeper
Spotted Wood Creeper
Palm Tanneger
Lemnon Rumped Tanneger

NONO
Southern Yellow-Grosbeak
Rufous-naped Brush Finch
Rufous-collared Sparrow
Glossy Black Thrush
Lots and lots of hummingbirds...still trying to figure out the species. Could somebody send me binocs? =)

The Parentals Visit Ecuador

“It’s like you live in a musem! The old wooden floorboards, the holes in the windows, the doors themselves…”
“I know. I´m part of a living history museum!”
My parents and I were sitting at my kitchen table, enjoying large mugs of hot tea while trying to keep warm from the cold breeze that filtered through the gaps in the window and doors. It had been just one day since we had arrived in my town, after spending two days in Quito. Having my parents actually step foot in the house where I had lived for one month, and where I would be living for the next two years made my experience here more concrete, and I knew that this was real, that I was acutally living in Ecuador, and not just dreaming the whole thing.
My parents had arrived in country three days before, after 12 hours of flying and waiting in airports. I couldn’t believe they were actually here… the anticipation for this moment had made the past month, and especially the past week, pass by at the speed of one of the slugs that habitually takes an evening stroll around my kitchen every night. Five months had passed since I waved goodbye from the Omaha airport, and they looked exactly the same, though slightly more disheveled given their journey. However, one night´s rest proved enough of a recovery, and in typical Thacker-Lynn fashion we climbed, amid sleet and wind and not even a full day after arriving in Ecuador, the highest active volcanoe in the world: Cotopaxi. This was achieved with the company of the Hammers, a family of four who had coincidentally planned a tip to Ecuador at the same time as my parents.

As their 13 year old son bounded up the steep slope as if it were nothing, I realized that at 24 I was not in peak physical form. This was reinforced four days later while I wheezed my way up an interminable hill while my parents appeared as if they were out on a Sunday stroll to Diary Queen. But that week I had little time to dwell on my lack of fitness. We biked dirt roads winding through the Andes mountains,



we discovered the delights of street food,



we waded in water flowing from the glaciers of the high Andes peaks while watching Quetzals fly among the cloud forests of Mindo,



we wandered among families enjoying the sunshine in the parks of Quito,



we enjoyed the generosity of my neighbors in the form of a plate full of choclo, habbas, mellocos, and aji.




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And as we watched Nono disappear behind the mountains from the window of our bus (while trying not to watch the dropoff just inches from our bus wheels), we wondered at the inconsistency of time. Those moments when you just want to put on the brakes are when time throws you a grin and shifts up a gear, usually without letting you put on your seatbelt first. One minute you´re waiting at the airport anticipating the week ahead, and the next you´re standing in a Quito street in your pajamas, watching the taxi carrying your parents drive away. But you have a camera full of memories, proof that in that blink of an eye was time well spent.



>

In the summertime, when the weather is.....cold?

We ambled along country roads under a bright sun, enjoying the warmth while we could, knowing that around noon heavy gray clouds would rise over the peaks, blotting out the sun and bringing with them a chill and sometimes rain. I walked with the director of the school, Margot, also my housemate, in the last group of kids. As usual, we had planned to leave around nine, but when I arrived at the predetermined hour of 8:30 Margot was in the middle of an interview with a local official, which didn’t end until well after our scheduled departure time. But the kids didn’t mind the wait, taking advantage of the sun and unsupervised time to behave, like, well, kids. Most of the girls broke into their specific groups, giggling and whispering, while the boys started a pickup game of soccer.
The ages of the kids on the hike ranged from 7-15, so naturally our pace was suited to those with smaller legs. After two hours of winding our way through the mountains on what is the main road from my town to the nearest city, but is still a narrow dirt track, I began to wonder how much farther our destination lay. Though the kids were infused with that “last-day-of-school” verve, the uphill climb was taking its toll, and we had evolved from three distinct groups to a long string of humans. However once we had reached the abandoned brick ovens, which overlooked a small stream flanked on the opposite bank by a hillside farm, everyone was magically infused with new energy and the kids scattered to clamber over the rocks and splash in the stream.
An hour later, surrounded by the remnants of 50 lunches (chicken bones and rice kernels), Margot sent one of the older girls on a mission to collect some cookies as a gift for the children from the farm across the stream. One immediately became two, and as the girls made their rounds the delivery duo soon became a mob. Students cheerfully handed over their government issued “healthy” cookies, then joined the group as it traipsed over the bridge and up to the mother, or grandmother ( it’s hard to tell sometimes), who had stopped in the middle of feeding the pig to watch the procession. I watched as the colorful and energetic students surrounded the woman, who was draped in old and worn shawls, her face a web of wrinkles from years of working in the elements. A bag of plastic wrapped cookies was exchanged for two sky blue farm eggs, then the two worlds separated, one to enjoy the last day of school, the other to a basket of clothes needing to be hand washed and cows needing to be milked.



Clouds had covered the sun and were threatening rain when the students slowly began to wander back from their various activities, some with wet hair and damp clothes from swimming in the stream. I opted to keep my fleece, scarf, and wool socks on and dry. We made our way slowly back down the road to meet our ride home, a small bus only slightly larger than a minivan. The teachers and students were unconcerned by the size (or lack thereof) of our transport, packing all 60 people into every available space like professionals. I had two kids on my lap, the driver had a kid on his lap, and three of the teachers hung out of the door. From the outside it appeared as if the bus was sprouting humans, and as I sat there pinned between two people I was reminded once again that I was most certainly not in the United States anymore. It took us nearly the same amount of time to return, due to the frequent stops we took to let students squeeze their way through the crowd to burst out of the bus, slightly dazed and with a chorus of voices to send them on their way home. By the time we reached my house the sun was behind the mountains and I could breathe again.
The next day Margot and her niece left for their hometown until September, leaving the house a little emptier and my evenings a little lonlier. But at least there won't be more wild bus rides in my near future...I hope.

New Digs: Part II

Electronic beeping pulls me from a dream involving lots of snow, and I blindly grope around my pillow for my phone, randomly pressing buttons until the noise stops. I turn over and curl up again under my heavy blankets, savoring the warmth for a few more minutes. When I open my eyes I can see beams of light streaming through the chinks in my door and single window. Knowing I won´t have the willpower much longer to get out of bed, I throw off the covers and hop over to the light switch. Changing into running clothes, I open my door to bright sun and a town already awake. The run up the mountain is painful, but the view at the top and downhill descent are well worth my sore muscles. A hot shower followed by a steaming cup of coffee (sadly, instant. Quality coffee is hard to come by here in Ecuador. Go figure.) complete my morning routine.
Sound like a typical morning in the coast of Ecuador?
No?
Well, that´s because it isn´t.

Wait a second, you say, wasn´t the plan to spend the next two years enjoying the beach and sun? It was, until an unfortunate incident caused the evacuation of all of the volunteers in my area, and a change of site for me. In a matter of two days I found myself temporarily homeless in Quito, with a hastily packed suitcase and the knowledge that I would probably never see my host family or new friends again. After two longs weeks in Ecuador´s capital I found a new home: high in the Andes and as cold as the coast is hot. Hello again to fleeces (slightly moldy and musty after a month in storage), Spanish I can actually understand, and the campo shuffle.
In my new home I don´t live with a host family. Instead, I share an old house with the director of the local school and her two year old daughter.

My bedroom is downstairs, she sleeps upstairs, and we both share a kitchen and bathroom with the father of our landlady (whose house this used to be until his wife died and he became too frail to live on his own), who you can find shuffling slowly around the property on his crutches. He and I apparently have the same schedule, and you can bet that when I need to use the bathroom it´s already occupied. I think he shaved for about two hours yesterday, emerging from the bathroom only when I had given up hope of a shower before catching the bus to Quito.


The kitchen is outfitted with a full size fridge, oven and stove, microwave, toaster, and plenty of counter space, which I put to good use as I spend a ridiculous amount of time cooking, baking , and listening to world cup games on an ancient radio. One perk of living independently is the ability to make my own food (adios to white rice three times a day!),which has been a source of amusement and curiosity on the part of my landlady, who usually finds the time to drop by during breakfast or dinner to see what´s cooking.Starting over in a new site is tough, and I´m still in the process of once again convincing myself that I can live and work for the next two years in my new home, which not only differs climatically from the coast but culturally as well. My month at my old site taught my at least one thing, which is what to expect those first few weeks on my own in an unknown place!

New digs

Last week I had a tarantula in my room. Yes, a real tarantula. It was obese, hairy, and gave my host sister a heart attack when she pulled the blue flannel curtain away from my window. After admiring the giant arachnid and persuading it to return to the wild (with a coat hanger and two hysterical eleven year olds), I thought about my visitor and how this was just one indication out of many that my life does not resemble the being it was six months ago.
Or even one month ago. Days spent in language, tech and safety classes and nights spent under three or four blankets are now days spent playing Marco Polo in the river with local kids, teaching impromptu classes at the local school, or helping the locals construct a “galpon” (or chicken coop) while nights are spent under nothing but a mosquito net. The Spanish here is an altogether different beast than Sierra Spanish, the most noticeable difference being that the folks here drop the ends of words and talk like they’ve just injected caffeine into their veins, and I feel like I’m back in my eighth grade Spanish class. I can get by pretty well with just smiling and nodding, though that only works about 75% of the time. When there’s a longer pause than necessary in the conversation it’s usually because somebody asked me a question and is waiting for an answer. Then I’m in trouble.


With the structure of training gone my days are varied and filled with “unexpected’s”. I never know if the teacher will disappear for an hour in the middle of the class I am visiting, leaving me with 10 energetic 7-11 year olds (tip: books and markers are life savers! ). Or I might get lucky walking the hour to the bus stop and catch a camioneta…though when the weather is cool walking is preferable, and if I’m even luckier I could catch a glimpse of the howler monkeys that frequent the trees along the road. I could wake up one morning to a week of no electricity or running water. Though even this has its benefits, since without electricity I wouldn’t have experienced the most stunning firefly display of my life. Some days I come home to find the grandkids Nidia, four, and Jonah, six months, waiting at the door (well, just Nidia), and Nicol (the 11 year old sister of Nidia who lives with us permanently), Nidia and I go down to the river to play Marco Polo with the local kids. Last night Bernadina asked me if I wanted to take a walk with her, and before I knew what had happened I was sitting in a living room with several strangers singing to the Virgin Maria.



A little background about my site: it’s a small coastal community comprised of about 300 people who farm, raise cattle, or fish for a living. The community is divided into three parts: comunidad abajo, media, and arriba (lower, middle and upper). I live in the middle.
As before I live with six other people, and share one bathroom, though this arrangement is easier because we have the river, which is quite enjoyable for a wash or swim. My host family consists of my host parents, three brothers and one sister (though she’s actually my host niece), two dogs (down from seven. We had puppies!), and one unbelievably tiny cat which I’m surprised has lasted this long. There is running water, though it's pumped directly from the river, so we either boil it before drinking or drink bottled water. I eat rice three times a day, supplemented by beans, shrimp, platanos (fried green bananas), fish, chicken,sometimes vegetables, and always accompanied by coffee, tea, or juice.
But, like the Sierra, the people are warm, friendly, and welcoming. They love to share food and conversation (I can just share the food at this point). For the next two years I hope to be doing the same!

If you ever...

If you ever find yourself in a small village by the name of Paquiestancia...
1. Stay with a host family. The main reason being that returning home each evening will be the best part of your day. No matter how tired or homesick you might be, being greeted with hugs by host siblings overjoyed to see you is like getting a shot of seratonin.
2. Beware of cows with one horn or scars. They have a preference for human flesh, and would like nothing better than to draw blood or severly maim. However, a seven year old with a corn stalk is sufficient to keep even the most persistant at bay.


3. Also beware of the canine community after sundown. Dogs who wouldn´t even give you a second glance during the day are transformed into four legged Mr. Hydes with a special interest in gringos. A flashlight in the face (not literally, just the light), or some rocks should be enough to get you home safely (or a companion who can't run as fast as you). If the dogs don't get their sport with gringos they turn on local livestock. Be prepared to eat sheep for a week.
4. A parade isn´t complete without at least one person peeing on the side of the road, a dog fight, some dog love, and the delay of two or more buses.
5. There is always room for one more person on a bus, even if the rest have to vertically spoon and the doors are unable to close.
6. Roosters do indeed crow at the crack of dawn. They also crow five hours before the crack of dawn. And four hours before. And three... Good luck sleeping the first week.
7. A visit to the hot spring above La Chimba is worth the 15 or so dollars for a camioneta, though even those with the strongest bladders might pee their pants a little on the single track, barely clinging to the side of the mountain, dirt (or mud, depending on the weather) road up to the spring. But the view is incredible, and the spring feels great after a few weeks of cold showers.



8. Want a guinea pig? Just wait for the cuy camioneta to roll into town and you can take your pick from the truck full of rodents. Be prepared to haggle over price. And remember to bring a laundry basket or old potato sack for storage and transport.


9. Take a hike and enjoy the mountains. Ecuador is a gorgeous country with so much to offer! Only wait until after you've acclimitized to the altitude to attempt the climb.

Butter, sugar, and chocolate: Ingredients for success

When I joined Peace Corps, the last thing on my mind was cooking. I expected to bus around the country, sampling different foods Bourdain style and eating whatever dish my host family set in front of me. But one of the main goals of Peace Corp is cultural exchange, not just cultural experience, meaning I should be sharing as much of my culture with my host family as they share with me. And what better way to exchange culture than through food? Our melting pot of a country has a plethora of dishes to choose from, mainly borrowed from other cultures, and I figured cooking dinner for my family would be a breeze. I wanted to make a dish they had never tried before, so one night I asked what ´american´ foods they had eaten.
Lasagna? Love it.
Pizza? Apparently my host mom can already make a killer pizza.
Tacos? Delicious!
Burritos? Of course!
Waffles? Old hat.
Chili? Got anything new for us?
You get the picture. I guess this is the result of being the twelfth volunteer to stay with my host family.

Round 1
I finally had the bright idea to make tomato soup and grilled cheese, a time honored classic which is my dad´s specialty. Simple, but delicious. And cheese is always a hit with the kids. But wait- I´m searching the shelves of our local supermarket, and... no canned tomato soup! ( I know, heating up a liquid can´t really be described as cooking, but I wasn´t going for skill, just authenticity. Americans like their canned soup.) On to plan B...soup from scratch, which involves making bouillaise or something like that and cloves and a bunch of other ingredients which together sound amazing, and when I´m finished do smell amazing (though a little heavy on the cloves). I´m a little nervous as the family sits down to dinner and I begin serving everyone. After I fill the first bowl my host mom sidles between me and the soup and I somehow find myself sitting at the table while she serves.
My family does eat, but I notice it isn´t with as much gusto as other meals. And there isn´t seconds or thirds per usual. Ok, I tell myself, it was the first time you´ve made tomato soup from scratch. Don´t be so hard on yourself.

Round 2
I don´t want to leave my host family with the impression that I can´t cook, so I beging to mull over something else with which to blow their socks off. They´ve eaten waffles before, but how about pancakes? With peanut butter and syrup? And I had seen a Mrs. Butterworth syrup at the supermarket. Perfect!
I begin by making half of the box of ´just add water´ pancake batter, but decide to go for the whole thing, since my family is rather large and tends to eat a lot. They also tend to have a varied schedule (cows don´t care about time). It´s 8:00, I have 4 pancakes rapidly cooling, and nobody has returned from milking. When my host mom does arrive, she works her magic again and I find myself seated at the table while she ladles batter into the frying pan. As the rest of my host family trickles in, I silently hope I bought enough syrup. I watch as my host father sits down to his plate of pancakes and begins to eat them plain. Wait, I tell him, it´s much tastier smeared with peanut butter and doused in syrup. He dutifully dabs a gob of pb over the pancake, deposits 4 drops of syrup around the edges, plops a second pancake over the first, and takes a bite. And chews. And chews. And chews. I give him credit: he cleaned his plate. Then proceeded to ask for a bowl of soup.
The three quarter full bottle of syrup has been sitting on the kitchen shelf for the past three weeks. And I definitely didn´t need to make the whole box of batter.

Round 3
The pancake debacle might have been my lasting impression had it not been for Betsy, a fellow PC trainee who lives in my village, and her baking skills. She brought extra chocolate chip cookies to class one day and I ended up bringing a few home for my host family. The next morning I was asked at breakfast if I knew how to make cookies like Betsy. Why, yes! As a matter of fact I do!
My ingredients bought, I gather what baking tools I can find in the kitchen, which are a few drinking glasses to use as measuring cups and soup spoons for the table and tea spoons. Things go fairly smoothly until I need to add the chocolate, which I could only find in baking bars. The chocolate does not want to break, no matter how hard I pound it with a drinking glass, and finally my host sister takes it outside and beats it with a metal pipe. More effective, but these cookies are still going to be a little ´chocolatier´ than usual. My host sister and I tape a piece of aluminum foil over the oven front (which had broken a few years back), and she lights the oven through a hole which has rusted through the base. I watch as an open flame erupts into the oven, and begin to question my decision to bake. The first batch is a little burnt, as is expected, but I keep a closer eye on the next, and by the time the third is baking I know about how long to keep them in the oven, and the best spot for unburned cookies (on either side of the open flame).
After we finish the customary bowl of soup (or 2 or 3 for some people) I place a plate of the cookies in the middle of the table, and watch as my host family rapidly demolishes the pile. Though my host mom doesn´t comment, she eats her fair share of the goods. Actions speak louder than words.
My reputation in the kitchen might not be completely salvaged, but at least I know I´m leaving the family with a good impression. And I know how to win over my next host family: with lots of butter, sugar, and chocolate.

Planting

The four of us stood nervously outside of the school, waiting for the head teacher to come out and start the ¨charla¨, or tree planting session. We could hear the buzz of excited young voices behind the cement walls, and an occasional curious head would pop up in a window to see what the ¨gringos¨ were up to. I was to teach the youngest class, consisting of kids from 5-8 (my host sister, Rubi, included). Having led hikes for kids as young as these, I mentally prepared myself for an onslaught of noise and activity as soon as I entered the classroom, and I wasn´t disappointed.
I said my customary ¨Hola, buenos dias!¨, and we were off. The activities and games I brought helped to keep some order, though the overwhelming enthusiasm of the kids, combined with some unruly and off the wall boys and flavored with my limited spanish created an atmosphere comparable to that of a circus. ¨Habla con sus manos!¨ I repeated over and over again, only to have Fernanda, my language facilitator, explain to me later that I was telling the kids to literally talk with their hands (you know, ¨talk to the hand...¨).




It was with relief and some trepidation that I led my students outside to begin planting. There were some immediate scraps as mostly the girls fought to hold my hands, with the unlucky content to grab a part of my jacket or pants. The kids watched (or ran around, or climbed the fence, or....)as Betsy and I hacked at the hard earth to create holes for the Aliso and Kishwar saplings, and stood back as the students eagerly threw in handfulls of abono, or compost, ripped the plastic bags from the trees, and had them tucked snugly into their new homes before you could say cuy. 16 trees later the enthusiasm levels were as high as when we started.
As soon as we had entered the classrooms, the teachers had pulled a vanishing act, and once finished planting they didn´t reappear. My new friends pulled me over to the grass and into a game of ¨lobo¨(?), where we held hands and twirled in a circle chanting something that ended with ¨que estas haciendo?¨ (what are you doing?), whereupon the ¨lobo¨ would answer something like ¨I´m boiling the water¨. Once the lobo answered ¨tengo mi cuchillo¨( I have my knife), the circle scattered and the lobo chased his or her dinner around the field, much like tag.
Finally, Fernanda called to us that it was time to continue our language lessons at Kendra´s house, and 15 minutes later we were able to extract ourselves from the hugs and leave, with a fence full of faces and calls of ¨ciao¨ to send us off. I left with half the energy I arrived with but gained a village of friends.

This left me wondering what my permanent site will be like. Yesterday, Friday, we learned where our lives will be unfolding for the next two years. The facilitators and trainers had decorated the floor of our communal classroom in Ayorra with a large map of Ecuador, which we slowly began to occupy as our names and sites were read to applause and cheering. ¨Sierra, sierra, sierra...¨ I silently chanted in my head, until I heard my name and town. I wasn´t familiar with the location, and continued my silent plea while I followed a facilitator down the walkway covered with rose petals and...to the left, to a point about as far away from the Sierra as you can get. Right on the coast, actually. So much for the extra fleece I bought in the market a couple of weeks ago. I´ll be living in a town of about 250 people located about 45 minutes from the beach and near a nature preserve, where I´ll be working part of the time. The realization of two years of hot and humid conditions is taking a while for me to wrap my head around, though before coming into this I knew there was a possibility of the next two years being warmer than I´m used to. Only time will tell how this works out. Whatever the case, I try to keep the words of my fellow PC trainee, Kendra, in my mind: ¨I´m in Ecuador. That´s what´s important.¨

It´s a Hard Enough Life!

It´s 4:00 AM, the sun hasn´t yet risen, stars from both hemispheres fill the sky, and Carmen and Miguel, my host mother and father, are awake and readying themselves for the long day ahead of them. They dress in silence, careful not to wake their youngest daughter, Rubi; who shares the same room. The pigs, sheep, and chickens need to be let out of the shed to root in the grass in front of the small store above the house, and the herd of guinea pigs need to be fed the scraps from yesterday´s meals.
Around 5:00 AM one of my host parents turns on the light in the room shared by my two host sisters, Flor and Marta, and their brother, Angel, beginning the day for the three of them (not without grumblings). Carmen and Miguel then begin the walk to their cows for the daily milking. Marta, the oldest, begins breakfast. The locro con papas (a soup with potatoes, milk, carrots, onion, fresh cheese, and avocado) from last night´s dinner needs to be heated up, the green bananas need to be sliced and fried into a dish called platacones, and the tomates de arbol (from the family garden) need to be ground into juice.



The in-house PC volunteer-in-training, Lauren, rolls out of bed with the sun around 5:45 or 6:00, depending on if she´s taking a shower that morning or not. She eats breakfast at 6:30 with Angel, Flor, and Marta, who leave at 7:00 with a ´chao, Lauren´ to take the bus to school in Cayambe, 30 minutes away. Lauren has just enough time to scrape the leftovers into the bucket for the chonchos (pigs), wash the dishes, and brush her teeth before she too has to leave for classes at 8:00, which are only a five minute walk away in another volunteer´s house. On her way she passes Miguel and Carmen, both loaded down with the morning´s milk: Carmen carries her milk wrapped in a shawl on her back, while Miguel carries his by hand. Rufu and Gusu, the family dogs, follow, though at a distance since both are involved in disputes with the other village dogs.



Once home Miguel quickly eats and changes into clothes for his construction job in Cayambe. Carmen finishes off the platacones, and a bowl of soup, then pours the rest of the soup into the communal bowl for the dogs and cats. The rest of the morning is spent in the garden (smaller this year because of the drought) harvesting pepinos, tomates de arbol, quinoa, maiz, papas, zuccini, tomates, and calabezas (gourds). At about 11 she puts the large soup pot on to boil, adds choclo (corn cobs), onion, chunks of chicken, green bananas, milk, potatoes, carrots, and barley. A large pot of white rice joins the bubbling soup on the stove.




12:30 heralds five hungry gringos, one teacher, and Rubi (done with school at 12:00) who devour the soup but have a harder time with the mountain of rice and fresh cucumbers. Conversation at the table is mainly between the teacher (a native Ecuadorian), and Carmen, since the students still have a long way to go to master the Spanish language. Before leaving for another three hours of class they help clean up the small kitchen.




Afternoons for Carmen are spent repairing water or fences in the cow pasture, cleaning house, washing clothes (a never ending cycle, and helping customers in her store. Once Marta, Flor, and Angel return from school they feed the pigs the leftovers from the pig bucket, return the sheep and chickens to their respective pen and roosts, continue with the washing, then start their homework. Around 4:00 two kids head out to the cow pasture for the second milking of the day. At 5 or 6 Lauren returns to an already bubbling soup pot and joins a table of studious kids to go over her vocab words or help out with English homework. By 8:00 the whole family is gathered around the table ready for the quinoa soup and maybe candied babaco that Carmen sometimes fixes as a treat. After eating Carmen and Miguel are having a hard time keeping their eyes open, and soon after take themselves to bed. The kids, however, have a couple of hours of studying left.
Though she works half as hard and gets more sleep than the rest of the family, Lauren is ready for bed soon after Carmen and Miguel, probably due to her strained and overused brain muscles from trying to speak and understand a foreign toungue all day. Once in bed she treats herself to a few minutes of a favorite book (in english!), then turns off the lights and prepares for another day in Ecuador.