A Smorgasbord

Merry almost Christmas! Here is a quick, random, stream of consciousness catch up of the last couple weeks (conversations with me may look similar...)

The first 2 pictures are from the Olimpiadas a couple weeks ago at Nuevo Mundo. Our scholarship students who we tutor in history are pic #2 (1,2,3 everyone say ¨I love trench warfare¨). Each of their classes came up with a dance and a cheer and the rest of us just got to watch and eat carnival food and play volleyball. It was a blast to hang out with those guys all day and all the money raised went to the Fundacion school where I work. That same Saturday we walked to the church for a bingo...and there was no power. So we had the bingo in our yard. It was a blast and felt really nice to be able to give a little something back to the church and the community. Here is a picture of all 200 people in our yard (can you find Brendan?) and one of Jon, Christina, Tierney and I with Yasu and Jose.

Last weekend we went to Bea´s (the daughter of our neighbor Francisca´s) baptism. They took me out to dinner with the family afterwards; we very rarely go out to eat so it was a treat to get a big plate of chicken and patacones out. Sunday I went into Guayaquil with Celso, Tasha, and Cynthia, who works with us at Mundo. We explored the Malecon (boardwalk) del Solado, rented a row boat and got some great seafood. I am determined to try everything here despite the tiny problem that I do not actually like seafood. The ceviches are delicious- a soup with lots of lime, onion, tomato and shrimp, though you can orer it with any kind of seafood (I tried it with conch). I am having ¨caldo de pata¨ for lunch Monday- foot stew, essentially- so openmindedness about food is a must.

My routine lately has been tutoring (aka hanging out and eating good food) in the mornings and teaching at Mundo or going to Semillas in the afternoons. I am on break from my adult classes at John Drury so have enjoyed having the mornings to ¨vagar¨ and hang out with people in the neighborhood.

We had a Christmas party a couple weeks back for our guards and their families. Each house was responsible for some kind of entertainment and, as singing and dancing are not our thing, Arbolito acted out the most popular (and over played) Chritsmas carol, Mi Burrito Sabanero, which sounds like the song that plays on the ride ¨It´s a Small World After All.¨ Brendan and Kipp, the musically talented, took care of the intrumentals while I dressed up as the donkey and carried Christina, pregnant Mary, around while Tierney fed me carrots. That night was the first night of rain so we took the dance party outside (all the Ecuadorians already think we are insane).

Our next Christmas performance (because the first was so good) is on Christmas Eve. I am a shepard and I think the people in charge think we could take our roles a little more seriously; we have nightly practice. I have 2 lines, though I do not think I have mastered them to anyone´s standards. For Christmas day we will visit with the patients of Damien House and then go to Sister Annie´s for dinner. We have a week off after Christmas so are putting together a trip to Vilcabamba (we put Banos on hold, too much volcanic activity) to do some hiking and explore the National Park.

Here is all of us at the baptism. That´s all on this end. I hope you all have a wonderful break and Merry Christmas!

Día de Acción de Gracias!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I actually forgot that it was Thanksgiving until around noon (not that I am not thankful...) My theory (regular theory, not a conspiracy theory) is that the consistency of the weather (75-85 degrees, sunny- tough life, I know) here warps our perception of the passage of time. Bring on the rainy season?

In a country where this holiday is obviously not celebrated, we have a couple festivities on our plate. Today at Nuevo Mundo our decimo class performed mini skits about the first Thanksgiving. They initially thought Squanto was a Pilgrim from Holland so we had some clarifying to do and they pulled through and did a great job (though I assured them only a couple people aside from the English teachers would understand them anyways). Tomorrow night my boss, Pat, has invited us all over for a big Thanksgiving dinner so we dont`t seem to be missing out on anything!

Last weekend I had my first Junta, a meeting in which the teachers talk about each student in each grade. It was immensely helpful to hear how my students were performing and behaving (or not) in other classes. Saturday afternoon I trekked out to an area called 28 de agosto with Cynthia. 28 is where Manos Abiertas, one of our 3 after school programs, is located and it is noticeably poorer and more rural than many parts of Duran. We met up with Tierney and Jessie and talked to Padre Liam (the number of Irish priests living in Ecuador..) about setting up a clothing fair of our donations.

Sunday morning we participated in what turned out to be a highly amusing Cristo Rey procession (I don`t think amusement was the intent, but isn`t it better that way?) We met up at the designated launch point at 8:30. At 9:15 our priest rolls up in a car and begins driving at the head of the procession, with a large framed picture of Jesus balanced precariously on his windshield. We followed our fearless leader to the church as he pulled over from time to time to have conversations with passers-by. A woman at the front started yelling loudly about the evils of abortion, at which point some little old lady carrying yet another portrait of Jesus became tired and handed it off to me. We made quite the entrance parading into church, me at the front holding Jesus. Holding my lauhter= Christmas miracle.

Sunday night we went to see Harry Potter (in English, and I won`t say more because you know I could talk about Harry Potter forever) and then to the airport to pick up our first retreat group! 5 high schoolers from Cape Cod; this group is chiquitito but it`t been great fun to see what has become, in a small sense, our world, through their fresh eyes. 1 almost down, 13 to go (including a group from BC in January)!

Father Jim is in town so we are having taco night at Arbolito after the school bus brings me home! Happy Thanksgiving!

100 days

Flew by. Two weekends ago we had our first retreat to Playas. The weather made our experience more reminiscent of New England beach trips than Ecuadorian ones so maybe for that reason it was an especially nice weekend and you just cant go wrong with built in time for naps and swimming in big waves. To keep with the theme of critters I seem to have begun here, I got my first jellyfish sting (little blue guy, no harm done) and my first parasite(s)! The round worm living in my stomach has hopefully bitten the dust after $1.20 worth of antibiotics.

Last weekend was spent almost entirely in the neighborhood (the best kind of weekend). I had my first bowl of ceviche, and Ecuadorian specialty. After I got over the fact that I was eating shrimp it tasted pretty ok. Sunday afternoon we played our first bingo; bingo is a huge deal here so it was about time. We sat in the street in front of the panaderia whose owners we have befriended (bread making lessons to follow!) and Brendan won tupperware! Chevere. It means something like awesome. Sunday night Celso, Mark and I went to Cynthias, (another Mundo teacher) house for seco de pollo, one of my favorite meals here. We played Monopoly in Spanish (which I think I won, but who knows). Great weekend.

Sidenote- Christina helped the little guys at Semillas make Flat Stanleys, well, Flacito Estanleys. For those who dont know, Flat Stanley is a cut out of a little man that children send to people who are far away or taking a trip and that person then takes a picture with Stanley and sends the picure back to the little type and ships Stanley back home or someplace else. We are going to send these to a few people we know scattered around the U.S. and the globe so, if you are taking a fun trip (or not!) and would like to be the recipient of a Flacito Estanley, let me know.

Semillas de Mostaza

Here are a couple of my favorite pictures from Semillas yet to date. Our latest amusement here has been dealing with a goat that our guard, Andres, seems to like to bring to work with him. (Sir, why do you need to bring your goat to work..) When I taught the adults on Tuesday I got a glimpse of the goat eating a notebook outside. Part of Monday was spent trying to recapture the goat who had then broken into the homework room (not distracting at all) and was wrecking havoc on the desks, chairs, crates of bananas, etc. The goat later came charging onto the cancha during charla (when we would really love 5 minutes to talk seriously to the kids- fail) and had to be escorted off by by Kipp, dragging it by the horns. Plenty of cheering. At least the goats presence has distracted us from that of the killer attack dogs... though perhaps the best conversation I have had with Andres so far involved my kindly asking him not to burn large fires near where the small children are playing. Guard antics aside, I think we are all agreed that Semillas is one of our favorite places in Ecuador. The first picture, clearly, is a pig pile on Christina and Daniel, our ayudante. Normal day. The second is of 5 year old Diego during recreo (if we were to pick favorites...)

More adventure fotos

Weekend(s) Recap

Happy Monday to all!
So, last couple weeks- ready...go! Last weekend was Beth´s birthday so we all slept over AJS for a celebration in her honor. Next morning we headed into Guayaquil for its independence day party and ended up staying in the city for almost 12 hours- nothing like a parade, good food, sail boat tours, fire works, and a free concert to keep a few thousand people entertained. This particular Ecuadorian concert was pretty amusing because the artists and songs switched about every 45 seconds (one would wonder if Ecuadorians have ADD when it comes to listening to music- this was reminiscent of a power hour mix). Perhaps the best parts of the concert were the continual interruptions by the host shouting ¨WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS, MY FRIENDS!¨ outrageously loudly and in English, when this phrase simply had nothing to do with whatever antics were happening onstage. Many audience members found it more amusing to watch us, the gringos (dancing, obviously) than the performers.
The week passed generally normally. I tutored a couple kids who live in the neighborhood (and was fed birthday cake for breakfast- not a bad deal) and had lunch with Lupe, one of our wonderful neighbors. She has informed us that she would like to have a one on one date with all of us to determine who she gets along with best- I asked her if our lunch was like a test and she said yes- no pressure or anything. We finished up our first partial (3 partials make up a quimestre) at Nuevo Mundo so things got a little hectic with grading (one of these days I will learn how to use Excel, but not yet..) This past weekend 6 of us- myself, Tierney, Jon, Christina, Mark, and Tasha- headed to the beautiful beachside town of Puerto Lopez and the national park Isla de la Plata. We got in around 9:30 Saturday morning and were under the care of our guide, Cherry, by 10, meandering through the fish market and stepping over 6 ft. long sharks, swordfish and the like. Just like a fish market at home, right? I was tempted to plop a swordfish down in the seat next to me on the way back to Guayaquil. A few men did end up bringing live chickens on the bus home so next time I must not let animals be a deterent. Anyway the boat ride to the island is about an hour and a half- a complete blast (and for those whose stomachs didn´t love the boat ride in its own right, it seemed the wildlife made it worth the rocky trip). We hiked the island for a couple hours and checked out a few species of birds, including the blue footed boobies, which are native only to the Galapogos and this island. From the boat we saw sea turtles, dolphins and one humpback whale (apparently whale mating season has just ended, so we were lucky to glimpse one). We snorkeled off the boat all afternoon by this gorgeous coral reef (first time snork-ler) and saw a million, as Cherry put it ¨Nemo and Dory fish.¨ Saturday night we ate at a local seafood restaurant on the water and stolled along the beachside bars and shops, stopping to have a beer in a hammock on the beach. Sunday we ate a breakfast overlooking the water in an awesome cane hut at our neat little hostel and spent the day at Las Frailes, famous for being the most beautiful beach in Ecuador. Encased by cliffs on each side, the beach was nearly deserted and we spent the day swimming, snakcing, and hiking a bit. The view from the mirador reminded me of the view from the lookout point at Gay Head (water was warmer, though). We were back by 9 Sunday night. This Monday morning I hung out at our neighbor Francisca´s with all her kids and will head over to Semillas, our afterschool program, soon before tutoring 5-year Jon-Pierre in some English. That´s about all the ¨new¨ stuff here for now, hope everyone has a great week!

Baby´s First Coup

Yesterday morning the opposition party tried to dislodge President Correa from office. He was released last night from the military hospital in Quito where he was being held. There were riots and protests in Guayaquil yesterday and access to the Puntilla and Guayaquil was cut off because the bridges were blocked. I was in Duran all day. One of my adult students in my morning class got a phone call (yes, I let them answer the phone in class) telling us what was going on and so I knew not to go to Mundo. Those who came back from Guayaquil said the streets were hectic with people protesting and burning tires. Everybody is safe; Kipp and Celso picked everybody up from work (only took a few hours..) and brought everyone back home. From where I am it doesn´t seem like we are in the thick of things. Life is going on as usual.

Animal Sacrifices

So we have been trying to integrate some meat into our diet. Attempt 1: Mr. Pollo frozen chicken. Standard. Attempt 2: Christina and I went to a local chicken vendor and ordered a couple pounds of breast meat. At this particular establishment chickens arrive in trucks every morning and those which we don´t see in the streets being trained for cockfights turn into somebody´s dinner. At least we know it´s fresh; our little bird was hacked to bits in front of us and still had pieces of feathers hanging on it when we brought it home. We soon turned little chicky into Coca Cola chicken (recipe for this and many others courtesy of Christina´s friends at the soup kitchen where she works) and it was delicious! Attempt 3: Yesterday we walked over to the least developed area of Arbolito, Sector 4 (we live in Sector 3), for a birthday lunch for Leo, one of our kiddos at Semillas. The family killed a pig for us. Background information: the mother had previously told us she was going to kill a duck for us and, thinking something was lost in translation, we thought nothing of it until a couple of my community mates walked the kids home after Semillas and their mother, Maria, presented them with a fully prepared duck dinner (seco de duck) to-go. So this time when little Melena told us they were going to kill a pig for us we knew they meant business. The first course of pig soup was a little tough to get down (intestines or sausage?) but things got better with the second plate and the cake. We have been working on venturing out into the neighborhood more so this weekend was a success in that department.

We are planning out first weekend trip to Puerto Lopez and Isla de la Plata, a national park on an island that fancies itself the poor man´s Galapogos so I´ll keep you posted on our travels.

Visual Confirmation

Here are Mark, Celso and I at Nuevo Mundo in our glorious uniforms. Note that I was not lying about the summer scarf.

Happy Hump Day!

Howdy all! I finished lesson planning for next week- we turn them in by Thursday for the following week. Classes at Mundo are going much better now that we have split the decimos and novenos into smaller groups. The idea is to get them speaking and writing more and it was too tough to get the shy ones to say anything in English in a class of 30 kids. My own speaking skills (or lack thereof) are still struggling but my comprehension is coming along (thanks to La Catrina and Destinos I am sure). I am 3 classes in with my adults and they are always a ball- the 2 hour class goes by quickly. We started very basic- Hi how are you? (to which they respond How are you?.. not understanding I have just asked them a question) They are also quick to tell me which English grammar rules are stupid or unnecessarily confusing and I fire back with things I do not for the life of me understand about Spanish, so it works well.

I only have 2 classes at Mundo today and then am headed back for Semillas in the afternoon- I am there Mondays and for an hour on Wednesdays and that time is still the highlight of the week because the kids are hilarious. Monday we made newspaper hats with the little guys and tried to explain who Peter Pan is.. no dice.
That is about all for now. Sorry, I just noticed this post is really boring. Have a great day!

Back to school, back to school...

Here is a pic. of all of us at AJS (birthday kids in tie dye front and center)

I have officially survived my first week teaching! I have 2 sections of 8th graders (here they are called novenos) and one section of 9th graders (decimos). Starting this week Celso and I are splitting the sections so we can work with the kids in smaller classes which will be a big help because there is such a range of abilities and comfort levels with speaking English. We will be teaching history to the decimos and English, lit. and grammar, to the novenos. The first couple weeks will definitely be an adjustment (prep. work is not the most fun in the world, duh). We also assigned an absurdly difficult story to the noveos before we had a chance to gauge their reading comprehension levels and one of the kids told me ¨you´re a nice person but my class has a terror of you.¨ Aside from that things are going well and the kids are a lot of fun to work with. I am definitely going to have to seek out other outlets to practice my Spanish though- our classes at Mundo are all English immersion and the other teachers treat us a little like outsiders because we are the new uncool kids who have yet to learn the language. It´s great fun talking to little kids on the school bus because my grammar doesn´t bother them at all- they just keep climbing all over me and blowing bubbles in my face. Needless to say the bus is awesome.

I am also going to start teaching adult classes this Tuesday. My boss has a pretty awesome mullet and knows lots of English swear words so I think things will work out just fine. The classes are at the John Drury School (same place we have Semillas in the afternoons, 2 blocks from our house) and from what I´ve gathered it´s a pretty strange place- it´s a tech. school that never exactly opened. The guards, who struggle at doing their job of opening the doors (I have jumped the fence before) usually let Capitan and Principessa, killer attack dobermans, wander around with the small children and periodically they bring a goat as well? All standards for ¨normal¨ must be adjusted here which has actually been a pretty refreshing process- it keeps things interesting.

Aside from teaching we have been meeting some people in the neighborhood, being fed some delicious food, and learning some vegetarian cooking of our own (any recipes appreciated, the meat here can be a little sketch so we just have to be careful about where we but it). I believe we were fed some questionable parts of an ox´s body for lunch last week at Mundo but I´d rather not think about it.

Yesterday was spent baking bananna bread for our 150 closest friends for a church fundraiser where we had to, get this, perform a dance to Rock Around the Clock (not a joke and, yes, I warned them about my dancing). It was a ball. I will have to find the video.

Home sweet home!

We are all moved in! The part of the weekend that was not devoted to painting and cleaning was spent celebrating birthdays. Ecuadorians have a great birthday tradition that I will surely bring back, in which which the birthday boy/girl gets whacked with a belt (or a broom...) as many times as they are years old. Auntie Laura you would be so proud, we made homemade pizza Monday night (I didn´t have much to do with the dough but I watched) AND Auntie Andrea I made Tyler´s mac n cheese the other day but there is no cheddar in this country so it was a little off. My favorite food to date are patacones which are plantains that are friend, flattened and fried again (what´s not to love). The Yogosos (this frozen gogurts) are not to shabby either and only cost .15.

On a non-food related note, Mark, Celso and I had our first meeting with Pat, our boss at Mundo, and we will start observing classes on Monday when the kids go back to school. We will meet the department head and learn about the curriculum etc. In the meantime I am also exploring other morning placements (because the foundation school at Mundo runs from 1:30 to 6:15) and will likely be tutoring and teaching an English class to adults in the neighborhood. I am taking the shcool bus to Mundo at least the first day so I´m pumped! I asked a little kid at Semillas what time the bus comes to pick me up and he looked at me like I was crazy.

Father Jim, the founder of Rostro, is down for a couple days so we are all off to Mt. Siniai, the site of the new house, so he can bless the house and then we are all going out to dinner together in Guayaquil. It may only be the 3rd time we have eaten meat since we have been in the country (fingers crossed it´s not guinea pig). That´s all for now, Happy Thursday!

Week 1 Recap

Here we are in our the signature Rostro polos! (and showing our true colors) So legit now. Everybody has almost survived the first week of work (I don´t start Mundo til next week). Semillas has been a great time this week- we generally get anywhere from 45 to 70 kids (with a high of 115..) and run una actividad for the first hour, have recreo for the second hour and then give a quick charla before giving everybody bread, a banana, a vitamin (the delicious Flinstones ones) and sending them on their merry way. The little kids are maniacs but a lot of fun and we have been mildly successful calming them down with a story. Fun fact- Dr. Suess books ryme in Spanish also- you should check out Juevos Verdes con Jamon. It seems to be more of a crap shoot whether or not we have any control over the big kids during the activity but today´s tangrams, for those who remember middle school math, went surprisingly well. Maybe they were too stymied (as was I) to try to strangle each other.

Also, I quasi-passed my driving test so I am allowed to drive around the neighborhood under supervision of Brendan or Kipp. It´s like having my permit- parental supervision required. Traffic laws are pretty iffy so I should fit right in.

We are almost done painting the house, just the living room to go, and should be moving in later tonight Woo Hoo!

Still homeless but employed!

This morning we finally worked out our work placements. I will be teaching English (or History?) at the Fundation School at Nuevo Mundo, which is a prestigious private school that runs the foundation in the afternoon to provide high quality schooling for students from poorer areas like Duran. Check out more about the school here: rostrodecristo.org/community/nuevo-mundo.html

I have a sweet uniform- good thing I´ve always wanted to look like a stewardess.. There is a summer scarf involved. A couple times a week I will also be helping run Semillas de Mostaza, 1 of 3 afterschool program Rostro organizes. Semillas will start up on Monday and then Mundo probably the week after. Can´t wait to start working and hanging out with kids!

In shakier news (...) there was an earthquake this morning but aside from a very rocky bunkbed it did no damage where we are. Afternoon goal: eat a chocolate frozen banana.

Ganadores!

Yesterday we had a "test" to see if we knew the bus routes around the city. 12 hours, 6 work sites, 2 retreat houses, and a few historical sites later, we made it to the Malecon which is the gorgeous boardwalk along the water and climbed the 450 steps up to the lighthouse to check out the view. This area, Las Peñas, is really cool because there are lots of bars and restaurants on your trek up to the lightbouse. Once we finally got up there we felt the need to choreograph and perform a song we learned in honor of Don Bosco, which we learned along the way. Yesterday was the first time I had been to touristy areas of the city; the buildings there are very European looking and just so you don´t forget you´re in Ecuador, there´s an iguana park right in front of the cathedral where the little buggers just wander around. To check out pictures of our scavenger hunt day (and pretty much every other day) Megan Radek, our in country director, posts them on facebook more regularly than we can and you can access her pictures if you´re friends with me :) (and if you aren´t maybe I should be creeped out that you are reading my blog)
Also, rents, note how Meaghan and Mrs. Garvey have commented on the blog- it can be done.

Survived Week 1!

Here is a picture of all the volunteers from last year and this year! Those guys spent their last week in country getting us acclamated and minimizing our running around like chickens with their heads cut off (success?), which community mates have verified actually happens. Will confirm after first chicken slaughter. Anywho, they wee unbelievably helpful and went home this morning so we are on our own.

We spent yesterday at a beach house owned by Pat and Sonia, the women who run Nuevo Mundo, which is one of our placements. Playas is about a 2 hour ride and it was gorgeous there- we spent the day playing in the waves and got to play some soccer and do some running (the last 2 were not a joke). Also, the sand dollars are ginormous, so cool, so I will try to bring home a bunch if I don´t swash them in my suitcase.

Today I headed out to Monte Sinai, the site of our third and newest house, and cleaned up the place where the second year volunteers lived and brought a bunch of furniture to the new house. It´s almost finished and it looks great- bright and airy- seeing it made us so excited to move into our place at the end of this week! Parents, hope Chappy was great today I will definitely miss the Vineyard this week as I am cleaning houses and picking a work site but things here are great so far! Happy Sunday everyone!

We made it!

Hi! We are here!! We are currently living in the retreat house for 2 weeks of in country orientation and we have been busy learning bus routes and checking out the work sites (tbd next week) and going to the afterschool program (playing with little kids- life is tough)
TTFN!

Survived my first silent retreat!

Hi all!
We got back this morning from a 2 day silent retreat in Weston at the Campion Renewal Center. Once I got over its shocking resemblances to the asylum in Shutter Island (I locked bedroom door when I slept), it was really gorgeous there. We were told it's where Jesuits go to die.. My only near-interaction with a Jesuit was the following: I am sitting on a garden bench in a clearing when I hear a car pull up on the other side of the woods to my right. This 85 year old Jesuit gets out and begins making his way through the lot with a cane. I notice he stops to look out into the woods, probably admiring nature or something. I continue reading and look up when I hear a rustle in the woods. The Jesuit is trekking through the hilly forest, cane in hand. Thoroughly amused, I observe for a minute and then go back to reading... until I hear the saw. He had climbed over to a fallen tree and was chopping wood with the saw in one hand and cane in the other. It was pretty excellent.

We are off tomorrow bright and early!

Address!

Caitlin Long o Megan Radek (include both)
Rostro de Cristo
Casilla 09-01-1024
Guayaquil, Ecuador

I have a Home!

Hi everyone! So, not in Ecuador yet (I'm in O'Neil.. spending more time in the library than as an undergrad?) I just wanted to check in and let you know we were finally placed in our houses (yes, we drum rolled). I am living in Duran in Arbolito, which was is the 2nd of 3 Rostro de Cristo communities. My community mates are Christina, Tierney, Kipp, Jon, and Brendan. So pumped to be living with these kids and not be homeless! Woo hoo!