Once in a Lifetime

I know that what I've found is once in a lifetime

(and) I know there's no way out

Cuz it's once in a lifetime

I know it has been a while since I have written… there are three reasons for that: 1) Life is becoming routine and it seems harder to find crazy things to write about. I just sorta go about my days and it’s starting to feel normal. I love that. 2) I have made a pact with myself that I am going to be on the computer less because then that way I interact with less English and I learn more Spanish. I also get to spend more time with my family. 3) Life has been quite busy and I just don’t find a lot of time to do all the personal things I want to do. Like journaling, writing this blog, sleeping, eating, reading… ect. But it’s happening. Now get ready!

So last weekend we had our official “one month in Ecuador orientation”. It was a wonderful weekend of friends from all over the world who are going threw the same things as me. We got to catch up and speak English. I am not going to lie; I think it is the first time I have been in my comfort zone since I got here. I could communicate freely and have real deep conversations. This is not to say that I don’t talk when I am with my host family, but the deep conversations are hard to have. I had some conversations on books, USA politics (BOOOO you North Carolina), and just about life it was so nice. We also were staying at a quite nice hotel place; the comfort food and nice beds were a nice get away as well. While it was hard to pull my self away from those interactions and that life, it was good to get back home and be with my family.

            My family, people have been asking about my family and want to know more, so here goes nothing. In my house is my mom, Jaddy. She works at the post office and has a great heart. I like her a lot, even though we have been having some trouble getting over the language barrier. Also in my house is my grandmother, mamita. She is the sweetest woman ever and I love spending time with her. I have found that she just loves it when you offer to help, she will never ask, and often when you do ask will say no, but if you do it anyway she is tickled. Near by live my aunt, uncle, 3 cousins, and one other exchange student. They are all very sweet and I find my self spending a lot of time at there house, because it is always busy with activity and even when all the parents are at work there are people there. That is a very brief run down of my family and what goes on with them. Keep in mind that that is only about .0001 of my family and they are everywhere. But they are the ones I spend the time with.

            Ok so the next big thing in my life is school. I started out in a class specializing in chemistry… that was a serious struggle. Now I am in a class focusing on math. I am so much more a fan of this. My class is super small… 15 other kids other than me. I like them all a lot and now that we are over the language thing we goof around just like my friends at home. They found out I am ticklish… that has been fun. The jumper cables never stop. On Monday I will be putting feathers in all their hairs... they are pretty pumped when they heard I had more. Classes are hard, but getting earlier by the day. Philosophy and lit are by far the hardest. But the teachers are willing to help. Fun fact of the day… and by that I mean the shittyist thing I have heard in a long time… teachers here earn $.85 per hour they teach. How they live I don’t know, what is wrong with our world and its value of education. Anyway… life is good and treating me well. Of course I have my down times, but they are way out numbed by the ups. I miss you all and love you tons and tons.

Livin’ life on the loose. 

Street Map

I would like someone to make a map

Mark my home and draw some lines that match

Things that have been offered on the street to me:

A-air fresheners, they are every where in Ecuador… in the bath rooms, the kitchen, the cars, on the street (yeah I don’t know that point of that either!) and apparently they are just a necessity in Ecuador

B- Bon Ice, this is a very Ecuadorian snack, in the US we call them icy freezes, but here guys walk around in complete, what look like, Bon Ice running suits. They then sell then out of a cylindrical cooler from $.10 or $.15 each!

C- Cuy, the local delicacy of whole guinea pigs skewered on a stick then rotated around a fire till golden brown. All you have to do then is take a big cleaver and chop it into 4 pieces and bam… lunch.

D-dulce- otherwise known as candy. They are huge on it here, many people walk around with trays of a wide assortment of candy from molasses candy to chewing gum. My personal favorite is the taffy that you can watch being pulled right there and then buy.

E-Ecuadorian hair wraps, ok so I didn’t really know what these were called so I am calling them Ecuadorian hair wraps. Many native women wrap their hair in what looks like a very colorful weaved belt. I am quite a fan of them, but as a white girl with very short hair have no use for one. L

F- funky English, everybody here has watched at least one movie in English (most of the time with Spanish sub-titles), and they have picked up pretty funny words from it. When these people hear I am from the US they get very excited and throw out phrases like “sexy bitch” and “California girl” and “New York!!!!” It sorta makes me smile a lot.

G- giant stuffed animals, often we will have guys will carts come to our door and try to sell us carnival sized stuffed bears or dogs. They often end up trading jewelry for these prizes.

H- hookah- ok so this isn’t super common, but the first week I was here I met a guy who has as shop that sells beer, hookah, and meat warps. He also spoke English so was very eager to be my friend. Now every time I see him I get offered hookah. Great. Even in the middle of a run… like I am going to stop and smoke a hookah… that will make my run great.

I- Ice cream, they are big on ice cream here. Every store sells ice cream, while I wouldn’t call it the best ice cream ever, it is still ice cream!

J- Juice… of all kinds and forms. I think I have been offered tamarind, orange, and coconut just to name a few. They are quite good.

K- key chains of Mary (with your name engraved!), my host mom got me one of these. For those of you who have seen my key chain you can guess that I am pumped to add another to its plethora.

L- Live birds, while waiting in line at the bookstore a man came by with a cage filled with about 30 live birds squawking and chirping. Dinner anyone? Just kidding… I think they were pets.

M-maize (corn), you can it get popped, on the cob, baked, pureed, with milk, and in any form you can possibly imagine.

N- nothing you would ever want… and everything you need.

O- odd books, mostly children’s books.

P-ponchos, they are huge into ponchos here…. With print, out of wool, large, small, you name it they have it.

Q-quick Snacks, they are all about little snacks on the street. And they always come in little yellow bags. You can get the Ecuadorian style G.O.R.P, fruit, French fries, salads… the list goes on.

R-recordings, always pirated. But often quite good.

S-scrunches, be transported to the good old 90’s because everybody wears scrunches here. Want a hair band… to bad. Hehe.

T-taffy, people will have these spikes coming out of their stand where they will stand and pull taffy. Then if you walk by they will hand you a small piece so you want more. It works, let me tell you. J

U-underwear, yep… just sorta chilling on the street. My favorite said 100% loca on the butt. Almost got it, but thought my host family might just think I was a little too strange.

V-various hats, well with my obsession of hats… I am right at home here. You can buy winter hats for little ones like a smurf, or pooh bear… or a dog. You can buy knitted hats with any shape, size, and number of things sprouting out of them.

W-water, drinking water is sold on the street everywhere… at first I refused to drink the water from the tap, but I have given up on that. I mean I am here for a year, that’s a lot of bottled water to buy.

X-x=ab-y/2… by this I mean schoolbooks. People will just walk up to you and try to sell you a book about algebra, or handwriting, or my favorite… English.

Y-Yo Go, the mentioned above Bon Ice salesmen also sell a similar product, but the base in yogurt. Pretty good if you ask me.

Z-zapatos… of every shape and size. (except size 42… my size. We have to go to 3 cities for that)

Run (in) This Town

Feel it comin' in the air

Hear the screams from everywhere

I'm addicted to the thrill

It's a dangerous love affair…

gonna run (in) this town

Ok so I know you all want to hear about the first day of school. But in my mind that is second to the most monumentous thing that has happened to me in 4 months. Ok maybe that is stretching it a little bit, but hey…. I am PUMPED! I ran for the first time since my surgery a couple of days ago. I was so excited. I was confined to a very small part of my neighborhood as my host family didn’t want me straying to far from the house alone, but it was so worth it. Today marked my second run and during it a mentally made a list of all the things that happened:

·      Wolf whistles… let me tell you very common.

·      A little boy said to his mom “look at that boy”, mom responded, “That’s a girl”. Glad I am so feminine. 

·      A ran by, on the side walk, a herd of cows wandering seemingly on their own down the street.

·      A creepy Indian guy tried to get me to smoke hookah with him.

·      I met my cousin on the street and had to stop to exchange kisses and greetings.

·      Turns out my cousin wanted me to help her with her English homework so my run had to be cut short to make it home before dinner to help her.

·      Everybody and their grandma’s dog barked at me. (Everybody in Ecuador has a dog… or 5)

·      Can you say stares… apparently a super tall while GIRL running down the street inst very common.

·      The list could go on forever… but there are a few high lights.

So pretty much I am so excited than I can run again and it is going to keep me sane here. (And at least a little in shape.)

Ok, now the first day of school. Let me just say that it was the most overwhelming and emotional day since the first day I arrived in my host family. Everybody at the school was very nice and super accepting. But I hadn’t been forced into an environment with so much happening so quickly in Spanish. Early on in my stay I was asked what my favorite subject was… I responded with Bio. So I apparently got put in the specialty (in the top grade, the one I am in you have to specialize, like having a major) of Bio and Chem. That, my friends, is not easy in Spanish. Or in general. Everybody here has had 3 years of chemistry already and I haven’t had any. And add Spanish everything into it and I was as lost as a little girl in a mall (do little girls get lost in malls?!?). Tomorrow I should be switched to Math as my major, I am feeling more solid about this as it is something that is a lot more cross language. J Some details about school. It starts at 7 and ends at 1 with two 15-minute brakes in the middle. The teachers more class rooms, not the students. I have to wear a super cute uniform, a picture is attached. I will try to write more about school soon, but it is bedtime for me as to get to school on time I have to get up at 5:30. Ugg. Miss you all (if there is anybody reading this anyway)!

Livin’ live on the loose

Me in my super cute uniform! ;)

(first day of school!)

Life is a Highway

They knock me down

And back up again

You're in my blood

I'm not a lonely man

There's no load I can't hold

The road's so rough this I know

I'll be there when the light comes in

Just tell 'em we're survivors

Well life over the past couple of days has been something. After my last blog post the next day I started feeling significantly better. But then the next day I went way down hill. So that night I was whisked off to the hospital for a ton more tests and my first night ever in a hospital. It was an experience. I am struggling to eat because everything made my stomach upset and they don’t have any of my typical sick foods here in Ecuador. It was a struggle, but was eventually able to get a little bit of food down. This lack of eating was of great concern to AFS because apparently its quite common for AFSers to come to another country and have a hard time with the culture so they stop eating. They kept asking me if I was sad or mentally ill. It was sort of humorous after a while, because really I was just sick. The low point in my whole stay at the hospital was the 5:30 am visit of the cleaning guy who proceeded to sweep the whole room (this included moving my IV stand). It was good that I didn’t know how to get angry with him in a language he understood so I just had to hold my toung. ;) My Ecuadorian family was so supportive and amazing I was speechless. My room was never empty and the average number of people in it was probably somewhere around 10. Everybody would come by before and after work as well as on their lunch break. More often then not bringing something for me to eat with them. They were all so worried and caring that I can never pay them back for it. The experience wasn’t what I would have liked for the first week, but it is something I will never forget. Turns out I have Typhoid… or a back infection (?)  ...Or another type of infection. We are not quite sure because everybody has been told different things at different times. But I have enough antibiotics to cure the world and I am feeling as good as new. Hopefully my Ecuadorian hospital adventures are done for my stay. 

Aside for that adventure there are many other things I have been doing in my life. A couple of days ago I got to travel to a near by city with AFS. The city called Silidas was named after its largest industry (not any more, but in the past) of Salt production. We visited the salt flats. These provided not only a very interesting thing to look at, but also a breath taking mountain view. We then proceeded to tour the chocolate and cheese factory that provide most of the cities current industry. It was an awesome experience and I was excited to get to move out side of my town. I have been taking every opportunity that has been presented to me to do things with people because they are awesome learning experiences and always-quite fun.

Yesterday I got my school uniform; it was about time as school starts on Monday. It consists of cotton polo with a red polyester sweater to wear over it. Then I have a skirt that is quite boring and grey for the bottom with knee socks. I also have a gym uniform that is a pair of cotton(ish) shorts and a set of polyester warm ups. Everything (minus the skirt) is in bright red, as that is my schools color. I am very excited to start school because it will add really good structure to my day, but really summer has been so great that school is looking like a lot of work. I will try to post my first day of school picture so you can all see the wonderful uniform. Ok so I do complain about it a lot, but its nice to not have to worry about what is appropriate to wear and when I need to wear what. It’s really not that bad.

That is a summery of my life here in Ecuador in a nutshell. I shall try to keep you updated and school and the other going ons of my first healthy weekend in Ecuador. Love and miss you all.

Livin’ life on the loose.