I know it's been far too long since I last posted, but my thoughts have been in too much of a jumble to write something coherent. I still doubt that my thoughts are in any sort of order, but there are some thoughts I really wanted to share, and I figure that if this post is a little all over the place, then you'll all be getting a peek into how my mind feels 90% of the time here.
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My honeymoon is over. AFS has a cultural adjustment cycle that describes the different phases of cultural adjustment that every exchange student goes through during their year abroad (https://www.afswiki.org/index.php/Common_Phases_of_Cultural_Adjustment). Like with anything new and exciting, there's a phase of exchange where you're life abroad is just that: new and exciting. You're being flooded with new experiences, cultural traits, languages, and people, which can be overwhelming, but in the end makes you happy about your new life. Like any honeymoon, this comes to an end as you settle into your life and establish a routine. My honeymoon is over. There aren't many things that seem novel anymore, and the culture shock has mostly worn off. In some ways this is nice. I feel like I have a life here, with family and friends, and like I've said in the past, the normalcy and routine can be comforting. In other ways, it makes life, and my many feelings about it, a lot more complicated. Normal, routine life can seem boring sometimes.
Ever since I got back from my trip to Peru a few summers ago, I've been announcing my desire for non-touristy travel to anyone who will listen, proclaiming that I want to understand culture, not just see pretty sights. While that is still completely true, and I'm incredibly happy to be doing just that this year, I'd like to say that tourist travel, despite its usual shallowness, is incredibly fun. I've always felt weird pulling out my camera to take pictures of seeming normal things here in Guaranda, since I'm not a tourist here, despite my obviously foreign appearance. Now that I've been here four months, I've found myself itching for touristy travel again, after denouncing it for so long, to break the routine of daily life here. It can be such a breath of fresh air to be able to pull out my camera, talk in English, and marvel at new sights without feeling like I myself have become a spectacle. Luckily for me, the AFS trips to the four regions of Ecuador (Galapagos, Sierra, Amazon, and the coast) are coming up in the second half of the year, so I'll get to practice my minimal photography skills soon.
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I'd like to make a short note about bravery, since I've been hearing how brave I am quite a bit recently. Let me tell you something: I don't feel brave. Not now, nor at any particular point since I decided that I was going to take this gap year. On the contrary, I've felt scared, sometimes down right terrified, more often than any semblance of bravery. The thing is that, for me, bravery seems a little overrated. No part of this process has felt like a show of courage to me, if anything its felt just the next step in my life. Maybe that's because I can't even remember when I decided I wanted to be an exchange student, but mostly I think it's because this was just something I wanted. 95% of any big decisions, especially the life changing ones, are just wanting something enough to go after it. Maybe there is some bravery in the decision, but after you've made your choice, its not bravery that keeps you going, its will power. It's the will to deal with whatever repercussions, good or bad, that come with your decision, that keeps you going.
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Exchange students are popular right? Who doesn't want to be friends with the new, cool, different, foreigner? This is a stereotype that I've definitely had to deal with being here, in the sense that, like any stereotype, it has some basis in reality, but doesn't account for everyone's experience. You see, at least in my experience, exchange students have a very specific kind of popularity. We are like shiny, new toys. In the beginning, everyone is very interested in you. They want to talk to you about your home country, your life there, and how you like life in your host country. They have lots of questions, and you have variations on the same conversation with every new person you meet. I personally was really grateful for others' interest in me in the beginning, because it gave me something to talk about when I might not have known what to say otherwise. But just like new toys, the novelty of exchange students fades. It can be hard to move from being the interesting foreigner to being just another person that people know, because you have to put more effort into conversations and relationships, but in a way loosing that novelty marks the point where you begin to make deeper and more meaningful connections with people.
I'll admit that I've had some trouble no longer being the shiny new toy. I could talk about the US and my life there for an eternity, but its been harder at times to know what to say when conversations turn to people I don't know, events that I wasn't here for, or aspects of life here that are still strange to me. I can probably attribute that to the language barrier, or my infuriating shyness in some situations, or the fact that even though I'd like to think I know a lot about life here, I still can feel incredibly lost. Those kinds of situations and conversations can make me feel lonely, they make my lack of history here especially apparent. It's easy to spiral downward into homesickness, to miss my friendships that have existed for years and conversations about my past with people who were part of it, but I try to remind myself that this year is worth it, that I'll always be proud of myself for going for it later on.
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My German friend pointed something out the other day that I had noticed, but hadn't given much thought to. In American culture, and I think in many European cultures as well, individualism is valued. Its okay to be different, to have different tastes and preferences. I'd say its considered normal to not be normal. That isn't a very prominent trait in Ecuadorian culture. Homogeneity is everywhere here, not just in people's physical appearances, but in their tastes as well. Everyone dresses very similarly, they all like the same music, enjoy the same TV shows, etc. Popular culture is narrower here, and straying from what is 'normal' has heavier consequences. I knew that this would generally be the case, AFS gave us a list of countries, from the most individualistic to the most collectivist, and while the US is almost always at the top, Ecuador ranked almost at the very bottom. Regardless, knowing something and living it are two very different things. I think I get some leeway, as an exchange student, to be different, but it's still strange to feel that society pushes you to fit in, rather than being told it's better to stand out.
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I could write more about everything that I've talked about so far, and as the year goes on I'll only have more things to say, but since this post is already pretty long, I'll leave you with what I've written. Hopefully it gives you some insight about exchange students, life, Ecuador, or really just anything. I realize that today is the day before Christmas, so I promise there will be another post soon, that's all about Navidad :)
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Christmas and Camping (almost...)
Pictures are nice right? Here are some to try and make up for neglecting my blog for the last month and a half.
Some pictures from setting up and decorating my uncle and aunt's Christmas tree in Quito.
My Christmas tree (the lights are actually multicolored, not just blue)
We spent a weekend at my great-grandfather's old farm house, and cooked out. It was the closest I've come to camping, although there was some electricity in the farm house, so we only half roughed it.
My mom, dad, great-grandpa (he's 91, and still putters around fixing up the house) and me.
Blackberry picking! They grow on trees here, and have lost of tiny spines.
That's all for now.
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Monday, November 3, 2014
Queso! (and my sixth sense)
I love cheese. I also love chocolate. Do you know what exists in Ecuador? A town that specializes in producing cheese and chocolate. Do you know what could possibly be better than a town that produces cheese and chocolate? A three day cheese festival in said town, that's what!
Yesterday, I went to Salinas, a small town about a half and hour from Guaranda, for a festival that was all about cheese. There was music, lots of foreigners, and most importantly, free food! I couldn't tell you how many different types of cheese I tried, but they were all delicious. I don't have any real cultural insights about the festival, except maybe that celebrations of food seem to be pretty universal. You could probably go to any country in the world and find food fests. We humans like to eat good food, and I cant tell you how happy it makes me that sometimes people organize events where we can all eat good food together :)
Yesterday, I went to Salinas, a small town about a half and hour from Guaranda, for a festival that was all about cheese. There was music, lots of foreigners, and most importantly, free food! I couldn't tell you how many different types of cheese I tried, but they were all delicious. I don't have any real cultural insights about the festival, except maybe that celebrations of food seem to be pretty universal. You could probably go to any country in the world and find food fests. We humans like to eat good food, and I cant tell you how happy it makes me that sometimes people organize events where we can all eat good food together :)
The weather in Ecuador is even more unpredictable than the weather in Denver. It was beautiful and warm in the morning and suddenly, the fog rolled in. I was so happy to have taken my mom's advice and packed my winter jacket, because when it gets foggy like this, its cold.
There were a few different musical performances, this guy was from the US, and could not only sing beautifully in Spanish, he was a phenomenal guitar player!
These are the natural salt mines just outside of Salinas. Water collects in little naturally formed pools, and when the water evaporates, salt is left behind.
I spent the hole time at the salt mine with my camera glued to the floor, because it was a million different colors and textures.
Part of the festival was some guys doing tricks on bikes. I'm not sure exactly how it relates to cheese, but it was interesting anyway.
One part of the festival was a 2 kilometer relay race, where each team member had to run while carrying this enormous hunk of cheese. My friend Rebecca and I almost participated, and then were glad that we didn't when we saw the cheese and were told it was 2 kilometers, not 200 meters.
Two of the cheese-runners, at the starting line.
My friend's brother, finishing out the race for his team. They got second place.
Another one of the musical performers. I really enjoyed their matching ponchos!
As I mentioned before, there were lots of foreigners at the festival. As an exchange student, or probably just by living in a foreign country, you gain an expert ability in spotting other foreigners, and an uncanny ability to guess where they're from. Now of course in Ecuador, its easy to tell who isn't Ecuadorian, because all of the Ecuadorians look so similar. What was a little more surprising was that you can somehow tell the difference between the Italians, the Germans, the Americans, etc. I don't really know how to describe it, but I could tell that the few Americans were american. They just looked like it. My friend said it's like we exchange students have a sixth sense for detecting other foreigners and where they're from. I think its true, and its a nice sense to have, because even if the foreigners we see are complete strangers to us, there's something comforting about seeing them. Its like someone is saying "Hey look, don't worry, you're not the only one!"
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Monday, October 27, 2014
Why Culture is Complicated
"...the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete."
- Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
I love this quote, and I've come to understand its implications in the world far more since being in Ecuador. Culture is incredibly complicated. What I mean is that culture encompasses so many facets of the way people live and interact, that it's impossible to ever truly understand a whole culture. Also, every individual that exists as part of a cultural group lives a different reality than the rest of the group. Everyone eats food and has a family and goes to school, but we all eat different foods, go to different schools and interact in different ways with the people in our lives. When we talk about culture, we tend to make generalizations and stereotype, because if we tried to describe the experience of every individual or even every family in a country or ethnic group, we'd never finish.
I struggle a lot with making generalizations when I talk about culture, because I know that what I experience is only a small fraction of an infinite whole, and I don't want to diminish something so beautifully complex into one sentence. Lets use food as an example (because ya know, food!).
It's hard to describe typical food in the US beyond hamburgers and french fries (which, as some of my friends would point out, are Dutch, not French, or American), because typical food differs from region to region. You can find different specialties in the south or New England or the southwest. On top of that, in the US we tend to eat a lot of food originally from other countries. I eat a lot of Italian and Mexican dishes, and when my family goes out to eat we can find restaurants that serve anything from sushi to tandoori chicken to pizza and everything in between. Why? Because the US is a country made up almost entirely of immigrants, and as a result our culture is a hodgepodge of other cultures. I love that about the US, because what is better than delicious food? A million different kinds of delicious food, that's what! But as much as I love it, it's also hard to try and explain this to people when they ask me what typical American food is. Maybe I'm making life harder for my self, because saying that hamburgers, fries and chicken wings are typical is an easy response to that question, but I don't want to perpetuate stereotypes.
Now I don't know if there's any real severity in letting people believe that we Americans only eat fast food, but this way of generalizing culture is something that I'm wary of. Maybe stereotypes about food seem harmless, but what about stereotypes about poverty and malnutrition? About lack of education or unemployment? Those kinds of stereotypes can be harmful to the way we see and interact with different cultures. It's easy to assume that everyone from one country or culture is rich or illiterate or living in poverty when all we hear about that culture are stereotypes. I think that generalizations them selves are not bad, in fact, they can be extremely useful when describing cultural norms. The danger comes in believing that the generalizations we make are true of everyone who pertains to a cultural group.
There's a lot more I could say about this, but instead of writing a novel here on my blog, I'll just recommend that you watch Chimamanda Adichie's TED Talk. She's far more eloquent than I am, and explains the idea better anyway. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg
What I need you all to understand is that what I write here is only my personal experience. While I'm trying my best to describe Ecuador and the culture that exists here, I can only truthfully describe the things that I've seen and done. I'm sure to make generalizations, and I promise that what I write is true of my own life, but remember that it just might not be true of the whole country. I've only been here two months (and three days technically!) and I can already say that my life, and life in Guaranda, is very different from life on the coast, in the amazon, or in big cities like Quito and Guayaquil. Ecuador may be significantly smaller and more homogeneous than the US, but there is plenty of diversity to go around.
And now I'm going to talk about myself, because I figure this blog is supposed to be about my life and the things I do with it.
The Friday before last, I got chosen to be the "madrina" of my class, for the inauguration of the in-school basketball competition. Every class chooses their team, has uniforms made, and chooses a madrina to represent the class during the inauguration. Basically, this means that as the madrina, I got to dress up, curl my hair, wear makeup, and even put on my heels, so that I could walk around the school courtyard in front of my class' team in line with all of the other teams. I was told that usually during the ceremony there's a beauty contest between all of the madrinas, but they skipped over that part this year, which my classmates were disappointed about. Regardless, it was fun to see each class decked out in the uniforms they designed, especially the super little kids! I wish that I had a picture from the actual ceremony, but I wasn't in a good position to take any, and trying to take pictures while holding a bouquet of roses and trying to not run into the girls in front of me is a little above my capacity for multitasking. I took some picture afterwards with my classmates, and I thought I'd share them :)
I'm currently in Quito with my family. My sister, Christina (Who would have thought that I'd come all the way to the southern hemisphere only to have a host sister with the same name as my actual sister?), goes to university in the city, and we came to visit her for the weekend. Let me tell you something: I love coming to Quito. There are a lot of strangely comforting things about being in a big city. I was so incredibly happy to go to the grocery store with my mom, because it looked like every other grocery store in the US. I have never been happier to push a cart down the aisle. Ever. Also, there are malls, with movie theaters and food courts. I hate scary movies, but I was happy to go see Annabelle with my family on Saturday night, because the movie theater looked exactly like the ones at home. I find myself comforted here by things that I didn't necessarily love or do much in the US, but that exist here. Stores and brands and restaurants become comforting just by being familiar. I don't think I've ever eaten at a T.G.I Friday's, but there's one in the mall near my sister's apartment, and I smiled at the sight of it, despite not even being a huge fan of the kind of food they serve.
Seeing all of these things that are achingly familiar make me long not only for the US, but also for the opportunity to live in a big city again. I can't help but wonder what life would be like if I'd been placed in Quito. But at the same time, it makes me grateful for my life in Guaranda.I'm on exchange to experience a new culture, a different life style. I don't doubt that life in the big city here is drastically different from life in the US, but I'm glad that my life here is nothing like my life in the US. Its both draining and exhilarating to be experiencing something so foreign, but I know that no matter how hard things might be sometimes, I'm going to want to keep getting a peek into unfamiliar cultures for the rest of my life. I thought I had wanderlust before I left, but that's going to be nothing compared to what I feel after this year.
Hasta Luego,
Elisa
Thursday, October 9, 2014
Public school is expensive...
Public school is supposed to be free right? I mean at least for the most part? That was the impression I was under, but I'm being proven wrong, ever day.
During my junior year in high school I wrote a nineteen page argumentative essay/research paper about the benefits of educating girls and some of the major reasons that girls don't get educated. I focused more on cultural prejudice against girls as the primary reason for the lack of female education, but I did include high school fees as a reason. I'm now getting first hand experience with those kinds of school fees, and I can absolutely understand why school is such an economic hardship for low-income families in countries where school fees are high.
In the US, at least in my experience, you have to pay a small fee at the beginning of each school year and then you have to buy your own school supplies. Here, and I suspect in quite a few other countries, you pay for everything. I mean EVERYTHING. Since arriving I've spent money on uniforms (one daily uniform, one P.E. uniform, and two pairs of shoes to go with), 6 textbooks (at about $16 each they don't seem expensive to me, but that's a lot of money here), curtains and a water jug for our classroom, a separate basketball uniform for the in-school competition, ten cents every day to put towards the class trip in June, notebooks, folders, and other school supplies, a set of protractors and rulers (that we have used exactly zero times), some of my tests (sometimes the teachers bring printed tests that we have to pay for in order to take), copies of a random assortment of other things (it costs about 10 cents to print of make a copy of anything), posters and supplies to decorate said posters for class presentations, and other small things that are hard to recall. There's even a third uniform that all of the girls in my grade have to wear on Mondays that I got out of buying (exchange student perks!). None of it is particularly expensive on its own (besides the uniforms), but it adds up in the end.
I've been noticing how everything adds up in the last week, and while I've got enough money to pay for what I need, there are girls in my class that say that they don't have enough money for all of the textbooks. It's so strange to me to have to pay for so much. When I told my friends that all of our textbooks are given to us and that we can print/copy as many pages as we want for free, they were absolutely shocked. No uniforms also cuts down on school costs by a ton. Going to school in Ecuador has made me appreciate a lot about American schools, especially how much is just given to us. Maybe I'll get into all of the other things I appreciate now in another post.
I'm here to learn all about Ecuadorian culture, so I figure its a good thing to tell you all about all of the cultural things I'm noticing now that I don't spend the whole day thinking "God, everything is so different here." AFS loves the analogy that culture is like an iceberg, you can't see about 90% of it. I've definitely gotten into noticing the 90% of culture here that you don't see right away, and its fascinating :)
Lets go back to school: Somehow, the girls in my class manage to insult and laugh at each other constantly, while also being close-knit. Its taken a while to get used to all of the names that they call each other and the fact that no one gets offended. When my friend asked me what the equivalent of "gordita" was in English, I had to explain that the closest thing was probably "chubby" but that it's not an affectionate thing to call someone the way it is in Spanish, it's more of an insult. Also, the girls in my class are constantly yelling. During class, during break, before school, after school, all of the time. A few people start to talk, then more people start talking, so everyone talks louder to hear each other over everyone else, until the whole class is yelling to be heard. This happens a lot when a teacher calls on someone to answer a question and they don't answer right away. Everyone else takes it upon themselves to answer the question at the same time. The volume escalates at record speed, its kind of incredible.
Tests taking here was also really strange for me at first, and still seems odd sometimes. Not only do you have to pay for some of the tests, but everyone whispers (audibly) to each other to ask for the answers they don't know. The teachers halfheartedly tell everyone to be quite and to not copy, but every test is a class collaboration none the less.
In the country materials AFS gave me before arriving in Ecuador, it said that in school, you don't argue with or question the teachers because it's considered disrespectful. While no one questions the validity of what our teachers teach us, there is certainly a lot of arguing with the teachers. My classmates argue about when homework should be due, what exactly the homework should be, when to take tests, what the questions on the test should be, whether or not tests should be graded or retaken, when projects should be due, and so on. When these kinds of discussions break out, the noise level skyrockets. Now that I think about it, it's a lot like waiting in line here: there is no line, you just try to push your way to the front, or be the loudest to be heard over everyone else. I cant quite tell if the girls in my class are really convincing or if the teachers don't mind changing due dates (even though we're "behind" in quite a few of our classes), but either way, the girls usually get their way.
School work always has to be immaculate. Everyone has a borrador (eraser) notebook where they write down notes from class and then later they re-write those notes in their notebooks for each class. There is also an unwritten rule that everything has to be colorful. Notes, posters, homework assignments, ect. I'm not really a fan of this, it seems like a lot of effort for something that doesn't exactly further your learning. But, what can I do, except to try and keep my notes clean, color coded, and organized?
My family here makes me wish that my family in the US didn't live so spread across the whole country. Here, all of my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and everyone else lives in Guaranda. I eat lunch with my parents, grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousins every single day. I never missed that kind of geographic closeness in the US because I never had it with my family, but having experienced it so much here, I know its going to be one of the things I miss when I come back. It's so nice to be around so many family members all at once, and so often too :)
I get along really well with the girls in my class and the other AFSers in Guaranda, but I'm not one to confide and open up to people quickly, so I've been missing my best friends lately. I miss not thinking about what I'm going to say, not having to try and explain my way around words I don't know. Its jolting to go from seeing the people you're closest to all of the time to only chatting on Facebook and Skype occasionally. Its hard, especially when there are so many thoughts that go through my head on a daily basis that I either don't know how to express in Spanish, or don't know who to tell here.
Sunday marks my seventh week in Guaranda, and once again, I don't know where the time has gone. If people ask me how long I'm living here, my automatic response has been to say ten months, but I'm trying to say that I'm here until June now, because I wont be here for ten months, at this point its only about eight and a half. I don't want that to be true, it seems like so little time, so I try to take my best friend Olivia's advice and celebrate every day that I'm here, because I'm going to want to come back even before I leave. I was telling my friend from school about saying goodbye to my family and how I cried on the plane and then I was explaining how its going to be so bittersweet to leave here. I know I'm not going to want to leave or say goodbye to people, but that I'll also be excited to see my family and friends in the US again. Who knows though, I definitely plan on bringing my family here to Guaranda, and I think I've convinced my whole class to come and visit me in the US sometime. I don't like goodbyes, so I'm determined to not make my goodbyes this year permanent.
Life goes on here, mine and everyone else's. I've reached the point that days just seem regular now, nothing all that special (except for the whole I live in Ecuador thing...). I watch, I absorb, I try to learn as much as I can now that I'm not constantly shocked by everything. I like being in that position. The world is a really interesting place, and I love that I have the opportunity to experience it first hand!
Hasta Luego,
Elisa
During my junior year in high school I wrote a nineteen page argumentative essay/research paper about the benefits of educating girls and some of the major reasons that girls don't get educated. I focused more on cultural prejudice against girls as the primary reason for the lack of female education, but I did include high school fees as a reason. I'm now getting first hand experience with those kinds of school fees, and I can absolutely understand why school is such an economic hardship for low-income families in countries where school fees are high.
In the US, at least in my experience, you have to pay a small fee at the beginning of each school year and then you have to buy your own school supplies. Here, and I suspect in quite a few other countries, you pay for everything. I mean EVERYTHING. Since arriving I've spent money on uniforms (one daily uniform, one P.E. uniform, and two pairs of shoes to go with), 6 textbooks (at about $16 each they don't seem expensive to me, but that's a lot of money here), curtains and a water jug for our classroom, a separate basketball uniform for the in-school competition, ten cents every day to put towards the class trip in June, notebooks, folders, and other school supplies, a set of protractors and rulers (that we have used exactly zero times), some of my tests (sometimes the teachers bring printed tests that we have to pay for in order to take), copies of a random assortment of other things (it costs about 10 cents to print of make a copy of anything), posters and supplies to decorate said posters for class presentations, and other small things that are hard to recall. There's even a third uniform that all of the girls in my grade have to wear on Mondays that I got out of buying (exchange student perks!). None of it is particularly expensive on its own (besides the uniforms), but it adds up in the end.
I've been noticing how everything adds up in the last week, and while I've got enough money to pay for what I need, there are girls in my class that say that they don't have enough money for all of the textbooks. It's so strange to me to have to pay for so much. When I told my friends that all of our textbooks are given to us and that we can print/copy as many pages as we want for free, they were absolutely shocked. No uniforms also cuts down on school costs by a ton. Going to school in Ecuador has made me appreciate a lot about American schools, especially how much is just given to us. Maybe I'll get into all of the other things I appreciate now in another post.
I'm here to learn all about Ecuadorian culture, so I figure its a good thing to tell you all about all of the cultural things I'm noticing now that I don't spend the whole day thinking "God, everything is so different here." AFS loves the analogy that culture is like an iceberg, you can't see about 90% of it. I've definitely gotten into noticing the 90% of culture here that you don't see right away, and its fascinating :)
Lets go back to school: Somehow, the girls in my class manage to insult and laugh at each other constantly, while also being close-knit. Its taken a while to get used to all of the names that they call each other and the fact that no one gets offended. When my friend asked me what the equivalent of "gordita" was in English, I had to explain that the closest thing was probably "chubby" but that it's not an affectionate thing to call someone the way it is in Spanish, it's more of an insult. Also, the girls in my class are constantly yelling. During class, during break, before school, after school, all of the time. A few people start to talk, then more people start talking, so everyone talks louder to hear each other over everyone else, until the whole class is yelling to be heard. This happens a lot when a teacher calls on someone to answer a question and they don't answer right away. Everyone else takes it upon themselves to answer the question at the same time. The volume escalates at record speed, its kind of incredible.
Tests taking here was also really strange for me at first, and still seems odd sometimes. Not only do you have to pay for some of the tests, but everyone whispers (audibly) to each other to ask for the answers they don't know. The teachers halfheartedly tell everyone to be quite and to not copy, but every test is a class collaboration none the less.
In the country materials AFS gave me before arriving in Ecuador, it said that in school, you don't argue with or question the teachers because it's considered disrespectful. While no one questions the validity of what our teachers teach us, there is certainly a lot of arguing with the teachers. My classmates argue about when homework should be due, what exactly the homework should be, when to take tests, what the questions on the test should be, whether or not tests should be graded or retaken, when projects should be due, and so on. When these kinds of discussions break out, the noise level skyrockets. Now that I think about it, it's a lot like waiting in line here: there is no line, you just try to push your way to the front, or be the loudest to be heard over everyone else. I cant quite tell if the girls in my class are really convincing or if the teachers don't mind changing due dates (even though we're "behind" in quite a few of our classes), but either way, the girls usually get their way.
School work always has to be immaculate. Everyone has a borrador (eraser) notebook where they write down notes from class and then later they re-write those notes in their notebooks for each class. There is also an unwritten rule that everything has to be colorful. Notes, posters, homework assignments, ect. I'm not really a fan of this, it seems like a lot of effort for something that doesn't exactly further your learning. But, what can I do, except to try and keep my notes clean, color coded, and organized?
My family here makes me wish that my family in the US didn't live so spread across the whole country. Here, all of my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and everyone else lives in Guaranda. I eat lunch with my parents, grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousins every single day. I never missed that kind of geographic closeness in the US because I never had it with my family, but having experienced it so much here, I know its going to be one of the things I miss when I come back. It's so nice to be around so many family members all at once, and so often too :)
I get along really well with the girls in my class and the other AFSers in Guaranda, but I'm not one to confide and open up to people quickly, so I've been missing my best friends lately. I miss not thinking about what I'm going to say, not having to try and explain my way around words I don't know. Its jolting to go from seeing the people you're closest to all of the time to only chatting on Facebook and Skype occasionally. Its hard, especially when there are so many thoughts that go through my head on a daily basis that I either don't know how to express in Spanish, or don't know who to tell here.
Sunday marks my seventh week in Guaranda, and once again, I don't know where the time has gone. If people ask me how long I'm living here, my automatic response has been to say ten months, but I'm trying to say that I'm here until June now, because I wont be here for ten months, at this point its only about eight and a half. I don't want that to be true, it seems like so little time, so I try to take my best friend Olivia's advice and celebrate every day that I'm here, because I'm going to want to come back even before I leave. I was telling my friend from school about saying goodbye to my family and how I cried on the plane and then I was explaining how its going to be so bittersweet to leave here. I know I'm not going to want to leave or say goodbye to people, but that I'll also be excited to see my family and friends in the US again. Who knows though, I definitely plan on bringing my family here to Guaranda, and I think I've convinced my whole class to come and visit me in the US sometime. I don't like goodbyes, so I'm determined to not make my goodbyes this year permanent.
Life goes on here, mine and everyone else's. I've reached the point that days just seem regular now, nothing all that special (except for the whole I live in Ecuador thing...). I watch, I absorb, I try to learn as much as I can now that I'm not constantly shocked by everything. I like being in that position. The world is a really interesting place, and I love that I have the opportunity to experience it first hand!
Hasta Luego,
Elisa
Monday, September 29, 2014
My Own Kind of Homecoming
I've been seeing tons of pictures on Facebook of homecoming in the US. It makes me nostalgic, not only for high school traditions like that, but just for the US and Denver in general. No worries though, its certainly not the dancing I miss! I'm in love with latin dancing, and while I still need a lot of practice, I think I've got quite a few of the basic steps down, and I always have fun dancing with my friends!
I had my own homecoming today, although not the dancing kind. Today was the end of the Adjustment orientation, and while I had a blast seeing and hanging out with all of the other AFSers, I actually found that I was excited to come back to Guaranda. I missed it, and I was so happy to be back, especially after the six and a half hour bus ride. I've been feeling more and more at home here over the last couple of weeks, but it really felt like home when I kept thinking that it would be nice to be back in my own bed and take a shower with hot water in my bathroom. My bed, my shower, my house, my family. I know that there are still going to be plenty of days when I miss my bed and house and family in the US, but its a nice to feel like I belong here in Guaranda after a lot of feeling kind of awkward and out of place.
As for the orientation, it was a lot of fun! It's crazy how completely similar and also completely different all of our experiences have been in the first month. Life on the coast is different from life in the mountains. Life in the big cities is different from life in smaller places like Guaranda. And yet, despite all of the differences, there are always thins that are exactly the same, or at least very similar. Milk comes in a bag everywhere, and everyone eats a ton of rice and chicken. Everyone has a uniform for school and everyone both loves and also doesn't like school. We all have a lot of the same struggles, and we find a lot of the same things strange. That's one of the biggest comforts of being around exchange students. We are all leading different lives, so we always have great stories to tell, but at the same we are all understand each other's struggles and we can all relate to each other.
Our orientation was on the coast, only a couple of blocks from the beach, which was wonderful, although it wasn't nearly as warm as I expected it to be. All I really cared about was that, although it wasn't incredibly hot, it was warm enough to go swimming in the ocean. Colorado is wonderful, but there's no beach, so it always feels special for me to get to swim in the ocean!
I had my own homecoming today, although not the dancing kind. Today was the end of the Adjustment orientation, and while I had a blast seeing and hanging out with all of the other AFSers, I actually found that I was excited to come back to Guaranda. I missed it, and I was so happy to be back, especially after the six and a half hour bus ride. I've been feeling more and more at home here over the last couple of weeks, but it really felt like home when I kept thinking that it would be nice to be back in my own bed and take a shower with hot water in my bathroom. My bed, my shower, my house, my family. I know that there are still going to be plenty of days when I miss my bed and house and family in the US, but its a nice to feel like I belong here in Guaranda after a lot of feeling kind of awkward and out of place.
As for the orientation, it was a lot of fun! It's crazy how completely similar and also completely different all of our experiences have been in the first month. Life on the coast is different from life in the mountains. Life in the big cities is different from life in smaller places like Guaranda. And yet, despite all of the differences, there are always thins that are exactly the same, or at least very similar. Milk comes in a bag everywhere, and everyone eats a ton of rice and chicken. Everyone has a uniform for school and everyone both loves and also doesn't like school. We all have a lot of the same struggles, and we find a lot of the same things strange. That's one of the biggest comforts of being around exchange students. We are all leading different lives, so we always have great stories to tell, but at the same we are all understand each other's struggles and we can all relate to each other.
Our orientation was on the coast, only a couple of blocks from the beach, which was wonderful, although it wasn't nearly as warm as I expected it to be. All I really cared about was that, although it wasn't incredibly hot, it was warm enough to go swimming in the ocean. Colorado is wonderful, but there's no beach, so it always feels special for me to get to swim in the ocean!
This guy was just hanging out at one of the beaches we went to. We couldn't get too close, because he wasn't friendly, but everyone stopped to take pictures. I have no idea how common sea lions are in Ecuador.
The Sea of Clouds
When you're driving from the mountains down to the coast, there's a point where you descend straight into the clouds. Just before that point, there's a fantastic view where the mountains just seem to disappear. Its hard to capture the beauty of it from a moving bus, but this was my best picture. The closest thing I can equate it to is looking out the window of an airplane, except that you'r not flying thousands of feet in the air, you're on the ground. Its one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Thursday, September 25, 2014
Anonymity
It's really interesting how much you can stand out, even in a sea of red and grey uniforms. It doesn't matter that I wear the same thing as every other girl in my school, I'm still almost constantly aware of the fact that I look different that everyone else. I'm the exchange student, and I can't forget it, because even now, three weeks into the school year, I get stared at a lot. A lot. I can't decided if it really truly bothers me or not, I guess what I don't like is how self conscious it makes me.
I've had to reason through why I get stared at so much. The US is incredibly diverse, and on top of that diversity, I went to an internationally focused school, so having at least a few exchange students every year was completely normal. Ecuador, on the other hand, is far more homogeneous. I'm one of only a handful if students without black hair, and blonde-ish in a group of black stands out. My school has hosted exchange students before, so I'm not a complete oddity to everyone, but its easy to tell that the student body is still fascinated by the fact that we exchange students look so different. Sometimes being one of three foreigners is nice, people tend to be really interested in why we came to Ecuador, what our home countries are like and what not. Yesterday, when I was walking to my dad's office after school, a group of girls called my name (because they knew who I was even though I didnt know any of them) and proceeded to ask all about the US, how i liked Guaranda/ my host family/school and all of the other questions that everyone always asks me. A lot of times, I miss the anonymity that a diverse population provides. It's nice to fit in, even if you don't look like everyone else. When everyone looks different, it's a lot harder to stand out. This general trend of being stared at follows me around everywhere, except when I'm with the other exchange students, my family, or other people that already know me. I hadn't really thought about this before getting here and experiencing it first hand, and they certainly never said anything about it in any orientation I went to. Honestly it's just weird, I don't like attention like that, but there's nothing I can do to make it go away, so I guess this is one of those situations that the AFS staff would tell me to adjust and get used to life with this. Easier said than done, but hopefully not impossible.
Another exchange student perk (or situation where we're treated differently) is with the Jura a la Bandera, a very important ceremony for all of the "seniors" where everyone has to pledge themselves to the Ecuadorean flag. This is an all day affair. It involves a whole choreographed march where everyone marches around the courtyard in sections and flags of all of the cities and provinces of Ecuador are held around the perimeter of the school courtyard. Because its such a big deal, my entire grade has been practicing this organized marching all week. I mean all day, every day, all week. I've had all of five classes this week so far, and the rest of the time I spend sitting on the concrete bleachers, watching the endless march. Why do I sit and watch? Exchange student privilege!(kinda). I can't participate in the ceremony, because I'm not Ecuadorean. I'm not really sure why that's a rule, because other AFSers are participating at their schools, but for whatever reason I can't. I was actually a little relieved that I don't have to participate because as as cool as it would have been to have that experience, it also means I don't have to spend four days marching the same formations over and over again, and I don't have to buy a third uniform (the one for the ceremony is called the "parada" and includes pantyhose, heels, and a bright red blazer). It also means that I've read a ton in the last few days. I need to find a bookstore here, ASAP.
The other AFSers and I leave for our second orientation tomorrow afternoon and I'm really excited to see all of the other students from Ecuador, and also to go to the coast. I'm excited to exchange stories and experiences, an also be in warmer weather. Guaranda is beautiful, and I love that the weather can be just as unpredictable at in Colorado(if not more), but I get cold easily, so the warm weather will be a nice change :)
It's completely crazy to think that I've been here for an entire month. The time has both flown by and also gone so slowly. Things feel normal now, and even though there are still things that can be hard, I've been having a ton of those "I absolutely love it here" and "I can't believe that this is my life" moments, which are basically the best feelings ever! I really hope that I keep having those kinds of moments in the future, because the first month was really hard. Homesickness is awful, and while it hasn't gone away, it's becoming something that I'm not noticing all the time anymore. It's exhausting to be constantly missing home, so it's super nice for life here to start feeling like a new home!
Hasta luego,
Elisa
I've had to reason through why I get stared at so much. The US is incredibly diverse, and on top of that diversity, I went to an internationally focused school, so having at least a few exchange students every year was completely normal. Ecuador, on the other hand, is far more homogeneous. I'm one of only a handful if students without black hair, and blonde-ish in a group of black stands out. My school has hosted exchange students before, so I'm not a complete oddity to everyone, but its easy to tell that the student body is still fascinated by the fact that we exchange students look so different. Sometimes being one of three foreigners is nice, people tend to be really interested in why we came to Ecuador, what our home countries are like and what not. Yesterday, when I was walking to my dad's office after school, a group of girls called my name (because they knew who I was even though I didnt know any of them) and proceeded to ask all about the US, how i liked Guaranda/ my host family/school and all of the other questions that everyone always asks me. A lot of times, I miss the anonymity that a diverse population provides. It's nice to fit in, even if you don't look like everyone else. When everyone looks different, it's a lot harder to stand out. This general trend of being stared at follows me around everywhere, except when I'm with the other exchange students, my family, or other people that already know me. I hadn't really thought about this before getting here and experiencing it first hand, and they certainly never said anything about it in any orientation I went to. Honestly it's just weird, I don't like attention like that, but there's nothing I can do to make it go away, so I guess this is one of those situations that the AFS staff would tell me to adjust and get used to life with this. Easier said than done, but hopefully not impossible.
Another exchange student perk (or situation where we're treated differently) is with the Jura a la Bandera, a very important ceremony for all of the "seniors" where everyone has to pledge themselves to the Ecuadorean flag. This is an all day affair. It involves a whole choreographed march where everyone marches around the courtyard in sections and flags of all of the cities and provinces of Ecuador are held around the perimeter of the school courtyard. Because its such a big deal, my entire grade has been practicing this organized marching all week. I mean all day, every day, all week. I've had all of five classes this week so far, and the rest of the time I spend sitting on the concrete bleachers, watching the endless march. Why do I sit and watch? Exchange student privilege!(kinda). I can't participate in the ceremony, because I'm not Ecuadorean. I'm not really sure why that's a rule, because other AFSers are participating at their schools, but for whatever reason I can't. I was actually a little relieved that I don't have to participate because as as cool as it would have been to have that experience, it also means I don't have to spend four days marching the same formations over and over again, and I don't have to buy a third uniform (the one for the ceremony is called the "parada" and includes pantyhose, heels, and a bright red blazer). It also means that I've read a ton in the last few days. I need to find a bookstore here, ASAP.
The other AFSers and I leave for our second orientation tomorrow afternoon and I'm really excited to see all of the other students from Ecuador, and also to go to the coast. I'm excited to exchange stories and experiences, an also be in warmer weather. Guaranda is beautiful, and I love that the weather can be just as unpredictable at in Colorado(if not more), but I get cold easily, so the warm weather will be a nice change :)
It's completely crazy to think that I've been here for an entire month. The time has both flown by and also gone so slowly. Things feel normal now, and even though there are still things that can be hard, I've been having a ton of those "I absolutely love it here" and "I can't believe that this is my life" moments, which are basically the best feelings ever! I really hope that I keep having those kinds of moments in the future, because the first month was really hard. Homesickness is awful, and while it hasn't gone away, it's becoming something that I'm not noticing all the time anymore. It's exhausting to be constantly missing home, so it's super nice for life here to start feeling like a new home!
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Sunday, September 14, 2014
Back to School
Its been a while since I last posted, but I wanted to at least semi-understand how school works here before trying to describe and explain it to the rest of my world.
Somewhere along the way, I decided that 4 years of high school wasn't enough for me, or, more accurately, I decided that I enjoyed learning enough to go through five years of high school in order to go on exchange. I don't regret that decision whatsoever, but let me tell you, high school here is wild beast that I've got no idea how to tame.
I'll start with the easy part: uniforms.
Somewhere along the way, I decided that 4 years of high school wasn't enough for me, or, more accurately, I decided that I enjoyed learning enough to go through five years of high school in order to go on exchange. I don't regret that decision whatsoever, but let me tell you, high school here is wild beast that I've got no idea how to tame.
I'll start with the easy part: uniforms.
This is out daily uniform. We also have a gym uniform that I think I'm going to end up loving, just because it isn't a skirt, sweater and white knee-high socks. Were not allowed to wear make up, nail polish, and all hair ties have to be white. I can't tell yet exactly how strict they are about those rules, but I'm afraid to be rebellious because the other day the inspector came into our class and made everyone stand up to make sure that our skirts were long enough. Mine wasn't, even though it was to my knees when I pulled it down as far as it would go. But being fashionable aside, its actually really nice to not have to think about what to wear in the morning. I can be very indecisive on that front.
On to classes. I'm taking 12 different subjects:
Psychology
Investigation (still trying to figure out exactly what that subject is...)
Math (This class is going to be beautiful, because I've already learned a lot of what were covering, so I might actually understand it and have a chance at getting a good grade)
Chemistry
Biology
Issues in the Contemporary World
Citizenship ( as far as I can tell its essentially government/civics)
English ( My teacher already calls on my 90% of the time)
Language and Literature (The first unit is on fantasy fiction, so the first class we talked about Lord of the Rings the whole time. I can definitely get behind this class!)
Emprendimiento ( I still cant figure out exactly what this subject is and I only have it a couple of times a week)
Gym
Computer class
I have 8 periods every day, and a different combination of classes every day. This schedule is essentially the most confusing thing I've ever had to deal with, and I took AP Calc last year... My saving grace is that we all stay in the same classroom all day and the teachers come to us, so I don't have to worry about moving rooms ever. Its a little strange for me to be in the same classroom all day, but what really throws me off is that there's a whiteboard at the front of the classroom and absolutely nothing on the walls. I'm so used to the walls and classrooms at school being covered in poster and pictures and who knows what else, that having bar walls all around me seems very empty.
I won't lie, the first day of school felt a little awkward. I am one of exactly two girls without black hair, and the other one is also an exchange student. Also, here I'm the tallest girl in my class, and one of the tallest in the whole school. The first day, mostly people stared at me. They smiled timidly too, but only a few girls talked to me. It was awkward. But, I'm happy to say that after that first day, things started to feel less weird with my classmates, they've definitely become less shy. I routinely get asked to help with English questions, and the other day one of our teachers just didn't show up to class ( that's normal, I guess...) so they all sat in a circle around me and asked a billion questions about everything I could possibly tell them about. It was a little overwhelming to be bombarded with questions like that, but it was also a lot of fun!
School has been where my Spanish skills are being tested, and surpassed. I can hold a conversation about my family or how my day was, but trying to understand chemistry in Spanish is a whole different story. I understand about 70% of what goes on in class, and I'm thankful for my friend Jeimy who doesn't seem to mind repeating the homework from every class to me, because I usually can't catch what the teachers say. I'm struggling most with how the homework is supposed to be presented. There seem to be all sorts of unwritten rules about what you write in your notebook and what to put in your folder, as well as when its okay to copy, paste and print from the internet and when things need to be handwritten. I've already messed up there quite a bit.
I just keep telling myself that it's okay to not have everything figured out right now, I've only been in school for a week, and I've only been in Ecuador for three. Its really crazy to think about that. Sometimes it seems like its been way way longer than three weeks, and sometimes it feels like I just got here.
I really do want to write more frequently, but I almost never have down time at home, so it's been harder than I expected. Regardless, I'm going to try to make room for blogging, because, like my darling best friend Olivia pointed out, I haven't posted in forever and she's tired of reading the same few posts. She wants to hear more, so Olivia, this post is for you :) I promise to write more soon.
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Wednesday, September 3, 2014
Culture Shock!
This post is going to be all over the place, but to be fair, it'll be representative of my life in the last week and a half, since I've also been all over the place.
I want to start with my very first bus ride from Quito to Guaranda. That was the first time I truly experienced culture shock, I just didn't realize that it was culture shock until later. I tend to get most homesick and sad when I'm alone or not doing anything, when I don't have anything else to think about. That first bus ride was the first time I had some time to think about everything since I got on the plane in Denver, and so I thought a lot about what this experience was really going to be, and how long 10 months really is. I was thinking about all of that, and allowing myself to miss my family, as I watched the Ecuadorian countryside roll by. There are a few towns and smaller cities that you pass through on your way from Quito to Guaranda, and as I watched them and all of the people, I started to get really panic-y about the year. I mean the "What have I gotten myself into/ Am I really capable of being gone for 10 whole months?" kind of panic-y. I didn't realize until later what had made me so freaked out. It was the poverty that I saw that got to me. I don't want you all to get an image in your head of straw huts and naked children running around, or any other stereotypical "poor" things. I want you to imagine buildings with facades the color of the sunset and bare concrete block walls on either side. I want you to imagine indigenous women in traditional clothing selling food from tiny roadside stands and too many street dogs to count. I want you to imagine construction that appears without warning around every other bend in the road. The kind of poverty you see here isn't a slap-in-the-face kind of poverty, its more subtle, but it's definitely there. I knew coming in that Ecuador is still developing, and that this wasn't going to be like visiting Europe, but seeing it up close and personal from the bus was jarring. What was really kind of scary was seeing it all and realizing that I would be surrounded by this lifestyle, this standard of living, for the next year of my life. I don't want to sound like the rich, privilaged American who scorns the "less fortunate", but seeing Ecuador didn't exactly fill me with the kind of "I will go and solve all of the world's problems now!" attitude that I would have hoped. I'm not on a mission trip, I'm not here to tackle poverty to the ground. I don't know if that makes sense, but I guess what I'm trying to say is that its strange to see a situation that you're accustomed to approaching as something to improve and realizing that instead, it's now something to learn to live around. That was my first real bout of culture shock, but, like everything else that was new at first, I'm getting used to it.
On to lighter topics, lets talk about food! In Ecuador, meals work differently than in the US. Here, breakfast is a small affair, usually with tea/coffee and some bread. Lunch is the staple meal of the day. There is always some form of soup first (usually with potatoes), then rice with meat and salad or cooked plantains. There's also juice, every kind of fruit juice you could imagine (plus some fruits I didn't know existed until this week) and always fresh squeezed. Dinner isn't really a thing, instead there is merienda, which is more of a nighttime snack than a meal. Usually we eat hot chocolate/tea and a sandwich, much like breakfast. It's been an adjustment, going from hardly eating lunch at all to that being the biggest meal of the day, with the other two being small. It's probably healthier though, not eating a big meal before going to bed.
Driving with my dad in the US used to make me nervous. Papi, if you're reading this, I take back everything I ever said about you being a bad driver. Although I have yet to see a single crash, the drivers here are much crazier. Speed limits seem to be optional, as well as staying in your lane (even on two lane roads). Plus everyone drives a stick, so driving is just a little jerkier than I'm used to anyway. You can part wherever there is space, even if it means parking in the on-coming traffic's lane. One of the three major AFS rules is that you can't drive, which I wont have a problem following at all. I don't think you could pay me enough money to drive here.
My school, while now technically co-ed, is basically an all girls school. Everyone here calls it "el feminino", which translates to the feminine, or something along those lines. I have a lovely and ugly uniform. Grey skirt, red, itchy sweater, knee high socks and black mary janes, along with a full gym suit that I get to wear when there is P.E. I went to school today for the first time, but they havent figured out the schedules yet, so there haven't been any classes thus far. That means that everyone shows up at school and socializes all day and then goes home. I talked to a girl in my class for most of the day and she showed me around, while informing me that the girls here could be kind of shy. That explained why I got lots of stares and some hesitant smiles, but not a lot of actual conversation with most of the girls in my class. I felt a little awkward, and very tall.
To finish up here are some random, but interesting things that happened: When I went to Quito to meet my host mom and sister, we visited a monument that you could see the whole city from. At the base of the monument there was a man playing a few different flutes for entertainment. One of the songs he started playing sounded familiar and it took me a second to realize it, but I soon recognized the song as Chiquitita, by ABBA. I laughed so hard, because in what universe did I ever imagine that I would hear an ABBA song being played on the pan flute?!
Also, I was with my host father at the bank the other day, running errands, and the security guard told me that I was Barbie. I know he meant it as a compliment, but it was pretty strange to hear. I'm not that blonde, am I?
There will be more to write later, but that's all I have for now!
Hasta luego,
Elisa
I want to start with my very first bus ride from Quito to Guaranda. That was the first time I truly experienced culture shock, I just didn't realize that it was culture shock until later. I tend to get most homesick and sad when I'm alone or not doing anything, when I don't have anything else to think about. That first bus ride was the first time I had some time to think about everything since I got on the plane in Denver, and so I thought a lot about what this experience was really going to be, and how long 10 months really is. I was thinking about all of that, and allowing myself to miss my family, as I watched the Ecuadorian countryside roll by. There are a few towns and smaller cities that you pass through on your way from Quito to Guaranda, and as I watched them and all of the people, I started to get really panic-y about the year. I mean the "What have I gotten myself into/ Am I really capable of being gone for 10 whole months?" kind of panic-y. I didn't realize until later what had made me so freaked out. It was the poverty that I saw that got to me. I don't want you all to get an image in your head of straw huts and naked children running around, or any other stereotypical "poor" things. I want you to imagine buildings with facades the color of the sunset and bare concrete block walls on either side. I want you to imagine indigenous women in traditional clothing selling food from tiny roadside stands and too many street dogs to count. I want you to imagine construction that appears without warning around every other bend in the road. The kind of poverty you see here isn't a slap-in-the-face kind of poverty, its more subtle, but it's definitely there. I knew coming in that Ecuador is still developing, and that this wasn't going to be like visiting Europe, but seeing it up close and personal from the bus was jarring. What was really kind of scary was seeing it all and realizing that I would be surrounded by this lifestyle, this standard of living, for the next year of my life. I don't want to sound like the rich, privilaged American who scorns the "less fortunate", but seeing Ecuador didn't exactly fill me with the kind of "I will go and solve all of the world's problems now!" attitude that I would have hoped. I'm not on a mission trip, I'm not here to tackle poverty to the ground. I don't know if that makes sense, but I guess what I'm trying to say is that its strange to see a situation that you're accustomed to approaching as something to improve and realizing that instead, it's now something to learn to live around. That was my first real bout of culture shock, but, like everything else that was new at first, I'm getting used to it.
On to lighter topics, lets talk about food! In Ecuador, meals work differently than in the US. Here, breakfast is a small affair, usually with tea/coffee and some bread. Lunch is the staple meal of the day. There is always some form of soup first (usually with potatoes), then rice with meat and salad or cooked plantains. There's also juice, every kind of fruit juice you could imagine (plus some fruits I didn't know existed until this week) and always fresh squeezed. Dinner isn't really a thing, instead there is merienda, which is more of a nighttime snack than a meal. Usually we eat hot chocolate/tea and a sandwich, much like breakfast. It's been an adjustment, going from hardly eating lunch at all to that being the biggest meal of the day, with the other two being small. It's probably healthier though, not eating a big meal before going to bed.
Driving with my dad in the US used to make me nervous. Papi, if you're reading this, I take back everything I ever said about you being a bad driver. Although I have yet to see a single crash, the drivers here are much crazier. Speed limits seem to be optional, as well as staying in your lane (even on two lane roads). Plus everyone drives a stick, so driving is just a little jerkier than I'm used to anyway. You can part wherever there is space, even if it means parking in the on-coming traffic's lane. One of the three major AFS rules is that you can't drive, which I wont have a problem following at all. I don't think you could pay me enough money to drive here.
My school, while now technically co-ed, is basically an all girls school. Everyone here calls it "el feminino", which translates to the feminine, or something along those lines. I have a lovely and ugly uniform. Grey skirt, red, itchy sweater, knee high socks and black mary janes, along with a full gym suit that I get to wear when there is P.E. I went to school today for the first time, but they havent figured out the schedules yet, so there haven't been any classes thus far. That means that everyone shows up at school and socializes all day and then goes home. I talked to a girl in my class for most of the day and she showed me around, while informing me that the girls here could be kind of shy. That explained why I got lots of stares and some hesitant smiles, but not a lot of actual conversation with most of the girls in my class. I felt a little awkward, and very tall.
To finish up here are some random, but interesting things that happened: When I went to Quito to meet my host mom and sister, we visited a monument that you could see the whole city from. At the base of the monument there was a man playing a few different flutes for entertainment. One of the songs he started playing sounded familiar and it took me a second to realize it, but I soon recognized the song as Chiquitita, by ABBA. I laughed so hard, because in what universe did I ever imagine that I would hear an ABBA song being played on the pan flute?!
Also, I was with my host father at the bank the other day, running errands, and the security guard told me that I was Barbie. I know he meant it as a compliment, but it was pretty strange to hear. I'm not that blonde, am I?
There will be more to write later, but that's all I have for now!
Hasta luego,
Elisa
Tuesday, September 2, 2014
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words
The AFS group from Guaranda in Quito, standing on the actual equator.
Me and my host family (minus my host mom, plus my host sister's boyfriend) in Quito over the weekend.
Quito!
The view of Guaranda
Chimborazo, the nearby, active volcano
Guaranda, from my grandparents front steps.
My house!
My room! (I have a lovely Hello Kitty bedspread that I'm slowly learning to tolerate)
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I'm hoping all of these make up for the short post. The truth is that I have about a million words to say about life here in the last week and a half, but I've had zero time to write about it, so forgive me if I promise to post about it all soon, instead of writing about it now. I'm shooting for a post once a week, or at least once every two, which should become easier once I'm settled at my 99.9% girls school (It's technically co-ed, but apparently you can count the guys on one hand) and I have some sort of schedule.
Hasta luego,
Elisa
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