Big news! For the next 2 years i am going to be living next to the beach! Sweating! Last sunday i got on my first bus and then a taxi and then another bus and then another bus and then in a truck and i arrived at my new site, 12 hours later and boy it was hot. Apparently it is the hotest months right now, what i good time to meet new people. I felt so bad as i introduced myself as this eager new volunteer with beads of sweat rolling down my face, pools of wet spots creating themselves underneath my boobs aparent from the outside and whats even worse is pools of sweat between my legs and my butt giving me the apperance that i had just wet my pants.
i wish i was exaggerating but i am not :(
I cant even imagine what they thought of me, not only am i sasquatch height but an extensivley sweating sasquatch at that. And then they started to talk to me which made me even more nervous and if you can believe it i starting sweating more. I pretty much was a human slip and slide, but its ok, take a sigh of relief becuase aparently i am cool enough to make friends even when dripping on people! SO yeah my town is hot.
Now less about me and more about this new town. I have two counterparts who requested me they are a married couple, the wife Aleida is 61 and the becon of femonizim i have always wanted to be. She says that there are only 2 things men have advantage over women, that is one, they can physically lift heavier things and secondly they can pee wherever they want (which really comes in handy in a third world country) i love her! Anyway her husband, Gonzalo, is 71 and originally from ecuador but spent many years in NYC where he met Alieda. Alieda is Cuban American and escaped the Castro situation with her parents when she was 12. She has probably the coolest story, which i can understand, becuase she speaks ENGLISH!!! BUt yeah so fast forward a bunch of years after college and kids and careers, Gonzalo and Alieda end up on the coast of ecuador having very successful lives and wanting to do more. They realized the nearby town has like 3 families for every single unit house so they decided, with the help of a rotary club and volunteers, to build a community of 50 houses. Now they help run this little town with no name of 250 people by setting up a sponshership program in the US to give the `kids school shoes, uniforms, materials, and breakfast. They also remade a local high school that was in shambles and really outstreach everything they can to help. They asked for me to come and aid them in this by living in the community and educating in hygiene, nutrition, environment and sexual health.
Here comes the pit fall.... this ridiculously poor little community was built in the desert about 2 km from the beach. With no resorces and ground that feels like cement. I am a natural resource volunteer and am supposed to be helping in such areas but this town has NOTHING!!! So if anyone knows anything about the dessert and what can be grown or how to make compost in a hot dry environment my ears are open. I was sure handed an awesome town, with the nicest people and the cutest kids who hug and kiss sweaty old me, but i dont know how to help with the lack of resources.
i have hope though. At least i can start with the sex ed and hygiene while i am trying to conjur a way for this town to make more money. But anywho i am at the BEACH!!! And i get to play Oprah, like give kids new shoes, Oprah. Pretty sweet.
So while i was at this town,which they call the village, i made some friends between the ages of 13 and 19. We played volleyball, soccer, went swimming and DANCED! Well actually, they brought me into the community center and put on rhianna "Umbrella" and as i started to sing to the tune they all looked at me, stared at me.. i was like yeah lets dance, but their idea was more like, let watch the gringa dance.... so i did. I just started to bust my moves with rhianna as my inspiration as i whaled my arms and snapped and grooved all by myself. Surprisingly THEY LOVED IT! They think i am a great dancer and told me all the other americans just jump and its silly. I was kinda hoping to give the other impression so i would not have to dance again but i dont think i will be in luck. SO then they next night they wanted to hear me sing some more and sat in a circle around me, gave me an ipod, put on umbrella again, and just waited for me to start belting it out.... so i did. Surprised once again they LOVED IT, gave me an ovation and just wanted to hear more. so pretty much i am brittany spears.
I would just like all of you right now and try to imagine yourself on a pourch, surrounded by 10 kids ranging in ages, a mom and a dad in the house who dont know you and then singing, as loud and stupid as you can, and them appreciating it.... i really do like this country, if only as a way to raise my self esteem hahaha. I was laughing so hard and of course sweating.
Thats my town, in all it glory, and maybe one day if you visit i will have them all sing you umbrella with a coreographed dance by me!
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Mono the "Latin King"
This past sunday i tried my hand at washing my clothes again. That week my mom made me change my sheets and i really tried to get away with not washing them but let just say Anita is on her toes. Yeah, i washed sheets, whole sheets that are bigger than me and not just one but two and a pillow case. i thought that my jeans were bad... not even close those suckers hold soo much soap that my shoulders were hurting for at least 2 days after. Though due to my hard work Anita was so impressed that she told me that i am ready to get married now, i only lack the ability to cook. I will take any compliment where i can get it.
After my sweaty two hours of kneading clothing we took a field trip to some really cool places but the thing that changed my day the most was a picutre that was taken of my mom and me. Anita is without any exageration a foot smaller than me. This picture literally looks like she found Sasquatch. I am going to post it soon hopefully.
Today i learned how to ride a bus by hanging from the outside after getting on it while it was moving and i also learned how to do a traditional dance which i am performing with 17 others in front of our families during an appreciation day. It was a highly successful day.
Last but not least, Conner was woken up at 2:30 in the morning wednesday by a knock from his mom telling him to help with the chickens. He went to the roof of their apartment and found his family taking all 50 chickens downstairs to be slaughtered... yes at 2:30 in the morning. He called it a Chicken masacar which occured in his kitchen, that by the end there was chicken shit, blood, and feathers all over the walls and family. What a wake up call and family bonding experience.
Oh and you can comment now! and if you would ever like to call me or send me a text i have a number it is
593 9 440 4870
tomorrow i find out where i will be living for the next two years! think good thoughts of either the beach or the rain forest for me
After my sweaty two hours of kneading clothing we took a field trip to some really cool places but the thing that changed my day the most was a picutre that was taken of my mom and me. Anita is without any exageration a foot smaller than me. This picture literally looks like she found Sasquatch. I am going to post it soon hopefully.
Today i learned how to ride a bus by hanging from the outside after getting on it while it was moving and i also learned how to do a traditional dance which i am performing with 17 others in front of our families during an appreciation day. It was a highly successful day.
Last but not least, Conner was woken up at 2:30 in the morning wednesday by a knock from his mom telling him to help with the chickens. He went to the roof of their apartment and found his family taking all 50 chickens downstairs to be slaughtered... yes at 2:30 in the morning. He called it a Chicken masacar which occured in his kitchen, that by the end there was chicken shit, blood, and feathers all over the walls and family. What a wake up call and family bonding experience.
Oh and you can comment now! and if you would ever like to call me or send me a text i have a number it is
593 9 440 4870
tomorrow i find out where i will be living for the next two years! think good thoughts of either the beach or the rain forest for me
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
I milked a cow
Yeah i really did, i put my hands beneath the cows hind legs and pulled on its nipples in a massaging type stroke until milk came out! WOW! It was frothy and warm and very white... people drink this. The only thing i could think of was who was the first to milk a cow and then consume such frothy white warm liquid. I am betting he was kinda like van gough, not so popular until after he was dead. After this experience we learned how to make fresh cheese and then found out you can also milk a dog. Yeah i actually mean that there was a dog who recently had babies and one of the other volunteers, as a joke, pulled one, of her nipples and milk came out. I guess you can milk anything with nipples.
Before this day filled with milk, three of the ten groups including mine, drove to this small town about 15 km outside of quito called Nono. We went to the local school and talked to some kids, 4 boys asked for my autograph, they were pumped i was in a plane. We then walked around a pretty large farm and then around 7 the town of about 100 houses had this huge parade for us. There was a band that played for 3 straight hours in which we were required to dance the whole time, and when i say band i mean like high school band coinciding with that type of music, kinda of difficult to finda good rythm. They had little kids dressed up in cotumes as potato heads and yoda and militia. While they also passed around spiked tea, quite amusing.
In the past three weeks i have learned to milk a cow, make organic compost, make worm compost, and make manure tea! When i thought i knew a lot i realized people make tea with cow shit to use as a pesticide. Just goes to show you never know enough. I cant wait to see what is next.
On the homefront, my spanish is getting better to the point i have conversations where i ask questions and my family in convinced i am pretty good. I was finally able to take a pretty satisfying poop, small accomplishments are the best. I think from the increase of cheese and stress i was a little blocked up for a few weeks but that has "passed" :) Oh and i think i saw a good looking ecudorian, not tall enough but it is a step. And my sister gives me a big hug every night before i go to sleep.
Finally my language group one first place amungst the others in our level with a presentation where we sang our own rendition of if you are happy and you know it with phrases in spanish about our town and i did the price is right making a complete fool of myself but hey we got free chocolate.
I almost forgot to mention i told a bunch of the other volunteers here after we had milked a cow that i want breast augmentation one day to keep them perky. And if there is a sterotype for volunteers of the peace corps put that in your head right now... i am talking dont shave, only wear REI and worked at a co-op in college. hahahaha i guess i am ok with being jugded and really when have i ever been normal, but it does not matter cause i seem to always fit in.
mucho amor
Before this day filled with milk, three of the ten groups including mine, drove to this small town about 15 km outside of quito called Nono. We went to the local school and talked to some kids, 4 boys asked for my autograph, they were pumped i was in a plane. We then walked around a pretty large farm and then around 7 the town of about 100 houses had this huge parade for us. There was a band that played for 3 straight hours in which we were required to dance the whole time, and when i say band i mean like high school band coinciding with that type of music, kinda of difficult to finda good rythm. They had little kids dressed up in cotumes as potato heads and yoda and militia. While they also passed around spiked tea, quite amusing.
In the past three weeks i have learned to milk a cow, make organic compost, make worm compost, and make manure tea! When i thought i knew a lot i realized people make tea with cow shit to use as a pesticide. Just goes to show you never know enough. I cant wait to see what is next.
On the homefront, my spanish is getting better to the point i have conversations where i ask questions and my family in convinced i am pretty good. I was finally able to take a pretty satisfying poop, small accomplishments are the best. I think from the increase of cheese and stress i was a little blocked up for a few weeks but that has "passed" :) Oh and i think i saw a good looking ecudorian, not tall enough but it is a step. And my sister gives me a big hug every night before i go to sleep.
Finally my language group one first place amungst the others in our level with a presentation where we sang our own rendition of if you are happy and you know it with phrases in spanish about our town and i did the price is right making a complete fool of myself but hey we got free chocolate.
I almost forgot to mention i told a bunch of the other volunteers here after we had milked a cow that i want breast augmentation one day to keep them perky. And if there is a sterotype for volunteers of the peace corps put that in your head right now... i am talking dont shave, only wear REI and worked at a co-op in college. hahahaha i guess i am ok with being jugded and really when have i ever been normal, but it does not matter cause i seem to always fit in.
mucho amor
Monday, March 1, 2010
Double Meanings
I have officially been in Ecuador for 11 days but it feels more like a month. This past friday i moved into my host family´s house and therefore entered a world with NO ENGLISH! I thought i knew some stuff, you know afer tutoring it and living in spain but i am just awful. I never saw the movie, Yes Man, but the title has become my life, since i have no idea what they are saying i just respond with yes and a smile, it seems to be working so far.
Anyway in my host family i have a madre that stands about 5 feet tall and loves hugs (in the morning, in the night, after dinner, before watching tv...) so she gets big helpings of my breasts multiple times a day. Then there is the padre that works making fences, doors, and windows for houses. He does not talk much but is quite nice. I have three siblings, but only one that lives with me. The other two are in college in the main city about an hour and half away but they come home for some weekends. The son is 18 years old and talks to me like i am an old grandpa. Meaning he shouts like literally in a really loud voice and extrememly slowly everything he says to me. It makes me feel really bad for my grandpa when i do the same thing, but hey i understand everything he says :) Then there is the sister that is 22 but she just doesnt talk so that works for me too. Finally is my hermanita. I think she is 10 and i can see behind her eyes that she wants to be best friends but having me as a bff right now is like talking to a happy door (I have no idea most the time what she says so i just smile). Anyway the way i see it is i can only go up from here. pumped!
Oh i almost forgot i have three dogs... boxers... and if you have never been to a south american country you cant get the full meaning of how scary the dogs are here. It is like they all really want to eat you... maybe because they are blood hungry but probably because it is custom to keep your dogs at the level of hunger just above death. Like if you cant clearly count their ribs from a block away they are fat. Its kinda sad but then again to have cats and dogs in america that cant even stand because of the sand bag of a stomache they carry around is also not so awesome.
Which brings me to the next culture shock i got, being called fat is a term of endearment... not sure if i will ever like that one, but luckily they have not said it too me yet... but then thats probably why they feed me sooo much. Yesterday for breakfast we got boiled corn under potato cakes, under freshly cooked pig. Meaning while i ate such a generous portion of breakfast i was staring at the whole pig cut and flattened on a grill, ears nose and all. Quite apeitizing i cant lie. After this awesome pig filled breakfast i was taught how to wash my clothes by hand on a stone. wearing gloves to my elbows and boots to my knees cause its also kinda a shower time. Anyway i realized the importance of being short here in ecuador, because your clothes are smaller and thus much easier to hand wash. The stone stands about counter height to an ecuadorian, about table height for me. So you put your clothes in a soap bath and then proceed to kneed them almost like dough until your madre thinks its sufficient, and then you must kneed water through the article of clothing until the water comes out clear. Which was not so difficult at first but since it took me like 2 hours to do 20 peices by the end the clothes that had been soaking were completely saturated in soap, getting clean water to run through that would be like finding an ecuadorian that is taller than me (almost imposible). so lets just cross our fingers that i dont sweat much in the coming days or else bubbles of soap will be coming out of my armpits.
And the purpose of my title, "double meanings" is because almost everything that i say actually means something sexual here... oh boy has it been fun! They just laugh and laugh at you and then think you like to have alot of sex.
so for those who are interested in sending me love notes, my address is as follows
My name (if you dont know it then please dont send me love notes)
Casilla 17-08-8624
Quito, Ecuador
i have a different one on my Facebook, i think they both work. keep these love messages to a max of 2kg or i think 5 pounds, and dont delcare any monetary amount.
I am not sure why you cant post if you have tried, i have my settings so anyone can comment, if someone is more knowledgeable than me i am going through a series of learning processes. and please nevermind my spelling there is no spell check here ugh
Finally my madre here makes hand croched (sp?) bags of any color and i think she is going to teach me how. She charges 30$ for one which i guess is not so bad but i would rather try to mess something else up
Anyway in my host family i have a madre that stands about 5 feet tall and loves hugs (in the morning, in the night, after dinner, before watching tv...) so she gets big helpings of my breasts multiple times a day. Then there is the padre that works making fences, doors, and windows for houses. He does not talk much but is quite nice. I have three siblings, but only one that lives with me. The other two are in college in the main city about an hour and half away but they come home for some weekends. The son is 18 years old and talks to me like i am an old grandpa. Meaning he shouts like literally in a really loud voice and extrememly slowly everything he says to me. It makes me feel really bad for my grandpa when i do the same thing, but hey i understand everything he says :) Then there is the sister that is 22 but she just doesnt talk so that works for me too. Finally is my hermanita. I think she is 10 and i can see behind her eyes that she wants to be best friends but having me as a bff right now is like talking to a happy door (I have no idea most the time what she says so i just smile). Anyway the way i see it is i can only go up from here. pumped!
Oh i almost forgot i have three dogs... boxers... and if you have never been to a south american country you cant get the full meaning of how scary the dogs are here. It is like they all really want to eat you... maybe because they are blood hungry but probably because it is custom to keep your dogs at the level of hunger just above death. Like if you cant clearly count their ribs from a block away they are fat. Its kinda sad but then again to have cats and dogs in america that cant even stand because of the sand bag of a stomache they carry around is also not so awesome.
Which brings me to the next culture shock i got, being called fat is a term of endearment... not sure if i will ever like that one, but luckily they have not said it too me yet... but then thats probably why they feed me sooo much. Yesterday for breakfast we got boiled corn under potato cakes, under freshly cooked pig. Meaning while i ate such a generous portion of breakfast i was staring at the whole pig cut and flattened on a grill, ears nose and all. Quite apeitizing i cant lie. After this awesome pig filled breakfast i was taught how to wash my clothes by hand on a stone. wearing gloves to my elbows and boots to my knees cause its also kinda a shower time. Anyway i realized the importance of being short here in ecuador, because your clothes are smaller and thus much easier to hand wash. The stone stands about counter height to an ecuadorian, about table height for me. So you put your clothes in a soap bath and then proceed to kneed them almost like dough until your madre thinks its sufficient, and then you must kneed water through the article of clothing until the water comes out clear. Which was not so difficult at first but since it took me like 2 hours to do 20 peices by the end the clothes that had been soaking were completely saturated in soap, getting clean water to run through that would be like finding an ecuadorian that is taller than me (almost imposible). so lets just cross our fingers that i dont sweat much in the coming days or else bubbles of soap will be coming out of my armpits.
And the purpose of my title, "double meanings" is because almost everything that i say actually means something sexual here... oh boy has it been fun! They just laugh and laugh at you and then think you like to have alot of sex.
so for those who are interested in sending me love notes, my address is as follows
My name (if you dont know it then please dont send me love notes)
Casilla 17-08-8624
Quito, Ecuador
i have a different one on my Facebook, i think they both work. keep these love messages to a max of 2kg or i think 5 pounds, and dont delcare any monetary amount.
I am not sure why you cant post if you have tried, i have my settings so anyone can comment, if someone is more knowledgeable than me i am going through a series of learning processes. and please nevermind my spelling there is no spell check here ugh
Finally my madre here makes hand croched (sp?) bags of any color and i think she is going to teach me how. She charges 30$ for one which i guess is not so bad but i would rather try to mess something else up
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