Normalcy

When did it all become normal. I decided to write a blog to update and really cant think of any topic. It has all become normal, the usual. But when did that happen? Everynight I get waken up by iguana/cat fights on my roof. I sometimes have a hard time deciding weather it is two cats, two iguanas or a cat and an iguana, or maybe even mutliple of both parties. Iguanas seems to make a lot more noise cause their finger claws are so long but i would imagine that a bunch of cats have the same potential to make all that racket. But then cats scream, like really scream, more like a baby scream than an adult but scream none the less. And i can imagine a cat screaming where i cant imagine an iguana making that noise. Then it all might just boil down to my mild hysteria? I can officially say that roosters have become more like the inssent crickets back home. They are always making noise and will always be making noise, so you kind of tune them out but need them secretly to sing you to sleep. yeah to sleep cause roosters here dont do the wake up call they do the all day call, i think its just the rampant hormones in this country. those same hormones that maintain the steady rate of teenage pregnancy and families the size of soccer teams. This is what i  call normal.

I rescued a kitten, a very ugly, devastatingly infected kitten. Little children, grown adults and kleber ran from this two week old kitten. Its eye goo alone was enough to take away my appitite for the whole day. This kitty is also a cuddler, you know the touching type. Like when you come in, its just always there touching you and when you lay down it attacks your face with that cooing that kitten do. Which is really adorable untill you add in the eye goo and to top it all off anal poo leakage. I just cant be mean to small helpless animals no matter how ugly they might be, and in my saintly state the kitty leaked poo on me twice in one night calling for many pajama changes but hey i was awake anyway trying to decide between iguanas and cats. So i bought some eye medication and when i try to put the drops in those tiny gooey eyes the cat shits on my counter, everytime. (due to the anal poo leakage) I cant even be mad cause he really cant help it, i think its time to see the vet. I am totally over poo.

If you did not know yesterday the 1st of december was World Aids day. In my never ending quest to get this country to start using condoms i planned a huge night. The night included a dance competition between all the dance groups in the pennisula and a hallway of Aids discrimination. Today i feel like i was hit by a bus full of untimely problems and surging headaches. I am recuperating slowly with a cocktail in sight. But really the event went well. We had 6 dance groups perform; two of which are really really good, the others are getting there. We had a huge audience all vulnerable to my AIDs/use condom propaganda being shouted by the animators. We handed out over 100 condoms and other pamphlets. Which i can only hope get used. If you are wondering why you would have a dance competition for World Aids day its obvious. The people that come to these events are primarily, youth girls that draw in horney youth boys, as well as any gay man, and the creepy old guys which pretty much wraps up all the "vulnerable" demographics, i know genius. Then when you top it off with free condom giveaways you really get the attention of all the aforementioned parties.

I have 18 days till i am home for chirstmas and less than 5 months till i am home to stay, i wonder how strange the states will seem. Maybe i will just buy a rooster.

washing machine

I am just gonna say it…. I really miss television and hot water. When your laying in bed and there just seems to be nothing that will turn your brain off for the night to let you drift off in a peaceful sleep and you start to get this hopeless feeling that starts somewhere between your stomach and upper intestinal tract, you know food is not going to solve anything and the minutes are just ticking by. Well in a place like my parents house, my college dorm actually anywhere I have lived up until Ecuador (wait take out Chincoteague island with Maggie, but normally I had enough booze running through me with the summer heat outside that sleep was not a quest) so yeah until Ecuador I would have just turned on the good old tube to some amazing program like “I should be dead” on Animal Planet, or “Jurassic fight club” on History channel, or maybe even the latest reruns of “jersey shore” on MTV. Any good American made English speaking program to just take you out of where you are, put your mind at ease, and coerce you into a wonderful night of dreams.  Unfortunately, the one television I have only gets one very fuzzy station and every single program is all in Spanish. (Too some that sounds like a surprise because I am pretty much fluent, well actually I am fluent in Spanish, but there is something about watching tv in another language, you just have to think too hard, plus their telenovelas are prossibly the worst acting I have ever seen, actually watching TV here is like a direct line to those no stopping thoughts that keep me from sleeping), so yeah not an option.

That brings me to the fact that I have not showered in 5 days. I finally broke down and used a wash cloth to try and get some of the crust off of me and let my hair get wet under a faucet since it was starting to dread. But we are in the depth of the cold season here, and honestly its chilly enough to wear pants and at night put on a sweater. Anyway the sun is just not hot enough to heat up the water tubes any so the water that comes out is fucking cold. Especially at night when I normally like to indulge in my bath time. Tomorrow I should work up a good sweat at my aerobics class, where immediately after I will literally run home to keep the sweat going making the cold water feel relatively bearable. Five days really is not so bad.

Oh and can I say, actually I am not sure, maybe I will whisper instead the two words, that seem so distant to my reality and so wanted… “washing machine” what I would do for a god damn washing machine. Remember when yogi bear would walk into a kitchen or wherever and see a picnic basket and it would be surrounded in the beam of gold lighting that seemed to keep it afloat hovering for his poor drooling eyes. Well currently when I picture a washing machine in my head that’s what is looks like. This large powerful mechanism shiny and white and dazzling outlined in this gold heavenly beam hovering just far enough away from my reach that I know my white girl jump will never make the distance. Meanwhile my pile of dirty clothes are just piling up and I half don’t have the money to get them washed and half feel bad for the poor lady because she has such small hands for my very large pants.

Other than my current desires life is going super solid. My womens football team is faltering a little but I am soo  busy with my other projects I hardly notice. My newest conquer will to be build a new classroom from recycled bottles that are packed with trash. I encourage you all to google it cause it is an awesome project you can do literally anywhere. But the basics are we need the whole community to start packing their washed off inorganic trash into washed out plastic soda bottles, until the bottle is completely stuffed and hard to the touch. After we have accumulated about 4000 of these bottles we will start to build the structures of the classroom and the roof. From there we pull tight chicken wire between the pillars and tie the plastic bottles to the wire in rows. We then fill all the holes with cement and cover the bottles to make a pretty, seemingly ordinary classroom. If all goes well, my town will be cleaner, people will realize a different way to recycle and use their trash, and we will be left with a school room, ready for any kind of natural disaster, to educate tomorrows leaders. So yeah if you are so overwhelmingly taken by this great project feel free to be moved enough to donate to help  buy supplies J the classroom should cost 1/3 of what a normal classroom should cost bringing us to needing about $3,000. Chump change right, no but really I will soon be looking for the money to get this project into a reality so the poorest district of my town can change out an old wooden plank and bamboo room into a nice eco friendly cement one so any support would be awesome.

Read the Hunger Games trilogy (recommended by my amazing friend beth daigle) in a weeks time on my new kindle (thanks to my fabulous mom) and I am in awe. Wished it would have ended differently but that is some of the best writing I have read, blowing me way out of the water in the writing game, sorry poor readers of my blog. But really read the trilogy when you get the chance, besides motivating you to conquer the world it also makes you insanely jealous, why does it always seem these days that the mediocre looking, average personality main character is torn between two handsome, strong, intelligent, loving boys. Its just not fair to get our hopes up like that, I mean I am pretty and all I do is fight for this no money making, fairly built, way too honest ecua novio. Where is my Peeta, or Jacob, I mean I would even take Ron Weasly at this point.

Life is beautiful.  Now get some rest.

1000 cupcakes

I made 1000 cupcakes. I have to write this down, for none other then myself, so that when I am old and grey telling stories to whoever will listen, I have proof that I am not exaggerating again but I really did make 1000 cupcakes in a day and a half. I will include also that I only received about 8 hours of help from a friend Edison who has never made cupcakes before; 8 hours out of 18. The next most important part of this story is why, well we can boil that down to my overwhelmingly persistent or as some say stubborn manner.  I wanted to clean up San Pablo, at least a little, really even if I got people to notice there is trash all around them I would have been happy. There are 8000 citizens of San Pablo I was hoping for 1000. I could find no financial help from anyone, so I raffled off a one hundred pound bag of rice and a DVD player which earned me about 70 net profit. That $70 plus another $100 I had saved from an earlier money maker were my only funds.  I originally wanted to give everyone a sandwich and a glass of soda but 170 meager dollars did not come to close to that. I had to think fast, having one week  left till trash day. So if you cant give them sandwiches go with something sweet, and cupcakes were just the thing, being on average 12 cents a piece (this is without frosting) coming in a variety of flavors, chocolate, banana, peanut butter, and good ol’ vanilla. I went and bought an insane amount of ingredients and started the baking bonanza. They all said it couldn’t be done.

Trash day had more participation than anyone had seen before. Children and parents alike were riding up carts full of trash* from all corners of the town looking for a sweet treat in return. They fucking loved my god damn cupcakes.

*NOTE: “Trash” is an objective term, for some it means waste made by humans including paper, plastics, cans, bottles etc. for others it means all things unwanted. In the case of San Pablo it is the latter, so Trash Day was more like home lawn care day. They pruned their bushes, cut the trees, sweaped the dirty top layer of dirt to leave the more clean shiny dirt underneath exposed, bringing all of this “Trash” to get their cupcakes. It ended up being about 80% organic material collected…. But at least they participated. And then we collected it all and threw it into an uninhabited part of Ecuador without any sanitation facilities in sight. Conclusions: contamination of Ecuador is the same, trash amount in San Pablo is the same, amount of people that think I help, exponentially grown J

Then I went to Costa Rica with my family, and here is what I think about that. Its silly beautiful; they have tons of animals; they have really comfortable places to stay, they have lots of things to do, they take safety measures, they have great looking men, they have really good tasting food from all over the world, they have drinkable water from the tap, they have volcanoes, they have cloud forest, they have beaches, they have a great bar scene with amazing happy hours, they speak English (including the taxi drivers), they have one of the best economies in Latin America, they also have crazy overly expensive everything that by the time you leave your week vacation you not only cleaned out you vacation account but also dipped into your retirement savings without really knowing cause the people are just so nice. So what do I think about Costa Rica, I think you should come to Ecuador instead. We have lots of things to do and many more places to see. Saftey measures are overrated and who travels to latin America to speak English, its much more interesting to not have any idea what they are saying. Along that line, when you travel you should experience local culture including the food, and I sure bet you cant get out of Ecuador without trying the local food, that may or may not be served with a side of Gyardia or helicobacter pylori, but it’s a hard catch to even find Costa Rican gastronomy. To put it more simply, you have a really good chance to lose weight on an Ecuadorian vacation than on a Costa Rican. Also who needs happy hour when at all hours drinks max out at $2.50 and a bottle of rum will set you back a whole $5. So yeah Costa Rica has their shit together, while Ecuador is still hovering in the outhouse but you will have a great time floating in the unknown and get home with enough left in savings that you can come back next year.

Que mas… I am now working for the Defensoria Comunitaria which would be the San Pablo social work and I help out on Saturdays at a new HIV clinic… put shortly I am the epicenter of all ugly rumors and head of knowledge of all the shit you never wanted to know about a town. Like everywhere else in the world, San Pablo has problems of all types… I am thinking about resigning, I just don’t want to know anymore; though because of my new found work I have decided that I either want to be a lawyer or a doctor.  It’s a toss up, one that I need to decide pronto.

I painted Van Gogh The Starry Night on my wall, the whole wall, next to my bed, its really big, it looks great but not as settling as I had hoped. I lay there in bed and from far away its looks real nice but up close you can see every brush stroke and I just cant stop looking, its driving me mad, last night I contemplated cutting my ear off and sending it to Kleber in an envelope. Van Gogh was not crazy he just could not stop looking I totally understand.

Remind me for next time to tell you the story about the gay birthday party I recently attended. 

Gumption

I am reading Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, about 100 pages from the end and good ol’ Robert M. Pirsig started talking about “gumption”. I got super intrigued by the word and how it relates to my life, the more I read the more I realized I need to work on my amount of gumption but it gave me great inspiration to sit down and write a long delayed blog so thank you Robert and your almost intolerable way of writing about the most simple ideas in life.

You know when you start to read a book cause all your friends/more intellectual peers, that you are insanely jealous of, told you they loved the book, and you read and keep reading it, and even after the last page look for more clues of what the hell everyone is talking about. Well that’s me and this zen philosophy long as shit, need every piece of your brain to pay attention or you have to read the page all over again, book. Though I still have another 100 pages so I will keep giving it that chance to blow my mind but so far I think this Robert guy needs a slap back into reality and/or needs to lay off the weed. If you don’t agree with me let me put it this way, who can write 540 pages with the intention of defining a single word but never actually doing it, the dictionary is not even that long.

In other news, I am currently doing a trash brigade of San Pablo. Meaning I am giving lessons to all the school kids in the town and trying to get a town-wide trash pick up day for next Sunday. The kicker is, though I am a volunteer, volunteerism is a very foreign topic, the only way I can get my community members to participate is to reward them with food. So this lovely trash pick up day needs heavy financial support, of which most of you know I don’t have. So I put together a raffle, two prizes, first: 100 pounds of rice; second: a new DVD player. And would you believe that almost no one was interested in the DVD player, but super excited about the rice. Could you even imagine if someone raffled off 100 pounds of spaghetti in the states, I am pretty sure you would get more donations than bought raffle tickets.  Its like the simple buying of a raffle ticket should put you on the dangerously obese list of the national institute of health. I am pretty sure the purchase would make your health insurance rate go up.  Anyway I had about 250 tickets to sell costing $1 each. The prizes were going to cost $60 leaving me with a small pot to buy some sandwiches to supply the trash pickers. I delegated the work by handing out sheets of 12 numbers each to friends for them to sell. I had a meeting in Quito so had to leave site and when I got back 5 days later I had found out that out of 21 sheets 3 and a half had been sold. I went on a raffle selling rampage, selling 6 sheets in three days. Bribing the town drinkers to sell a sheet for free beer (which worked much better than expected).  In the end I made about $70 much less than expected with only a week to pull off some miracles. Hey at least I made $70. 

They made me go to the dentist, I really went in with high spirits, thinking I had gotten over my little girlish freight of all those big bad spinny tools and stainless shiny steel. Within 5 minutes of sitting in the newly bought chair I was quickly reminded that all that fear is definitely still there and my teeth  have not gotten any less sensitive. I tried meditating, which I think is a practiced sport, on the bright side I have a whole other year to hone in on those skills. She had to put two novicane shots in both sides since of course I had cavities (I really like sugar, stop yelling at me at least I don’t really like crack, think about those teeth problems) Once I could no longer feel my nose let alone my teeth I let her start the drilling and I swear after like 15 minutes I could already start feeling it again. I think my relationship with Novocain is synonymous with alcohol, I am just too strong for that shit… And this is not even getting into the nurse lady in charge of the spit sucker thing, she was letting it rest under the tongue around those really sensitive bone bumps that have like minus two layers of skin over them. After I started to wine about that she let it slide into my throat, when I started choking they decided I was too sensitive to handle the spit sucker thing and deduced to just let me spit, me, cant feel my nose let alone handle the functions of my mouth, spitting. An hour later I was out and not talking, those dentists are possibly the only people that can really get me to shut up, and when I get back to the states, am going to look for the first dentist that has no quams about putting me under for a simple teeth cleaning.

In case you did not know I made it through my first year which means I only have one year left, its like shit I got to start doing something. Saving the world might take more than two years in the middle of no where. Especially at this “its too damn hot to walk so I think I will just stroll” pace of my Ecuadorian life. On the bright side I am filling up daily with more and more gumption, at night time I sleep with a blanket comfortably. Next time you see the map look at the equator and all the countries around it, yep all “I want a 100 pounds of rice” poor. It’s just too hot not to sleep, I went to cold quito for a week and did not take a single nap in 5 days, did not even drink coffee woke up at 6:30 every day and not once felt my eyelids sliding closed, it was like I was a whole new gumption filled person.

Finally, I got to see an Ecuadorian rugby game, mens, to put it short they have many years of development ahead. I was begging them to let me play, I really hate this machismo culture, I really could have shown them a few tricks/rules/general rugby ideas. But it was great to see the game expanding to such places as Ecuador, I just feel bad that they are being taught by gringos from the states, who in the scheme of things suck at the game as well and not by some beefy Samoan from new Zealand who could really teach a thing or two. I am going to the local university to see if I can start a team, hopefully behind all those whispy hair surfer guys there are 15 bad asses that want to play in some dirt. I need rugby in my life

Naturally Occurring Mud

My blogging has slowly become a thing of yesteryear. My bad. But it’s a new year, so new blogs and I am going to really try to stay on top of it this time. I think what happened is my life became increasingly less interesting, more of the same but really just saying that I am fooling myself. I think I could live in Ecuador for 15 years and every new week will shock me in another unexpected way. So what has been happening.

Well for chirstmas I went home to rolling hills Pennsylvania to spend some time with the fam and what turned into a 2 week food and alcohol tour. It was amazing. I made it back to Ecuador about ten pounds heavier, possibly still hung-over, with eggnog on my mind, fabulous. I also got to take the cobwebs off my skies and pummel down the slopes for a day with my family, minus mom who went to work instead. I decided that skiing is the most painful fun sport invented, and that is coming from prior black-eyed rugby player. Why you ask? Well due to my personal altitude of almost 6 feet, my blood in cold temperatures likes to stop moving beyond my knees and elbows leaving my poor toes and fingers to fend for themselves in their white deathly state of icicles constantly screaming for help at that wonderfully rich oxygenated blood that just stares from my knees laughing. If I was 5 feet tall, skiing could be thoroughly enjoyable.

As normal travel back to my site in Ecuador posed its own large dilemmas like a two hour delay on my first flight with exactly a two hour layover for my second flight had me literally sprinting through houstan airport to arrive luckily just in time, sweating my ass off but as luck and a lot of things seem to happen in threes, I not only made the impossible happen with making both my flights, but I had been upgraded to shrimp salad, mixed grill, free alcohol, first class seats on both my flights. It was quite possibly the best end to my two week gluten session. The third luck struck when I was trying to get a bus down to Guayaquil to make it back to my site. I was in Quito at about 11 pm fresh off the plane and searching for a bus, I managed to get one of the last tickets that night on one of the last buses back, sitting in the very last seat that really shouldn’t even be there, but was stuck in the very back in the isle row so I had all the leg room in the world. I am not sure how the stars aligned for me that day but I was not asking questions. I made it back. And it was new years.

I was soon informed by my dancer pants best friend and ecua-novio that I had nothing to wear. Shocked as I have more clothes than every peace corps volunteer in Ecuador combined, but I guess I was not prepared for the extensiveness of new years eve in Ecuador. Whether or not you only have 5 dollars to your name you will spend that 5 dollars on a new outfit for the turn of January. The night process goes like this, Mass is at 9 which is held outside because there are too many people to fit inside (I elected to skip the crowd and spend that time changing my outfit 12 times.) It lets out at 10 wherein the whole town meets up with their significant other or best friends, children etc to casually walk in these new outfits up and down the main drag. It reminded me of old community days but with adults and minus the fair rides. You do this till just before 12, just walking and then turning around to walk back and then again and again. Then comes the real excitement. For two weeks prior to new years families make what they call “viejos” which are large paper mache people or animals ie, someone made a Viejo in the form of my ecua-novio, also shrek, penguins, transformers…  they stand between 4 to 7 feet tall, human viejos are dressed in real clothes, paper mache head, if you don’t have a good hand in such artwork you can buy them at local Viejo markets. Well at exactly at midnight they throw the viejos in a pile in front of the house and set them on fire, big bonfire type, while the men grab a bottle of rum or anything alcoholic nearby and start drinking, and the children start to play with the flaming debris. Most people then proceed to have this huge dinner till about 1 am after which you either just keep drinking or go to the dance or both. I personally went to a baptism celebration with ecua-novio and his fam till 4 am and then to the dance until 6 am. My night was so far from my norm new years, which is passed out wasted face by 2am without even a dream of seeing the likes of 6 am or having the human mobility to dance. So it was different, enjoyable, and even further rocked my feminist internal core to vibrations with the cultural rule that only men can enjoy the awesomeness of what is alcohol. But no worries I got mine over chirstmas J

On another note, I started my aerobics class up again and I guess with the images of green been casserole, chirstmas cookies, bagels and their lasting effects on the love handles hovering in my mind, I kicked my own ass, twice, I have been so sore, it feels fabulous. I also gave wings to my raising pigs for money project at the high school with a successful flee market of donated clothes I brought back with me, raising a little over $200. Also having meeting with the parents trying to convince them of how good an idea this is, much harder than I expected. All I asked was for them to send their food trash to school with their kid so we can feed the pig, it turned into a 4 hour contemplation, between 30 parents, over the intricacies of raising pigs, which I really have no knowledge. Also a complete dismissal of all the benefits students get with this kind of responsibility and possibilities of dissections and uses of pig shit. But I think we are moving forward with the idea, and I am just crossing my fingers that some spiritual bunny will come bless me with overflowing knowledge of  pigs, or maybe I should just go with google.

Finally I had a really awesome friend come visit me and in all our combined awesomeness, we went to the banos of san Vicente. Banos meaning bath, but in this instance more meaning mud pit. We hitchhiked our asses there, not taking no for a answer so we could bath in some natuarally occurring mud, like all mud is not naturally occurring… but anway, Its this little compound that has this muddy water pool and when you test out the cold water, your toes get pulled into 2 feet deep of caly/mud. It’s a fairly sizeable ugly area, circumference of 10 or so feet, enough for many visitors to enjoy in the niceties of the mud. When you arrive you see women, children, men alike standing in the muddy water, picking up the clay from the bottom rubbing it all over their bodies, face, hair and all. And then sitting out in the sun to let it dry. I was perplexed but soon joined into the excitement, skipping out on the face, and hair. It has a certain sewage smell to it, I guess its sulfur or some other mineral, but nothing I would put in my nose electively. After we turned into human rhinos we washed off the mud and went into the hot spring tubs, this time regular clear hot bubbly mineral water, still with that same subdued sewage smell.  After a little more normalcy we went for massages ($4) choice of sabila (aloe vera) or more mud. I picked mud, my friend said he had enough of mud and went with sabila. It was a 15 minute process, less massage more like mud/sabila rub down. They heat it up a little and then just spread it all over your body, while trying to make polite conversation. It was at this moment that all my hopes of keeping this naturally occurring mineral mud out of my nose when to shit and the masseuse rubbed it all over my ears, face and yes some in the nostrils. She then promptly kicked me out of the room, covered, having to carry all my things telling me to go let it dry once again and then wash off. I met my friend outside, he seemed to fair better then me as sabila is clear, just kind of looked like he wreaked his car but the air bag was a gelatin bag instead, with the same disgruntled car crash expression, apparently his masseuse could use some hospitality lessons. We washed off, a 15 minute process, (it was in my goddamn ears) and got a ride back to my site. All in all a great experience but prob not going back anytime soon, I will stick with my naturally occurring ocean for now. 

jhalmars got moves

I would guess about now people are wonderin g what i am doing, but before i start this let me warn you that i am using possibly the shittiest key board in exsistence, the keys dont push down, and i also have no patience for  corrections so sorry in advanced. i will try my best...

Tuesday and thursdays at 4pm i teach an arobics class in the tiny village. I get between 4 to 8 women each class. On Thursdays i have my best friend here come in a do dance thearpy for half the class. the women love it, and its hilarious. My classes are a combination of rugby workout, and P90x. Those women are crying by the end, its actually very satisfying. We are on the ground, and up in seconds, high knees, boxings and doing planks. All which lasts about an hour. The women range from 25 to 50 none of whom have ever thrown a punch in their lives, nor have wanted to. So the boxing part of the session is more like fairy dancng with swingnig arms and pointed toes. I have kinda of given up on correct form and have concentreated more on trying to make a women that has lived on the equator her whole life sweat. Its like they dont have glands or something, i am there in the front with two towels and puddle around my feet and these women look like they are ready to go out for the night. Let me remind you it is the cold season still,  i have no idea what i am going to do once it gets hot, bring a kiddie pool or something, and two changes of clothes. But i have succeeded, a couple times i saw a small sweat spot on the back of their shirts, i was pumped.

Then there is thursday class with jahlmar. The moves this kid has would but shakira to shame, no joke. And the new fad in south america is reaggeton. Now is the time to youtube latin reaggeton videos. In case you dont have time, girls and guys of all ages come together on the dance floor and literally have the raunchiest sex with their clothes on. I am talking doggie style, missionary, and 69. I thought the dance floor at bentlys was bad but i have never seen such blantant sexual pelvis moving as i have seen here. So why am i talking about this, well Jhalmar on thursdays for half an hour teaches mothers with 5 kids how to do these moves. We are on the ground, over chairs, face down, going in circles jirating our vaginal areas, it is so uncomfortable its hilrious. These women like most people in the world were not blessed with the possibility to forcefully ossilate the pelvis while shaking the ass and the tits. Lets just say its hard. I am one of the most advanced of the ladies and i look like i am having a seziure. Anyway if you can buy a plane ticket and see for yourself its just that ridiculous.

As for other things i am doing, i started a community bank, and am putting together a world aids day celebration with a parade and activies during the day to educate. Hopefully it will go well. i am also trying to put together a womens soccer league cant wait till they realize that i dont know how to play. I have a speed walking group, they go mid mall pace their little tiny legs just dont permit for speed walking, i am just glad they come. i also ran a ¨"marathon" for the professors of the high schools, it was like 2 to 3 miles, got second in that bitch, took home a trophy. Not gonna lie i have blood on my hands it was totally not fair, these women have never ran further than the bus, and i am not even a teacher, i never even go to the high school, it just so happened i showed up the week of the race and they coerced me into running. I am really happy i did not take home first, they probably would have jumped me.

My puppy is getting bigger still adorable, and i broke up with ecua novio but i think we are still together, it did not work out as i had planned, but hey i have clean clothes thanks to his mom (really awkward), and he is teaching me to make ceviche! There are also an ennumerable amount of rumors about us, i was told we are the number one topic on convo of people in town. I supposedly buy him new clothes, and give him money when he wants, and bother him so much he is obligated to be with me. I also apparently hand fed him bread while walking down the street and he spends every night in my house oh and we are getting married. there are probabyl more that i have not heard yet, i asked him where my ring was. This was all told to me by my host mom who heard it from my host dad who came home very upset saying, "guess what they are saying about our doughter, i cant let them say these things about her" I love them. and it sounds like nothing but this is real serious stuff, novios are not allowed to spend time together alone, let alone stay the night. The questin then arises, how do all these 14 year olds get preggers... i think i am going to give a lesson on birth control and condoms, they will probably believe me now seeings how they think i am have outrageous sex and yet still not pregnant :) Yes there is always an up side.  i guess next time i break up with him i am going to have to do some translation.com look up on how to make it more clear.

anyway love you all, oh and aparently i have lost weight, people comment everyday, i put sole reasoning on the fact that i am not eating a vat of rice everyday now that i live on my own, but keep the compliments coming, its great :)

a whole new year

I am 23 now, seems crazy I remember like it was yesterday turning 21 and heading to Bently’s, miss that. But things change, people change, I have changed. For this entry I am going to do a little review of my past year and then a synopsis of what is new.

A year ago I moved home to reading Pennsylvania to spend my last couple months with my parents before I left the country for 2+ years. Well at least that’s what I told Faith and Mike. In reality I had just spent a summer at the beach with my bff Maggie renting bikes to tourist at the incredible rate of $7.50 an hour for about 25 hours a week and spending the rest of those hours at the Chincoteague inn, golfing and people watching on the best beach in history to partake in such activity. Therefore putting me into a good amount of debt that had to be paid back by the time I left, February. Best option was to live with mom and dad.

So I headed home but stopped by a rugby tournament on the way and accidentally messed up my knee once again putting me on crutches and an immobilizer. Really no surprise there. So in my great attempt to both make money and rehabilitate I got a job at the local meat head “I do roids” station called LA Fitness. I had worked at a gym before in the frat row district in college so I knew my way around the power shakes and boneless skinless grilled chicken diet but never had I encountered such beings that work in a LA Fitness, I said wtf at least 10 times a shift, that plus I was straight up awful at the job, so it was only a 2 month gig .  I then moved on to bigger better positions, one as a sales attendant at Clarks shoe stores and as a waitress at the Rugby Tuesdays in a mall. I worked my ass off seeing how I was in even bigger debt.

It was about November or Decemberish that I got a call from peace corps saying that things got messed up and my departure date was not for another 6 months, but they had a position leaving in February for South America if I wanted it. Though pretty far away from my original plan of Africa working in health, I bought a bottle or two of wine, and invited my bff Beth over to decide with me. Peace Corps gave me two days to decide my fate. Well not hard to put together, I obviously decided that maybe with wine I can speak Spanish and that this was a sign of fate pulling me away from my long time goal of living in Africa. Thanks Beth, I have not regretted it yet.

By February I had pulled myself out of debt, even had some cash in the bank, could size a person’s foot by the sound of their step and knew exactly how cheap the bastards are that live in Reading PA. So yeah I was about ready to leave, plus my faithful car’s heater pooped out on me mid January in the coldest winter PA has had in decades. I packed my bags and alligator and moved far far away. From that point on I think I have it all written in the blogs before this, so if you need to catch up feel free to scroll upwards. Put in short, one of the most sweaty, and tallest Americans was put at zero altitude directly on the equator and told to try to make friends. Against all odds it worked!

Now for what is new. I turned 23, have my very own house (think jail cell) its made out of cement and has bars on the windows but I love my house. I teach aerobics classes in Spanish on Tuesdays and Thursdays . I have my very own garden with some tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, squash, and well I am not really sure. I know what compost is and I have made some. But that’s all well and good, the more important things are that on my birthday I brought home a puppy! The cutest little shit in the world. I named her Isla, that means island, yeah I know its not a name but its her name. She has no race just mutt, officially has gone outside to poop but refuses to pee anywhere but the kitchen floor. But as you sigh don’t forget that my awesome house is made completely out of cement, so who really cares how many times she pees on it, its not like it will get uglier. Isla also has a bad case of fleas and ticks, I call it a fiesta here at my house, with all the wildlife running around. But she is the most adorable little thing that pees when she gets scared/nervous which is exactly what I do so yeah we are life partners.

Second new thing in my life is my Ecua-novio. Ecua for Ecuador, novio for boyfriend. His name is Kleber, which is pronounced clever, now don’t get too excited, this is nothing big or realistic. It is though the best way to learn Spanish, and keep other cat calling men at bay. If you can remember from my other blog, Kleber is the guy I described as the tall one. He is approximately my height, is the only guy in my town with bigger feet than me and thinks I am really cool, therefore puts up with all the times I ask “what?” We will see how this goes… Also if there is a six figure income making guy reading my blog thinking I am the one for him, I want to make it clear that I am very much still on the market J

Oh and before I forget to mention,  I think the purpose of Peace Corps is to make girls like me a little more domesticated, you should see what I have popped out of my kitchen. Some top notch stuff, plus that whole cleaning and putting your shit away after you use it, I had no idea I could ever be this person, well I should say, I had no idea I could ever be my mom J

Argentinian pop god

It was my host moms birthday and i, like a good daughter made her a cake, it liteterally looked like a piece of rounded out shit but it tasted amazing. After they all laughed and took their first bites with extreme caution i got praise of how good it was and many smiles. Due to the good mood, my host mom, sister and aunt decided to go to a free concert held in a nearby city. It was tuesday night about 9 pm when we left the house. I did not exactly want to go since i thought it was folklore music and this just is not my jam. I was somewhat dragged along, not really expecting much but boy was i surprised.

We arrived at the outdoor concert wherr there were another 2000 costal ecuadorians eagerly awaiting the entrance of the main musician. While the pre show acts were still singing their hearts out at a loudly booing crowd my tiny little host family, tiny meaning short, pulled my arm through the crowd as far front as their little legs could take them. Now lets rewind. I almost 6 feet tall walk into a concert of ecuadorians, immediately i can see directly to the stage from the far back, i can even see the performers feet from my view point. I did a couple 360 circles and noticed the only thing i could see were tops of heads, i made eye contact possibly 3 times with little kids sitting on their dads shoulders. So as i march through the crowd with my tiny family the grumbles got even louder, since ever step i advanced, took away the sight of at least 50 people. Anyway i mede it through without any fights so thats positive. Meanwhile we are all waiting for this main performer named bilma palmar. At about 10 30 he arrived and the crowd went wild. Micheal jackson on  his last tour wild. i was like wow this might be good after all. I saw the bass player walk on stage looking like he is right out of some awful emo band, and  a tamborine/shaker player with the same getup. Then the guitarist with long curly hair that touches his shoulder blades and a swinging rag in his back pocket, a little 80s but i can deal.

Once the whole crowd was jumping and screaming bilma the bilma took the stage. In his have to jump to get them on black skinny jeans. Black printed t shirt that just fit over his 42 year old bear belly and accompaning man boobs. This was matched with a pair of three stripe white addidas and long blond hair fashioned in quintisencial 1985 bus driver mullet. Within seconds i was jumping with the crowd, who can applaud a man with that much confidence. For the next 2 hours he sang songs that everyone knew the words, and fist pumped at least every 5 minutes. He tried to sing some american rock songs like "if i stay or if i go now" but the all spanish speaking crowd was not so into it. Lets just say with his kareoke voice and lost sense of style the man knows how to get the crowd going. The alcohol was flowing like crazy and they could not get enough.
 oh i love this place, but i really miss having other people from the states to share these experiences with 

my poor mom

It has been a while, almost two months, so sorry kids, a lot has happened, so here is the condensed version.




I found my house, and was working everyday… now that’s a lie, my host dad Vicente worked on it everyday and I showed up for some gringo support. He was a savior. My family was coming about 3 weeks after I signed up for the house, with the plans that they were going to stay with me here for 3 nights or so. That meant we had to attach the side walls to the roof, build two doors, put a kitchen sink in and connect water, connect water to the bathroom sink, and make a drain for the shower. Also change the faucets, buy an oven and gas tank, and somehow find all those other house necessities, like a bed, dishes, pots, seats, maybe a dresser and so on. So I gave all that I could meaning money, and Vicente and my landlord got it ready. I lucked out hard core on my host family, they almost fully furnished my house and lent me three extra beds for my family that they borrowed from friends and neighbors. Oh, the biggest project of all this was to re do the bathroom, by laying tile, painting, finally buying a mirror, and I must say I cant stop looking at it :) Anyway during all this mess I found out I had an UTI, yeah I know lovely, and the same day also figured out I had head lice, it was an awesome day. I got some medications no problem, but head lice in Ecuador are like roaches, they can live through everything. I daily shampooed with the killing shampoo for like two weeks, and had my host sister pick through my hair two different times, two hours each sitting. I think they finally might be gone…

In my last two weeks at my host families house I was served guinea pig, deer, and multiple whole fish about the size of my man hand which I ate all with a spoon. Guinea pig is traditionally from the mountains of Ecuador but my host mom had two growing and one day the pet dog crunched them, so after many tears marina cooked them up, lets just say not horrible tasting but really not worth the work. There is nothing on those little shits. The deer my host brother watched die somewhere and by bringing it to a vendor he got some to take home and 30 bucks. I was not so pumped to have eaten a deer that died of an infected wound but what can you do. Then the fish, there are at least 500 bones in a fish the size of your hand, I am now an expert and probably can filet any size with my new found knowledge of their internal structures.

Highlight of the past two months was the visit of my parents. Super freaking cool. We built a roof on a gazebo in my park. Planted a garden, danced in the town square, in proto lopez we went whale watching and saw blue footed boobies, plus red footed boobies, and another not every colorful boobie. In mindo we went zip lining over the canopy of a cloud forest through a course of 8 lines, we went partners, upside down, superman style, all while I got to interpret the safety directions to my non Spanish speaking family, you can really get them to believe anything. We then went horseback riding, with my mom that is terrified of horses, my brother and matt that are about the same size of an Ecuadorian horse, and my sister and I who really have no prior experience. While the 15 year old guide was jamming out to his ipod, my brother legs were almost dragging on the ground, my mom could not get hers to move, and my sister and my horse were playing follow the leader, until they decided to race. And yes I mean full gallop race down a path with no care of who was on their back. I actually thought this was the end of my life, as I was bouncing up and down holding on for dear life and screaming, my sister was laughing while also peeing her pants a little, until finally they got tired or something and stopped. About 20 minutes later the guide caught up and brought us back to base camp. Only to find out that matts horse tried to not only brush him off on a tree but also tried to launch him off by jumping with the front two legs. I could not sit right for a couple days, but really “only in Ecuador.” We then went to the tena and got to see the jungle, with monkeys and a huge snake, and beautiful butterflies. Oh and I got to eat some really tastey filet mignons. Really awesome trip, next time any of you see my mom tell her you are proud, cause we kinda made her go through hell in Ecuador in all of our adventures. Did I mention we climbed vertically up a mountain side and repelled down the other side of shear rock wall. Mom your awesome.

So now I am back in my house, its great. One downfall, I have to learn how to cook from scratch, has not gone so well so far, but hey I will either come out of this skinny or the next Julie Childs. Tonight is potatoes, shrimp, and string beans :)

Boys

So don’t get too excited, my love life is anything but booming, it just that in the past couple weeks I have had some very interesting encounters with the opposite sex. Well, as you might have assumed by now, my life is a little lame when it comes to traditional North American views of having a fun night. The highlight of my weekends is normally having a movie night with my youth group. But the fiestas of my town came around, two weekends ago, and my night life took a huge upward surge. We had a beauty pageant, which I am highly considering entering for next year. There was also a burning of this large structure called the castilla, they start at the bottom lighting some small fireworks and then it progresses upward lighting of more spinning, twirling explosions for about two stories in height and at the end 4 or 5 huge fireworks get set off for the finale. Before this spectacular, they had a guy carry a fake cow resemblance on his head and called him the “vaca loco” meaning crazy cow. This was all somewhat amusing until I realized this fake cow structure was loaded with pyrotechnics that would set off at undetermined intervals as he was running through the crowd. This is where I will add no exaggeration, this vaca loco’s main purpose was to scare the shit out of everyone, make every small child cry, and grown men flinch as he seemingly tried to light the crowd on fire with his fireworks. Possibly one of the most dangerous events I have ever atteneded, not to mention there were no firefighters in sight, I just kept saying “not cool” as I watched the crowd scream in terror, but yes it was amusing. The last event of the three day fiestas is a big parade through the streets, I walked with the high school, it was definitely not very exciting.



Now for the good part, every night starting at about 10 or so there is a dance. For the more mundane music, there is a band in the street for the parents to get their groove on, and drink as much beer as possible. For the younger crowd there is this basement type cell, with all the lightings, and sounds of a night club. The cell is about the size of my parents family room that comes equipped with no windows, fans, or any type of ventilation except for the front door that is about the size of a Bilbo Baggins entry. I literally have never felt taller in my life, but across the very dark, incredibly hot space, I spotted a boy that also looked taller than everyone. Being my sometimes over conceded joking self, I told the kids I went with that I was going to make him my boyfriend. That night he had two girl counterparts so I laid off hoping I might get another chance. And I did. The next night, and last night of the fiestas, I went back to the dance cell, and tall boy was there, without girl counterparts. Within 20 minutes of my entrance he came over and asked me to dance (I guess my previous nights scope out/stare down got my point across) I danced with him until I was sweating, literally dripping, on to the ground and then took a break until he asked me to dance again. This whole process of dancing, dripping, cool down, happened about 4 or 5 times, it was then he asked me to go sit on the church steps, and talk, so I will cut to the chase. In about 20 minutes or so he told me he was looking for his soul mate and think he found it in me, and would really like to be my boyfriend. This all happened without even holding hands, nothing. I could not stop laughing and told him I would tell him in a week.



So I think I am going to lay low for a while, this was just way to much excitement.

Hot sauce and hair cutting

Since the beginning of June I have been baptized, became a god mother, and started to feel comfortable with my new home of Ecuador. Yeah its been a good month. Now for a little explanation…


My high school, where I am still “teaching” English three times a week has a yearly celebration called the Nobatada. At said celebration the senior class baptizes the seventh graders, who are the youngest grade in the high school. The baptism is a loose interpretation of what you would see in the church. One senior dresses as the father, there are a couple nuns and other bishops. Then there are three very important devils in tight spandex red outfits sucking on lollipops continuously grinding with the father. I cannot forget to mention that the father is also drunk and smoking weed. After a lengthy presentation of how uncatholic they can be the seniors bring the small innocent seventh graders forward one by one to give them the body of the Christ, being a candy ball with an inside of something grotesque. Each poor kids face turned immediately upside down as soon as one was shoved into his/her mouth, quite hilarious to watch. This year the high school has like 6 new teachers or something crazy, so they decided to make it a full baptism by calling all of us new-bees up. I took my place in front of the father, after I shaked my ass a little for the crowd, and then got to try such wonderful body of Christ, quickly realizing why all the sour faces, because the candy ball was filled with hot sauce!!!! Not sure if you have ever witnessed me eat anything spicy before, but I am one of those kids, yeah one of those who tears up a little, sweats, and looks like she is going to barf. I cannot even explain how awful it was, then they poured water on my head while I was wearing very thin white shorts, luckily they dry quickly.
As for being a god mother, every kid in Ecuador has the pleasure of having three godmothers. One for baptism, one for the first nail clipping, and a third for the first hair cut. Yeah, I am not kidding. This week I was blessed with the opportunity to be a godmother of the first hair cut for Francesco. I will preface this by, it did not go so well and will now explain with some imagery. Take my regular sized hands of a man, put some children’s school scissors in them, and then place a small child in front of them who cannot sit in one place for longer than a second, ok, let describe the kid more accurately like a goldfish, attention span of nothing and always on the move. Not to mention the hair was completely dry and the small child is highly irritated by anything close to his ears. After one snip I told them I did not want to continue on, oh but I did. Seriously, I felt horrible after I saw what I did to this poor kids head. Not one hair was the same length as the next and there is an obvious chunk missing the middle of his head in the back. But they told me I did great and today Francesco asked me to pick him up, we are almost friends.
Why am I starting to feel comfortable? It simple and for anyone that has lived with me for any period of time over a month will fully understand. I have started to only shower twice a week. I am on a Sunday, and Thursday ritual now. I might take another shower during the week if I do any type of hard exercise but even then it all depends on how long of a time period it is between the stopping of dripping sweat and reaching my house. If the equation leads to more than two hours, I probably wont shower. But again if you have ever lived with or near me this is no surprise. I have always like to savior my showers by not taking them often so when I do they are that much better. Plus the not having a mirror thing takes away that whole idea that my hair is greasy cause really I have no idea, and having to shower in ice water also does little to promote the idea of taking them more frequently.
Few other side notes: I got the opportunity to talk to one of the local prostitutes that works illegally in my town with some visiting med students. We learned some awesome things, like she gets tested monthly for STD’s and AIDS, she makes about $5 per visit, and told us she always uses condoms with her guests. She was also very grateful that we came to visit because most people regard her as trash. It was actually a really cool experience, so if you ever find yourself with some friends passing by the local brothel, take a break from your busy lives and talk to one of the ladies, it’s great. I also have started to play basketball with the kids in my town, let just say I might as well be Michael Jordan to these kids. They have no chance with my height and that I have been taught how to dribble. To negate their downfalls they have resorted to literally jumping on my back every time I have the ball. Very soon I will be have a small info sesch on the rules.

Motor oil... what?

I officially have two and a half friends. They are a 17 year old, and 15 year old and a 14 year old boys in my town. The half is because i dont think the 14 year old would hang out with me if it was not for the other two. Well, I was pretty desperate one friday evening as i was planning my 10 o`clock bedtime and comtimplating whether i wanted to watch the only movie i have over agian and i heard some of the neighborhood kids outside so i went to join them. We got into conversation of bad words in english, and in this low, i have no life, i feel like a grandmom, i gave in and started to teach them the finer words in our lovely language. This of course escalated, of which i wont go into many details, but the one kid asked what you should use for lubricant, and before i could respond his friend said, well of course motor oil. Yes, he said motor oil. I almost lost my cool immediately but decided instead to use it as an awesome informal education moment. I quickly dispelled the beliefe that motor can be used, and that not only can you not use it but it might actually kill the girl. So if you were wondering what jrex was doing in Ecuador to help save the world, rest assure, that i am saving lives, dispelling one myth at a time. Oh and making some awesome friends.

Me and said friends are going tomorrow to buy seeds for the garden we are growing with the youth group, also buying movies and baking ingredients because this saturday we are playing movies for the town to raise some money and selling COOKIES!!! Not sure if i can describe how pumped i am for cookies its been a while.

My counterparts Aleida and Gonzalo gave me a bike so that i dont have to walk 25 minutes to school everyday, i rode it one day and now i cant sit down because my butt is so bruised from the bumpy dirt road and the bad positioning of my bones, I walked the bike back, my town laughed at me. I am going to see what i can do about a new more comfortable seat. Also i was invited to be apart of the high school baptism that they do every year where the seniors baptize the seventh graders. I asked what they wanted me to do and was told that i should be the devil. Beside the initial hurt i asked what the job of the devil was and it is to wear a very small red outfit with a tail and grind with the priest. I think i am going to dodge this one with all my effort. Not really in my plans to get down to reaggeton with a 17 year old student of mine.

Besides that i am eating a lot of fish, still dont think i like fish, but it goes down, and they are starting to give me smaller portions. not much smaller but anything helps.

Baby´s dont like mustard

I have mentioned before that i live with a family that has a one and a half year old little boy running around being a tyrant at all times. Me and him are not what you would call good friends, but we have this special pact. He loves food, and i always have extra, i also eat by myself inside cause my mom says i will get eaten by mosquitos if i eat outside sooo... little baby is always at my lap smiling to be fed, and what does he get? He gets rice, white lovely rice, and i get to bring my plate back with a little less food on it, could not have created a better solution if i tried.

So little baby boy, named Franchesco, is being weened off of breast feeding. But Franchesco really likes breast milk and i think just the whole aroma around the feeding time. Anyway, to get him to not appreciate his moms boob, she smears mustard on it and when he asks/cries for some milk, him mom pulls out her mustard covered tit and chases him around with it. Yes chases him around cause the whole family is there cracking up thinking this is soo funny and completely normal. I have to agree it is hilarious cause Franchesco really does not like mustard and just seeing the family laugh while my sister has her boob hanging out makes me appreciate my surroundings so miuch.

My family here on the coast has a washing machine, i was sooo pumped! Sunday morning i went to use the washing maching thinking, i have it made in the shade (aka not having to scrub my clothes by hand in the sun) After the cycle was over, my mom told me to bring my clothes over to the washing tubs and proceeded to have me scrub my clothes by hand. Four different times. and then a rinse out cycle. WHY THE HELL DO THEY USE THE WASHING MACHINE??? have not figured it out yet either :( quickly became not so pumped, oh and of course they find me completely amusing laughing at the sweat rolling down my face.

I was also taught how to clean a fish, and brought to the lovely sardine "factory" The main reason i never liked/ate fish is that horrible smell before it gets cooked, not sure the sardine factory helped, and when i say factory i mean a tin roof about 100 feet long with tables of fish under it and men and women descaleing, then chopping off their head, tail, and intestines, in such a rythmic fashion you cant peel your eyes away. They get 30 cents a bucket and can make like $15 a day which is awesome since monthly family income is around $180 per month.

Me and my family are bonding and in a couple weeks i think i am going to start teaching an areobics class... yeah call me bo banks i am going to put these ladies through some serious cardio hahahahaha

of course it still runs

I am going to concentrate this post on my daily surroundings so whoever decides to read it has a better understanding on what i see everyday. I might get off track, sorry.

My little neighborhood is made up of 44 houses, not all of them are occupied, but there are 44 houses. They were placed in perfect order, 5 rows, with 10 plots in each, one is occcpied by a "park", another by a communuty center, another by a day care center, and a few others that have nothing on them. In two months i will be moving into the aforementioned day car center, fully painted with pooh bear, tigger, rainbows, and butterflies, but not gonna lie i am PUMPED! Why you ask... well the house i live in now is probably one of the more luxureous of the neighborhood. In total it is about the size of my family room including the bathroom in pennsylvania. It is cement blocks put together in a rectangle with a wall down the center splitting off the bedrooms. One side of the wall has a plastic couch, and a tv, also a bathroom with running water and huge shower, the other side was split into three rooms, mine is the middle. I originally thought that cement walls would be good sound barriers, but alas nope. They hear me every time i have explosive diahrrea, and i hear my dad snoring at night, though that just reminds me of home.  What does not remind me of home, is a 1 and 1/2 year old nephew that i have. he is absolutely adorable and then he starts crying at 3 am. Still love him though, but i think i will love him even more from my own house. Hot water does not exsist, only water that was sitting in the pipes and the sun heated it up, but that ends in about t minus 10 seconds, never knew i would thouroughly enjoy a cold shower, but i do, i do a lot.

Other point. i would really really like to sleep until 9 am, and watch a movie in the middle of the day, or lay in a hammock reading my book. BUT (big but) my family is expecting so much of me, every day i wake up and they ask me what i am going to do, when i lack and awesome answer i see their dissapointment. I am living there for no rent and they feed me like crazy, so i really do need to prove my worth, but i cant wait to live in my own place. Oh and once i move i am buying a dog so i have an obligatory friend. Oh and i then get to cook for myself and maybe never eat rice again.

To get away from my town, that is to go to school, to get lunch, to get the internet, to see life, i have to either walk for 25 minutes and arrive soaked or take a truck. Obviously taking a truck is preferable, but they never come around, i end up waiting for an hour or more until a car comes so i can get on with my day. The cars here ligitametly look like they were found in a junk yard and with some gas and a high spirit they run. The other day i got a ride with my family in a short bus. Imagine, outside colored the brillant array of lime green, blue, and orange fringes. Driver sits on a lawn chair rigged to the floor, i sit on a metal bench. There are 5 full cracks going from top to bottom of the windsheild rigt infront of the dirvers face. The stick shift is just barely in reach of the driver if he stays in the low gears, reverse is out of the question, and obviously none of the meters on his dash have worked in years. Astonishingly enough I am comfortable.

Mothers day is a HUGE deal here. the school has a big program for all the moms to come, and as i witnessed, embarress themselves full time. The different grades make recycles outfits that the moms wear for a fashion show. They make them do potato sack races, and carry a lemon on a spoon in your mouth. Its two hours of making moms do ridiculous things, but they get presents for it. Then the whole weekend everyone gets wasted in celebration of their moms. I think i might try to bring this tradition back with me. They stay up drinking in the streets playing music, and dancing till around 4 or later. It was pretty incridible, as an outsider i kept having to remind myself that this is for mothers day. So i definietly drank one for you mom :)

Also if you read my last blog, i will let you know that i am not gaining weight. Not sure how it is possible but i recently saw a mirror, and got to see what i looked like. Havent really changed much, fit into my tight clothes a little better, and got somewhat of a tan going on. I can only attribute the lack of extra poundage on the extreme loss of daily water weight. but i am not complaining.  I also went for a run yesterday and got chased for 10 minutes by a pack (10+) dogs, barking biting at me. I definetly peed a little bit as snapping mouths were only centimeters from my ankles, it was like i could already see the blood spewing. Made me run faster though, but probably not going to take that path again.

also i saw a real city, with life, and people, and restaurants of more than one food choice, it was incredible.

i would like some white rice, with some more white rice thanks

they feed me a lot.

they  feed me alot for breakfast (three scrambled eggs, 5pieces of toast, and a block of cheese)
they feed me even more for lunch (hot bowl of soup, heaping plate of white rice with a cut of meat and potatoes)
then they feed me dinner (mountain of pasta with meat, with another half a plate of white rice)

there are some types of food you can shove down your throat, white rice would not be one of them. oh yeah neither is hot soup when it is 90+ degrees. Never knew, imagined, dreamed it was possible that activating my metabolism when i eat makes my body work hard enough to start sweating. yeah i am that obese single guy in the corner of denny´s gulping down his grand slam while dripping through his shirt.

I started my english classes, i teach about 6 classes a day three times a week. The one teacher just has me aid her in pronunciation, and grammer while she leads, the other teacher leaves. yep, just walks out right after he gives me a theme like the seasons or time. Cant lie though it is high entertaining. The kids, and when i say kids i mean high school, i teach a 19 year old, well the kids just stare at me waiting on my ever move, and they know almost zero english so i conduct the class is spanish, which is the enteraining part. a back a forth convo i can do, but a lecture for 45 minutes is totally another ball game. So i just start talking, and they are way too afraid to laugh at me so instead i just start cracking up cause i know i soud ridiculous, and i also make jokes that no one gets so laugh a little more. All in all they love me.
I had a class for 2 hours yesterday, 2 straight hours. after the first i asked them what they wanted to do. they replied SING!!! meaing me sing. so i did. i wrote down the lyrics and sang the second hour away. The one teacher returned to class... and took up a seat with the students to listen. maybe next week we will learn how to dance. Life in general is just ridiculous

i am starting a vegetable garden so i can one day eat a salad instead of more rice, and i went to a huge mall with a costco type store about 30 min from my site, and found snack packs!!! After a day of barely understanding what is going on, and constently looking like an invalid, the sweet taste of something familiarjust fills your soul with joy. Not sure how else to explain it, but the sight of a snack pack was like seeing the fountain of youth. I eat doritos, a lot of doritos, because i can relate the taste to something before 3 months ago. So sad and yet sooo satisfying.

and after rereading this we can all probably assume that i am getting fat...
Yes its an assumption cause i have not seen a mirror in weeks, i am now starting to understand why.

Shits and Swearing in the Jungle

Two weeks ago i left my security town of Cayambe, and my mom Anita, and everything i knew to go on a technical trip with 8 other natural resource volunteers around the interworkings of humidity and mosquitos! Before i left i gave my family an easter basket since i left them on easter and they absolutely loved it! I went out and bought a basket and put in it a bunch of stuff my mom sent me from the US including a blanket, a bunny, cadbury eggs, hot chocolate, and isntant coffee. I added some movies and popcorn and i think i entered their family immediately. Oh i also made them my moms famous baked ziti before i left as well. I think they enjoyed it but i added way too much cheese (and for me too much cheese i thought was impossible, i regularly eat a mound of mozzarella as a mid afternoon snack but that was until i tried some of my baked ziti) Nonetheless they ate it and had seconds. I was also able to watch the holy week parade which i was there for about an hour and saw the original design for the KKK outfit which was stolen from this parade by some white americans a bunch of years ago. Quite difficult to look at with feelings of easter in mind but made for some awesome pictures. A man had an eplieptic seizure at my feet, we hurdled my 9 year old sister dresssed in a very cute pink outfit over our fence about 10 feet high. But my sister is about 4 feet tall and her mom is like 5 feet so you do the math and pictured how that worked out... i sat back and watched in fits of laughter, this was all because we forgot out keys opps! I then followed the first dramitacally hot ecuadorian that i have seen around a church and down a couple blocks and then took a ride on a large motorized worm through the streets of the town with my mom and sister. All in all a very eventful good friday!

Another feat that i accomplished was hiking ( it will be my first and last time) It took about 3 hours to summit what i thought was going to be ahill but ended up being a mountain. Pretty much did it on my own becasue i was soooo slow and dieing slowly, stopped half way up bymyself and had a nutter butter snack break (best idea ever, also biggest fat kid move i have done in a while) made it to the top not wanting to move any more and ate two sandwhiches only to descend by sliding on my but a good 1000 feet cause it was just soo much easier that way and at the bottom deciding that hiking really is just not for me but nutter butters are.

I then left for my technical trip. and on the second day when we learned about watershed management i witnessed three 8 year old boys crucify (without the nails and blood) one of their friends on a cross they constructed out of two 3by4s held together by wire in the middle of a park. Possibly one of the most hilarious events i have ever witnessed. He was too heavy to actually lift him in the upright standing position on the cross so they kept dropping him and using very innovative ways to make the structure more secure. Little boys all over the world do the craziest things. Oh and about this time i got my first bought of diarrhea. Started slow and manageable until i entered the jungle...

Yeah we went to a "dry jungle" where it rains every day half of the year, rains so much it is requitred to wear big rubber boots to wade through the 6 inches of mud laying everywhere. The humidity was about 100% and i quickly realized that living in a dessert has huge perks and also impressed myself with the amount of sweat one person can produce when not moving. At various moments i would stop and just shake my head for about a minute (like a dog would his body) to splash the sweat off of my face. I officially got my entire fabric of shorts soaked without going into any body of water, meaning the previous "look like i peed my pants" actually connected on the sides all the way to the seems at the bottom. I know i know impressive. BUT i got to see gigantic turantulas, wild howler and onther type of monkey in the trees, a cute white fuzzy caterpillar that if you touch it that entire body part goes numb for about an hour and tones of gigantic trees you could probably sleep in if it was not for the aforementioned dangers. Oh and i saw a huge gigantic one of those famous turtles and fed it bananas! In this jungle we stayed at a volunteer house with no electricty and a dry toilet. which is an outhouse without the water or the nice smell.. and in about a year after some good use the human shit turns into really good compost. who would have thought.  Sounds like a great idea, you get rid of water pollution and put nutirents in your soil for free. yeah very cool until you consider a statement i made before... Diarrhea, all of a sudden not soo cool audibly shitting into a trench on an uncleaned toilet by candlelight. Hence the title shitting and swearing in the jungle. But hey i just made the decomposition that much faster for some awesome organic compost.

After the jungle we spent 5 days at a beach resort in the esmeraldas which i am now certain has the most beautiful people in ecudor, like abercrombi modle ready. I swam in the ocean everyday, but bit and sweated some more. got to use water running toilets for my digestion problems and ate shirmp for about 3 meals a day. really good fresh shirmp. We returned to meet up with everyone for our final week this past friday and take our final tests before coming a volunteer. I think i passed but my number twos have now become fully number 1s just coming out of the other hole... if you can believe it, kinda of amusing cause at all times it just sounds like i am peeing to outsiders but little do they know, i am not! They want me to give a stool sample which will also be quite humerous cause i have not seen anything solid come back out of me in a while but i am going to give it a go. Luckly i feel fine so no worries there but i will let you all know if i got some sort of cool worm.
This thursday is the official swearing in day, when i get to be an official Peace Corps volunteer and my 2 years commence! Pretty pumped to take my oath and see what other crazy adventures lay ahead for me :)