Friday, May 10, 2013

Weekend loneliness


Warning: This will not be a positive post.

That doesn’t mean that I’m so incredibly unhappy here that I want to go home the next chance I get. I felt like writing about another aspect of living abroad since I haven’t in awhile. The thing is, sometimes, I feel really lonely here. It’s not that I don’t have friends or things to do. Rather, it’s that the people I spend my time with all have things to do outside of me. I’m not the center of anyone’s world (not that I want to be – that’s a lot of pressure) so I do sometimes end up alone.

I usually feel this the most on weekends. The problem is that the people I spend the most time with are either Ecuadorian – and thus have their own families and lives that make demands on their time – or foreigners who have other demands on their time during the weekend. I don’t mean to say that I end up staying at home, by myself, every single weekend; but I do spend a significant amount of time alone on Saturdays and Sundays. Maybe that’s my fault…I don’t know.

In the States, this wouldn’t always bother me because there are so many things I can go do by myself. And while I’m not afraid to go do things by myself here, I don’t feel I have as much freedom as I do back home for safety reasons. I won’t be out by myself after dark, for obvious reasons. But I also try to avoid certain areas and certain activities during the day as well. I won’t go see a movie by myself, for example. I also won’t go walking around the Mariscal alone since it’s known to be full of tourists, and hence, a target for thieves.

Additionally, spending lots of time with Ecuadorians stresses me out because I’m so terrified of offending someone. For example, I enjoy spending time with my boy’s family because they’re so nice and treat me very well. Yet, I’m so afraid of doing something offensive or wrong that I sometimes prefer not to see them when I’m low on energy or not feeling well. This creates a problem on weekends since that’s how a lot of Ecuadorians spend their free time – with family.

In case you’re wondering, this all came up because I feel lonely now. I had plans to go on a weekend trip with a friend, but I had a lot of grading and she wasn’t feeling great. I was asked to spend time with family, but since I also haven’t been feeling great lately (something’s going around), I’m not sure I’ll go – especially since grandparents are involved. They tend to terrify me on a whole other level.

I guess my point is that even with friends and significant others, living in a foreign country can be lonely. After living there for a while, the energy boost that comes from wide-eyed, childlike curiosity over everything wears off. You find yourself back in your normal style of living. Maybe it’s just me, though. Maybe everyone who’s lived abroad is reading this and thinking I’m an idiot. Well, at least I’m doing my best. I’m usually quite happy, but sometimes personality happens. Everyone has different experiences. Perhaps this will become irrelevant next cycle when I begin teaching on Saturday mornings. We’ll have to wait and see.

Now to end on a positive note:


Starting at the top - Israel, Iris, me (obviously), Cesar


Sunday, March 24, 2013

Cuyabeno Trip

I'm sorry I haven't written or posted anything here for awhile. I guess getting settled into living here has really cut down the things I have to write about. Anyway, this blog will mostly be pictures. But for the first week of this break, I took a trip to the Amazon jungle with my friend Iris. We stayed at a lodge in he Cuyabeno Reserve. It's a national reserve to help preserve part of the rainforest. The lodge is located 2 hours by boat from the border of the reserve. It's not actually on the Amazon river. It's located on a tributary of it named the Cuyabeno river. We stayed for 4 days & 3 nights, although 2 of those days were actually spent traveling. It took about 15 hours to get from Quito to the Jamu lodge. Normally, you take an 8 hour bus from Quito to a town called Lago Agrio. However, a bridge somewhere along the route was washed out from high levels of rain so the route was longer - 11 hours. Then, it's a 2 hour chartered bus ride to the entrance to the reserve. After, a 2 hour canoe ride to the lodge. Anyway, here are the pictures.


In the canoe on the way to the lodge



Entrance



On the Cuyabeno River. The water is brown from all the sediment and minerals.





Monkey


Baby anaconda


Sloth


Our room



Walkway from the lodge to the canoes





On the way to Laguna Grande





Floating forest


Walking in the forest

Cicada nest

Walking palm tree







Walking through the swamp

Orchids

More swamp


More orchids plus our guide



The main lodge



One of the cabins

Fishing for piranhas

Small white piranha

Check out those teeth



Isn't it beautiful?









We went on a night walk to see insects.

Golden silk spider

Caiman (like small versions of alligators)

Indigenous community we visited to learn how to make yucca bread.


Their garden

Papaya 

Starting to peel the yucca

Yucca actually comes from the roots of a tree

Peeling the yucca

Fire to cook it

Grating the yucca

Then rolling it up in a mat

Squeezing it to get all the water out

Sifting it once dry

Cooking it

Blurry picture, but it's grainy

Finished

Night monkeys peeking out of a hole in their tree

Playing a dart game

More sunset pictures



A caiman at night. It was too dark to get anything but the creepy eyes.

Snake

Jumping in the laguna

My travel buddy

Another snake


Muddy boots and pants after a long hike.

Travel buddy and tour guide

Floating in the laguna

Monarch butterfly



Blue & yellow macaw