Welcome to the Jungle

This weekend, I went on an adventure to Tena. Tena is located about 6 hours (by bus) to the East of Quito.  It's a small town in the Amazon jungle. On Saturday morning, at 6 am, a group of us took a bus there. We arrived around noon, where it was extremely humid. After finding a nice hostel and eating lunch, our hostel owner took us to las cavernas jumandy.

Of course, on the way there, we had no idea what was going on. We thought he was taking us to see some waterfalls. When we got there, we saw a pool with water slides. We were told we weren't allowed to wear our flip flops, but had to wear boots (like rain boots). We were also only allowed to wear our swimsuits, and not our clothes. At this point, everyone was extremely confused, but decided to go along with it. Finally, after everyone had stored their stuff, put on their puts, paid their $1, we found out. We were going to explore a series of caves in the dark. We were given some headlamps and a flashlight. Our guide took us through the caves - complete with bats, lots of water, and a mud bath. It was pretty exciting; definitely a good decision to just trust our hostel owner.

On Saturday, while five people went white water rafting, I went on a jungle tour with two other girls. Our guide took us climbing up waterfalls and swimming in our clothes. It wasn't the heart of the jungle or anything, but it was still pretty exciting. I did get some bug bites - because the water from the waterfalls washed off my bug spray - but none of them itch. :-)

Finally, we took a bus back to Quito at 5 pm, and I got home around 10 pm. Unfortunately, the next day, I was really tired from traveling, but it was still a ton of fun. :-)

Another week, another adventure.

This week's adventure is brought to you by my host family, but indirectly. As you may have guessed by now from my posts, I have the best host family ever. They are always giving me little presents, taking me places, and making sure I'm happy. Well, weeks ago I mentioned to my host dad that I wanted to get a tattoo to commemorate my year in Ecuador. When I told him, I was thinking I'd wait until I got back to the States because I didn't know what I wanted and because I was afraid of the cleanliness of tattoo parlors here. However, it turns out that, among all the other connections my family seems to have, there is also a tattoo artist in the family.

Another volunteer and I went to meet him about a month ago. Emily had a vague idea of what she wanted, but I didn't. I knew I wanted something Ecuadorian, but I hadn't really found a symbol that I liked. Andres suggested a couple different things, and I decided on an indigenous cross. Emily and I had to leave pretty soon after that, since I had to get to work at 4, but we planned to come back in a week or so to see the drawing and for Emily to get her tattoo.

Anyway, to make a long story short, I finally got time to go back on Wednesday to get my tattoo done. (Finances and long holidays prevented me from going earlier.) I really like my new tattoo, and am happy I got it done here. It's on my back, across from my chalice too. I'm considering asking Andres to touch up my chalice one, since I don't like how it healed with some light spots. But that will have to wait, again for monetary reasons. (For those of you wondering, this new one was $70.)

As for the rest of the week, I've pretty much just been teaching. There was a power outage for a few hours yesterday, but CEC has a generator so we still had classes. However, I had about half of my students because there was a big soccer game in Quito. (I'm going to be honest: I can't remember if it was against Peru or Paraguay.) I was also planning on going to Ambato this weekend, but I'm simply too tired, and decided it would be better to just stay and chill in Quito. But next weekend, I hope to visit Tena in the Oriente, so I figure it's a good idea to just relax this weekend. :-)

Is this real life?

So last week, the whole country took a long break from class and work, Wednesday through Sunday. During this break, I traveled to the coast where 16 WorldTeach volunteers were gathered to chill and have fun. We went to a town called Montanita; a small little tourist town with a pretty beach, tons of hostels, clubs, and cocktail stands lining the streets. Needless to say, it was madness. So of course, I don't have a lot of pictures, but I'm still going to use those to show what it was like, rather than explaining everything. (Mostly because I don't really have time to try to describe everything.)

There trip to Montanita took 14.5 hours (10 hours in a bus, an hour for dinner, and then 3 hours in a taxi), so this was quite necessary.

 Chilling on the beach the first day. :-)

 Check out all the rainbow umbrellas. Literally, they were everywhere, as was the blasting pop & salsa music.

 My first hostel was down at this end of the beach.

Iris and I love WorldTeach.

Out in the waves. The water was actually pretty warm, since it's the Pacific Ocean. However, when the sun went away, it got chilly.

Frisbee on the beach, with a local 3-legged dog.

 Robert and Jessica went surfing. Jessica's board was too heavy for her to carry, though. (It was twice her size, after all.)

 Parasailing! I really wish I'd gone. :-(

 James goes out to teach Jessica how to surf while Robert got pulled down the shore line by the tide.

So that's what the beach part of Montanita looks like. I didn't take any of the little town or the 2 hostels I was in, but they were very colorful and full of rainbow umbrellas and tiki decorations. As for why I was in 2 hostels: I stayed with Iris and Jessica in Casa del Sol for the first 2 nights. On Friday, they went to Manta, and I decided to stay, so I went to Elizabeth, Johanna, and Grace's hostel for Friday night. On Saturday, the 10 of us remaining headed back to Guayaquil. I spent Saturday night in Guayaquil at a hostel with Elizabeth, Johanna, and Robert. We got to hang out with Jorge and CJ for a few hours, which was fun since I haven't seen either of them in a month. On Sunday, Robert, Elizabeth, and I flew back to Quito.

It was a fun vacation, but I'm happy to be back in Quito. I love the sun, but I don't like having sand everywhere, all the time. I also like having access to water 24/7. The second hostel I stayed in did not always have running water. Also, if I have a choice (which I do), I prefer the mountains.

One Week of Teaching = Done

So I have now hit the one-week mark teaching classes. I am teaching Advanced 1, from 4 pm – 6 pm and 6 pm – 8 pm. So far, it’s been stressful because the two classes have vastly different personalities. My first class is made up of colegio (high school) students who seem like they couldn’t care less about the class. For student teaching in the States, I was able to energize my HS classes by using a lot of references they knew (pop culture, mainly). Here, though, I don’t really know that much about the pop culture. I’m working on it, but I can only do so much in a day. It also doesn’t help that I have to constantly tell them to get off their cell phones and stop using Spanish. I’m not a fan of being the bad guy. :-( My second class is made up of university students and working young adults (20s and 30s). They are fantastic; they always seem so happy to be in class.

Friday is the first exam of the cycle. CEC sets exam days and gives us the exams for students to take, so all I have to do is make sure no one cheats (constant vigilance!) and then grade the exams.

Then, next week will be awesomeeee. But before I get to that, last Saturday, I went to the giant basilica here in Quito. It’s a gothic-style building, but with a twist. Instead of gargoyles, the architect used animals from the Galapagos Islands. It looks pretty awesome. For $2, you are also allowed to climb all the way to the top and look at Quito. However, to get to the top, you have to cross a rickety wooden bridge, and then climb some steep, open, terrifying ladders. Naturally, I only made it across the rickety wooden bridge and up one terrifying ladder. (One ladder goes to a landing where you can see out, and then two more go all the way to the top.) Despite being completely incapable of conquering my fear of heights, the view of still lovely. :-)

Anyway, next week: the whole country basically goes on vacation from November 2 until November 7. Naturally, this means I do not have to teach. Instead, a large group of WT volunteers are planning on renting a beautiful villa in Montanita (a town on the coast) and chilling. I expect this will be absolutely amazing. I love Quito, but it is a tad chilly. And I am super excited to see everybody. Right now, the Quito people who are going are in the process of buying bus tickets there/plane tickets back, so hopefully everything gets worked out so we can go.

Lately, my house has been having problems with the water. Randomly, the water will stop working and will not come out of any faucet. Luckily, this has not happened at a time when I need to shower (that would be bad), but I would like to be able to wash my face at night and brush my teeth. My family is working on fixing the problem, but because they can’t figure out what the problem is exactly, this is proving difficult. So for now, I just keep hoping there’s water when I need to shower or eat.

Otherwise, everything is going well right now. Unlike last week, when I had to plan day-by-day, this week I have every day planned out so I’m less stressed. Everything’s going well with the host family; no major health issues yet. Just excited for next week! 

Can one day of adventure make up for a not-so-exciting week?

Already, I’m falling behind in my goal to write once a week. It’s just too difficult to keep up with! And it’s not like I really did anything very exciting last week anyway. Mostly I hung around the house, except Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday afternoons when I went to “work”. However, I didn’t really do much there, either. Right now I’m supposed to proctor placement exams (remember classes start the 18^th) and grade them, but last week the coordinator I work with did most of it for me.

I think the biggest thing to happen was on Sunday. Sunday for my family, and I think a lot of families in Ecuador but I’m not sure, is family day. My family usually spends Sunday being active and/or having an adventure. This past Sunday was definitely Family Adventure Day. We drove to the southern part of Quito, near the Panecillo [a giant Virgin Mary statue; she is the patron saint of Quito], to a beautiful overlook call El Cinto. Here there’s a church located down the side of the mountain; I believe it was called “el cinto de la virgen” but I can’t remember. There were a lot of people around attending church, selling food, etc. From this overlook you could see the path the lava takes when Pichincha decides to erupt. It’s an active volcano, although I believe there’s only been ash lately. Everything was extremely green, and you could see little pueblitos down in the valley.

Afterwards, my family decided to drive down into the valley. We passed through one of the little pueblitos and kept going for about an hour. The country was extremely beautiful, but the road was pretty terrible, as it wasn’t paved. There were a ton of little places to eat advertising fresh trout (trucha), chicken (pollo), and guinea pig (cuy). Every so often we would stop at one of these places and my dad would ask how much far to the “aguas termales”. I had no idea what these were, and was really afraid we were driving all this way for some special drink. If I didn’t like it, I was going to feel really terrible after all the effort.

Finally, we reached a fork in the road with an entrance gate to Urauco. After paying the entry fee, we drove on for another 10 minutes. At the end of the road were some natural pools, one heated by water from Pichincha. This was what was meant by “aguas termales”. Unfortunately, none of us had brought swimwear, so I just looked at the pools. Really, just looking at them was nice too because they were nestled in a valley between some mountains and thus surrounded by greenery.

But this was not the end of the adventure, of course. Apparently there were some very pretty waterfalls up in these mountains surrounding the pools. So naturally, we were going to climb the mountain to look at the waterfalls. Having only gotten 2 hours of sleep the night before, because I was hanging out with another WT volunteer and some Ecuadorians, this did not initially sound like an awesome idea. However, the waterfalls were definitely worth it. Not gonna lie, I was pretty scared during some of the climbing as parts were really steep and you had to hold onto ropes to keep your balance. But my family kept encouraging me, and I was doing better then Chiqui (the family Chihuahua, he always comes out with us on Sunday), so it wasn’t too bad. The scenery was beautiful, and it was lightly raining/misting so it was nice and cool.

After we returned from our mountain trek, Ariel stripped down to his undies and swam in the heated pool while the rest of debated whether to eat at the pools or at one of the little stands along the drive back. My family really wanted me to try the trout, so somewhere along the road was decided as best. Unfortunately, as we drove back, we discovered none of the places advertising trout actually had any. I suspect this was back it was already about 2:30, and most of the people were eating as we drove up. Eventually we had to settle for chicken in the little pueblito we’d passed through on the way up. I think my family was a little sad about this, but I thought the soup was good so it was fine with me.

So that was my big adventure for the week. This week I’ve been basically doing the same as last week, although I did hang out with another WT volunteer (Emily M) on Monday before work. Luckily, I’ve actually been doing work at work this week, too, so I’m not as bored. Yesterday the U.S. played Ecuador in a soccer game, so that was also fun to listen to while working. (Ecuador won, naturally.) Tomorrow, my dad is taking me and Emily M to meet a tattoo artist that he knows (he’s the cousin of my dad’s nephew), so that’ll be interesting. If I can find a symbol of Ecuador that I like, I will be getting another tattoo while here. But I have a year, so I’m not in a big hurry to get that done.  So yeah, that’s about all I’ve got for now. Hopefully I’ll actually remember to write again on Sunday. It looks like I may climb Pichincha with Emily M or hit up Otavalo again. Who knows, it’s only Wednesday.

Some more fun facts about Ecuador:

1) Despite $20s being large bills, ATMs here usually only dispense 2 $10s and the rest of your cash in $20s. However, I got lucky yesterday and got all $10s.

2) Chocolate chips don’t exist here. You’d have to crush a chocolate bar, essentially.

3) The rainy season seems to be starting. You can usually expect it rain every afternoon now around 2 – 3 if you’re in Quito.

4) Smashing your finger in a car door hurts just as much here as it does in the States. (OK, so that one wasn’t really about Ecuador. I just had to mention that my finger is still bruised and swollen from shutting it in a car door Saturday night. But luckily I can use it again to type.)

Last week of orientation

My goal for this year (where this blog is concerned): write once a week. Quite honestly, I hate writing. Journaling, blogging, essays…I hate all kinds of writing. Usually I have some good ideas up in my head, but when I actually sit down and try to write, I discover that I don’t want to commit my thoughts to paper. I’m sure there are a number of reasons behind this, but because it’s not something I’ve needed to change, I haven’t bothered to figure out what they are.

Anyway, this past week was the last week with all 41 volunteers in Quito, so naturally, I tried to spend more time out of the house with people. I’ve been hanging out at home with my family a lot – not necessarily a bad thing – so I figured I should try to get out while everyone was still here. On Wednesday, I went out to Ladies Nights with a lot of the WT ladies. It was a lot of fun to just hang out with the girls until 10 when the club allows guys in.

On Friday we had our final practice English class. I don’t know if I explained this, so let me back up for a second: for the past 2 weeks, everyone’s been practice teaching at different SECAP locations. We were divided into groups of 5 – except my group, which had 6 – and assigned one of 3 locations. Over the course of 2 weeks, the groups rotated so everybody taught at least twice. (With the exception of one group because they didn’t even students for the first couple of days.) These classes were free to the students. Friday was the last day with our class, so my group took our students to the giant KFC right across the street from our SECAP location. It was a lot of fun; they bought us chicken and we gave them their certificates saying they’d completed 26 (or 20 if they’d missed some classes) hours of English. After everyone had exchanged numbers/e-mail addresses/Facebook names, they took us to a nearby bar where we hung out and danced for an hour until we realized we had to get to the big WT group dinner. The group dinner was also a lot of fun. It was at a pizzeria called Al Forno in La Mariscal. We sat at two long tables, so it was hard to talk to everyone.  A couple of the guys brought roses for everybody, which was really sweet. After dinner, a lot of us went out dancing in La Mariscal.

On Saturday (with a few exceptions), everyone not placed in Quito scattered to the four winds.  Meanwhile, I went to Parque Itchimba with some of the remaining Quito people to see a concert. Of course I didn’t understand any of the music, but it was fun anyway. There were tons of people around, so it reminded me a little bit of ACL. I spent the rest of the weekend with my family.

My family, quite honestly, is amazing. Saturday night they took me to get hot dogs at this little stand near our house. We then ate them at a really pretty scenic overlook where we watched the clouds and fog roll in. After we drove down to Guapolo to see a church that we had seen from above. (Unfortunately, it was closed, but all the pretty antique streets were worth it anyway.) On Sunday, we met up with some of their friends in Parque Carolina. While my mom, her friend Mary, and Mary’s husband did zumba, my dad and I took my brother and his friend to go ride on the ponies. Soon it started to rain, so instead we drove about 30 minutes east of Quito where there were all these gorgeous flower stands. (I didn’t take my camera with me, so I have no pictures.) After some flower plants were purchased, we returned to Quito where we bought some KFC chicken for lunch. We brought it home, and my dad made fries and rice to go with it. In case anyone’s wondering, KFC here is a bit spicier than in the States. Finally, around 7, we drove the family friends home. They live in south Quito, so it’s difficult to get back – especially at night – when you don’t have a car. I got to see a lot of new scenery in Quito that I hadn’t seen before. Let there be no doubt: Quito at night is gorgeous.

Now there are 10 people (myself included) left in the capital. 5 are placed at CEC with me and 4 are placed at SECAP. CEC (Centro de Educación Continua) is part of a larger university called Escuela Politénica Nacional. From what I’ve been told, CEC is one of the best institutions for learning English in the country. Certainly it’s one of the best places to work, as the administration is well organized. (Yes, this means I can expect to be paid on time for the most part.)

Classes at CEC are organized in 8-week cycles with a 1 ½ weeks – 2 weeks in between each cycle. The next cycle begins October 18. Until then, I’m scheduled to work 4 pm – 8 pm doing administrative work (e.g. proctoring placement exams, putting together students packets, etc.)  I don’t know what level(s) or at what times I’ll be teaching yet. Before the start of each cycle, which is usually a Tuesday, there is a teacher meeting, usually that Monday, where the teachers are told their class level(s) and times. I do know, however, that I should not receive anything below Intermediate. (The levels are as follows: Beginner, Basic 1, Basic 2, Intermediate 1, Intermediate 2, Advanced 1, Advanced 2, Academic 1, Academic 2, Academic 3, Academic 4.) Once I actually know what I have, I can post it.

Anyway, now that it’s taken me an hour to write all of this, and I think I’ve included everything, I’m going to go eat lunch. Some more fun facts about life in Ecuador:

1) Most people here are pretty short. For example, I am taller than my host dad.

2) People here drive like madmen. Sometimes they’re in 2 lanes. At night they’ll run red lights (although this is also a bit of a safety habit too. Why wait at a corner like a sitting duck if there are no cars?)

3) Public college is free, but can also be difficult to get into.

4) The form of currency is the dollar. However, stores and restaurants do not always have change for a $10. If it’s a $20 (which is what you get when you go the ATM), forget it. You have to go to a big chain like Supermaxi (a grocery store) to break it.

5) House photos!

It was raining outside, so I had to hang up my clothes in my room.

Table where the family eats breakfast and almuerzo.

No dishwasher. Gas stove/oven. 

Chiqui, the family dog. He's an attention whore.

Where clothes get hung up to dry. My room is the window on the right, all the way at the end.

My mom is a beautician, and will occasionally have clients in the house.

Where the car is (usually) parked + the door to the outside world.

Living room/family room. The picture hanging under the clock is of my brother when he was younger in a little tux.

I can't seem to get a good picture of my bathroom because the lighting sucks. But that's the shower on the left.