So next week we will be taking our first tech trip. My group is going to Santo Domingo-Pedro Vicente Maldonado-Puerto Quito. Im pretty sure that's several cities lol. Anyway this is where we will be giving out first charlas to groups of children. Within this group we are going to be split up into smaller groups. We are giving all in all 4 charlas. One is on "corazon feliz", the other about personal higiene and washing hands. The third is Nutrition and the fourth is another one on "Corazon Feliz". The charlas range from 5 year olds to adults. The specific charla on corazon feliz was presented to us today and seems really interesting. A PCV started the program and it focuses on educating ecuadorians about Diabetes, Hypertension, Cholesterol and Blood Pressure.
Im excited to see how it goes. As of right now Im not very nervous because I've got all these fun ideas on what hands on activities we can do with the people. Even though the charlas seem basic they are so necessary because, even though it's hard to believe, many of the people don't practice things like basic higiene things like washing hands. Tomorrow actually we will be going to a school to give some type of charla, but won't find out till tomorrow morning exactly what we'll be doing.
Along with the charla our group has to do a survey and interviews with people about the community and then we will give a very formal presentation about our findings in front of a panel of the Peace Corps Trainers.
Ok I gotta go wash my underwear by hand. Host mom's giving me gloves this time so my hands dont freeze! yay!
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Week three cont...
Yeah decided to just start another blog for the actual week..Im sure it gets a little boring ready my really long posts.
So Monday we did a really fun activity with tire gardens!! yes it's exactly what you think, we took tires, cut one side so the hole was a little bit bigger, also cut out handles. Then we had to flip the tire inside out. SOoooo much harder to do than you'd think. These are just your regular car tires. It's a lot easier with softer tires, but everyone was able to flip there's inside out. We then planted everything from carrots, to radish, and cilantro. These types of gardens work really well with people who dont have a lot of land. Plus those who want just small gardens or want to be able to move them..although they are pretty heavy to move once they are filled with soil. The guy that led the activity has been in PC forever!
On Tuesday we did and interesting activity talking about behavior change. It started out as a regular lecture which I wasnt super pumped about because they tend to be boring. The facilitator talked about what it takes to make a behavior change. We would be picking a behavior about ourselves that over the course of training we want to change. This really helps us as volunteers get in the mind set of how as we go into these communities we may have all these great ideas on how to make the community "better". In reality this will involve the Ecuadorians to make many behavior changes, and this is hard. So in order for us to understand how hard it is for them to make changes we first need to practice on ourselves in a way..I haven't really thought of a behavior I want to change. Maybe just being more patient in general..not sure. If anyone has ideas on how I should change let me know, lol
Wed we did our community bank. In a way it's kinda a joke because people don't really take it seriously. It's a great practice for when we get into our communities but our group doesnt work the best to respect those who are supposed to be holding some type of authority (president, secretary, etc) Hopefully as the weeks go by we can learn better to work together. Oh just so many ideas to take with us to our communities!
So on the 4th of July there will be a mañana deportiva. Each group (TEFL, youth and families and health) are going to have three sport teams (soccer, basketball, and volleyball) we took some time to talk about the team and chants and stuff. It should be fun! Im going to play futbol and voleibol.
Then that evening we stayed a little later and did a bonfire with food and s'mores for Katya's birthday. It was really fun..reminded me of summers at home :)
Today (thursday June 23) we did another cooking class, food from the jungle. It was this mix of chicken breast with cilantro and this other vegetable that I don't remember all cooked in a big leaf. Really good and healthy!!
So Monday we did a really fun activity with tire gardens!! yes it's exactly what you think, we took tires, cut one side so the hole was a little bit bigger, also cut out handles. Then we had to flip the tire inside out. SOoooo much harder to do than you'd think. These are just your regular car tires. It's a lot easier with softer tires, but everyone was able to flip there's inside out. We then planted everything from carrots, to radish, and cilantro. These types of gardens work really well with people who dont have a lot of land. Plus those who want just small gardens or want to be able to move them..although they are pretty heavy to move once they are filled with soil. The guy that led the activity has been in PC forever!
On Tuesday we did and interesting activity talking about behavior change. It started out as a regular lecture which I wasnt super pumped about because they tend to be boring. The facilitator talked about what it takes to make a behavior change. We would be picking a behavior about ourselves that over the course of training we want to change. This really helps us as volunteers get in the mind set of how as we go into these communities we may have all these great ideas on how to make the community "better". In reality this will involve the Ecuadorians to make many behavior changes, and this is hard. So in order for us to understand how hard it is for them to make changes we first need to practice on ourselves in a way..I haven't really thought of a behavior I want to change. Maybe just being more patient in general..not sure. If anyone has ideas on how I should change let me know, lol
Wed we did our community bank. In a way it's kinda a joke because people don't really take it seriously. It's a great practice for when we get into our communities but our group doesnt work the best to respect those who are supposed to be holding some type of authority (president, secretary, etc) Hopefully as the weeks go by we can learn better to work together. Oh just so many ideas to take with us to our communities!
So on the 4th of July there will be a mañana deportiva. Each group (TEFL, youth and families and health) are going to have three sport teams (soccer, basketball, and volleyball) we took some time to talk about the team and chants and stuff. It should be fun! Im going to play futbol and voleibol.
Then that evening we stayed a little later and did a bonfire with food and s'mores for Katya's birthday. It was really fun..reminded me of summers at home :)
Today (thursday June 23) we did another cooking class, food from the jungle. It was this mix of chicken breast with cilantro and this other vegetable that I don't remember all cooked in a big leaf. Really good and healthy!!
WEEK THREE!!!
So I thought for this update I would do an over all week "resumen". And if I can get it to work ill put up some pictures :) It's officially the start of week 3..can you believe it? Re-cap of the rest of the weekend. I ended up going out on Saturday night. We went to a club just getting into the city of Quito. We were supposed to be meeting another volunteer there with her sister but as we arrived we realized that she wasn't there. There were a bunch of people outside and it was obviously awkward because it was a group of 5 gringas trying to figure out what exactly to do. So I just walked up to where it looked like people were going in and asked if this was where we entered. The guy told me that it was VIP only, so I asked him if we had to go to another door, he asked who I was with and I told him 5 other girls. So we got in ahead of everyone, perks of sticking out and being good looking I guess.
Everyone was pretty dressed up. By this I mean the girls were in practically dresses and heels or just done up really nice. The guys of course had their hair gelled back with hollister looking shirts, lol..ahh so typical. Around 11ish people started arriving and the night was pretty fun. Erika and her sister finally showed up so we had some other ecuadorians to hang out with. Made me kinda think of home and how we'd always go out to this place called honey...but completely different. At 1AM a band started to play more traditional music so that was fun to dance to that with various people.
Father's Day was kind a bust. After much deliberation we ended up going to the same pool place like the previous sunday. Neither of the actual children showed up, and it started to rain pretty hard around 3. We didnt get out of there till 5. Apparently it was my host father's birthday on friday (love how no one tells me). So my host brother, Pato and his family (two girls and wife) came over and we had cake. I wanted to call my own father but hadnt had time to buy saldo. Thought I wouldnt get to talk to him but he ended up calling so that was nice!
Everyone was pretty dressed up. By this I mean the girls were in practically dresses and heels or just done up really nice. The guys of course had their hair gelled back with hollister looking shirts, lol..ahh so typical. Around 11ish people started arriving and the night was pretty fun. Erika and her sister finally showed up so we had some other ecuadorians to hang out with. Made me kinda think of home and how we'd always go out to this place called honey...but completely different. At 1AM a band started to play more traditional music so that was fun to dance to that with various people.
Father's Day was kind a bust. After much deliberation we ended up going to the same pool place like the previous sunday. Neither of the actual children showed up, and it started to rain pretty hard around 3. We didnt get out of there till 5. Apparently it was my host father's birthday on friday (love how no one tells me). So my host brother, Pato and his family (two girls and wife) came over and we had cake. I wanted to call my own father but hadnt had time to buy saldo. Thought I wouldnt get to talk to him but he ended up calling so that was nice!
Monday, June 20, 2011
June 18, 2011
Second day of our “cultural trip” to Cotocachi. Everyone got up yesterday and met at the park at 6 am. So early! We then split up into different groups. Each group was about 20 people. We took a bus into Quito. Then from Quito we took a sort of coach bus to Otavalo/Cotacachi. We arrived at the central Plaza around 10:30, I guess the people that were supposed to meet with us were late, and so we had time to look at the open market merchandise.
The guys arrived and we split up in 2 trucks. Most of us rode in the back clinging on for dear life, still, it was exhilarating to be in the back of the truck, mountains surrounding us, bouncing all over the place because of the rocky terrain.
We arrived to a community named La Calera. There was a school and kids were out playing volleyball. Many of them had the traditional dress on and everyone had braids. This made it somewhat difficult to distinguish girls form boys when they wore modern clothing.
After waiting around for some time we all went to the upstairs of the community center. A guy talked to us about the community tourism that goes on throughout the area. It sounded like a good idea-tourists come into the community and live/learn with the people there. Most of the communities are still very traditional. There are also a variety of excursions/activities offered, from hiking, to bike riding and trips on horseback.
For the rest of the afternoon we were going to walk around the community to learn about the different jobs people had and then alter we would help with a project. To put the afternoon in a nutshell we walked to different houses, saw what the people were doing and then kinda stood around. There was very little interaction and like I said, a lot of standing around. On our little tour we saw a women making traditional blouses (rather, the high tech machine did all the sewing for her), a hammock maker, and where they make cement bricks.
On top of this we had arrived around noon, expecting to eat and didn’t get fed till about 2 hours later. The food was so-so..I think everyone was a little disappointed with the lack of organization and interaction with the people. Many of us were hopeful for the “minga” where we were going to help the community with a project.
So we headed down the mountain to this small watering hole. Apparently this is where everyone was going to bath in the next few days out of tradition. The people were hard at work cleaning the watering hole and clearing paths..but there wasn’t really anything for us to do. For one there weren’t enough tools and 2nd, there was really no direction as a to what was supposed to be done. After awhile of batting away mosquitos and watching people work, a path was cleared to go to a sacred watering hole with hot water. Let’s just say the water wasn’t hot and it wasn’t as spectacular as we had been told. Realizing that this whole trip kinda seemed like a bust the only hope we had left was the time with our host families.
Rebecca, Portia and I ended up in a group together. We arrived to the house. Attached to their house was a room and bathroom for us-really cute. We ventured out back and met the mother, her sister and grandmother finishing up the slaughter of their chickens. IT was so dark I have no idea how they were able to see.
Apparently there was going to be a Baptism in the morning and the family was responsible for providing the food afterwards. So we helped peal potatoes, with knives. For every one potato that we did, they had finished 3 or 4. There were so many potatoes! At around 8 we were called for dinner. The dinner was pretty good, lots of carbs though.. rice, and mashed potatoes. Half of the family was in the kitchen eating because there wasn’t enough space at the table. They had chicken foot soup. My oh my did one of the boys go at that chicken foot! I'm glad ours didn’t have any feet.
Around 9 we came to our room- FREEZING!! It is so cold here! And we are supposed to be in summer. A part from that it was almost always cloudy. So this morning we were to wake up, have breakfast and then do activities that the family normally does. We had breakfast and talked with the father some.
He then walked us around the garden in the back, so many plants of different kinds. Evidently he does agriculture and construction for work. Because of the baptism everyone left, except for the son-who is maybe 8. They made him walk us around. It was a nice walk, practically all in silence. I tried to ask some questions but only got on word answers.
We came back to the house and most everyone was gone. We got our things together and then the bus picked us up around 10. We ventured back to Cotacachi only to wait forever for the bus. Thank goodness it took us straight to Tumbaco. A group of about 8 of us had lunch at my parent’s restaurant. One of the Spanish facilitators, who was a PCV and now is married came and we talked to him about the training system. Apparently the Spanish classes have been cut heavily. Some people have been raising concern about it because they are worried they will not get the proper education in Spanish to do their 2 year service. He suggested talking to the director and shared with us how the director somehow feels that every couple years they have to update the system even if it’s working well. I guess a couple groups ago they had 4 hours of Spanish a day. I hope that the people that need the Spanish get it so that they are confident.
I then stopped over to Portia’s house for a little fiesta. It was about 7 people sitting around in the garage drinking and dancing..oh so Ecuadorian, but really fun! I finally came home around 6 to an empty house, which was good because I need some down time before we go out. Hopefully we can get a small group together to go to Cumbaya or Quito. Tumbaco doesn’t really have any places to go out and dance. We’ll see what happens.. Buenas!
The guys arrived and we split up in 2 trucks. Most of us rode in the back clinging on for dear life, still, it was exhilarating to be in the back of the truck, mountains surrounding us, bouncing all over the place because of the rocky terrain.
We arrived to a community named La Calera. There was a school and kids were out playing volleyball. Many of them had the traditional dress on and everyone had braids. This made it somewhat difficult to distinguish girls form boys when they wore modern clothing.
After waiting around for some time we all went to the upstairs of the community center. A guy talked to us about the community tourism that goes on throughout the area. It sounded like a good idea-tourists come into the community and live/learn with the people there. Most of the communities are still very traditional. There are also a variety of excursions/activities offered, from hiking, to bike riding and trips on horseback.
For the rest of the afternoon we were going to walk around the community to learn about the different jobs people had and then alter we would help with a project. To put the afternoon in a nutshell we walked to different houses, saw what the people were doing and then kinda stood around. There was very little interaction and like I said, a lot of standing around. On our little tour we saw a women making traditional blouses (rather, the high tech machine did all the sewing for her), a hammock maker, and where they make cement bricks.
On top of this we had arrived around noon, expecting to eat and didn’t get fed till about 2 hours later. The food was so-so..I think everyone was a little disappointed with the lack of organization and interaction with the people. Many of us were hopeful for the “minga” where we were going to help the community with a project.
So we headed down the mountain to this small watering hole. Apparently this is where everyone was going to bath in the next few days out of tradition. The people were hard at work cleaning the watering hole and clearing paths..but there wasn’t really anything for us to do. For one there weren’t enough tools and 2nd, there was really no direction as a to what was supposed to be done. After awhile of batting away mosquitos and watching people work, a path was cleared to go to a sacred watering hole with hot water. Let’s just say the water wasn’t hot and it wasn’t as spectacular as we had been told. Realizing that this whole trip kinda seemed like a bust the only hope we had left was the time with our host families.
Rebecca, Portia and I ended up in a group together. We arrived to the house. Attached to their house was a room and bathroom for us-really cute. We ventured out back and met the mother, her sister and grandmother finishing up the slaughter of their chickens. IT was so dark I have no idea how they were able to see.
Apparently there was going to be a Baptism in the morning and the family was responsible for providing the food afterwards. So we helped peal potatoes, with knives. For every one potato that we did, they had finished 3 or 4. There were so many potatoes! At around 8 we were called for dinner. The dinner was pretty good, lots of carbs though.. rice, and mashed potatoes. Half of the family was in the kitchen eating because there wasn’t enough space at the table. They had chicken foot soup. My oh my did one of the boys go at that chicken foot! I'm glad ours didn’t have any feet.
Around 9 we came to our room- FREEZING!! It is so cold here! And we are supposed to be in summer. A part from that it was almost always cloudy. So this morning we were to wake up, have breakfast and then do activities that the family normally does. We had breakfast and talked with the father some.
He then walked us around the garden in the back, so many plants of different kinds. Evidently he does agriculture and construction for work. Because of the baptism everyone left, except for the son-who is maybe 8. They made him walk us around. It was a nice walk, practically all in silence. I tried to ask some questions but only got on word answers.
We came back to the house and most everyone was gone. We got our things together and then the bus picked us up around 10. We ventured back to Cotacachi only to wait forever for the bus. Thank goodness it took us straight to Tumbaco. A group of about 8 of us had lunch at my parent’s restaurant. One of the Spanish facilitators, who was a PCV and now is married came and we talked to him about the training system. Apparently the Spanish classes have been cut heavily. Some people have been raising concern about it because they are worried they will not get the proper education in Spanish to do their 2 year service. He suggested talking to the director and shared with us how the director somehow feels that every couple years they have to update the system even if it’s working well. I guess a couple groups ago they had 4 hours of Spanish a day. I hope that the people that need the Spanish get it so that they are confident.
I then stopped over to Portia’s house for a little fiesta. It was about 7 people sitting around in the garage drinking and dancing..oh so Ecuadorian, but really fun! I finally came home around 6 to an empty house, which was good because I need some down time before we go out. Hopefully we can get a small group together to go to Cumbaya or Quito. Tumbaco doesn’t really have any places to go out and dance. We’ll see what happens.. Buenas!
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Today flew by!! Our tech group worked in the “huertos” all morning. We did raised beds with lettuce, radish, carrot and spinach. Then at the end of the beds we planted Parsley and Cilantro. We also learned about worm gardens! I'm kinda pumped about trying to start all this at my site! Or even once I'm settled down back in the states..even though it’s far away all of this information is going to be good for life, ya know?
At lunch we put our presentation for the afternoon. Everyone had to present the PACA tools that we used in Puembo on Saturday. I think our group did the best. We had the 24 hour calendar and the “rueda de recursos” (resource wheel). So what we did was make a table of all the kids we interviewed and coordinated the times and activities with colors. This way it was easy to see when the majority of kids were free.
With the “rueda de recursos” we gathered the names/places of important resources in the community. We then made little nametags and attached them to different flowers. So instead of a “wheel” we had a bouquet of flowers. We then gave examples of different projects and had the audience create different bouquets with the different resources, creative, right?
After school there was a soccer game-gringos vs Ecuadorians. I didn’t play although I should’ve. I gave my shoes to someone else to play, maybe next week. By the time they got don't it was getting dark so we came back. I was with a different crowd than yesterday so it was good to hang out with other people. It’s nice to know I can fit into the different groups within the big group.
We are off to Cotacachi tomorrow-5 am I have to be up, and I wanna sneak an episode of Deter in!
At lunch we put our presentation for the afternoon. Everyone had to present the PACA tools that we used in Puembo on Saturday. I think our group did the best. We had the 24 hour calendar and the “rueda de recursos” (resource wheel). So what we did was make a table of all the kids we interviewed and coordinated the times and activities with colors. This way it was easy to see when the majority of kids were free.
With the “rueda de recursos” we gathered the names/places of important resources in the community. We then made little nametags and attached them to different flowers. So instead of a “wheel” we had a bouquet of flowers. We then gave examples of different projects and had the audience create different bouquets with the different resources, creative, right?
After school there was a soccer game-gringos vs Ecuadorians. I didn’t play although I should’ve. I gave my shoes to someone else to play, maybe next week. By the time they got don't it was getting dark so we came back. I was with a different crowd than yesterday so it was good to hang out with other people. It’s nice to know I can fit into the different groups within the big group.
We are off to Cotacachi tomorrow-5 am I have to be up, and I wanna sneak an episode of Deter in!
Wed. June 15, 2011
So today was exciting! We were able to leave the training camp..er I mean facility and travel to Quito to visit the office there. It took 1.5 hours all in all. 1st we al met at the park in Tumbaco. Then took the bus into Quito. From there we hopped on the Trolebus and then took another train type thing to where we would get off and walk to the office.
It was really nice to be in Quito and se places that used to be everyday routine. The Peace Corps office is just down the street from where the old CIMAS building used to be. I was telling my Spanish teacher about the program and it turns out she used to work for CIMAS as a Spanish teacher! She knew the people from CIMAS and everything! Small world right?!? (p.s. for those of you who don't know, CIMAS was the study abroad program I did the spring semester of my sophomore year in college)
The Peace Corps office is hidden in a way. There are no signs to show that it’s PC. They took an old house-huge house and turned it into offices. It’s a really neat place, everyone was super nice. We were able to get the full tour. Then they sat us down and gave us a charla on security!! At this point it’s practically unnecessary. Everything is such repetition!! They even brought a taxi to show the correct signs of a safe taxi. This in theory is a good idea but at least for me, I’d had enough.
Then another guy talked about all the finance stuff. It was good to see what money goes where, etc..his presentation was much more engaging! We left around 2 and actually got back to Tumbaco early! I went with some people to get boots for working the garden tomorrow. Then we met up with others to get drinks. It was really fun to hang out with people outside of training. It was the 1st time that I had and now I feel a lot more connected with people
Peace
It was really nice to be in Quito and se places that used to be everyday routine. The Peace Corps office is just down the street from where the old CIMAS building used to be. I was telling my Spanish teacher about the program and it turns out she used to work for CIMAS as a Spanish teacher! She knew the people from CIMAS and everything! Small world right?!? (p.s. for those of you who don't know, CIMAS was the study abroad program I did the spring semester of my sophomore year in college)
The Peace Corps office is hidden in a way. There are no signs to show that it’s PC. They took an old house-huge house and turned it into offices. It’s a really neat place, everyone was super nice. We were able to get the full tour. Then they sat us down and gave us a charla on security!! At this point it’s practically unnecessary. Everything is such repetition!! They even brought a taxi to show the correct signs of a safe taxi. This in theory is a good idea but at least for me, I’d had enough.
Then another guy talked about all the finance stuff. It was good to see what money goes where, etc..his presentation was much more engaging! We left around 2 and actually got back to Tumbaco early! I went with some people to get boots for working the garden tomorrow. Then we met up with others to get drinks. It was really fun to hang out with people outside of training. It was the 1st time that I had and now I feel a lot more connected with people
Peace
Tuesday June 14, 2011
So this morning we had Spanish, nothing too out of the ordinary. The nurses then gave us a presentation on Malaria and Dengue. They also gave us Malaria pills, which I'm not too thrilled about taking. The pills do not do anything for resistance against Malaria but rather suppress the malaria itself.. I know you won’t be too happy about this mom but if I don’t take them I am automatically medically separated which means bye-bye Ecuador.
The next session was on our health benefits, and when/what the Peace Corps does and doesn’t cover. They offer a pretty amazing health coverage, awfully boring presentation. To top the day off we had another painfully boring presentation on community banks, which I think could’ve been interesting if the presenter wasn’t so monotone and boring!! We split into 2 groups and formed our own community banks, which we will do in real life, so that should be fun!
I came home and washed my underwear by hand! My family goes to get the laundry done’ kinda like a laundry mat but they don’t wash underwear for you. So I did it on the cement slabs. A lot more complicated than I though, and takes forever! The water was cold too, so my hand and fingers were numb by the end. I used the last to check some e-mail and then went down to eat, watched some news and called it a night!
The next session was on our health benefits, and when/what the Peace Corps does and doesn’t cover. They offer a pretty amazing health coverage, awfully boring presentation. To top the day off we had another painfully boring presentation on community banks, which I think could’ve been interesting if the presenter wasn’t so monotone and boring!! We split into 2 groups and formed our own community banks, which we will do in real life, so that should be fun!
I came home and washed my underwear by hand! My family goes to get the laundry done’ kinda like a laundry mat but they don’t wash underwear for you. So I did it on the cement slabs. A lot more complicated than I though, and takes forever! The water was cold too, so my hand and fingers were numb by the end. I used the last to check some e-mail and then went down to eat, watched some news and called it a night!
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