When in Ecuador...

I’m writing this laying in bed (on a piece of paper again, as I still haven’t had a chance to get to a computer) the night of Feb, 13. Things have gone pretty well since we got here last Saturday. My host family is very nice and has been very patient with my lack of Spanish. The first night we got in town there was a fiesta and my family and I sat up front to watch the entertainment. There was music, dancing, and then a beauty pagent for girls in the local high school. They did a dance routine in their normal clothes to I think a Britney Spears song and then a dance in Traditional Ecuadorian clothes. The last part was in formal wear and had them all answer a question ("What do you think the role of women is in today´s Ecuador" etc.). It was a lot like Miss America. As I mentioned, when we first got there I sat up front with my family. Quickly they asked me to sit at the very front table. I realized thet they wanted me TO JUDGE THE CONTEST! The queen from two years ago was supposed to judge with two other women, but she was late. They asked me to take her place. It was a real honor and very unexpected. I did the best I could with the Q&A part, but I really couldn´t understand what most of the answers were. The former Queen showed up right after the contest started and sat next to me, so I pretty much just cheated off her scoring sheet. The night ended with us all dancing ´till about 1:00AM. What a way to enter a community.

Since then I have been practicing my Spanish a lot and trying to hang with my host family. My Spanish is pretty horrible and it is frustrating for all of us when we try to talk. I end up just saying "Gracias" and " Muy Bien" a lot. The five of us in my town (by the way, my town is pretty decient sized and has two churches, a couple schools, and stores for whatever we need) have been split up into two groups that meet every morning for about five hours for Spanish class. I´m paired with a girl from upstate New York. Her Spanish is a lot better than mine, so I´m just trying to keep up. Luckly she is pretty cool (like the rest of the PCT´s in my town) so it isn´t a problem.

Tomorrow we are going to the local school for Valentines Day activities with the kids. We got a bunch of stuff to make cards and I´m going to try to teach them how to play Dodgeball. It should be fun.

Jay

P.S. - I haven´t had the opportunity to eat guinea Pig yet, but I have had about 10 different types of Juice that I´ve never heard of that have all been awesome (Tomate de Arbol is my favorite).

P.P.S - No Montezuma´s Revenge either !!!!!!

¿So this is Ecuador?

We had to get up at 4:30 AM today (This is starting to become a bad habit) so we could catch our 11:30 AM flight from DC to Miami. Think that seems a little like overkill? Yeah, so did we. Anyway, it was hard to get up because I hadn´t slept more than 30 minutes that night (too much nervous energy). The flights were OK and we landed in Quito around 7:30PM on the 7th. There was a bunch of PC staff to meet us and then get us though customs and immigration. Then they rushed us out into the parking lot and we were blown away because there was a big group of current Peace Corps Volunteers (PCV´s) at the door waiting for us. It was grat to have such a warm welcome.

We spent the first night in a Hostel in Quito and then got up early on Thursday for a bus ride to Cayambe (1 1/2 hour North and on the other side of the Equator). The ride was awesome as we were heading through a river valley in the Andes. We took the Pan-American Highway and the drop-off on the side of the road had to be about 500 feet to the river.

In Cayambe we did our country specific training and started language training. The compound (I can´t think of a better word for it) that we stayed in was a nice walled in group of buildings where we can all eat take classes and sleep. One of the last things that they did was to give us our groups for Community based training (CBT). I´m with four other PCT´s in a small town halfway between Cayambe and Quito. I´ll be staying there for the next 10 weeks with a host family. The idea is that by integrating as much as possible we will be able to learn Spanish faster. Sometime during CBT we will find out our 2-year assignment location and work details. We leave tomorrow morning to head to our new homes, so tonight we are taking it easy. As I write this (on paper because I have no computer access) I´m looking out the window at the sun setting over the Andes. I´m excited to get this adventure finally really started, but I wish you all were here to see this.

Jay

¨I can´t believe we´re really doin´ it!¨

So, besides having to wake up at 4:30 AM and having to make a couple of final decisions on which T-shirts I was bringing and which ones I won´t see for a couple of years, the morning of departure started well. I had some problems the night before packing. We were supposed to to bring three big bags of stuff, but I decided only to bring two. This was because I had talked to some Returned Peace Corps Volunteers (RPCV´s) and they said to bring as little as possible. I had to leave some things out, but hopefully that won´t bite me in the ass later. The biggest decision was whether to bring an extra pair of shoes or my baseball glove. I went with the glove because I figure I can always buy a new pair of Nikes, but me and baby brown have been through a lot.

After Saying goodbye to Dad and Kyle, Mom took me to the airport where I flew to DC (Side Note: Jackie Joyner Kersey was on my flight with her husband). Spent Monday in DC meeting the rest of my group. There are 45 of us from all over the US and with a lot of different experiences. It should be a good goup. There are a bunch of people from Texas, Ohio, California, and Wisconsin, but only 1 from Missouri. Damn, no Cardinals fans!

Tuesday we went over expectations, safety, country details and other training exrcises. Everyone was half there and half in Ecuador, so it wasn´t as productive as it could have been, but we still learned a lot. One of the last things we did was to go around and have everybody say a short phrase that summed up how we felt. Mine was the ¨Dumb and Dumber¨ quote that serves as the title of this post. Most of the goup is younger than me (22-25), but I think they still got the reference. after that we grabbed dinner, re-packed, and tried to get some sleep for the long day of travel ahead.

Hasta en Ecuador,

Jay

P.S.- Our group is officially called "Omnibus 97¨ as it is the 97th PC group to go to Ecuador. Now, I wish that I had brought one of my Old 97´s T-shirts. Oh well, I´ll see it in two years.

Time To Go

It is getting close to departure day (Feb, 5th) and I guess this is as good a time as any to start this whole blog thing. My goal with this is to let y'all follow what I'm doing in Ecuador and give everyone a chance to let me know how things are back home. I'm keeping my e-mail address open, so we can use that for sending info that doesn't need to be out there on the Web. I decided to keep this as an open blog, so anyone can look at it. This makes it a little less secure, but then you guys won't have to log in every time you want to check it out. Please feel free to post any stuff you want to on this (as long as it isn't from Cubs fans in Chicago talking trash).

Enough with the blogosphere details.....

I 'm almost done getting things ready to go. I just have to get a few more things (Duct Tape for one. I hear that it is invaluable.) and then pack it all up. I fly out at 7:30 AM on Monday, so I hope to get everything packed up before the game on Sunday. I then spend two days in Washington, DC and fly to Quito via Miami. We have to go on a three day retreat after we land up in the Mountains right away. I'm excited to meet everyone in my group (there are 46 of us) and get this adventure started.

I don't know how often I'll be able to post on this site, but I will try to as much as possible. It all depends on how often I can get on the net. I should be able to pretty frequently duing the fist three months of training, so expect my next post from Ecuador sooner than later. Anyway, I hope this first attemp at a post was readable even though it was mostly informational. Have fun with this guys because any messages from you will be like gold to me.

Thanks again for all the support and well-wishes that you all have given me, and I'll talk to you later from below the Equator!!!

Jay