Llegamos al fin

Well it looks like this is it. My suit cases are packed for the most part (I have accumulated a ton of stuff). Today is my last almost normal day in Guayaquil. The parents are getting here at 10:15. The director of my study abroad company is going to pick me up and take me to the airport to go meet them and bring them back to the house. I already went to the terminal today to check on the bus times for our travels as we are headed to the beach early tomorrow morning! I also stopped by the movie store and grabbed a handful of dvds since they are only 2 dollars a piece here!
So here are a few closing remarks/lessons learned/random thoughts about Ecuador that I have thus far not mentioned.

• In some countries April Showers bring May flowers, in others April showers bring loss of electric power.
• Everyone on the public bus sits in the aisle seat even when the window seat is empty because it provides a quick escape route and is less likely to have a robber sit down beside you and rob you and leave.
• Iguanas are the squirrels of South America.
• Clothes, books, and anything else manufactured are rediculously expensive in developing countries, but you can buy 20 limes for one dollar.
• Some people seem to have a deep religious belief that mashed potatoes should only be served cold.
• People also seem to have a deep religious belief that a meal is not a meal unless it consists of at least half a plate of white rice.
• And that rice should often be accompanied by potatoes... or spaghetti...
• Also that spaghetti is a normal ingredient in scrambled eggs.
•  Poverty is not a simple problem and can not be fixed with simple solutions. Giving a poor family 25 cent a day wont solve all of their problems. They also need public transportation, education, access to sanitation, health care, etc.
• Soy milk, milk substitutes, or powdered milks are more popular than regular milk here because it is expensive and hard to have decent refrigeration. 
• You can make almost anything out of a plantain. Chips, stew, dessert, soup, tortillas...
•  In some countries it is perfectly acceptable to call someone chubby as long as you add "ita" on the end so that it sounds cuter. The same also goes for skinny, big nose, white, etc....
• Child labor is a rampant and serious problem everywhere.
• McDonalds has invaded EVERYWHERE.
• KFC serves lentils, fried shrimp, and cookies in South America. Who knew?
• You can never know who around you speaks English.
• Being respectful and curious about someones cultures opens all sorts of doors!
• The world is HUGE!
• Sometimes you close your eyes and open them again and four months has passed in what seems like seconds.

La Despedida

This week has been all about saying goodbye. Classes finished up on Thursday night. I turned in my last exam with my eyes half open at ten thirty that night and swore to myself I would never take a class that went that late again. We had a closing ceremony on Thursday afternoon with the school. We had one last cultural seminar and watched a video with a ton of pictures from the whole trip. Surprisingly we managed to get through the whole thing tear free.

A lot of people got stuck in Guayaquil rush hour traffic (they have rush hour at lunch time too because everyone goes home)  so we even got to witness one last crazy dance from our Korean dancing queen while we were waiting. Sangwoo treated us to an original routine to authentic Korean music. Shortly after this he also pulled out his famous umbrella prop and did a dance with one of our directors. It was all quite entertaining and in good fun.
Thursday night we had the entire group meet up for one last time to go dancing! It was a lot of fun. We ended up with a group of probably 35 or 40 people since we had all the internationals and ecuadorian friends. It was a great way to say goodbye! I dont think the bar had ever had that many people come in at once before! They didnt know what to do!

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night were all spent at small get togethers saying goodbye to who ever was leaving the next morning. Generally at least one to two people have been leaving everyday. There are still a few of us left in Guayaquil who are going to get together tonight for a little while and then most of them are headed off to Peru in the morning. I am starting to pack up my suitcases and organize my room today! And I have a few last minute errands to run.

After a lot of convincing, I finally assured Leonor that I would be fine if she left for Saturday and Sunday and went to see her family and grandkids for Easter. I gave her some stickers to bring to her granchildren which they loved! One of the big traditions here during Semana Santa is to cook a soup known as Fanesca. It is a dish specifically prepared during Easter and is supposed to represent the binding family unit and the story of the death of Christ. The soup generally has every ingredient imaginable in Ecuadorian food, including 12 different kinds of grain which are meant to represent the Apostles.

 There is even one specific grain that is supposed to be really breally bitter if you dont cook it right which is supposed to represent Judas. On top of that there is also carrots, onions, potatoes, yuca, eggs, milk, hearts of palm, cheese, platains, maduro, avocado, a special kind of salted fish and more. Needless to say it takes quite a while to make, sometimes a few days. It is also part of the tradition to package up nine portions of the soup to give away to nine different neighbors. The soup is traditionally made on Good Friday.

My friend Danielle invited me over on Sunday afternoon to eat lunch with her family. They were having the traditional Easter lunch of Fanesca and they also bought some authentic humitas downtown. Humitas are a mixture of course maiz with cheese and egg and then they usually have a little extra cheese filling down the middle. The whole thing is wrapped in corn husks and cooked like a tamale. They are traditionally eaten as a snack in the Andes with a cup of strong black coffee. Anyway, the grandma was over and it was fun to watch everyone running around the house and cooking. We had a very nice lunch and the soup was really good! Afterward I played cards with Danielle, her host Mom, and the Grandma, which was also a lot of fun. They are very loud and vocal when they play cards around here!

One more week before I return to the States! I cant believe it!

Ecuador... Whats going on politically

One of the classes that I took this past semester was a History of Ecuadorian Culture Class. Even though my teacher seemed to harbor a particularly rare breed of paranoia with regard to the influence of foreign powers on Ecuadorian politics and we spent the majority of our time in the classroom talking about the United States and the World Bank, I was extremely interested in a lot of the readings that were assigned and did a little further research. I have also been asking around to a lot of Ecuadorian friends (and Leonor ofcourse) to see what the people think about the current political situation in Ecuador.
To make a very long story short.... this is what I have found out:

Just like many other Latin American countries Ecuador has a history of colonization, domination, and instability. Ecuador is particularly famous for having gone through 9 presidents in 10 years. One of their presidents, Velasco, was actually elected 4 times but only made it through his term one out of four terms. The other three times he was ran out of office before he could finish. Ecuador has also been heavily influenced by monopolies and neo-liberal power houses such as the United States, World Bank, and WTO. Lucio Gutierrez was the last elected President before Correa. He was most famous for having kicked out 90% of the Supreme Court judges. He was voted out of office peacefully by the Congress before his term was up. However I think it must be considered that he was set up for a quite a difficult job when he entered office. Ecuador suffered an economic chrisis in 1999 where inflation rates and national debt soared so high that the entire country went bankrupt and was forced to adopt the dollar as the new national currency as an emergency move. This devalued most bank accounts in Ecuador by about 70%. There is a huge argument that the rich and those that had inside government information had already transferred their money in to foreign accounts and were not effected. By 2001 70% of Ecuador was living on or below the poverty line.

Anyway after Gutierrez, Alfredo Palacio took over as President. He is a little known President in Ecuador. I think this because he didnt have the controversial flair and large scandals that follow most Presidents here. His platforms were moderate and stayed more or less in the center of the political scale. After he retired from the Presidency Palacio moved on to become the President of a lovely little University in the suburbs of Guayaquil called la Universidad de Especialidades Esperitu Santo where I have been studying for the past four months! :) He was President for two years and then handed over the title when Correa was elected in 2006. Since Correa was elected he has passed a new constitution, kicked out many top officials, refused US military presence, and defaulted on the national debt and then bought it all back for 30% of its value.

So that brings us to where Ecuador is now. Currently Ecuador is still very heavily influenced by the power of the Catholic church. It is generally viewed as the most Conservative country left in South America. Correa has been stepping away from US influence and instituting many new developmental programs. He has also designated considerable more spending to improving the health care system as well as education. According to current policy every citizen should receive free health care and free education. The country is divided in to two main political regions, the Sierra and the Coast. The Sierra mainly represented by Quito traditionally belongs to the Conservative parties while the Coastal region (Guayaquil) typically belongs to more liberal parties in favor of foreign trade. Correa has had a harder time winning over the support of the coastal region. He has also had a hard time winning over support of the wealthy. Although they constitute a small proportion of the population they represent a large amount of wealth and power. Ofcourse this is probably due to the fact that he has a tendency to call them names such as Pelocones on national TV (which is a derrogatory term for people that live in the suburbs of Guayaquil). But then again he has a reputation for calling a lot of people derogatory names. He refferred to a reporter one time as "the fat spotted looking one in the corner" When he was questioned about why he called her that his response was he didnt see a problem with it if it was true.
Anyway, Im getting distracted. The big deal right now in Ecuador is about the Consulto Popular, or referendum that is scheduled to take place on May 7th 2011. It consists of 10 questions about 10 different issues, 5 of which would cause amendments to the Constitutions. A rough translation of the questions are as follows:

1. In order to reduce and combat corruption, Are you in agreement that unjustified private enrichment should be considered illegal?

• This means that the government would have the ability to investigate any claims to large personal property that does not match the personal income of that said person.

2. With the purpose to avoid games of financial gain (gambling) from becoming a social problem, especially in the most vulnerable sectors of the population, are you in agreement that in your respective area of municipality, casinos and gambling lounges should not be permitted?

3. In order to avoid killing animals for sheer purposes of entertainment and simple diversion, Are you in agreement, that in your respective area or municipality, that public spectacles that involve the killing of animals should be outlawed?

• This is especially controversial in Quito where Bull fights are extremely popular still. As far as I understand the bull fights are aloud to continue they just cant actually kill the bull in the ring. This same practice is being carried out in Portugal right now. However the question is unclear as to whether this would include the prohibition of cock fighting. Every Ecuadorian that I talk to seems to have a different opinion on whether or not this includes cock fighting or not, which is extremely popular in the countryside.

4. With the purpose to avoid the excesses that exist in the media, Do you think that a Regulation Committee should be established to make rules concerning the distribution of media that contains sex, violence, and discrimination in written press and regular media?

• This is quite possibly the most controversial issue being considered. Many people feel that this is hindering their right to freedom of speech. Others are also arguing that it is an attempt by Correa to gain more control and over the media. Especially after the large role that the media played in the "attempted coup" on September 30th.  However at the moment the Ecuadorian media can be a little raw. For example there are no restrictions on pictures printed in newspapers after a homicide, as such the pictures are often quite graphic and bloody. There are also no restrictions to the type of tv and movies that can be played on the airwaves at certain times of day. For example when I ride public buses they quite often show graphic movies with sex and violence (Im talking full nudity and tons of blood) on buses that are transporting many young children.

5. With the purpose to avoid the unfair exploitation of common workers, Do you think that employers who do not register their employees in Social security should be sent to the Social Security Board?

• When a worker is registered in social security they pay an 8% tax, the employer matches that tax with an addition 8 to 10%. As a result, many workers make negotiations with their employees to simply give them the 8% tax in cash and then they gross an additional 16% earnings and never register for social security. However this means that they are not entered in to the government system and dont receive all the benefits.

So I know this is probably not as interesting for everyone else as it is for me since Im here, but I thought I would give you guys a little taste of some of the debates that I have been listening to for the last few weeks. Its even more interesting to hear what the people have to say about it. Many people believe the whole referendum is simply an attempt by Correa to gain more power while making the people think they are being asked. Half the people believe that their ballot will be counted as yes or no for all the questions in one big group while the other half believe that the votes will be counted per question. I also find it interesting to see how the questions are all written in such a leading manner as if trying to persuade people to answer a certain way. Most of the people I have talked to are resigned to believe that everything will pass due to media coverage and advertisement to the country side.

What do you do when you realize you only have two weeks left in Ecuador?
Throw your beach towel and a bathing suit in your backpack and head to Montaña for the weekend!
After the stress of classes and actually having to study last week I decided it was time for another beach adventure. Somehow I ended delegated as the organizer of our weekend adventure, which put me in charge of finding a hostel and buying the bus tickets. Sounds simple, but nothing in Ecuador is ever as simple as it should be. I went on Thursday to the terminal to buy tickets and argued with the vendor for at least twenty minutes because she refused to sell me tickets until the day I was leaving. I have bought them the day before many times, but I think the lady was just lazy and didnt feel like cooperating at that moment. Anyway, she told me to come back the next morning. So Friday morning I hopped on the public bus, listened to a ten year old walking up and down the aisles rapping in spanish so that people would give him their spare change, and crossed a crazy street full of traffic and beeping horns to make my way to the ticket booth once again. I got there around 10 and the same lady was there and just smiled at me and refused to sell me a ticket until 3 o clock in the afternoon since the bus didnt leave until four. So I glared at her and walked back out of the terminal, back across the street, got back on the bus, and listened to a lady trying to sell me genseng all the way back home.
But in the end everything turned out fine. I went back to the terminal and was the first in line at three to buy tickets for all eight of us that were going for the weekend and then got myself some icecream for all my hardwork while I waited for the bus.

All in all it was a wonderful weekend! We ended up finding a hostel on the main street of the town for ten dollars a night. And it even had a bathroom with a shower that worked most of the time! And it had sheets on the bed. So I figured we hit the jack pot. We spent most of the days laying on the beach and soaking up as much of the Ecuadorian sun as possible while being harassed by beach vendors selling sunglasses, hammocks, and jewlery. A few of our Ecuadorian friends went with us and were attempting to teach some of the foreigners how to surf. However they didnt have a lot of success due to the huge amounts of people in the water. The picture to the right is one of "the instructors." He refused to rub in the  sunscreen on his face all day. Dont be fooled, most Ecuadorians are not that tall.

I fell in love with a new Ecuadorian dish this weekend called Encebollado. It literally translates to mean Pickled Onion, which makes it sound disgusting but its actually delicious. It is a fish soup that is served for breakfast and is really traditionalon the Ecuadorian coast. It also has a bunch of yuka and other vegetables and is topped with cooked fish and marinated onions. It is also served with chifles (thinly sliced fried plantains) that can be eaten on the side or crushed up and mixed in the soup. It was $1.50 for the soup and .25 to add chifles! It was my breakfast both days this weekend!

Walking back to the hotel on Saturday after our day at the beach, we found a lady who was doing trenzas, which is kind of an Ecuadorian hair wrap. A few of the girls and I decided to get one so that we could look more Ecuadorian when we went home (haha). After I got my trenza we walked around the streets a little more and we ran in to a guy who was playing a huge Peruvian rain-stick thing. We stopped to watch for a few minutes and started talking to him. He was an older gentleman from Peru who worked making artisan crafts. He grew up in a beach town in Peru all his life but moved to Ecuador because he liked the culture better. His English was pretty much limited to "Hi how are you?" "Welcome to Ecuador" and "I have good price for you" so when he realized that we could all speak Spanish he was really impressed. He saw my trenza and told me that it wasnt complete because it needed something to finish it off. So he chatted with us and told us all his life story while he made a Peruvian sun charm out of a regular role of metal wire.

Here is the final result of my trenza! Peruvian sun charm and all! Its amazing how much people open up when they realize that you make an effort to speak their language and are interested in their life and their culture.
Anyway, the final beach weekend was an amazing success and we avoided any huge break outs of tears, although I am sure they are coming this week at our closing ceremonies. I have already finished my Spanish exam. I have a presentation and an exam tomorrow and then one more exam on Thursday and then I am officially done with my Ecuadorian schooling! An Ecuadorian friend is throwing all of the exchange kids a big going away party on Friday night and then I will be back on US soil exactly two weeks from today!

In land area Ecuador is one of the smallest countries in Latin America. However, when it comes to political unrest, cultural diversity, urban concentration, and rich natural resources, it proves one of the most interesting and controversial countries in Latin America. One of the largest problems in Ecuador is the huge cleavage that exists between the rural and urban people of the country. Ecuador is polarized with two main city centers: Guayaquil and Quito. These two cities control almost every aspect of Ecuadorian life. Quito is center of politics and conservatism while Guayaquil functions as the center of trade and liberalism. The two centers also represent the difference between the people of the coast and the Sierra respectively.

I know that I have talked briefly about the problem of poverty on this blog before but I don’t think I have adequately addressed the effect that rural to urban migration is having on the economy or the desperate lack of housing.

Land rights have been a problem in Ecuador since the Colonial times. The indigenous obviously never used deeds or titles to land so when the Spanish came over, who owned what was all left in a big mess. A lot of this is still going on today. For example, in my Ecuadorean culture class last night, my Professor was telling us about a farm he used to own. He explained to us how he was in the process of restoring an ancient bamboo house that was on the property until his “farm was invaded.” When I prompted him farther about what he meant about the invasion of his property he explained that about 500 Indians had dumped their stuff on the land and begin to build shacks and farms. Apparently this type of land invasion still happens on a regular basis and there isn’t much that you can do about it. It is virtually impossible to kick out 500 Indians on your own and the government has enough problems to deal with it so it takes no action.

Anyway, the point is that the poor from the country side have been migrating in to the outskirts of Guayaquil in search for better economic opportunities. They often arrive to Guayas with absolutely nothing to call their own and they simply pick a spot of land and move in. The current government has established regulation that if a family has been living on the lot for five years or longer the land becomes automatically theirs. These areas of town typically surround the city and are often a collection of ramshackle huts and bamboo houses with dirt floors and no running water or electricity.

Well this past Saturday morning I woke up in my nice little bed in my own room and walked downstairs to eat a freshly prepared breakfast (patacones, my favorite! Leonor always cooks these for me when she knows I have to miss lunch at home because it’s a hearty breakfast and I don’t think she trusts other people to feed me enough!) An hour later I found myself in a reality so drastically different that I felt like I had fallen down a rabbit hole.

Welcome to Monte Sinai on the Pereneal Norte area of Guayaquil. It is a main highway on the outskirts of the city. As soon as the road was built people started invading and settling down in neighborhoods. The entire neighborhood is filled to the brim with dirt, bamboo houses, trash, unpaved roads and standing water. The roads were especially bad that day because we had a strong rain storm the night before.

We were there with a volunteer foundation called Hogar del Cristo. Hogar del Cristo is a huge organization that was founded in Chile and works with the extreme poor to provide shelter, education, and micro credit loans to help the poor start small businesses to improve their situations. We were scheduled to build two houses. The houses are made of bamboo and last about 5 to 6 years if they are well taken care of. They have to be built on stilts off the ground because the land is swampy. They generally consist of one room and often end up holding up to 6 or 7 people. They have no plumbing and no electricity, but they do provide a little shelter and security for the families.

We started with nothing but an empty little plot of land. The first phase of construction was digging nine base holes, about 1 meter deep, to serve as the foundation for the house. We grabbed some shovels and went at it. After lots of sun screen applications, sweat, and mud throwing we began to actually put in the posts. We had a carpenter helping us out to make sure that the houses remained level and would be sturdy at the end. Next came the floors.

 The walls were pre-assembled by Hogar del Cristo and simply had to be attached and nailed in. Then came the “stairs,” the roof, and the doors and the windows.

But the truth is I only helped with the digging of the post holes (although that did take almost the whole morning). At about noon our director asked us if anyone would go with the future family of the house and help to prepare lunch for the entire group. I really wanted to get to know the family and was automatically interested in the idea of cooking with them so I was the first one to volunteer.

The first step of lunch preparation was a trip to the market.

We collected one dollar from each volunteer, which left us with about 30 dollars to make lunch for 40 people (we didn’t charge the families of course). I was a little worried it wouldn’t stretch.

But before we could even leave the site we got stuck in the mud due to the poor road conditions and ended up having to get back off the bus and dig/push the bus out.

 Anyway, once we were on the road again we headed down to the market of the little barrio (neighborhood). I was covered in mud and sweat, but apparently my blond hair and obvious gringa appearance still wasn’t hidden because the people in the market looked at me like I had three heads. The grandma of the family immediately rushed in and started barking orders to the sales people asking for chicken. They pulled out three freshly killed chickens with the heads still intact and the necks sliced open where the blood had been drained out. On top of the three huge chunks of rotting flesh we bought a huge bundle of sweet plantains, a few pounds of rice, some menestra, vegetables, and fried eggs. The total came out to $25.80. We spent the last few dollars to buy some Cola to drink and headed back to the grandma’s house to cook.

Upon entering the grandma’s house it became apparent that the entire family must have been taking shelter there while they were lacking housing. There were two beds along the walls of one room with a tiny stove area against the other wall and a refrigerator squeezed in. Extra blankets were thrown everywhere that I’m assuming served as beds on the floor. If you exited through the back door there was a tiny closet size shack where there was a hole in the ground for the bathroom. Allow me to introduce you to our family… The older lady to the right in the picture is the grandma who already had a house. The lady holding the baby is a mother of five and she is who we were building the house for.

We spent the next hour or so picking out stones and debris from the rice, chopping vegetables, and slicing and frying the sweet plantains. We made a traditional Ecuadorian dish called Seco de Pollo with rice and maduro, and then lentils, rice, and fried eggs, for the vegetarians. Once the seco de pollo was cooking we had some free time to hang out with the family.

One of the little girls was sitting on the bed trying to get her shoe on. I asked her if she needed help. She didn’t answer me, she just looked up at me, got a huge smile on her face and immediately ran straight at me and fell in my arms to give me a huge hug. Her name is Arriana and she is three years old (although she thinks it’s hilarious to try to trick you and tell you she is only two). She is the youngest girl in their family of 5 children. We eventually got both of her shoes on and she became my best friend for rest of the day.

Arriana was quick to introduce me to her youngest brother, Mathius. Mathius is six months old. The other girls in the house take turns playing with him and making him smile. I think he is their favorite toy. The oldest girl, around 8 I think was in charge of watching him almost full time. At first glance he seems like the ideal baby. He is extremely calm, never cries, and the only reaction you see him make is the occasional smile. After playing with Mathius and holding him for a while I started to wonder about his development level. I could feel his rib bones sticking out on his sides and his cheeks were thin and almost sunken, far from the fat cheeks of a Gerber baby. I quickly begin to suspect that his calm demeanor was the result of a lack of reactionary capabilities rather than a personality trait. He made no movement to new people and didn’t seem to notice people tickling his feet or touching him at all.

The electricity in the Grandmas house went out in the middle of cooking lunch. No one seemed extremely concerned as I suppose it is a common occurrence. It came back on after a few minutes and we just kept going. Once lunch was ready the volunteers all piled in and we all ate up. We helped the ladies clean up and headed back over to the construction sites to finish up. The family came with us to help out.

We finished up both houses around 5 and took a few last pictures with the family. I gave Arriana a hug goodbye, and showed her how to count to three one more time to tell people how old she is, and then we all piled on the bus once again. I wanted to take Arriana with me but I’m not sure I have enough money in my account to bribe my way out of a kidnapping charge.

Overall the day was inspiring and heart breaking at the same time. The situation of these people is desperate and applies to millions. There is no easy solution. Even the house we provided for these people today is a temporary solution that will leave them homeless again in 5 years if they don’t break out of poverty. The neighborhoods are often cut off from public transportation which limits their economic opportunities even further. It is exactly these types of situations and problems which contribute to the political instability of the country.

 

Feliz Cumpleaños!

Okay, so Sunday night I went with a few friends and walked around Mall del Sol, which is located in downtown Guayaquil and is the second biggest mall in South America. The biggest is in Brazil... go figure. The mall is a really funny place to be because its a huge confusion of cultures and a big mess of people. You pass by one stand of traditional Ecuadorian artisan crafts typical of the indigenous people and then turn the corner and there is Hooters. But my favorite thing that I ran in to in the mall was this "Japanese" arcade. This pool was in the mall window for everyone to watch as they walked by. They put the kids in the huge blow up balls and have them run around on the water like gerbals. It was awesome. Inside they also had a huge section of dancing arcade games and another area with large blow up spheres for people to climb inside and play something a little like bumper cars. The whole thing was pretty cool.

But anyway, yesterday was Leonors birthday. I woke up in the morning to the smell of freshly baked cake and automatically realized that she was making her own birthday cake... I had bought her a card a few days before so I wrote a little message in Spanish and brought it down to her at breakfast. I think she was excited.

My friend Alberto came over to help me cook lunch for Leonor and my host sister. I wanted to give her a day off for cooking on her birthday. We made home made Mexican Fish and shrimp tacos and they were delicious! I made home made guacamole to go with it. We even did all the tortillas by hand! I think it was the first time that one of the renters of the house had cooked for her because I could tell she didnt know what to do. We kind of just took over the kitchen and went at it.

Ofcourse we ended up with tons of food! There was barely room on the table! I think it was also the first time that Viviana or Leonor had ever eaten tacos because they were both extremely confused about how to make them. I dont think there is a lot of "assemble at the table" food in Ecuador, so it was kind of a fun little change. We even had soda for the first time since Ive been here to celebrate! Eventually I explained the step by step process to constructing the perfect taco and I think everyone really enjoyed the food. I figure it is the thought that counts anyway!

Been working hard for the past week trying to take advantage of my last few weeks here the best that I can! The first half of the week was full of homework, which is still really inconveniencing my vacation.

It’s been interesting being an American here for the past week with all the drama going on with the Ambassador. Correa pretty much decided to kick her out because Wikileaks released information where she accused the Ecuador police of being corrupt. This of course is a completely absurd reason to kick someone out of the country because it is a widely known and admitted fact that the police here are corrupt. Almost everything government or state related can be accomplished through bribes and connections. According to friends the going rate to get out of a speeding ticket is about 30 or 40 dollars that you slip the cop when he pulls you over… a DUI or possession charge is supposed to be more costly… around 100 or 300 accordingly. It costs around 20 to 50 for them to not check Visa papers, etc… Anyway the point is that corruption is accepted here and Correas reaction was completely unnecessary. In my opinion exiling the Ambassador from the country was more a symbolic action showing his opinion and position toward the US than anything else. According to a lot of Ecuadorians the “coup” that occurred in September last year was completely instigated and carried out by the American CIA. We are generally considered to be a big exploiting bully down here, which Correa likes to encourage. But that’s a complicated issue that I could discuss for hours so I digress for now. Although I must say that my Ecuadorian culture teacher and I are heading down a fast track towards a full out brawl during class one of these days. But at least he aggravates me enough to keep me more or less awake at 10 at night.

My Spanish teacher is a little crazy, kind of like the Guayaquil form of a hippy. She doesn’t really like tests and she thinks classrooms are stifling to brain flow. She blames the white walls and chalkboards for our reluctance to talk during class. However this worked to our benefit this week. We were tired of doing work so we convinced her (without a lot of effort) to take us on a tour of downtown Guayaquil instead of having class. So we left at three on Thursday on a University bus and headed towards el Centro. She showed us some old neighborhoods and we passed the historic downtown and the main Cathedral. Then she took us to the main market in the city center where they sell everything from fruits and vegetables to flowers to meat to herbs and incense that are believed to have healing powers. They also sell these braided cords that resemble switches that my Spanish teacher swears are still sold to whip children.

From the market we went to a really cool museum called el Museo Principal where they had a bunch of artifacts from the historic cultures that used to live in Guayaquil. There was an old Indian tribe in Guayaquil called Huancavilcas that lived in the area of Guayaquil that fought off the Incas for more than 50 years before the Spanish conquest. The rock behind Josh and I in the picture is an old stone that was used for human sacrifice. One side of the rock is the in the shape of a crocodile with a hole to place the person head… then you cut their neck and there is a little canal for the blood to drain out… pretty gross. The other side of the rock is in the shape of a chameleon but has the same purpose.

Upstairs in the museum they had some crazy shrunken heads from a culture in the selva (Rain forest).

They are real heads that the Indians put through a process of skinning, cooking, filling, shaping, and stitching. The heads were then either worn around the belt as prizes or displayed around the city to inspire fear in its inhabitants to cross the man of power.

They also had portraits of all the different presidents who have served Ecuador. I find it rather amusing since many of them barely even served a year. It seems engrained in the culture of a lot of South American countries to kick out or kill any President that isn’t pleasing them rather than wait until a new election. This is how Ecuador had nine different Presidents in 10 years.

There was a girl who was President for a total of three days but then peacefully removed from power to be replaced by a man. I found it interesting that they conveniently forgot to put up her picture in the museum as well. She should be between these two men.

After the museum we jumped back on the bus and went to the Iguana park, which is the principal park in Guayaquil. Our teacher brought a huge bag of bananas to food the Iguanas. As I learned that day Iguanas love bananas, they eat the whole thing including the skins which seem to be their favorite part. By the way in case anyone didn’t know Ecuador is the number one exporter of bananas in the world and after corn rice and one other product that I can’t remember right now, the bananas are the fourth most commonly eaten food product in the world. Over 25% of the bananas consumed in the US come from Ecuador. I think we were more of a spectacle in the Iguana park than the Iguanas were though.

A couple of the girls were afraid the Iguanas were going to mistake their toes for bananas and proceeded to scream and jump on top of benches to avoid the stampeding herds of Iguanas that began to follow us around the park. It was quite funny to see an Iguana run. But we also looked ridiculous because they were running from the Iguanas screaming while the Ecuadorians were petting them like puppies. Overall it was a much better day than normal class.

Friday I went to the artisan market downtown which was completely overwhelming but very cool. It had more crafts, clothes, and miscellaneous objects than I could have ever imagined. To celebrate one of the international kids birthday we all went back out on the pirate ship that we went on a few weeks ago. It functions pretty much as a floating dance party during the night so that was a lot of fun. Saturday we volunteered with a Foundation called Hogar del Cristo that works to help provide housing the homeless and extreme poor in Ecuador. That was one of the most interesting experiences that I have had so far in Ecuador but I will write more about that next blog as I don’t have all the pictures yet.

Later that night we climbed up the four hundred and some odd steps in Las Peñas to reach the top of the light house in Guayaquil. The view of the city was amazing!

If you look at the spot of light in the water on the left side, you can see the lights of the pirate boat that we went on Fridayt sailing along the Malecon.

Today Leonor took Alberto and I to the main market of Guayaquil. This market lies a little outside of the city. It is the market that where the vendors in the other market go to buy the goods to take them to the middle of the city to sell. It was really cool and huge! They sold everything there! And every type of vegetable and fruit you could imagine. I still haven’t managed to know all the names. I tried two new ones today as we were walking around the market. They also had cows hanging from stalls, octopus, and monstrous fish. Leonors birthday is tomorrow so Alberto is coming over to help cook fish tacos to give her the day off from cooking lunch. We bought all the ingredients at the market for less probably around 7 dollars and its going to be enough for lunch for four people! It should be a lot of fun!

US Ambassador

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703712504576244853633929750.html

The Little Things

So I have no new pictures to add today. This week has been pretty regular. So far I have been to the gym and classes and refrained from kicking my host sister in the shins, though I dont know how long my restraint is going to last.
I realized again how short of time I have left on Monday when I had to register for classes in South Carolina next fall! Its hard to imagine going to school somewhere else again! Although USC does have some definite advantages... like lights that work even when its raining outside.
I had a midterm exam yesterday in my Ecuadorian culture class yesterday. Right as my brain was begining to flow and cleverness was ready to fly from my fingertips in a stream of knowledge and made up fluff that was guaranteed to wow the teacher... the lights went off. We were left sitting in the pitch black barely able to see our own nose let alone our exams. A few of the Ecuadorians pulled out their trusty blackberrys which are attached to them like superglue at all times, and a few other kids pulled out lighters so that we could at least stare akwardly around at each other in the semi-darkness and complain about the lack of light. We waited for ten minutes in the dark and watched as all the other classes around us gave up and left (this class is at 9 at night so no one ever wants to be there anyway). The teacher finally gave us permission to leave and literally right as my hand touched the door knob the electricity flashed back on... so I got to return to my desk and finish the exam...
The funny thing about all of this is that it is completely normal and no one was the least bit concerned. The school has tons of power outages when it rains too much because the power lines arent strong enough to handle the storms.... This one was only a small one, the lights usually go out for a few hours. The teachers just pack up and hope its better the next day. Conversely, if it doesnt rain enough they have power shortages because a lot of the power sources depend on rain...so then University has to be shut down at 7 when there is no more light.
I woke up at 630 this morning to go to the gym early. It was the first time that I had seen the garbage collectors out in the neighborhood. I dont know why I had never thought of it before but in Ecuador the cost of labor is so low compared to the capital that is required to buy machinery, that all garbage collection is done by hand and just thrown in the back of regular pick up trunks. And I thought being a trash man would be no fun at home, at least there you dont have touch all the trash...
I spent the rest of my day doing homework and hanging out with Leonor while she cooked lunch. She asked me when my parents are coming and is now all excited to cook lunch for them one day! She is already planning out the menu! She is planning on making sopa de bola de camarón as an appetizer, which is a soup with shrimp filled platain balls in it. It sounds strange but it is an Ecuadorian specialty and pretty complicated to make so its a nice compliment. It should be a good time!
I have today and tomorrow left of classes this week and then only two more weeks left. I also have a cultural seminar on Friday where we will discuss how developing countries should ethically use natural resources... which probably means talking about the oil predicament again. Then we are watching a documentary on a attempted coup in Venezuela in  2002. Some people here relate the events of September 30th of last year in Ecuador (pepper spraying/"kidnapping" Correa) as an attempt to copy what happened in Venezuela to gain popularity. Saturday we are off to  help build a house with a charity foundation called Hogar del Cristo! Should be another exciting weekend!

First of all I would like to point out that today is April 3rd. What does that mean?

I officially have exactly one month left in Ecuador!!

On May 3^rd I will be soaring in to Greensborough, North Carolina on an American Airlines flight. What does that mean? That means returning to real life and responsibility… and maybe having to do more on the weekend than go to the beach…

This past week was midterms so I spent most of it either at the gym working off stress, locked in my room reading, or sitting in a class room until 1030 at night trying not to fall asleep. By the time Thursday rolled around I was about  ready to rip my hair out. Im not accustomed to this kind of hard work anymore. I went out salsa dancing on Thursday night at a local bar that we have been to a few times before.

Friday I spent the whole morning doing homework and then spent the afternoon swimming at a friends pool. We worked up an appetite swimming so a big group of us headed over to a buffet called Little Chef. It was $12 and had more food than I have seen in a long time. They had everything from Ecuadorian specialties such as maduro con queso and ceviche, to stir fry to flan. The most exciting part? They had a full salad bar! Granted most of the salads had choclo or corn and tons of mayonnaise but it was still pretty exciting. And there was all you can eat sushi and crab legs! We were in heaven. I think we ended up staying there for over two hours before we finally worked up the energy and motivation to walk out.

We left early Saturday morning for a trip to a little beach town called Puerto el Morro. We went on a 3 hour boat ride where we saw tons of dolphins. They were swimming right up to the boat and playing everywhere in the water.

In the middle of the boat ride we stopped at an island to get off and see some birds… The island was swampy and turned out to be a breeding ground for starving mosquitos. I was one of the first ones off the boat and within a few seconds I had about 20 of them just on one leg… and I was wearing bug spray. I thought I was in a horror movie. I tried to get back on the boat and refuse to go see the stupid birds but the way back was blocked off by everyone else getting off so I had no option but to proceed. By the time we reached the platform to where you were supposed to watch the birds I looked like I had the chicken pocks and I was about ready to murder the tour guide for taking us to Mosquito Land.

I very loudly made sure the director knew I was not amused and that if I got dengue or Malaria because of him he was going to have it coming… Anyway the birds that we got off the boat to see were the same ones we had been watching all day from the boat and it was definitely not worth the marks or the bites. Before heading back I applied two more coats of repellant but still managed to almost double the amount of bites on the trek back. Everyone else was pretty much eaten alive as well but apparently I was their favorite snack of the day because I won the award for the most bites. By the end of it I was so covered in bumps and bites that they had to give me some pill for the swelling and some mosquito aftercare and have me lay down during lunch… I really wanted to throw my water bottle at the director but I refrained… barely.

But what made the trip worthwhile was some special guests we brought along with us this weekend. My friend Megan works with a foundation in the middle of Guayaquil that shelters young girls who have family problems. The girls come from a large variety of backgrounds. Some of them have been physically or sexually abused, others were neglected, others are orphans, and some just come from such large families that there isn’t enough to go around. The girls are taken in by the foundation and given food, sheleter, and education. However they don’t have a lot of freedom since the shelter doesn’t have the resources or safety regulations that would allow the older girls to go out.

As such a lot of the girls are 15 and have never gone out with friends, been to the movies, gone to the beach, etc… let alone talked to boys. Every time Megan went on a trip with us for the weekend they would crowd around her on Monday and want to know every detail of what we did. It was obvious that they were hungry to see a little bit of the outside world. So Megan talked to the school about it for ideas to help the girls get out for a weekend and do something fun. As a solution we had five of the girls and one of the Tías (a chaperone from the foundation) come with us on our trip to Puerto El Morro!

The girls were ecstatic and had a great time! They were all very open and happy and extremely patient with all of our broken Spanish! After just an hour and a half bus ride to the beach they were already holding my hand, hugging me, and telling me all about their lives. They were squealing and chasing dolphins around the boat! And  taking turns taking pictures with the boys and stealing all of the guys sunglasses and hats! It was really cool to hang out with them and get to know them all.

At the same time it was heart breaking to see how desperate they are for interaction with kids and people besides the 20 some girls that live at the foundation with them.  A few of them had Facebook and made sure to get my name so hopefully I will be able to keep in touch with them! I talked to Megan and I am hoping to surprise them and go visit them one morning this week or next week that I have free.

After the tour I said goodbye to my new friends and they dropped us off in a beach town called Playas to spend the night and part of the day on Sunday.

We are building a house next weekend as a volunteer project in Guayaquil and then we only have one more weekend free before school ends and everyone heads off in their separate directions to travel!!! I cant believe it!!!