Many things have happened since my last entry.  Due to some complications, I moved to a different host family on Monday of this week.  My new host family is very nice.  My host mother’s name is Yoli or “Mami Yoli”; my host father’s name is Eugenio.  I think they have at least one daughter living in the house, but I have not met her yet.  We live in a house at the end of a quiet street.  My room is much larger than my previous room, and it is completely decked out in shades of pink and peach.  There is one other student living here as well; his room is very blue.  The house is a little farther away than my previous home so I need to take two buses to get to school.  It takes about 40 minutes.  There is a lot of traffic in Quito!

School continues to be challenging.  We are still working on grammar, and we will continue until the end of next week.  So many verbs, so easy to make a mistake!!  Nevertheless, I think it’s been important for me to review some of the grammatical structures.  I will have to do a final project before my times ends here.  It includes a 30 minute presentation and a paper.  I have decided to investigate the Conquest and Colonization of Ecuador. 

I’ve gotten used to the beautiful landscape here.  Tall mountains surround the city and houses creep up the steep mountainside.  The mornings are generally bright and warm, but as the afternoon continues, sheets of clouds come over and slide down the mountains slowly covering the city.  I’ve also really enjoyed some of the great foods here.  There is a lot of bread!  I’m not used to eating so much bread, but it’s fresh and filling.  Ecuador also has a huge variety of fruits, fruits that I have never heard of or seen before.  Take bananas for example.  There are green bananas (verde), red bananas (rosado I think), small bananas (orlito), banano/a/platano, Maqueno, and maduros.  There are probably more, and I may have messed a few of these names up, but you get the point!  Anyway, I’ve enjoyed trying some of the fruits.  I generally have fresh juice (blackberry is probably one of my favorites so far) for breakfast each morning.  In addition to fruits, another new food has been quail eggs!!  They were delicious!

That’s about it for now.  More adventures are in the works for the future!  Chao  

It´s been a little over a week since I´ve been here, and I´ve already had many interesting experiences.  I arrived on Saturday evening the 12th to a very kind and welcoming host mother in the Quito airport.  Thankfully my luggage arrived as well.  After a quick night of sleep, I was up early to begin a full day of Mother´s Day celebrations.  Pilar, my host mother, has 2 children who are married and have their own families.  Her son Esteban lives in Guayaquil, and her daughter lives here in Quito.  We left on Sunday morning with Esteban, and his wife´s family to eat lunch at a nice restaurant in Cumbaya which is several hours away by car.  Although it was a lovely drive, I had a raging headache and severe dehydration from the change in altitude.  Quito sits at over 9,000 feet.  This means that the temperature is generally in the 50s and 60s.  People do not have air conditioning or heat here.  There are two seasons, rain and no rain.  We are just entering the no rain season.

So we arrived at the restaurant, and I ordered locro (a potato soup) and mote sucio.  I learned a lesson with the mote sucio (hominy with really fried pieces of pork).  Never order something that has the word ´dirty´  in its title.  Later in the day, we spent some time with Pilar´s husband´s family.  Her husband had 8 brothers and sisters so it´s quite a large rumbuncious group.  Needless to say, I slept well after my first full day in Ecuador.

My classes began on Monday.  There were five of us new students.  We had a placement test, orientation and a tour of some of the old city.  Overall, it was a good first day.  Pilar showed me how to get to and from the school.  We live on a really big hill.  So everyday now I walk down this huge hill until I get to the main street which is called 6 de Diciembre.  I pay .25 cents  to get on the bus.  I know what you´re thinking, .25 cents?  That´s a steal...and it is, except the experience is less than inviting.  If I thought I had been crammed into a bus/metro/trolly before, it was nothing like this experience!  After 4 stops, I get off and walk a few blocks to the school.  We have class from 8:30-1pm.  After that, we are free to do what we like.  Right now, I´m taking Spanish grammar with 2 other students.  I´ve also been getting to know the other students at the school.  Most are from either Europe or the U.S.

One student from Germany invited me to go with her and some of her host family on Friday evening to walk around some of the older parts of the city.  We went to the Centro Historico.  There, we watched some improv street theater, and we ate fried empanadas with cheese and morocho which is basically rice pudding in a glass.  After that, we walked down to a street called La Ronda.  It´s long narrow cobblestone street with live music, restaurants and handcrafts.  We spent some time dancing, karaokeing and we tried canelazo, a traditional alcoholic drink made from sugarcane alcohol with hot fruit cider.

Saturday we left for Mindo, a cloud forest about 2 1/2 hours away from Quito. Eight of us from the school went.  We spent the majority of our time hiking down to some waterfalls and ziplining.  Some people also went to a butterfly farm.  It was a lovely drive.  We returned by 6 in the evening.

That about covers the week!  I´m still getting used to some of the safety precations that we need to take here in the city, but I´m hoping that things will get easier as my time here increases.

I´ve enjoyed hearing from some of you already.  I continue to think about you all as the summer months are approaching and many of you are going through periods of transition.

Until next time!  Chao

After an amazing graduation celebration with friends and family, I am preparing to leave for Ecuador on Saturday!  I finished up my Social Work degree at the end of this semester in April, and I will continue working on my Spanish degree in Ecuador.  I will return to the U.S. at the end of August.

I have had mixed feelings about everything since graduation.  While I am excited to be finished at EMU, I will miss all of the good friendships with my fellow classmates, professors and mentors.  I will miss the Redmond Dead Poets Society, swimming holes, dancing after dinner, planned and unplanned mischievous adventures and the pleasure of eating globs of ice cream in the cafeteria.  The lovely Shenandoah Valley in all of its natural beauty, and simple charm has found a way into my heart; I will miss it too.  Since my parents are in the process of moving away from Columbus, I am realizing how much I will miss the people at Columbus Mennonite Church as well as friends in the Grandview community.  So, as I prepare for my next adventure in the South, I am in a way processing certain losses and anticipating significant changes when I return to the U.S.

Despite the many transitions of the past year, I am excited for the new journey ahead of me!  I don't know quite what to expect in this new small country (did you know Ecuador is the same size as Nevada?), but I'm looking forward to new friendships and experiences.  I will take four classes in Spanish at the Academia Latinoamericana de Espanol en Quito over my twelve weeks of study, and I will live with a host family, but that's about all I know!  I will update this blog when the timing feels right.  I will have plenty of internet access while I am away so please take liberties to comment or write an e-mail; after all, I want to know what is going on with all of you too!  If there is one thing I have learned this past semester, it is the importance of relationships and friendships, even if they are at a distance.  I will continue to keep all of you in my thoughts from far away.

Until next time....!