Follow my time volunteering in an elementary school in Tumbaco, Ecuador!

Monday, March 22, 2010

Looong post

It's been over 2 months now, and oh boy, time is flying. I'm almost halfway through! Ahhh!

We are now on our fourth teacher for Pre-Kinder in 2.5 weeks. People keep showing up, teach for a few days, decide it's not for them, and leave. Four teachers in 2.5 weeks. It's ridiculous. I don't blame them, though. I only have to have one class with them; I can't imagine teaching them an entire day. With almost every kid either having attention problems, behavioral problems, speech problems, or mental problems, Pre-Kinder is certainly a handful.

I have to start creating the kids' exams, which start next Monday. This is harder than it sounds because of the aforementioned problem: we have so many different types of kids--and they all learn differently--and hence we have to have different types of exams. So while I have only three classes, I'll think I'll end up having to make at least six different exams. The methods of teaching and testing here at my school are so different from what I experienced in the States, and I wonder sometimes which actually works better. I remember my elementary school experience being lots of sitting at a desk, copying the alphabet from the overhead, and becoming increasingly less and less interesting as we watched our field trips and game playing disappear--it was never this wild, play-based style here at the school in which the kids learn solely through songs, games, art, and some writing. I wonder who actually learns more, or who actually retains the information longer, or who learns faster. What exactly IS the best way to teach the children?

We celebrated a great St. Patrick's Day on Wednesday. We found the sole Irish bar in the whole of Quito and joined the hordes of green gringos ready to celebrate their Irish (or pretend-Irish) heritage. Trying to explain to our Ecuadorian host families why we were celebrating was a challenge--why DO we all wear green? Who's St. Patrick anyway?--great fun, though.

Funny story about St. Patty's Day. The minute we stepped into the area called "Gringolandia" (Land of the Gringos), the first people we saw were from somewhere in the Middle East, not the expected mass of Irish or at least Americans. These guys were wearing long robes and turbans and had really long beards and wore not a tad of green. We all sorta looked at each other and said, "Well, they're certainly not Irish!" These not-Irish-looking people then tried to sell us special brownies which just made us crack up even more. Soo funny.

Now for some more observations:
- In almost all Ecuadorian schools, a uniform is required. Sometimes it's the plaid, private school look that you see in the States occasionally, but more likely the school uniform is actually a sweatsuit. The first time I saw a group of kids walking around in these sweatsuits, I just assumed they were on a sports team. But no, what Americans wear to the gym, Ecuadorians wear to high school.

- There are no hard cheeses here in Ecuador. Only soft, white cheese with strange tastes and an inability to melt EVER. No cheddar to be found, sadly.

- Not only does milk come in bags, but yogurt does too.

- Ecuadorians have this annoying habit of not telling you what's going on. You have to ask about EVERYthing. For example, I never am told the school schedule for the day, let alone for the week. So sometimes I get a surprise when there's like a birthday party for one of the kids or something that I didn't know about. My host family is the same way. I never get told when somebody has a late class or has to go to the doctor's. They just disappear and leave me wondering where they are.

- Wedding anniversaries are a big deal here. There's a pretty serious, Catholic church ceremony for 25 year and 50 year anniversaries. I went to this ceremony with my family to celebrate 30 years of marriage between the aunt and uncle of my host mother. It was a 45 minute ceremony with lots of Bible readings and prayers and even communion. Then everyone came to our house for a big lunch and cake and champagne. I got bitten by a trillion mosquitos during the lunch which was a bummer, but overall, it was really great.

- I'm gonna get kinda Spanish-nerdy here for a minute so you Spanish students reading will understand and probably nobody else will. Sorry. I'm still trying to figure it out but they seem to use "usted" and "tu" interchangeable here. (Both are forms of "you" but "usted" is used to be more polite, generally used with teachers, children to adults, the elderly, etc. and "tu" is used casually for friends.) But at the school here, I've found that the teachers sometimes use "usted" commands for the kids, saying "Vaya a jugar" etc. And some of the kids use "tu" forms for the teachers. I would've thought the kids would use "usted" with the teachers to be polite and the teachers would just be casual with the kids. Not the case. I even sometimes hear things like "Te vaya" where they mix "tu" and "usted." I don't get it.

- They love to cook with bananas here. At first I thought it was gross when I found a hot, cooked banana lying limply there on my plate, but now I just love it. They fry 'em, cook 'em, make little chips out of themÉ. Delicious.

- Nobody walks barefoot here. Not even at home. I always wear shoes at my house because the house is set up so that you have to walk outside to get to the other rooms, but when I spent the night at a friend's house and walked around barefoot, they kept asking if I wanted to borrow some sandals.

- Books are expensive. And when I say expensive, I mean that the prices are pretty much the same as in the States. And the selection of English books is pretty scattered and strange. Lots of porn books, only the seventh book in a series, and lots of Isabel Allende. We've started a book sharing thing between ourselves so we're managing to get enough to read. However, it's not exactly a fair exchange since I keep giving people my English books (the language we all know) and can't get any in return because I can't read Icelandic and Swedish (the only books they brought from their countries).

- Don't trust the signs. Many a times we have been tricked by the "We're open 24 hours" signs because they are NEVER open 24 hours.

- Ecuadorians find ANY reason to celebrate. They just like to party here, I guess. We've celebrated Carnaval, International Women's Day, every kid's birthday here at the school as well as the teachers', wedding anniversariesÉ the list goes on. We get a whole week off for Easter and got two days off for Carnaval. They just love to break out the alcohol and clear away the chairs for some salsa dancing. At the wedding anniversary, all the old folks were jamming' away to the salsa in the living room and singing, maybe a bit drunkenly, all of the classic, Ecuadorian love ballads. So funny.

- After high school, kids here don't move out like they usually do in the States. My 20 year old sister still lives at home, which is the norm here. She says it's not realistic to try to find your own apartment; it's just so much easier to live at home for free.

- I've talked with my host sister a lot about going to university here and how it differs from my country. In Ecuador, you have to choose a major/job upon entering, and you graduate in 4 years with a job title, with a few extra years added onto the normal four depending on how qualified your job is (doctor, lawyer, etc.) Many students wear full suits or at least dress up to go to class which is a big difference compared to US university attire: hoodies and sweatpants.

- There are two cell phone providers here: Movistar and Porta. "People with Porta don't have friends," my host sister likes tells me because everyone in Quito, for the most part, has Movistar. It's also kinda nifty because they have 3x1 or 2x1 days where if you give the store person $5 it will either be doubled or tripled, depending on the deal, and you get more cell phone minutes.

- People pee in the street quite often. Just saying.

- They don't like cats here. I've only seen two in the whole of Ecuador while on the other hand, I've seen hundreds of dogs. And they howl at night, my bedtime music. Makes me miss my kitties!

- They honk their car horns just for the sake of honking. Hence, constant honking all hours of the day.

- There are no Asians and no gay people. My friend and I saw six Asians at once in the park one day and nearly died of surprise. We just sat there on the swings and stared with our mouths hanging open. What a day.

- I'm realizing that there aren't direct translations from English into Spanish and vice versa a lot of the time. When I first got here, I tried to translate everything from English directly and just couldn't do it. It means that none of us really have a verbal personality like we might in our home countries (for example, I say "legit" and other such phrases). And the same is for Spanish. They have little expressions that just can't be translated very well. Like "chute" which is something like "that sucks" but not quite. It's interesting.

Now for more news.
I had a great weekend this past weekend. To start off the fun, during school on Friday, we made Easter eggs! (Thanks, Mom!) The kids just loved it. When I was telling the story about the Easter bunny and how we dye eggs, one of my students just kept whispering "Wow!" with eyes as big as saucers. So cute.

Then that evening, I had two volunteer friends over to my house, and we baked brownies! My oven is horrible, though, and doesn't really like to bake anything in general, always producing cakes and brownies with burnt bottoms. It was still good though--we ate it right out of the pan and devoured it in minutes! We also made good 'lo American Kraft Mac 'n cheese (which cost us a whole $2.43 per box compared to the $.99 it costs in the States!). My volunteer friends had never had Kraft mac 'n cheese and they loved it. We also shared it with my host brother and his cousin, but I don't think they liked it.... haha. Then we had a bit of a salsa dance party in the living room and blasted the music while pretending to know how to salsa. (My host brother is pretty good at it, actually!) We're starting salsa classes in April so hopefully we'll be improving soon!

On Saturday, we went to Mitad del Mundo, or the middle of the world. It was a bit lame, though. We had to travel for hours to get there from Tumbaco, and when we arrived, there wasn't much besides the red line that supposedly is the equator. (We walked 10 minutes up the road and visited another place that said IT was the middle of the word--"according to GPS!"--since we'd heard that the actual big monument and red line weren't actually the real thing.) So we took the mandatory picture to say we'd been there then got ice cream and peaced out.

That evening we met Olivia's sister and sister's boyfriend who'd just arrived from the States for a visit. Her dad had visited a few weeks before so it was fun getting to know all of them! Now the rest of us are dying to see people from home--so hey, if anyone is interested in coming to Ecuador, now is the time! Now till July 2, you get a free tour guide!

We started exams today so Basica had their English exam. And all but one got really good grades!! It's such a relief to know they've actually learned stuff. Yay!

Ciao for now =)

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Update

Sorry I haven't been writing lately but there hasn't been much to report. These past few weeks I've been pretty sick so I've just been laying low--going to work, sleeping a lot, staying at home.

I was walking home tonight, though, and I randomly looked up. And the sky was just filled with millions of brilliant stars. I couldn't get over how gorgeous it was. And there, right above my head, watching me walk home, was the familiar Orion constellation. The night was so clear that you could even see the three, generally indiscernible stars of his knife thing hanging from his belt. It made me happy. I also probably looked like a total idiot because I was weaving drunkenly down the road with my head glued to the sky. But whatever.

And now for some stories, the things that happened in between me being sick and me being sick again =)

First off, we went to our first soccer game! La Liga, the best team in Ecuador, totally smashed the team from Guayaquil, 5-0. We went to the game with a guy who had actually played on La Liga before he had to quit to go to university so that was really cool. Everyone here in Ecuador gets SO into these games, chanting, screaming, jumping around--it was fantastic. The players actually even got into a fight on the field (hello red card), and there was even a line of police separating the fans of the rival teams. They get so competitive here, and this is only the university level. So much excitement! But my god, the heat was unbearable. Screaming straight down at us and turning us into a row of burnt lobsters in 10 minutes. So we all looked like little old ladies with shawls thrown over our heads in an attempt to block that crazy sun. I have to go to more soccer games here, though. They're so fantastic.

And then I had a little adventure on the bus on the way home from Quito one day. I got on my usual bus, La Morita, like I always do to get home, but right at the corner where the bus should turn left to get to my house, it turned right instead. And I'm thinking, "Well, ok. Maybe this is a normal thing for a Monday afternoon at 4:30pm. Right?" So I stayed on the bus and watched a little old woman with a heavy bundle of who knows what hobble off at a stop further down the wrong way of the road, looking calm-as-can-be like this was a normal bus route. After minutes of long, winding, dusty Tumbaco roads, the bus finally stopped, and I found myself at a legit, rural farm in some tiny corner of Tumbaco. I was starting to freak out a little bit at this point, but there was one other guy on the bus who looked to be in the same position as I was so I held tight. I didn't really have a choice, to be honest, since I had absolutely no clue where we were. Ten minutes later, another La Morita bus came to this same tiny Tumbaco farm, picked us up, and dropped me off at my house. But on the way back, we passed yet another La Morita bus on the way to that same farm, so now I'm just completely befuddled as to how the bus system works. Special one-day offer: Monday afternoons at 4:30pm--to the farm!

On the other hand, I had a great time the other day being a mall rat with a friend of mine at the Tumbaco centro commercial. I've discovered that in the food court at the end of the mall, one entire wall is completely made of windows and hosts an excellent view. I now go there to sketch sometimes (something I didn't think I'd be doing at all during my time here in Ecuador. But I couldn't help it: one day, I just HAD to go out and buy some pastels and sketch something. Never felt that urge before.) So after I finished sipping my mango juice and making some sketches of that gorgeous view, my friend and I discovered a music store in the mall. As in musical instruments, not CDs. He knows guitar, and I know some piano so we just started rocking out (not together--we're not that good haha). It was so nice to touch a piano again, though. I've missed that.

I also went to the birthday party of my host siblings' 80-something-year-old grandfather. I literally walked in the front door of my house after coming from Quito, and my host brother nearly pushed me back out the door saying, "It's my abuelito's birthday. Wanna come?" Of course, how could I say no? So I left with him with only 5 cents in my pocket, forgetting that I had to pay for the bus. We ended up on the bus, emptied our pockets, and between the two of us, only had 35 cents. It was so pitiful. I had to ask this nice lady to give me some money.

But the party was great fun. I met a whole horde of people in some way relating to one another and ate a great meal at the table with the old folks. (I was a special guest so I actually got a seat at the table! How exciting!) By the end of the evening, I was chatting with an 8-year-old cousin who amused herself for quite awhile by asking me the English word for every single thing she could possibly see in the room: How do you say "candle" in English? Beard? Glass? Wine? My favorite was, "How do you say gringo in English? Hilarious because not only is the word "gringo" a bit impolite generally, but of course, there is no real English translation. So funny.

As for "normal," everyday occurrences, the teaching has been going well. We're getting ready for exams in a couple weeks so I have to decide what I want the kids to know by then. I made a fruit salad with the oldest kids to reinforce the names of the fruits (which was fun and yummy) and now we're moving onto vegetables. And we're still trudging along with the names of the family and things in the neighborhood with the other kids. It's so exciting when I see that the kids are actually learning things. The oldest kids especially are really good at their fruits now, and it makes me smile every time when one of the kids can remember the English word for something I've taught them. We had a bit of difficulty in Primero de Basica, though, in learning the difference between "tree" and "street." We took a walk in the neighborhood around the school to point out the doors, windows, houses, etc, and when I asked them the words for "tree" and "street," I noticed that the kids pronounced them as exactly the same word. It sounded something like "estree." It was very interesting for me just to realize that the pronunciation is actually very difficult for the kids. I didn't even think about that before. So now we're working on those two words which I want them to differentiate before the exam.

And as always, there's some new lunchtime experience to report. For example, I shelled shrimp for the first time the other day. (They eat lots of shrimp here which I didn't like before I came here. Now, my favorite lunch is a dish sorta like fried rice with shrimp but with Ecuadorian spices. Sooo yummy.) And everyday at lunch now, my host mother makes me eat straight ginger to "cure me of my cough." It is nasty as all get out, straight ginger. I'm never going to be able to eat ginger again.

And then this last weekend, I had a nice, quiet weekend at home. My host brother and I made a cake and watched movies one night, and on Sunday, my whole family went to the pool! Getting there was so sketchy though; we took a bus to Cumbaya, a town in between Tumbaco and Quito, and then we all walked down this random alley and climbed into a small, 12-seater bus that we somehow knew would go to this pool. So strange. But very common--it's the only way to get to the pool! The pool was actually more like a spa of sorts, with multiple saunas and hots tubs as well as the pool. We ended up spending 5 hours there--so great just to relax all day with my host family!

Then, this Monday, March 8, we celebrated International Women's Day at the school, which actually is pretty big here. My host mom bought a huge pizza (!!!) and flowers for all of the teachers, and the kids all made cute cards for their moms. And then my host brother came home from school carrying a rose for each of us women in the family. Soo cute.

As for upcoming travel plans, everyone here gets a week off for Easter, La Semana Santa (Holy Week), so I think we're planning another trip to the beach! Can't wait!