Birthday weekend and more

Giving taller in the community of Shumid

All has been going very well in Alausí. I presented the results of my community diagnostic to my organization. We had a long talk about my projects and my role as a part of the technical team for COCACH. I’m really excited for my projects. I have 3 major projects (which are basically what I’ve been talking about all along). My project with teenagers; with this I have the opportunity to collaborate with the UN Population Fund which I’m super excited for. I will also be continuing my talleres with the madres de familia. My third project is a bathroom project for the communities. Most of the communities don’t have any kind of bathroom. My organization wants to build not only latrines but full bathrooms (including a sink and shower) for these communities, which makes sense because having a bathroom is only half the problem with sanitation and hygiene. The communities need a place to wash their hands and bathe regularly. The only problem with this project is the funding. If anyone has any ideas for grants send them my way!

Birthday with my officemates (they didn't know how old I was turning so the candle was a question mark)

Other than working on my projects, I’ve been busy. Last Saturday was my birthday. Friday night my officemates took me out to karyoke to celebrate. They got me a cake and a couple small gifts. It was really fun. The next day my whole host family and I went to Quito to visit the family I stayed with last time I was there. We just kind of hung out all day. They got me a cake for dinner. As I learned Friday night, they have a tradition here that the person celebrating their birthday has to bite the cake before you cut it. Of course with your face that close to the cake, what do you think happens? Friday night it wasn’t an issue since it was just a bunt cake with no frosting, but Saturday night, the cake had a thick layer of chocolate butter cream frosting (which was delicious by the way). When I went to bite the cake, someone (I’m still not sure who) shoved my face into the cake. I had frosting all over the place-in my hair, in my nose and even in my eyelashes! It was really funny (and no I will not be sharing those photos). Overall, it was a really great birthday. I was really worried that I would be spending my birthday all alone with no friends, but my wonderful host family made me feel right at home.

Meditation by a dry waterfall

The next day, Mr. and Mrs. Zuñiga, Criss and I went on this nature retreat thing outside of Quito. It was really pretty. Our guide was a psychologist who is really into alternative medicine and meditation. We meditated next to a waterfall (which incidentally didn’t have any water flowing from it). After about a three hour hike (roundtrip) we were back up at the top of the mountain having a picnic Ecuadorian style—rice, potatoes and a huge bucket full of chicken! It was very tasty. After that we headed back into the city because I had to get ready to go back to Alausi.

Cuenca

This week is a All Saints Day and All Souls Day. The whole country pretty much shuts down for 3 days for people to honor family and friends who have past away. But since I am not Catholic nor do I have any family to remember in the cemeteries of Ecuador it basically means vacation for me!

A bunch of PCVs went to Cuenca to celebrate Halloween. Cuenca is the 3^rd largest city in Ecuador and is VERY touristy. I saw so many gringos it was almost startling! The city is absolutely gorgeous. All the architecture is colonial, so there are cute balconies and flowers everywhere. There is also this huge cathedral in the middle of the city. Because Cuenca is so toursty, there are a tone of dining options besides rice and potatoes (although, don’t worry, they do have that too if it’s what you fancy). I had Indian food, and sandwiches, I even got Kraft mac and cheese in one restaurant. I never knew how much I missed fake powdered cheese until that moment. Some of the PCVs who live in/near Cuenca knew all the places to go. Friday night we went to this really chill restaurant with a live band. This was the night everyone was getting into town so we all chatted and caught up for a while. It was really good to hear about everyone else’s experiences. That night we went out dancing...that wasn’t marching in place or in a circle. It was great!!

The next day, more people were coming into town still (some people live 10+ hours from Cuenca). We went to this very pretty park and chatted all about our sites and our experiences. It is so amazing to me that even though we are all in the same country—some of us even in the same province—and we are having such different experiences. As is to be expected, some people are having an absolute blast while others are frustrated or board. Even though I’m thankful everyday for my site assignment here in Alausi, it truly made me value how lucky I am to be here. After talking to the other PCVs I realize that Peace Corps could not have done a better job placing me. I am not so rural that there is very little structure and coordination with my counterpart, but I’m not in such a big city that I get lost.

That night we went to a local gringo owned bar for a Halloween party. Some people went all out on their costumes. I was so impressed by what they could come up with the limited resources here. My costume was pretty lame. My friend and I sported our Olmedo jerseys (the soccer team from Riobamba) and put glitter on our faces and wrote “OLMEDO” on our face. Olmedo had played the team from Cuenca that day and won. People take soccer very seriously here so we were a little bit worried about getting beat up. Luckily, nothing happened and it was a great night.

Standing next to the mountain I'm about to climb

The next day a few of my friends and I went out together for breakfast and a very cute Australian owned cafe. I went sightseeing for a bit then headed home. Even though Cuenca is celebrating their independence this week so Monday through Wednesday are holidays. Some people stayed the whole week, but I decided to head back to site. Good thing too, because the next day Don Samuel (the driver from the office who lives with his family here in Alausi—I’ve talked about them before) invited me to go visit his father for a family picnic. His dad lives way up in the mountains on a farm. There was a mountain peak next to the farm and Don Samuel jokingly asked if I wanted to climb it. I responded seriously that I did. So Fernando, his 11 year old son, Balto, the most energetic German Shepherd you’ll ever meet, and I set up the mountain. There wasn’t really a trail so before long we were crawling hands and knees through tree roots to get to the top. It took us about an hour and a half to get to the top, but it was gorgeous! When we got back down to the bottom, Patricia (Don Samuel’s wife who is only a few years older than I am) had made lunch for everyone. After a brief chat with Grandpa we headed back down the mountain. The whole way Santiago (5) and Michelle (9) asking me how to say random words in English. I don’t think they remember any of them, I just think they liked thinking of really random things for me to say funny.

The next day two of my PC friends and I decided to hike Chimborazo. They live in Riobamba and had also left Cuenca on Sunday. Chimborazo is the highest mountain in Ecuador. The trail goes all the way to the summit, but once you get to the snow line, it is impossible to climb without gear and a guide. But there are several markers along the way. We wanted to go to the second refugio (which is pretty much the highest you can go in a day and is where you camp if you are going to hike to the snow line). However, the mountain had other plans. By the time we got to the first regfugio (about an hour and a half into the hike) the weather turned bad and started to rain. At that point we were at about 14,000 feet so it was super cold. We decided to head down for the day and planned to return at a later date for a 2 day hike to the start of the glacial caps.

Today I’ve just been hanging out at home doing things I’ve needed to get done for a while (i.e. laundry, clean my room, update my blog, study some Spanish and Kichwua).

The rest of this week and next week are looking pretty busy at work. I’ve got some talleres to plan and I have to prepare a presentation for an upcoming PC conference in Quito.

In other news, I got skype up and running at my house so I would love to chat with people!

I hope all is well back home!