Story time

As usual I’ve been very busy here in Alausí. My projects with my women’s groups are going great. We just talked about family planning in the communities, and all of the women are really interested in doing a “couples workshop” with their husbands. We will talk about the importance of family planning-more specifically the importance of talking about family planning as a couple. There seem to be 2 extremes in the communities, either the husbands don’t want their wives to use any type of birth control and beat them if they even bring it up, or the force them get a tubal ligation—often times without the woman’s consent or knowledge. The women also want to talk about women’s rights and gender equity in the communities in these workshops. I really don’t know if all of the men will come to these workshops, but hopefully some will come. Even if only a few of the men come, they can be leaders to the other men in the communities based on what they learn.

My projects with my jovenes are also going really well too. We just had a big taller with UNFPA and one of my other PC friends, Kellie, and her kids on sexuality. Now this group of teenagers is going to replicate the lessons in their own communities. Kellie and I also want to have a big event with both our groups of kids on March 14^th and 15^th to celebrate World Women’s Day. We want to plan some workshops on gender issues as well as some fun activities like skits and a soccer tournament. Plus, it would give our jovenes a chance to get out of their communities and get to know other parts of their own country.

In other news, I was selected to be a part of the Peace Corp’s Gender and Development (GAD) Committee. I’m the new treasurer. GAD used to operate a scholarship program to help girls finish high school (in Ecuador upwards of 56% of women do not finish high school). Unfortunately, GAD can’t continue with the scholarship program so no new girls will be receiving scholarships. However, the girls already in the program will get to finish with their scholarships so me and the old treasurer (who will be completing her service in August) have to oversee that. Basically what GAD does is serve as a support system to other volunteers who would like to include gender education in the work that they do. As I have mentioned before, machismo is alive and well in Ecuador and has a huge impact on all aspects of life (i.e. health, education, development). Including gender education, especially for volunteers who work with kids and teenagers, is a good way to help fight against machismo and the impact it has on the development of the communities we work in.

Things have also been going really well just in terms of life in Ecuador. I’ve been spending a lot of time in Alausí getting to know more and more people. Pretty much everyone knows who I am in town now.

Instead of going into great detail about my projects I wanted to share some stories. I feel like in my blogs I’m always giving an overview and none of the funny/random things that happen in my life make the cut.

A rude awakening:

I went with the Zuñigas to meet the grandma (also incidentally my host mom’s mother) who lives in the campo. She is a very sweet little old lady who lives by herself with her animals. The entire community was without power, so we ended up staying the night at her house. We had a really nice evening just talking and Mr. Zuñiga played the guitar a little. When it came time for bed, they gave me my own room—which was far from necessary and extremely nice. I slept very well all night long until around 8 am. I woke up when I noticed someone—or something—had sat right next to me on the bed. I open my eyes to find a very angry chicken about 3 inches from my face. I screamed and quickly shooed the chicken out of the room, but it came back in and jumped on the bed again! As it turns out, it was the chicken’s room that I was sleeping in and it was very upset that I was there. I decided to get up since it was already morning anyways. The chicken waited for me to get dressed right outside the door. As soon as I left the room, the chicken ran in and—God knows how—shut the door behind it so that I couldn’t go back in. I had clearly crossed a line with this bird and it was NOT happy.

Dance Performance

As I have mentioned, I am starting to work in the high schools in the area. A few weeks ago, one of the high schools had a celebration to honor the top students—a very serious event with a parade and everything. When I was invited, I thought I was going to watch…they had other plans. I had to walk in the parade as one of the authorities of the school and sat at the head table along with the president of the school board and the director of the school. Fortunately I didn’t have to make a speech, but they did officially recognize me in front of the entire crowd as a “special guest from the US here to help them in sexual education” (which is technically true, but not really worthy of any kind of recognition). They had also invited a singer to come and perform for them all the way from Quito. When the singer got up to sing, everyone maintained their very staunch formation and no one was dancing. He started out singing traditional Ecuadorian songs, but then a dance song came on. He dragged me up on stage and I had to dance in front of about 200 people who just stood there staring at me. The worst part was that while he was singing, he wasn’t dancing. So basically, I was dancing by myself. It was so embarrassing, especially considering that Ecuadorians make fun of me for my bad dancing on a regular basis. I’m sure the whole school saw how red I was and when I looked over all of the authorities were just staring at me…it was so awkward.

I’ve been working on the railroad

Alausí is located along a railroad that goes to the beautiful Nariz del Diablo. You used to be able to sit on top of the train and enjoy the gorgeous Andean views the whole way. However, just recently a Japanese tourist was decapitated on the ride. This caused the Ecuadorian government to re-evaluate the safety of the ride and initiated a complete overhaul of the rail system to the Nariz del Diablo. Over the past several months, they have been fixing the rail and cars to make them safer. A few weekends ago, I decided that I wanted to hike to the Nariz del Diablo before the train opens in February. So I set off with a friend on Sunday morning. I was a really great hike. Some parts were very steep, but we mostly followed the rail line. Finally, though, after a few hours we came to a huge river. The bridges hadn’t been built yet so there was no way of crossing. The security guard who was guarding the track at that point told us that we couldn’t pass and technically we weren’t allowed to be on the track at all. He told us that the train was coming to pick up the workers and that we could catch a ride back to Alausí with them. I was a little hesitant to ride back with all the workers, even with my friend—a tiny blonde girl on an hour long train ride with a bunch of construction workers could turn out badly. As it turns out, though, I knew the conductor. He also owns a restaurant in Alausí that we often eat lunch in. He let me sit up front with him and even let me drive the train! (ok, so basically he set everything up and I held onto the steering wheel while the train just followed the tracks, but still I drove the train!). It was a really cool adventure, plus I got to ride the train for free (normally it costs like $20 a person).

Christmas car ride

Right around Christmas time my group of jovenes was going around to all the schools performing Christmas skits and handing out candy to all the little kids. Being that I am in charge of this group, I was the one responsible for making sure everyone got to where the needed to be (3 schools a day for 3 days in a row—a ton of work, but the kids really loved it so it was totally worth it). One of the days was just a hideous day. It was freezing cold out, pouring rain and so foggy we could barely even see the road in front of us. We were in a tiny mazda 4-door pickup. 13 kids were in the bed. After about 20 minutes of driving, however, they were freezing and soaked and wanted to ride in the cab. So they all piled into the cab. If you have ever wondered the maximum possible number of people you can fit into the front of a 4-door pick-up, the answer is 15. We were so smushed and cramped. 5 people in the front seat, including the driver. There was literally not a free space to move in…but we all fit and made it to the next school on time. We had to pile out one by one, twisting and contorting from every available space. The best part was that all the kids were in costume, so as they got out there was an angel, Mary and Joseph, the wise men, baby Jesus and Santa Clause.

I wish I had some pictures to show you, but I’ve gotten really bad about taking pictures. Sorry.

Hope all is well back home! It sounds like there is some crazy weather going on. I hope everyone stays warm!!