The New World!

Pocahontas had no chance

No, not the shitty Colin Farrell movie... I'm talking about the school I teach at, Fundación Nuevo Mundo! Thusfar I've blogged about a bingo and my secret love affair with mayo, an attempted coup, a weekend in paradise,  a 7 year old's birthday party, and more info than I'm sure anyone cares to read about Rostro orientation, potential work sites, and after school programs... how about a normal day in the life of a 27 year old accountant teaching English in Ecuador??

Most mornings start around 7am with a community prayer. We have a pretty liberal interpretation of prayer (gracias a Dios), so it can be anything from a traditional prayer to a song, poem, or excerpt from a book or speech (like for example when Celso enlightened us all with the Emancipation Proclamation one morning... nothing like a little Honest Abe to start the day!). After prayer I usually take Oso (our dog) for a walk, say hi to some neighbors, and finish up any lesson planning or grading before heading in to work.

At 12:15 every day I teach English to the 14 graduating seniors at Nuevo Mundo. The school year here is from March - December, so these guys are deep into 2nd semester senioritus. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a challenge trying to keep their interest, but I just keep reminding myself of how much fun I had senior year in high school (and how little I remember from the actual "school" part of it). They're all great though, and I admire the hell out of all 14 of them. Just to graduate high school is a huge accomplishment here, and all of these guys are going to college next year, and I know they're all gonna do great things with their lives. I gave them a writing assignment a few weeks back to talk about what they want to do after graduating (I billed it as practice speaking in the future tense, but it was more for my own curiosity than anything else), and they talked about wanting to be doctors, dentists, engineers, business people, and teachers. A couple of them are hoping to get scholarships to study in the States, and literally all 14 of them mentioned something about wanting to start a foundation or give back to the Ecuadorian people in some way.

It's a great testament to the type of education they get at Nuevo Mundo. A lot of schools in the States value community service and teaching social justice (probably the main reason I'm here now is what I learned in high school and college), but it just rings so much truer here because poverty and injustice are part of everyone's daily life. There are plenty of historical/societal factors to blame for the injustices here, but instead of focusing on the blame, Nuevo Mundo empowers these kids to make positive changes in their world. It not only provides them with the tools, the education they would not otherwise have, but the mission of Nuevo Mundo is also to inspire the heart to use these tools to create change.

Bieber fever is rampant here

So after the seniors, I teach 2 classes of 7th grade English. No matter where you are in the world, pretty much every teenage year is hilariously awkward, but 7th grade has to be up there as one of the funniest. You're definitely not a kid anymore, you kind of think you know everything, but you're still trying to figure out the whole social dynamic and how you fit in, and to top it all off, hormones are going crazy! Haha it's definitely a challenge to teach this age, and just as the seniors give me a hard time with senioritus, the 7th graders give me a hard time with whatever you want to call being 13 years old. They've been learning English since Kindergarden, but they are definitely beginners compared to the seniors. They constantly try to talk to me in Spanish, which is pretty hilarious because my Spanish is barely better than their English. They're all awesome though, and we usually have a great time in class.

The 7th grade classes are at different times every afternoon, so in between and after classes I usually work on lesson plans, grading, etc. (aka my least favorite part of teaching). Also, Celso, Caitlin, (the other 2 Rostro volunteers who teach at Mundo) and I each spend a couple afternoons a week tutoring the sophomores and juniors who have scholarships to attend the morning school. A couple years back, the afternoon school decided to phase out the high school (the seniors I teach are the last class left), and instead offer scholarships to the top 10 students from the 9th grade to finish 10th - 12th grade in the morning school's IB program. I talked a little bit about this in my earlier blog about the different work sites, but the morning school, known as Centro Educativo, instructs the wealthier students of Ecuador, while the afternoon school, Fundación, allows the poorer children to utilize the same facilities as the morning school. Half of the classes in the morning school's IB program are taught in English, so we help the becados (scholarship kids, from beca, which means scholarship... not to be confused with pecados, which means sins!) to make sure they're understanding everything in their classes (History is a big one because there's so much vocab they've never heard before).

The becados probably have the most interesting social dynamic because they all come from poor neighborhoods like Durán and now have scholarships to attend high school side by side with the wealthy elite of the Puntilla. Cliques and normal high school social dynamics are tough enough as it is, but this adds a whole different challenge to everything. They taught me a word the other day, pelucón, which is a common word for the Ecuadorian bourgeoisie. The literal translation is hairy, and refers to the old wigs French aristocrats used to wear in the 17th and 18th centuries (think George Washington, etc.). Ecuador's liberal president, Rafael Correa, has popularized the term often using it to refer to people with money who represent the old political practices/parties of the country.

The last class gets out at 6:10pm (remember, the pelucones use the school in the mornings, so the foundation school doesn't start until the afternoon), then I take the yellow school bus with the foundation kids back to Durán. I usually get home around 7pm, have a lovely dinner with my roommates, then wrap the night up with some more planning/grading, hanging out with the neighborhood kids, reading, and/or journalling. Oh and random Ecuador fact while I'm on the topic of daily routines... the sun sets and rises at the same time all year on the equator. Sunrise around 5:30 - 6am and sunset around 6 - 6:30pm... 12 hour days all year.

Puerto López and Isla de la Plata

click here to see the pics from my trip!

After almost 3 months here, I finally got to see some sights! Last weekend I went with Tasha, Christina, Jon, Caitlin, and Tierney to the beach town of Puerto López, a little beach town about 3 hours northwest of Durán/Guayaquil. Our buddy Wacho runs a taxi service, and he picked us up at 5am Saturday to catch the 5:30 bus out of Guayaquil. Wacho convinced us to pay the extra $2 for the scenic route along Hwy 1, and it was tooootally worth it. Felt just like cruising Hwy 1 back home! Amazing views of the Pacific, and we got to drive through Montañita and some other beach towns along the way. Definitely going to have to make it back to see some of these other towns!

So we got to our hostel in Puerto López around 9am, and were quickly convinced to take a boat ride (leaving immediately!) out to Isla de la Plata (known here as the poor man's Galapagos). On a volunteer's stipend, the real Galapagos just isn't in the cards, so we came to Puerto López/Isla de la Plata hoping to at least see some of Ecuador's most famous attaction. Instead of the multiple day, multiple hundred dollar trek out to the Galapagos, we each paid $35 and got more than our money's worth in one day at Isla de la Plata (which by the way gets its name from its history as a secret pirate's lair for stashing loot--plata means silver, or money). That included our admission to the national park, breakfast, a 2 hour walking tour of the island, lunch, some snorkeling around the reefs, and the hour and a half boat ride each way. Isla Plata doesn't have anywhere near the biodiversity of the Galapagos (honestly it's pretty arid and not much lives there), but we got to see a ballena (whale), a delfin (dolphin), some tortugas (sea turtles), and bastante piqueros patas azules (a shit ton of blue footed boobies). I took a bunch of pictures and uploaded them to the album above.

Oh and on our way out of Puerto López, we passed the morning fish market (apparently Puerto López is the county's biggest fishing port), which consisted of dozens of fishing boats unloading human-sized sharks and fish onto the beach to be trucked into town. Kind of disturbing seeing all these huge dead animals just laying on the beach (I assume sharking is legal?), but impressive at the same time. We were all so thrown off by the whole thing that I didn't even think to get my camera out until we were almost done walking through it all (click the picture above to see the album... I got a couple pics of some sharks and then some pics of the market as we were in the boat on the way to Isla de la Plata).

We got back from Isla de la Plata around 6pm, cleaned up at the hostel, and went to a little restaurant called Carmita's across the street from the beach. I finally had my first Ecuadorian ceviche, and it was DE-licious! I'm pretty food ignorant, but this stuff was great--an assortment of raw shrimp, fish, and other sea-meats in an awesome lime sauce with some garlic patacones (mashed then fried plantains) to complement.

Sunday we hitched a ride in the back of a truck to another national park just north of Puerto López. There's some pics in the album above and here's a map of the beach... I don't remember the name, but we practically had the whole beach to ourselves. We went on a little 30 minute hike up to a vista point where we could see the whole cove and another equally amazing cove to the north. After the hike, we just relaxed and enjoyed the beach before heading back to Guayaquil that night. Other than a few sing alongs that came on the radio that literally everyone on the bus except us knew, the bus ride home was pretty uneventful. All in all a good weekend, and I'm looking forward to my next trip!

¡Gringo Bingo!

Okay so after all that drama last week, how about a little light-hearted blogging??

So for some reason BINGO is huge here, and today I finally went to my first bingo night! $1 buy in for about 2 hours of pure entertainment. If they let me, I think I might have to become a regular. For $1 you get one sheet of paper with 6 games, and each game has at least 3 winners--linea (standard 5 in a row), cuatro esquinas (4 corners), and tabla (first person to get all the numbers on their sheet, but each sheet only has numbers on about 12 of the 25 squares). They also play cinco loco for a couple of the games (clearly it's too crazy to play EVERY game), which means the first person to get any 5 numbers wins.

On the second set of cards, I won cinco loco, and the crowd. went. wild. Mind you, by the crowd I mean the rest of the 50+ people crowded in the street outside the house of the woman with the microphone and boombox running the show. Being almost 6 ft. tall with blonde hair and blue eyes, I'm already kind of a celebrity, so when I victoriously jumped to my feet, threw my hands in the air, and yelled BINGOOOO! everyone went nuts. Shortly after I collected my prize (a sweet fake leather women's wallet), a group of young ladies asked me to pose for a picture on their camera phone. A couple games later, I was one square away from winning again, and I had a small cheering section around me. Alas, I didn't win again, but it was a great time nonetheless.

During intermission (what, did you expect people to play 2 hours of straight bingo without a break??), I bought some Delicious chicken and rekindled my love affair with mayonnaise. We used to be pretty serious back in grammar school (mayo & turkey sandwiches, mayo & kraft singles sandwiches, and my personal favorite, ketchup, mayo, & liverworst sandwiches), but at some point we had a bit of a falling out, and we haven't really been speaking in a while. I don't remember what happened, but I think things moved a little too fast a little too soon, and our relationship started to get unhealthy--for both of us. So we've been on a friendly break the past decade or so, but mayo is all the rage down here, so I've been giving her another chance as of late. And Dios mio, am I glad I did. Papi-pollo [fried chicken (pollo) + french fries (papas fritas, or papi)] costs $1.25 at most places and usually comes with a DELICIOUS mayo glaze. I don't know if it's the combination of chicken grease and mayo, or if the mayo down here is just better than back home, but I'm hooked. Give me some Big Cola to wash it down with, and I'm a happy man.

Vocab of the day - bulla (pronounced BOO YAH!) means noise, as in ¡mucho bulla! or ¡bastante bulla! or ¡bulla en la calle! I just love an excuse to say BOO YAH! so I was pretty pumped to find out it actually means something here.

thank you, Stuart Scott

Part II: the longest tarde of my life...

Whoa! How about that cliffhanger yesterday?!?! Sorry I was running out of time at the cyber and couldn't finish everything. Don't worry I'm safe and everything is fine down here. Here's how the rest of the day went down...

12pm - HIGH NOON. Christina and I get back from the clinic and our house is officially CTU Headquarters. Kipp and Wellington (Rostro de Cristo Head of Security/superhero) are both on the phone, coordinating with our office in the States and our volunteers trapped in Guayaquil (I was going to use the word "stuck" but "trapped" just sounds so much more dramatic). To recap from yesterday's blog, the bridge from Durán to Guayaquil is closed, the police all across the country are on strike, buses aren't running, banks, schools, businesses and anything else that would benefit from a police presence (i.e. the entire country) are closed, and Christina's walking around with an IV bag because the parasite inside her won't let her hold any fluids down. Oh, and our in country director Megan is on a plane to Miami (by now the airport is also shut down, but her flight was literally the last plane they let leave the country), and Celso (aka the only fully bilingual volunteer now that Megan is out of the country) is no where to be found.

Jon and Brendan are at their worksite in Guayaquil, and the plan is for them to spend the night there if the bridge doesn't open. I exlained the worksites in more detail in a previous blog, but Jon and Brendan work at Damien House, a clinic for people suffering from Hanson's disease run by Sr. Annie, a bad ass nun from Brooklyn. Annie's been in Ecuador for 30 years, so even though we're all worried, we know they're in good hands. Tasha and Tierney are also at their Guayaquil worksite, Santiago Apostal, a school for working kids. Their plan is to hold tight there, but if possible rendezvous with Jon and Brendan at Damien house so they can all spend the night at Sr. Annie's.

Jessie and Beth are at their worksite, Chicos de la Calle, in Durán, so Wellington and Kipp take the truck to pick the girls up (buses aren't running).

12:30ishpm - Oh look who it is! Celso casually strolls in. He was just across the street at Jesus' house having lunch and watching the news. We also had the news on, and by now we're starting to hear a little more about this police vs. Correa drama. Aparently it's not just a strike, but an attempted coup. Every channel keeps playing this clip of Correa yelling "If you want to kill the president, here he is! Kill me if you want to! Kill me if you are brave, instead of hiding in the crowd like cowards!"

2pmish - The main bridge is still closed, but we get word that the other bridge--an hour out of the way--is open. Kipp and Wellington are back by now with Jessie and Beth, so Celso and Wellington pick up Isidro (another guard, who brings a shotgun just in case) and the three of them set off for Guayaquil to rescue Jon, Brendan, Tasha, and Tierney from the mayhem in Guayaquil (I considered using the words "pick up" instead of rescue, but then it wouldn't really be a RESCUE OPERATION, would it???).

Before they left, they picked up Caitlin from the Arbolito house and dropped her off at the our place so all the volunteers would be in one place. So Caitlin, Jessie, Beth, Kipp, Christina, and I are all at the AJS house, holding tight until further notice. I'm not really into pooping my pants if I don't have to, so I went to grab some ice cream at the store with Jessie while everyone else watched the news and chewed their finger nails. By now our office in the States had emailed our parents a couple times to let them know about the situation and that we're all safe at the house. So a couple parents called to check on us, and we found out that Ecuador made the news back home... exciting!

5pm - The rescue team gets back safely with all the volunteers! Guayaquil sounded pretty crazy... streets closed, demonstrations all over the place, people burning tires, LOOTING! Never even a hint of a threat to our safety, though, so nothing to worry about. Haha one funny story from the rescue op... during the madness of rushing off to Guayaquil, no one thought to grab money for the bridge fair. So Celso, Wellington, and Isidro are in line at the toll and all they can scrounge up from their pockets is 20 cents. But wait! What's that? A first aid kit in the glove box?! That's gotta be worth something, right?! At pretty much every major stop light--or, in this case, bridge toll plaza--people come up to cars trying to sell fruit and other wares. Wellington flags down one such vendor and tells her he'll sell her the $5 first aid kit for the low low price of $2. She agrees and just like that they've got bridge toll taken care of!

The rest of our night was pretty uneventful. We made dinner, watched a movie, and tried to not think about whatever madness was going on. The police had the President trapped in a hospital for most of the day, but it wasn't a coup attempt so much as it was a police strike that got out of control. The army came and rescued Correa at around 10pm Thursday night, after a brief firefight with the police outside the hospital. Sadly, 4 police officers died and several others were injured. Once the president was freed, though, everything was relatively back to normal. The US and every other country in South America announced their support for Correa, and even Correa's largest political rival, the mayor of Guayaquil, publicly backed Correa's government. School and work were still cancelled again Friday, but for the most part, everything was back under control. Here's a good article from the Associated Press that summarizing all the events of the day:

Ecuador revolt: Attempted coup or uprising?

Bottom line, it was a hell of a day, but we're all safe and sound down here, looking forward to getting back to work Monday. Thanks for all the thoughts and prayers!

Part I: just a little political unrest, no big deal...

So my plan was to spend my next blog updating everyone on my sweet new job as an English teacher, tell you all about the awesome kids I'm teaching, and maybe throw in a few pictures... then the proverbial shit hit the proverbial fan yesterday, so I'm guessing you'd rather hear about that instead. Here's how it all went down...

7am: Took Oso for a walk (Oso is our kick ass guard dog) and bought some bread for the house. Thursdays are my prayer days, so I read a little pump up excerpt from Nelson Mandela's Inaguaral Speech. Pretty standard morning so far... I don't usually teach until the afternoon, so I've been working walks with Oso into my daily routine.

8am: Celso and I drive to the airport to meet our in country director, Megan. She's flying out to the States for a vacation, so we need to pick up her car and bring it back to our place. The handoff goes smoothly, Celso takes the van, and I drive the truck back to Durán. On my way back over the bridge (by now it's around 9am), I notice a ton of police officers going the other way (toward Guayaquil), and when I get to the Durán side of the bridge, there's cops setting up a road block and stopping all traffic leaving Durán. "Interesting," I thought, "there must be an important person in town or something." I forget what it was, but there was a great song on radio Disney (mostly trashy american pop/hip hop, but the only tunes I can get in English) at the time, so I was pretty busy rocking out to that to get too concerned with the road block.

9:30am: I get home and Kipp and Christina, two other volunteers from the Arbolito house are in our living room. Christina was just at the local health clinic (right around the corner from our house) getting an IV cuz she was up all night vomitting and couldn't hold any liquid down... yet another case of the parasites (we're all getting hit by them). So they're hanging out until Christina feels better, and I finish grading some homework, get dressed for school, and head out.

10:30am: On my way to the catch the bus to work,  I find out from our guard Wellington that the bridge is closed for a police demonstration. "Ohhhhhhhh yeah I think I saw that this morning." So we call Nuevo Mundo and find out classes are cancelled today. I'm pumped! I change out of my work clothes and start to think how I'm going to spend my first snow day in Ecuador! The eternal day off debate... do I get productive on something I've been meaning to do, or do I sit around and watch movies all day...

10:45am: The initial excitement wears off when we start to realize what's really going on. In addition to meaning I don't have to work, "police demonstration" also means that there are no police working in all of Guayaquil. Soon after we find out that means there are no police working in the entire country. That kinda stuff just doesn't happen in the US, so we're starting to get a little scared here. All we know at this point is President Correa tried to pass some law that would have cut police bonuses, so the police all across the country decided to strike. Pretty scary considering the normal dangers of a third world country compounded by the lack of a national police force.

11:30am: Remember poor little Christina who's laying on my couch with an IV? She had to go back to the clinic to get her test results, so I walked her over there (carrying the IV of course). When we get there, though, we find out that the clinic closed early for the day because of all the madness going on. By this time we also found out that all the banks closed across the country since there would be no police to protect them from bank robbers. Schools, medical clinics, banks, internet cafes, corner stores--everything is closed, buses aren't running, the main bridge into Guayaquil (only the largest city in the country at 3+ million people) is closed, and everyone is pretty much locked in their homes glued to the news. Oh and did I mention we have 4 volunteers stranded in Guayaquil and our in country director is on a flight to the US???

I'm already being overly dramatic, so just to be extra annoying I'm gonna put some scary pictures I found on the web and do this...

TO BE CONTINUED....