Estero de Platano

Tonight I´m getting on a bus for Estero de Platano, a small town on the coast of Ecuador (and hour south of Atacames which is an hour south of Esmeraldas if you want to find in on a map). I will be volunteering for the next three months in this community of about 600 people. One of my tasks is an economic assessment of the community for future sustainable development projects by the foundation I´m working with but additionally (and what I´m most excited about) I¨ll be working with a group of local artisans, helping them organize as a business to sell their goods in local markets. Unfortunately the closest internet connection will be about an hour bus ride north so my already slacker blog postings are unfortunately going to get worse... but we are going for quality here right? :)
My love to all, Dayna

The Galapagos

Where to I begin to explain the awesomeness that is The Galapagos Islands!

After 7 weeks of intensive Spanish classes, I decided to treat myself to a trip to The Galapagos Islands. I chose to do a land based tour rather than the more traditional boat tour largely because it´s cheaper (and included a bunch of free activities), but also because my money then goes to people who live on the islands (hotels and restaurants) rather than the owners of the boats who are often not even from Ecuador. My small attempt at Eco tourism.

All of my photos (warning, there are a lot of them) can be viewed here: http://picasaweb.google.com/dayna.erickson/Glapagos# (and yes, I did spell Galapagos wrong in the album title, but I can´t figure out how to change it in Picasa, anyone know?)

Here are some of my favorites though. A narrative of the trip will follow next time I´m at a computer.

I´m off to catch a bus!

Lovingly,
Dayna

Taken while snorkeling.

Sunset on Isabella Island

Male Magnificent Frigate (only the single ones puff up their throats like that, trying to get chicks.)

Blue Footed Boobie!!!!

A tortoise having lunch.

Tortuga Bay

One of many friendly Sea Lions.

I love this guy. He looks like ET... or ET looks like him since I think he´s older.

Otavalo - Long Over Due

After the aforementioned bus ride I arrived in the town of Otavalo at about 9 in the morning and found the famous market. It was early enough yet that it wasn´t flooded with tourist so I was able to pleasantly wander around at my leisure.

This photo doesn´t really do justice to the magnitude of the market.

A few hours later I called Anna, a friend from college, who was living in a town nearby. Anna started a foundation http://www.tandanafoundation.org/ that among other things does volunteer medical vacations in the highlands of Ecuador. This happened to be the last weekend of her last medical trip for the fall, as well as the weekend in which the Tandana intern (who had been living with a family in the pueblito of Quinchinche for the past 7 months) was being made Godmother to two of the children in the family with whom she lived. When I called Anna, the baptism ceremony was about to start, so I took a cab to the church and quietly slipped in the back.

The godmother/godfather role is very important in Ecuadorian society. As Ecuador is primarily a Catholic country, the godparents are expected to have a major role in helping to guide a child´s spiritual life. They become coparents in effect, (actually comadre, and compadre).

Lindsey, La Madrina (Godmother) in the middle with the two boys infront of her and the family around.

After the ceremony, we went to the family´s home to begin the traditional two day celebration, but on the way there Anna made sure we stopped at her family's house to pick up a number of plastic grocery bags. It was a one room house, about 30 by 15 with a dirt floor. Normally one side of the house held the kitchen and the other side of the house was occupied by the parents bed, but for this special occasion the kitchen had been moved out to the guinea pig shed (and the guinea pig cages were moved outside) and we coudldn´t figure out where the parents bed went. In their place a number of wooden benches had been set against the walls and a large table had been created with a sheet of plywood and a couple of sawhorses. The first course was a chicken soup with potatoes. This was a bowl of soup fit for a meal, not just a course and before we were done, the second course arrived, corn colada (the consistency of runny hummus) and fried "cuy" which is guinea pig. Half way through my colada I´m full and wondering what I´m going to do because I know there is another course coming and it´s rude not to finish your food. The third course is "seco," a dry plate consisting of a grain, usually rice, but in this case a type of white jumbo sized corn kernels that I can´t remember the name of at the moment, and meat, lots of meat. The heaping plate is put in front of me and I have no idea how I´m going got manage because I´m already uncomfortably full when I notice those around me pulling out plastic bags grocery bags and subtly putting food into them under the table. Everywhere around the room I see greasy grocery bags stashed next to purses and coats. Apparently is it less rude to take your food home with you than to not eat it.

Anna, Lindsey and I with our Colada and Cuy.

The family then began to present Lindsey, La Madrian, with the traditional gifts, baskets of food and alcohol. Given that this family is very poor, we were glad that Lindsay lives with the family so they´d have to help her eat it. Another tradition is that all the alcohol has to be consumed before the end of the party. How this is done is La Madrina, or someone she designates on her behalf, goes around the room, from person to person, with a single plastic cup offering them a drink. The guest has the option to say no thank you, take the cup and drink, or first instruct the person serving the beverage to drink a glass before drinking one themselves. Now, the person serving the beverage can not refuse the drink if instructed to drink by the guest. Since Anna and Lindsay didn´t particularly like beer, I had the privilege of serving the beer. It was a tough job.

La Madrina with her godsons and all her baskets of food. The outfits the boys are wearing were provided by the godmother, as part of the tradition.
After all the guests had eaten, which happened in shifts because the table could only accommodate about 14 at a time, the party started heating up. Anna had arranged for a band of traditional musicians to play. The maternal godparents, not knowing there was already a band coming, had arranged for a DJ to come as a surprise, so we had both. At first there seems to be a bit of a turf war going on but by the end the DJ helped amp the band so all was well.

Abuelito getting his groove on, the paternal grandfather to the godsons, and the cutest little old man ever.

We didn´t stay until the end, but I’m told the party raged well into the night largely due to some homemade cane alcohol that was later brought out.

The next day a group of us hiked to a local waterfall. The two girls in the photo are scholarship recipients from Anna´s foundation.

This one´s for the Whiman Magazine. Those girls are 19 and 22 if anybody's wondering.

My Love to All,

Dayna

Deep Thoughts by Dayna Erickson

As far as I can tell, the Spanish language does not have a good translation for the word "compromise." One definition is "arreglo" which is agreement or "llegar a un arreglo" to reach an agreement, but that´s not exactly the same thing. Another definition is "transigir" which means to give way, to make concessions..."avenirse a transigir" to agree to concessions...in other words to loose.... not exactly a compromise....I´ve also heard the word "transar" used which means to trade, "compromiso" is a false cognate that means commitment..."comprometer" or "comprometerse" means to compromise but it´s to be compromised, to put in jeopardy or to put in danger...hmmmmmm.... perhaps this is an indicator as to why doing business is so different here.

Top Fives

Things I Love About Quito:
1) Fresh squeezed juice every day.
2) Speaking Spanish! It´s just so much fun!
3) Getting long interesting e-mails from my brother.
4) Ecuadorian sense of humor. (watch Que Tan Lejos)
5) The Chocolate!

Things I "Don´t Love" About Quito:
1) Having to constantly walk with purpose in order to avoid being robbed.
2) Keeping my money in my bra in the event that I am robbed. (It´s really uncomfortable after awhile)
3) Being charged $60 per month by bank of america for international
withdrawals (this is not really Quito´s fault)
4) Frequently being asked if I'm single by strangers; taxi drivers,
bus drivers, the woman in line at the grocery store....
(I know it´s a cultural difference, but it gets old.)
5) Not picking up the Spanish as fast as I would like.

Things I Miss About Home:
1) My favorite jeans and comfy sweater (I finally broke down and bought jeans)
2) Having coffee with my dad in the morning.
3) Peanut butter
4) Having beer options. (Here it´s Pilsener or Pilsener.)
5) Throwing toilet paper away in the toilet. (The plumbing can´t handle it.)

Daily Life

Sorry for the delay in posting. I didn´t realize how many people were reading this until I received a lot of concerned e-mail. Thanks for all the love and support.

The food here is great! And fortunately (knock on wood) I haven´t experienced any "problems." My host mother makes me breakfast and dinner. Breakfast consistently includes, a hard boiled egg, a croissant type roll with jam or cheese (or both), a glass of fresh homemade juice, a banana, and a cup of warm milk with either chocolate or instant coffee (or both). I haven´t been able to figure out why a country that grows their own coffee prefers to drink NesCafe. I understand that it´s cheaper and they'd rather sell than drink a very profitable crop, but it is just not the same. The fresh juice is my favorite. My host mother makes it every day in the blender and often with a strainer too. Orange, passion fruit, guava, tree tomato (which is more juice like than traditional tomato juice), and a number of other delicious fruits that are native to Ecuador that Í don´t know the names of. By far the best is the ¨mora¨ juice which is the Ecuadorian equivalent to the blackberry.
The discovery of blackberries in Ecuador inspired me to teach my host mother how to make pie (because my favorite pie to make is Blackberry Sour Cream). Since a recipe of pie crust is enough for 2 or 3 pies, we also decided to make apple pie. Due to the challenges of baking at high altitudes and my substitution of corn starch for yucca starch (pronounced YOU-KA, it´s kinda like a potato), the blackberry pie unfortunately turned out a bit runny (my Ecuadorian brother called it pudding), but the apple pie turned out great, and made me very popular amongst my siblings. My Ecuadorian mom loves the ¨masa¨ (pie crust) so much she wants to use if for empanadas... I can´t wait to try them.
Carmen (my host mother) and I with the apple pie.

Just like mom makes....

Lunch and dinner are about the same and always include hot soup. Fortunately my host mother enjoys cooking, particularly cooking soups. After the soup course there's a "dry" plate usually including rice, potatoes, some kind of meat, and some sort of vegetable or salad. It is very common to have rice, potatoes and pasta all in the same meal... Ecuador is not for the Atkins inclined.

I have to do laundry once a week because, well to be honest, that´s how much underwear I brought. My family has a great washing station in the back yard that includes a washer and dryer, and a number of clothes lines. Because things dry very quickly at this high altitude and because of the cost of electricity, the dryer is actually only used to store the dog food.
The weather in Quito is different from the rest of Ecuador and it´s currently winter. It will be sunny and warm (mid 70's) in the mornings, by noon it´s usually cloudy, and by about 2pm it´s pouring down rain. Nights are cool, in the mid to upper 50´s. If laundry is done on a week day, someone has to be home to bring it in before the rain starts.

Thanks to my wonderful brother I now have a new camera. It would have been 50 bucks for me to pick it up form the post office but because the woman felt bad that I was replacing a stolen camera I didn´t have to pay...:)

Me at school:

And it came to pass in those days....

Last Friday night I went to a Vietnamese Restaurant called Uncle Ho´s to watch the US Presidential debate. Word got around among the American Expats in Quito that it´d be on a big screen TV. I arrived a little late and the place was packed. Wall to wall people, even folks sitting on the floor. (For the Portlander´s this place is about the size of the inside of the Tin Shed... oh man would I really love a blue cheese burger from the Tin Shed right now...) The TV ended up being about 28 inches, but it was bigger than the one that appeared to normally reside there. The debate was interesting and I have to admit I´m glad that´s about all of this race that I´ll witness.

Honestly, I find Ecuadorian politics more interesting these days. They voted on the new constitution last Sunday. Because voting is mandatory, they stop selling alcohol three days before and election in hopes of ensuring that no one votes drunk. With the vote on a Sunday, it made for a slow weekend. I caught a 7am bus to Otavalo on Saturday to spend a weekend with a college friend who lives there (that story in another installment). ¨Catching a bus¨ is a lot more interestingthan it sounds. First of all, you can get on or off a bus anywhere, there aren´t exactly ¨Bus Stops¨as we know them, except for at bus terminals going to far off locations, but those are really bus starts and even these buses stop if someone along the route wants on. Well they don´t stop exactly, more like slow way down, so the expression of catching a bus is literal.

Because the main bus terminal is in the south of the city, I live in the middle, and I was heading north my host mother suggested that I take a cab to the street where the bus would pass by. No problem I though, except this street turned out to be their equivalent to a highway. Awesome. When the bus listing my specific destination came tearing around the corner it wasn´t even in the slow lane so I figured he didn´t see my international "I want to get on the bus" (similar to the international "I want to get a taxi") signal. But he did and right in front of my eyes the driver muscled through two lanes of traffic to the far lane where I had to run to catch up with him (on
the side of a highway) and jump on. Phew.

Something you should know, everyone had to return to the city they were from (or the place of their last known address) in order to vote. This reminds me of the Christmas Story in Luke chapter two where a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed. And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; because he was of the house and lineage of David...can you tell that I had to memorize that at one time? Any way, needless to say the bus was crowded. I got one of thelast two seats on the bus and as we proceeded along we picked up people regardless if there were seats. Now these aren´t city buses with bars to hold on to. These are old tour buses, in fact this is probably where tour buses go to die. They have great big tall seats, curtains (often with additional valences and pom-pom fringe added) and NOTHING in the isle for the people to hold on to. I had an eye contact only conversation with a traditionally dress woman bracing herself against my seat and the one in front of me. She´d roll her eyes after she got clobbered by peoples bags getting on and off the bus, make faces when we´d hit a large bump or fly around a corner. It was one of the funnest conversations I¨ve had in a long time, probably because I understood every word.

The new constitution passed, by the way, by a vote of about 70%.

I´m now off to watch the vice presidential debates with a bunch of gringos at a place called Finn McCool's. I expect it will be entertaining.

Love and Hugs,

Dayna