Buenos tardes, todos! We are officially into our schedule here, and we love it! We went to church the first time last Sunday, and it was fun, but rather difficult to understand the sermon. Actually, I didn´t catch any of it, which was kind of sad. But Ruth and Jessica are able to translate the main ideas after, so that´s good. Our Español continues to improve, little by little. Monday we started teaching at the Blingue Escuela where Ruth´s dad is the principal. Next Thursday and Friday (I think the 7th and 8th) there is going to be a huge program with the entire elementary school for the Day of the Family. There are 700 or so Elementary students, and we are teaching Kindergarden through 2nd grade a song in English. We haven´t worked with the 3rd or 4th graders at all, since they aren´t doing much in the program this year. We have been helping the 5th and 6th graders as well...we aren´t teaching them the song, but we help the teachers in whatever way we can. One time they were allowed to ask us questions in English and we would answer in English. Their first question: do you have a boyfriend? lol! They are learning about the bones in the body, so Laura was asked to tell all of her stories about fracturing bones and they would have to translate it in Spanish to their teacher. It was pretty funny. Today we taught a whole class by ourselves, which was very fun! There are a few kids from the older classes who are doing a sort of drama for the program. We really enjoy working with them too. There is one class of Kindergardeners (the classes are usually split in three with 40 kids per class) that fell in love with us. When we were leaving their class all of the girls attacked us with hugs and Laura couldn´t get out of the door because she was surrounded by 8 little girls! So cute! Now whenever they see us they come running and give us big hugs and stay by us until either they or we have to leave. We just love them! It´s so fun to enter the school in the morning and have kids yelling our names and saying Buenos Dias! Oh, by the way, the classes each have their separate rooms, but all doors open to the outdoors and the hallways are ourside as well. Very different, but very fun!
School starts at 7:20 and we always leave at 7:05, so our days start pretty early. Class ends at 12:20, we often walk home for lunch, spend a few hours around the table eating a talking, and then head out for afternoon activities. Some days we hang out and play sports with Christian and Loida, Ruth´s younger brother and sister. We love them so much! We like to spend time in the market in the Central and we´ve gotten to know some of the English teachers pretty well. Especially Isabel, who lives just around the corner from us. She is so fun! Next week we´ll be at the school every day, since we´ll be helping with the program and Thursday and Friday. We love being there!
Tomorrow we are going to the town of Nabon with Jessica. It´s about a two hour drive and we leave at 6:30 a.m. It´s going to be fun, but we´re not entirely sure what to expect. On Friday we are going to the school for a couple hours in the morning for a program for the Dia de la Niño...the Day of the Child...they have a lot of celebrations here. :-) Then the Lackey´s, a missionary family here that we know, are going to pick us up and take us hiking on one of the mountains near Cuenca. We´re going to have a picnic and spend some good quality time with them. In the evening we´ll be going to our first Futbol game! Cuenca is ranked 2nd in all of Ecuador, so we´re really really excited about that. Muy emotionada! Not sure what Saturday is going to bring. Sunday is Ruth´s birthday and we´re having Guinea Pig for lunch! It´s considered a delicacy here and it´s kind of pricey...especially since most jobs pay about 200 to 300 dollars a month. We´re excited to try it though! The Ecuadorians laugh at the fact that some Americans have Guinea pigs as pets.
Hmmm, what else would you like to know? There really aren´t many bugs in Cuenca, which we much appreciate. Lots and lots of flowers though, as I´m sure you could tell from our last post.
We usually walk everywhere here, but we´ve gotten to know the bus system as well. I love being able to walk everywhere that we want! I´m definitely going to miss that when we get back to the States. Sometime´s I find myself reading Enlish words with as Spanish words and occasionally I´ll sing the English song we´re teaching with a Spanish accent. We´re teaching Loida and Christian how to play Dutch Blitz, and they are now obsessed with the game. Their favorite English word is Blitz and they´ll often say it random times during the day. Very funny! Family is very tight here and we spend a lot of time around the dinner table. We´re still having difficulty getting in contact with the orphanage, but hopefully we´ll be able to get there next week, if we´re supposed to.
lol...the Internet cafe we´re in right now is playing music from India...how random. We here a lot of popular songs from the US, which always makes us shake our heads. Even the radio here gets English stations.
Well, we best be going for now. Hope all is well back in the States! Thanks for the comments, we love reading them!
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Very Ecuadorian
We have had a wonderful week here already, but we can´t believe how fast the time has flown! We are learning a lot about the culture and we´re even picking up more Spanish, per no mucho. We wanted to share some of the interesting cultural differences that we have found.
1. They use spoons for every meal. Forks are only used on special occasions, like Sundays, as we discovered today.
2. Every girl in Cuenca gets her ears pierced when she is 2 days old. Jessica doesn´t have her ears pierced, and they all think it´s strange.
3. When it gets cooler in the evenings, everyone bundles up in sweaters. They fear that they will get sick if they are cold. No one EVER eats anything cold when they are sick, even yogurt is warmed up.
4. As is custom with most developing countries, toilet paper goes in the garbage, not in the toilet. This has been fairly easy to remember...hopefully we´ll be able to reverse this when we get back to the States. :-)
5. The water faucets are opposite from the U.S. in that the hot water is on the right and the cold water is on the left. We still mix this one up.
6. They eat popcorn with their soup. At first this sounds weird, but it´s actually very good! You should try it! Especially with spinich soup...yum!!!
Now for some pictures...okay, many pictures.
Our first outing without our translators!
The door to our apartment will never open for us...
so we call it...
la puerta del diablo!! :)
1. They use spoons for every meal. Forks are only used on special occasions, like Sundays, as we discovered today.
2. Every girl in Cuenca gets her ears pierced when she is 2 days old. Jessica doesn´t have her ears pierced, and they all think it´s strange.
3. When it gets cooler in the evenings, everyone bundles up in sweaters. They fear that they will get sick if they are cold. No one EVER eats anything cold when they are sick, even yogurt is warmed up.
4. As is custom with most developing countries, toilet paper goes in the garbage, not in the toilet. This has been fairly easy to remember...hopefully we´ll be able to reverse this when we get back to the States. :-)
5. The water faucets are opposite from the U.S. in that the hot water is on the right and the cold water is on the left. We still mix this one up.
6. They eat popcorn with their soup. At first this sounds weird, but it´s actually very good! You should try it! Especially with spinich soup...yum!!!
Now for some pictures...okay, many pictures.
Our first outing without our translators!
The door to our apartment will never open for us...
so we call it...
la puerta del diablo!! :)The toilet paper outside of the stall, better not forget it!
Lucho y Ruth, pray for him
this is for you Ben!
Jessica wanted to save it, it didn´t want to go in the bottle
we ate lunch on top of the mountain
the beautiful view
it hardly looks real!
the road we were driving on!
Ruth´s Bienvenida
eating popcorn soup
Lucho y Ruth, pray for himthis is for you Ben!
Jessica wanted to save it, it didn´t want to go in the bottlewe ate lunch on top of the mountain
the beautiful view
it hardly looks real!
the road we were driving on!
our food!
Ruth´s Bienvenida
eating popcorn soup
at the market
Ruth´s cousins Jonathan and Priscilla, so cute!
Kari´s group at the mall
Lauras new favorite fruit!
Thursday, May 24, 2007
a picture update for you!
Laura and Kari in Cuenca!!!
Welcome Home Ruth!!
The view from the apartment that we´re staying in! Absolutely beautiful!
Isabel (one of the English teachers), Loida (Ruth´s adorable sister!), and Ruth! They are so much fun!
Kari and Laura at the flower market...a dozen roses costs $1...pretty amazing, huh?
Jessica, Laura, and Kari on top of one of the mountains that overlooks the city of Cuenca! We love it here!
Monday, May 21, 2007
Bienvenido a Ecuador!!
Buenos tardes! We have offically arrived, as of 1:00 a.m. Saturday morning. We have had an amazing time already! The flights got a little long and our first night was spent in a hotel right off a busy street where cars and trucks honked all night, but really, it´s been good. :-) Guayaquil, the city we flew into, is very humid and hot, but Cuenca is absolutely lovely! We are in the very center of mountains, in a big bowl, and still manage to be 8500 feet up! The drive yesterday took 4 hours. Diving through the mountains was very fun and very bumpy! Good thing for four wheel drive! Ruth´s family is so sweet and welcoming! We are very thankful that Jessica is here with us to translate. Our Spanish isn´t as good as we had hoped, and Ruth´s family doesn´t speak English. Ruth flies in tonight and will get here tomorrow evening. We can´t wait to see her and welcome her home! This morning we went with one of the classes from the Bilingue Colegio to the mall to help them practice their English. We had 39 11 year olds and five adults...we each took about 8 of the kids and walked around the mall for an hour! Very fun! The mall was very Americanized though...complete with a KFC, Burger King, and Payless Shoes! This afternoon Jessica, Laura, and I went to the downtown area and spent time in the market, which was much more Ecuadorian. We had a blast! We bought 2 dozen roses for 3 dollars...pretty good deal, huh?
The food here has been muy rico...very very very good! We´ve had rice for every meal except for breakfast this morning, but that´s fine with us! Fresh fruit accompanies everything. So far we feel great. Hopefully it´ll stay that way! The altitude hasn´t seemed to effect Laura at all, but Í´ve had a few headaches. Not bad though. We tried to play basketball with Ruth´s brother and sister, and we really felt the altitude then...more than just the fact that we´re out of shape. :-)
Our schedule looks like Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday teaching English at the Bilingue Colegio and doing some traveling the other days. We´re going to make it the jungle, but we´re not sure when. Very excited about that! The school is very big. 700 Elementary students and 800 high school students. The school compound is very nice and very close to the house...a 20 minute walk or so.
We´ve gotten some attention for our blondeness (both Jessican and I are very blonde), but it hasn´t been too bad actually! I only looked once when someone whistled, and that was the very first time so I wasn´t used to it yet. Someone told us that we were ¨linda, linda, linda¨as we walked past. Translation: beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. But no one has followed us yet, so that´s good. I feel very safe, especially having Jessica here who knows the city and can talk to people in Spanish. It´s going to be sad when she leaves in two weeks!
We are staying in the top story of the Ulloa´s house, which they made into an apartment with it´s own enterence, kitchen, and bathroom! Yep, we´re pretty spoiled! Our bedroom window looks out over one of the four rivers in town and we can hear the river rushing past. There´s another staircase inside our apartment that leads to a terrace. The mountains are viewable from nearly anywhere. Last night we all drove up the the top of one of them and had a view of the whole city! Í´m prtty sure that it´s the third largest in Ecuador! Jessica warned us that we would need more sleep here, and we´ve found her correct so far. We slept for ten hours last night without waking. It´s only 6:40, and I´m feeling rather tired. I´m sure some of it has to do with traveling for the past two days as well. We´ve taken pictures, but I don´t have my USB chord, so I can´t put any on right now. Hopefully before too long we´ll get some up. I best be going. Buenos noches!
In Christ,
Kari
The food here has been muy rico...very very very good! We´ve had rice for every meal except for breakfast this morning, but that´s fine with us! Fresh fruit accompanies everything. So far we feel great. Hopefully it´ll stay that way! The altitude hasn´t seemed to effect Laura at all, but Í´ve had a few headaches. Not bad though. We tried to play basketball with Ruth´s brother and sister, and we really felt the altitude then...more than just the fact that we´re out of shape. :-)
Our schedule looks like Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday teaching English at the Bilingue Colegio and doing some traveling the other days. We´re going to make it the jungle, but we´re not sure when. Very excited about that! The school is very big. 700 Elementary students and 800 high school students. The school compound is very nice and very close to the house...a 20 minute walk or so.
We´ve gotten some attention for our blondeness (both Jessican and I are very blonde), but it hasn´t been too bad actually! I only looked once when someone whistled, and that was the very first time so I wasn´t used to it yet. Someone told us that we were ¨linda, linda, linda¨as we walked past. Translation: beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. But no one has followed us yet, so that´s good. I feel very safe, especially having Jessica here who knows the city and can talk to people in Spanish. It´s going to be sad when she leaves in two weeks!
We are staying in the top story of the Ulloa´s house, which they made into an apartment with it´s own enterence, kitchen, and bathroom! Yep, we´re pretty spoiled! Our bedroom window looks out over one of the four rivers in town and we can hear the river rushing past. There´s another staircase inside our apartment that leads to a terrace. The mountains are viewable from nearly anywhere. Last night we all drove up the the top of one of them and had a view of the whole city! Í´m prtty sure that it´s the third largest in Ecuador! Jessica warned us that we would need more sleep here, and we´ve found her correct so far. We slept for ten hours last night without waking. It´s only 6:40, and I´m feeling rather tired. I´m sure some of it has to do with traveling for the past two days as well. We´ve taken pictures, but I don´t have my USB chord, so I can´t put any on right now. Hopefully before too long we´ll get some up. I best be going. Buenos noches!
In Christ,
Kari
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
