So much to learn, see and do!

¡Buenas Tardes!

The last week has been both exciting and exhausting with a lot happening each day! We are two weeks through training, now into our 3rd of 11 weeks and there is still so much to learn, so the days are packed with information.

We have started our cooking classes within the Community Health program where we learn traditional Ecuadorian foods and how we can modify them to keep them traditional yet improve the nutrition. Last week we learned how to make mañestra (lentils with onion, garlic, broccoli and spinach), tilapia, patacones (double fried plantains - ok, not too healthy, but still delicious!), and a typical salad. The meal was delicious! I was telling my host family about what I had learned and they thought it sounded delicious. Being a typical meal from the coast, it isn´t something they normally eat, so I told them I would make it for them. My 13-yr-old host sister and I made it yesterday for my family and some extended family for a birthday celebration. After grocery shopping and 4 hours of cooking, we had a large and tasty meal, which everyone loved!

Last week we also started our gardens, which is another part of our nutrition objective. We made three garden beds, then planted carrots, lettuce, beets, radishes, green peppers, cilantro and camomille. During the tech session we also learned how to create worm beds with California red worms to decompose organic matter more easily than creating compost piles. We learned how to make boxes to plant seeds before transplanting, then how to transplant both vegetables and trees. We worked in groups for all of it and have to maintain our gardens for the next 7 weeks to harvest our veggies. We each got to plant our own tree, however, so I have my very own weeping willow growing in the Peace Corps compound :)

On Wednesday of last week we made our first trip to Quito to visit the Peace Corps headquarters there and get to know the whole staff. The trip to and from requires 3 very, very crowded buses (especially when you try to fit 61 gringos in with the normal bus traffic...) and is a confusing route, but I´m sure that someday I will learn to navigate the public transportation myself (actually by week 6 when we are set out on our own!). After the Quito visit on Wednesday I stayed in the center of Tumbaco to hang with some compañeros, other PCTs. This was the first time I´ve been able to stay and it was fun to get to know everyone better and interact outside of the class/training setting, even if we did break the cultural integration rules by hanging out in a large, loud group in the bodega off the main park. It was a great time!

On Friday we split into three groups for our cultural trips. I went to Cotacachi, a small, rural, indigenous town about 3 hours north of Quito. Although we had to leave at 6am, the transportation there went without a problem, and the bus driver agreed to pick us up the next day and bring us straight home to Tumbaco, so we wouldn´t have to transfer at the Quito terminal. Cotacachi is known for its leather products, so we got to see some neat things in the market at the square. We toured the town for a while, which is actually home to a well-established community tourism program, so nobody was surprised to see a bunch of gringos there. That aspect made it interesting and made us feel a little out of place, but overall it was good. We ate a late lunch on Friday, after travelling for hours then walking around for a few more. Everyone was starving, but my small table of friends was a little less hungry after I found a worm in my potato! We didn´t do a whole lot in Cotacachi, but it was nice to get the feel of a rural town, and the scenery was undescribably breathtaking! At one point we sat on the top of a ridge overlooking huge valleys, mountains, and the volcano Cotacachi. We sat there for a little over an hour, but I think I could have stayed for ever.

We got back Saturday and hung out in town for a little longer before I went home to spend the rest of the weekend with my host family. My family is very sweet and care about me a lot, so I´m having a great time with them! The spanish gets very frustrating at times, but I think our spanish classes are about to increase in frequency, so hopefully I´ll learn a little more quickly. A few other random side notes: I learned how to do my laundry last week, which is not only difficult, but I´m pretty sure I could feel my clothing slowly shredding on the stone that I had to wash it on. We´ll see how long everything lasts with that! Also, I have been lucky enough to not eat any cuy (guinea pig) yet, and I think I´m in the clear with my host family after talking to my host sister about the guinea pigs I had as pets growing up!

Overall, things are going great here. I´m having an amazing time, meeting great people, learning a ton, and doing just what I want to be doing! I miss home and love hearing from everyone, so please keep sending messages!

¡Besos!

Kerry