Family, Friends, and the First Day of School

¡Buenas tardes!

I believe I left you off on Friday night after my adventure at La Ronda.  I woke up pretty late (late in this house is around 9:30 a.m.) on Saturday after my late night out.  I had breakfast (fresh bread, marmalade, and coffee, as usual), and relaxed a bit.  While I was reading in my flat, I thought I heard music coming from upstairs so I went to check it out.

Turns out, it was actually coming from the street. There were a bunch of white tents set up, and chairs in rows (with people in them), and a small band playing. At first it looked like a church service. But, when people started dancing, I assumed otherwise—let’s be honest, even in Ecuador, they don’t dance during church.  I went upstairs to ask what was shakin’. Turns out it was a celebration called Pase de Niños. Normally, it takes place on Christmas Eve, and is a type of Christmas celebration, complete with parades, food, and, of course, children. There was no parade on Saturday, but quite a lot of celebrating. Salomé, my host “niece” (who, at 11, is more like a younger sister) went outside to cash in on the food stash.  There were fried potato tortillas, pork, a weird type of pointy corn-on-the-cob, queso fresco (literally, fresh cheese) and some other random things. This plate of food was put on the table to pick from to supplement the rest of our meal.  Cecilia had made a soup that was a creation of her own. I’m not sure what was in it, but it was an vegetable based broth, with something added to thicken it, and finely shredded meat (likely chicken or pork). The plated food we had for lunch (Ecuadorians usually have soup and some type of food on a plate for lunch) was rice, fried bananas (try it—fry some banana slices in a butter and sugar [optional] mixture—delicious), and tilapia with a cream and onion topping.  I have yet to run into anything that doesn't taste phenomenal.

Pase de Niños, from the stairwell window

The random mess of delicious food from the celebration

Cecilia's soup creation

Plated food: rice, tilapia, fried bananas

After lunch, I walked a mile and a half or so away from my house to meet one of my friends in the program, Hilary.  (The program is called Ceiba Tropical Conservation Semester, in case I mention it in the future).  She had just gotten in a couple days before, so we went to a café on Rio Amazonas Avenue, one of the major streets close to where I live. The street is lined with banks, restaurants, and shopping districts.  The café we went to was Juan Valdez café.  This part of town is a little bit more commercialized—within a block radius is Tony Roma’s, Pizza Hut, Burger King, McDonald’s, and two malls.  After catching up a bit, we decided we needed notebooks for class, so we went to a papelería (or “paper shop”).  Once again, to give you an idea of the prices, I spent $1.50 on three single-subject notebooks.  We went next door to a movie store, and I bought Harry Potter I and Horrible Bosses for $1.50 each. Not bad! I must say, although I feel like I'm keeping my head above water with my Spanish, it was nice to speak in English for a little while. It requires and exponentially smaller amount of thinking, and it was great to see a familiar face.

We then walked across the street toward El Parque Carolina, which is a huge park (about a fifth the size of Central Park) in the same area as the coffee shop and paper/movie stores.  At the entrance to the park, there are beautiful statues of hummingbirds, which are all painted differently. It reminded me of the butterflies you see around Platteville or the cows you see around Madison.  There were people everywhere—on the paths running, walking, and biking, on the basketball/volleyball courts, and most of all, playing soccer all over the place.  There must have been 50 games going on when we were walking around.  There was playground equipment everywhere, and a random painted plane for kids to climb on in the middle of the park.  We didn’t even walk down half the park before we turned around. 

Painted hummingbird

Another pair of hummingbirds

The painted playground-plane hybrid

Giant palm trees in the central strip of Naciones Unidas Avenue

Saturday night, I had coffee and bread with Cecilia, Rodrigo, Santiago, Lourdes and her sister (I can never remember her name—it’s a bit hard to pronounce), Salomé, and her mom María José.  Earlier in the dad, María José had been texting and ran into her glass door and cut her hand. We sat around a while making jokes about it, like “Hey, María José, this is what a door looks like open, and this is what it looks like closed.” Some things traverse cultures (and minute details of this experience make it that much more fun).  Later, Salomé and I went upstairs to her flat to make beaded bracelets and watch Phineas and Ferb in Spanish.  We also watched some Justin Bieber parodies (just as funny in Spanish), and some more music videos.  While many of the young Ecuadorians do listen to music typical to Ecuador, their favorites are usually Rihanna, Lady Gaga, Selena Gomez, and Shakira. 

Yesterday, Sunday, was pretty uneventful.  Cecilia and I took a bus to the University of San Francisco de Quito in the Cumbayá valley, where I will be going to school for the next month or so.  It is a small, beautiful campus, with palm trees, colorful buildings, gorgeous architecture, and a lagoon (complete with a zip-line) in the middle of campus. Pictures to come! Since the purpose of the half-hour trip was to learn about the buses, we didn’t stay long.  Fun fact: each bus ride is only a quarter.  For lunch we had a soup called la sopa de chifles. This was a soup with a very thin, vegetable and oil type of broth, with bananas (that tasted more like potatoes) in it. Again, fantastic.  We  also had fried pork, rice, and papas fritas (this word is used to mean "french fries," but in this case, we were eating its literal translation--fried potatoes in oil). I could definitely get used to this food!

It was about 55°F Sunday evening, which is really cold for Quito.  As a treat, and a remedy for the cold weather, Cecilia made everyone a drink called ponche (pronounced “pohn-chay”). This is an Ecuadorian drink served warm, and made by blending together milk, vanilla, egg, and sugar, and sprinkled with cinnamon. It was fantastic!  I admit it was a little chilly out, but I didn’t bring a blanket to the table like the rest of the family.

Ponche, with cinnamon on top

Today was my first day of school.  It was really just orientation. For those of you who don’t know, I work for SOAR (Student Orientation and Registration) at UW-Madison.  It was interesting going through Quito’s version of International SOAR! We were briefed on topics like health, safety, a brief history of Ecuador, culture customs, and how Ecuadorians act in different situations. We also had a 30 minute speech and greeting by the president and founder of the university, Carlos (yes, we’re supposed to call him that), who had some interesting advice for us.  He told us to take advantage of the culture, the flora, and the fauna of Ecuador, and if nothing else, to “party.”  I don’t think we’d be getting that advice from David Ward.

Here are some of the things I’ve learned in the last couple of days:

-It is culturally accepted, and even endearing, to call someone with a darker complexion than yourself “negro” or “negra”—my host mom affectionately calls my host dad her “negrito.” As we learned in orientation (and as I am quickly discovering for myself), there is no concept of being “politically correct.” It’s an adjustment, but usually pretty refreshing. Ecuadorians have no problem asking you how much your shoes cost or how old your parents are (sorry Ma and Pa, I told ‘em).

-There are numerous herbal and traditional remedies for everyday ailments. When I told Cecilia that Andrew had cut his thumb peeling potatoes and it wouldn’t stop bleeding, she told me that I should have taken the thin layer from the inside of an egg shell and put it on the cut. Apparently it dries it up immediately. I guess we’ll know for next time.  Other examples include: rubbing mustard on a burn, potato juice or boiled lettuce in milk for an upset stomach, and bread soaked in milk on an open pussing sore.  Why drink Peptobismol when you have lettuce milk?

Anyway, I hope to have more pictures up soon. A couple shout-outs for the day, to Debbie, Meghan (mi hermana), and Robert Freidel (if you’re reading).  Debbie, every time someone uses the word cariñosa, I think of you. It means warm, loving, and affectionate—this describes the Ecuadorian people really accurately, and I think you’d fit in quite well (especially with that Spanish gift you have---A-ly-ss-a!).  To Meghan, I think no one would quite understand and appreciate the bluntness of Ecuadorians like you and I would. I think you’d like it lots. And to Bob—their jokes here are almost as bad as yours are back home.

Love,

Caitlin