Adventures of My Site Visit July 23, 2009

I survived my site visit. You may have not had any doubt about my return to Cayambe, but I did, especially after maneuvering through the different bus and metro terminals just to get to another, final bus terminal in Quito, WITH TRAINERS. Had an encounter with a drug addict and watched a guy have a seizure next to me on my 8-hour bus ride from Quito to Porteviejo. But I’m home, safe and sound in my room in Cayambe, able to share my adventure in Los Tillales.

I was greeted in Noboa, a community about 2 hours outside of Porteviejo by the current volunteer, Kristen, and other volunteers of Corozon Feliz who were there for a health fair – checking blood pressure and calculating BMI. The group of women volunteers I met are awesome – very spirited. I hung out at the fair with them all morning, trying to learn as much as I could in Spanish. This job would be so much easier in English! After a few hours we headed to Los Tillales in the back of a pick-up truck, all 15 of us.

My first impression of Los Tillales was, wow, its really rural and in the middle of nowhere. I knew I was spoiled in Cayambe, but I had no idea how much until actually arriving at my site. We have all the main amenities – electricity, indoor plumbing, and a stove. However, the water is frequently turned off, so everyone keeps big containers as full of water as possible for the days when it doesn’t come through the pipes. I got to experience this for 2 days, and took my first bucket bath. There is no hot water, but because its so hot on the coast, the cold showers/bucket baths feel refreshing. Also, although my host family has a gas stove, they rarely use it. Rather, they use the orno in the backyard. I sleep with a mosquito net (tolda) to keep them and other things out of my bed…(see photos).

My host family is super sweet. I live with the grandmother, 2 of her daughters basically live with us too – their houses are almost attached – and their daughter and son. So we have three generations under one roof. Their Spanish is really fast and its hard for me to understand, but I’m making some headway with one of the daughters, Maria.

Everyone else that I met my first day was extremely friendly, but I was on sensory overload and couldn’t get past the physical conditions of the town. There is basically one main road that connects Porteviejo to Sucre (another bigger town about 20 minutes from Los Tillales), and Los Tillales appears to have sprung up along it, like many other communities. At first, I didn’t get the sense of really having a neighborhood, I felt like I was just living in a house sprung up along a road. But after talking with lots of the people, and hanging out there for a few days, I felt the presence of the community. Everyone knows everyone, lots of people are related, and they were all really welcoming, which helped warm me up to the site.

I went to a charla with Kristen and some other volunteers in Aquacate, a town about 1.5 hours from Tillales. It was really interesting – about 20 people showed up to participate. We weighed everyone, took their blood pressure, talked about the importance of exercise and physical fitness, then did aerobics for 30 minutes. Good times – I sweat like a pig!

As far as the work aspect goes, there are so many opportunities – the town, like many places in Ecuador, doesn’t have many resources. I’m going to have to keep reminding myself that I can allow myself months to get to know the people, the town, what programs/projects already exist, and what other needs the community has before trying to “save the world.”

My head is spinning with ideas of how to expand Corozon Feliz and meet the other needs already expressed by my counterpart, Nelly, of the Committee of Health Volunteers that solicited Peace Corps for a volunteer. Not to mention potential opportunities to work with Plan International, colegios, the new local government that comes into office in August, and another group being formed to address domestic violence. Sucre and the surrounding communities have more projects put together than I expected, and seem very energetic and open to trying new things.

After my one tough night, I’m super excited to get back to Los Tillales, improve my Spanish and start to integrate into the community. As I said all week while I was there, I have big shoes to fill as the previous volunteer did awesome work and is loved by everyone.

This blog posting wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t mention the food orgy that occurred last night in Porteviejo with other volunteers – you know who you are, but shall remain nameless here. It felt sooooo good to be in a mall, with a food court that had a movie theater. We had 5 hours to kill before heading to the night bus, and what better way to kill it than by eating and watching a movie in English??!! I think I ate my weight in ice cream yesterday, along with sanchipapas, a sandwich, pieces of a burger, and popcorn. We watched The Proposal, which made me a little homesick, and then ate more ice cream. To top things off, we took an executive bus back to Quito, which was basically like staying in a Ritz Carlton with a flight attendant, seats that reclined, and a foot rest!! Oh how I love La Reina bus line! Good thing I do, because I’ll be spending another 24 hours on her again in the next month.

And my sandals spell like a litter box. Miss you Boo.