Se Aquila...

So for the last week, I was in the crazyily large, incredibly overwhelming city of Guayaquil, Ecuador. I am going to make every effort not to sound crabby in this blog entry, because I dont want to look back at it later and wish that I had had a better attitude. I will say this, Guayaquil is certainly not what I imagined when I signed up for Peace Corps.

Lets start at the begining. Saturday I bussed out to Quito with my family for a birthday party. I spent a great afternoon eating chevice (a sprimp soup concoction that you put popcorn and dried bananas into for extra deliciousness) and running around playing tag with my host brother and cousins. I then took a cab to the Peace Corps Office to meet up with some other girls who were heading out for their site visits at the same time as I was. I learned 3 important things in Quito:
1. You are not expected to tip taxi cab drivers. (.50 wasted, but he was a nice guy, so its okay)
2. The PC office has free internet for PCVs and PCTs. Incredibly important.
3. Papa Johns is just as delicious in Ecuador as it is in the States. Oh man, do I love garlic butter sauce!

Allison, another PCT, and I got out to the bus station around 9pm to take the 11:10pm bus. The bus ride was fine for the most part, I slept most of the time. Around 6am the bus stopped. I wondered if were were in Guayaquil...it didnt look like a large city...no, we were not in Guayaquil. We were in some random town and the bus was broken. We were all then ushered onto a new bus (which already had some people on it, so not everyone had a place to sit). But wait, my bag! Its under the first bus..."No se preocupe..." (dont worry) they say, they will transfer our bags onto the next bus that comes. Why not onto the bus that we are on?, who knows, welcome to Ecuador. 6am, I am sleeping, hazy headed, knowing its probably not the best idea to leave without my bag, but....sit outside in random town and wait for the next bus or worry about it later. I´m gonna go with worry about it later. So I got on the bus, soothed myself with some gpod music, and fell back asleep until we got into Guayaquil. It is now about 9:30AM (thats right, we were on the bus for about 10 hours!).

Okay, so one task down, we are safely in Guayaquil. Minus my bag (which contains all of my clothes, my toothbrush, basically my entire life...what the hell was I thinking leaving it behind?!?!), but thats okay. The bus attendant says they will be there at 10AM. Riiight, I wouldnt belive that in the States, so I certainly dont believe it here. I´m thinking we can check back around noon, in the meantime, we moved onto task two: calling the current PCVs to come pick us up. Well, after looking like some fools at the payphone that we couldnt figure out how to operate, we successfully called them and got picked up. Everything from there was smooth sailing, my bags came in around 7 or 8PM, nothing was missing, no harm no foul.

Jenny was the PCV I was assigned to spend time with in Guayaquil. She is super cool! She´s from LA, but she´s been in Guayaquil for the last year. She works on a bunch of different projects, including some early-childhood development work at a daycare, gender equality rights workshops with teens, a teen theater group, a women´s rights group, and an LGBT group. One afternoon, we went to the Malecón 2000 in Guayaquil, it was beautiful! Its basically this huge waterfront park that appearantly used to be a dump but has been totally redone to beauty! We climbed up 444 steps to get to the top of the city, and then another 56 steps to get to the top of a lookout point where we could basically see the whole city. It was great. (of course, we took lots of breaks, Theresa is still too gordita for all that).

Tuesday AM I was a big girl and got on the city bus all by myself and successfully arrived at my counterpart´s office. My counterpart´s name is Nelly, shes about the same age as I am and super pillas (slang for energized, but actually directly translates to batteries) and very smart. We are getting along really well, so that is very good. I will also be working closely with Miguel Angel at the Fund. AfroAmerica XXI. Hes a cool guy, self proclaimed hippie.

To sum up the week: there is another volunteer from Canda with AFS who started on the same day as I did (Nadene). We spent some time at a youth leadership conference...overall not very interesting, I am not sure that the youth were really paying attention, it was hard for me to follow and made my brain tired to translate all the Spanish. However, I did meet some super cool ladies from Minnesota/Wisconsin who come to Ecuador every year and help women with artisan crafts that they then sell in the states and send the profit back here to Ecuador. First week and already networking, pretty much I rock at life. The rest of the time I spent visiting the different barrios (neighborhoods) that I will be working in (and chilling in the office with free internet, oh yeah!). There are 4 barrios in total, but 6 communities (2 barrios have 2 communities each, then 1 each in the remaining 2 barrios). To describe the barrios as "low income neighborhoods" would be the understatement of the year. The roads are almost all dirt roads, and the homes are sturdy enough, but essentially made of bamboo like material, plywood and sheet metal. It is not uncommon to see kids running around without shoes on, dogs roam the streets doing their deeds everywhere, garbage is accumulated in every direction. I love it! Basically, the barrios are my favorite part about having to live in this city. I go there and I just see so much potential! The people are shy with me because they dont know me, but when we get together in smaller groups, I can tell that they are super pillas, they've got ideas, they've got vision, they are looking to me for a way to put that into action. My job duties (at this time) include training to prometores (community leaders/contact people) on organizational and community development; supporting the currently existing community groups in their activities; supporting the development of community groups that are less developed; educating local youth on HIV/AIDS prevention; working on including male community members in the development process; and supporting the organization in soliciting support from the municipo (city gov´t) for projects they are working on. Pretty much, I am stoked about my job. I have met a bunch of the community leaders and am working out a schedule for getting out to their barrios for their meetings when I return to site in September.

Sounds like I love Guayaquil, huh? Well, I wouldnt go that far. The job is cool, but thats about all that I am feeling good about. The housing that has been arranged for me in Guayaquil is, well, its not okay. I dont want to get into all the details, but its not going to work out. Dont worry about me, I am safe, I am fine, I am just not happy with it at all. And I am kind of disappointed and frustrated with that right now, but I am confident itll work out. I took pictures, prepared my argument for why the conditions are not in accordance with safety&security or health guidelines, and I have found alternatives to provide to staff for approval so that I can move when I get back. I think that my constant worries about housing and not wanting to go back to my house put a dark cloud over my week. Its basic Maslow's heirarchy of needs, I cannot do this selfless giving of my self stuff (which is like level 5 or 6 or something) when I am worried about my level one basic need for safe food, shelter and water access. I spent the whole week frantically and worrriedly looking for signs that said "Se Aquila" (for rent); it was pretty much all I could think about it. The only time I stopped thinking about it was when I was out in the barrios getting to know the gente (people).

Overall, I am still really stugging with the city concept. I dont like cities, I cannot help it, it has been engrained in me to live in the suburbs. If that makes me a snob, then sign me up for the snob listserv and call me a snob. Besides that, I didnt picture myself in a city at all when I signed up for the Peace Corps. I know that in the begining I kept saying that its the job that matters, not the place that I am, but I am eating those words now. I have no concept of living in a big city. Everyone walks too fast, its bad to make eye contact with people, you cant talk to random people on the street because they might rob you, I have to be home before dark because I live downtown and its dangerous at night, I am having to learn to ride the bus (without the convenience of a bus route map, cuz it doesnt exist in Guayaquil), and the real kicker, all of this is in Spanish. I thought that my Spanish was getting better, but its a whole other ball game to talk to locals on the coast who talk super fast. I blend in physically, but once I open my mouth, everyone knows I am not from around here (or thinks I am kind of delayed maybe...?). I am worried about making friends in this huge city. I am worried about my safety (and I am not being paranoid, in the last year volunteers were robbed at gunpoint during the nighttime next door to my office and in front of my house). I am just worried. I should stop this now, though, because its a bad idea for me to start crying at the internet cafe.

The upside? Given that everyone walks so fast, and there is no where me to cook in my house, chances are I will be loosing some weight. Keep your head up, kids; and I will do the same. When things are super sh!tty, they can only get better, right?

Love and miss you all,
Theresa

Is this because I´m black...? Just kidding!

So, as you can see I have moved my PC Assignment to the top of the page because today was Site Assignment Day! (Lovingly dubbed the "day of destiny.") I will not make a whole post talking about my site since you can read the same info above. As you can tell, my prediction was right, and I am being sent to the big scary city! Who would have thought that joining the Peace Corps would wind me up in a city that is bigger than both of my hometowns put together??? I checked the stats on Wikilepedia, and the population of the metro-area of Guayaquil is bigger than that of Milwaukee´s metro area plus the population of Green Bay (and then some...). So this is the site that I was worried about, but I have been prepping myself since Thursday, so I am feeling pretty good about it (scared, but good). I am told that my organization is one of the strongest ones that PC Ecuador works with, and I get the impression that they are basically THE major Afro-Ecuadorian organization in the country. The counterparts (our direct contact people) seem super rad, very motivated and full of good vision for the community. Overall, I am pretty sure that I got pretty lucky. What I do feel very good about is the reasoning I was given on how my site was selected. I am not going to go hooting my horn or anything, but it does seem that the staff has a lot of confidence in my potential as a volunteer. Lets hope I dont let them all down!

I go on a site visit this weekend, so I will know more after that. Until then, there is really nothing going on with me that is remotely as important as my site assignment. I have lots of reading to do!

I hope you all are well. I miss home really bad this week, for whatever reason, probably because last week was so trying. Anyhow, thanks for all the nice comments you guys make on this site, that stuff is majorly important to me (ps, if you havent made a comment, now is the time, because I am starting to question our friendship...sooo just kidding). Also, whenever you feel the urge to send me some care packages, get to getting...you know how I like presents...Target is open til 9pm...hahaha

love you all,
theresa

Life is calling...

So, this past week we had what is called the "Site Fair." Basically, the counterparts (or our direct contacts at our sites) come in and present information on their sites and the programs they are working on. Then, we smooze shamelessly with them in horrible Spanish grammer to get them to want us to work there. Here is how it went down:

The Thursday before last we were told that it was optional for us to make up our resumes in Spanish to hand out to the counterparts. Given that it was an option, I sided with the not doing it decision. Basically, my Spanish has improved majorly, but I still sound pretty gringa stupid, and I was not trying to call myself out like that. Well, the next day on Friday, we were told that the resumes were mandatory and that the counterparts really look highly upon those who have them (even if the Spanish is sub-par). So I made one, of course not until the last minute on Sunday, but hey, better than nothing. It cost me $3 to print of the copies. That might sound like a good deal, but a full lunch of chicken breast, rice, beans, a fried banana and a drink costs $1.50; so $3 for a stack of 10 pages is pretty expensive! Of course my language facilitator totally crapped all over my resume with his red pen...so money essentially wasted, but I handed them out anyhow.

The Site Fair was super informative! We had sites from all over the sierra (middle) and coastal region of Ecuador, and 2 sites in the Amazon! (that exclamaion mark has nothing to do with my desire to live in the Amazon, its just exciting that someone else will be and I will look at pictures). There were a handful of sites that I was interested in, but my top ones were a kick-ass Women´s Rights organization in Machala, a super rad group of youth who are working on bettering thier city in Sua, and a really chill artisan Afro-Ecuadorian group in Mascarilla. I liked the Mascarilla, its a small town where they are working on some super rad artisan projects to increase tourism in their area to generate revenue for the town and the folks who live there. We were given the chance to talk to our program manager about which sites were were most interested in because she and the PC team here are the ones who make the choice in the end. So I told her that I really wanted to go to Mascarilla, and she was like, "Yeah....no." What? Appearantly she sees me in a large city going into the barrios seeking out new leadership. Come again? Large city? You realize I lived in the suburbs even in Green Bay, right? What? I am scared....

She kept saying that her stronger volunteers need to go to the tougher sites, so she needs to use my skills in the tough cities. It seems that I was determined to be a "strong volunteer" even before the site fair, so I am not sure that my $3 spent on resumes even mattered if I will be sent to a site in a scary city that I did not hand out my resume to anyhow... We´ll see. Site assignment is on Tuesday; so on Tuesday, I will know where it has be determined that I will live for the next 2 years...

Keep your fingers crossed for me.

peace,
theresa