¡Tranquilo mi'ja! ¡Todo pasará bien!

I think I'm going to be a slug when I get home.

With more precision: I think I'm going to get my ass kicked at school when I get home.  Everyone is just so relaxed here: make-up work is acceptable (in fact the normal practice!), absence is your own concern, and late work is expected. If anything, this has become my downfall.  Generally, I am incredibly punctual; I get really stressed out about not getting homework done on time, and performance is everything on presentations and tests.  I know, it may not really seem like this is truly my character default, but I try not to vocalize my few anal-retentive tendencies.  At school in the states, I work my ass off to get the perfect score.  Teachers are not as forgiving there. Your first try is always the judged performance.  No practice run, no slack.

My first day of Orientation at USFQ, our orientation and department head Daniel Cordoba told us that it was expected of us to adhere to the cultural norms, which included being late to everything because lateness = punctuality (up to 20 min).  My conversation teacher taught us how to speak in the passive voice to reject responsibility for any of our actions (saying that things happened to us rather than us doing the action (even if it was our fault)).  And my Ecuadorian Culture professor taught us how to barter for time on projects and how to avoid handing in projects on time.  Needless to say, I have had a rather extensive education here in Ecuador.

I was rather on-top of my school work up until last week, when I was sick for two days and missed two papers, a presentation, a quiz, and an exam.  If you miss these things in the US, you might as well sign your own death sentence. You're failing if you miss a test. You're failing if you miss a presentation. You're fucked if you miss a paper or hand it in late.  In Ecuador, all of my professors told me to get better, and to take the test later, to hand in the paper or email it at my discretion, to do my presentation the following class.  Todo pasó bien.  In fact, my Conversation class convinced our professor that we don't have time in the semester to do our scheduled dramatizaciones.  She agreed, and now we have one less thing on our plates to take care of. Instead, we're moving the test up a couple days and we're going to have food and hang out our last day of class.

All of this change is exciting, thrilling in fact, but without the rigid guidelines, I find myself slacking.  Not beyond salvageability, but I worry about next semester.  Gracias a Dios que I already did a major chunk of Ecuadorian exploration. I can feel better about living a more tranquil life in Quito next semester.

I guess that just means I'm adapting well to ecuadorian life.

Life thus far!

So I've been in Ecuador for almost eight weeks now and I have been avoiding writing this blog for about.... eight weeks now!  It is almost impossible for me to find the time to sit down and write because I am so enthralled and captivated by life here I would much rather be exploring than sitting at home.  But alas, I do want to be able to reflect on my experiences and I want to share my thrilling life here with my friends and family.

So first an overview of some interesting cultural aspects of Ecuador that I was not expecting: 

1. They say that everything in South America is cheap... NOT completely TRUE!  Some things here are incredibly inexpensive.  For example, food.  Dining in an Ecuadorian restaurant is ridiculously cheap compared to American dining.  The dining-out culture is very different as well.  People eat in restaurants if they need to eat and have no other option.  Food is not the seductive and enchanting temptress in Ecuador that it is in the States.  Ecuadorians generally don't put as much thought and time into preparing a tantalizing dish.  They don't dream about food and drool over snacks.  They just eat. A typical meal costs about $3 which includes soup, a main course with potatoes or rice and some sort of protein as well as freshly made fruit juice or coffee.

[Speaking of coffee, Ecuador actually produces its own coffee; however, it primarily exports most of its coffee and the people drink instant coffee like its their job.  It's not that real coffee is expensive.  Not in the least.  For some reason they just prefer instant coffee.  I will defend it in the case of Cafe con leche, which more often then not is a hot cup of milk which you scoop instant coffee into.]

Generally anything made in Ecuador is cheap for Ecuadorians.  Fresh produce, alpaca wool items, etc.  Imported products are more expensive in Ecuador than they are in the States.  Recently, Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador, instated a law that imposed high taxes on imported items in order to stimulate the internal economy and promote local business.  This has done little to stimulate the economy.  It is really just increasing poverty because the country doesn't have the production infrastructure to replace the products that experience extreme increases in price.

2. Ecuador has its own sense of time.  Everything in Ecuador takes an EXTREMELY long time to do.  This extends to almost all parts of the culture.  For example, in the business world, paperwork takes forever, technicians take their own time and there's no guarantee that what they are fixing is done right.  Lines are forever long, and often you have to take a number to get in line, but people usually skip you anyways.  Ecuadorians themselves take their time doing everything.  Especially when going from one place to another.  We call this slow paced crawl "Ecuapace."  Being stuck behind someone doing ecuapace is incredibly frustrating, considering that Americans have such a strict sense of time; "get to where you're going as quickly as possible so you can do as much as you possibly can while there."  Although I do hate being stuck behind these people, I truly appreciate their sense of time and duty.  They tend to take care of themselves in comfort.  Why rush?   

There are, however, only two instances in which an Ecuadorian will move quickly: getting on the bus or crossing the street.  Cars always have right of way over pedestrians so if you need to cross the street you need to run.  Also, traveling by bus or trolley is fundamental for many Ecuadorians because many do not have their own transportation.

3. Machismo is no joke!  The most apparent evidence of this cultural phenomena is cat-calls.  For example, in Quito, when I'm walking down the street, I'll get obnoxious hissing calls from men trying to get my attention, or men will shout out obnoxious names at me such as, but not limited to:
"preciosa, reinita, princesa, deliciosa, baby, sexy, amor, etc"
Better yet are the phrases that they say in English.  In Guayaquil, all the men passing by Katie and Melisa and I said "I love you" in a really forced accent.  In Otavalo, I got a couple manly "Good morning"s with some obnoxious winks. Especially when they are in packs, the banter can be ruthless.  Women are often treated like meat, and I suspect that American women receive an awful lot because they believe we don't understand.  By no means does that indicate that Ecuadorian woman don't receive equally awful catcalls, but American women are idolized and coveted because American culture and life is coveted.  White skin here, in a predominantly mestizo culture, is idolized.

just a few observations thus far to share with my friends. many more to come!

It's been agreed upon: Latin American Music Sucks (Generally)

insane latin music I hear all the time in Ecuador...

Mi Niña Bonita- Chino & Nacho.
Pa panamericano- Yolanda Be Cool & DCUP
Stereo Love- Edward Maya & Vika Jigulina
Danza Kuduro - Don Omar ft. Lucenzo

Coconut Rice is traditional at Thanksgiving, right?

I feel very conflicted when I think about spending Thanksgiving in Ecuador.  It's almost bitter-sweet.  My mom set up her computer next to the dinner table at home so that I could electronically eat with them.  It's wonderful that I get to see my entire family and even more wonderful that I get to share this experience with them in someway, but it's not really the same.  Not being able to be physically near them is really difficult.  But I hung out with everyone on the computer while they were cooking and eating hors d'oeuvres.  Harry and I always have really enlightening dirty Spanish conversations when we're on skype; these conversations I truly look forward to most.  I also got to see Maxwell in all his adorable glory! I'm so grateful that I get to see him pretty regularly and that I'm not really missing all of his infancy.  My family has been very good about keeping me up to date on his life and new developments.  

I guess that it's truly bitter-sweet because I can't be with my real family, but I get to be with my new family, my family of friends from Ecuador. However, this experience feels a bit more bitter for me right now because I'm feeling rather under-the-weather and therefore am feeling restless because I can't do anything else but meditate on my absence from my real family's Thanksgiving.

So last night we had a Thanksgiving feast at Melisa's host-family's house.  It was the first time my host mom (Sandra) had ever had a Thanksgiving meal so we all did our best to make it as American as possible.  Needless to say we completely failed.  It was the most Ecuadorian Thanksgiving I could possibly imagine.  But Thanksgiving isn't really about the same old routine food, it's about being with the people that you care about, to be loving and kind and grateful to those people. The problem with imitating American Thanksgiving feasts is that we have completely different ingredients here. We did the best we could though.

Melisa's host family (Lucy, Dani, Valeria, Tio y Abuelita), my host family (Sandra y Rafa), Lee and Mark all showed up for the wonderful meal.  We even played the Thanksgiving game (thought you might like this mom!) So for an entrada Sandra made these little Mushroom torts, the we had greenbean casserole (which I made completely from scratch (homemade mushroom soup and french friend onions)), mashed potatoes (thanks Lee!), Turkey with mango or manzana sauce, coconut rice, pasas moradas (the raisin equivalent of cranberry sauce), this corn-pineapple-strawberry combo dish, and for desert flan with honey.  Needless to say, very ecuadorian, but very wonderful to be surrounded by some of the most important people in my Ecuadorian life.  Unfortunately but fortunately, Katie's Mom and sister flew down from Boston yesterday so they couldn't attend dinner do to time conflicts. We thought about her a lot though!

So tomorrow night I have another Thanksgiving to attend with my friends at Lucho's family Hacienda in Nono.  More details to come on that disaster!  This time Katie and her family will be there so it'll be more genuinely familial for me!