So I got back to the school after the bug attack incident and the days of fever, and I said my goodbyes in Salasaca. But I will go back there in September to tie up some loose ends and say my real goodbyes.
Thanks Robert! You have made my time in Salasaca amazing and have introduced me to a whole community of friends!
Now, it is time to go before the evil immigration charges me lots of money I don´t have. And it looks like it´s going to be Venezuela, first going through Colombia. Caribbean beaches, here I come!!! That will be luxurious after being in the Andean winter! I´ll try not to walk into any cocaine-producing plantations on my way to Venezuela, but they are pretty widespread... Don´t worry, though. Good Spanish, good sense, and a good friend will keep me, relatively, safe!
Mom, I´ll give Santiago contact information, good idea.
Next dispatch from Colombia!
Friday, July 27, 2007
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Attack of the killer ... whatever-they-weres
So this weekend we decided to have a nice relaxing time going fishing out in the forest with some friends. While there, I got bitten by something that I didnt really see over 100 times. We realized when I got back to Baños because my back swelled up with countless insect bites as well as many other places of my body, including some places where I dont know how the bugs got there. Well, some of the insects in Ecuador arent your garden variety bugs and these turned out particularly nasty.
In the middle of Sunday night I woke with a raging fever that reached hallucinatory heights. Groaning, tossing and turning. Over the next two days, Santiago hovered over me with cold rags, trying to bring down the fever and pounding headaches. Every part of my body was on fire and the pain was everywhere. I could hardly leave the bed or eat. One time walking to the bathroom I just fell over because of the vertigo. Luckily I fell on the mattress instead of down the nearby staircase. I didnt make it out the door, much less to Salasaca to teach, which made me feel endlessly guilty. I think I actually tried to convince Santiago to drag me to the bus station a few times, but I really dont remember much.
I woke this morning and the fever broke. But I had no energy from not eating much and from sweating with an insect-induced fever for two days. The swelling around all the bites has gone way down, and I think I am about to be better. I gotta get to school tomorrow. I wanted to go this morning, but my body screamed NOOOOOO, NOT YET. So I am taking it easy so that I can go to Salasaca to say my goodbyes...
Damn bugs!!!
In the middle of Sunday night I woke with a raging fever that reached hallucinatory heights. Groaning, tossing and turning. Over the next two days, Santiago hovered over me with cold rags, trying to bring down the fever and pounding headaches. Every part of my body was on fire and the pain was everywhere. I could hardly leave the bed or eat. One time walking to the bathroom I just fell over because of the vertigo. Luckily I fell on the mattress instead of down the nearby staircase. I didnt make it out the door, much less to Salasaca to teach, which made me feel endlessly guilty. I think I actually tried to convince Santiago to drag me to the bus station a few times, but I really dont remember much.
I woke this morning and the fever broke. But I had no energy from not eating much and from sweating with an insect-induced fever for two days. The swelling around all the bites has gone way down, and I think I am about to be better. I gotta get to school tomorrow. I wanted to go this morning, but my body screamed NOOOOOO, NOT YET. So I am taking it easy so that I can go to Salasaca to say my goodbyes...
Damn bugs!!!
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
What to say?
I dont know what to say, but I havent been very good at updating. Next week, I am heading off to God knows where. I am sad to leave my friends here in Ecuador, but happy to be traveling. And, um, lots of stuff is happening but it involves grants and scholarships and boring financial things so I wont get into it, but I am trying to help arrange my return to Ecuador to work on a traditional health center.
We´ll see what happens...
We´ll see what happens...
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
I havent been to the Internet so...
The entry below was from a week ago, but I havent been to the Internet in forever.
Update: Some Irishmen and a Canadian moved into my house. Baños is still depressing although the road is no longer pure landslides. Argentina is freezing to death in the coldest winter in 89 years so I am re-thinking my travel plans. And, only two weeks left in Ecuador for now!
Wow...
Update: Some Irishmen and a Canadian moved into my house. Baños is still depressing although the road is no longer pure landslides. Argentina is freezing to death in the coldest winter in 89 years so I am re-thinking my travel plans. And, only two weeks left in Ecuador for now!
Wow...
Alternative bilingual school
A week ago, I went to the Escuela Fray Bartolome in the town center. This is the largest school in Salasaca, where there are hundreds of students, real classrooms, a load of teachers, uniforms, and all the typical stuff. The front of the school says “Foundation for the Ecuadorian Indians, Switzerland” so I guess maybe it was built by Swiss people or something. Most students in Salasaca attend this school.
My school, Katitawa, is an alternative school that receives no government funding. We only have one paid teacher who teaches all grades. The school is bilingual and instruction is in Kichwa and Spanish. We also have a strong focus on environmental education and the students learn as much about traditional medical plants as they do about math. We have 30 students in the whole school. I think we are kind of like Montessori schools in the US, in that we don’t have structured classes. Students learn what they want, when they want, and we are there to guide them, not to lecture.
I was invited by Padre Carmelo, the priest who is the director of Fray Bartoleme, to come to the graduation ceremony at his school to invite the whole town to take English and biology lessons during the vacation months. I was impressed at how different their school is compared to ours. It feels almost like jail, with dark classrooms with barred windows and a concrete playground. The students lined up to do their physical education, like jumping jacks and other boring stuff. At Katitawa, our physical education is growing the plants outside and hiking the miles to and from school, not jumping jacks. There is no concrete at Katitawa.
Two weeks ago in Katitawa, we celebrated Inti Raymi, the sun festival, and had our final presentation. We had invited the Fray Bartoleme School to come observe. Their students lined up in their uniforms watched in awe as our students, clad in ponchos, bayetas, and anakus, showed off the fields of medicinal plants and the lamb meat hanging from the volleyball net. Later, we cooked a whole lamb in the hole filled with volcanic rocks that the men had dug. We danced around it as a friend’s band played traditional highland music. That was our ceremony.
Tuesday, in Fray Bartolome, the teachers wore suits and the students formed lines. So different from Katitawa. The funniest part of the day was when it was my turn to announce the vacation classes. They were using a microphone to talk to hundreds of students and their families. Padre Carmelo handed the microphone over to me, and once it started working, I began to talk.
AND IT WAS WEIRD!!! I mean, obviously, I’ve heard myself speak Spanish. But it’s one thing to speak Spanish to your friends and students and quite another thing to hear that Spanish broadcasted back to you from several loudspeakers in the school and even across the whole town. You know how it’s weird to hear yourself in home videos and stuff, now imagine that, except shouted across a village, amplified, and in another language. And I have an Ecuadorian accent. It was like an Ecuadorian woman had stolen my voice and was making town announcements. I could hardly concentrate I was so distracted by my voice booming out fluent Spanish, which turned not so fluent once I heard myself chattering away from every direction. The women looked up from spinning their wool, and I just thought how strange the whole situation was. The small Kichwa women sitting on the concrete spinning their wool, listening to the voice of a tall white foreigner booming across the village, all of us listening and talking in our second language, Spanish.
Maybe Ashli has some comments… Ashli, perhaps you’ve spoken Russian via microphone to hundreds of people? Was it weird for you?
My school, Katitawa, is an alternative school that receives no government funding. We only have one paid teacher who teaches all grades. The school is bilingual and instruction is in Kichwa and Spanish. We also have a strong focus on environmental education and the students learn as much about traditional medical plants as they do about math. We have 30 students in the whole school. I think we are kind of like Montessori schools in the US, in that we don’t have structured classes. Students learn what they want, when they want, and we are there to guide them, not to lecture.
I was invited by Padre Carmelo, the priest who is the director of Fray Bartoleme, to come to the graduation ceremony at his school to invite the whole town to take English and biology lessons during the vacation months. I was impressed at how different their school is compared to ours. It feels almost like jail, with dark classrooms with barred windows and a concrete playground. The students lined up to do their physical education, like jumping jacks and other boring stuff. At Katitawa, our physical education is growing the plants outside and hiking the miles to and from school, not jumping jacks. There is no concrete at Katitawa.
Two weeks ago in Katitawa, we celebrated Inti Raymi, the sun festival, and had our final presentation. We had invited the Fray Bartoleme School to come observe. Their students lined up in their uniforms watched in awe as our students, clad in ponchos, bayetas, and anakus, showed off the fields of medicinal plants and the lamb meat hanging from the volleyball net. Later, we cooked a whole lamb in the hole filled with volcanic rocks that the men had dug. We danced around it as a friend’s band played traditional highland music. That was our ceremony.
Tuesday, in Fray Bartolome, the teachers wore suits and the students formed lines. So different from Katitawa. The funniest part of the day was when it was my turn to announce the vacation classes. They were using a microphone to talk to hundreds of students and their families. Padre Carmelo handed the microphone over to me, and once it started working, I began to talk.
AND IT WAS WEIRD!!! I mean, obviously, I’ve heard myself speak Spanish. But it’s one thing to speak Spanish to your friends and students and quite another thing to hear that Spanish broadcasted back to you from several loudspeakers in the school and even across the whole town. You know how it’s weird to hear yourself in home videos and stuff, now imagine that, except shouted across a village, amplified, and in another language. And I have an Ecuadorian accent. It was like an Ecuadorian woman had stolen my voice and was making town announcements. I could hardly concentrate I was so distracted by my voice booming out fluent Spanish, which turned not so fluent once I heard myself chattering away from every direction. The women looked up from spinning their wool, and I just thought how strange the whole situation was. The small Kichwa women sitting on the concrete spinning their wool, listening to the voice of a tall white foreigner booming across the village, all of us listening and talking in our second language, Spanish.
Maybe Ashli has some comments… Ashli, perhaps you’ve spoken Russian via microphone to hundreds of people? Was it weird for you?
Monday, July 02, 2007
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)