Enjoying Everyone

By the time you read this, I will already be on my way to Uruguay. We have finished our first term as Manna Project International – Ecuador and have now all taken off for our Christmas and New Year’s vacation. I’ll tell you all about it when I get back, but just to give you an idea, I’m dipping into some of my savings I made from being a teacher (teachers have savings?) and heading off to Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile for two and a half weeks.

Surprisingly, however, I don’t feel that I actually need this vacation yet. I really enjoy living in Ecuador and working with the kids and families in San Francisco. In fact, several days this week I spent over eight hours in the community simply hanging out and really getting to know the people. Just yesterday we had two major events in the community. In the morning we held our second parent discussion. We have a big restructuring in store for January and so we brought the parents to not explain these changes to them, but also to provide an open forum for them to provide feedback to us. The way our School Support Program is currently structured it is very difficult for us to teach because we always have kids working on homework and there really is not a specific time set aside for our lessons. We have decided that it would be better to separate the homework time from the class time. This way, kids who do not have homework will not become a distraction for those that do; furthermore, we will have an hour of focused class time every day. We will have two days a week of Language and Literacy instruction, two of Creative Arts, and one day of focused English class. Many of the parents were quick to point out, and I am sure you have as well, that there is no place for math in this schedule. In response, we explained that there will be math instruction everyday. As kids finish their homework, before the focused class time, we do not have the option of sending them home, nor do we have the option of simply allowing them to roam wild. It is in this time, between finishing their homework and starting the next class, that we will provide math and logic activities.

Our parents responded quite well to these proposals and we are happy to be moving forward with changes the community approves of and supports. We wanted to take it one step further, however. We then went ahead and gave them the opportunity to ask for whatever they wanted, even if there was no way we could provide such services. If we do not ask the community what they want, there is no way we can effectively serve the community. Several ideas mentioned include opening an athletics program (both for youth and for mothers), continuing with English class at an hour when more adolescents and adults can attend, looking to obtain a computer so as to offer typing and computer classes, and increasing our incentives for consistent attendance. Every month we provide an incentive of some form or another for all kids who have not missed more than three days of class and the parents had some wonderful ideas of what these incentives could be. They suggested taking field trips to several museums and a zoo in Quito, having a tour and the opportunity to talk to students at a university, or going on one of the many amazing short hikes in the area.

After the parent meeting we met as a group for lunch to discuss and digest these ideas proposed by the parents before heading to the second anniversary of the Cooperativa del Valle – Esperanza y Progreso (Valley Cooperative – Hope and Progress). Cooperative in Ecuador our in many ways like mini-banks (i.e. this one has 700 members with accounts from people in the communities surrounding San Francisco); however, there is one major difference: These cooperatives are not interested in profit, but rather developing the strength and solidarity of the community. Although I have really not mentioned it before, we absolutely would not be able to function without the support of this cooperative. Not only did they do all of our publicity and registrations in October, but they also donated the building in which we are working. The event kicked off with mass and continued with a speech competition from local high school students as to the importance and value of cooperatives in this type of community. After some incredible speeches we were amazed to find out that they would also be serving an enormous plate of fritada: fried pork with Andean corn, yum! The afternoon culminated with a performance from a local band accompanied by dancing in the street.

A much bigger party, however, was that of the Feria de Quito. December 6^th is the anniversary of the Independence of Quito and the whole city comes out for a week of song, dance, and bullfights. Pertaining to the latter, we attended two concerts. The second of which is what you would expect a bunch of gringos to attend: big concert at La plaza del teatro (National Theater Plaza) right in the heart of the Centro histórico on the night of December 5^th. What was most fun about this event, was more than simply the music however, was the face that thousands of quiteños were parading the streets not only on foot, but also on top of buses! The other concert, and the one I had more fun at, was a Vallenato (Colombian country dance music) concert we attended in South Quito. South Quito (all half of Quito) may well be the poorest urban neighborhood in all of Ecuador, and this park where the concert once was right in the heart of it. None of us had ever been to this part of South Quito before, but I looked at the map and figured I could get us there on the bus. After a while everyone believed we were lost, but I had faith and we made it! We were most definitely the only non-Ecuadorians in the entire place; nonetheless, or probably because of, we had a blast. Although the opening act was awful, the main band put on a very exciting and energetic show that really got the crowd into the performance.

My favorite part of the Feria de Quito, however, was definitely the toros (bullfights). Many people who do not understand bullfights believe them to be a gory and cruel event, but I truly believe that a properly performed beautiful is an absolutely beautiful thing. There are incredibly strict guidelines and rules that govern the entire process of wearing down and eventually killing a 500 kg bull. One such requirement is that when you bring the bull past you, you must keep you legs perfectly still. And the closer the bull comes to you the better; touching is definitely preferred. Another rule is that you must bring the sword over the bull’s head, in between the horns, and enter it directly behind the shoulders, through the spine, and into the heart in one full swoop. My favorite aspect of attending a bullfight, however, is watching the pompous bravado with which the toreros (bullfighters) parade around the ring. One such bullfighter was so confident is his own ability that after bringing the bull in for a pass he immediately went down on his knees with his back to the bull pumping his sword in the air as the crowd cheered in appreciation.