Christmas and New Years

My Christmas in Eucador was definitely not like any other. To start, it didn´t snow (as you may have guessed). The Ecuadorian Santa Clause does still drive a sleigh pulled by reindeer (presumably to slide through the mud that now fills the streets due to the arrival of the rainy season) and people still decorate there houses with fake snowmen and Christmas lights and fake Chirstamas trees. They still listen to many of our popular Christmas carols but have some great songs of their own, such as the one about the Donkey on its way to Bethlehem.

Christmas Eve started out with a mass and a nativity play staring a 1 month old baby as baby Jesus, an Ecuadorian pre-teen as Mary, me, as Joseph, and the other volunteers as shepards and wisemen. It was so much fun to participate in something that means a lot to the community but it was a real challenge to keep a straight face when I walked down the aisle barefoot wearing a robe and looked around to see everyone I know from Duran giggling at me. After mass we went to our neighbor Eduardo´s house to celbrate his son´s 9th birthday. We ate dinner and cake and did manadatory salsa dancing for a few hours before heading back to our house. Our boss Megan had a party at our house for a group of teenage boys from the street boy shelter who had nowhere else to go for Christmas. I had a blast spending Christmas eve with them. Their crude humor reminded me of my friends from home and we joked around and threw a football. We ate a big turkey dinner at midnight on christmas eve, which is customary here.

Christmas morning I hung out and had breakfast with my fellow volunteers. In the afternoon we went to Damien House to spend time with the patients there. We sang them Christmas carols and served them ice cream sundaes and soda. They were soo happy to see us becuase for many of them we were their only visitors on Christmas day. That night we went to Sister Annie´s house for a delicious Italian dinner (hadn´t had that since I left home). Sister Annie made us sing and act out the 12 days of Christmas which was a blast. It really felt like a family gathering, complete with my adopted grandmother Sister Annie.

For New Year´s Eve we were invited to a neighbor´s house for a late dinner, followed by burning some fireworks with the kids afterward. At midnight, we returned home to burn our ¨Año viejo¨ or old year. The people here make or buy paper dolls that are supposed to represent all the bad things about the past year, and they burn them in the streets on new years eve. We made a big rat to symbolize the 20 or so mice which we killed in our house this year, filled it with firecrackers, doused it in gasoline, and watched it explode. We then went on the roof and watched firework shows from all over the city. Everyone was hanging out in the streets blasting music, dancing, and blowing things up. That is my kind of celebration. Happy New Years to all.