Always Time for New Experiences

This past month was highlighted by three really great experiences and one really depressing one. Starting with the good, Maria, one of the patients at Damien House, has been cured of Hansen´s disease and the doctor determined that she was healthy enough to leave the foundation and return home. Maria is from Naranjal, a rural area about an hour and a half outside of Guayaquil. She hadn´t been home in over two years, so she was very excited to pack up her bags and head back to her house and farm. On the other hand, she had also gotten very close with the rest of the women that she had lived with at Damien House for the past two years and now had to say goodbye.

Luckily, Brendan and I had the oportunity to go to drop Maria off at her house. Five of the women patients from Damien House went with us to accompany their friend on the trip and see her house. After a hilarious ride with 6 old ladies and a cat that Maria was taking home, we arrived at Maria´s house and farm. Her sister and daughter were there waiting for her and were so happy to have her back. Maria´s sister insisted that the women take some fruits and vegetables back to Damien House, so Brendan and I went with her around the farm collecting stuff. First she brought over a wheelbarrel full of oranges and through them in a sack. Then we went into the woods and gathered a nut called "bread fruit" from the ground, peeled it, and put it in a sack. Then she showed us how to dig up Yuca roots. Then she cut down some sugar cane, pulled a papaya off the tree, and finally grabbed two ducks by their feet and stuffed them in a sack. We left Maria at her house but her family made sure that we didn´t leave empty-handed. The women were a little sad to say goodbye to someone they had grown so close to over the last few years, but happy for Maria that she is able to return to a normal life with her family.

A few days after my trip to the farm, my second student group arrived. This group was from John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio. They were a great group and I had a blast hanging out with them for the week, translating, driving, and giving them tours (although it was tiring). They made a lot of connections with my Ecuadorian friends and neighbors and were a huge help at the after-school programs. It´s amazing how much the kids love the extra attention that retreat groups give them when they visit. Anyway, leading my last group was a great experience and I will not forget about them anytime soon.


The day after the John Carrol group left, another group of doctors and nurses with Project Perfect World arrived in Guayaquil to operate on children´s feet, hips, and spines. I spent the week translating for the group, both for the surgeons in the consult room and for a group of physical therapists and orthotic specialists that were fitting kids with braces and prostetics. I had the opportunity to watch a few spine surgeries which were incredible. I also was able to translate for some kids who were able to walk normally for the first time in their lives because of the braces that the group fitted them with. It was an emotional experience, with parents crying tears of joy and kids overwhelmed with excitement at being able to walk. It was a pleasure working with the medical group and I have been humbled by how hard they work to improve the lives of the children of Ecuador who would never be able to afford the care they need without the generosity of these groups.

And finally the bad. One morning in the end of May I was walking to the bus stop when I saw a large group gathered outside the church. I soon found out that our church had been robbed. The night before someone had smashed the concrete around one of the windows and pryed open the steel bars that cover the window. They went inside and tore the big metal door to the closet off its hinges and took all the instruments, amplifiers, and microphones, in addition to the church wine, vestments, and chalices. The instruments had belonged to Nueva Generación, a group of young adults from the neighborhood who have been playing music in the church for years. When I walked around the church and saw the mess they had left it made me feel sick. I couldn´t believe that someone would actually rob the church of the only valuable things it has. The whole community was upset but we are moving forward and focusing on raising the money to replace what was stolen.

                                                   Me with the group from John Carroll

The Year is winding down

Sorry it´s been awhile since my last post. I feel like so much has happened since then but there isn´t much to tell.

We had another retreat the last weekend of April which marked our 9th month being in Ecuador. I had some time to relax on the beach and reflect on the first 9 months here and how I want to live out the last 3. The place we stayed was a beautiful retreat house perched on the top of a cliff overlooking the ocean, complete with a pool and a narrow path down to the beach.

A few things I reflected on that weekend were the incredible hospitality of the Ecuadorian people and the deep faith they have despite the suffering they´ve endured. I know that I have talked a lot about the hospitality before, but it is still shocking even after nine months of being here. Unfortunately I was not able to spend Mother´s Day with my own mother, but I did visit the houses of several families which treat me as one of their own. I have even been invited to the birthday parties of people that I have only talked to a few times, just because they were friends with volunteers in the past.

It´s interesting to hear what Ecuadorians think about hospitality in the US. A lot of people have asked me if it is true that Ecuadorians that go to the US get beat up on the streets. I tell them thats an exaggeration, but with some of the things that have happened over the last few years I can´t really tell them with confidence that they won´t be harrassed in our country, and it would be even less likely that they would actually be welcomed.

As I said earlier, I have met a lot of people here with incredible faith. There are a number of people who are discouraged and depressed by the conditions that they find themselves living in, but the majority seem to have a faith that no matter how bad things get, God will provide and will not abandon them. Among many families, there is a general hope that things will be better for their children than they were for them. Being a witness to this faith has been a humbling and inspiring experience.



These last few months, I have grown much closer to my Ecuadorian friends and neighbors. That is going to make it even harder to leave. I now have my departure date and flight reservations, which makes the fact that I am going to have to say goodbye that much more real. In addition to saying goodbye to all the friends I´ve met throughout this year, the patients at Damien House I´ve spent so much time with, the adorable kids from Semillas, I think I am also going to miss living in Latin America in general. Lively music is playing everywhere you go, people in general are very open, warm, friendly, and laid back. You can drive how you want without worrying about traffic laws, etc. Anyway, I still have a few months left so I´ll try to make the most of it.

A few other things

Last month I translated for another medical group. They were from New Hampshire and did knee replacement surgeries on adults. We have another group coming in early June which will be doing foot and hip surgeries on children.

Last weekend I went to Montañita, which is a small beach town that is very popular with international surfers. I don´t surf but still enjoyed the laid-back surfer boy atmosphere.

I will be leading my second student group next week. This group comes from John Carroll University in Ohio.

I think that is it for now, I hope everyone is safe at home, thanks for reading!

Damien House Informational Video

This is an informational video that some other volunteers made about Damien House. It gives you an idea about what Damien House is all about and you get to see some of the patients and staff at Damien House that I have gotten to know so well in the last eight months. Its also nice that you all get to see Sister Annie, who has been like a mother to me since I´ve arrived here in Ecuador. I have a short cameo washing the dishes. Yes Mom, I have learned how to wash the dishes here haha. 

 

Carnival Update and Medical Groups

So Carnival had started out slowly but quickly got crazy after that. On Sunday we loaded 25 people into the back of our neighbor´s pick-up truck and drove to a small town called Salitre about 45 minutes outside of Guayaquil .  In every town that we passed through we were doused with buckets of water by people standing alongside the road. We spent the day hanging out with Eduardo, one of our guards, and his family. In Salitre, there was a large river full of people swimming and splashing around. The river was lined with makeshift restaurants and bars made of bamboo that served traditional Ecuadorian food. We spent the day swimming in the river and smothering each other with this paint powder that was being sold everywhere. Even strangers would come up to us and just rub red or blue or purple paint in our faces.  

 On Monday and Tuesday we had Carnival parties at Semillas with the kids and retreat groups. We played games with water balloons, sprayed each other with silly string and foam, and covered each other with paint. The kids had a blast, especially because it was for once acceptable to throw things at us and the visitors. Walking around our neighborhood became very dangerous for those few days, as I would never know when a group of little kids or a random old lady would attack and smother paint all over my face. Carnival was a blast but it did get annoying eventually. I spent about two hours Monday night scrubbing myself with rough sponges and showering in the hose trying to wash the purple dye out of my ski;  and hair, and teeth, and eyelids, and ears, and nose, and just about everywhere else. I used alcohol pads to get it off my face (but it looked like I was wearing mascara for 2 days after) and floss and mouthwash to clean the purple off my teeth and gums. Fortunately, I have dark hair so it was difficult to see the purple streaks. Brendan and Christina were not as fortunate. They had purple hair for a week. I was eventually able to clean myself enough so that I didn´t look like a purple smurf, but my clothes and shoes didn´t survive. I´m glad Carnival only comes once a year.

This past week a group of doctors from the US has been performing orthapedic surgeries on poor kids in Guayaquil´s children´s hospital. I have been helping organizing the surgical equiptment and getting them finding whatever they need for the operations. I´ve also helped a little with translating, talking to the families of the patients, and doing odd jobs such as asking around the hospital for a saw to cut a pair crutches that were too big. The team is small, only five people, so I have gotten to know them pretty well. They are from New Mexico, Kansas, and Pittsburgh and performed about 15 surgeries in the past week. They let me hang out in the operating room and watch whichever surgeries I want. It is absolutely amazing to watch as the surgeon cuts into tendons and drills into bones, sewing things back together to change the shape of people´s feet or hips. They have been teaching Ecuadorian doctors how to perform the operations that they are doing and it has been really interesting to watch that process. They will leave the country on Sunday but I´ll be working with another group in three weeks. 

I´ve heard some really random English phrases since I´ve been here that have made me laugh. People in my neighorhood often yell out whatever English words they know when I pass by. One of the most common greetings I hear is "Good AAAAAAAAAAfternoon" with the emphasis incorrectly on the A. Last month, however, I was caught off guard when an Ecuadorian passed me and said "waz up nigga" in the same tone as if he were saying "hello, how are you."  I assume that he heard that in a movie and has no idea that it is not a normal greeting in English, but I can´t help but break down laughing whenever I hear it. 

Oh and if you were wondering, it is still hot here. 

Miss you all and take care.

St. John´s and Carnaval

The end of last month I had my first retreat group, a group of 5 high school boys and two teachers from St. John´s Prep in Massachusetts. I went with my housemates to pick them up at the airport on Saturday night and spent 16 hours a day with them until I dropped them off at the airport the following Saturday. It was an exhausting but fun experience. It was fun getting to know the guys and showing them around Duran and Guayaquil, introducing them to friends and neighbors, driving and translating for them, giving them a tour of Damien House, and taking them to meet the kids at Semillas. Both of the chaperones were first-year teachers who weren´t too much older than I, so it was fun hanging out with them and getting to know them. The group had a lot of questions and made many observations about our neighborhood and our program which spurred my own further reflection. By the end of the week, it was hard to say goodbye, but i hope they all had a meaningful experience and keep the people they met here in Ecuador in their hearts and prayers.

Carnaval starts today in Ecuador and in much of Latin America and Europe, and ends on Tuesday. Caranaval in Duran and Guayaquil means throwing water, mud, paint, and whatever other liquid you can find at friends and random passerbys alike. I have been hearing stories for the last few months about how wet and dirty I will be getting in the next few days, but I´m still not too sure what to expect. A lot of locals head to the beaches or the mountains during Carnaval, but I´ll be staying home to avoid the crowds and because I have to give tours at Damien House to retreat groups on Monday and Tuesday. Possibly I´ll be able to make a day trip out of the city to relax for a day. Since Carnaval just started this morning, I haven´t had much thrown at me yet, although on my way to the cyber to write this I did get a bucket of water thrown on my head from a friend on a second story balcony (it felt great in this heat!)

Speaking of the heat, its been extremely hot and sunny here the past three weeks, with tempatures rising to over 40 degrees C (104 F). The rain has stopped for now, the mud quickly dried up, and the dust has returned. In an attempt to cool off a little, I went with Brendan and some Ecuadorian friends Ricardo, Aide, and Daniel to a pool complex outside of Duran. It had a few crowded pools, two waterslides, and lots and lots of people doing whatever the hell they wanted! Unlike most American waterparks, this place had neither staff nor lifeguards and sold lots of beer. There were people diving into crowded pools, others chugging beers and jumping off the roof of storage sheds into the pools, and lots of soccer balls flying around hitting people in the head. The waterslide was awesome but I decided not to go on it anymore after the first three times that I smashed into little kids that were climbing up it the wrong way or had just stopped to rest in the middle of the slide. Despite the chaos, it was lots of fun and a great way to cool off.

The last month at Damien House I have been working to organize medical brigades from the U.S. who are coming to Guayaquil to perform surgeries on both Hansen´s patients and other needy patients in local hospitals. I´ve been helping the staff at Damien to gather the montains of documents needed to get approval from the Ecuadorian government for the doctors to perform surgeries and get their medical equiptment past customs. I am excited to serve as a translator for the groups and will hopefully get to watch them perform a few surgeries. We have groups coming in April, May, and June.

We will be busy with retreat groups the next month, as we will have 3 groups visiting us in Arbolito in March. I will let you all know how carnaval goes and what the doctor´s groups are like. I hope everyone is doing well. I miss you all but feel very much at home here and I can´t believe how fast the time is passing.

Retreat groups and graduations

2011 started out just as busy as 2010. We had 3 retreat groups visit us in january, from Boston College, Iona College in New York, and Manhattan College. It was great hanging out and getting to know the visiting students. They asked a lot of good questions and noticed a lot of things about our lives and the community that we have long grown accustomed to and no longer notice.  It was especially rewarding to spend time with the BC group because of my own experience leading the BC group to Duran last year. I didn´t know any of the students this year but it was great seeing my former staff leader Chris Darcy, an administrator at BC, who returned to Ecuador with this year´s group. Retreat groups are one of our few connections to the US and it was great to get to know all the students and staff that came to experience life in Duran.

In mid January, local schools let out for a 3 month vacation, the equivalent of summer vacation in the U.S. A lot of kids that used to go to school in the afternoons have now started going to our After-school program. We now average 100 kids at Semillas everyday, making discipline and planning activities a real challenge. We have been slowly adapting the program to run with twice our normal attendance, but having over 100 energetic kids ages 4-15 running around at the same time has been crazy.

The rainy season is now fully upon us, which means mud everywhere, lots of mosquitos, very humid weather, and wading through standing water in rubber boots in order to get to work.

The last weekend of January all the volunteers went to the beach for our 6 month retreat. I have mixed feelings about my year in Ecuador being half over. Sometimes I feel that the first months flew by and i will be leaving before I know it. Other times it feels like I´ve been here forever and I can´t believe I still have another 6 months left. Our Ecuadorian neighbors are already getting sad about us leaving, but I try not to think about that yet, 6 months is still 6 months no matter how quickly the days pass.

I´ve been to two high school graduations in the past month. A few weeks ago Syrah Cuenca, one of our neighbors and the sister of a Rostro staff member, graduated from Nuevo Mundo School as the valvictorion of her class. She gave a very emotional speech thanking her parents for instilling the values of education in her and her siblings. We celebrated at her house afterward with dinner, cake, and lots of laughs and dancing.

Yesterday, my friend and neighbor Joseph Bonilla graduated from his high school in Duran. There is a tradition in Ecuador where children and their parents choose a "padrino" or God-parent to support them in each of their major childhood accomplishments, including baptism, first communion, confirmation, graduation from elementary school, and high school graduation. I was honored to be asked to be Joseph´s "padrino" for his high school graduation. After the ceremony we gathered at the his family´s house for dinner, more cake, more dancing, and lots of fun. Too few kids graduate from high school in our neighborhood, and I have so much pride and respect for those that do, especially given the conditions that they are raised in. One thing both Joseph and Syrah have in common is at least one parent that would do anything to see their child succeed.

                                                                                          

Joseph and I

Jospeh with his Mom, sister and me.

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.