Life on the Equator, or within a couple of meters.

February 24, 2008
Sunday 2:30 PM
Our room in La Esperanza


Hola como estan yo me llamo Santiago Paul no se preocupen porque estamos bien y ustedes como estan en los Estados Unidos y Mary esta bien aqui, y estaban lavando la ropa, y les gusta la comida y hoy comimos chuleta de cerdo y choclo con habas y papas me gusta patinar en el parque y juego con bolas y como golosinas y vemos unas peliculas.


The above passage was written by our little brother. He was very excited to write to everyone. So, I hope you enjoy!

I’ll start by saying that everything here remains great and we still feel very lucky to have been placed in Ecuador with such a great family for these first few months and to have such great fellow aspirantes (fellow Peace Corps trainees, we’re not supposed to say we’re volunteers until we make it to swearing in on April 18, 2008. So until then we’re aspirantes).

Now for a quick recap of the past week. On Monday night I ‘helped’ make a traditional Ecuadorian dulce(sweet) called caca de perros, or in more formal circles, tostados dulces. I was supposed to make them but I really ended up just being more of an observer as you can see from the photos (you’ll see I was quite busy keeping in touch via numerous incoming phone calls. Who knew we were in such high demand!! It seems like the going rate calling from the U.S. to Ecuador is around 10-15 cents per minute, much cheaper than calling the U.S. from Ecuador). The reason why I was supposed to make them can be inferred from other photos where you will see other aspirantes in the kitchen cooking. As part of our language and culture classes we made a meal together.

The remaining photos consist of pretty pictures of La Esperanza, a local marching band, an injured bird that our family looked after for a few days, a day trip to Carpuela, gardens we helped plant at our training center, greenhouses we helped make at our training center, waiting for the bus, cows crossing the Panamerican highway, washing laundry, watching and learning how to improve laundry techniques, guinea pigs (for future consumption), quails (their eggs are used in fruit drinks), and a delicious lunch made by our host mom (described by Santiago above, consisting of pork chops, fava beans, potatoes, corn on the cob, soup, and juice from tomate de arbol…sorry no translation available but it’s a yummy fruit).

We also took a trip to observe an environmental education lesson in a bilingual (Kichwa and Spanish) school, where Mike was able to practice his Kichwa for the first time. We learned how to cook some healthy meals with foods that are available here(which is pretty much everything) and we were given a great cook book with tons of wonderful sounding recipes that seem like we could actually make….once we get to our site. And for those of you who don’t know, we have some information about our site but you’ll have to call us to find out 

That pretty much sums up the highlights from the past week. This week we’re taking a trip to a nursery and getting information on all the possible sites that are available in Ecuador for aspirantes in Agriculture and Natural Resources.

Oh, and in case you haven’t heard, President Correa declared a national state of emergency for all of Ecuador because of severe flooding in the coastal regions. Although the flooding is terrible, we are safe and dry over 3,000 vertical meters above where the major flooding is occurring. So please do not worry about us, we’re great.

Love to you all!

PS...we have added a new link section to the blog. On the right hand side you will see links to the websites of other Peace Corps Volunteers (or trainees for now) that are here in Ecuador with us. Their views are of course their own (although we may share some of them). enjoy.



as always, click on the above picture to see a larger version.