Inti Raymi

March 9, 2008
Sunday
La Esperanza
Nuestro Cuarto

Hello from Ecuador!

We just finished our fourth week of training, which leaves us with only six short weeks more. However, as we mentioned earlier this week, week five, will be our last in La Esperanza for un rato (a bit of time). After this week we will be traveling for three weeks. Thus, this may be one of our last posts for a while. But don’t worry we will return with lots of pictures and stories to tell.

For now we will tell you all about this past week and all the fun we had and all the things we did and learned.

The first and probably the most culturally interesting we found out about are the Fiestas of San Pedro during the months of June and July. Now just to be clear what I’m about to write about happens in June and July, we did not attend this fiesta we were only told about them and given some pictures to share with all of you.

The Fiestas of San Pedro originate from a Kichwa festival called Inti Raymi (Mike says that Inti means “sun” and Raymi is “fiesta” in Kichwa). During the fiestas one of the major events involves a baile. Before the baile begins some people purchase live roosters and hang them from the ceiling by their feet. During the baile, as people toma mucho cerveza, people dance with the roosters and swing them around as they do so. As the night goes on eventually the neck of the rooster breaks. The person who was dancing with the rooster when its neck broke is then responsible for bringing the owner of the rooster twelve live chickens in the year to come. When the person who broke the rooster’s neck brings the chickens to the owner of the rooster, the owner of the rooster must give that person a basket with four types of prepared meat: several cuyes (guinea pigs), conejos (rabbits), chancho (pork), and ironically pollo (chicken). After that exchange everyone is even and then gets excited for the festival again!

So we have a few pictures of our family all dressed up for the fiestas of San Pedro. These pictures are from a previous year and unfortunately do not include any photos of dangling roosters. Enjoy!

Now for the more mundane, yet still totally interesting and fun so keep reading, events of the past week.

Mike visited a yogurt factory in Cayambe (the largest city nearby, about 25 minutes from where we live and located directly on the equator). The yogurt factory is run by the military so don’t be alarmed by all the pictures of soldiers in the slideshow.

We took an afternoon trip to Cayambe after tutoring last Saturday and ate gigantic cookies in the park. The Parque Central in Cayambe, where we were eating said cookies, has tons of lilies not to mention lots of other really beautiful flowers!

Of course, we still had language classes and so we have a few pictures of those. For anyone that is interested in learning Kichwa you can get a few words off one of the pictures that we posted.

Then there are all of the random life moments we documented this week, including: more delicious food, me keeping warm both on the couch and before bed, vistas of Volcan Cotapaxi (where hace dos years I got altitude sickness at 16,000 feet), Santiago shining his shoes for school, Mike crouching on the bus because there were no seats and he’s really tall for Ecuador, me feeding the mama dog, me sharing photos with our family on the computer, laundry, Mike on the phone with his Grandma, Mike studying Kichwa, Mike standing next to a poster he won and then gave to our Ecuadorian family, waiting for the bus, riding the bus, Mike almost getting impaled by barbed wire while waiting for the bus, the clock the bus driver has to clock-in with at each bus stop to make sure the buses run on time, our classmates in Spanish class, a demo on how to make compost, and me and Dona Fabiola with a cake on El Dia de la Mujer (The Day of the Woman).

So that sums up this week. We’d love to hear you thoughts, inquietudes, and cualquier cosa that you have to say about any of it, so keep commenting! (Mike´s granmda loves to hear all of your comments!!)

Next week everyone finds out about there sites. There will be volunteers all over Ecuador near both borders North and South, right on the coast, in the mountains (like us) and in the jungle as far as the roads go, which isn’t very far. Some volunteers will be living with indigenous communities like the Tsachila, Awa, Huarani, Shuar, and of course Kichwa! This means a few (including us) may pick up a third language! (just click the name to see the link)

On a positive political note, Columbia has officially apologized and things have calmed down. All that is left to worry about now is the continual flooding on the coast. Hopefully the rains will stop sometime soon. (being at 9,000 feet above sea level, there is still no need to worry about us)

Hope all is well stateside and we still miss you all!


March 11, 2008
Tuesday
Tabacundo
Computer Place

After several days of technical difficulties, it looks like we can finally send some more photos your way! Enjoy!! Also, the skies today were unusually clear and we were able to see 13 different snow capped peaks from our front doorstep and the training center. It was quite a treat (although we don,t have any pictures of it)(check some of our fellow trainees pages to see if they were able to get any). Today was also the day when everyone else found out where they will be stationed for the next two years. Pretty exciting (even though the married couples have known for awhile).

Mary will be giving an environmental education presentation (El Lorax) in a primary school tomorrow, so send your positive thoughts this way....and any spanish vocabulary, too!

enjoy the pics!!


(and as always, click on the image to see a larger version or to save it to your computer)