Friday, January 6, 2012

Happiness is like a bullet going through my heart

Thought This needed to be blogged ....

This past Tuesday afternoon we had our first flood. Yup ladies and gents, the rainy season has started in my site. Oh joy! Our apartments, not to mention the streets, were flooded. My bedroom had an inch of water, my balcony had probably an inch ½, and Katie's apartment had an inch of water just pouring in from the windowless tiny hole that our landlord promised to fix ya mismo. Yup famous Ecuadorian phrase, “Ya Mismo” will drive you mad, angry, and push your patience to its limits. Ya mismo = wait 4-5 hours (when at a party or going out) and when dealing with house issues, you will probably wait a month maybe two for them to fix the problem, get irritated and try to get the problem fixed again. As I am writing this, the windowless hole is getting fixed, finally after two months and a very angry Katie, we got progress. 

Well that was an interesting Tuesday, we had our first real Peace Corps moment of Oh shit this is really happening to us, this is our life now. Funny how one moment can change your perspective on a lots of things. I am a horrible person when it comes to letting friends get close, even getting to know the real me, I am worse in relationships, haha. There are a few people who I am close to and whom I trust completely. But being thrown in with people you never knew and experiencing things like floods, a whole new culture, and illnesses changes you and I realized how much I have opened up to Katie and Benja. Yeah I know lots of people go through these realizations, but its a big first for me, specially when it concerns trusting people. And I hope that I have more epiphanies through my Peace Corps service. I am glad to be here with new amazing friends, even when shit happens I am glad they are there with me. My motto, Keep moving forward just like in Meet the Robinsons (I adore that movie!) keeps me going.

I wish I had pictures from that night, Benja took some but hasn't posted them up yet, so I gotta wait. My host moms house flooded and so did many of my students homes. Our street had water up to our knees, it was the most disgusting water ever. 

Wed. - Friday

Anyway, M.D was here for the last 2 days, giving us updates on stuff and also talking to the schools that will be getting a volunteer. Fun piece of news, Katie and I will be meeting the new volunteers come February, I cant wait! Haha we will play nice, we promised. It will be fun to spend half of Feb. in Quito-Tumbaco at the training center and also talk/hangout with the new volunteers. I also get to visit my Tumbaco host fam again, I cant wait. I am also excited to get some training for the Teacher training workshops we will be doing soon. We get to travel once a month to a TEFL site and have a workshop with all the English teachers from that area. Yup massive English teacher training workshops are on there way very soon. These workshops are much needed and it is also a great learning experience for us as TEFL volunteers.

Oooo I am going to learn how to play the cello, even if I am not that good at it, I want to learn it. I need a new hobby and playing an instrument will be a good way to center myself, that and doing yoga/exercise will help. Ah cello, just thinking about playing that instrument sets my heart on fire:
Watch http://youtu.be/DRVvFYppU0w and http://youtu.be/Ry4BzonlVlw you will understand why the cello affects me so.

Oh oh one last thing small achievement of the week getting my students to say "May I go to the bathroom" and "Can I come into the classroom." Yup I am so proud of them.


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To two of my closest friends, miss tank and miss gaiaskully, I am so sorry for your loss and the hurt you must be feeling. I wish I could do anything to make it go away but all I can say is I love you both very much. Hugs <3<3<3







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