Manzanilla

Some facts:
•    I made it!
•    The food is delicious (my host mom is an excellent cook!)
•    There are 25 trainees in my group, 6 men, 19 female.  Everyone is generally around my age and eager to be here.
•    I will be living in Tumbaco, a town 40 minutes from Quito while I am training.
•    I will not be an official Peace Corps Volunteer until the end of training on August 1st.
•    I moved in with my host family Saturday (more on this to come)
•    Training is 8 – 5 Monday through Friday at the PC center, a 20 minute bus ride from my home in Tumbaco.
•    Topics in training: safety and security, health, culture, language, technical skills specific to our programs…
•    Not even a week in and I was sick from both ends and with a fever… yikes!

I have been here for a little over a week, but it feels like much longer.  Last Thursday when I stepped of the plane the smell of Quito was the first thing that greeted me.  Who would have thought that burning trash, sewage, and exhaust could mix to create an aroma that was so welcoming to me.  It brought me right back to when I stepped off the plain 9 years ago.  I felt good getting a stamp on my passport and stepping through the door of the airport not hiding behind braces, bangs, and the insecurities of a freshman in high school.  I felt relaxed, excited, and ready to approach my time in Ecuador with a bit more education, experience and preparedness to deal with uncertainties.

We all hopped on a bus, bustled over to Tumbaco and went to bed in bunkrooms in the training center trying to process the fact that, indeed, we were in Ecuador and would remain here for the next 27 months.  The next morning began the start of orientation to Ecuador, training, and the Peace Corps.  In one of the breaks we were given throughout the day, I took a stroll on the street surrounding the training center.  In rounding a corner, I got my fist real view of Ecuador…  rolling hills, mountains in the distance, everything dotted with small farms and towns.  Nestled into the fold of two rolling mountains sat Quito, in the morning sun the tall buildings looked animated in the distance.  It reminded me of a giant snow globe (one with sparkles instead of flakes of snow).  
 
Saturday I moved in with my host family.  Rocio and Pedro are two of the most accommodating, bubbly people I have ever met and I am lucky enough to be living with them for the next ten weeks.  My Spanish is better then I expected and I can generally hold a pretty decent conversation, which has made the start of this host family experience different from ones I have had in the past.  This came in handy when I was one of the first volunteers to become sick from both ends and with a fever… what can I say, I guess I have a sensitive stomach, or maybe I got a little to excited about trying all the strange and interesting fruits in the market.  Rocio was very worried about me so I kept trying to assure her that I was happy get sick now to toughen up!  I got better in a few days and have been trying to get Rocio to let me help her more around the house.  Last night we made empanadas together… a green and yellow banana dough with a ground beef filling, delicious!

And so now to manzanilla, the thoughtful title of this post.  Manzanilla translates to chamomile, and I am referring to it here in the form that many know it best, chamomile tea.  Manzanilla is what connects in my mind and senses this new and exciting experience I am in to my previous travels to Ecuador.  In the past when returning from a Norfield Ecuador trip, many of us would stock up on a delicious Ecuadorian tea, manzanilla con miel.  Over the years we have brought so much of this tea home, that there where still boxes left in our cabinet before I left for the Peace Corps a little over a week ago.  Sipping this warm, naturally sweet tea over the years in the states has been an act for me accompanied by a small, happy memory of Ecuador.  It is therefore interesting to me that now, when I hold a cup of that same tea in my hands here in Ecuador I feel like I am connected to my friends and family at home in the US.  I guess that word, home, is starting to become more and more fluid.  And maybe for the moment manzanilla represents a feeling of home for me, a cozy, sweet link between my home in the US and what I hope to make as a home for myself here in Ecuador over the next 27 months.  This is what I thought about when I was running every 30 minutes to the toilet, sipping on manzanilla tea in the moments in-between.

I have today off from training because of a local holiday, which is why I have had time to record some thoughts here.  Our training schedule until August is PACKED!  I will do my best to update this in a few weeks and hope to include some pictures soon.

Ready to Exhale

Take a deep breath in and hold it, hold it, hold ittttttt… keep holding.  This is how I feel.  I have been thinking so long about beginning service in the Peace Corps that I think I have started to turn a few shade of blue from holding my breath in anticipation.  And while I might now have the unfortunate fate of starting this adventure as a blue person, the time I have had to anticipate has been a real gift as it has provided me with the space to pursue a number of interesting opportunities that have allowed me to reevaluate and, ultimately, reinvigorate my decision to join the Peace Corps.

So now, on the cusp of a new adventure, I would like to share a few thoughts with you… (This is a very long post; please feel free to skip to whichever thoughts peak your interest.)

Peace Corps?

Yes, the Peace Corps.  In wanting to spend more time working in development abroad I looked at a lot of volunteer programs, graduate schools, and job opportunities.  In the end, the Peace Corps seemed like it would be the best fit for me at this point in my life.  I like the 27-month commitment, the mission and goals, language training, how well it is established, and ultimately that it will point me in the direction of community where I can make a home for two years learning a little more about the world and myself.

Ecuador!

Receiving my invitation to serve in… Ecuador (!) means more to me then I am able to express through words in this blog.  When I applied to the Peace Corps it was with the understanding that I would go wherever they placed me, be it some place in Africa, Asia, Latin America…  When I learned that I was going to Latin America I was thrilled beyond belief, then to learn I was going to Ecuador… it seemed like a practical joke, too good to be true.  I am still waiting for someone to call me up, letting me know that they made a mistake and meant to send me somewhere else.   

Ecuador has had a prominent hand in forming me into the person I am today because it was in Ecuador that I was first introduced to Latin America, the practicality of Spanish in my life, and fascinating Indigenous Cultures.  In brief two weeks service trips with Norfield Church, I was so transformed by Ecuador that, in college, I majored in Globalization concentrating in the global forces impacting Indigenous Peoples and the Environment of Latin America.  Within my studies I wrote papers about dictatorships in Argentina and Chile, read books about the startling and terrifying webs of terror in Columbia, I partook in a summer internship in Nicaragua, spent a semester abroad in Bolivia… Ecuador was mentioned here or there, but I never learned about it to the extent that I did many other Latin American countries.  My previous time in Ecuador has thus become a blotchy memory trumped by more in depth experiences and studies elsewhere. 

So, to be given the opportunity to go serve in a place that is responsible for planting the seed for so many of my other pursuits makes my commitment to the Peace Corps all the more purposeful.  I have a real emotional connection to Ecuador, and in serving there I feel I am fulfilling a commitment I made to myself a number of years ago.

Packing…

Packing has been an adventure in and of itself.  At this point I am not sure where in Ecuador I am going to spend my two years so I am packing clothing considering a placement in a jungle, mountain, or coastal region.  Not knowing exactly where I am going to be, I find myself packing as if I was going on an extended wilderness expedition.  What does this mean?  I am packing lots of layers and I cringe a little every time I put something 100% cotton anywhere near my backpack. 

            Besides clothing some random items on my list are lotssssss of art supplies to share with new friends, a few of my favorite children’s books, duck tape, my guitar strap, a book about growing sprouts, pictures of family and friends, spices, and a ridiculous pile of shoes.    

Goals.

Most of my goals and aspirations are still marinating in my head.   I will share them with you as I continue to learn more about my exact placement in Ecuador.  For now I will share with you one goal, the most measurable goal, and the one that relates most directly to anyone reading this.  I want to do everything I can to share this experience with anyone who is interested.  At the end of the day, what would any of this mean if I didn’t have friends and family with whom I could recount my stories and thoughts?  I am going to do my best to update this blog regularly, which to me means a few times a month.  In addition, I intend to draw a daily, note card sized, sketch of a takeaway image or feeling from the day.  I have another website where I hope to sporadically post some of these sketches (rebeccajeanb.com).  These goals might be a bit ambitious as I do not know what kind of access I am going to have to the internet, but, I will do my best.     

Fears?

Speaking Spanish, culture shock, being away from home for 27 months… perhaps these should sit at the top of my list.  But, at the moment they do not, these are the things I am excited about.  At the top of my list is, SNAKES…. They are so sneaky.  They always seem to pop up right under my shoe then squiggle into the brush in a way that makes my insides flip flop.  I find them so terrifying that I have become fascinated by my own fear.  Just typing this my shoulders are getting tense.  Anyway, I know that there are a lot of poisonous snakes in the jungle and maybe along the coast.  I am afraid of finding one in the treetop above me or in my shoe.  I realize this may be a completely irrational fear, and it does not necessarily relate my exact experience in the Peace Corps, never the less, there it is.  

Are you still holding your breath?  I am too, but, not for much longer.  Thursday I arrive in Ecuador and can finally exhale.  Emptying my pent up breath so that I can make room to inhale every moment of this new adventure.  I do not anticipate future posts will be this long.  At the moment I have a lot of time to sit and consider things and I wanted this first post to adequately set the scene for what is to come and give you a sense of my general perspective.