Tranquilo

There’s a secret garden behind my house! And 7 baby chicks! 7 is my lucky number! There were 9 baby chicks but Ponky killed 2. Ponky and Beethoven (affectionately called Beto) are the sons of Kiera. These 3 are the scruffy perros malcriados that live in the courtyard, who hate me. They also have a beautiful Burmese-looking cat with blue eyes named Valentina, but she wants nothing to do with me. Milk is delivered to our house every day from a local cow. My host grandmother grows all of the herbs used for the tea we drink after dinner. There’s a giant TV in the main square above the market, which is always showing a soccer game. Everything is so interesting.

The Peace Corps often encourages the volunteers to accept every invitation they receive in order to get to know the community and become a part of it. I had decided that I have more than enough time and the “ganas” (desire) to start living a healthier life when I got to site with food and exercise. I wanted to set a precedent of independence, which is much less common here, and establish a routine as soon as I got here. So I went to the market and the tienda on Sunday and bought fruit, cereal, yogurt, and veggies for my breakfast and lunch for the first week. I ended up feeling terrible because my host grandmother asked me “no te gusta mi comida?” (you don’t like my food?) and I tried to explain in the most polite and tactful way that I am not used to eating so much soup and rice. Then after my first day at school, I announced that I was going to go running at the park nearby. My host grandma seemed appalled. “How do you know about this park? Who are you going with? Well, hopefully you’ll be back before Consuelito gets here so you can have cafecito.” The culture here is much more community based so doing anything alone is viewed as strange. So, my new host mom talked to my neighbor and invited me to go exercise at the park with her instead of going alone… at 5:00am. So that happened. I was really tired after school, but I’m going to try and run again tomorrow morning, but I may just have to admit to myself that I’m just never going to be a morning person. To be continued.

Today after classes all the English teachers had a meeting at the office of the Ministry of Education in Latacunga. We introduced ourselves to about 200 teachers and while I would normally die of public speaking anxiety, I’ve found myself growing more and more comfortable in front of large groups here. I was also introduced to the whole school on Monday and I don’t think I even blushed. Everyone is just so friendly and welcoming here. When I speak in English, they clap as if I did a trick, and then when I speak in Spanish, they’re even more impressed. Granted, I’ve also received several marriage proposals and “I love you baby”’s, but “piropos” (compliments/flirtations) are much more common and accepted here.

Being in Latacunga also made me appreciate Pujili that much more. Latacunga is a big city and I felt overwhelmed by all the people, traffic, commotion, and tiny sidewalks. Though I think that my life in my site will be very quiet and calm, probably boring at times, there’s a reason that the best way to describe a town here is: “tranquilo”.