Nancy Germeshausen Klavans Cultural Bridge Fellowship: Quito Summer 2006

Day 3 in Quito has been great. I already find my spanish getting better. The family we live with is wonderful. The mom does not speak english but somehow i manage to understand about 75% of what she is saying. We manage to discuss politics and learn all about Ecuador.

While walking around yesterday i couldn´t help but notice how warm the people are. They are very helpful in giving directions. Generally it seems that most people are among the middle class level. It will be interesting to see if that perception changes once i start working. I did manage to stop in to the office where iwill work on Friday afternoon. I met the Vice President who gave me a tour of the office. It seems that their work is quite strong in Quito and i look forward to contributing during my time here.

While discussing politics i was intrigued by the fact that Ecuador has had 6 presidents over the last 10 years. As Cris, the lady who i organized our home stay with, told us the people of Ecuador and in particular Quito are organized and so whenever they feel a president is not living up to what they feel they should be doing the organize for change.

Hopefully by Monday i will be able to write more about my work experience and understand this wonderous country more

Till next time…

I think the best decision i made in coming to ecuador was my living arrangements. After mulling over various options including living in the touristy areas, i opted for a family home that is close to the airport. Filled with thoughts of sleepless nights listening to airplanes flying over top i was pleasantly suprised.

My friend Bahar had managed to get a placement in Ecuador working in a hospital here which was great. So when we were deciding where to live it was not such a problem to live a bit further away. We opted to stay at a house where we could be fully integrated into ecuadorian culture. Although a bit pricier it was a safer bet than the core of the city.

A long delay in miami got us into quito around midnight. So when we woke up today we were excited to get a chance to explore, since i might not have as much time to do that when work starts on Monday. The first stop was Baca Ortiz, a poor pediatric hospital in the heart of Marsical Sucre. On the drive down, the city reminded me a bit of places like saudi, kenya and lebanon. Not because they are architecturally similar in the least but more because in all those places, advertising is so huge and prominent. We dorve down the mountain to see signs of KFC, ALLEGRA OR DOMINO PIZZA. Quito is visibly quite poor yet very colourful. From where we live the whole city looks like it is resting at the edge of a mountain with spots of blue, yellow and orange. 

The people have a distinctive look to them for sure..Bahar and i might be able to blend in Italy, Spain or other latin countries but here we are not only about 4 to 6 inches taller but our facial features are quite different. Most people have a strong indigenous look.

When we arrived at the Baca Ortiz, it was obvious from the enterance that this was a very understaffed pediatric hospital. There were streams of children filling the waiting room hoping for a chance to be seen by the doctor. It seems that volunteers come through here quite often as the director knew the proces that bahar needed to follow to become registered there.  I hope to go in to work with her at least once during our stay here to get an impression of the health care system.

Right now we were walking around trying sort out possibly taking spanish classes, finding a way to get phones. We have been repeatedly warned of the increasing crime here both petty and more serious. We are quite cautious and defintely don´t plan on going out alone at night.

Tomorrow we will be shown around more by our hosts but i look forward to starting my work on monday.

 

till then…..

I am on my final leg of preparations before heading out to Quito. At this point all i have left to do is pack and get on the plane. I am finiding myself going through what my friend Serah went ... [Continue reading this entry]

I can't believe how quickly time has flown by. I only have two more weeks before i head to Quito on my adventure there. I think i finally have finalized my housing situation. Prior to going i had thought that living ... [Continue reading this entry]