Hiking and hanging out with the family

Sometimes friendly Australians give you their yoga mats, sometimes the truck that goes all the way back to your community picks you up hitchiking, and sometimes you get bed bugs.

Cotacachi

I don´t think I have bed bugs but something is definitely getting me while I sleep.  Try as it (they?), they haven´t been able to get in the way of a serious amount of sleep while here - it is always crazy to me how tiring existing amidst a different language can be.

Last work week was great, while this week is off to a really slow start. From the clinic in my town we did a bunch of community visits. I was treated to a brief taste of altitude sickness in the last community which sits around 3000 meters, but more importantly got a glorious view of Cotacachi, one of the volcanoes outside of Otavalo.

Laguna de Cuicocha

On Sunday I hiked around Lake Cuicocha, a crater like not far from town. I went with Bekah, a doctor from here with Tandana for a month as part of her residency. It was gorgeous, we met some wonderful American travelers and caught a truck all the way back to town.

My Spanish is definitely improving, as measured by fairly in-depth conversations with various health workers at different clinics. Communication with my host family, at least verbal communication, is pretty much at a stand still, as we try to meet in the middle with my gringa Spanish and their Kichwa Spanish. Beyond vocabulary and accents, I´m having a blast,  albeit completely exhausted by, playing with all my siblings. With 6 little brothers and sisters I always have someone harrassing me to play set (fun!), read, draw, or most recently, engage in a thumb war - previously unknown to them, it has taken off like wild fire.  More endearing is the reciprocal hair braiding while watching horrible Latin American reality TV. My favorite time is when we have teeth-brushing parties outside before bed, something I hope will be a lasting tradition. I´m less enthused by the endless intrusions when trying to do yoga in my tiny cement room, but well worth it. The grandmother of the family is by far the hardest to communicate with, but we have our morning salutations down pat now, full of smiles and friendly gestures.

En el Ecuador

I found myself in town with a free afternoon and missing everyone at home -  I suppose more accurately all the people I love who are dispersed across the globe right now - so starting a blog seemed like a reasonable course of action. Im yet to send an in-depth email to anyone and forget the login to the blog I kept in Nepal, so here we are.

Im (sorry, I cant figure out how to use the apostrophe on this computer) currently living in the small indigenous community of Gualsaqui, Otavalo, Ecuador. IM NOT IN THE PEACE CORPS (yet, hopefully....) Im here as a volunteer with the Tandana Foundation, which does a variety of work in the communities surrounding Otavalo, all centering on community connection and interpersonal exchanges and relationships.

View from a clinic

Last week/my first week was pretty miserable. Im living with a family of 9 and though they can and do speak Spanish to me, they speak Kichwa to oneanother which was initally quite isolating. I spent the week at a rural health center that is over staffed and lacks patient access options. It rained (read: poured) everyday. The school in the community where my six siblings attend purportedly is at the center of Hep A outbreak.  I found myself trying to interpret everything I was experiencing in terms of my time in Nepal, which left me missing my friends and a (marginally) more structured academic setting.

Saturday I somewhat inexplicably woke up in a great mood, excited to explore the touristy but world renowned Saturday market in Otavalo and better orient myself around the town Im calling home for the next three months. Little did I know I would run into three friends from the states who are the most infectiously positive and adventuresome people I have met to date.

The guys buying ponchos to wear while biking through S. America

The weather also turned around on Saturday and I returned home sweaty and happy and ready to eat mass quanitities of rice and potatoes which thrilled my host family.

On Sunday I went to Cascada de Peguche with two doctors from the states who are here for a month. It was gorgeous but somewhat of a tease as there is so much hiking to be done in the area.

Cascada de Peguche

Since the waterfall it has been a wonderful mix of family time and promising volunteer opportunites, both in a clinic that has midwifes, shamans, doctors, a lab, and a variety of other local healers and in a rural clinic in the  higher elevation community of Inguincho. Last night my family finished a two room cement addition to their home, where they can cook on an open fire rather that the small stove in what is currently our kitchen. We all sat on the floor of the new room and ate a delicious potatoe-pasta-beef stew, during which all the kids decided to use me as their test subject for new hair styles. What goes around really does come around, as I remember spending hours messing with the hair of any willing family member.

Make my day and send me emails - rachel.bollens@gmail.com