PERRITO!!!!

It seems that every time I write a post here, I turn around and something else I want to write about happens.

Sunday night, I was able to sit around the kitchen table and talk with my family. Somehow, my host-grandmother and I got onto the topic of blood types, which was a very interesting discussion to have in a foreign language. As we were sitting there, my host-brother came home and walked into the kitchen holding his newest birthday present in his arms. A wiggly little black and white puppy! My family now has TWO dogs on the roof! Since there’s now a puppy, I have played with the dogs. Toño likes to play fetch, and the puppy likes to follow people around. Apparently Toño is actually a hunting dog that Marco takes bird hunting over on the other side of “those mountains over there.” It makes me feel better to know that the dogs won’t have to live on the roof their entire lives but will also get to run around outside on the ground too.

One of the things I have noticed here is the street dogs. I expected to see them, but not so many varieties or quite so many in general. They seem to be about as common as squirrels are in the states. But then many people have pet dogs as well, and there are all sorts of pet stores around the city. It’s just such a different place.

The other morning, I was in the kitchen pouring some fresh bottled water into my water bottle (the tap water here is not drinkable unless boiled for at least 3 minutes) when a person walked up to the other side of the window. Which is weird considering I’m on the second floor of a building. But the building next-door is only one story high and the roof goes right up to our kitchen window. Go figure.

I made Marco laugh last night by imitating a puffed up turkey. He made me repeat it twice.  I was trying to describe the turkeys’ behavior to them since they don’t have them much here. Apparently turkey meat is really expensive and they just don’t have turkey farms. But Marco really liked my imitation of a male turkey making noise. I then tried to change the topic to deer, but I don’t think they understood what I was saying, (they might have thought I was talking about ostriches, I’m not sure) so I gave up.

These last couple days, Susie has asked me to help her with various computer things. Yesterday she wanted to save something that she got off of an email onto her computer. Today, something malfunctioned and we tried to fix it together. I don’t think I helped that much, the computer basically fixed itself, but it’s still fun to be the computer go-to person here. Even if trying to translate computer words is confusing. (Half of them are the same as in English, the other half are totally different.)

I’ve started my “real” classes now. Yesterday I had my Oral Ecuadorian Literature class and a photography class. I’m really excited about the Lit class. Apparently we actually have to get stories from people we know and meet here. I dropped the photography class though. It was supposed to be my easy stress-free class and I felt stressed out after the first day, so instead I think I’m switching to Weaving. At least I sat in on the weaving class today and the professor said I’ll probably get into it. I’m much more excited about the weaving class. It looks like it’s going to be a lot more fun than the photography class. Also, Kalamazoo (as far as I know) doesn’t offer a weaving class. I also started my Andean Anthropology, Quichua, and Colonial Art of Quito classes today. The Anthro and Art classes will be interesting, but not very exciting I think. Quichua on the other hand seems like it’s going to be awesome. Quichua is the native language of the indigenous Andean people. So far the language is difficult to follow, but I think it will get much easier as time goes on.

I have yet to get any homework, but I’m sure that is going to change. When it does, I don’t know if I will have as much free time as I do now (granted, I really have too much free time at the moment, so that’s not a bad thing) so I don’t know if blog posts will be very frequent. Never fear though! I will post as often as I can and have something to say!

Coming home from school on the bus today I met an interesting group of people. There were three guys who were clearly Latin American, all with long dread-locked hair, and one very pale redheaded girl. Two of the guys were from Chile, one from Ecuador, and the girl was from France. Apparently they are travelling across Latin America. For what reason, I do not know, but they were doing something with music too and started drumming and singing on the bus. Of course, once they were done singing, they collected money for their travels from anyone who was willing to give it up, but I’m used to that by now.

Something that has been very strange for me is all the places I keep encountering the English language here. Sometimes it’s because someone tries to speak English to me, thinking I won’t be able to understand their Spanish. Other times it’s a sign or a label that is entirely in English. Today, I noticed that the stove in my house has all English labels, but the microwave doesn’t. It’s just so strange to be jolted back out of the Spanish-speaking world, by a sign, or a set of labels, or something someone says, into the English-speaking world again.

One other thing I have started doing is watching a “telenovela” (soap opera) with my host-parents. Spanish soaps are notorious for being over-the-top and ridiculous. And that notoriety is well deserved. It’s difficult for me to understand what exactly is going on most of the time because the characters talk very quickly, but so far I’ve noticed lots of cultural things. There are a few phrases I’ve picked up that are characteristic of Ecuador and a few other actions and gestures that are familiar. I think the show might also be a good way to pick up on stereotypes here because each of the characters has a very distinct personality and fills a particular role to a T.

I think that’s it for now. Until next time!