Argentina

At first I wasn’t sure if I should go.  The plane ticket was expensive, I would miss out on two weeks of my exchange in Portoviejo, and my idea of traveling and my host parents’ are quite different.  But, in the end I went for it and it turned out to be one of the best decisions of my exchange. It was a completely different side of South America.  We stayed the majority of the 2 weeks in Buenos Aires, which was a mix of Europe and the states, but with the unmistakable hint of South America.  I have always had this strange obsession with big cities.  Every time I go into New York, Boston, Phili, or DC I decide that I’ll have to live there at some point in my life.  There’s art, businessmen, women with dreads down to their butts, traditional native music, American pop—everything.  That’s my idea of living.   Buenos Aires was the same and even more because of the mixture of cultures and continents that made up the city itself.  I got to visit Jo, which was not only incredible because I got to see her but also because I got to spend some time with her family and see how people live down there.  The culture is much more open-minded. Time is also much more relaxed, and everything is pushed later—whether it be dinner or what time to arrive at a party.  It’s not a big deal to go to bed around 2:30 and sleep in until 11.   Jo’s host mom had to get up early—around 7 or something like that—to do some work or go to an appointment.  She came home around 11, said she was tired, and took a nap.  Being a seasoned napper myself, I was super impressed.  After lunch, they sit outside around the table and chat for hours, or lie down in the hammocks and relax.  I really loved it (if you can’t tell yet). 

Jo, embracing her inner American, had done planning.  We had a list of things to get through before I was allowed to return to Ecuador.  We had to go to hippie fairs, drink mate in the plaza, eat the famous chorripan, have a true, Argentine family dinner, visit the Catedral, go to the best ice cream store in the world with something like 150 flavors, etc. etc.  Thanks to her and her family, I really ended up having an incredible time and getting (at least a little part) the Argentine experience. 

 One of my favorite customs in Argentina was mate (mah-tay).  It was originally a type of ceremony, but now it’s more of a social activity. It’s a traditional tea that you drink with a metal seive-straw (bombilla), a gourd (the mate), and the lose tea leaves (yerba).  Preparing it isn’t really complicated but there are a few tricks and traditions.  You pour the yerba into the gourd, tilt it to the side, and then put the bombilla in the upper side.  Then, you tilt the gourd back upright, and pour hot water (it can also be made with juice or cold water, but usually hot water) in right where the bombilla is.  You don’t move the bombilla (learned the hard way) or else it fills with yerba and you get a mouthful of the tea leaves. The person who prepares the mate drinks first, and then it’s passed around.  The server pours for each person (you can pour straight from the kettle, or we took a thermos of hot water to the plaza and shared a mate there), and after the person finishes drinking, they pass it back to the server.  If you say thank you after drinking, it means you don’t want any more. 

The mate is a tradition native to Argentina, but a lot of the food came from France and Italy because of the huge European population. We can just say that I was in heaven most of the time. 

At 7am, there were chorripans on the street (a huge, spicy sausage in a hotdog bun that’s eaten with chimichurri sauce) for the early risers and the sweaty, drunk partiers that are come trickling out of the discotec.  Later on, you can grab a mate in the plaza, and then head to get a plate of your favorite pasta—raviolis, lasagna, spaghetti with pesto sauce.  OR you can indulge in some of the best pizza in the world.  We discovered El Cuartito, arguably the best pizza in Buenos Aires.  They had this pizza called fugazzetta, which had a layer of cream cheese, mozzarella and then pounds of sliced onions on top.  And of course, you have to eat your steak while your in Argentina.  There’s no avoiding the Argentina parrilla (grill/bbq) which is said to be some of the best in the world. 

One of my favorite things to do there was just walk around the streets.  The architecture was pretty European, but there were so many interesting, different parts.  We hit up all the different parts—Recolleta, Caballito, La Boca, etc. The last day, I went with my host mom to do “shopping”—purchasing clothing to later sell in their store in Ecuador.  I’m not sure what the area was called, but there were people from all over South and Central America, and it definitely contrasted the ritzy, touristy areas that we had been to before. People went up and down the street with huge suitcases filled with clothes, bargaining and buying in bulk.  There were vendors on the streets and up against the buildings, taking every chance they could get to sell you something.

Walking around at night was incredible (and sort of novel because it’s not really safe to walk around Portoviejo even during the day) and there were tons of cafés where you can sit down and grab a hot chocolate or cappuccino, listen to music, and watch the street performers.  We didn’t get to see much of the night life because it picks up around 2 or 3 and goes on until the early morning, but we had a nice, relaxing time checking out the glowing monuments and little boutique stores. 

We took a two-day side-trip into Uruguay to see Punta del Este, which is a resort beach town.  Unfortunately, we ended up traveling about 2 hours by boat and 7 hours by bus each way, and our few hours that we did have in the town were a little disappointing.  It was cold—no one could swim, not sunny, and the only thing to do was eat over-priced food or go to fancy brand name clothing stores.  What I really enjoyed about the trip was the bus trip.  It was different from Buenos Aires—tons of farms and much less glamorous—but one of the most beautiful landscapes and sunsets that I’ve ever seen. 

We traveled with another family who had a 3 year old along with them, so we ended up going to a zoo and an amusement park along with the usual tourist sights.  We also visited this place called Tierra Santa.  It’s hard to explain, but it’s basically a kind of theme park (but not one with rides and games) with a religious theme.  There was food, puppet shows (with huge mechanical puppets that would repeat one movement over and over), reenactments, huge cement replicas of biblical people and animals, etc. There were cement buildings where one or two stories of the Bible would be replicated in some way—pictures, script, or more puppets. Putting myself in a Christian person’s shoes (I’m not Christian myself) I think I would have been somewhat offended.  It was poorly constructed, poorly organized, overpriced, and just altogether strange. Even my host family was making jokes and taking obnoxious pictures with huge cement sheep and donkeys or posing with their arm around the biblical characters.  The big attraction was this giant cement and fiberboard mountain in the center of everything that you climbed up to see more biblical figures and get a view of the entire park.  I saw some incredible churches in Buenos Aires and some beautiful religious art in the museum.  I think those are incredible ways to honor religion and faith.  But, Tierra Santa did not give me the same feeling.   

I need to wrap this up—sorry about the length to anyone’s actually read this far down. SO: nothing turned out quite how I had planned, but it was a fantastic vacation anyway.  I got homesick and sick sick a couple days, I got to go to one art museum for about two hours, and I would have liked to eat pizza about 7 more times, but I shared the experience with my host family and we balanced the activities accordingly.  The culture was amazing, and I really, really want to learn more about it.  I’ve already searched airfare from the states to Buenos Aires and study abroad options at Wellesley because I am determined to get back sometime soon.  Time to get job searching…

Free Time

Today I read an article written by a Peace Corps member in Ethiopia.  I was just snooping on Facebook when I came across it, and as I’m hoping to join the Peace Corps someday myself, I decided to check it out.  To my surprise, I found that I could relate to almost everything he said. 

One of the first things he says is “Peace Corps is defined by a strange dichotomy. Freedom and containment. I wake up every day with a blank slate. I can do anything. I can do nothing. And while the possibilities are only limited by my own imagination…”

Beautifully sums up my experience her in Portoviejo.  Especially now that I have summer vacation, I have almost unlimited free time.  Whatever I want to do, I can do.  If I wanted to read Thoreau all day and try to find meaning to life, I could.  Or I could spend my afternoons in the shopping mall and my evenings in front of stumbleupon and 9gag.  My time is mine to fill.  For starters, I took a French course at the beginning of my vacation to take up some free time and start learning language #3.  I’ve also been going to the gym pretty regularly, and sometimes I go running or swimming with friends.  I try to help my parents out in their store when something needs doing, and I try to include family time in my days, whether it be watching a movie with my papi, playing Jenga with Luiggy or going out for icecream with Andrea.  The rest of the time---a mix.  Portoviejo is no Europe—we can’t go hang out in the plaza or the square.  My parents aren’t big on me being outside very much at all.  We do have a supermarket and a mall (pretty sure I go to both at least 3 times a week).  I’ve been keeping up with the Portoviejo Supercine (movie theater)’s supply of films, and there are also unlimited pirated movies for sale right outside my urbanization in the shopping plaza.  I’ve done a lot of reading—whether it be Spanish or English—about everything from dragons and fairy tales to religion and African cultures.  I’m a 9gag fanatic.  I write in my journal all the time. 

It’s been a learning experience.  There have been days that I’ve wasted away doing very very little—I’m learning work harder and be more motivated, but I’m also learning some patience with myself.  I’m figuring out how and why I’m motivated and what it is that I want to spend my time on.  I’m also learning that this is how life goes.  Technically, in life, we have day after day of free time.  It’s our job to fill it—jobs, school, kids, Facebook, cross country training—whatever that may be.  It’s my job to do something meaningful in those hours. 

Sometimes, the search for something meaningful to do makes us realize what exactly it is that’s meaningful to us.  We start to realize how much we valued our friends and family back home (and how much we value the ones here).  We learn what we really loved from our home country, what we really hated.  We analyze the aspects of our host culture that we want to carry with us, and the ones we’d rather never see again.  We start to rethink what we want to do with our lives---where am I spending my time now that I have so much?   If I could do anything with it, what would it be?  When I got here, I was planning on pursuing a medical career.  But, I didn’t find myself researching premed programs or looking through biological studies in my free time.  I watched documentaries on tribal cultures.  I wanted to learn a new language.  I read through my entire digital camera manual.   I don’t think I’m going to be a doctor anymore. 

I have 4 months left, and I plan to make each one better than the last.  That’s the goal.  When I’m feeling the exchange student nostalgia---wishing I could go outside without being stared at because I’m white, wishing I was somewhere with big museums and fantastic restaurants, or wishing I could be sitting around my kitchen table NOT eating rice and plantain---I remember what I’ve been given.   I remember that my experience will be perfectly unique and this has been and will be and has been one of the best years of my life. 

Weather

In Ecuador there are two seasons—the dry season and the rainy season.  One is hot, the other is hotter. After I arrived here, 4 months went by with no more than 2 or 3 rain showers. Everything was brown and dust was EVREYWHERE. They joke about the dust here all the time. Even my host brother said he missed it while he was in Switzerland.  Sort of like how I miss the smell of cow manure in Kutztown…

But, now we’ve hit the rainy season.  The brown mountains and dead trees are starting to look like the Andes that I remember from my last trip to Ecuador—pointed, craggy mountains with what looks like a spray paint coating in green.  And all of that beloved dust?  Mud.  And TONS of it.  I always end up with muddy streaks down the backs of my calves from getting in and out of cars.  Taxis with chivalrous drivers pull right up to the curb to drop us off so that we don’t have to leap down into puddles and mud banks.  The paved roads are bad.  Filled with bigger holes, bigger rocks, and bigger mud slicks.  The unpaved roads are nearly impossible, and a lot of them are closed down. 

On our way to the beach we pass through some of the countryside.  We saw houses, farms, bridges, and entire streets flooded with water.  It was awful to see, considering that the people who live out there are some of the poorest.  But, I figure that they must have learned how to deal with it every year when the rains come. 

The flooding also hits my town and the surrounding areas.  Today in the paper, I saw an article that said 85% of Chone (town about an hour away) was under water.  There are big effects on business, health, and people's day to day activities. Luckily our part of town doesn't flood too much, but we still get hoards of mosquitos (the Amazon was nothing compared to Portoviejo) and all the mud.

 A picture of Los Tamaridos--the part of Portoviejo where my aunt lives

 Another from the Diario--Portoviejo's daily paper

Culture Shock

Culture shock is not pretty or pleasant, but without going through it, none of my perspectives would have changed.  The purpose of an exchange would never be achieved. Culture shock, to be honest, is nothing like I thought it would be.  I imagined it like this—You go to Tanzania in the Peace Corps, are living in a straw hut with no water and limited electricity.   Men, women, and children work 14-hour days, with the sole purpose being survival and passing on a better life to the next generation.  You finally realize how different their perspectives, goals, and desires are, and how wide the economic gap has grown.  Why should you, an 18-year-old American, have such a different and more privileged life?

So yeah… call me dumb, but when I think of culture shock, that’s what comes to mind.  And, I’m pretty sure I’m not alone. But, what I’ve found is something different. The biggest differences are sometimes the easiest to deal with.  You spot them, identify them, and realize that you’ll just have to accept them or you wont survive in your new destination.  I accepted the fact that I would see more poverty in the states.  It bothers me to see it, but I have to deal with it.  I accepted the fact that women and men have different social statuses here.  My sister and I clean the house, my brother fixes the car.  When I offer to help bring in groceries, I’m usually denied or given the lightest bags.  It’s different, but I’m not here to support women’s rights or equality.  I’m here to learn about Ecuador and learn about myself.  Culture shock, for me, are those days when I come home from school, drag myself upstairs, and miss all of the people and things that were so familiar.  When I miss understanding all the ropes.--never being surprised by some quirk that I had no idea existed.  Just knowing how everything works, how to communicate what I want, and how to get people to understand me 100%. 

For the most part, I’ve dealt pretty well with all of it.   I’m a flexible person.  I’m adaptable. But every now and then something just gets under my skin.   The fact that my religious beliefs aren’t very accepted can get a little uncomfortable. The fact that I have to dress up more when I go out sometimes seems a little strange.  But what I’ve learned is—the point isn’t to stick 100% to your own beliefs and values.  You have to put yourself in the shoes of the Ecuadorians--think of their lives from the time they were infants.  You can’t just try to understand their perspective from your own viewpoint.  You have to leave behind your cultural values, ideas, and upbringing, and look through theirs.  For example, I’ve learned to accept the fact that my parents will ask the last name of every one of my friends to make sure that they know the family. I realized that it’s because they just want to look out for me, and that in this culture, the people you go out with define your reputation. They don’t do it because they don’t trust me or because they’ll only let me go out with a certain class of people.  As my papi once told me—“Todos pagan por uno.”  I’m not sure if those were exactly the right words, but it’s basically that if one person in a group does something, everyone pays.  If some exchange students have a bad reputation, we all do.  If a group of my classmates has a reputation for drinking and I go out with them for one night, I’ll start to build the same reputation.

Another example that’s a little clearer---when I first got here, I was shocked by the difference in social status between men and women.  When I wasn’t allowed to carry heavier grocery bags, I would feel sort of angry and cheated.  But—I looked through the eyes of my brother or my dad.  They thought that they were being chivalrous and nice.  They were accepting the jobs that no one really wanted.  From their perspective, they were respecting me much more by taking those jobs than by letting me do them.  

I’m rambling. Anyway, getting back to this whole thing—THE POINT OF AN EXCHANGE.  You jump out of your comfort zone. You realize that even if you call yourself a liberal, free thinker, you aren’t.  I think it is impossible to realize how much our society affects us until we’ve gone to look beyond it, and had the audacity to question all of those things that we never even realize we took for granted.  It makes us rethink what we want to do with our time here and how we view ourselves in the context of our world.  Not only have I experienced that by putting myself in the shoes of the Ecuadorians, but just being out of my old town and in a completely new group of friends has changed my perspectives.  The exchange students in my town are always hanging out, and just being around them forces me to look at things differently.

So, what more can I say but thank you to all of the people who’ve made this happen for me.  They told us in orientations that we might get to our new host country and wonder what the heck we’re doing there and why we ever signed up.  I can say that I’ve never wondered.  I’ve had my moments of frustration—can’t say I enjoy being charged triple for taxis or being served soup with a duck foot sticking out of it—but there is this underlying point to being here that I don’t let myself forget.

Año Nuevo

New Years Eve didn’t bring quite as much homesickness along with it.   They have a lot of great traditions here that I’ve never heard of or seen anywhere else.  When I was asked out American traditions, I felt kind of strange explaining that we watching a giant glowing ball drop on the TV and then usually party all night.  Here, they make “años viejos” or “old years.”  These are paper mache figures that are stuffed with fireworks and burned at midnight.  The idea is to burn the old year—to get rid of old regrets, failures, habits, etc. and to make room for the new year with its new opportunities.  Neighborhoods and local stores and organizations make huge presentations of años viejos, which are judged in a contest.  Around 9pm on New Years Eve, everyone in the city goes out to check out this years’ set ups and decide for themselves which is the best.  My two favorites: one depicted the process of making Ecuadorian sunhats, which is a important, traditional art in my area, while the other played some of the most vulgar regaetton music and had dancing scenes from the discoteca [keep in mind… these are all life size figures made of paper mache and placed on huge wooden platforms… it was INCREDIBLE to see how much they got into it].  To pay for it all, men dress up as the “widow” of the old year and ask for money in the streets.  After our tour around the city, we went back to the house for dinner with all of the family.  Turkey was the main dish, but there were crab rolls, farm raised chickens, fried rice, salad, etc. etc.   As soon as we finished eating, the minutes were ticking down to 12.  Everyone made at least some attempt to stuff 12 grapes in their mouth with the last 12 seconds of the old year, and at 12 on the dot, the champagne poured and the fireworks were lit.  The años viejos were doused with gasoline and thrown up in flames, and as every car alarm began to sound from the rumbling booms of firecrackers, everyone cheered, cried, and wished one another the best in the new year.  And, as if there weren’t enough things going on, a few running laps around the urbanization with suitcases were made to ensure frequent traveling in 2012.  After the festivities died down we went up stairs to get primped and prepared for the next step: the partying.  Even my parents went out to party… it seemed like all of Portoviejo was heading out.  There are huge, formal parties with $25 dollar entrances and required invitations.  But, in the end I headed to a friends house who’s parents had decided to throw a party for the exchange students.  After enough dancing and food to kill me, I headed back to the house around 6 am, slipped into my bed, and slept well into the new year. 

La Navidad

Today after French class, I hung out with my friend Emma [a fellow American exchange student] at her house.  As is our tradition, we decided to paint our finger and toenails with the most obscene colors [or color-sparkle combinations] possible.  While we were in the bathroom picking out color combinations, I was admiring the Christmas themed toilet cover.  Not only was it Christmas themed, but it included pompoms, some sequins, and the words “FELIZ NAVIDAD” in bold white letters.  We decided that bringing back a few Christmas themed toilet covers would better represent the Ecuadorian culture than some kind of alpaca sweater or postcard from the Galapagos.  Christmas decorating is a way of life in Ecuador.  EVERYTHING is decked out—Supermarkets, malls, bathrooms, bedrooms—I’ve even seen special silverware sets with snowflakes on them.  To top it off, there’s no Thanksgiving to mark the “socially acceptable” beginning of Christmas decorating.  Early November hits and the world becomes a Christmas wonderland. If you have the money, huge nativity scenes are a must, both inside and outside.  In my house, there were three women who sat in my living room for three days decorating—the tree, banisters, guest bathroom, chairs, mantles, etc.  Emma and I also decided that we miss ugly Christmas trees that are not professionally decorated and aren’t completely color coordinated.  A few of those hideous ornaments that we made at Christmas parties 15 years ago never seemed quite so beautiful.  Anyway… so we finally make it to Christmas Eve.  In Ecuador, they open presents at midnight on Christmas Eve instead of Christmas morning.  At 8:30pm, we are still whizzing around toy stores, searching in the mall, and trying to buy tape and gift bags. We start eating around 11:30.  Pork, chicken, fish, etc… everything is piled onto a giant plate that is set in front of you.  Coke, strawberry soda, and Nestea are passed around the table, seconds are offered, and everyone eats until they’re stuffed.  Next up—presents.  My own gifts were well received, and I was given some lovely ones too, including a giant, stuffed angry bird.  After gifts, we sat and played Jenga [one of my little brother’s presents] until 3 in the morning, and then headed up to bed.  Asi se acabó la navidad.