Week´s recap in pictures

Hi friends!

Airport run!

I thought I would give a small recap of our past week or so with pictures. First, on September 15^th our new In-Country Director arrived in Ecuador. The next few weeks will be filled with orientations and the transition between two directors. We got together with the Duran volunteers to greet her at the airport and provide a warm Rostro welcome. We spent the night with our Arbolito friends, which is always a treat. Chris and I got up early on Saturday morning to make his recipe for banana pancakes for all the vols. The pancakes were a nice reminder of home and eating them at all hours of the day and night on Williams 3 last year!

With the Jesuit novitiates at work

Mike and I have continued to work with the three Jesuit novitiates in our office this month. Unfortunately Thursday is their last day – we have had a lot of fun working with them and getting to know them. Like I mentioned in my last post, we are holding after school tutoring programs in different neighborhoods every day as this month’s project. It has been really great to be out and about in Mount Sinai every single day working and making new friends. In the coming weeks Mike and I will have to work out how or if we will continue with the program. On top of working, the Jesuits have brought a lot of life to the office. Our spare time in the office we passed doing everything from chatting about our distinct cultures, their Jesuit formation process or Wilo giving me salsa dance lessons (which is still definitely a work in progress!).

Any unoccupied time I’ve had in the office I’ve spent reading Poor Economics – A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo. I was really captivated by a presentation given by Duflo at Holy Cross last year and brought the book along with me to Ecuador. It covers varies topics like health, hunger, microcredit, incentives, businesses, aid programs, and more. For me it has been extremely interesting to read while living in Mount Sinai. I witness the statistics given in 3-D form everyday in my daily life and hear similar testimonies as given in the book during casual conversations with neighbors. I’m learning a lot!

One last update from my Hogar de Cristo work – last week I met with the leader and a few women who collaborate with the Hogar de Cristo microcredit office. I’ll be meeting with a larger group of women this week to learn more about the process and how I may be able to accompany them or provide workshops on finance topics that would be helpful.

Dinner with Arbolito

This past weekend we again spent with the Arbolito community. First, Friday was our all Rostro de Cristo day of reflection. After a day of reflection, journaling, and logistics, Megan (our current In-Country Director) kindly made us all a lasagna dinner! We shared a great meal and then spent the rest of the night playing 2 vs. 2 soccer on our little patio. The next day we all woke up early to construct two Hogar de Cristo cane houses together with the 3 Jesuit novitiates out in the campo.

House Build 1

House Build 2 - Completed Home

House Build 3

House Build 4 - With the family

Mount Sinai is filled with these cane homes. They are lifted up on stilts because during the rainy season the flooding, especially for homes near the canal, is treacherous. The homes cost $1000 and the family can pay piece by piece – putting down a $50 down payment and then paying $25 a month for 3 years. Because of the level of poverty in Mount Sinai many homes are donated or given at a reduced rate of about $14 a month. They are simple – the chilly winds pierce through the cane at night and it is just one large room with one divider – but they are extremely popular.

With the (huge!) help of a Hogar employee, 8 of us constructed the Hogar home in exactly 5 hours! We dug the holes to put the poles in, then laid the flooring, then put up the pre-constructed walls, and then finished with a tin roof. When we climbed down after hammering in the last nails the family had already begun to make this house a home. Streamers hung, a table was set up, the little kids were blowing up balloons, and the parents and uncles set up benches. It was a really great day and a unique opportunity to build a relationship with a family whose house we built.

Night with the novitiates

That night Mike, Ana, and I went back with our three Jesuit novitiate friends to spend the afternoon with them. Since we met them they have insisted that we come swim in their pool and spend time with them outside of Hogar. We swam, shared a delicious meal, participated in mass, and then met a few of the other Jesuit residents. On our way home they took a few pit stops to see sights of Guayaquil along the boardwalk.

Yapangacho

The rest of the week has been spent in neighborhood time – literally just hanging out, tutoring, and cooking with our neighbors. One of the greatest ways the women of the community have ministered to us and opened up their lives to us is through their cooking. Most every neighbor asks us how the cooking is going on and if we have moved on from cooking just rice and lentils yet. When all we do is laugh they swoop in like any loving mother would and offer to cook with us. Our most recent cooking lesson was on Yapangacho (sp?): potato pancakes with a peanut butter sauce, fried eggs, salad, rice, and hot dogs. We are slowly but surely learning to cook Ecuadorian.

I’ll end this post with a funny (well now) story about my attempts to slowly let go. I wrote in a previous post about my current focus on embracing this feeling of lack of control in nearly every aspect of life. This week a group of women were in my office working with another employee on an upcoming workshop. Upon finishing they asked me for my help. The women were taking a course on haircutting at Hogar de Cristo and needed heads to practice on. With some hesitation I agreed – how could I say no when 6 women were standing with smiling, pleading faces. We get to the salon across the Hogar property and I learn that these women actually do not know how to cut hair yet. One woman was put in the middle as the example and the “professor” taught how to cut hair as all the women furiously took notes. As you can imagine, a little bit of anxiety rose in me. I never realized the control and importance I placed on my own physical appearance. What came to mind as I sat there for the first few minutes of silence as she began cutting my hair was our reflection during all RdC on simplicity. Simplicity can also be interpreted as letting go – of all those things that prevent us from being fully present to or building honest relationships with ourselves, our neighbors, and our God. So in that moment, I decided to let go of what may happen to my hair and I engaged in conversation with the woman, learning all about her life and her hopes for starting her own salon one day to support her family. It was a difficult and honestly stressful morning, but I did learn something from the experience. And all ended well – the “professor” went around at the end and fixed everybody’s hair. Another interesting day at the office…

Love and miss you all,

Colleen