By "arrival," I of course do not mean my own. Given that I have been here for nearly a month now (wow?! haha, or en espanol, jaja). On Friday when I got home from school, Olimpia, my host mom, told me that Blanca had gone into Cayambe, to the hospital, that morning. For the baby. Lunch was quite frantic, as one would expect, as Olimpia moved (probably as fast as I´ve ever seen her move) around the house getting things ready so that she could get to the hospital to be with Blanca. That afternoon I was...freaking out, you could say. I wasn´t expecting the birth to be "so soon" I guess. Really though, by appearances, I knew it could´ve been anytime. I went walking to the other town that afternoon to sort of "cool down" and see if Nick (the other male Intercordian in Ecuador, who also goes to King´s) was around. I guess I talked about his host family last time. He wasn´t there at first, so I walked around town a bit. When I came back, about 10 minutes later, I saw a truck loaded with grain outside the house and a bunch of people unloading. It had been raining for a few hours by this point, and they were all quite soaked. They had come from where we were harvesting grain a couple weeks ago, with it now processed into bags. About 100 pounds each. They weighed them that day. I guess they ended up loading and unloading the truck a few times (one of which was because they got stuck fording the river!). Pretty tough work. And with the rain, a pretty miserable situation. There was quite a bit of joking and fooling around when I saw them though, which Nick said had been carrying on the whole time. Which is something neat to see. Grumbling could still be detected in Spanish, I think. We ended up playing Monopoly in their kitchen (where the fire is) with his brothers and another neighbourhood kid who had been working. The rest of the family was eating, which meant I was offered food as well, so I had a second lunch. I´ll be a hobbit yet. Never expected to play Monopoly though. Not in a building made of dirt, right next to a fire. Anyway, Blanca and her little girl arrived home Saturday afternoon and seem to be doing well. Though, Blanca has mostly been in her room, with the baby, since getting home. I have not seen much of either of them.
This Saturday is my niece´s (though, for some reason I have been calling her my cousin.....) first communion. She is quite excited for it. The past few Saturdays she has been working through her little prep book, going to her class, and seems to know her stuff. I´m not sure what all is in store for this. Celebrationwise, and otherwise. A lot of that having to do with the fact that she lives with us, at her Grandmother and Grandfather´s house. Her mom has been in twice, in the time I´ve been here, for a couple hours each time. I´ve never seen her dad. Or her brother. Maribel, told me that she doesn´t actually know where any of them live. One of the hardest things I´ve heard so far. Basically, I don´t know know what that means with regard to her parents showing up. I hope they do. But, at the same time, the two times Maribel´s mom has been at the house, have been the most tense. So...
The other aspect, which I´ve hinted at, is that Olimpia and Luis, my host parents, (Maribel´s grandparents), are not Catholic, but are Pentecostal. I think, though, that there is an acceptance of each other in this (which is good, I think...I´m not much of a fan of the division that seems to be there...). I´m getting this idea basically from the fact that Maribel came with us to church when we went. And that she took part in it. That might not mean a whole lot, but maybe. We were at church that day for about four hours anyway. We spent the first 40 minutes praying, while people arrived and began praying as well. A few prayed at the front and some of them were praying into microphones. There was a certain ambiance because of this, as well as the others that prayed out loud. I wish I could have understood what they were saying, because there is definitely an intensity to how they are saying what they are saying. An urgency, maybe. I had that same wish more times as well, of course. After individual prayer, one of the ladies led a song, then read some scripture, then prayed, then more song, more prayer, more song. Basically a cycle back and forth of the two. After her, the young pastor got up and did much of the same, though he had a guitar as well. I think he had more of a sermon type thing as well. Hard to tell. After him, the older pastor did the same. They all used different passages of scripture though. After this, there was anointing, I think. They filled some...what looked like shot glasses, with a yellow liquid, which was oil or perfume. People came up in groups and were prayed over, and then oil was put on their foreheads, and sometimes hands as well. This happened for awhile, and I wasn´t really sure what was happening. Or more, why it was happening. The reason some went up sometimes and not others, and so on. After that though, was a final bit of song and prayer and then we all sort of shook hands and went out. Kind of different. Kind of the same.
My day at school usually starts around 730, where the kids are rounded up and do various exercises/marching and hear announcements. Class is supposed to start at 8, but usually starts earlier. Each class is about an hour long, with four classes a day. Grade 1s, Grade 2´s and 3´s, Grade 4´s and 5´s, and grade 6´s and 7´s. The best behaved are the grade 2/3 class and the 6/7 class. The others are...hit and miss, haha. So far I´ve taught the family, some verbs, the body, question words, greetings, and colours. With the upper grades I´ve been able to get into writing questions on the board and getting them to come up with answers. For example, What colour is a banana? A banana is yellow. This is...kind of exciting. Basically, they are actually learning something. Compared with what others have said about their classes, this is actually a significant thing. They feel they aren´t learning anyway. I´ve noticed though, I am not really the cool teacher I used to think (as a kid) I´d be. I often take away candy from the kids (before 8, even) and things like that. But they learn. They don´t seem very surprised anyway. Mostly the problem is, its tough to repeat when you have stuff in your mouth. Especially tough, when the letters sound different! There is a break at 10 for half an hour for "recreo". Then two more hours and I am finished at 1230. School actually ends at that time, with sometimes more time for some students for music. They seem to be learning a traditional song which is quite common here. Perhaps, it is the song. I like it quite a bit, anyway. I heard a ridiculously long version that day I was at the mother´s day celebration at the all girls school. There was a dance to it there, which went on for about 10 minutes. They faded it out. It didn´t resolve. I was a bit tortured for the rest of the day because of that. Or maybe it was sitting four hours in the sun (Nana, Mom, unread this sentence).
Yesterday, as well, was the Dia Del Ninos, (Children´s Day, I guess) so I played bingo with the first class. Afterwhich we played a bunch of games outside. Feedbag races, some other types of races, musical chairs, and so on. Good fun. They made me lead the first group to go at musical chairs, grade 1s to 3...in dance. Probably there is a video of it. There was much laughter. Lots of fun. I feel like I dreamt this a couple years ago, actually. A school in the mountains with me at it. Really weird feeling. Maybe I´ve mentioned this dream to someone before?...Anyway, we ended the day with a "feast" for the kids, which was nice. Then they went and got lunch from the kitchen. Haha, they eat a lot. So, so far, school is going good. I need more paper though, and have come into Cayambe to buy more, so I am headed to get some now. Please pray about these things I´ve mentioned above. Its needed. Gracias.
Jordan
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