This is what a lady asked me while I was standing in line at the Quito airport for my boarding pass. I think she was doing some sort of tourism survey. She asked me my nationality, age, and if I spoke spanish well. I told her I did and she still tried to refrase some questions in english for me. How cute. She asked what I had done here, and it felt like I had to give my experience in a nutshell. Most nutshells don't involve talk about localism and imperialism, btu I couldn't resist. She asked me what I like the most, and immediately I thought of how warm people are here. I told her it's just easier to smile at strangers and to feel la "alegría latina". I'll miss that. She asked me what I liked the least, and the first thing I thought of was the fact that there's no toilet paper anywhere. I wasn't used to the fact that you had to carry your own to most places, even to some restaurants. The good definitely outweighs the inconvenient, though.
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| Some of us after Keneshia's hip hop lesson :) |
Other things I'll miss: Hearing salsa in the street, in cabs, in stores, etc. I'll miss the fresh fruit juice that I still drink with eyes wide open after tasting the freshness. I'll miss hearing spanish being spoken at the dinner table and outside my room. I'll miss those kisses on the cheek. I don't know if I'll miss people telling me "provecho" every time they see me eating something, but we'll see. Also, I'll never forget those quirky food melanges: Yoghurt and pan de yuca, bananas and cheese pancakes, oatmeal drink, spaghetti with rice (for the die hard carb fans), and platanos mixed into EVERYTHING.
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| @ The film presentation |
Today I met with Ale and Jorge literally just before leaving for the airport so that they could help me organize my thoughts about doing a Tanner presentation at Wellesley in the Fall about the program. This program was not what I thought it would be. Just with any service project, I didn't feel useful at times and felt as if I weren't really making a difference. I knew that I would not appreciate and learn more from my experiences until I would actually leave Bahía. Now I have learned the importance of being a role model and just being there for others. After saying goodbye to Crystal at 4 am on Saturday, I couldn't go back to sleep because my mind was overflowing with thoughts from the project. After two hours I decided to write them down and the thoughts flowed into a list of topics I wanted to cover in my presentation. I'm glad I'm writing them down now and that I got feedback from Ale and Jorge before I left because my ideas are fresh in my mind right now. Some topics jumped right out at me, such as socioeconomic class and opportunities. Others were harder to talk about, such as gender relations, because they weren't as prominent. The kids in the workshop got along, and the girls shared leadership roles with the boys. I sensed mutual respect, which is awesome.
Right now I'm sitting in the terminal waiting for my flight to Lima, Peru which connects to L.A. then Seattle. I'm getting a haircut right after I land. I'll stop writing now because there are toddlers having a wrestling match right behind me so ciao for now!
Char
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