(usually) Lost in Ecuador

Good morning world. It’s 10:12 Ecuador time, and I have absolutely nothing pressing to do today. Fascinating, am I correct? All I’ve done today is clean the floor, clean my shoes, and get a talking to from my host mom. That’s right. Allison got in a spot of trouble. Well, it wasn’t really so much trouble as it was just an admonishment. I’ve had Jan over to the house hundreds of times (and more so lately because he’s been having problems at his house), but Friday, host mom decided that it simply just wasn’t alright. Oh well. She just told me she didn’t like it, I said I understood, she said she wanted good communication between us, and that was the end of it. No biggie.

Let’s skip back to last Sunday. I said I would go to church, didn’t I? HA. Instead I slept, not that my host mom minded since she was horridly sick. We pretty much hung out for the day, and then randomly around seven o’ clock at night, Josh and Collin show up at my house, telling me they’d been desperately trying to call me. My cell phone had bit the dust, so of course I hadn’t heard anything, but basically, they told me Emily (from Australia lives in Quito) was coming to Portoviejo on Monday and she needed a place to stay for the week. They wanted to know if she could stay here. I looked at them doubtfully, pursed my lips and twisted my hands as the two of them shot puppy eyes. I knew I’d have to ask HM, being that permission from her would be hard obtained, not to mention there was a certain amount of risk involved. Emily didn’t tell Rotary in Quito and definitely not MY Rotary club, so if this crashed on her head, it would be my head as well.

But all I did was nod.

Surprisingly, my host mom said yes quickly, and we were a go. Karen was in on all of this, as she was the ‘contact number’ for Emily’s mom. Somehow…. It seemed like it was all going to go off without a hitch. The next day, I went to the terminal in the afternoon to go pick up Emily. I wandered around a bit drawing attention, then I finally got a phone call from her. After discussion, it was decided that Emily was thoroughly lost. I hadn’t known that there was a smaller terminal in Centro that was sometimes used. Ugh. But I got her down to my house, although she somehow lost her cell phone in a taxi within half an hour of getting into Portoviejo. We went to Luke’s house, hung out there, then back to my house for the night. We made a quick drive to Manta for some money thing with my host parents, then came back to Portoviejo and ate hamburgers before collapsing.

Tuesday was Emily’s first day in my school, and no surprise – She loved it. She said she has no exchange kiddies in her school, so having 11 of us all in one place must’ve been quite the experience. I got not one question from any teacher or inspector; they’re so used to us just showing up with random people they don’t even bother to ask anymore. It was on Tuesday night that we got our little shock… Emily’s mom called Karen’s cell to tell Emily to call her (since Emily lost her cell phone) so we did. Emily’s host mom had talked to the Quito Rotary about Emily going to Portoviejo… OOPS. Quito didn’t have the same reaction as Fernando, thank God; they seem to be rather chill about the entire thing, but they moved Emily’s return date up to Thursday. They actually wanted her to take a plane back to Quito, but that was definitely out of the question.

Wednesday was another tricky day. I have Rotary every Wednesday of course, but Emily couldn’t go to the Rotary meeting with me. So she just stayed with a couple of the boys and they went out together and I picked her up after the Rotary meeting. The district trip is approaching frighteningly fast. I see my Dad and Judy next Wednesday, and then… Wow. Less than a week and it’s the last trip, and then people begin to leave. Time’s like liquid. Fernando didn’t show last week, so I didn’t get to ask him about going to Guayaquil with Dad and Judy a day earlier. Looks like the exchange kiddies go down on the 28^th to Guayaquil, but I want to stay the night there with my parental units on the 27^th. I’ll be going to the beach on Thursday (probably Crucita. I wish it was Manta. Manta is better.) with Dad and Judy; depending if the host parents decide to come along I might be able to tow a couple of the exchange kiddies with me if we go by bus, which is so much cheaper anyways. I hope they let me alone so we can go to Manta.

Thursday, we got Emily all packed off to Quito, and we got our uniforms for the school Olympics. Did I mention? No? We have no school all next week, just sports playing! In other words, I get to go be athletic for the entire week in volleyball and basketball. And for the girls we’re playing six on six volleyball. I will totally rule at this. But anyways, we bought new uniforms for it at sixteen bucks a pop, but I got cheated on my shirt. They gave me one two sizes too small and with my name spelled as ‘Alisson’ even though I’d given the lady a piece of paper with my name on it. Fail. So she took it back and we’re hoping I get a good one on Monday. The boys uniforms look so much nicer than ours… I’m jealous. We had a ‘desfile’, or parade on Thursday night to start it all off. It was also a mini modeling show, and we had Monika be the model for our class. She looked quite stunning, but she got second place and was disappointed. I have lots of pictures to post up on Facebook; I think I’ll do that today.

Friday I went to go watch Jan and Oliver do the track and field events. I threw the shot put too because I could, and I’m still pretty good at it. Poor Oliver did the distance run and was dying by the end of it, and Jan did long jump (I got some funny pictures of that too). Sports for me start on Monday, and I’m excited for it! Tomorrow it just looks like another hang out day, although I have a couple of movies to watch, so that might help it roll along.

Love you all lots and lots, and I can’t wait to see you (Dad & Judy)!

Next blog update = ??? I doubt I’ll be able to get on during the trip, so it’ll probably be after the trip in another SUPER BLOG post which is a million pages along. We’ll see.

Also I LOVE EMILY SORG AWESOME PACKAGE

It’s actually Sunday here, but let’s say it’s Saturday. It’s Saturday in Washington, anyways. I’m writing very late at night, but I lay down in bed and the ‘blog blog blog’ instinct just nagged at me insistently so I figured I should just get it over with. Not that it’s a task or I have anything pressing to discuss, but here I am in any case.

So I went to the U.S. of A.

YEAHHHHH BABY

People ask me, “How was your trip?” and I just make some incoherent noises at them. It was one of the strangest and most amazing weeks of my life. I’m not going to go through and describe it all, since this is my Ecuador blog, but impact-wise, it’s been odd. It seems as though someone up there was looking out for me traveling-wise, since whenever I had a problem or just needed someone since I was having a mini freak out, someone was always there to help me out or point me in the right direction. Thank YOU. I was an emotional wreak; nervous and overjoyed and creeped out and I could cry at the drop of a hat. I missed the exchange students, but being in Washington with my Mom and Dad and then Sissy’s wedding (on a side note my sister was pretty much the most beautiful bride I had ever seen, and Brent GREW MORE and is now tall, that silly boy) and going back to school… Only one person told me I was ‘different’, Mr. Nedved (my scripture teacher from last year) and it was after perhaps a minute of talking to me. It didn’t really sink in for me until I got to Dad’s house and I went down to the dock for an hour, and I put my feet in the water, even though it was frigging FREEZING out there, and I looked around and thought to myself, “This place doesn’t change but I have and will.” Creepy, am I right? But it was just… Oh. I have no words, which is unusual for me, as most of you know. I don’t feel the same. It’s not something tangible, and most people can’t tell, but sometimes I wonder if I know myself any more – Or if I ever knew myself to begin with and now I do know and I’m just getting used to the idea. But moving right along.

I stayed the night at River’s house when I got back, and I got up around noon since I was jet lagged. We got her ear pierced real quick, the tough chickie, and then it was off to the Manta Express to take a bus-car thing back to Portoviejo. I got back here around 6:00 in the afternoon on Thursday, and it didn’t feel real. I felt like I hadn’t left at all although I knew I had. My room’s been rearranged a bit, ugh, hate it when they do that when I go away on a trip, but everything’s the same. The maid they hired got fired (THAT RHYMES) because some things were going missing, but Karen expects that we shall hire a new lady sometime this next week. Going to school on Friday? THAT was fun. Monika unfortunately got dengue, a nasty flu passed around by mosquitoes, so I didn’t get to see her, but the look of joy on Laura’s face when I handed her a 24 oz. Rockstar was hilarious and oh-so-worth it. We’ve been having Twinkie Time for the Europeans, who have never had Twinkies before, and people were glad to see me. We walked home, and Friday night we went out to Bono (the bar) to celebrate a bit, aka more Twinkie time. Got home and collapsed into bed, and woke up the next morning to my cell phone after having a lovely dream.

Now, we have an English project that includes making a short video in English, but I wasn’t planning on going to help them in the morning considering I wasn’t in any of the groups. I got a call from Jan saying that he was going to be late since his mom had disappeared for a bit, and after calling around it was discovered that none of us have the phone numbers of my classmates, so I tiredly offered to go tell them he’d be late, which involved me crawling out of bed. Aren’t I a good friend? But I got roped into filming and narrating for the group, so when Jan finally DID show up, I’d taken his spot. I’m an excellent friend. It was pretty funny, since it included cross dressing and HORRID English, so we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, and then I headed back home to do some cleaning and lunch eating.

I went out again tonight, since it was Lukas Bauer’s birthday barbeque. Yes, I did hit him with the belt. I got him goooooood. But Josh did better – Poor Lukas actually got a small cut! Florian hit him pretty hard too, so us girls took pity on him at the end of his sixteen whippings and tapped him with the belts. It was a small party, perhaps 13 of us, and therefore more relaxed, so we didn’t have to do too much, just hang out. Tomorrow (today) I head to church bright and early. Exciting, I know. I’m going to bed so early tomorrow night… I’m actually headed to bed now.  I know this is a bit of a short post, but again, skipping USA stuff and including exhaustion, I’ve got rights.

I love all of you guys out there, and July 11^th is my leave date, so it’ll be quick.

Ciao for now, mis amores. Keep in touch. Your next update is next week on Saturday, and the weeks go quickly from now on… Four weekends my two best friends leave, two and people begin to disappear.

(I love you Mom)

(I love you Dad)

(I love my friends & family)

(…I LOVE MY LIFE)

Wait. It’s Saturday morning. Something must be up… Since I’m actually writing my blog on time. Well, just take it as it rolls, guys. My room is nice and cold at the moment, due to air conditioning, but something smells burnt, which sometimes happens when I use the AC. Hmm. I hope it’s not the AC unit as I fear.

Last Tuesday (I wrote my last blog on Monday, remember?) we skipped out on the second half of school to go watch Marvin and Leslie play tennis in the Federacion Deportiva, which is right next to school and a short walk. It seems like us exchange students simply do not have the attention span to sit still for an entire school day…. I don’t think we went to an entire day of school all week. Anyways, we went to a movie in the afternoon (Leslie, Monika and I that is) called ‘La Fuente de Amor’ in Spanish and ‘When in Rome’ in English. Not so bad for one day, eh?

Wednesday, Jan and his sister showed up for school after having disappeared to Quito for four days. Caroline (that’s his sister) said that she was leaving the next day, so Allison had a bright idea: Let’s go to Manta! Of course, you’re supposed to tell Rotary about all trips three weeks in advance, you have to have parental supervision, etc. etc., but the three of us just spontaneously took the bus down to Manta for the afternoon. We met up with Collin, Ashley, and Kristina from Manta, and got some AMAZING ice cream that they dip in chocolate. Oh my God, it was amazinggggg. That night we had a suspiciously short Rotary meeting which I remember almost nothing of. Fernando told me I needed confirmation from Rafael Ramirez for my US trip, and I’ve been worriedly emailing the guy ever since and I’m about to email Fernand- SPEAK OF THE DEVIL JUST GOT MY CONFIRMATION EMAIL!

School on Thursday was tough cookies. Irritable and frustrated, Monika and I finally got out of school and went to my house to just rest for a bit in the air conditioning. I don’t know whose mood was worse. Didn’t do much that day – I watched some CSI? My journal entries are so terribly short, reflecting how much I do in a day. My days feel long and drawn out, but it’s not like many events occur in a day to day basis. It’s just so gosh darn hot around here.

Friday was just an amazing day. Again, at Allison’s recommendation (aren’t I the delinquent?) we’d had a half planned/half spontaneous trip to Manta which involved us leaving at 7:30 in the morning on a bus to Manta. No, I did not go to school. No, all hell did not break loose. The six of us (names withheld for safety purposes) had a nice, air conditioned bus and then we went straight to Murcialago Beach (Bat Beach) for some swimming. I didn’t go swimming, being designated stuff watcher with two others, but it turned out sunny, thank goodness, and we had a great time. After that we went to Collin and Ashley’s school to meet up with them, and MANNN do they have a nice school! It’s so clean and big and wow… I didn’t know schools like that existed in Manabi! We went to the Manta shopping after that and ate lunch before going to see Clash of the Titans in 3D and then heading back home on the bus. Excellent day indeed.

I’m heading over to eat lunch at a friend’s house today, and then I guess it’s just a sleep day. Tomorrow I plan on getting all my things organized for my trip, and then I just have to survive Monday/Tuesday and I leave Wednesday morning to the US of A! To say ‘I’m excited’ would be a gross understatement, I do believe.

Ciao for now!

Afternote I. I got a message from my Dad on MSN – I’m going on a nationally syndicate radio show for an HOUR (www.therothshow.com). Can you believe it? Because wow I CAN’T. What is the lady going to talk to me about for an hour?! But I’m excited!

Afternote II. Short blog entry again?

Afternote III. 4 days, 99 hours, 5964 minutes, 357888 seconds! <3