Session 2 Has Begun

On Saturday we said goodbye to our Session 1 summer vols (miss you all already!) and got to work cleaning the house and grocery shopping to get ready for Session 2. Luckily for us, one of the summer vols, Amanda, decided to stay for both sessions which is going to be a huge help. Amanda first came to the Manna House in March on a UGA Spring Break trip. She fell in love with the kids in the library, and the adults in Charlie's English class, so she is back again. It has been really nice for us having Amanda here, first of all because we love her, and second of all because she makes a great leader for the group. You can read her final blog post from Session 1 and her advice for the Session 2 vols here.

So most of Session 2 arrived Sunday evening, and spent the day on Monday touring Quito and getting adjusted to the altitude. One of the vols had some trouble with flights and will be arriving on Wednesday. The girls are excited to be here and get involved in the programs. You can read about their experience first hand following the Session 2 blog here. 

A big thank you to Molly, Joanna, Tucker, Brooke, Suzie and Amanda for all of your help during the past month and welcome to Ecuador Session 2!

And the Race is on!

When we first had the idea to put on a race in Rumiloma back in January, we had literally no idea what we were getting ourselves into. We mentioned the idea at our women’s exercise party and found some definite interest in the community. We set the original date (for March) and then started doing our research and talking to people with more experience in race planning. We quickly realized we were in over our heads, and if we wanted the race to be a success we would need a lot more time. So we moved the date to June to give ourselves some time to plan and organize. Well, now its June and too much time turned into no time at all before we knew it. So the race is on to finish everything we need to do and get ready for the big event on Saturday, June 23^rd.

Ecuador seems to be in a race craze right now, and we wanted to join in. Our idea is to bring a race to the people in Rumiloma, promote exercise and a healthy lifestyle, and of course introduce more people to our centro. The majority of us in the Manna house are passionate about running, and we want to be able to share this with our community.

The entire process has been a lot of work, and we hope to see it all pay off with a successful event. We have spent the last few months writing lots of letters, talking to the transit police to close the roads and the Red Cross to ensure the safety of our participants. We have written to various companies all over the valley to try and find sponsors to help out with the race costs. We have been turned down by some and helped out generously by others. We have definitely learned the value of connections during this process. Something that I love about living here in the valley is the power of the word vecino. Our neighbor Caesar has been indispensable in the process of finding sponsors, walking me around Sangolqui and asking businesses to do us a favorcito and help out with the race. We have also been able to reignite our partnership with EPV, the cooperativa next door to the centro (our library vecinos), and they are helping us out a ton with event promotion and inscriptions. A friend of ours, Nolo, hooked us up with a friend of his in Powerade, who much to our surprise agreed to sponsor our race! We were amazed that they were willing to support our small race in a small barrio in the valley, but again, there is the power of connections. We opened inscriptions yesterday with our first runner, one of our other neighbors, the president of our barrio in Sangolqui. We are extremely anxious and excited to see how the race turns out, I will be posting more updates as the date approaches!

Teen Center Party

We have been talking for a while now about having a party in the teen center to boost attendance and just to try something new. We have had a few parties in the library this year, but never one just for teens. Taking advantage of the extra chaperones we have with the summer vols around, we threw a party for teens (12 and older) last night. We advertised the party at last week’s movie night, in the library, and at Chaupitena, the high school where Emily and Taylor teach nutrition classes. We weren’t sure what to expect having never done this before, but the party was a great success. The teen center filled up early with kids playing ping-pong and videogames, and fighting over what music to play on my ipod. As we hoped would happen, the teens mainly entertained one another, flirting, chasing each other around and trying their hands at break dancing. They all enjoyed the frozen pizza and cachitos and apart from a few spilt sodas, there was no permanent damage done. Everyone seemed to have a good time, and we are hoping to see a few new regulars in the teen center now.

Yesterday also happened to be a special day in Ecuador, el día del niño (Kid’s day). Special programs were held in schools, and we put the summer vols on planning some fun activities for our kids in the library. Molly and Amanda baked cakes, and took all the kids out to the cancha to play soccer after art class. With all the sugar and added excitement yesterday was an extra crazy day in the centro, but the time flew by.

 Summer Vols Amanda and Molly passing out refreshments

Kevin and his Cachitos 

Chaupitena teens playing cards

A Spanish Tradition

   In an effort to provide our first group of summer volunteers with cultural experiences and a more complete picture of Ecuador, this past weekend several of our volunteers had the chance to witness a bullfight, a tradition that has been preserved, with some changes, from Ecuador’s days as a Spanish colony. 

Matadores and picadores don costumes reminiscent of colonial Spain

 We were much happier to be watching than participating

   The Andean region of Ecuador is in fact the home of some of the most highly sought-after bulls exported for bullfights in Spain and elsewhere.  However, the bullfight we witnessed took place in a humble location near our home in Sangolquí, and featured both locally raised bulls and bullfighters (matadores).  

One of our vols, Joanna, taking in the scene.

Reduce Reuse Recycle!

So we’ve been looking for a while now for the best way to get rid of all the extra plastic bottles we had lying around the library from previous art and recycling projects. Recycling facilities are few and far between in Ecuador, but we couldn’t bear to throw them away, especially when we are trying to set an example for the kids in the library. A friend of ours informed us recently that there is actually a facility in Selva Alegre (not far from our house in Sangolqui!) where we could recycle all the extra bottles. After Nicole checked the place out, we decided to make a project out of it, asking kids in the library to bring in bottles off the street until we had enough to fill up our neighbor Caesar’s pick-up truck. Knowing that kids will do anything for a funda de caramelos  we offered them an undeniable incentive: a bag of candy in exchange for a bag of bottles . Nicole took the lead on this one, giving me time to ease my group of summer vols into life in Sangolqui and experience all of our programs. Her and Caesar took an entire truck-full of bottles to the recycling facility on Saturday and even more exciting news- we can continue to have recycling in the library and at home! It was painful for us when we first moved in to see how many recyclables get thrown away here, and how much trash builds up in the streets. It was even more painful to see how quickly we got used to trashing our own plastic and glass containers. We are thrilled to be taking a small step in the right direction, and trying our best to educate the kids in the library on the importance of recycling and reusing materials whenever possible.

In other news: Watkins and I traveled to Baños with the summer vols this past weekend. Check out pictures from the trip and  read about Session 1’s experiences first hand here!