Strange weather here too

I hope this finds you well and happy. Lucy and I have been reading news of home in Wisconsin where the weather has been challenging to say the least (baseball-sized hail and tornadoes). One friend of ours lost her barn. Here we have cold rain 4 or 5 times a day and it has been this way for the last two weeks. The sun rarely comes out and lots of crops are being lost to fungus and blight.

Despite the challenging weather, we're fine. Not to say there are no ups and downs but for the most part we feel we have adjusted. I think the most difficult adjustments are behind us. We have stayed busy with a number of things besides keeping house. Lots of families are trying to build houses when the weather cooperates. We have been helping Jose (notice Lucy with the women helping prepare concrete mix and Jose with his father, Feliciano in the pictures above). We have also been working on a map of the world which the community is now excited about. The last couple of days many have been painting the many countries of the world and asking endless questions (another pic above). The picture of the children is in Sasapud where we just had the luck of connecting with a group of women who want us to lead a workshop on yogurt making. I say luck because because of auspicious coincendences that led a man to be present who helped translate to Spanish for us as these women mostly speak Kichwa.

The last picture is of one of the ¨hungry ghost¨dogs that come by regularly to see if we have any food to share----which we usually do. My heart always goes out to these beings who are lacking in essential nourishment and of course, love.

my this find you well nourished in all that is essential.

Craig

alli tuta May 9, 2008

Hi folks! Things are looking up for us right now. Lucy and I are both healthy and we have moved into a more comfortable house. The first picture is of our house above the foundation "Inti Nan" from across the river. The second one shows Lucy on the steps we have to climb to get up to our home. I included a typical street scene and a couple of the vistas as we look down the valley from San Bernardo (at 10,700 feet) towards the town of Llin Llin. I'll post some people shots tomorrow. We are heading out to eat now here in Riobamba where we are shopping for household goods and a good matress. Hasta pronto.

Craig

First Week On Site

May 1st
Lucy and I are in Riobamba doing some shopping and staying in a hostel where we have a comfortable bed and hot shower. Our fears about the difficulty of life at our site were realized staying there for the first week. San Bernardo is at an elevation of 10,700 feet and our other site, Sasapud is at (por lo menos) 11,000 feet. It is cold and rainy and we have to trudge up and down muddy paths every time we leave our room. Our room is cold and damp---too cold to sit and read. We do warm up in bed with three heavy wool blankets on us. We eat in a primitive outside kitchen where the family likes to cook with a wood fire which is very smoky. The smoke seems to have aggravated a cold I had so I am now hacking and coughing continously. We had headaches at first due to the altitude but those have stopped. We have no cell phone coverage unless we hike up the hill 20 minutes.
That's the bad news.....the good is that the people are wonderful. They seem to take all the adversity in stride. They are always smiling and laughing and carry themselves with dignity. They remind me a lot of the Mayans in Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala. While some do speak Spanish, they prefer to speak Kichwa which means Lucy and I need to learn much more. Poco a poco. Last Sunday we attended one of the many evangelical Christian churches in the area. We were introduced up front and then shook hands with the over one hundred people in attendance. Unlike service in the U.S., the sermon was short with many different group singing their hymns in Kichwa (two hours total). We were warned not to be to open about our religious persuasion (Buddhism) as they would probably shun us. We decided to be honest about who we are, emphasizing we are from a Christian background of course! Turns out that people have been very accepting of us, even though one of the first questions they ask is if we are ¨evangelicos¨. I think being an older married couple is a big plus. We went up to Sasapud a couple of days ago and were introduced in a big meeting of about 60 people. People seem freindly and genuinely interested in us.
So now we are trying to change our housing situation. We are hoping to rent a two room place that get more sun where we can cook with gas. We are looking at spending good money on a mattress that won´t leave us with a backache. We haven´t decided on a refrigerator, partly because they are almost nonexistent in San Bernardo, and partly because it is so coool we are not sure we need one.
I confess to getting a little excited about all the dairy activity in our region. There are cows grazing everywhere, along with sheep, burros, and pigs. There are many small cheese factories. I'm already thinking of ways they might improve their dairy-centered agriculture. One big problem is there is no rain in the summer and all the abundant pastures dry up. Some sort of way to store silage would make sense. Of course they have very little money (if any) to invest. There's too much rain to think about drying hay. The climate is perfect for small grains with lots of barley and oats being grown. Alfalfa does well here too. Rotational grazing would definitely enhance their milk production as well as help to prevent soil erosion which is a tremendous problem. So much to do, it´s hard to know where to start.
First we are just going to get to know our two communities....sorry no pics this time but we´ll put some more on soon so you can see that despite the poverty, it is very scenic where we are. Thanks to those who have commented here on the blog. As I sit here there is a big parade going by with lots of drums and civic groups chanting slogans....never a shortage of animo here in Ecuador....My you be happy and peaceful.......
Craig

It's official---now we are Peace Corps Volunteers

April 23 Lucy and I were sworn in as volunteers at the Ambassador's residence last week. It was an uplifted atmosphere with everyone dressed up. There were some terrific speeches and one of the volunteers even composed a song for the occasion. Lucy had to wear sunglasses because her eye was very red from a broken capillary. I wore them too in solidarity. The view from the residence was astounding with a valley leading out to Volcan Cayambe. This was the first day in weeks that the sun was shining and it wasn't raining. After we swore allegiance to our country and to the values Peace Corps stands for, we were lucky enough to receive a tour of the Ambassador's residence from the Ambassador's husband. Lucy and I and a couple of other volunteers are meeting with the ambassador near our site in a few weeks. The ambassador is retiring soon and is being replaced by another woman. There's a photo here of me with our beautiful language teachers.....Cisa, Teresa, Carmen, Alexandra, and Silvana. Chevere!

Presently we're studying Kichwa with Jose who you will see in later photos. Lucy's eye is looking better so we are going out to our site to live at the end of this week. We are feeling both anxiousness and anticipation for our life in San Bernardo/Sasapud. It will be a challenge to live there we know, but we also know the people are resilient and generous. We'll keep you updated.

kaya kama,

Craig

Photos from Chimborazo.

Here we are with our Agriculture Program director. The next photos in order are: vicuna (ecuatorian deer that live in the highland paramo), an alpaca or is it a llama?, two photos from a cacao processing plant.



They gave us a free sample of chocolate (pasta de cacao) and we used it to make no-bake chocolate cookies for our host family in Tabacundo. Yumm
We leave for Quito to swear in on the 16th. Then we will be in Quito for one more week of Kichwa language training. On the 24th we leave to live in San Bernardo, which will be our site' south of Riobamba for the next 2 years.
Thanks for your comments. We look forward to more. Overall we are very happy but at times feel lonely for all of you.

April 1-4 training trip Rio Bamba

Craig and I are in Rio Bamba this week with 10 other "aspirantes". We are staying in a nice hotel and during the day we go out to various agricultural sites or farms and learn ag practices. On Monday we went to one of Craig and my sitios, San Bernardo. It is 1 and a half hours from Rio Bamba.
It´s beautiful, very rural, very little traffic and the air is clean. The things that are worrying us a bit are the steep slopes for farming. They are hardworking people and our counterpart is a great hardworking go getter Kichwa man, well respected in the community and also he´s by Kichwa teacher. The paths going up to the little fields were steep and slippery cuz it had rained that morning. It was challenging getting up and down and fortunately we paused often to catch our breath.So that is one worry, getting up and down those slopes without falling !!
The first few months we are supposed to live with the family of our counterpart. I didnñ´t go in the house but it looks kind of on the small side. We´ll see how that goes. I am a bit tired of living with a family but I´m sure it will help us integrate and all that. So then we get our own house. The young guy we are repalacing livied in a shack and he climbed a ladder to get to it and his bathroom was down the ladder in the community building below.
We will not be living there thank goodness. There is a house (very run down) that our counterpart has bought with the idea of fixing it up for us to live in and for his family to use somehow in the futur5e someday. It looks very rundown to me. Another possibility is that there is a clinic in the town with a few rooms to rent and I heard that that is rather new and nice but we didn´t have time to go and see it. There aren´t any stores or tiendas in the town so we will have to walk 1/2 hour or take a bus to Rio Bamba to buy things. The former volunteer went to Rio Bamba almost every week. So I guess the site looks like it will take some time to get used to. We certainly won´t be in the most comfortable site.
The people seemed very friendly and warm. On a sad note, a 13 yr old boy from the community was hit by a truck on the highway (out of San Bernardo 45 min.) I´m not sure what he was doing out on that highway . He was with a friend. So now the whole community is mourning cuz he died.
They just got hooked up to internet in that community and the P.C. volunteer before us and his sister in the U.S. have helped the people have a web site so see if you can find it on line. It would be something like www.sanbernardo.com or maybe you need to say ecuador too. I´ve got to go. We are all going out to dinner somewhere. RioBamba is great. Lots of places to eat, some museums, great markets and shops and yes there is a touristy, scenic train where people sometime sit on the roof. Chimborazo mountain is in site when the clouds go away and it is awesome!!!! Love, Lucy

March 20, 2008 Semana Santa

Lucy and I finally got an afternoon off from training. Last weekend we went to visit our former exchange student, Miguel, and his family in Ambato. We had a great time and were welcomed as family. On the way back from Quito Lucy had her backpack slashed on the bus (nothing taken as we took precaution not to take many valuables with us). This week we went with our fellow aspirantes to a volcanic lagoon about an hour north of here and hiked for nine miles around it at an altitude of over 10,000 feet. It was probably the most beautiful lake I've ever seen. Now everyone is preparing for Easter. The special food is already being served. Tomorrow will be a grand procession imitating the coming of Jesus into Jerusalem on a donkey and being adored by the people before he is executed. We heard quite the sermon on this (last week outside of Ambato) from a priest who is a friend of Miguel's family.
Saturday we head to Puerto Quito for more training at a finca over there. I'll try to load some pictures of the vistas from the house we are living in here in Tabacundo. The snow-covered volcano is Cayambe and the equator runs thru it. There are also pics of me with Miguel and another of Lucy and Miguel's brother and mother. Tenga una linda fin de semana.
Craig