ringing true

I've just about hit the one week marker in Ecuador with my Study Abroad program jazz. After stalking this chica a bit... what i've been thinking deep down inside for the past week was confirmed a little bit more.

I had an amazing experience in Guatemala. Not going to lie. But i was reminded after my first day in Quito, not to try and recreate my experience i had this summer- cause it won't work.

For this reason, i have tried this week to as little as possible compare this week to the awesomeness of my summer.... trying not to compare Gaute with Quito....trying not to compare study abroad with AIESEC. Well, that is very hard to do when they are so drastically different.

I was greeted in Guate with a group of Guatemalans and was taken out straight from the airport. I then went the next day to a national @ conference and had at least 30 phone numbers in my phone of guatemalans within 72 hours. I know i've already said all this...but i say it again because this is really how it was the rest of the summer....and by the looks of it, it was the trend of many other badgers this summer too. Alone figuring everything out..but not, we had a network like woooah.

Now i'm in Ecuador. I started orienation at school on monday with 250 other gringos. Okay fine. at least reall school will start on Wednesday and there will be locals to meet so i can figure out where to go in this city. Hmmm. Well school started on Wednesday alright.

My classes are filled with foreigners who don't speak spanish to you. I even saw a girl next to me taking notes in english in our Spanish taught History class of Colonialism in Latin America....hmm. My 'laguna beach' campus is full of small groups of either americans chatting amongst themselves or groups of ecuadorians in small groups talking to themselves. I found my self idle for a little over an hour between classes with no clue on what to do. I walked around campus for a bit, not sure on who to try and make friends with... and not sure how to. On a camopus with no sports teams (except if you take a class ...i'm in yoga by the way, too cool) to join or go watch, and no clubs to join. I randomly sat down in an open patio area to eat a sandwich and made a comment about the weather to an ecuadorian. No dice.

In my classes I try to find the 3 or 4 ecuadorians and sit by them and ask them questions or make random comments... but my curiosity or blatant efforts to make conversation have been done in vain. With lack of people talk to, I joined a group of americans for lunch. Where we had burgers across the street with 3 other tables of americans....

Tomorrow I'm going with a group of 20 americans to a market 2.5 hours away. Frankly i'm pretty excited to see some of Ecuador finally and get back into the swing of weekend getaways, but its weird to not be accompanied by locals. My 'family' asked me if I'm going with any Ecuadorians since it will be a lot safer and easier to get there and walk around...i replied with nooo, only americans- i don't really know any Ecuadorians yet. They just nodded.

I've been left this week with a feeling like my feet are stuck in mud. I want to see Qutio...I want to go to the sweet places...I want to be able to go into the university and feel some sense of belonging...I want to make Ecuadorian friends... I've just felt like i haven't been able to pick up my feet and mooooove. More effort is needed I guess.

I've been searching for AIESECers in Quito to grasp onto the network that I know is there...but i wish I would have started the process of emailing and facebooking a little earlier. If all goes as planned...I'll be meeting some aiesec alumni that I heard were pretty cool, (and great dancers!) from down the aiesec chain of the quito travelled. We'll see how that goes.


For now? Keep speaking spanish, keep trying to grasp on to Ecuador.

i think i just hitch hiked in south america...is that bad?

So the past two days i've had orientation at school for all the white people. The ecuadorians basically just look at us and are thinking what a bunch of weirdos speaking english. LUCKILY Jen and I have stood our ground and stuck by our choice to speak in spanish at all costs!

Well anyways, today i was walking around the campus that is tiny winy and my flip flop broke. i was hobbling around asking for tape or something to try and fix it so i could attempt to run across the huge highway type thing in front to go the walmart type store on the other side. Well no one had shit in any of the offices for some reason...so Jen and I hobbled - well she ran i hobbled- across the street to find shoes. They didn't' have any. what to do. hmm

so we just stood in the parking lot thinking about what to do and this women passed and i asked her ...."where can we find sandals?" she said ooh in Tumbac. We nodded and said ooooh okay. (like we knew right??) She said...do you need a ride? Um?? we thought... we looked at eachother and then at her- and she looked like such a mom- so we said, okay sure. We figured it was down a few blocks on the highway.

Then she starts turning corners more and more and asks us..you know how to take a bus right? Suure we said. I mean we both have taken one before- sure it was only to get to school today, so- sure we knew. She stopped at a bank and said i'll be right back and jumped out of the car.

As soon as she slammed the door, i said.. JEN- I THINK WE ARE GOING FAR AWAY. she just looked at me and said ooh well!!! No better way to learn! (with a little bit of terror in her eyes i think....aha) Sure enough, the women was driving us to ANOTHER CITY.

She dropped us off after 15 min maybe and said..okay well the highway is that way to catch a bus!

Thanks we said. got out. looked at eachother. and laughed. WHERE ARE WE!?! hahahah. TUMBAC of course!

No worries though, after buying some flip flops we found are way home safe and sound- with a little guessing on which bus to take that is ;)

Tip: los verdes q dicen A QUITO son buenos :)

hola me llamo Caroline Hanson

Things you should do on your first day of class at your university in a foreign country. Speak their language and try not to steal or lie.

Well today was the first day of orientation at my new school. The 250 of us gringos arrived at 830 in the morning and spent an hour chatting it up with each other. Within minutes i spotted miss Jen and we spent a good hour of WAIT WAIT LISTEN TO THIS...OMG NO WAIT, pretty much couldn't contain ourselves.

We were speaking in Spanish and scanned the mass of gringos and whispered dude i can't wait to meet Ecuadorians. I couldn't help my word vomit of how sweet Guatemala was, but quickly realized that its just not the same when you say it out loud to people who have never been there. One dude, Jose, came over to Jen and I and started talking to us. His spanish was really great, and he asked us how our summers were. As soon as i said that i lived in guatemala he said OMG HOW COOL I'M FROM EL SALVADOR, I LOVE GUATEMALA. And the stories started flowing.

Okay- speed ahead to the orientation. 4 hours of people speaking at us. Security, culture, campus....etc. The majority of which was in English. I was surprised, but i guess its for the best so people get the information they need to be safe.

Speed ahead- time to leave. Walking out with a friend from spanish class (i was walking alone by the way and really wanted to talk to anyone speaking spanish but EVERYONE WAS speaking english, the only people i heard speaking spanish were Jen and Maureen...so yea- strange) to find something to eat. We walked around campus a bit and found like alittle cafeteria that sells all different types of burgers and sandwiches and such. We walked into line, but noticed that there were a TON of people in this other line for this like buffet.

We walked over and saw a HUGE buffet with everything you could possibly want with tons of gringos. SWEET- free lunch! We loaded up our plates with a ton of food, soup, bread, fish, salads, dessert...TODO.

Then we got the the end and noticed there as a person with a list of names and you had to sign next to your name.

It was a private lunch for people who had prepaid with a certain group (or so we concluded.)

What to do?

Give up our food that we were drooling over and walk out empty handed?

Naa. Pick a name and sign away and hope the girl looking over your shoulder isn't Caroline Hanson.

Buen Provecho!! :)

Arrived

in Quito, Ecuador.

Family seems nice enough.

I have internet in my room.

strange.

leaving on a jet plane, don´t know when i´ll be back again

no one could have prepared me for what its like to leave. I figured i would be of course a little sad to leave at the end of my time in Guatemala, but i didn´t think it would hit me like a ton of bricks. I didn´t think i´d be leaving people that can very well be considered life long friends and a part of your family. I didn´t think that every goodbye last night would seem like seconds slipping through my figures with every person. 

´´take a little peice of everyone one of us with you  in your soul. Think about us whenever you want and have your experience with us make you a better person.´´

I leave today a country that is imbedded with this experience that taught me so many things...can never be given back to me, but can never be taken away.

What are the odds....

Second family abroad...and again im with a Caty.... now i just need sarah or ken10 to say Hola Cati and all will be good.

so here´s my family.....this weekend aaa la gran. not ready.


Hola querida Kathy

Soy Caty recibe muchos saludos desde Quito Ecuador, de parte de Marcelo, Caty , Daya y Marcelino tu nueva familia en Ecuador.

Que lindo poder compartir este semestre y que tu seas parte de nuestra familia. Recibi la informacion de tu llegada espero que tu viaje sea muy placentero, te estaremos esperando en el aeropuerto el sábado 25 de Agosto a las 10:26 pm. Estamos muy ilucionados con tu llegada y que este tiempo sea muy lindo muy tranquilo y agradable para ti , saluda mucho a tu familia y dales un abrazo de nuestra parte

Un beso y un muy buen viaje

Nos vemos el Sábado

Saludos

Caty.

the eye of the storm

My summer has come to and end. My last weekend in Guatemala is underway and i´m preparing for sad last week of work saying goodbyes to students, teachers, bosses...friends. My flight leaves next Saturday, and one week from today i´ll be sitting in a strangers house (hopefully) in Quito, Ecuador.

It´s a strange feeling. My summer was packed of weekend excursions, working hard or hardly working, and learning what its like to go off and do something alone in another country. But then again, like a friend told me, ¨you´re only as alone as you let yourself be.¨

I have the feeling inside me that I should be coming home now. It feels like i just had a wonderful summer and now its time to head back to Madison once again, move into my apartment, start doing class raps again...and get back into the ¨school¨ mentality once again in the comfort of Madison in Fall. I should be getting psyched for football games and already begin to lookforward to Halloween.

As much as I have loved the summer and being away and experiencing all of this, its hard for me to accept that whe i hop on the plane on saturday i won´t be heading home. I´m heading further south and thrown ino a whole nother ball game.

I made my class schedule last week, and when i look at it i get sick to my stomach thinking that all my classes will be in spanish. I´m moving back in with a family... and i´ll finally be able to join in on the comparision of the infamous Study Abroad vs AIESEC traineeship experience.

I´ve already been bombarded with emails ´preparing´me for what Im in for at the university in quito, and life in ecuador. I haven´t read any of them yet.

This week i´m once again comfortable, enjoying a few last days in familiarity before round two starts up and i´m thrown around and shaken up a bit more.

Missing home, soaking in Guatemala, anticipatingEcuador.

The wonder of Tikal

My sister and her boyfriend headed back to Wisconsin last night, but ooh what a four days we had together. For such a short visit, i planned 'guatemala on speed' for them and i think they enjoyed themselves greatly. My favorite part of the trip was Saturday, when we jumped on a plane at 6am and took a 30 min flight to northern guatemala in the district of Peten to the Mayan city of Tikal. The we only saw about 20% of the city on a five hour hike through the jungle...but man absolutley incredible.

The most intense was climbing a 10 story ladder (litearlly) at a 78 degree inline up Temple V. Climbing it was scary as hell, but the whole time i was thinking, okay...once i get to the top i'll be okay becuase i can relax and enjoy the view before i tremble back down this rickety wooden ladder. Boy was i wrong. In the zone, with kelly behind me and jon behind her- i got to the top and stood up i looked to my right and saw not a landing to stand and walk around, but two wooden board that were no more than 2 feet wide for you to walk along. I immeditely sat down and looked over at the rest of the trembling tourists realzing that this was probalby one of the most unsafe and stupidest things that people around here do for fun.


Kelly and Jon reached the top, and kelly had a panic attack and was kelly at me sentences that made no sense and almsot kicked jon in the face on accident as she had no control over what her mouth was saying or her limbs were doing. She immedielty went back down the ladder with jon..as i chose to stay at the top alone. I decided i'll never be here again in my life so i was going to block out the fact that nothing except this wodden board that was last replaced who knows when and enjoy the view of the entire peten jungle and the peaks of the other towers coming up and out of trees. It was an incredible view worth the climb.... but i don't think i'd ever do it again.


Later on hike i learned that many people die climbing the temples. The last one happened three weeks ago- turist, young women, one foot slipped and she fell from step 69 to step 39. The steps are so steep that you don't hit all the steps .....and you fall a loooong way down before you hit anything. I'm convinced that on some of them you could jump outfrom the top of one and miss all of the structure completley. EEEKKKS.

Incredible day, incredibly hot (around 90 all day with 85 % humidity!), incredible history....man.

Down and Dirty Down South

Road trips are always fun but add crossing country borders and you get a whole new type of excitement.

-How far to San Salvador?´ we ask the man walking downt he side of the highways

-really far

-really? How far?

-about 20 min.

-oh, okay.

45 min later

(to another rando on the side of the road)

-How far to San Salvador?

-Oh god, like 1.5 hours or so...

-shit, okay, thanks.

2 hours later, dripping with sweat as we are reminded we are once again in a tropical country, we arrive- somehow without a map or an address to our destination.

AIESEC El Salvador lives up to Central Americas reputation of kick ass aiesecers.

With a party till 5am we hoped in the car and drove to the beach to see the sun rise.

I walked an indutrial fishing peir at 545 am. It was so busy you´d think it were 12 noon.

We crashed on the beach around 630 or so, me to be woken up by...

-KATY! KATY!

I open my eye to find myself sweating balls baking in the 8am sun. Slowly turn around to see E train yelling from where the car is parked a ways back pointing frantically down the beach to my left.

I turn my head to see at least 13 cows running, quite fast might i add, right for me.

I shot up and bolted down the beach, sparkly top ,skinny jeans and all.

A day of pool lounging, coconut drinking, and bitches bitches playing with aiesec el salvador finished up the weekend before a tiring 5 hour drive home back to guate.

More people need to go on traineeships.

Que putas.....

After a pick up truck ride down La avenida de las Americas...Karthik and I sit in my living room downing Gallo national guate cerveza...thinking, que puta, we´re living the dream.

Salud to who care to wonder and who care to dream, and live el sueño of latin america.

signing off...

karthik and katy