Balancing Act

Today's guest blog comes from Miss Haley Booe (pronounced like boo, not booey). Haley hails from North Carolina and the hookie-infested Virginia Tech University. She's well known around here for being a Tai Chi enthusiast, enjoying toast, introducing us to Step Up (1 and 2), and having a huge supportive heart. For example if you check out the group Women's Exercise picture below you can catch a glimpse of one of her motivational signs that reads 'believe in yourself, you can do it!'

"Life in the Manna House, as you might have already guessed, is a bit like a circus. It may be due to the fact that once a week there is food in someone’s hair by the end of dinner, but recently, I’m convinced it’s because many of us have been perfecting a balancing act in regard to programs.

My time in Ecuador thus far has been concentrated on the Women’s Exercise program. Recently, we moved locations to the third floor of the library. This was an exciting move for us, because now we have our own space and a chance to further network within the library community. On the other hand, we’ve also been having a difficult time with attendance, and trying to figure out how to boost our numbers. One culprit could be the Ecuadorian fear that all foreigners have swine flu. And since my pale (almost translucent at this point) skin and light hair scream “Gringa,” people might be running in the opposite direction for that reason. As plausible as that theory sounds, I think it’s more likely caused by the fact that the past two months have been a transition period, both in the Manna House and in our Ecuadorian communities. Many people spend August and early September soaking up the last days of summer by taking family vacations and are busy doing what us Spanglish-speaking gringos call matriculando-ing (Spanglish for “matricular” or registering for school). Now that school is back in session, and that we’ve made phone calls to over 70 women who have previously attended exercise classes, attendance is slowly picking up. The women who attend class regularly are great, and I am excited and ready to see this program grow this year.

Aside from learning how to do guided meditation in Spanish for yoga class (apparently a class favorite… who knew?) I’ve recently been helping with lesson planning for English. I am helping Chet teach Adult English on Wednesdays and am starting to help Sarah with Children’s English on Mondays. The nutrition program for Aliñambi also requires some time, as several of us spent mornings going to the school to take growth measurements on each of the students. It’s very exciting to be a part of these different programs, and it’s looking to be a promising year.

Understandably, it takes a bit of juggling and a lot of planning to prepare for and teach many different classes - hence why I often feel like I’m a part of the circus. But then again, it could be that I’m woken up most mornings by the cow (whose grunts more closely resemble those of a dinosaur) that likes to graze outside of our window. Although the chaos of the Manna house and the flexibility required to run programs sometimes resembles a Barnum and Bailey’s three ring stage, Ecuador is becoming my home and I’m thrilled to be a part of a these communities.

Haley strengthening her core with a smile

Sonia, me and one of the other women doing yoga

Haley leading us into Meditation

Group picture after last Thursday's Yoga class

¡Hasta pronto!

- Haley "

Vamos a La Selva!

Today's guest blog was supposed to come from Miss birthday Booe, Haley herself (HAPPY BIRTHDAY HALEY!!!)... however, we all just spent the last 2+ celebrating by gorging ourselves at Crepes y Waffles (a delicious non-Ecuadorian establishment).  The average course went a little something like this: ice cream, salad, personal dinner crepe, shared and/or personal desert, followed by homemade cake.  If that doesn't induce food coma, I'm not sure what would.  

We're also leaving for SierrAzul, an ecological reserve in the cloud forest with over 2,000 hectares of virgin forest, in t-minus 7 hours.  This will be the first of our quarterly retreats and we are super excited!  So, my apologies for this haphazard blog entry and our lack of a guest blog but we promise to deliver an entry from Haley and a detailed account of our retreat after the weekend (and on time!)

Chet is a good sport as the girls from the library "dress him up" after art class

Part of the table at dinner (we unsuccessfully tried to get the whole table)

Group shot after dinner (sorry if you're one of the members of the dart game)

Haley with her lemon poppyseed (minus poppyseed) desert #3

Have a great weekend! 

- Jackie

The Result of Writer's Block

"Writer's block is a condition, associated with writing as a profession, in which an author loses the ability to produce new work."  Thank you, Wikipedia.  I don't quite know whether being a co-author of a (semi) Daily Life Blog counts as being a professional writer (I'm leaning towards no on that one), but I do know that I happen to be suffering from writer's block.  What has happened recently?  Any funny stories?  Ridiculous happenings?  Interesting breakthroughs?  What do people actually want to read about?  Nothing... I'm coming up with nothing.

This is not to say nothing has been going on in Manna World recently.  In fact, it's been quite the opposite.  We have all been throwing ourselves into planning and running programs, keeping up with operational jobs (or maybe not keeping up so well if you call yourself a blog writer...), attending marathon meetings, and trying to plan some time for ourselves.  Throughout all of this, it's becoming apparent that the small things are often the most exciting... to us, at least.  Today's (small) excitement was...

... a mailbox run.  Our post office box (or Casillero to those of you who are awesome and have been writing us letters) is located in Sangolqui, which is located a bus ride away from Conocoto, and doesn't have the most convenient hours.  This means that we only check it once every few weeks, or when our friendly post office worker calls the house to tell a lucky someone that he/she received a package that is too big to fit in the actual post office box.  (This is a highly coveted phone call.  Trust me.)  Needless to say, it's always exciting to be one of the lucky few to receive a letter in the mail.  This week's mail included several cards that were written nearly a month ago (love the Ecuadorian correos) and a birthday package to Haley complete with several packages of powered cheese from the treasured Kraft Blue Box.  Real cheese doesn't exist here... so we settle for the orange powder from home.  (Kind of gross, I know.)  Like I said, it's the small things.

Haley shows off her powdered cheese collection... while I remain skeptical.

Yep.  That was an entire post on writer's block and mail runs... which clearly means it is time for bed.  Check in for a guest blog from Haley tomorrow and a recap of our first group retreat early next week!  (And HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO HALEY! ... as I'm officially posting this on Thursday!)

Until Monday,

Sarah

Advertising Antics

When you're starting up a handful of new programs, excessive advertising comes with the territory.  Planning for classes, charlas, mingas, and health clinics takes a ton of time and we certainly want to make sure we have successful event turn outs.  In order to make this happen, we are on our way to mastering various types of advertising strategies.  Some are pretty straightforward: making posters, handing out flyers to community members and library kids, and attending as many community-based meetings as possible (churches, town councils, futbol leagues etc.).  

There are also some more non-traditional methods.  One of them involves hopping on buses and having one person give a presentation while the other puts up flyers at the front of the bus; so far Erik and Mike have mastered the art of bus advertising while the rest of us stick to less intimidating methods.  However, starting next week I will be participating in three days of advertising via riding around on a Camioneta shouting into a megaphone about the details of our very first Minga, set for the third of October.  

Erik and I have collaborated to co-lead a community clean up in Rumiloma.  It's a perfect combination as he is in charge of organizing Mingas (an Ecuadorian word for people coming together to do community service projects) and I am running the environmental programs.  Litter is a huge problem in our community as people are accustomed to simply throwing trash, from water bottles to candy wrappers, all over the streets.  Many community members approached us both in the library and at one of the town meetings last week about this issue and wanting public trash cans.  We've also created a friendly competition between library kids to give them incentives to come to the clean up.  Hopefully we'll be able to use this time to talk with interested people about improving waste management and mitigation for our community. 

I'll keep you updated about how the telefoneo incident goes (and of course about the clean up itself);  I think I'll be spending the next week taking notes on the Camionetas drive down our streets yelling things like "el gas el gas el gas" and "escobas escobas... escobas."  

- Jackie 

Learning to Teach

Everything here is a learning experience.  Literally everything.  I was a science major in college, which basically means that I learned how to memorize and regurgitate large lists of information.  My only worry was how I was going to cram all of it into my brain before the exam.  I never had to think about how others learn, or how to effectively teach someone else.

... until last Monday.

That was the first day of programs.  And for me, the first day of Children's English.  My first day as a teacher.  Thank goodness Dana is my Children's English partner-in-crime, because I'm fairly certain that without her, the first class would have amounted to me standing in front of a bunch of kids like a deer in headlights.  We anticipated having only a handful of kids show up for the first day of class, as word-of-mouth seems to be the primary source of information around here (and it is neither rapid nor entirely reliable).  So when 8 kids showed up, pencils in hand, we were pleasantly surprised.  Throughout the course of the week, parents walked into the library, kids in tow, and asked to have them enrolled in Children's English.  By the end of the week, we had a total of 20 kids... the most we've ever had enrolled in a program in the library space.

Seeing the third floor turned into a classroom every Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon has been exciting, rewarding... and slightly overwhelming.  We recently decided to split the class into two, in order to give our students more attention and lessons that better fit their abilities.  And thanks to the help our fellow PDs have offered, we will have twice the number of profes!  (Seriously.  Mil gracias!)  We're hoping that with this new arrangement the kids in Children's English will learn more effectively and retain more information.

Now, instead of pulling all-nighters to cram for the next big neuroscience exam, my nights are spent thinking about how our 9 youngest students learn best and researching engaging learning activities, in order to tailor lessons to best suit them.  It is certainly a learning experience... but it is also a welcome change of pace - thinking about others instead of myself.  And a good reminder of why we chose to come to Ecuador in the first place.

Thanks for checking in!

Sarah

PS. Sorry things have been a little slow in the blog world... we're adjusting to our new schedules, and it seems we're all playing catch-up around here.  Here's to an attempt at consistency!  :)