La Gran Carrera

So, my arms are sore, for a few reasons, but I’ll get to that as I tell you how the last few days have gone. Yesterday and today, I have been exposed to many new things. It’s been great…mostly.

Sunday morning, I went to church with my roommate, Carla. We took a bus and got there around 9. Sunday school was from 9:30 to 10:30 and the service was from 10:30 to 12:30 (but this could be longer). Sunday school was interesting. It started with somewhere between 5 and 10 people there. As it got closer to the service starting, more and more people showed up and joined in. During the service, they sang many songs, most of which I didn’t know, but a few of them I did. The pastor used some objects during his sermon which helped me get the idea of what it was about. It’s hard to listen to Spanish for so long and not get lost. After church we got a ride back to the seminary with a girl from the church. We then walked down to Carcelen with 2 other students for lunch. On Sundays, I am on my own for lunch since it’s not provided at the seminary. We went to a small place where I got shrimp with rice (a huge portion) along with some fried bananas for only $5. We then took a taxi back to the seminary, where I decided to take a “Nazarene nap.” At 5 we all (Kevin and I, our roommates, and the NILI staff) headed over to the Hall’s house for a welcome party. The Halls live off the campus in a gated area along with the Fishers, who I was introduced to as we were headed back to the seminary. The Work and Witness building where Work and Witness teams stay is also there. We ate American tacos for dinner, played the Wii (part of why my arms are sore…sad, I know), and just hung out and had fun.

Yesterday was crazy. I got up at 6:40 and went to breakfast and 7. Breakfast was really good. We had slices of bread with some kind of cheese and hardboiled eggs. I also found out that they drink their milk warm, which was kind of weird because some of it solidified on the surface, but was fine all around. I then headed back to my room because I didn’t have class ‘til 9:30. I pretty much just relaxed, checked some things online, and took a short nap. Class at 9:30 was Spanish. I will have this every weekday at the same time. The class will be split into 3, 4 week blocks, with 1 class focusing on different things each block. Today, our professor, Senora Evelyn, tested us to see what level our Spanish is at using a written test and by talking to us individually. We also talked about what we’ll be doing for the semester. We get to do a lot of day trips for Spanish! Our first one is Wednesday! It’s going to be lots of fun and I’m going to learn a lot. We also got a quick tour of the seminary today. We got to see where all the missionaries that live on campus live and other fun things. We had a travel workshop scheduled today at 2. This turned out to be La Gran Carrera or the Great Race. Our first clue was to find out roommates and head to the gate of the seminary with everything we need when we go out (NILI ID, copy of passport, some money, and our charged cell phones (yes, I’ve been given my own cell phone for the semester)). At the gate we were asked if we had everything we needed, given a form to fill out when we leave, and given our next clue, which told us to get on a bus to a certain place. We were also given the 50 cents needed for both of us to ride the bus (yes it’s that cheap, 25 cents a person). It took us a little while to figure out which bus we needed because there are many and once we figured it out we had to wait. We got on along with Kevin and his roommate, Harrison. Once we got to where we needed to go, a bookstore where Stan and his family were waiting, we raced each other into the store and got our next instruction from Stan: find a yellow book with NILI on it. We found the book and got our next clue, to take a trolley (also 25 cents a person, given to us with the clue) to a certain stop and go to the nearby market. Again we raced out of the store, pushing and shoving (I’m sure this was a great sight to see). We found out where the trolley was. Kevin and Harrison beat us to the trolley and were able to get on without any trouble. We had to wait because the next trolley that stopped was so full only a few people could get on. We had to push our way onto the next trolley, which was also very full. At each stop, more and more people crammed themselves on and we got squished. Trying to hang on when there are that many people is almost impossible and that’s the other reason my arms hurt. Then, the trolley we were on decided to be difficult and stop working, making us fall even farther behind. After about 5 or 10 minutes of roasting in the trolley with lots of people pressed up against us and no air moving, the trolley started again. We made it to the market where we got instructions to buy something using the 75 cents we were given. I now have a woven bracelet that says Ecuador on it and Carla has a matching one. We then were told to take a taxi to a park, which we did for the $2 we were given (again, very cheap). At the park, we had to take a paddle boat in a circle. Then, we were sent to the nearby mall to find Juan Perez, who happened to be out Spanish Professor. We had to say something in Spanish that was on our clue (all the clues were yellow pieces of paper). She gave us our last clue which was to take a bus to Carcelen and then take a taxi to the seminary, which can be complicated because to be dropped off at the entrance to the seminary when coming from Carcelen, you have to go in a big loop and make a U-turn (which some taxi drivers aren’t very fond of). We arrived at the seminary quite a bit after Kevin and Harrison because getting a little behind them with the trolley caused us to get into a lot of traffic on our way back. But it was still a lot of fun. Then, last night there was a party for the seminary students to welcome us. We had snacks and played lots of games from UNO Attack to Jenga to some get to know you games. Afterwards we watched a movie.

Not only have I had some very interesting things to do, I’m also starting to get used to certain things that are different here. Going to the bathroom for instance, takes a bit of thinking because I have to remember to throw my toilet paper away instead of flushing it. We also only get 4 rolls of toilet paper a month to share between the 2 of us. This is plenty, but it seems odd to ration it like that. At meals, lunch and dinner mostly, I will be eating a lot of rice, potatoes, and soup. Almost every meal will have at least one of those items and a lot of it, too. Public transportation is crazy. You can be standing at the bus stop, but unless you know how to signal the bus, it won’t stop, same with getting off. The bus also only stops for a few seconds and is moving by the time you are fully in the door. The busses are very jerky so you have to be ready for this or lose your balance. Buses and trolleys can be very crowded and uncomfortable, but they’re cheap, so I guess I can’t complain too much. Children as young as 4 or 5 often work with their parents. At lunch yesterday, we were served by 2 young girls, probably 4 and 6. And on the bus yesterday, a boy, who was about 12, took our bus fare. Water, like in most 3^rd world countries is not safe to drink out of the tap, so we have a large bottle of water in our room to get water from when we are there and there are also many jugs on campus that we can get water from and refill our bottle with. I’m finding the altitude doesn’t really affect me too much when I’m just walking around campus as long as I drink enough water, but as soon as I try to run (like today during the race), I find myself very out of breath, much quicker than usual, and it takes me longer to recover. But I think I can deal with that, especially since you won’t find me running often and I’m making sure to drink plenty. When I want to send an email or update my blog, I have started writing what I want to say in a word document and then pasting it. This is because the internet here can go down without notice or just not be working well at a random time, so instead of getting frustrated and trying to get back on the network, I can just wait until I am connected and paste what I wrote. I haven’t been successful in getting pictures up yet, though I haven’t tried too hard yet, so I’ll get those up when I do.