¡Gracias a Dios Esta Viernes!

So it's been a long, long week here in Ecuador. At least for me anyway. I got in a long and confusing situation with my 6th grade class (which is my pride and joy) and chances are good that they will hate me for much of the semester. But like Mike says, it's not my job to be their friend. It's my job to be their English teacher. It's not my job to make them like me. It's my job for them to speak and comprehend the English language.

Sometimes, though, particularly after a rousing speech by the primary school disciplinarian, amusingly named Victor Hugo), I feel that teaching English is this terribly colonial thing to do. Like the future success of my students hinges on their ability to speak and write in English when the success of a native English speaker is not equally contingent on his or her knowledge of other tongues. This is part of the solidarity argument. Adam once described solidarity as those of us blessed with opportunity getting down on our stomachs and pulling with all of our collective might to bring up those without opportunity. Our egalitarian goals should include a lot of work for the priviledged too. It's not enough that I should teach Enlgish. I should have to study Spanish with equal effort. The combined work toward the understanding of the language of the Other is what puts us on the road to solidarity. And we're learning more everyday that solidarity with the poor is not a place that we can arrive at. It is just a place we've heard of and we're trying more and more to head in that direction.

That's the view from Arbolito...
- Meredith

The view from Arbolito

Buenas Tardes!

I am finally getting to the blog and my apologies for not writing sooner. I have been very caught up in my own reflections which usually get funneled to my personal blog. But as I tell my Nuevo Mundo students "No quiero excusas!" (I don't want excuses) so here I go.

I am living in Arbolito with 5 other fabulous volunteers and their dedication to this life teaches me daily. If there is one thing I could say about Johanna, Katie, Sam, Adam and Mike it is that they all work very hard. I admire Katie's hard work a lot because both of her job placements as well as her heart are in Arbolito. She knows more than all of us combined (though Johanna is a close second!) She is leading the charge to meeting the neighbors, something that has been a bit more challenging than past years, but certainly as important.

I got to sit and talk with the mom of one of my most rambunctious students last night and it was definitely a great idea. I could see that she had a lot on her plate as the mother of three boys and this peek into his life will help me be a bit more understanding the next time he pops out of his seat without permission. This is a blessing I am not sure I would receive in another job in another place. Would I be able to sit in my student's house and chat with their parents in the U.S.? Would I be invited? Or scolded if I didn't come soon enough? The welcome of the Arbolito neighbors is very warm...in fact as we strive to meet new faces in town the welcome is downright hot!

The best part of living in Arbolito, for me, is my community in the house. We were at a wedding this past weekend and it struck us how much like a family we are. We decided that is because we don't always agree. But it seems that after every fight there is more capacity to love each other than before. Funny how that works. We've been here two months and I am already confusing people by referring to Katie as my hermana and Mike as my ñaño. We struggle, we have different opinions and desires and ways of thinking and being, yet we come together to pray, to eat, and to serve. There is only one person we can credit this to and that is Christ.

I think that we have been doing a fabulous job of keeping Jesus as the center. We are a house of people who think that Jesus was onto something. Someone who put the poor first and lived simply with his friends might have an idea of how to love people as we want to learn how to love. We are figuring out that God is not so much a noun as he is a verb of how to be in relationship and we strive to "God" each other and people around us every day. We are learning that He is in control and that sometimes the only thing and the best thing we can do is look to Him. We're not sure if solidarity is attainable, but we know which direction to go to grow closer to it. Hopefully whether we're walking in Arbolito, crossing the street in Guayaquil or riding the bus over the bridge we are going in the direciton of love.

And that's the view from Arbolito. More to come soon!
Besos-
Meredith

Two and a Half Months In

Hello all! Being a part of this program is a HUGE blessing and I am so thankful to be in Ecuador.

To preface...I feel very unqualified to write about my experience or about Ecuador. Like a mouse in the middle of a maze, I can´t see the big picture right now, and things are always clearer in retrospect. So por favor take everything I say with a grain of salt - my thoughts today might contradict my thoughts tomorrow.

So, from day one in Ecuador everyone has said "poco a poco," and it´s really the case. Little by little I´m getting accustomed to life here and learning things. And, like Dean Brackley says in his book The Call to Discernment in Troubled Times, "We need different types of nourishment at different points of our journey." As much as I want to know and understand everything right now, it would be paralyzing and I wouldnt know what to do with it all. There have been plenty of challenges during these first 2 1/2 months, but in the midst of these have been countless blessings. We really feel the love coming in from family and friends and people who care about the program, so thank you.

So, some blessings... Yesterday I got to watch our neighbor Freddy play checkers with one of the college visitors. He won 4 games in a row, but i helps that he´s the ony one that knows the Ecuadorian variation on rules. Another blessing is praying with my housemates every morning and night in our "upper room," as Alison called it. I love attending the base Christian community meetings, and I want to share them with you (at the risk of glamorizing poverty, which I certainly don´t want to do). The first time I went to a meeting, we sat outside the woman´s house who was hosting it because her house was too small to have the meeting inside. We were told that the woman has a small home but a huge heart, and I am sure it´s true. But it was pretty amazing and surreal to be sitting in a chair on a dirt road in Duran, Ecuador underneath the moonlight, coming before God together in such a basic way, singing and praying to the God of us all. I can´t begin to fully understand poverty or the Ecuadorian political or economic system or what life is truly like for the people we gather with every Friday night, but I know I´m thankful they are willing to share it with me. I´m learning about selflessness and generosity, humility and pride, suffering and joy, and bearing one another´s burdens.

As the time ticks on, I am trying to understand the very central significance of love and to understand how to love more fully. Brackley also writes in his book, "Dorothy Day used to quote Dotoyevsky, saying, ´Love in practice is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.´ Above all, love demands sacrifice, and we are slow to sign up for that."

Sacrifice requires leaps - we gotta jump in or otherwise we´ll never get around to it. I still remember when I visited Ecuador last year and Pat told us to live radically, don´t just live any old life. People will not be fed and have their basic needs met if we all live any old life. So now what? We keep searching and putting our experiences into perspective and determining what these experiences mean for us, each of us, regardless of where we are in the world.

Love to all,
Jenny

Hey everybody!
So this is my first post, and I promise there will be much more to come; but not until I get this cast/splint off so that I can type with two hands. Basically, I just wanted to let you all know how extremely grateful we are for all your interest, support, prayers, and love! We really can`t say it enough! If it wasn`t for that, a lot, if not all of us, would not be here! You, too, are ever-present in our thoughts and prayers, and thus, are with us everywhere we go! Thanks again! For even though it`s only been two months, we have already been able to catch glimpses of the amazing beauty that life holds, especially for us, during this time in Ecuador! God Bless!
Un abrazo muy fuerte,
Mara :)