Random night out

Well, after planning a nice quiet night with the girls last night, we somehow ended up going to a free concert in support of Cuba with some ecuadorean friends of Amandas and then staying out talking (in spanish - hurrah!) about allsorts of important topics....I was somewhat out of my depth when we started talking about the political system of ecuador, but I like to think that my nods and hmms were sufficiently intelligent!

Then bumped into a guy I volunteer with so went out with him and his friends to this rather strange club where I bumped into just about everyone I have gotten to know over here and so felt suitably popular. Unfortunately feel suitably tired now and am planning a nice quiet night in. Apparently we are meant to be going round to someones house for them to cook for us, but might give that one a miss!!!

amanda hems her jeans

Well that title is what you get when you ask a friend for inspiration!!!!

not that any of you know, but was v ill on sunday (think my body was rebelling after having been dragged through work and school on v little sleep) so after spending just about all day in bed feeling sorry for myself, I have now recovered and the sun is shining here and all is well with the world. Also, had a very nice quiet night last night with the girlfriends on a very definate no boys allowed night out. Went for good food and tea and gossip.....just what we all needed!

And today in a rush of confidence and optimism (and a general feeling that I havn´t done all that much for the centre I work at) I volunteered to try and get all us volunteers and kids into a museum for free....and I suceeded!! hurrah. Took my spanish teacher along for moral support but asked all by myself and have now got us all booked in for free at 2.30 on friday for 5 volunteers and 20 kids. Guess I must be vaguely intelligable in spanish after all.

Oh, and the title of the blog refers to the fact that Amanda bought some jeans here and rather bravely entrusted a 70 year old man (who seems to specialise in mens suits) to shorten them. Needless to say, they dont look great! But have spent lots of time convincing her that no one is going to be looking at her ankles!

chiva bus

Didnt have time to write everything yesterday so heres some more of life in ecuador! Friday was a rather interesting day all in all as we had a party at the centre where I work and also at spanish school so was very much in demand! Unfortunately we had all been out thursday night so was not feeling at my most perky, but pulled through! So the party at the centre was hilarious, mostly on account of the fact that I had been talked into miming to tina turner with another volunteer and so I had to spend the longest 5 mins of my life prancing around infront of 30 kids to simply the best. Aaargh. At least they all thought it was hilarous and I realised that I might be getting to that stage where you dont really get embarrased much anymore...scary...am definately getting old!

So after the fun at the centre (including me dancing and being told by some of the older kids, with a serious amount of surprise present in the tone of voice, that i could dance quite well) went back to school for a trip on a Chiva Bus. This is basically a small bus where everyone piles on top, along with a band, and then off you go for a 2 hour tour of Quito trying to cause as much noise and mayhem as is humanly possible. Enjoyed it loads and was thoroughly surprised by how much all the people around seemed to enjoy it too, with much honking of horns and dancing in the street.

No other exciting news from this weekend as we all decided we needed a restful weekend at home....so just lots of pottering around and eating (hurrah). Will try and have some more adventures soon to liven this thing up!

kids, spanish, tina turner and salsa

Well my life continues to be lovely here but a little dull for blog entries i am afraid, my life basically consists of going to the centre with the kids in the morning, spansih classes in the afternoon and then salsa classes or some form of bar/club outing in the evening. Although to liven things up a little took the kids on a couple of outings this week which was lovely. In particular we took 25 of the little darlings to the vivarium (think snakes and iguanas) scared me half to death as there were 5 of us volunteers and the kids ranged from 3 to 15 and we took them all on a 25 min journey on public transport and a walk through a park to get there.....cant really it see it happening in england but everyone seems perfectly happy here to let us wander all over the city with their kids! Was a great outing though...the kids all loved it and we had a fab time finding the biggest snake, thge ugliest iguana and the most poisonous animal! It has been really nice that we have been able to get the museums to let us in for free or at a drastically reduced amount as we are paying for it all ourselves! Turns out it isnt a free placement after all...definately worth it though to watch the kids

Natwest card protection

Why does everything involving a helpline have to be so difficult??! On sunday the lovely card machine in banos swallowed my card for no apparent reason and so had to phone the lovely natwest card protection people to cancel it. Cue lots of stupid questions from the lady on the phone such as "so ecuador, is that in florida?", and "so when did you realise your card was missing" directly after telling her that my card had been swallowed by a cash machine. It took all my patience to restrain from telling her what an idiot she was. Grr......and calm

Girls weekend away

This weekend we all went on a little trip to Banos, a small spa town about 4 hours away from Quito, and in true style, had a rather amusing time. After the obligatory half hour delay while we tried to co-ordinate 5 girls to be in the same place and the same time and with everything they need, we then spent a good 10mins finding snacks for the journey before finally setting off for Banos. The result of all this was that by the time we had wandered round Banos bickering about where to stay, it was midnight and we were all exhausted so we flopped into bed.

Saturday was far more sucessful though and we had a fab day cycling around the countryside. What was touted as a 2 hour trip actually took us 5 hours as we seemed to stop every 5 mins for photos, and other activities but it was lovely. Slightly didgy bit when we had to cycle through a pitch black tunnel with cars also coming through, and somehow we all managed to fail to realise that if we took our sunglasses off we would be able to see a whole lot better! Anna also managed to fall off while in the tunnel and like the good friends that we are, Amanda and I managed to stop for 1sec to check she was still alive before continuing to hurtle out of the tunnel! After that things were much more serene and the country side was amazingly beautiful. Also had little walks to waterfalls, a fun trip over the river gorge in a tiny cable car, Rachel bunjy-jujmped off a bridge and we all had a very welcome sunbathe and swim in the river at the end....lovely

I then managed to convince everyone to go on a little trip from 9 - 11 to watch the volcano spew out lava and stuff as it does every night. All very fun as we got to ride on the roof of a chiva (little wooden bus) etc etc and it would have been amazing, had it not pissed it down with rain and been so cloudy we could have been anywhere! Its testamant to the girls that we we still laughing at the end of it, but we got ourselves into a club fairly smartish!

On a better note, have now moved into my hostal and its lovely.....am thoroughly enjoying the freedom and its so nice to have some outside space. Hurrah! Plus they managed to rent out the room i was going to have so now I have a much nicer, bigger one, for the same price! Its all good

Girls weekend away

This weekend we all went on a little trip to Banos, a small spa town about 4 hours away from Quito, and in true style, had a rather amusing time. After the obligatory half hour delay while we tried to co-ordinate 5 girls to be in the same place and the same time and with everything they need, we then spent a good 10mins finding snacks for the journey before finally setting off for Banos. The result of all this was that by the time we had wandered round Banos bickering about where to stay, it was midnight and we were all exhausted so we flopped into bed.

Saturday was far more sucessful though and we had a fab day cycling around the countryside. What was touted as a 2 hour trip actually took us 5 hours as we seemed to stop every 5 mins for photos, and other activities but it was lovely. Slightly didgy bit when we had to cycle through a pitch black tunnel with cars also coming through, and somehow we all managed to fail to realise that if we took our sunglasses off we would be able to see a whole lot better! Anna also managed to fall off while in the tunnel and like the good friends that we are, Amanda and I managed to stop for 1sec to check she was still alive before continuing to hurtle out of the tunnel! After that things were much more serene and the country side was amazingly beautiful. Also had little walks to waterfalls, a fun trip over the river gorge in a tiny cable car, Rachel bunjy-jujmped off a bridge and we all had a very welcome sunbathe and swim in the river at the end....lovely

I then managed to convince everyone to go on a little trip from 9 - 11 to watch the volcano spew out lava and stuff as it does every night. All very fun as we got to ride on the roof of a chiva (little wooden bus) etc etc and it would have been amazing, had it not pissed it down with rain and been so cloudy we could have been anywhere! Its testamant to the girls that we we still laughing at the end of it, but we got ourselves into a club fairly smartish!

On a better note, have now moved into my hostal and its lovely.....am thoroughly enjoying the freedom and its so nice to have some outside space. Hurrah! Plus they managed to rent out the room i was going to have so now I have a much nicer, bigger one, for the same price! Its all good

Police escorts

Last night we all went out salsaing and were meant to be meeting at a certain club. However, Amanda managed to get completely the wrong address so after wandering around La Mariscal for a bit, we finally gave up and went over to this massive group of policeman to ask for directions. Unfortunately they didnt know, but then 3 insisted on accompanying us while they asked for more directions and walked us all the way there (about 10 blocks away!) Think we had one of the important policemen as well as when we went past some other policemen, they saluted! Was rather amusing to have an armed ascort to the bar and even more amusing to watch the reaction from people in the bar watching us thank all the police and walk in!

Turned out to be a really lovely evening as well with lots of great live music and dancing...although all my newly found skills care of the dance lesson seemed to go out the window (although for that I do blame the men!)

And off to Banos this weekend for a little trip. Its meant to be gorgeous so am looking forward to it......might even involve a long bike ride although am assured its all down hill (and you can get a bus back up so its all good!) And even more good news, I moved out of my house today so as of now, I am an independent woman again, free to eat when I want and not tricked into eating samosas for breakfast or horrid bits of animals

the children get dirtier and my spanish gets worse

Am, rather surprisingly, loving working with all the kids. They may be grubby but they are all exceptionally cute and incredibly affectionate. They have discovered that I am happy to throw them around and so I have them in fits of giggles as we pretend to be planes around the classroom. Its all good exercise. Finally getting a hang of the routine there, in terms of there doesnt appear to be any routine, but I manage to get at least 30mins or so of maths teaching or reading in, before the room descends into chaos. Basically it seems that nearly all the kids you see on the street aren´t homeless but their home lives are less than great and so the centre provides some kind of stability and care for them. Plus it seems to be where families can come to do washing and where a lot of the older kids come to eat and wash. I guess its a bit like a youth centre + extras and seems to be really well utilised. We dont have any funds though to use so we are also desperately trying to fund raise so we can go on little trips, especially as its the holidays at the moment. So far a couple of schools over here have given some money so we are taking a group of the older kids to a museum and the younger kids to the ranarium (apparently this is snakes and things, so might give that one a miss!). The director of the centre seems to want to take everyone on a 3 day trip to mindo in a few weeks and somehow thinks we are going to come up with $1000!!!!! We´ll try but somehow i think we might be lacking on that one! More entertaingly, we are also putting on a bit of a talent show in a couple of weeks and I have somehow been talked into taking part with one of the other volunteers......at the moment we are going to be tina turner unless I can do some quick thinking! So all in all, am rather glad I didn´t work at the womens centre, and am hoping that I can start making more of a contribution now that I have figured out how I can fit in, and now that the kids are starting to recognise me and talk with me.

And on a completely different note, am loving living in Quito. Luckily my friends here are equally enamoured with salsa so we are getting a fair bit of dancing in and yesterday we even went for private lessons! It was really good and feel like i understand a bit more about what I am meant to do, even if actually doing it is a tad more problematic! Definately going to go back for some more.....although I dont think I will ever be able to move my hips like they think I should. My teacher also tried to do some dip thing where he seemed to think I would be happy to be flung backwards whilst clutching him with one leg wrapped around him. Needless to say, after a couple of attempts at my clinging to him with v stiff arms, convinced he was going to drop me, he gave up on that particular move. Maybe that can be my challenge for a couple of weeks.

Anyway, us girls are all off to the Bodeguita de Cuba tonight which, I have been assured, is heaving on a Thursday with loads of dancing....hurrah....will try not to fall over and embarrass myself.

On a less positive note, my spanish appears to be faltering now and its all getting a bit frustrating. Even the 4yr olds at work are taking pity on me and trying not to get too frustrated when they have to tell me for the 450th time what the spanish for white board is! Ah well....one day I will get the hand of it.

Saving small children

Today I started to save the world, one small child at a time! And what fun it was!!!! Its a kind of "here you are, get stuck in and have fun" kind of orientation so just kind of hung out all morning and played with small, grubby children with runny noses! Not sure how many are really street kids as the vast majority seem to have parents and homes and it seems to be used as an after school club. So I was helping with teaching maths to small children and then just generally playing.....seems i am quite a strict teacher but none of them went off crying so thought that was a good thing! There are also quite a number of older kids (15 - 25 ish) who come to learn english so am hoping i will graduate to doing that fairly soon.....although am not sure how to go about it, but they all seem to be at a level where its fairly easy! my spanish is just about holding up, but when you are playing jigsaws with 3 year olds, not much is needed!

Have also done the horrible thing of telling Jorge that I want to move out of his house! He was really nice about it though and now all i have to do is tell the women i am living with (eek). Feel much more relaxed about it all, and it means i can eat what i want to when i want to


OoOh speaking of which dont think I relaed the story of blood soup yet! how could i forget. So there i was sitting down to a nice soup for lunch which had a plate of accompaniments. One of the things looked like crispy refried beans so put a couple of spoons in and on I ate. Anyway, then Jorge comes and sits down so I ask him the name of the soup (hadn´t caught it when the mother told me) and turns out it has a Quechua name for blood soup....nearly died! Turns out the crunchy things are fried cows blood......urggh. Then spent the rest of the meal trying to think of any horribly diseases passed on through cows blood....couldnt think of any so am happy, and if anyone out there does know some, dont tell me!

A little excursion

well this weekend, we descended on the moutains north of Quito for a respite from the city smog and much fun was had by all! After a snap decision on thursday, we rounded up 8 people and after the obligatory hanging around, managed to get everyone on a bus to Otovalo only 1 hour after we had hoped to be gone (the joys of large group travel!) Friday night was then spent in a rather entertaining bar (only found after a car pulled up seeing we were looking lost on a street corner, deduced we were after dancing and directed us to this bar!) with a peculiar mixture of folkloric (think pan pipes) salsa and reggaeton music and a rather large number of israelis on their obligatory year off after the army!

Then had a v early start as everyone wanted to get to the market before the bus loads of tourists from Quito. So after waking up at 7am was then rather disconcerted that we didnt get to the market (5 mins walk away) until 10am (again, getting 8 people all moving, especially when one wants to talk to everyone, is rather tricky). but as the market had one row of interesting veg/meat/spices and then the rest was tourist orientated, llama coated jackets/blankets/hammocks/jewellery, I wasn´t too bothered to only spend an hour there!

As Otovalo also turned out to be a rather depressing town with not much going on, we then decamped to a little village in the mountains and proceeded to amuse the hostel and resturant owners with our own brand of organised chaos, whilst also ending up with loads of new local friends, including a group of 7 year olds who took pity on our pathetic attempts to find waterfalls and paths and became our guides for the afternoon!

Sunday was then spent on horseback as I was somehow peer-pressured in to going on said horse ride round the countryside. And whilst it was a very beautiful ride with some v cool guides, I now have massive bruises on the inside of my thighs thanks to the excessive galloping (yes, galloping......i was so convinced i was going to fall out my saddle and held on for dear life!) and can hardly walk....but never mind.

More importantly, went to my voluntary work placement today and they were sooo lovely. Such a difference from the womens shelter. I get to work 9-12 which is perfect and it is in a base where kids come to study and play so i get to just hang out and so whatever is needed. I´m a little nervous, but there are some other volunteers there and it seems a really welcoming place so all is good

Anyway, have to go any buy another pair of sunglasses today as after buying a replacement pair for the ones i lost on the plane on Friday, I left my new pair behind in otovalo! Its a good job they are cheap!

Salsa and early morning starts

Living with my host family continues to be an interesting experience, not least because I am being woken up at 5.30 each morning when the buses start and I am shaken awake! Was also fed this rather strange thing the other day which was some heavy savoury sponge thing with raisins (well, 2) which had been steamed in a banana leaf...yum!!! I managed to eat half before I couldn´t force anymore down and gave up.

Also went out dancing for the first time last night and had a really fun time. It seems that I did learn something in Cuba after all and managed to not embarrass myself totally on the dancefloor - hurrah! I think it helps that while the men can dance here, they are nowhere near as good as in Cuba so they dont expect as much from me. It was really funny though as a couple of them were like "ooh, you dance well" in a rather surprised, but you are a foreigner type way. Only bad bit was that whilst I told my family I would be in late and not to wait up, the mum was still watching tv, waiting for me.....and i didn´t get in until 2. Its worse than when i was 17!!!

Quito itself is really nice and has a surprisingly relaxed feel. There are 2 very distinct areas - the old town where i live and is very colonial and picturesque and where lots of locals live, and then the new town, part of which is "gringo land" with all the hostals and backpacker type resturants, internet cafes etc. And whilst the city as a whole isn´t that beautiful, I feel very at home here and when it is clear it is just stunning as the whole city is surrounded by snow-capped mountains and volcanoes. Off to visit a little town called Otovalo this weekend where there is a massive crafts market. I suspect it will be full of tourists taking pictures of indiginous people and cant see me buying much (not really into the whole artenesal look, although may be tempted by poncho with llamas!!!), but it is in a really spectacular location.....may even be talked into going horse riding again!

Life in Quito

Well have now had first (and second) day at school and am really enjoying it. Have met some other girls my age (which is a relief as everyone on the first day seemed to be either 12 or 50!) and my teacher is just lovely and not at all appalled by my hideous spanish, so all is good in the world of spanish school. More importantly they organise loads of activities so am busy seeing quito by night (v beautiful - they have gone in for coloured lights and illumination of churches in a big way!) learning salsa and signing up for trips to mountains (no uphill walking required luckily as am struggling with just breathing at the moment due to the altitude!).

Not so hot on the volunteering front unfortunately. Spent forever on the bus to get to the shelter, to then wait for an hour before being told that they didnt need me! So have decided to overcome my phobia of kids and go and work for an organisation that helps street kids get an education and a job. Its a bit christian so am hoping they dont make me pray much, but apart from that it looks really interesting and its much closer to home so i get a lie in too - always a bonus. Bit of a surprise that this attracted me (as most of you know, am not really all that maternal) but already my heart is being broken by all the kids living on the street and i also figure my spanish is probably more at a 5yr old level right now so i can be more use with kids than with abused women! But lets watch this space and see I cope....

my new home

After a good 12 hours sleep am now able to think slightly more clearly and so am going to write a bit more (lucky you!) Forgot to tell you rather typical caroline story from yesterday.....when packing I carefully put my tweezers in my rucksack knowing that the authorities consider these to be highly dangerous items...unfortunately i forgot all about my beloved pen knife nestling carefully in a little bad in the bottom of my day pack! This wasnt spotted until i had to change planes in Lima and the rather officious man at the scanner spotted it ....grrr. So had to fill in a form and it was confiscated. Sob sob

Anyway, have the morning off today to relax before starting class this afternoon. Am living with two lovely women who are both rather crazy and seem to have adopted the local pakistani and indian community. So there is always someone hanging out in the lounge and this morning I was fed a samosa for brekkie! A lovely samosa but rather too much for 8.30am!!!! Their house is also by the quitoan equivalent of the M25 so was rocked to sleep by the house gently shaking as buses and lorries went by. I am really close to the old centre though which is beautiful and surprisingly un-gringofied. This does mean that I am a least a foot taller than everyone else and so have a clear view wherever I go!!! I am also feeling the effects of the altitude somewhat and am having to slow my pace right down so I am not huffing and puffing everywhere (well, I´m blaming this on the altitude, it could also be my complete lack of exercise and continual eating /drinking for the past 2 months!)

After the calm of Brazil, am also back in the world of cat calls and hissing - hurrah! Had only been out the house 10mins this morning and had 2 mumbled comments, a wolf whistle and a rather persistant hisser...although given that the preferred woman here is short and dumpy, not really sure how to take it

Eek, have rather obnoxious american by me getting irate that the internet service isnt up to scratch.....might have to strangle him soon!

bad day cont

so for some reason the keyboard stopped working! But in short, went to LP recommended hostel that was safe and clean! felt rather dubious when i pulled up outside but i was tired so checked in. But then 15mins after sitting on the bed worrying and having one of those what the hell am i doingtravelling moments, ran away (despite much pleading by hostal owner) and as was so upset (for some random reason!)checked myself into a nice posh travel lodge type hotel....for only $30 seemed worth it!

Anyway, now in Quito, have met my family for the next few months and they seem really nice, if a little mad and over protective of me, Quito itself seems a little unpromising at the moment but have been given the grand tour of all churches in the vacinity (with much excplination about each saint / prayer etc) so can categorically say that the churches are very beautiful! Also think it will all be a lot more copable with when i have a good nights sleep and i have my first day at class....god what was i doing signing up for a month...its going to kill me!!!!

not so jealous now are you!

So yesterday was a good day. Got mistaken for portuguese twice (hurrah, must be nicely mahogany again .... going for the love child of david dickenson and girls aloud), was chatted up by suitably greasy haired waiter, had best caiprinha yet and spent a significant portion of the day in the sun in a hammock. result! However, in a true yin yang stylee, today has not been so great

Have had to come to sau paulo (erk) via a nasty 6 hour bus journey.