Yes I am alive!!!

Yes I know I have not written in a while! Ok a long while…. (thanks dad for the daily reminders!… haha). But I am back now. I have been doing lots of stuff since my last posting. Lets see where to begin. I finished up training at the beginning of August, did my last LPI (Language Proficiency Interview, more like inquisition, seriously I have had IR exams in college that did not dread as much!) hahaha. But I tested out of Spanish at Intermediate-Medium. But they still wanted me and six others to head out to the coast for two more weeks of language training, really it was for learning how effing fast they speak on the coast. Really it would have been helpful to have training on the coast, but I will settle for two weeks!

Well, after we finished up training we all headed back down to Quito for Swear-In. That was actually a fun trip because our bus got pulled over for ‘violating a traffic law’. I will admit that we were probably violating a few traffic laws with all 40+ people and all our luggage crammed onto one bus. But we all made it, checked into the hostel and had a great time the next couple of days. Though I was fighting a bad bout of tonsillitis the whole time :(.

The we all became volunteers on the 18th. Quite the experience, mostly because, as sad as this is, the bagels and cream cheese after the ceremony! The ceremony was held at the US Ambassadors residents, which was, to say the least SWEET! There was a really nice lawn and gardens, it was nice because we got to hang out after and soak in some sun. Later in the afternoon we got to have a picnic at the office. It was actually quite an amazing, burgers, hot dogs, pasta salad… your typical BBQ fare…

Later that night we had a little party at our hostel, a very fun night that was! The next morning we got up early and headed to Chone for two weeks. Here are some pictures off it all.

 

The Cariacu training group.         US Ambassador & Country Dir.  

The view from the lawn.                 On the way back to the hostel.

Party time.

Summer Camp has come to an end......

Well training has finally come to an end.... as a tear moves slowly down my cheek... Well not really, I'm finally ready to swear in and head to my site. But before I head to my site I am going to Chone for two weeks to further work on my coastal Spanish.

Yesterday I had the last of my test before I head back to Quito for swear in. I was able to test at Intermediate-medium in Spanish which I was really happy about. Other than that not much has been going on around here. But I will be able to update more after this week.

-Jackie

I LOVE THIS PLACE!!!!

So I was a little nervous about going on my site visit this week, but not anymore!! I love the organization that I am working with and I love the family that I will be living with. I have a great set-up. I live close enough that I can walk 15 min to work. And i have a great office, with some really amazing people. The city is big, its busy, but its great... I finally get that South American vibe from it. I will have internet everyday at work! and in my house! I am going to take pictures tonight, and tomorrow... I know everyone wants to see pictures! But the internet is really slow up north and im only here for a couple of days! But i will post them!

Btw, the heat is not as bad as I thought is was going to be, but they are keep telling me that its really cold here, and they have jackets on.... we shall see!


-J

Its been wayyyyy to long....

Hello Everyone!

Sorry it has been such a loong time since I have writen on my blog, it has been crazy busy the last couple of weeks, but i had some time after cook classes today to write... I have been trying to load photos for a while but will no luck, but dont worry i am taking them!

Training has been going great, have all sorts of classes during the week, lots of mud and rain the last couple of weeks, with a few nice days peppered in....

The next two weeks are the big weeks though... Next week I get to find out where I will be living the next two years...eeks... its a surprise but not really, for those of us in the HIV program we are going to be in the province of Guayas, and mostly in Guayaquil... Then the week after that we head out for our site visit which will be very interesting, it will be the first time that i will be on my own since i have been here... But i will be just fine, but after that we will be back for a couple of weeks and then onto our tech trip.... But i only have about 5 and a half more weeks here in training... I will hopefully upday you guys agian soon...


-J

Training has begun!

Well after a nice couple of days in Quito, we moved onto out training sites just outside of Cayambe. The city of Cayambe is about 40,000 people just North of Quito, and the equador. Our bus trip up to Cayambe was interesting to say the least! Our trip started out at our little hostel in Quito, where we all piled into the bus and headed over to the PC offices to pick up our BIG bags and head to Cayambe to meet our host families, which was both nerve racking and exciting! How ever when we showed up and got our bags to load on the bus, things got a little interesting. ALL 40+ health trainees bags could not fit on the bus, so we packed as many as we could in the bottom of the bus and then through the window pass the bags to the back of the bus! How ever the trainees who were sitting in the back were out of luck, and had to sit on the bags! People were crammed into every corner of the bus, but we made it work! We then took a 1 1/2 hour bus ride north, we got to see some very interesting things, including the equator sign which was really cool.

We got to Cayambe and piled into the back of a truck bags and all (literally!) and off we were! It is absolutely beautiful here!!! I will post lots of pictures! We got to the first house to drop off the first person at their house, which was supposed to be me, we got all of my stuff out of the truck, and I had started to meet all of my host family, and then everyone was ready to head to the next house when they realized that I was at the wrong house and they had switched me and another person. So we got everything re-packed in the truck, said good by and then headed to drop everyone else off… We got to my house and no one was home :( They had some car trouble so they were unable to meet me… so I went to another trainees house to stay with them for awhile while my family made it home!

We took a little walk around the area which was nice, it rained off and on, and walked back to town with my other training site friends. It was really nice to see everything, I did take a lot of pictures! My family made it home and I got to meet them, they are really really great people! I was really tired and it was really late to I will have to ask their names again in the morning. I have a mom, a dad, brother, sister, and an uncle, AND a puppy :)

Well until next time… Hasta luego!

-J

Made it to Ecuador!!

Hola! Well here I am in Ecuador! It took a lot to get here, but we are just now chilling in the hostel, and we are now headed to our host families near Cayambe tomorrow, which I am really excited about! The past couple of days have been long and tiring. So far training has consisted in a crash course of everything and all things Ecuador! So far I am really excited to get things going with my work, but there is still a lot of stuff to do before I am at that stage.

The first day that we were at the PC office we did our language test, I was really nervous about it. I personally thought that I did quite bad at it, and that I was going to test beyond low! LOL… But when we got our training assignments today I actually tested higher than I thought that I was going to do. I tested at beginner high, so I am pretty happy about that. That means that I only have to go up two notches to be able to swear in :)

Well I have a lot of stuff to do before tomorrow (packing, yet again...writing letters, programming my phone) So I will post again from Cayambe.

PS: We have not really done much other than go from hostel-to-bus-to-office and back…. so I have not really taken any pictures! But I will be taking a ton of them tomorrow!

-J

Stagging

Hola de Ecuador! Los voluntarios de Cuerpo de Paz y yo vamos a Ecuador hoy! Ok thats about all I got right now on my Spanish lol… well it turns out there are 68 of us voluntarios heading to Ecuador, most of us are in the Community Health extension, with a few in the Youth and Families group. It was fun to spend some time in DC, and to see Miss Cyndi :)

But other than that not much has happened to exciting, but I think that it will get real crazy when we finally get to Ecuador, and I am pretty anxious to get this party started!

I will write again when I get there…

-J

  Food @ Ben’s

DC Metro