Monday, December 17, 2007
silent night? PLEASE?!?!
So downstairs in the living room there is an infernally tacky fake Christmas tree. Watching Enrique screw in each plastic branch was beyond hilarious for this girl, who grew up in the woods. The lights flash, the included ornaments are all the same, and the thing PLAYS MUSIC. If you can call it that-- it has a repertoire of six or seven Christmas songs, and plays no more than one chorus of each before seamlessly moving on to the next, all in that horrible a-rhythmic style of electronically synthesized monophonic crap. This thing plays constantly from dusk until bedtime-- or if Enrique falls asleep watching TV or listening to the radio, it never gets shut off. Mind you, it is a full two floors below and a whole house across from me, and I can't get "Jingle Bells" out of my damn head. UGH.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
esa cosa que me hiciste, mami, me gustó
Wow, I have been really terrible at blogging. Whatever.
Got back from the Galápagos yesterday, and WOW. Tons and tons of animals, and the most stunning landscapes I've ever seen-- on ISLANDS, no less. You can see why I liked it. Puerto Ayora reminded me so much of MDI, except with that unmistakable Ecuadorian flair. More than anywhere else in Ecuador, I really want to figure out a way to go back for a long time. Of course, the Galápagos are the hardest place to be allowed to live... I guess I never have tried to make things easy on myself.
Quito life is definitely old, but I'll be out of here in twelve days. And I'll miss a lot of things it when I'm gone, I'm sure. Salsa class, for one. We've gotten good enough that I think it'd be feasible to go to a salsateca and not look like complete fools, so I think that'll be a project for the next twelve days.
For the past couple weeks I've been teaching English at an educational recovery center for kids with learning disabilities or behavioral problems and are therefore in danger of needing to repeat a year of school. At first, we had six- and seven-year-olds (who can't read or write yet in Spanish, much less English, and were complete terrors), but those were replaced with entirely manageable nine- and ten-year-olds, and a pack of hilarious thirteen-year-old girls. It's pretty intense sometimes, but such a valuable experience.
Two side benefits of teaching at that school: walking past the cafe with the best cappuccino in Ecuador every morning, and discovering a place with eighty-cent haircuts. I am intrigued, and my hair does need cutting. I think I'm going to go tomorrow after teaching at the school. This ludicrously cheap haircut could turn out horribly badly, but if so-- I'll be home in under three weeks and can get it fixed. Wish me luck...
Got back from the Galápagos yesterday, and WOW. Tons and tons of animals, and the most stunning landscapes I've ever seen-- on ISLANDS, no less. You can see why I liked it. Puerto Ayora reminded me so much of MDI, except with that unmistakable Ecuadorian flair. More than anywhere else in Ecuador, I really want to figure out a way to go back for a long time. Of course, the Galápagos are the hardest place to be allowed to live... I guess I never have tried to make things easy on myself.
Quito life is definitely old, but I'll be out of here in twelve days. And I'll miss a lot of things it when I'm gone, I'm sure. Salsa class, for one. We've gotten good enough that I think it'd be feasible to go to a salsateca and not look like complete fools, so I think that'll be a project for the next twelve days.
For the past couple weeks I've been teaching English at an educational recovery center for kids with learning disabilities or behavioral problems and are therefore in danger of needing to repeat a year of school. At first, we had six- and seven-year-olds (who can't read or write yet in Spanish, much less English, and were complete terrors), but those were replaced with entirely manageable nine- and ten-year-olds, and a pack of hilarious thirteen-year-old girls. It's pretty intense sometimes, but such a valuable experience.
Two side benefits of teaching at that school: walking past the cafe with the best cappuccino in Ecuador every morning, and discovering a place with eighty-cent haircuts. I am intrigued, and my hair does need cutting. I think I'm going to go tomorrow after teaching at the school. This ludicrously cheap haircut could turn out horribly badly, but if so-- I'll be home in under three weeks and can get it fixed. Wish me luck...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)