last night i spent the night at my friend maria cecilia's house and we had a ton of fun. her house is right next to the river so you can hear it from her room. when you look out the window you can see it! so last night i got to fall asleep to the sounds of a river and it was sooooo amazing.
anyway..
i now don't really HAVE a host family...
i guess my first host family wasn't getting along with me or something weird like that...who knows.
apparently i was too shy.
ha...ashley...shy...hahahahah
to those of you who truly know me, you know that i am everything but shy.
you will never hear the words "ashley is" and "shy" in a sentence together unless the word "not" is in between.
alright. lets stop talking about how i'm not shy.
so i live with my host sister's (not host sister anymore) aunt. and she is a photographer with 3 younger kids.
all of them are super fun to be around and they make learning spanish really fun and exciting and it's also fun because i get to teach them english!
tomorrow i leave for camping in the mountains until sunday with my friend maria cecilia and after i return i come back to my host aunts house...i'm not sure if i should now just title her my host mom? orrrrrr????? i'll open the doors to suggestions so y'all can help me choose.
today my host aunt (mom?) took me shopping at some of the markets here. i only spent $20 and i got a TON of little things. everything i bought was no more than $3 except for a scarf i bought which was $13. i would say i made some really good purchases and my momma would be proud because i was verrryyyy good about saving my money. (hey mom, glad to see you found my blog on your own this time...or maybe not..we'll have to see)
i have only two weeks left here in this country and i have learned SOOOO much over the past 3 weeks. i have even made a note on my ipod of all of the new words and phrases i have learned. my host aunt's (mom's?) little kids all laugh at me because to them those words and phrases are just so simple.
the neighborhood i live in has security guards and a couple weeks ago i asked my friend maria cecilia why i hear them blowing their whistles at night..she wasn't able to translate but i just figured it was because someone was doing something they weren't supposed to so they blew their whistles. apparently i was wrong because today i asked my host aunt (mom?) and she said the guard blows his whistle so the people know that he is awake and doing his job since he works all night. i now find hearing that whistle rather comforting, actually.
this paragraph of my blog is probably going to make some of you really jealous and want to move to ecuador..but i'm gonna tell ya anyway that gas here is only $1.08 and the most expensive gas is $2. :)
i titled this post what i did because i feel like my first host family didn't understand that it was going to take me time to adjust to a new culture and language. i also don't like to try every new food i see right away all at once. i want to be introduced to things slowly so i know what i (and my stomach) like and don't like. i was also super overwhelmed with the language when i got here. to those of you who have never traveled abroad before i am here to tell you it is CRAZY. EVERYTHING is in spanish. maybe a little english here or there but you don't pick up on what people are talking about for awhile and you feel super left out!
now that i have been here awhile the spanish is getting sooooooooo much easier, it's much easier to process what people are saying and you start to pick up on the popular phrases people use to start conversation. i also have a translator on my ipod and let me tell you, it is my favorite app EVER...whenever i hear something over and over that i don't understand i translate it. my little host cousin (now little host sister?) has taught me a lot of spanish. she likes to point at things as she says them so it helps me put two and two together and all of her phrases she helps me understand. and it's even more rewarding when i get to USE the phrases.
i feel like i haven't really talked about the culture here...so i might as well tell you what i have learned..which is quite a bit. brace yourself.
when you greet someone and leave someone you kiss them on the cheek. you don't actually kiss their cheek though, you just touch cheeks and make the kissing sound. which me coming from united states was super awkward at first..but kinda cool when i get an almost kiss on the cheek from cute guys here...just sayin. though when guys greet and leave each other they shake hands or high five or something guyish.
most people assume "adios" is how people here say goodbye...but it actually isn't used. they say "ciao" pronounced like "chow" and when i said adios people were a little thrown off guard. i think its a more formal way of goodbye. like we say goodbye...or just bye. and i think adios is goodbye and ciao is bye...but dont quote me on that one.
foods here are very different. the fruits are all aaaaamaaaazzzziiiiinnnnngggg and the juices are all hand made with fruits and they are SUPER good. i love the juices and i am going to miss them a lot. they eat soup for lunch usually. i am almost pretty sure they make soup out of everything. today i had soup with egg in it and it was really good. you'd think it wouldn't be but it was!!
most of the families here have maids.. i think i might have already said this. but they clean and cook for you. and do your laundry. which is super magic. you just put your clothes in a bin and when you wake up they're gone and when you come back in your room they're folded on your bed! when i told my host aunt (mom?) that in wisconsin it isn't common she said that it's common here because it is so cheap. it's only $200 a month for them to work everyday all week for you.
here they also have doors where you press a button and then someone inside answers a phone type thing...they'll ask who it is and you say who you are and then the door electronically opens when they press a button. that i also find pretty magic.
they do not have basements here. because storms here are never severe. which for me is AWESOME! no tornadoes or any massive storm would ever make it over the andes mountains so i have nothing to worry about. it does rain here a lot. but when it rains it is only for 15 minutes tops. the problem is that sometimes it rains and then stops...and then 10 minutes later starts again.
you can also drive an hour and a half south of a city and it will be a totally different climate. yungilla, where i stayed this past weekend was warmer than here in cuenca. these people here think that 50s is "cold"...i think it's totally fine...then again, i am from a state where "cold" is below 32.
tomorrow i am leaving with my friend maria cecilia to go camping in the mountains until sunday, and then i come back to live with my host aunt (mom?) for the rest of my time here.
i miss my friends and family but i am glad that i have finally found a place where i can stay and be happy and comfortable. :) i will write as soon as i can!!
ciao!
ashley
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