Tearin Up Tena

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Whew. What a week. Today is the last day of vacation for me. It has been a four day weekend due to Carnaval. Before I get to that, I suppose I should rewind to last week and our tech trip to Tena.

On Monday morning, I woke up at 5 in order to pack. There is nothing I like more that putting everything off to the last possible minute. And everything always takes longer that you think it will, so I was already running late when I discovered I was locked IN the house. They have extra locks which they put to use during the night. My family knew I was leaving, but they hadn’t woken up to say goodbye, so I really didn’t want to go knocking on their door… Eventually I spotted the keys on the table and after several minutes of trying to quietly jangle these keys around, I was free. Of course the bus was at least a half hour late. So it goes.

We arrived in Tena around 11 am. It was much more hot and humid than Tumbaco, but also not completely unbearable. Immediately our facilitators sent us off in pairs to find people on the street to interview about this national park nearby. That was slightly awkward, but no surprise there. After that, it was an afternoon of charlas (informal talks) by some locals working on projects with the national park and nearby indigenous communities. We had some extra time when we were done, so one of the presenters actually accompanied us to a nearby animal rescue center. It was similar to a very small-scale zoo since they allowed visitors and also had non-native species that had been seized from abusive circuses or other abusive circumstances, like lions and ostriches.

We stayed in a comfortable hostal, made complete by a few hammocks, in downtown Tena. We actually stayed there 3 of the 4 nights. Tuesday we went to two different indigenous communities that are working to start up some eco tourism attractions. The first was on a much smaller scale. We got a tour and then helped around with various tasks. My favorite part was probably the monkeys. There were 2 monkeys that were free to run around and very comfortable with people, especially Marco the monkey. He would jump on you from a tree, wrap his hands in your hair, and curl himself around your neck. It was amazing. He was hilarious. The pair followed our tour and were hanging around us much of the day. We ended our time there with a traditional lunch of tilapia wrapped in leaves and smoked over a fire. It was delicious, though interesting because you are served the Entire fish (scales, head, fins, and all).

After that we went to an eco tourism lodge in a place called Shandia that was recently built. We stayed the night here and helped with making the grounds look nice in preparation for their grand opening during Carnaval. The next day we went back to Tena. In the afternoon, we had a presentation by a current Peace Corps volunteer and her counterpart. It was an interesting presentation related to climate change, though what was even more interesting was how familiar this Peace Corps volunteer looked… As is turns out, her name is Grace and we went to elementary school together. Small World. I thought this was pretty crazy cool and something to get a bit geeked about, though she did not seem to share my enthusiasm… which I am still confused about… When I figured it out, she just smiled slightly and gave a small nod. Well okiedokie then.

Thursday was Awesome. We went to this small organization called Runa. They are working to find indigenous farmers with Guayasa plants to harvest the leaves to make this energizing tea. It comes from an indigenous tradition in the area where they wake up every morning at 3 or 4 am and sit together, drinking guayasa, to share their dreams from the night before and other thoughts. This small organization, which was actually founded by some Americans, will soon have the product available in some Whole Foods I believe. It’s a great place though because eventually they want to completely back out and have it run by locals. It is also organic certified. After learning about the organization, we headed out on this long hike through the jungle to follow a farmer to a few of his guayasa trees to harvest the leaves. At one point during the hike, we came to a river which we had to cross. This required us to all to strip down and wade across with our belongings held high above our heads. It was amazing! Thank goodness we had been advised to wear our rubber boots too, seeing as we encountered ridiculously muddy areas where you could sink down almost to your knee in mud. Great Day.

We went out Thursday night with people that worked at Runa. We played cards and drank pilsners. At one point I embarrassed myself by being pulled into attempting to salsa with an Ecuadorian while many others observed. Disaster.

Friday morning we went to a school and did presentations on an environmental topic of our choice. I was with 2 other people and we focused on forests/deforestation. It could have gone better if we had more time to prepare, but we got through it. As we wrapped up, the first real tropical downpour started since we’d been there. Wow. Holy rain. Class basically stops when it rains like this because the students can’t hear the teacher at all, so we all just played with the kids for a while. We left early that afternoon and got back to Tumbaco that evening. A great trip overall.

Saturday, a group of 6 of us volunteers went to some hot springs for the night. Hot springs are delightful. Mmmmmm. We got back Sunday though and I was Exhausted. I slept an absolutely ridiculously long time Sunday night. Monday morning, I went with my host mom and dad and her sister to Otavalo for the day, which is about 2 hours away. We actually went thru a bunch of small towns/cities just to show me the area. It was a very nice day, though a long day. It can still be quite overwhelming to be in their company for 12 hours straight when I am still so non-fluent in Spanish. It was really nice though and I’m really glad that took me.

Now it’s Tuesday. I have a lot of crap to do today, but I have been quite productive thus far. Tomorrow it’s back to the grind. And word on the street is that we find out site placement in a week. We actually find it out one day before we leave for our sites for an entire week. Ugh, I just want to know NOW!!!

(As I was trying to post this, a drunk man who spoke english found me in the computer lab and spit all over me for half an hour as he went on tangent after tangent about volcanoes, the craziest man he ever met that was from michigan, and about how Hannah Montana is apparently acting out these days. Ugh. I can still feel the flecs of spit all over my face.)

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Comments

[Merrill]

graaaaaace
Grace apparently doesn't know how cool/random it is to run into people you know around the world... just sayin!! one of my fav things about this lil globe of ours... it's actually small! oOoOoo who knew? anyway, love your blog, woman! and i especially love hearing about the spitting english speaking man. ok and your adventures too. do you have a skype? the fam should probably skype you someday!! let me know :) besos!