Hey Jude

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I know my site placement. Would you like to know? Ok. Drumroll please… The place that I will be living for the next 2 years of my life… is… ZHUD.

I am quite positive that that will mean as much to you as it did to me upon finding out, which is nothing. So let me enlighten thou: Zhud is a small indigenous community in the Sierra. It is also sometimes referred to as “The Y” because though it is a very small community, it is where the Pan American highway meets the road to Guayaquil. No one stops in Zhud, but there is lots of traffic passing by at all hours. It is in the mountains and very cold.

We found out our sites last Wednesday and left the very next day to go to them by ourselves for a week. That is how Peace Corps roles. It was slightly intense.

I was extremely excited to begin with. My job description sounded really cool: They want a volunteer to help them document their culture and indigenous knowledge and then perhaps work on a tourism project which would be based on attracting people who want to learn about and experience their culture. Unfortunately my visit was not all rainbows and butterflies. I was quite shaken and not what you would call exactly happy. However, since then, I have been able to put things in perspective, and am working to regain my excitement poco a poco.

I stayed with the family that I will actually be living with when I return. It is a 32 yr old mother, Rosa, and her 2 children, Alex and Norma. The father is currently living in the U.S. working. One of the biggest problems in the community is the large numbers of people migrating elsewhere. Many of the fathers move to the United States or Spain to work and then send money back to their families in Zhud. Opportunities for making a living in the area are lacking. My mother (I now have 3 mothers. This is a constant source of confusion in conversations among the volunteers seeing as we all now have 3 mothers: “wait, your real mom? Or mom in Tumbaco? Or mom in site?”) actually lived in New York for 6 years, though she still knows no English.

No one can speak English, which is fine. However, they all speak Extremely heavily accented Spanish. It is absurd. I cannot understand it whatsoever. Most of the older population also speaks Quichua, which is an indigenous language. I honestly was convinced that my mom’s parents were speaking in Quichua for the longest time. Turns out it was Spanish. Communication is going to be slow-going for a while. I guess I am also supposed to try to learn Quichua. I had my first official lesson on Quichua yesterday. Let me share a few phrases:
How are you? – Imashnatacangui
Where are you from? – Maimandatacangui
Where do you live? – Maypita causangui

Right. I think I’ll be sticking to Spanish for a while.

I live in a relatively large, 2-story cement house. Most of the rooms are empty. I actually took over the kids’ room, so the 12 yr old girl and 10 yr old boy now sleep in the same bed as their mom. They don’t seem to mind (I wouldn’t either; at least it must be warm. I was still cold at night and I was wore long underwear, sweatpants, t-shirt, long sleeve, sweater, and wool socks under multiple heavy blankets), but I’m guessing they are not going to want to do that for 2 years. So after the required first 3 months, I may need to look for somewhere else to live. My bedroom has a bed and a large dresser full of the kids’ clothes. And that’s it. I have no idea where I am going to put all of my belongings. While furniture may be lacking in the house, space is not. The majority of the rooms are absolutely just empty. Again, this is a good sized house, but the only rooms with anything in them/only rooms we spend time in are the kitchen and our bedrooms. The door to the bathroom is a shower curtain. The downstairs bathroom doesn’t even have that. But they do have hot water. So it’s all good.

Rosa’s sister with her husband and 2 kids live in a house that is basically in the same yard as ours. Her parents live across the street. They are all in and out of each others’ houses every day. Most of the families have land they work and animals. Mine is no exception. There are chickens and pigs in our yard. I went out with the family in the mornings to milk the one cow producing milk right now and to move the others. So yes, I did try to milk a cow for the first time. They made it look extremely easy. It was not. They laughed at my attempts. That is one skill that I hope to perfect while here – conquer those udders.

One morning I arrived out in the field with my mom to find her parents way down this incredibly steep slope doing something in the trees. I thought they must be harvesting some plant or something. Rosa indicated that I could remain at the top if I wanted, which I was rather tempted by, but decided to risk tumbling down anyway. If her parents made it down there… So we shimmy down this hill. Turns out they were not collecting plants, but rather trying to hoist this cow up which was lying among the trees in this ditch. I had no idea what was going on. Soon more neighbors arrived, and they all set to heaving and hoisting and pulling this cow up while I stood awkwardly to the side tugging at a rope a bit when I could. Eventually they got it out of this ditch and then went to machetiting a path slightly less steep to lead it out. Eventually I figured out that the night before it had fallen down this slope and ended up in the ditch. After this, we continued on our morning activities. Next we came across some other neighbors checking out their new born calf. It was the freshest thing I’ve ever seen. It was still lying down with some goop on it and mommy still had some goopy, bloody excess hanging out from the birth too. Just another day in the campo.

The food is decent, though eventually I will need to start making some of my own unless I decide I want to completely turn into one large potato. They eat soup for every meal. Breakfast is soup. Lunch is soup with another dish. Dinner is just soup or soup with another dish as well. They do not eat much meat, which I like. But oh my. Potatoes, mallacta (smaller potatoes), rice, pasta. Potatoes, mallacta, rice, pasta. Potatoes, mallacta, rice, pasta. It’s absurd. I wish I had taken a picture of this one meal that really stood out. It began with a Heaping bowl of soup Full of potatoes and small noodles. Main course was a mountain of rice with an all too generous portion of pasta on top. There are some veggies and fruits that occasionally show up, but the portions are small and I wish I could hide their salt and sugar from them. Fruits are always in juice form, and require silly amounts of sugar.

For the first few months in my site, I think I am just basically going to be hanging out, getting to know the people and working on my language skills. Life is going to slow down. I will be getting used to a very different pace of life. I am going to read A LOT of books in the next 2 years, which could actually be awesome. So if you have recommendations, or even better, want to send me a book someday, you should probably do that.

There is no internet in Zhud. There are about 3 small stores, a few little restaurants with entire pigs hanging out front, a school, a tiny police station, a building used for town meetings, and a health center. That is it. However, there is another town about an hour away with internet. And Cuenca is 2 hours away, which is the 3rd largest city in Ecuador and super cool.

So I am sorry friends and family, but I am not coming home just yet. I am going to give it a go in Zhud and milk some damn cows.

For now I am back in Tumbaco. 3.5 weeks left of training. Training is incredibly obnoxious, but I will enjoy my remaining time with my volunteer buddies. Unfortunately, being placed in Zhud, I am extremely far away from all of my really good friends. On the bright side (I have been working on/am getting very practiced at ‘looking on the bright side’), I will just have to travel a lot and go see them.

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Comments

[Bill Hill]

hey Jude
Dear Anita, Sounds like you need a down quilt or sleeping bag. How can I send you one? and I will work on a list of reading you might be interested in. Tried calling you a few times last night, but got endless rings the first time, then an announcement that all international calls were stacked and to try later, and I will. Love and hugs, Dad

[merry beth duffy]

Hola
HEY SWEETIE!Sounds like you will have a interesting life for the next two years! I'm sure it will go by faster than you think.Enjoy it all you can and doen't get to frustrated over the language just smile alot.Te amo MB

[Nicole]

Hey Lady, I will definitely send you some books. Facebook me your address when you can. Miss you! Love Nicole