Pero, antes de acabar...

Hello dear loyal followers of this blog (I’m talking to the 15 of you that actually read my community service blog).

My countdown has, somehow, officially reached single digits, so I thought I’d give you a quick update on what’s going on, with the promise of more thorough posts to come. My main concern right now is the 20 or 30ish page investigative/research paper that I am writing. In Spanish. My paper is about the public vs. critical perspective of the recently changed education policies in Ecuador. This is the longest paper than I’ve ever written in English let alone Spanish, so until Tuesday I shouldn’t spend too much of my time regaling you all with my Ecuadorian misadventures. 

However, after Tuesday (maybe one of these before I get home?) I plan to post a blog about running here in Ecuador that I’ve written in my head, the blog I promised wherein I’m real about the challenges of being abroad, and that one blog I wrote in January and promised I’d post in May.

I’ll also potentially write about getting back to the states and what that’s like, but who knows.

Mid-Chiva Ride PC: Brianne

Never fear though. A quick story for your enjoyment: aside from having a Latin American lover, should you spend time in Latin America, I also recommend that you do your best to find your way onto a Chiva party. A chiva is essentially a truck where usually there’d be cargo or animals, but instead they cut off the sides, leaving a sort of “fence” and then dressed up the inside to be a dance floor. In the one I was in there was also a pole dancing pole. I’m not sure if it’s standard or not, but alas. The chiva drives around for a few hours blasting Latin American music as people dance and drink. As you can imagine, with each turn and stop light there is ungraceful lurching and as I’m already a poor dancer, I can’t tell you how many times I came THAT close to falling on my face only to be saved by my friends. I had a blast not only dancing (or can you call what I do dancing?) but also being able to see Quito at nighttime as we sailed through the streets. And I’m just lucky enough that I get to do it all again tomorrow.

Enough procrastination, back to my project. (Wait, but does anyone have any funny YouTube videos I NEED to see right now or songs I should listen to?)