Video log entry featuring Lori’s visit to Ecuador: canyoning, zip lining, swinging, swimming, sliding, jumping, Lori driving a buggy, rafting, and overall having a grand adventure. Thanks for sharing these experiences with me, Lori. Come visit Ecuador, it’s an amazing place. All is possible!
As a child, I grew up in a farming town of about 15-20,000 people. For years, I dreamt of leaving my small town and exploring the world. Living in a big city, learning more about new people and places, and having greater opportunities available seemed like the ultimate lifestyle. This isn’t to say I didn’t…
Ecuador will always have a special place in my heart. It´s the first country I visited outside the US (when I was 17!), it’s the place where my sister lived for a year, the country that my brother-in-law is from, and it is the first country I have stayed in for an extended period of time….
At 6:21 my eyelids flicker open. My alarm, set for 7:45 am, is at this point a hopeful dream. The rays of sun streaming in through my thin lilac fairy curtains push me out of sleep and into wakefulness long before I am ready to leave my subconscious. The sound of the news comes into…
Sometimes I forget I’m in Ecuador. Most days are pretty standard. I eat oatmeal for breakfast, just like I did back in the States. I still drink coffee twice a day (but it’s instant. I have come to accept this sadness.) I go to school every day just like I did back in Berkeley, though…
I prefer deep conversations. I like conversations that stimulate your senses and make you reconsider what you thought you knew. Discussions that leave you hungry for more knowledge and a greater understanding of the world around you, that you vividly recall months and years later. Even as a child, I preferred serious conversations to surface level chats. I still…
One of the best aspects of living in Ecuador is the preponderance of holidays. In the 6.5 weeks that I’ve been here, there have already been two holiday weekends. Talk about awesome. Now, when you’re a foreigner living in abroad, you’re almost obligated to aprovechar de the holiday weekends and go see more of what your beautiful…
Quito is no longer new. I’ve been here almost a month and a half, and I am beginning to feel like life here is my new normal. Our training with WorldTeach ended, and along with it the camp-y feeling of spending all my time with 24 other volunteers, visiting tourist spots in the city on the weekends,…
I’m not going to lie, the idea of “EcuaTweets” monthly blog posts was not my own. Before coming to Ecuador, I did my research and read countless Peace Corps and WorldTeach blogs. One of my absolute favorites was a PCV blog by a Cal alum in Zambia (fishinginzambia.wordpress.com). I loved reading his insights and anecdotes…
As a little girl growing up in the Central Valley of California, I was lucky enough to have easy access to both mountains and beaches. Every year, my family would usually take two vacations: one to the beaches of Sea Ranch, and another to a national park in the Sierra Nevadas. While I thoroughly enjoyed…