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I was so much older then, I am younger than that now. Ecuador

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I have now been back from Ecuador a little over two months.  I have already taken a vacation (Taking The Canadian train across Canada) and am getting ready for many more.  My settling in to Greenville has gone better than I expected in some ways, harder than expected in others. When people ask me did I love Quito and Ecuador.. I can be a bit flummoxed as to where to start.  So much of it I loved, so much of it was sooo hard, and some if I just endured.  It was a jumble in so many many ways.  But for me, the important story  is that somewhere along the line my reboot button got set.  After being back for about 6 weeks  I spent 10 days walking and riding on a train with no wifi .  My head cleared and some ideas of how I would like to spend the next years came together.  In short, I am good! For the first time in a VERY long time, I am curious about my future and looking forward to it. For me - the pre- and post Ecuador me is best expressed in one of my all time favorite song lyrics
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What I will miss in Ecuador

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I started witing this the day I left in my home, then in the airport.  Then last Wed. I got home and now I am finishing it at home.   I am going to finish up my blog here in Carolina de Sur. ______ I am sitting in my room waiting for time to leave for the airport.  I am totally ready with hours to spare, and when I get to the airport I will have hours to kill.  I am very! excited to be going home. But there are some things I will miss about my life in Ecuador.  Below is a list in no particular order. $3.25 worth of fruit from market across the street from me. 1. THE FOOD. Ecuador has more types of fruit than anywhere I have ever been.There is a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables at incredibly low prices.  It is cheaper to eat well in Ecuador than to eat junk food. (Chifles by far being my favorite junk food)  I will particularly miss the eggs.  The eggs are fresh, often with pieces of feathers and various chicken things, and cost 7/$1.00.  They are unwashed so do not need to be
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MY TRANSPORT (MIS) ADVENTURES PART II

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ECOVIA In my last post, I went through transport issues at my first house, and my first cycle of teaching.  In December I moved to a new house, where my hosts were a married couple Byron and Elsa.  I love Byron and Elsa and we spent many dinners sitting around the table and laughing and laughing. This in spite of  language gaps.  One of the frequent sources for our laughter were my transport stories. The commute from my new house to work was quite easy and safe.  I was able to take EcoVia both ways.  My house was on top of a very high hill, about a mile from the EcoVia stop.  On the way to work, it was downhill all the way and with breathtaking views of Quito and the Andes.  Coming home at night it was a mile up a Quito hill (a Quito hill is much steeper than a San Francisco hill).  However, the neigborhood ran a small bus service where for 25 cents you could take a bus up the hill. Ecovia is one of the public transport buses in Quito.  I have a real love/hate relationship w
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MY TRANSPORT (MIS) ADVENTURES PART I. A good deal of my time and energy has spent trying to get myself from one place to another physically and emotionally intact. While this has been relatively easy  since January, September - December was another issue.  But in any case  I was always accruing good stories.  As I think my transport (mis)advntures are a pretty good reflection of my whole Quito/Ecuadorian experience, and they reflect the different places where I lived and also another theme of my life here - telephones-I will tell my transport stories. TRANSPLANETA I have had several comments on how my posts often are about hard times - or not exactly good times. And I don't think anything demonstrates "the good, the bad, and the ugly" as much as my Transplaneta experience.  The Transplaneta is the specific  bus I took from my first home to work.  It is part of a private bus company in Quito.  At this point in my Quito experience I did not know Quito, I did
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LIMA, Spanish, and turning towards home

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Peruvian ceviche - raw fish, corn, sweet potato, served with Pisco Sour. LIMA I have been back from Lima for a bit now - actually Monday is the 2nd test for my class (2/4) so I have been back for about weeks.  Lima was great - it was a week of ceviche and Spanish.  I stayed in a very upscale neighborhood - Miraflores -and the apartment I rented  a room in was two blocks from my Spanish school.  The Spanish school was really, really good - and I believe I did make some progress.  At this school we studied in classes- with no more than five people to a class.  I had only one classmate - a young (22-23) German woman who knew German, English, French and was learning Spanish.  Her English was so good when I first heard her talk I thought she was from the USA.  Whether it was because she was young, had already learned many languages, or she was just smarter than me - she was pretty amazing.  We would learn a new tense, the teacher would put the conjugation on the board, an
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VACATIONS!

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VACATIONS, Well, once again I am pretty shocked at how little I have blogged. There is so much I want to blog about and yet somehow it doesn't happen.  I am actually beginning to turn my sights to coming home - and I am very excited to do so.  But I want to catch up on my blog/journal  before I return. I teach in 8 week cycles and will teach a total of 4 cycles.  Next week I will end my third cycle and I will begin my fourth and last cycle June 5.  In between cycles we have at least a week off.  Time off is hard for me - weekends alone are a struggle, as I spend way too much time alone so having several weeks alone poses a challenge.   Popular vacations for expats/ tourists are the Galapagos, the Amazon, and other beach places.  As I only travel alone here I pick places and activities that I think I will enjoy alone AND that I think I can handle logistically on my own and with my limited Spanish.  Logistics really just means my ability to get around a city and f
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Feliz Ano Nuevo ( and MLK day, Presidents' Day, Groundhog Day, St. Valentine's Day, etc.)

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GreetingMen at equator site at Cayambe, Ecuador I wish each and every one an exciting, interesting, healthy, and safe New Years.  ( a few months late) The picture above is is of a set of statues that I saw on my holiday travels and they really touched me.   I had never heard of this art project, and now I am enthralled by it.  While it is no longer New Years ( in fact it is PAST my 65th birthday in the depths of winter and I am sad to be old, happy to be alive, and grateful for Medicare!)  I still want to blog about this artist and his works. These statues are part of the Greeting Man art project.  (http://www.greetingman.com/)The artist is   Yoo Young-ho  from South Korea   The Greetingman project is placing these statues in strategic places around the world.  Each statue is blue - to represent lack of prejudice and is 6 m high and bowing in greeting.  Below is an explanation on why the artist chose to represent greetings . “Greetings are the beginning of all relationships
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