Jeeze, I cannot believe it's already January 17th and this is my first post of the year! Sorry to those out there in cyberspace who have grown wane and thin from lack of Leslie-blogging.
New Year's Resolution Update:
I know you're all dying to find out how I’m doing. So, um, not too bad. I have eaten at least one veggie all but one day, I believe. And I've managed the afore-mentioned goal of two per day about half the time. I am trying to get better. Part of the problem is my poor pre-planning. I'll be on my way out the door for school and realize I don't have a veggie for lunch. But I have neither something ready to go, nor enough time to prepare the veggies to take. So I skip the lunch veggie with plans to double up on the supper veggies. Which sometimes happens, and sometimes...not so much. Complicating my problem is Ecuador's lack of frozen or canned veggies. But all that to say I bought another big load of vegetarian goodness today at SuperMaxi (yes, that's what the store's called; its big brother is MegaMaxi. I'm not kidding) and spent an hour decontaminating, slicing and dicing. Hopefully I'll be set for success this week.
Bible Reading. Going...ok. I'm a little worse at this one because I know the goal is for the whole year, rather than day-by-day. Both weekends so far have been used to catch up to where I should be. I am moderately embarrassed about this. But still I plug on. I'm reading in chronological order, so we started with Creation in Genesis, and now I'm wading through Job's horrible excuse for a social network. I mean seriously! "Curse God and die!" ?? Did Job's wife's mommy forget to mention the "supportive" and "encouraging" aspects of being a wife? Man, she makes ME look like a person with the gift of compassion! And his friends? Yikes, man! Is there no one else in town? Maybe one of those "I alone survived" guys to come be your yes man? In all, it stinks to be Job.
Moving right along. It seems that the "real" rainy season may finally have arrived in my fair city. It's been raining nearly non-stop for about 24 hours now. Well, I guess I can't really account for the hours between 1am and 10am. But it was raining both when I fell asleep and when I awoke. It usually starts to rain in the afternoon during 8th period (last period of the day) which is convenient for my walk home shortly thereafter. But Friday it wasn't raining- it was pouring down in true monsoon fashion. I chatted in the teacher's lounge with some friends for awhile hoping to wait it out, but eventually the futility of that plan occurred to us, and we headed out.
I cross one big street during my 6 block walk. This particular road (Avenido America) is split in the middle with the trolley lanes. So there's, I think...8 lanes all together. Three northbound, then a little sidewalk to wait on; then the two trolley lanes; another sidewalky area; then the three southbound lanes. So I got stuck on one of the sidewalks between the roads because of the LUNATIC DRIVING that happens on Friday and Saturday nights in Quito. I mean, now this is a definite tangent, but these people are CRAZY! It's like all common sense and knowledge of all things driving-related is shut out of drivers' head by some sort of magnetic force.
Anyway, so I rushed between the stop-and-go traffic to the first sidewalk area and, in my haste to not be run over, didn't notice the big trolley (which is actually more like a bus) that was speeding across the intersection. Said trolley aparently did not notice me, either, because it rushed past, sloshing nasty, cold, dirty street-slime-water all over my feet and legs.
Just as I was preparing to be annoyed, I glanced up and caught the eye of an Ecuadorian woman who had just been assaulted in the same way by the same rude trolley. She smiled at me as she brushed herself off, and I couldn't help smiling back. Thanks, unknown Ecuadorian lady, for the perspective. No harm done.
And it was good that the unnamed lady put me in a good mood about my wetness at just that moment, because about 10 seconds later, as I was trying to cross the rest of the street, I ran into a cross between a huge puddle and a flooded street. Short of walking through the middle of the cross-street, there was no way to NOT wade through six inches of rushing water in the street-turned-river. I opted for wet feet over death (you will remember the drivers had all gone temporarily insane) and I just walked through the stream. Here's what I looked like by the time I got home:
New Year's Resolution Update:
I know you're all dying to find out how I’m doing. So, um, not too bad. I have eaten at least one veggie all but one day, I believe. And I've managed the afore-mentioned goal of two per day about half the time. I am trying to get better. Part of the problem is my poor pre-planning. I'll be on my way out the door for school and realize I don't have a veggie for lunch. But I have neither something ready to go, nor enough time to prepare the veggies to take. So I skip the lunch veggie with plans to double up on the supper veggies. Which sometimes happens, and sometimes...not so much. Complicating my problem is Ecuador's lack of frozen or canned veggies. But all that to say I bought another big load of vegetarian goodness today at SuperMaxi (yes, that's what the store's called; its big brother is MegaMaxi. I'm not kidding) and spent an hour decontaminating, slicing and dicing. Hopefully I'll be set for success this week.
Bible Reading. Going...ok. I'm a little worse at this one because I know the goal is for the whole year, rather than day-by-day. Both weekends so far have been used to catch up to where I should be. I am moderately embarrassed about this. But still I plug on. I'm reading in chronological order, so we started with Creation in Genesis, and now I'm wading through Job's horrible excuse for a social network. I mean seriously! "Curse God and die!" ?? Did Job's wife's mommy forget to mention the "supportive" and "encouraging" aspects of being a wife? Man, she makes ME look like a person with the gift of compassion! And his friends? Yikes, man! Is there no one else in town? Maybe one of those "I alone survived" guys to come be your yes man? In all, it stinks to be Job.
Moving right along. It seems that the "real" rainy season may finally have arrived in my fair city. It's been raining nearly non-stop for about 24 hours now. Well, I guess I can't really account for the hours between 1am and 10am. But it was raining both when I fell asleep and when I awoke. It usually starts to rain in the afternoon during 8th period (last period of the day) which is convenient for my walk home shortly thereafter. But Friday it wasn't raining- it was pouring down in true monsoon fashion. I chatted in the teacher's lounge with some friends for awhile hoping to wait it out, but eventually the futility of that plan occurred to us, and we headed out.
I cross one big street during my 6 block walk. This particular road (Avenido America) is split in the middle with the trolley lanes. So there's, I think...8 lanes all together. Three northbound, then a little sidewalk to wait on; then the two trolley lanes; another sidewalky area; then the three southbound lanes. So I got stuck on one of the sidewalks between the roads because of the LUNATIC DRIVING that happens on Friday and Saturday nights in Quito. I mean, now this is a definite tangent, but these people are CRAZY! It's like all common sense and knowledge of all things driving-related is shut out of drivers' head by some sort of magnetic force.
Anyway, so I rushed between the stop-and-go traffic to the first sidewalk area and, in my haste to not be run over, didn't notice the big trolley (which is actually more like a bus) that was speeding across the intersection. Said trolley aparently did not notice me, either, because it rushed past, sloshing nasty, cold, dirty street-slime-water all over my feet and legs.
Just as I was preparing to be annoyed, I glanced up and caught the eye of an Ecuadorian woman who had just been assaulted in the same way by the same rude trolley. She smiled at me as she brushed herself off, and I couldn't help smiling back. Thanks, unknown Ecuadorian lady, for the perspective. No harm done.
And it was good that the unnamed lady put me in a good mood about my wetness at just that moment, because about 10 seconds later, as I was trying to cross the rest of the street, I ran into a cross between a huge puddle and a flooded street. Short of walking through the middle of the cross-street, there was no way to NOT wade through six inches of rushing water in the street-turned-river. I opted for wet feet over death (you will remember the drivers had all gone temporarily insane) and I just walked through the stream. Here's what I looked like by the time I got home:
It was a little like rainy season in China, except colder. :) In case you're curious, this is in the hallway of my apartment building. The open door behind me is my apartment. One of my lovely neighbors, Amy, took this fantastic shot for me.
In closing, let me share a second-hand hilarious student moment with you. Craig, a Canadian co-worker was talking with some of his students (high school) Friday about the plane crash on the east coast last week. If you hadn't heard, a flock of Canadian geese fried both engines on a passenger plane, which was then forced to make an emergency water landing into Hudson Bay. Happily, there were no human casualties of the crash (though it must have been a bad day for those geese...). So, one of the kids asks Craig how they knew the geese were Canadian (remember, these are South American kids), and Craig, unable to miss this perfect opportunity, replies, "Because they said, '(honk), eh? (honk) eh?"
In closing, let me share a second-hand hilarious student moment with you. Craig, a Canadian co-worker was talking with some of his students (high school) Friday about the plane crash on the east coast last week. If you hadn't heard, a flock of Canadian geese fried both engines on a passenger plane, which was then forced to make an emergency water landing into Hudson Bay. Happily, there were no human casualties of the crash (though it must have been a bad day for those geese...). So, one of the kids asks Craig how they knew the geese were Canadian (remember, these are South American kids), and Craig, unable to miss this perfect opportunity, replies, "Because they said, '(honk), eh? (honk) eh?"
