Appreciating the Little Things

Throughout this trip it seems as though the differences between cultures appear to put a negative connotation on the culture of Cuenca.  We all have realized what little things we are missing from back home.  Thinking ahead, there are definitely going to be things here that I will miss when I get back home.  Not only will I miss the big parts, like my host family, but many little things that I experience every day.  For example, there is a small, fluffy, white dog that walks down my street every day that I pass when I go home every night and in the mornings.  He doesn´t belong to my family or anyone I know but there is a kind of silent relationship that I´m going to miss.  Coming down the stairs every morning and hearing ¨¿Como amaneciste?¨ and meeting the loving smile of my host mom will be another one of the little things missing from my life in Ohio.  Breakfast is always ready for me, no matter what time I need to leave.  If my mom in Ohio even is out of bed by the time I need to be out of the house it is a special event.  The chances that she is in a good mood that early in the morning are even slimmer.  Probably the biggest thing, though, will be all the time I have to myself.  For now, the time makes me lonely but I have a feeling that when I get back and am inundated with work to do, people to hang out with and holiday happenings I will be desperate for some alone time.  Until its gone, though, I don´t think I will appreciate it.  It will probably turn out to be that way for many things I have here in my Cuencan home but only time will tell what I will truly miss.

Intrusive/Unifying Power of Music

Throughout the time, our group has been here we have had a chance to experience many different forms of culture in many different ways.  I have noticed a great amount of cultural homogenization in the music especially in Cuenca.  My host family typically listens to a instrumental music channel on the radio in the kitchen.  Instrumental music is pretty much universal, and some of the pieces I recognize from hearing them at home.  At Amauta, we took salsa lessons and the music for that was very distinctive and indicative of the culture associated with the dance.  In the parades, many small marching bands played and groups of indigenous dancers had music to accompany them.  That music all had an ethnic flavor that made it feel and sound as if it were expressing the identity of the city.  Amidst all of this nationalism, though, a lot of United States hits have made it into the culture also.  The only other music played in my house besides classical is American popular music.  Walking in the morning, the only music blared out of car windows is English music also.  In a sense, the music here expresses the struggle between keeping the identity of your own culture and being able to evolve in a increasingly interconnected world society.  Is westernization taking over or can countries such as Ecuador keep their cultural heritage?

Ignorance is Bliss

I recently noticed some of the changes I have made throughout this trip.  One of the more predominant to me is how I walk through the city to class every morning.  I take the same route I have taken since the beginning of our time in Cuenca but my mindset on my journey each morning has shifted.  As with many of the other students, I have been given a sort of ¨specialized¨attention.  At times I feel like an exotic animal in a zoo.  Through the weeks, though, I feel more distanced from the attention than I did when I first arrived.  During the first few weeks my focus was geared towards my personal safety and staying alert.  After the culture shock of the first week, I stopped reacting to every whistle and/or noise around me.  The car alarms became an easily recognizable pattern and the dogs barking no longer woke me up at night.  Settling in was a nice and necessary adjustment.  Even the mountainous slope I hiked up every morning seemed to be enjoyable. Slowly, I started zoning out the cat calls, car horns, and giggles.  The final transformation into complete social ignorance came about a week ago when I started listening to my iPod on the way to class and, in the afternoons, wearing my sunglasses.  Now, not only have I zoned out alarms and cat calls but I have also literally taken myself out of a state of alertness at all.  I find myself happier to remain in blissful ignorance (not having to see or hear any crude, lude or rude comments) than to maintain an uber-alert state.  I believe this may be how Americans get the stereotype of being uptight and egotistical, instead of giving a desired reaction we blatently ignore parts of the culture we don´t like.  I found this interesting in how I assimilated to a new culture that I am temporarily a part of.

Regionalism in Ecuador

For a while I have been thinking about the patriotism in Ecuador.  It amazes me that not only do these people have a loyalty to their country but also to their region, and to their city even.  Even in the dialect in which Cuencano´s speak, some words or phrases are very Cuencano.  My host mom even asks me at least once a week if I like Cuencano food, as if it is so much different from food found other places in Ecuador.  I would say that in the perspective of the country alone, regionalism trumps nationalism.  Expanding on that, I would also say that loyalty to a city trumps regionalism.  If it came to a global event, though, I still believe that nationalism would be almost as strong as the loyalty to the city.  There are even local holidays here.  I cannot think of a city at home that celebrates its personal independence.  The closest we get is celebrating bicentenials of the states. It seems that Cuencanos would not only put their lives up for their country but also for their personal city.  Also, they can all recognize people from the other regions.  Many people in our group have stories of their host parents pointing out people who are from the coast, which is not that far from here.  That is like someone from Cleveland identifying someone from Columbus.  It is crazy to me how they can make that distinguishment.  It is never made in a negative sense, more as a statement of fact rather than a racial discrimination.  I suppose that in such a small country being loyal to the closest thing to you would be logical.  It is a very interesting state of mind to observe in the culture.

From the front porch looking in

Having a city tour in Guayaquil proved to be a very interesting and beautiful experience for me.  The inspiration of the coastal economy is evident in the structure of the entire city.  Everything seemed to be sea-themed, especially the boardwalk.  Much of the decoration on the piers was relateable to sailboats or ships.  I found the church one of the most intriguing places.  I was brought up Catholic and have studied Catholicism and Christianity.  In the church there was one depiction of God bestowing power unto Jesus.  It grabbed my attention, though, because God was depicted as a man.  Recently, I took a class in Catholicism.  The first class we were all asked to draw God and most drew a depiction of Jesus or a man.  Later it was described to us that God is defined as everything ¨other´.  God technically has no gender in religious terms and is everything that surrounds us.  I wonder whether this depiction has anything to do with the effects of a very machismo culture that gives a lot of power to the male gender or if this is a sign of the world still having a fairly masculine power stronghold.  In the United States, there is still a differentiation between the sexes but I have never seen a work of art that portrays a gender-neutral idea or figure, in a masculine form (at least not in a religious setting).  Personification of ideas is usually balanced between female and male expression.  While English is inundated with references to the male gender when referring to the general population, depictions of people usually includes equally males and females.  It was interesting to see the effect of masculinity even on the inner workings of religion in this culture.

The Road Less Traveled

Last week our group went to the Galapagos Islands.  I find it interesting that nature has as much say in the human system as humans have say in the natural system.  The population control there made me think about how our world may change in the coming decades.  With ever increasing problems of water, food, and overall resource availability is it possible that some day the entire planet could be regulated like these islands are? What would govern such a society? How could human rights be upheld in such a global system?  If the entire world adapted to a limited population standard, how would we say who was good enough to live?  The issue seems like a very extenuating circumstance but in fact, supposedly, humans are already overpopulated for the amount of resources on this planet.  Most Americans, actually, have a ecological footprint that is equivalent to multiple "planets" of resources if everyone adopted the same way of life.  If this continues (and assuming we don't come up with an genius way to inhabit another planet) some day we may have to choose who gets a chance to live.  In the Galapagos, only those with enough money or those who are born on the islands have the ability to stay.  Having a job there is a temporary pass to live there but that is not permanent.  For me, its interesting to ponder if the world needed to cut back population would that be how we chose who could stay? Would how much money someone makes be the selective pressure we put on ourselves to survive? We would truly take the form of mother nature creating a social darwinism selecting for rich people.  Westernization  is starting to show signs of turning into a system such as this one.  It is a scary thought that such a violation of human rights is pretty much banging on the front door of the global society.  The effects of such a system would change the world ethic.  How do you set standards on living when it is an inalienable human right?

The Broken Record Effect

Frugurt....Nice Cream. The effect of post modernism is evident fully in the advertising of Ecuadorean companies.  Post modernism could be defined as the reuse of ideas that succeeded the first time around.  In the case of Frugurt, fruit is obviously a fairly popular and healthy diet choice and yogurt has recently been increasing in popularity so a regurgitation (pun intended) of the two ideas could possibly be profitable.  The idea of mushing two ideas together to make a "new" one shows how Ecuador is staying pretty up to date in the outlook of the world.  It is concerning to think that we cannot come up with enough new ideas, so we need to refurbish and reuse the old ones.  This kind of cultural recycling is quite interesting.  In the United States, it has been evident for a while that post modernism is taking effect.  Especially in the movie industry, the effects of reusing old titles and ways of life is starting to become frustrating.  We always here history repeats itself but when the idea does not even change enough to require thought to figure out its origin, the excitement factor disappates.  I never realized that the effect of post modernism had hit other countries besides the US.  Ecuador seems to be doing a better job, so far, although I am sure there are examples to the contrary.  Mostly the effect is seen in advertising here where its not as depressing to reuse old ideas.  Sometimes that strategy can be very profitable.  A store that says Nice Cream has a positive connotation to it that, at least at a first glance, makes one smile a little.  It is different that having the newest version of Tron come out or remaking True Grit without John Wayne.  The negative connotation to our use of post modernism seemingly works against our country.  Maybe we should take after Ecuador and use it elsewhere and get some fresh ideas in other areas...

Time keeps on slippin.....

From the few weeks being here and settling in Cuenca for an extended period of time it seems the concept of time is different here.  In the United States we pride ourselves on punctuality.  Here it almost seems as if time is a suggestion not a statement of fact.  When a group of us were told to meet at 2:30, we got there around 2:15 whereas our Cuenca friends showed up around 3.  It is intriguing that such an act is normal in this culture while in the United States it would be very rude to be even a few minutes late to a meeting.  Its almost as if clocks are made differently here with the numbers jumbled.  That is the other thing about Ecuador time that is different.  In the United States, there are clocks everywhere.  Here it is almost impossible to locate a clock unless you are on a computer.  The house I am staying in has 3 clocks, but only one of them is actually set to a reasonably close time.  I am starting to feel uptight because of how closely I keep things scheduled instead of just letting loose and let time roll by as it always does.  To me, it seems primitive to not denote what hour it is.  It seems less productive in a way because you have to plan for the area of time instead of exact time.  On the other hand, things seem to run more flowingly here.  There are less disputes due to people being late and not a level of stress due to time.  To be rushed is to be uptight here.  I do not know if I will be able to adjust to this form or not or even if it is logical to do so.  The only thing to do, I suppose, is to accept the difference and assimilate to the time frame. It is always easier said than done though.

Jurassic Park

The Amazon Rainforest, undoubtedly, was awe-inspiring.  I can honestly say the memories made there are going to be some of the best of my life.  I saw some of the greatest spectacles of bird species. For me, another exciting anecdote was that we got to meet Pete Oxford, who is a photographer for National Geographic.  He was very intelligent about bird species and identification, and overall, I felt, he was a very nice man.  He especially enjoyed my laugh, which is more of a squeak.  The most amazing bird species thus far are the white-fronted toucan, hoatzin, scarlet macaw, and caracaras.
Our guide, Romiro, was quite the character as well.  He loved monkeys.  Everytime he heard one he would say, "Mira!" and run off into the forest to catch up with them.  It made the trip much more fun.  We were lucky to see as many animals as we did.  I never realized how many medicinal trees the rainforest had either.  Its like the most functional pharmacy I've ever seen.
It is hard to say what the best part of the trip was.  The lagoon canoe ride, the canopy walk, the tower, and the caiman ride were the highlights.  The only damper in the trip was the plane ride home when all the native Ecuadoreans were laughing at us mostly because of what we were wearing (i.e. hiking boots, rubber boots, field pants).  The ride itself was also quite turbulent.  If I could chose a place to call paradise, the Amazon would be it.  Despite the humidity, it is the most beautiful and calming place I've ever been to, and I hope to return sometime in the future.

A Whole New World

This week has been a very interesting one.  It was the first our group of 16 spent in Ecuador.  The cloud forests were especially amazing to me.  The first night driving through the city was an eye opener for me.  So much of the advertising in Quito is geared towards "gringos".  One that especially stood out was one that referred to a Beatles´ song.  A long banner hung with the lyrics "let me take you down cus we're going to" and the restaurant was called Strawberry Fields.  I found it interesting that not only the music in itself made it all over the world but also that it was used here in such a way.  Even in the United States I rarely see a bar named after a song of a popular band and especially not one with the lyrics helping to advertise the store. It is interesting that the lyrics were not translated, either.  The preferred audience would almost have to be tourists.  It is a growing industry here and one of the mainstays of the economy so it would make sense to have advertising geared towards foreigners.  It gives merit to the idea of english becoming the lengua franca.  The advertising not only says ¨Come here gringos¨ but indirectly it could be telling the local population that it is hip and a sign of prosperity to take on the american way of life.  The places advertised in such a way were businesses that appeared to be doing fairly well.  The association with prosperity and the United States could be the driving force of westernization here.

Welcome

Hi Everyone,

Welcome to my blog! I will be leaving for Ecuador in t-minus 9 days.  This blog will, hopefully, illustrate the intriguing portions of my travels.  I'm excited but nervous for the trip to begin.  I have never traveled outside the country before and haven't flown in over 5 years.  I am a biology major (and a huge bird nerd) so probly many of my posts will include pictures of cool little animals.  I also will be posting about how shrunken the world has gotten since technology came around.  Hope I make this interesting enough to light up your day a little bit. Love Always <3