Thursday, July 31, 2008

Writer's strike

I have been too unmotivated/lazy/stressed to finish my last story. I apologize to leave you all hanging... I have it almost done, but am just having trouble motivating myself to finish it.

So, I will instead post a public service announcement for the upcoming benefit show at my old stomping grounds: Dick's Den. Our pals in CHHF will be on the "big" stage and Noel will be behind the bar slingin' drinks and donating her tips to benefit our projects here in Ecuador. I am truly humbled by the generosity and kindness of our friends back home. You guys rock!!!! I miss you so much!!!!

Here's the details: Wednesday (my old shift...sniff sniff)
AUGUST 6TH FROM 7-9 p.m.
Dick's Den
2417 N. High Street
Columbus


They even made a flyer. Here 'tis:


so, if you live in the greater C-bus area, you MUST stop by and have a Labatt's Blue and a shot of George Dickel for me... and leave Noel a big fat tip.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Adventures in Bameno, part I

I am back from my latest trip adentro and true to form, it was an adventure. Because you are now reading this means that I got back in one piece. Not to say that I am not totally exhausted and dealing with a particularly virulent sore throat and cold…but I am back…and I am happy to be back.

‘So, how did it go,’ you ask? Well, that is a somewhat difficult question to answer. Traveling and organizing anything with the Waorani is always challenging. See any post from my trips with them for exhibits a-q.

As with any of my stories of traveling adentro, more than half of the story is just getting there. True to form, this was the case this time, too. On the flip side, I lucked out and got to go with the taxi that was taking the gas for the canoes. So instead of leaving at 8:30 a.m. and spending almost 20 hours on the rented bus (which was making several stops, plus a 6 hour detour to pick up other women), I got to leave at 7:30 p.m. and go directly to the community, which was only about 9 hours (notice I say only 9. My perspective on time will be forever changed after this whole experience. Suddenly a 4 hour drive to our cabin in MD sounds sooooo amazing). Anyway, this was huge both for my body and my mental well being.
So, Edison our taxi driver friend picks me up at my house, we drive into town to look for Manuela (who was temporarily missing) and pick up the drill bits needed for the cordless drills for the workshop. We get out of town basically on time (30 minutes late constitutes on time here). As we were leaving Puyo, we get stopped at a police checkpoint whereby the taxi driver is asked for his documents. Just a routine check. A few hours into our trip, however, we are stopped again by what looked like military police. They wanted to know what we had in the back of the truck and where we are going. Edison answered that we had gas (true) and that we were going to Gareno (false). It was an innocent enough of a lie, as it was the closest Waorani community where canoes are used frequently…it just didn’t happen to be the community where we were headed. It wasn’t a big deal, it just made for a little less hassle from the police. Okay, I should back up a moment and fill you in with important background information that would make this little lie more relevant: there is a new micro-enterprise/problem where people are smuggling gas from Ecuador (where gas is subsidized and the price fixed at $1.48 a gallon) to Colombia (not subsidized = more expensive) where it is resold at a big profit. The government is trying to crack down on the gas smuggling in the northern part of the country by basically prohibiting sales of gas into gas cans unless you have a mountain of paperwork signed by the provincial governor himself. This evidently wasn’t an option for us. So, for our merry band of travelers, this meant buying gas in Puyo, hiring a taxi to drive our gas for the canoe motors 9 hours to the town of Tiwino. Sound crazy? Well, it is. (No, we couldn’t buy it in Tena and shave 2.5 hours of the drive. Why not? Because we don’t have credit there. Why couldn’t we pay with cash? Because, we don’t have it. Funding agencies do not send a check at the initiation of a project to spend as expenses arise. The Waorani run credit at certain stores and businesses, then have to turn in the bill to get it paid for by the funder. No credit, no dice, or in this case, no gas. It is a maddeningly inefficient, and in this case, expensive system.)

Okay, back to the road trip. I manage to curl up in the backseat of the cab and catch some zzzzzzzz. Then I wake up and we are at yet another military checkpoint. This time the cab is surrounded by three military police and they tell us to get out of the car and show our identification. This is about the time that Manuela remembers she doesn’t have hers. I am slow moving trying to dig out my ID, put my shoes back on, find my glasses. I finally hand the very unfriendly guy gripping the large automatic weapon my ID and he starts grilling me with questions, “what’s in the back of the truck? Where are you going?” Reflecting on our situation> we looked so sketchy. A taxi from Puyo with two huge barrels of gas covered by a tarp headed north in the middle of the night. Hummm… I started to panic, because a different military dude was simultaneously grilling Edison and I wasn’t sure what Edison was saying…if he was going to tell them the name of the actual community where we were going or some other random name or story. I was really fearful of contradicting whatever he said and risk getting us into some type of trouble, so I played the dumb gringa card and pretended to not understand what we was asking. No speak espanol. Thankfully I didn’t have to play this game very long because Edison had quickly completed his interrogation got back in the drivers seat and said “vamos.” No problem. I understood that. We all got back in the car and took off. Turns out Edison happens to be retired military. And, it turns out that they were searching for weapons not smuggled gas. Deep breaths.

At around 4:30 a.m. we stop at the newly installed military/Environment Ministry checkpoint. The station is new and is charged with trying to stop the flow of valuable tropical hardwood illegally logged from the Waorani territory (the flow of wood, incidentally, is headed to Colombia where it is processed and then too often it makes it to the U.S. as various final products). We asked if the busload of Waorani women had already passed on their way to Tiwino (our plan was to meet up with the bus at the bridge around 5 a.m.). The guys at the station didn’t seem to know what we were talking about. What? This was very worrisome, because that meant the bus had problems or something happened. We decided to push ahead. When we drove to the Tiwino bridge, we saw the big red bus parked along the side of the road. So if a huge red bus full of Waorani and a few random gringos passed through the checkpoint without notice without them noticing, how easy was it for the cunning illegal loggers? I don’t know what this says about the checkpoint system…but in their defense, there was a “shift change” at 4 a.m. and the previous guys might have dealt with them…but still……..sketchy.
At dawn, we unload the two tons of food and baggage from the bus and carry it down to the area where we would be loading the canoes. Except the canoes weren’t there. We took over the cute thatched tourist cabin adjacent to the river and hung out while we waited…and waited …and waited. About 5 hours later, the big wide steel canoe steered by Penti pulled up. No explanation was offered as to why he wasn’t there at dawn, as we had agreed. These are just one of the things that you just have to deal with in this line of work. Because a lot fewer Waorani women came than expected, we were able to cram into one canoe…which was great because there wasn’t another canoe. As gringos, we were offered the prime seats (with backs!) while the Waorani willingly piled in on top of bags and one another. We’re all set to go and then we are forced into yet another holding pattern. Evidently there was a part to the motor missing. Deja vous hits me again from my last trip where we were missing a critical part. Very luckily, this part was able to be found somewhere close…and we were finally off…at the crack of 11:30 a.m.
The plan was we were going to leave at dawn and go straight to Bameno, our final destination. The estimated travel time was 12 hours, which, if we left on time would put us there right at sunset. The late start put a bit of a kink in this plan. We didn’t want to be on the river after dark, and we didn’t want to have to camp on one of the beaches…which happened to be in what is called the Intangible Zone of the Waorani territory (mom & dad don’t freak out) which has been set aside for the Tagaeri and Taromenane, two “uncontacted” indigenous groups who live in voluntary isolation. Not unlike how the Waorani were before contact with missionaries, these groups are fiercely defensive of their territory. So, basically, camping on the beach was not a good option.
So, without really discussing any of this yet, we just pushed off and motored downriver. The weather was actually quite perfect. Yay! I’m not completely cursed with bad luck! It was partly cloudy, so the sun was not beating down on us. And there was no rain. The wildlife viewing was awesome. We saw a Harpy Eagle (very rare) several pairs of Scarlet Macaws, lots of parrots and tucans, Currasows (also very rare), lots of monkeys (mostly squirrel monkeys), turtles, Amazon Kingfishers, trogons, and lots of other birds we couldn’t identify. I am sure we would have seen a lot more animals had the loud canoe motor not scared so many away. Had it been raining, the trip would have been quite miserable. The hardest part was just getting comfortable. Despite the cushioning offered by my sleeping pad, my ass was aching after just a couple hours. There was just no way to get comfortable.
We kept motoring away, only getting hung up once when the engine cut out and we drifted into some branches and then got hung up on a log...


Can the canoe be unlodged from the tree?
Will the group be attacked by vicious caimans and boas?
Will our hapless heroine make it to Bameno and avert nightime attacks by the uncontacted tribes?

Tune in tomorrow for the exciting conclusion of Adventures in Bameno!!!

Monday, July 14, 2008

random ramblings

A big thank you to all my friends, family and blogstalkers that bought tickets for the Peace Corps Ecuador Gender and Development Committee raffle! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am excited to report that with your help, we raised over $12,000 which will provide more than 70 scholarships for Ecuadorian girls so that they can finish their high school educations. The funds raised will also support leadership camps as well as an important campaign to combat the increasing problem of trafficking and sexual exploitation of persons—particularly women and children. It was an amazing fundraising effort…with almost $1,000 coming in through a last minute push.

I wish I could say that someone I knew took home the grand prize of roundtrip tickets between the U.S. and Ecuador…but sorry, no dice. That prize went to Anne Nooney. But, Anne, if you’re reading this, please contact me! Let’s chat. : )

So, if you “didn’t get a chance/forgot/were to late/” to support our scholarship program through the raffle, you can ease your guilt through supporting another great project close to my heart: an Environmental Education guide for teachers that my hubby is writing (and I am providing critical moral support, editorial review and refreshing beverage delivery service while he works on it). It’s a great project…as the teachers here are desperate for these types of educational materials…and certainly the environmental ethic is lacking among large segments of the population here. He’s tailoring it towards the specific environmental challenges in the region, getting local teachers to review it and then will be providing training workshops to roll it out. Anyway, check it out support it with a donation, porfa!

Okay, enough of the ads. What have I been up to lately that I haven’t been too busy to blog…. Let’s see. The last few weeks I have been occupied with my work with the Gender and Development Committee. I had a lot of legwork leading up to the big raffle as well as dealing with budget and meeting planning issues for our little group. There were a few bumps along the way, but in the end, everything went swimmingly. My work with the committee has been one of the most rewarding parts of my Peace Corps Service. The group is great. Another VERY rewarding part of my experience, while I’m mentioning it, is my interaction with my World Wise Schools teacher and class at Unioto High School in Chillicothe, Ohio. The class has been learning about Ecuador…both studying on their own, and communicating with me through emails, letters, skype and even a Peace Corps sponsored phone call (we were one just a handful chosen worldwide to participate in the call). A cool experience for both all involved. A big public shout out of thanks to Mrs. Knipp for the awesome carepack!!! Awesome!

In other news, Jer and I snuck away for a (way too) short trip to the coast for a combo 4th of July/birthday/going away gathering for one of our PC Pals. BIG NEWS: I SAW A WHALE!!!! Yes, my friends, I went on a whale watching trip and actually SAW a whale. Not just one. I think I must have seen 50… or the same two whales 25 times…either way, it was SPECTACULAR! At one point they were only about 20 meters off the side of the boat. It was an awesome experience. I saw one do a huge jump/breach. Others seemed to be waving their flippers in the water like synchronized swimmers. It was mating season, so we saw lots of pairs swimming together and surfacing to spout their water at the same time. Okay, that description is less than eloquent, but I’m rushing to write this, so cut me some slack. We also went to Isla de la Plata, also known as the “poor person’s Galapagos” as you can see some of the same wildlife there as you can on the Galapagos, for about 1/10 the price. WE SAW BOOBIES!!! Blue-footed boobies, that is. And lots of frigate birds…sea turtles, a snake, some lizards… We went snorkeling off the island and saw brilliant Nemo-like fish as well as dozens of other unusual other-worldly looking sea creatures. It was a cool experience…just way too little time to spend in a place that took so long to get to…

So…speaking of places that take a long time to get to…I will be going to the Waorani village of Bameno this week. I don’t even want to think about how long this trip is going to take, or how many gray hairs I will get as a result of dealing with the logistics of this marathon trek. Let’s just say it is going to be by far my longest and deepest trip adentro yet. The Waorani Women’s Association is hosting another handicraft workshop... So, if this trip is anything like my last few trips adentro, I should have a 15-20 page blog entry...and will need another dye job. So, you’ll have to sit tight and wait till I get back…which won’t be until the 24th or so…to hear my latest exciting tale from the jungle. Wish me luck.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Zipline



Thursday, July 3, 2008

bus stop buddy

Walking home from town the other day I ran across two little girls playing by themselves on a bench at a bus stop. Something compelled me to stop and talk with them. One of the girls, Jennifer (she pronounces it YENeefer) was five years old. She was precocious, friendly…in that nosey yet innocent way of asking a zillion questions (Where are you going? Why? Where do you live? How far? How old are you? How many brothers do you have? and on and on and on…). She had a high pitched squeaky voice. Below the hem of her jean skort, were two dirty, knobby knees. Her friend whose name I can’t remember was four years old. She was striking not so much for her light skin, but for her short, caramel-colored curly hair and wide set brownish-hazel eyes. It turns out Jennifer’s mom works at a local restaurant. Her sidekick’s parental unit works at the car seat re-upholstery place next to it. Evidently, the sidewalk and bus stop in front of the businesses was their self-managed daycare center. I played with them for a while, but, having grand plans of going for a jog, I said goodbye and started to walk on down the sidewalk... Or tried to, anyhow. The girls had other plans. They each grabbed one of my arms, dug in their heels with all their strength (which was significant considering their size) pulled me back towards the bus stop. They begged and pleaded for me not to go. After several unsuccessful attempts at detaching them from my arms and legs, I walked (with them still attached) back toward the restaurant where Jennifer’s mom was working, hoping for maternal intervention. No such luck. The owner of the local laundry mat who was chatting up the young mother, urged me to just take them with me. I jokingly asked them if they wanted to go with me to the U.S. (usually kids here are terrified of this suggestion) but these two readily agreed.

“But you don’t have your suitcases packed,” I said.

“We don’t need suitcases,” they replied.

“Well, you’ll at least need a coat, because it gets really, really cold in my country during the winter. We have snow there, you know,” I say to them teasingly.

All the sudden the little one detaches and takes off running down the sidewalk the other way. Jennifer was hot on her heels. Did the thought of snow scared them? This was my chance to make a break for it. But... I hesitated just a moment too long and both girls came racing out of some storefront towards me again. Each of them had a little sweater in their hand… ready to go with me...