Ecuador de mi corazón

I have had Ecuador on my mind today.

This is perhaps due, in part, to the fact that I awoke to the news of a mild earthquake (a 5.-something) in the Guayaquil area. I was able to Google-map in on the epicenter and it was just a few miles from the neighborhood in which I lived; I think that, just because of the catastrophes of the past week I am a bit 'natural-disaster sensitive' at the moment.

I lived in Guayaquil for half a year in 1992. I lived with a beautiful family who adopted me as one of their own for the time I was there, I studied at the University at night and taught in a primary school in the slum of Mapasingue during the day. Fifth grade. One of my girls was kicked out when she got pregnant. Another younger student in the school died while we were there of leukemia.

Mapasingue, view from my 5th grade classroom

I remember being so angry. So wanting to change the world. So wanting to change their lives.

But it ended up that it was mine that was changed much more, in all that I was taught while there.

Today I learned that it is much harder to find people in the third world via the Internet than it is here. "Duh," you are probably saying. But those I am trying to locate are rather established individuals. My mami just happened to appear in an online newspaper article dated TODAY, May 27, 2008, eulogizing her as an exemplary instructor for young children and giving the care and guidance that the young so need in today's world.

I am so proud. That doña is my mami! So I sent an email to the author of the article, commenting on the content of his statements and explaining a bit of the story of how this woman had also been my teacher, but not as a kindergartener but as a foreign exchange student whose life this woman greatly influenced in a very short time. I lamented the fact that our contact had completely ended 10 years ago and said that I wanted to reestablish contact. And I requested that he might either inform me as to how I might contact her through the school mentioned in the article (a school I have had no luck in Googling) or to somehow pass my information to her so that she might take initiative if she wishes.

I also found my favorite professor from Guayaquil, Profesor Vargas, and sent him an email. I met him again when I visited Guayaquil immediately following my years in Japan; I literally went from Japan to Oregon, dropped my bags there with my parents and then hopped down to Guayaquil for about a week. I needed to create a clean break with Japan and immerse myself in Spanish, especially as I had not spoken Spanish in three years yet had just been accepted into a tuition-paid graduate program as a grant scholar--ugh! I had to remind myself that yes, I still could speak Spanish! So I went to Ecuador in a jet-lagged fog. I remember Profesor Vargas taking me up to Las Peñas, a beautiful, rustic, very artistic central of Guayaquil. It was a beautiful day.

However, I remember in reality very little about that whole trip; my entire world was in such shock from leaving Japan. Even though I knew I had finite time in Japan I was still not emotionally prepared for my departure.

I was proposed marriage by my Ecuadorian "cousin" who I had been out with a few times back in 1992. I think he wanted an "in" in the USA to give him an extra edge in the shrimp market. When I told Mami I had to practially beat Frederick off with a stick, she was shocked and ready to call his mother--I had to beg her not to, that I just laughed it off, but unmarried women in Ecuador are treated by their families in a very protected manner. I really ought not have said anything...but at least, in the end, we could all have a good laugh about it!

Now I would give anything to be able to find his name so I could find out through him how to contact Mami, who is his aunt. Of course his last name is different. So I have had no luck searching the camaroneras guayaquileñas today--and yes, I have searched all of them.

Richie--I would love to contact Richie. He treated me like a princess and I was able to contact him from Japan and let him know I was heading down back in 1997. He had just opened his own discoteque and was starting to settle down a bit and really enjoy Life. One night in 1992 Richie and Jimmy took me to the licorería, bought a bottle of rum and a bottle of Coca-Cola, and we drove up to the Mirador--the Lookout--over the city. As the city lights started to waver and spin I became aware of all the "fun" that was being had all around me, and then of the fact that my toes were becoming wet--yes, Jimmy had started sucking my toes. Could have been an erotic experience had it not been Jimmy--no matter how drunk, that just was never going to happen. The police fortunately showed up and we went on a drunken, crazy, wild car race down the hill and back to my home in Las Cimas...

I felt safer in Guayaquil, a horribly poor and crime-wrought city, than I did in pretty much any other city besides Cuenca. Due in part to familiarity, I suppose. I never was robbed or had anything slashed. Followed only once; I have what is called a "determined stride" and I think that has kept me out of a lot of danger. I had worse experiences elsewhere. In Quito, the people were different. I did not like Quito as much. Not as...um...warm.

However, it appears I have nobody anymore in Guayaquil. In Manta, in Manabí, yes. Oh, how I would love to go back to visit! Manabí has its charm and, as a coastal province is a very open population.

What a rambling entry this is. I guess this is representative of just how jumbled my thoughts are today. I opened my photos and the Young Prince and I sat looking at them. I was thrilled to hear him chuckling, sharing my sense of humor at having seen cows walking in the street, a monkey that swung down in the Amazon and swiped my glasses off my face, an iguana swimming across the swimming pool, blue-footed booby birds giving besitos on the Galápagos...this is why I took these photos, now I am starting to reap more benefit than I had ever expected! I showed him pictures of Mapasingue, of my children flying homemade kites make of newspaper and sticks off a ledge of a broken-down house, of a "schoolbus", of the classrooms that had nothing plastered on the walls, of the playground that was simply cement blocks set over dust. He stared so seriously at them, uttering an "Oh" that sounded so profound for his almost-four years.

It was as if he could understand the differences, at even a most superficial level.

Perhaps the understanding has begun.

I am feeling a very strong pull coming from Ecuador--the Ecuador of my heart, a country that is backward and poor (not as poor as 20 years ago, mind you...) yet that is so rich in lessons to teach and experiences to have. I am not certain as to why I feel this way so suddenly; my sixth sense usually informs me when something is dreadfully wrong.

I pray that is not so this time.