Today is Friday, our last day at
the center working with the children and staff of Calderón, and our last day
working together as a team. At breakfast we talked about what we were
going to do today and reviewed the words to "Te Quiero Yo," the
Barney song "I Love You", which we appropriated to represent our
feelings toward the people we are serving in Ecuador. At the team meeting, Tom
read a moving poem by a cancer survivor that helped remind us what we are doing
and why we are here and Seija read her journal entry, which included
reflections of her extended stay in Ecuador. The team, already feeling the
bittersweet reality of ending a successful mission and facing saying goodbye to
our hosts, were equally moved by Seija's emotional writing. On the bus to
Calderón, we practiced "Te Quiero Yo" several times while I did my best
to play the chords on the charango, and our driver, Fabián (the husband of
Pilar, a key member of our host organization, FUNDAC), tried to keep his eyes
on other cars, buses, and trucks as they dashed in and out of traffic with
abandon.
We arrived late at the center, with
the children having already eaten their breakfast. Being Friday, many
children were home with their families; Katie was a bit disappointed to find
that there were only four kids in Tía Alexandra's class. Tom started his
day as usual, with a task list that included more to do than any person would
be able to accomplish in one day. Today he started by finding examples of
screws he needed Maggie to buy at the hardware store. (Maggie has become quite
the hardware shopper, by the way, while supporting an array of Global Volunteer
projects.) Seija reported to Ruby's classroom and proceeded as she did
every other day, proactively helping the children move from task to task with a
mix of fun and precision; one might hear her chanting, "uno, dos, tres, cuatro"
with the kids as they literally marched to the bathroom. After going on a brief
shopping mission in the local commercial area, Suzanne resumed working in Tía Gaby's
class and I made my way to the kitchen.
The morning proceeded like any
other morning at the center with the exception of the tías obviously making preparations for our final celebration and
the tías in the kitchen making plans
to move to their new location about five blocks down the street from the
center. In between preparing healthy meals for the children, Olga, Elisa, and
Marisol were sifting through drawers and cabinets selecting items that would be
moved later in the day. While the ladies were generally happy and relieved to
have found an affordable location to prepare food for both centers and to have
received permission from FUNDAC to borrow the stoves and a refrigerator from
the centers, there were moments of sad reflection. One such moment
involved Olga finding a memento from her late husband's funeral. Elisa and
Marisol huddled around Olga as they read the words next to a photo of her
husband in a frame bordered by the baby Jesus, his Mother Mary, and angels.
This poignant moment made clear that the ladies had shared good times as well
as emotionally difficult times together in this soon to be decommissioned
kitchen.
After helping serve lunch to the
kids, and as the kids were going down for their naps, the Global Volunteers
team went to Belén's for our final lunch and devoured another delicious
sampling of Ecuadorian cuisine. On the way back to the center, Tom, Katie, and
Seija stepped into a masapán shop for
one more look at the handcrafted souvenirs that are the pride of Calderón. We
returned to the center while the tías
were finishing their lunch. While we were away, the ladies in the kitchen
had already moved the stove to the new location and asked if I could walk there
to help the driver unload the refrigerator that was being relocated from Center
2. We walked down the street, over the highway on a pedestrian overpass,
and another block and a half to the new kitchen. The driver and
refrigerator were waiting in front of the white block building that had a large
metal security door and smaller service window built into the front. Inside
was a large, immaculately clean space with kitchen equipment stacked throughout
on the floor. Olga explained that, with a little help from members of the
community, everything was going to be set up on Sunday. All of us on the Global
Volunteers team are relieved that the FUNDAC organization and staff conceived a
workable solution to this issue that threatened the ongoing viability of the
centers.
Time to party!!! One by
one, after each of us finished our last task of this volunteer trip, the Global
Volunteers team sat down in the large room at the front of the center. The
tías were all wearing black and were
taping themselves with masking tape to simulate skeletons. Elvita started
the final celebration with a short speech thanking Global Volunteers and our
team while Maggie provided us with an English translation. The tías then gathered in front of us and
the kids, donned skeleton masks, and started a song playing on the sound system
about skeletons who get up at night, kill imaginary things, scream when they
see their reflections in the mirror, and then go back to sleep during the day. Many
thanks to Maggie for the translation of this song; some of us were a bit concerned
about what messages the tías were
trying to convey. We now understand that they were honoring us with a
locally popular song and a creative interpretive dance.
Suzanne and Neal with the new charango
Then it was our turn to perform
for the children, the tías, and the
FUNDAC members who were present. Tom started our portion of the celebration
with an impassioned speech of thanks to all of the center staff and FUNDAC for
allowing us to share these two weeks with them. He told those gathered
that we would be forever grateful for the love and kindness we received from
them and that we would remember them forever, a sentiment shared by all members
of the Global Volunteers team. After Tom finished speaking on our behalf (with
gentle prodding from Katie), we started singing "Te Quiero Yo." As I played
the charango, Seija, Katie, Tom, and Suzanne sang and did hand motions toward
everyone. With little encouragement, everyone joined in when we sang the
song in Spanish.
Tom giving his heartfelt words
After we sang the English and
Spanish versions of the song, each member of the Global Volunteers team said a
few words to thank our hosts, the tías,
and the children. Then, with everyone singing along, we sang the Spanish
version of "Te Quiero Yo" one more time. No sooner did we sit down
than the tías asked each one of us to
come forward, one at a time, to receive handmade cards and gifts of masapán. The tías thanked each one of us and gave us a big hug. A frenzy of
dancing and picture taking followed and lasted for the next hour. Hugs
were shared among nearly everyone left in the center, along with requests for
email addresses and promises to return to Ecuador some day. After much well
wishing, the Global Volunteers team made it to Pili's van for the return to our
hotel.
Tía Norma and Neal
Elvia and Suzanne
Elvia, Suzanne, and Tía Gaby
Óscar and Tom
Katie, Tía Roxana, and Tía Alexandra with two little ones
Suzanne, Tía Ruby, and Seija
Tía Olga, Suzanne, and Neal with his new handmade magnet
Pilar and Tom
Suzanne showin' her moves
Tía Gaby and Neal
Tía Karina and Seija
Elvia, Katie, Suzanne, Pilar, and Seija
Shirley and Tom
Maggie met us at the hotel at
6:15 p.m. to take us out on the town in the Historic Center of Quito. After
a cab ride in the typically slow Friday night traffic of Quito, the Global Volunteers
team arrived at the part of Old Quito known as La Ronda. The street and just
about every business was crowded with people eating, drinking, and listening to
a variety of live Latin American music. We stepped into one restaurant
that served what must be the largest empanada known to man; I think it was
about two feet long, a foot wide, and covered in coarse granulated sugar. Then
we walked to the bottom of the street and back up to a restaurant serving
traditional Ecuadorian fare and featuring three musicians playing a variety of
Ecuadorian and Andean music. Here Maggie recommended we try a traditional
Ecuadorian cocktail, to which, being the compliant volunteers that we are, we
eagerly complied.
By the time we finished our
courses at the Ecuadorian restaurant, it was time to catch a cab back to the
hotel. At the hotel, the team presented Maggie with a card and a token of
our appreciation. We thanked her, said goodbye to one another, and went to our
rooms. Tom and Katie planned to get up early in the morning, take a shuttle to
the airport, and catch a flight back home to Georgia. Seija planned to check
out of the hotel and check in to a hotel in the Historic District of Quito to
finish out her long stay in Ecuador. And Suzanne and I planned to rent a
car and drive to Baños to veg for three days before returning to San Francisco.
On behalf of all of us on Ecuador
Team 151, thank you, Maggie, and thank you, Global Volunteers, for giving us
the opportunity to serve the community of Calderón, where we received much more
from our hosts than we provided through our humble service.
"Let there be peace on Earth
and let it begin with me."
Entry submitted by: Neal Pierce
Message of the Day – Tom Horne: “There was a time in my life during my years
in college when I was so talkative that the waterfall of words kept others at a
safe distance. Of course, in time, this cascade pushed others away. But what I
didn’t realize till much later was that I kept talking faster and louder to the
world around me because I couldn’t hear the world within me. Of course, the
more noise I made, the less chance I had of having what was real enter me or
rise from me. It became a damning cycle.
"So often, we mistake the need to hear with the need to be heard. All
that talk was a way of reaching out to others with my heart. Ultimately, it was
all based on the fear that if I didn’t throw my heart out there – through
endless words and gestures and questions – I would be left alone. It’s taken me
many years to learn that the world comes flooding in if I can only keep myself
open.
"It remains important to reach out and to express oneself, but
underneath that is the need to be porous and real. Through the opened heart,
the world comes rushing in, the way oceans fill the smallest hole along the
shore. It is the quietest sort of miracle: by simply being who we are, the
world will come to fill us, to cleanse us, to baptize us, again and again.” –
Mark Nepo in The Book of Awakening