Job!! Life!

Well, last time I wrote I was still trying to figure out what life was going to be like this semester...and I still don´t totally have it worked out, but a lot of it´s been decided. So!! My big dream for this semester had been to work in a cafe and for once not teach language classes or something like that. I thought I´d found the perfect bar/restaurant to do that at--it´s called the Naranjilla Mecánica, (the Clockwork Orange) and was looking for someone who could speak English, because they get a lot of tourists there. So I went right in and had an interview and agreed to do what´s called a "práctica" the next day, where I work for a day or two and see what I think (no pay) and then if I decide I like it, I start actually working there. The pay was going to be $200 a month, which is all right, I guess fairly good by Ecuadorian standards, and it would have been from 11 am to 5 pm Monday through Friday. It was a chill schedule and everything, but the one thing that kept bothering me was the fact that Gabriel´s classes are all in the morning, and my plan had definitely been to try to find work in the morning, in order to spend some afternoons with him, since I´m taking classes at night. Barely any café would go for a 7 am to 1 pm schedule, which is what I wanted, though, so I decided to give the Naranjilla Mecánica a try. A "try" was definitely all I ended up giving it, since after one day I decided that it was waaaaaaay too much work!!! I didn´t realize that the place gets so busy for lunch, and the cooks get super stressed out, and the other waitresses do too, and there also just hadn´t really been any time for anyone to explain to me what I was supposed to do, so all of a sudden a new family would walk in the door and I would get shoved out of the kitchen told to "attend to them"...whatever exactly that meant I was never sure. Obvoiusly that element of chaos and stress would have calmed down after a few days working there, but I guess I just felt like I should take advantage of my neutral-to-negative feelings to find a job with better work times.

So the next day, I went with my friend Adriana to the FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organization, which is part of the United Nations. It´s got a great location, relatively close to my apartment (a 5 minute bus ride, a 30 minute walk), and the best part is that they are doing GREAT WORK. The organization is all about environmental conservation WHILE promoting human production, above all trying to eliminate hunger and food resource problems in Ecuador. The best part (I know I already said "the best part," but this really is the best part...) is that the boss, who is clearly a genius and just a great person, has set me up to start working this next week on a project dealing with Colombian refugees in the northern part of Ecuador, trying to set up a way for them to use agriculture efficiently to guarantee food all year round. Apparently, I will be consulted for anthropological opinions regarding the projects proposed???!!!!! I know it seems crazy, and I definitely don´t feel capable, at this point, to say ANYTHING (what do I know about Colombian refugees?) but I think it´s SO cool that I´m going to have exposure to this kind of thing. The work hours are perfect--9 am to 2 pm 5 days a week. Oh yeah, and then there´s the worst part, which is that it´s a volunteer position...BUT, I realized two things. First, I can easily print off some posters saying that I´m a native English speaker and can give private lessons, in order to make some extra money on the side. And second, I realized that, as much as I´ve been feeling terrible about spending all my money reserves these last few months and not making any more money, now that I´m working on a project that I feel like is TOTALLY worthwhile, I suddenly feel SO much better about spending my money from last semester, or money my parents send me, or whatever. I guess once I feel like I´m being productive, I feel like I also have the right to consume. So, things are looking great.

I started my college classes last week too. Yoga is fun and chill, lots of American exchange students in it, which is fun. They´ve all just recently arrived and seem to still be figuring out the systems here (bus, classes, social interactions). It´s fun to talk to them about their first impressions. And then there´s creative writing, which is great because I´ve met more American students there, who are really cool, and also some other cool people. It´s not necessarily the best because my teacher is sort of weird--I really liked her the first day, just because she was completely animated and super lively. The second day was weird because I felt like she was sort of being mean to us on purpose, criticizing our work excessively, and then sort of rubbing in the fact that we hadn´t done the assignment correctly. I also thought she was inconsiderate of the American students who are still learning Spanish, saying things like "Well, I erased that line of your poem because it didn´t make any sense." !!!! But anyway. We´ll see how it goes.

That´s my life! I´m doing well. I guess all the Mac kids are getting ready for classes! Crazy! I had a dream last night about Minnesota, it was October and it was starting to get really cold (actually I remember exactly, it was October 1), and then it started snowing!!! Gabriel was there too and he didn´t believe that it could actually be snowing in October, he kept trying to tell me it was hail. ANYWAY!!!! Keep in touch. Love you guys

P.S. I´m gonna put pictures down here that other people took and I got off facebook, mostly so Mom and Daddy can see some new pictures!!!! Yay!