I've climbed everything...

Seriously. Here is a list of things that I have climbed or been to the top of while in Ecuador in chronological order according to memory:

0 - El Panecillo (retroactively added)

1 - El Volcán Cotopaxi (volcán = volcano)

2 - Ferrocarril al Nariz del Diablo (ferrocarril = traincar)

3 - Una cascada (a waterfall)

4 - A clock tower of La Basílica (an enormous cathedral in Quito)

5 - Pichincha en El TeleferiQo (a tram car to the top of Mt. Pichincha)

And each has its own story to follow shortly. However, first, I should describe a little bit about my program and what we've done so far, as I have basically skipped that.

I am in Quito, Ecuador on a program called Duke in the Andes. The program is run through Duke University, obviously, but we don't have any students from Duke on the program this semester. Apparently, it's basketball season. However, we have kids from different schools all over the east coast including Wesleyan, Smith, Columbia, Bowdoin, Emory, and Colby. We are 16 in all: 14 girls and 2 boys. Two of the girls are here for the entire academic year and have been here already 6 months. They are good at Spanish.

During the program we will be taking classes at a local university - Universidad Politécnica Salesiana. Those courses start in early March. However, we have already started taking several courses taught through the program: a course on Spanish language and grammar, a course entitled "The History of the Church in Latin America," and our core course - "The Construction of Interculturality in Andean America." All of our courses are taught entirely in Spanish, which is a doozy, but now I can say interculturality in Spanish.

Everyone will be working out some for of community volunteer work at sites of our choosing. I have already visited a small school for children with special needs and I hope to start volunteering there later this week. Other students will be working at a variety of volunteer sites doing work on issues such as environmental protection, minority equality, and multilingual schools for indigenous children.

We all live with host families. You have learned a little about mine but you'll hear more as time progresses. So far, everyone seems very happy with their dwelling spaces and I personally couldn't be happier.

On top of all of this, we get to go on several "excursions" to different parts of Ecuador. We will be visiting the Ecuadorian Amazon, an Afroecuadorian community, an indigenous community, and the Galapagos Islands. We can also travel on our own on the weekends, which I plan to do a lot now that I'm settled in Quito.

During our orientation week, we went on a 3-day excursion to a few different places including a city named "Riobamba" and some small villages in the same province. My first three climbing adventures took place during that excursion. I'll post about that excursion next and put up some pictures (if I can).

Alright.

Photo albums: "Cotopaxi", "El Nariz del Diablo", "La Basilica" & "TeleferiQo"