walk with me

one of the pillars that sets rostro de cristo apart from other volunteer programs is its emphasis on "being" with the people of durán. it's often frustrating because i don't feel like i really do anything here. what am i doing here that is tangible? the idea of "walking with ecuadorians to find long-term solutions" just seems idealistic. unattainable. but for the first time today i may have experienced what that looks like.

last night i came home from manos abiertas with marie and people were teaming all over our road. this usually doesn't happen, but isn't that out of the ordinary as there are always childrens international meetings next door to us. and while there was a meeting that night, the purpose on the street was much bigger. you see, my street is not exactly that. it is a dirt road, with bastante juecos (large holes) which makes it difficult to drive down in the dry season and nearly impossible in the rainy season when standing water, mud and the threat of bacteria makes a lagoon affect. so last night my neighbors came together and decided that they were going to marianita's office, the mayor of durán, the following morning and asking for her to finally fill in our street. kevin, my in-country director, told me that he wanted me to go to the meeting with our neighbors the following morning to see what happens. so, the next morning i woke up at 6 a.m., met with aracely and a few of our neighbors and headed for a bus to catch to city hall.

to be perfectly honest, i didn't have any idea of what to expect. in my mind, i kept imagining us storming marianita's office, sitting there for a lengthy period of time explaining our case and waiting for the outcome. in reality, it was much less romantic than that. the ten of us got off the bus and stood in front of an office door for maybe ten minutes when a woman, i presumed to be a secretary, came out and started talking with people. i quickly learned that this was no secretary, but marianita herself. bella, one of my neighbors quickly went up to her, explained who we were and what we wanted and she quickly pointed us in the direction of another city worker, who we all rushed to instantly. there was so much talking going on, so fast,that before i knew it, it was over. we were headed back to the bus. so much for a dramatic blog entry. as we waited for the bus, i had aracely explain to me what had just happened. as it turns out, my neighbors had asked marianita for our street to be filled last year and nothing happened. this time she pointed us in the direction of the woman in charge, who told us a crew would be out to survey the street that morning (which they did) and the street would be filled within two weeks (we'll see). as i ate breakfast with kevin later that morning, he said it best: "they don't need us." so often i feel that we, that i, have this north american mentality that i know how to do things, how to do things efficiently and correctly and i'm here to show these poor ecuadorians how the world works. that's the purpose of volunteer work, isn't it? to help those who can't possibly help themselves. but today served as a tiny reminder of what the world, what my program is about. not about being benefactor, or using my pull as a white, U.S. citizen to get the street filled, but the walk with my neighbors as we do it together.

later, i worked at semillas de mostaza. patrick and i worked with the non-homework kids on an activity surrounding this week's theme, citizenship. we broke the kids up into two teams, boys and girls, and gave them both an empty box. we talked of how good citizenship is more than just voting. good citizenship is about community. a community that takes care of itself. so as the community of semillas we were going to clean up all the trash around the school. the team with the most trash won a stamp (six stamps and the kids are allowed to go on a field trip with us on friday). it was a simple exercise, one that they probably won't think of past today. but it has to start somewhere. if true change is to occur, it has to start with the people, not with us.





elkin standing in the middle of our street





the water truck that comes down our street



a few of the boys at semillas



a few of the girls at semillas