Myths and truths in Ecuador

Considering I arrived here having read a LOT... but still not really knowing what to expect... I thought I'd share how accurate I've found my expectations to be over the course of these three weeks.

FACT: People here talk about politics a lot more than in the USA.
And, considering the last elected president to serve a full term was (I think) Sixto Durán Ballén in the mid-90's, the people who aren't particularly happy about Correa's government are a little at a loss. Popular unrest has already booted several presidents, and the situation hasn't improved. (It's not like the US, where we complain without doing anything about it: people really do protest here, and talk and think about and act on what the government should do. )

The people who are most discontent with Correa's government in general seem to be the people who are the most educated and least interested in partying :), but I don't have a very large sample size (and it happens to be that I like the people who don't love Correa, so I'm probably also biased). But it has been really interesting to talk about the purpose of a government here, since they're currently re-writing the constitution. There are a lot of bitter jokes about the "right to pleasure" as well as the right to single-sex marriage, but hot topics aside, it was interesting to hear Jonathan, from my lab, explain that he saw the government's role as nurturing and enabling its populace economically and through education and the support of technological development. I hadn't really ever thought about the mission statement of a government before.

MYTH: Everyone in Ecuador is Catholic
While there are a lot of Catholics, among students (again with a small sample size) it seems to me that there are a lot of people who believe in God but not in religion -- a lot like back home. In addition, there are Baptists and Evangelicals, and Guayaquil has one of the most beautiful Mormon Temples in the world.

FACT: Driving here is NOT SAFE
Yes, there are seatbelt laws and traffic lights and such. At least in the city. But, according to the people in my lab, yellow means "speed up," red means "time for 5 more cars," and green means "wait for the 5 cars and then it'll be yellow." Lanes are guidelines that motor scooters and buses alike choose not to follow. And 7 people CAN fit in a taxi. Moreover, I have learned (with serious respect for the person who accomplished this) that it is possible to affix wires to new terminals using tape and a hair tie should the fuse for the headlights blow when you're in the middle of nowhere.

FACT: The beaches here are beautiful.
And, if you're lucky, on your way home from one, driving in the near-pitch-black (lights are for cities!), you'll have your own private neon light show due to the phosphorescent dinoflagellates who shine in the turbulence of breaking waves. And you'll get out of the car with your friend and watch for almost an hour, cold on the beach with really tired feet from having walked like 3 miles barefoot on the sand already that day... and nothing will matter except how incredibly amazing it is.

MYTH: "On time" is half an hour late, and people take siestas.
It really, really, really, really depends. In my lab, on time for a meeting is 10-15 minutes late (like at Yale), but you need to be there on time -- the delay is for discussing politics and drinking coffee. Lunch breaks depend on your time -- we all manage ourselves -- and, por lo menos, the doctora (Dr. Pilar Cornejo, in charge of the lab and I think a bunch of other things) is always busy!

Conditional Fact: Ecuadorians dance better than Americans
This is true of sober people. At all times, the dances are better here (I love salsa. And bachata. And all the ones I don't know the names of), but when drunk, guys here are just as bad at rhythm as "white guys."

FACT: It's hard to adjust to a different place -- anytime, anywhere
Because the transition between excitement and reality, between everyone being friendly and actually needing good friends who can help you when you're frustrated by EVERYTHING, is hard. Luckily, I ended up at a techie university.... so I've got my kind of people :) and I have people to lean on when I need help.

Hugs to all,

Michele

Shocha!

This last week has been filled with extremes--ups and downs, hate and love. Last Friday, I was ready to hate Mongolia. We woke up and had no running water or light in our bathroom. I was responsible for sending info about our apartment development to potential buyers, and learned that because I was using webmail (the same as our Yale mail), the attachments weren't sending, and I just looked so unprofessional. And then Michelle and I were walking home from dinner, and I was holding a bottle of juice in my hand, and these three little boys come up and grab at it, trying to snatch it away. I kept my grip on it, and we kept yelling "No!" at them, but they followed us for three blocks and kept laughing and mocking us. One of them spit on Michelle's leg, and the others sneered at me. Fil jokes all the time about the "terror children," but this was the first encounter I'd actually had with them.

As we continued to walk home on the shitty, shitty roads with no drainage system (after raining for three days straight..all our roads have become ponds), I was ready to write off Mongolia as a third world country. I felt like such a horrible person, but even as I realized that I've lived a pretty good life, I continued to sulk on the way to our first AIESEC meeting.

All of our spirits were low going into the meeting, but we had a beautiful conference room in the university, had a blast playing Jeopardy with the 20 students in the room, and were able to very effectively convey the concept of the summer "project" to them. Everyone was in professional attire, and we had such a diverse group of Mongolians--despite the mood we were in initially, we were so happy the rest of the night.

The next day, we had our company picnic in a ger camp in the countryside. We learned Mongolian time is roughly an hour and a half late, definitely giving the Spanish a run for their money. I played basketball with the boys (and we won!); Fil and Yin played soccer, with goals made out of feces piles. We went horseback riding, and it was the most amazing thing on earth. I had a lazy horse that didn't listen to me when I said "Choo" to get it going; it responded to our guide, so I tried to imitate him by using a really deep voice and saying "Chooooo." I got all the other horses to start going faster, but still no luck with mine. But we rode up the hill, and could see the vast countryside, while our guide sang in Mongolian, and got a sense of what it was like to be him and just wander in tranquility. When my horse could see "home," and we were on flat terrain, he started to gallop--I could feel his legs powering under me, and it was so much fun to actually ride the horse and feel the wind blowing around me.

When we got back, the entire company was sitting in a ger, eating little snacks and drinking vodka. It's rude to refuse anything, and there's a person who sits in the middle and passes the food and cup to everyone in a circle. You have to accept it with your right hand, with your sleeve down. Fil was jokingly told that he had to finish the whole cup of vodka because the guys in front of them had to drive back to UB later; not realizing it was a joke, he downed the 4 shots worth of vodka...and Yin followed suit after. Ridiculous, much? The second time we went around the circle, everyone had to sing a song first. I was the second person to go, and as I was handed the cup, I felt like I forgot every song I knew. I finally remembered Backstreet Boys, and all the girls jumped in, too :D. It was awesome, whenever the Mongolians sang, no matter how old they were, they all knew the traditional folk songs--and can sing them incredibly well. We also got a mix of languages in--French, German, Russian, Serbian, Chinese, Spanish, Japanese, Mongolian, and English!! They love their beer and vodka, and they know how to have fun. They also feel a really strong connection to their "motherland,"--later in the night, with a guitar, they were all singing again. A friend told me that these songs have no author, they were just written by someone and passed along at get togethers like these; and the coolest thing is that it's the young generation that knows them.


As for work, I am becoming a cement expert. We're responsible for writing an industry overview for the prospectus to list their newly acquired cement factory on the Mongolian stock exchange, and even though it's cement...it's actually really interesting. On Tuesday, we had an analyst from Deutsche Bank interested in the Mongolian real estate market come--it was my first meeting with any kind of investor, and it took about three hours, but I got a really good sense of what the general market is, how a "professional" sells something to someone, and our company's future outlook. Lee, our boss, was exhausted after this (the analyst lady asked like a million questions a minute)--and took me to two bars/dinner for the next three hours. It was cool because he knows his shit about Mongolia, and we talked a bit about the US.

Mongolians are a great insight into deep-seeded human nature, and they're truly a product of their environment. They love to fight, and know nothing else than to be corrupt, sometimes. They're extremely tough, and courageous, but surrounded by a powerful country that's more agressive than them (Russia), and a powerful country that's sneakier and smarter than them (China). At the same time, the US is in an interesting place. It's really a great place, and Lee's been defending it for 15 years in Asian countries surrounded by Europeans. And I almost always do, too. But we're soft, and other countries are looking at us more like prey, and less like this awe-inspiring dream land we were ten years ago. We talk about China's media being censored, but there are so many things the State Department doesn't want to tell us, but are reported in foreign newspapers; or people just don't want to hear, so newspapers don't publish it because they have to make money. I know this is kind of a broad generalization, but I look at Mongolia, which is reaching a critical point. It's got incredible natural resources, and if it learns how to manage its money well and gains the infrastructural and institutional knowledge, can become a rich country in the next twenty or thirty years. Or, it can devour its resources and implode. And then I look at the US, which doesn't have that many natural resources but an incredible wealth of knowledge, but with a world that's becoming more and more sophisticated and a citizenship that often seems to be losing its values, that still doesn't want to wake up to the fact that the bubble we've been riding is going to burst, and is not going to be fixed anytime soon. And I worry about both. But I also believe more and more firmly that social entrepreneurship will be the key to it all. I've realized that it's a really nebulous field, and doesn't have a great definition. But whether it's a developing country that needs to develop a civil society or a developed country that needs to re-develop a value system, it's all the same--the business and the morals; the economy and the community need to come hand in hand.

Now I've digressed and probably make very little sense/am preaching to the choir. So I'll stop. Except to add that I'm also confused. I look Mongolian to everyone, but when I can't speak it, they ask what nationality I am, and whether I say I'm Chinese or American, I always feel a need to justify it with the other, and then I feel like I'm somehow snubbing one of my cultures and it's just strange.

The Cat and the Sea

I had put in some overtime at work, so rather than leaving at the usual 5:30 I walked out the doors about 7:00. For whatever reason I didn’t feel like going straight home, so I turned the corner and headed to the waterfront.

Downtown Izmir extends right up to the edge of the ocean. Imposing office buildings with giant glass and concrete walls tower above the outdoor cafés and restaurants, casting shadows over the imitation-marble walkway when the sun is in the East. Now, at the end of the day, the sun hovered in the West, a few inches above horizon, scattering its light across the waters of the Aegean and giving everything at the waterfront a rich, brilliant glow that hurt your eyes if you stared for too long.

I walked south along the quai, away from the tourist district. My black slacks were hot in the sun, and I undid another button on my pale green dress-shirt, allowing cool air to flow across my chest. As I walked, my polished black shoes thumped gently over the fake marble, and the population I walked through began to change. Fewer slacks and designer sunglasses, more jeans and baseball caps.

Eventually I reached a sort of point that jutted out into the bay. A knee-high concrete wall ran along the ocean side of the walkway, while on the city side patches of grass were spread across a small incline, dotted with boulders. I sat on the wall, gazing at the green and brown hills on the opposite side of the bay, hazy in the mix of low sunshine, ocean mist and smog of the city. Near where I sat a man stood fishing. Dirty blue jeans, grungy orange polo shirt, and a Yankee baseball cap that looked like it had been picked up off the street. These fishermen are a fairly common sight in Izmir; from what I’ve observed they seem to be the citizens of the city that exist somewhere between the impoverished and the middle class, neither reduced to begging nor able to exist entirely on whatever work they may find. I did not pay him much attention, and focused on the darkening waves, the low sun, the light on the hills.

As I sat there, lost in thought, I saw out of the corner of my eye a cat slowly creeping towards the fisherman. Its patchy fur covered a set of visible ribs, and it moved with that hunted look that most of the city’s cats seem to acquire. It had obviously smelled the fish that the fisherman was using for bait.The fisherman looked at it, watching its slow progression towards him. I waited for him to scare it away. He reached down, picked something up from the ground, and threw it at the cat.

The something landed a few inches in front of the cat’s nose. The cat went up to it, sniffed it, picked it up, and trotted away. As it passed I could see it was a scrap of fish. I looked back at the fisherman. He was busy reeling in his line, and paid no attention to the progress of the cat.A few minutes later, the cat returned. The fisherman looked at it. I expected him to ignore it, to wait for the cat to move on to seek sustenance elsewhere. Who gives twice to a beggar? Instead, he reached into his bag and pulled out a small fish. He tossed it to the cat, who once again picked it up and hurried off.

Three times the cat returned. Each time it moved closer, eventually sitting within a few feet of the fisherman. The last time the fisherman simply held the fish out to the cat, who took it from his hand. The fisherman threw away a plastic bag. It had been the last of his bait. He had not caught anything.

By now I had moved up to the small incline, sitting on the grass, watching the cat, the man, and the sinking sun. I pondered over it – a near-impoverished man, hoping to catch himself dinner, and giving away his opportunity to do so to an animal he owed nothing to, that could do nothing for him, that he would probably never see again in his life.

The sun slipped behind a bank of clouds and sank below the horizon, leaving behind a golden trail burned into the sky. I stood up, brushed the grass off my slacks and green shirt, folded my sun glasses and put them in my bag. I walked down to the low concrete wall, took a breath of the fresh sea air mingled with the heat of the city.

I walked up to the man and gave him a five lira note, perhaps the equivalent of ten US dollars. “For the cat” I said in Turkish. He looked at me blankly. I repeated what I had said. A wide grin transformed his face, and he replied: “Kedi için. Teşekkürler” – “For the cat. Thank you.”

I don’t know why I gave him that five lira note. It was a foolish bit of sentimentality, perhaps – the fish he gave the cat were worth far less. But then, I wasn’t paying for the cat. It wasn't even really about the cat. It was about a rare bit of human generosity, a small yet beautiful action, carved out of a busy day in a busy city, enshrined by the last minutes of a fading sun. Money was the only thing I could use to tell this man my thoughts, the only universal currency I had to recognize a universal act.

And in reality, what good would it do? Could he possibly understand what I, a stranger from a different class and culture, thought about what he considered a mundane episode in his life? Did he recognize what that five lira note represented? There is no way I can know what he did with it. Chances are a million to one I will never see him again, and it is completely possible that he simply pocketed it without a second thought.

And yet, when I remember his smile -I think that in that fraction of a moment, there was recognition. We both acknowledged this strange, tender piece of human nature that led him to give a fish to a stray cat. Perhaps, just as the fish was really far more than a fish, that rectangular piece of paper had nothing to do with what was printed on it. Its power was in the act of placing value on his action, in acknowledging that in this world of billions there are at least two who can recognize something that makes life worth living, something worth paying for. And in that brief look that passed between us, I think we both understood.

I walked back along the waterfront through the fading light, and gradually entered the tourist district. I looked around me, saw people busily taking money from those who were frantically spending it – and yet there were so few giving anything.

An Unexpected Party

This weekend I was out late with friends, watching the football match against Portugal (Turkey lost) and rather than catching the bus at midnight to my host's aparment I spent the night where I was (another AIESECer's house.) The next day when I got back my host told me he was heading out of town to a place called Denizle to visit his girlfriend and family for two days, and left about an hour later. Which was fine – I'm comfortable getting around Izmir by myself, making dinner, etc., so I wasn't at all concerned about being on my own for awhile.The only problem was when I suddenly ceased being on my own.

Last night at about 10 o'clock I was at the apartment, in my boxers (it was hot), listening to some James Brown and checking my email when I hear a knock on the door. I think, well, I just won't answer it – I'm sure they're looking for Kemal, and it would be a rough gig with my limited command of Turkish to explain that he's visiting his family and girlfriend for two days.They knock again. I think, two knocks, right? After that, you kinda figure the person isn't home and try again later. They knock again. Louder. I put on some shorts and answered the door.

On the other side is a man about 5'5", looked 190 pounds and in his 40's. He is just about as surprised to see me, a shirtless blonde dude, as I must have looked to see him. Some rapid Turkish, from which I extracted something about Kemal – "Denizle", I replied. "Aile." (Family in Turkish.)At which point I expect the man to nod, say good night and beat a hasty retreat. Instead, he takes off his shoes (customary before entering a home in Turkey) and walks into the apartment. For some reason I trusted him – I seriously doubted he was going to pull out a chainsaw and go for my legs, and plus I couldn't kick him out. I didn't have the vocabulary.

So he walks into the apartment and into Kemal's room, where the computer is. He speaks a few words of broken English, I respond in broken Turkish, and somehow between the two of us and with the help of some rudimentary sign language we figure out that he's Kemal's neighbor who lives downstairs and that I'm a student who's working in Izmir. Conversation lags after we've figured out who the other person is, and at this point I once again expect him to big me a good night. Indeed,he heads for the door and I load up my Turkish goodbyes. As sooın as he gets to the door, however, he makes some gestures, using the word "Ben" (I) and pointing to the apartment floor. I get the drift that he'll be back soon, although the reason he had to leave still wasn't clear to me.

As soon as he leaves I head into the living room and hunt around until I find my Turkish pocket dictionary. By the time I find it I hear him coming back, so I head to the door.He's brought company, in the form of a woman who looks in her mid-20's, about 5'4" and rather attractive. Just so you get the full picture, at this point my complete wardrobe consists of a pair of black boxers peaking over the top of a pair of khaki shorts, which are hanging beltless and low on my hips. It quickly becomes apparent that he brought this woman to serve as a kind of interpreter – but her English is only marginally better than his, although with the dictionary we're able to communicate in some form. I'm still standing there wondering why the hell these people are even here when another woman shows up, who looks in her early to mid 30's. Some rapid Turkish, and the younger woman walks out, leaving me with two complete strangers in Kemal's apartment. Then another girl shows up, probably about 15, quickly followed by the woman in her 20's who's carrying a huge plate of fruit, and not too long after a man in his 50's who I've never seen before in my life.

So here I am, standing in this room with 5 Turkish people, practically no clothes on and holding a gigantic plate of fruit, with everybody kind of looking at each other trying to figure out what the hell is going on. They start speaking to each other in Turkish, and I take the opportunity to slip out and get a shirt on before returning to try to sort things out.

Luckily, the latest arrival, the man in his 50's, spoke fairly good English, and so we started getting into a conversation about what he does, what I do and so on. I was still clueless as to why they'd all decided to crash Kemal's apartment, but the guy is nice enough so I talk mostly to him and don't worry too much about what everyone else is up to. The plate of fruit has by now been joined by two forks and come to rest on Kemal's bed, where people gradually start unloading its cargo.Turns out the man in his 50's used to be an English teacher, then worked for a bank and is now in the export business to the Middle East and America. So I got his contact info, and we chatted about various bits of American and English literature – To Kill a Mockingbird, Shakespeare, Virginia Woolf. I was amazed by some of the stuff he had read. Meanwhile the first guy who showed up is on the internet, while the three women are sitting around occassionally speaking a few words, but mostly either watching the guy on the internet or trying to understand what the other man and I are talking about.

About an hour after the first knock on the door the guy on the internet gets up, and as if on cue everybody else in the room stands up and heads to the door. There are various goodbyes in a mix of English and Turkish, I promise the man in his 50's that I'll email him, and they walk out the door leaving behind their mostly full plate of fruit.

Reconstructing events I'm guessing that the first man is in the habit of using Kemal's internet connection, and had just planned to stop by for a few minutes – but once he figured out I wasn't Turkish, he alerted his friends who all decided to come for a visit. At least that's the current leading hypothesis.

If correct, it's offers a few intriguing insights into Turkish culture. First, they still live in a society where dropping by a neighbor's to borrow something is routine – compare that to our relatively isolated American way of life, where sometimes the most we do with our neighbors is say a few words in the elevator, or bid a good morning as we jump in our cars to head to work. Secondly, all these people were perfectly willing to drop everything and spend an hour in what could have been a fairly uncomfortable social situation – except that everyone was so willing to communicate, to be friendly, and be open to a complete stranger for no other reason than that I know their neighbor.

Perhaps it all rests on a culture that is still cohesive, that retains something of a tradition of living in true communities and has therefore maintained a few of the social customs that go with that. And the interesting thing is that I would feel entirely comfortable knocking on any of their doors, in the expectation that they would be glad to see me, would welcome me in, and would do their best to meet whatever need I had, notwithstanding the bizarre circumstances in which we met, the differences in culture and the fact that we can barely communicate with one another. The unexpected things in life are often the most to be looked for.

Istanbul Part IV

I can't believe I'm here. The MC office looks and feels almost exactly the same, and it feels as if it could be last summer, and I've just been away a couple weeks on a Country Visit to a -stan. I decided not to get my own flat until October, because I'm traveling so much this summer it didn't make sense to start paying for one now. So I'm back in the MC flat, which, miraculously, is CLEAN. Drew, Shan, Eric~ since you've visited me here you can fully appreciate how miraculous indeed a CLEAN MC flat would be. ;)

Friday is the LC Istanbul Alumni Boat Trip, which I'm incredibly excited about. Think: all my friends from the LC in 2005 when I was a CEED whom I have not seen since the boat trip last year, unlimited free cocktails, beautiful cruise up the Bosphorus almost to the Black Sea.

Bjorn~ I hear you were on the Izmir Boat Trip and that it was amazing? Almost my whole ex-MC team was there, maybe you met some of them? Mehmet, Candost, Onur, Burak, Sinem, Gülsen, Yunus? I also heard you randomly met Burak in the square, he said it was a nice surprise since you had only talked online before. Also, I'm coming to Izmir on Saturday, so I'll see you soon! Do you have a turkish number? Text me... 0554 278 85 18.

The new team is great, I haven't seen them in action yet, but we went out last night and they're cool. One of them, Bora, has a really similar @XP to me. He was on an internship in Russia, and then this past year he did MC Abroad there, so we had a lot to talk about. The new VPTM, Duygu, is originally from Izmir and I'd heard so much about her already from the Azerbaijani MC, two of whom did a CEED there last year. I can see why everyone loves her!

The only downside is that Maher (the Egyptian on my team) is getting deported in 2 weeks, after thinking he'd be able to extend his residence permit for the rest of the summer. :( The upside is that he'll get to see Ma'andi really soon, his best friend from way back.

Tonight I have my interview for Caucasus & Central Asia Regional Coordinator position. Wish me luck!!!

West Coast--Ghanaian Style

This past weekend (and Monday), I finally was able to travel outside the village where I have stayed for the past three weeks. Nick (another foreign volunteer) and I rode on terribly overcrowded bus from Junasi to Takoradi, which is one of Ghana's biggest cities and ports. From Takoradi, we took a tro-tro (a ten passenger van that should never be used to carry human beings but still does so) from the city to Cape Coast.

Cape Coast served as an administrative and trade center for many European powers, the last of which was the British. Each European power expanded the original Portuguese fort at Cape Coast. Over the years, this fort grew into a castle. The Cape Coast Castle is widely known for its role in the slave trade. It served as the nerve-center of the West African, if not the entire African, slave trade. According to the tour guide, almost 20 million slaves passed through the Castle. I don't have many pictures of the holding cells in the Castle, but one is enough. One room in particular stuck with me. It was the punishment cell. Big, rebellious male slaves were locked up in that room until they died. They received no light, no water, and no food. Three heavy doors prevented any possible escape. I remember seeing blood stains and scrawls on the wall of the cell. It was an experience I will never forget.

Bus aside from the very serious and solemn tour of the Cape Coast Castle, I had plenty of fun in other parts of the West Coast of Ghana. I spent many lazy hours watching the waves come in and out. Some of the beaches I was at was so picture perfect that there weren't many people around. In fact, it was quite lonely (a good sort of lonely) throughout the trip. At most places, it was just Nick and me. We would read our books and watch the ocean. It was very relaxing.

On Monday morning, I took a canoe ride with a local villager in Butre, a small farming village by the sea. This guy took me up the Butre River for about an hour. We were supposed to find crocodiles and monkeys, but they're pretty difficult to spot unless you have more time. The whole canoe ride was amazing in itself. The mango trees that lined the river, the crabs that skittered over the mud banks, and the chirping of so many different birds--it like being in a real version of DisneyWorld's Animal Kingdom or being in an episode of Planet Earth. It was surreal.

On Monday afternoon, we got to Busua--a backpacker, hippy sort of beach town. We checked in at a French-owned hotel. The place had a stunning view of the beach. At night, I ordered probably the best meal I've had since arriving in Ghana. It was a simple fish dish. I also ordered a glass of red wine--a little over the top, but it definitely made the whole evening/night somewhat like something out of the movies. I took a few still life photos of the wine glass with the full moon.

AIESEC Yale in the news...

For those who haven't seen it yet...

Check out the impact Alina, Filip, Michelle, Eric, and Yin are already having in Mongolia!

Sambanon from Ulaanbataar!

So naturally, it's 1AM, and I'll be up for another couple hours on my computer. :D Being in Mongolia obviously doesn't change my undying bad habits...the good news is that I didn't get jetlagged!

I've had an absolutely amazing first couple of days here, but first comes stories about home, because I've been wanting to post something since two weeks ago. Only problem was, we had such huge storms in DC that the power/internet went out almost every day for a week. Not to mention it was 100 degrees, incredibly humid, and the AC was broken...it was down for almost a day the first time; the last time, I was locked out of my house(!! because we only use our garage door opener...). I of course never heard the end of it from Ray, because "I'm in rural Ghana for goodness sake's and they get the power back up in 12 hours. You're in the capital of the United States of America for crying out loud..." BUT in that time at home, I had emails daily coming in from people all over the world--not just our EB on 5 different continents; but an AIESECer from Australia who was in Mongolia last winter and started starting AIESEC with a couple of kickass Mongolians, who emailed us because one of those guys heard that we were going back this summer in one of his lectures! Another who's at the UNDP in Liberia, who I emailed blindly trying to find AIESECers in Liberia, since they're not an official country because they've had low numbers ever since the civil war(s) started in 1989. Everytime I have a moment of realization, it's still incredible 1) how huge the AIESEC network is internationally--and it really takes some exposure to grasp and 2) how easy it really is now to communicate with anyone in any corner of the world.

Through all of this, I'm very aware of the fact that I'm going to Mongolia, but somehow the fact I'm actually going, and living in a country where I don't speak the language for the first time, doesn't hit me until I'm sitting at my gate. I flew through Beijing to Ulaanbaatar, and along the way lost a suitcase and a contact, and saw the North Pole!!! (see below :D)

But now I'm in Mongolia, and though it's really only been three days, I feel like I'm already settling in--Michelle and I rearranged our room, our dorm has good internet, and everyone thinks I'm a Mongolian. Which is weird, because I'm not used to not being able to reply to people when they speak to me in a language that isn't English. And Mongolian is HARD!! I'm hungry is something like "Bi yat-as-chuan". Sambanon means hello. I can barely pronounce people's names, unless they tell me their nicknames and spell it for me. I also can't tell if someone goes by their first name or their last name/whether the name that comes first is their first name or not, because everything is switched. Our friend was explaining to us that Mongolians don't even have last names, but I'm still confused...So all I can do, as Filip puts it, is moo and oink, and somehow we get by.

My first night, Fil and Michelle updated me on their adventures (which I'll let them tell them.) The next day, incidentally Friday the 13th, was my first day at work. I got a tour of the city, which is small, fairly polluted/sandy, and has lots of construction. I will be responsible for selling apartments to this luxury apartment complex, as well as broker stocks, and work on a prospectus for the Mongolia Fund they're starting. If you're confused...I don't know that much more about my job than you do, so don't ask. :p I just know that I'm going to be paid commission and learn more starting tomorrow. My coworkers are a blast, though--we went out to the nightclub my boss owns that night, and they obviously get along very well and enjoy each other's company. They specialize in the expat community, though the CEO's wife is Mongolian, so they do care about the country and hire a lot of Mongolians.

Yesterday, our friend Myagaa, who the Australian enlisted to start AIESEC at the University of Humanities, took us with his friends to the countryside/national park, Terelj. We held a hunting hawk, rode camels, herded sheep as we rode horses, climbed Turtle Rock, hiked to a monastery, held a baby yak, saw a bajillion baby sheep/horses/humans, and had traditional Mongolian food with one of the guy's grandfather. En route, we skipped some tolls, forded two rivers, saw a sandstorm, and listened to amazing Mongolian music. It was unbelievable.

The elections are coming up on June 29th, so we see vans with different party flags everywhere; the leader of the Democratic party produced this really good hip hop song to get all the young Mongolians to vote...Apparently there's no difference between the two main parties, except for that one is less corrupt than the other.

That's all I've got for now. Except for the fact that I just realized that we are essentially creating an entirely new organization in a foreign country, and we've got two months on the ground to do it...that's quite a task. Not to mention we're working part-time jobs where our bosses are going to milk us for as much as they can, so they're pretty much full-time. And we have excursions planned for a bunch of weekends. And I've got other duties to attend to. But it's the best summer I could have imagined, and I can't wait to tell you guys more :D

Fotos de Guayaquil y Quito!

<<----- Me, Doreen, Joaquin, Martina, Luna, at the top of the teleferico (cable car?) with a view of only part of Quito. The city is HUGE.

I have now officially spent almost as much time in Quito as Guayaquil.
Let me make the implications of that more obvious:

I arrived Tuesday, got oriented Wednesday, went to work on Thursday, and completely spur-of-the-moment joined the other foreign girls and Joaquin (who's from Ecuador and works in the university's International Relations department) on an overnight bus ride to Quito. That meant skipping out on my second day of work. Apparently this is okay.

Apparently it is also okay to:

-- Push and be pushed onto trolleys, buses, etc, and then (in the case of buses) hang on for dear life standing far too close to the door as the vehicle honks and dashes its way through the streets. While hanging on, you must also find change to pay the dude who helps the bus driver (he gives women a hand up into the bus, collects fees, and telling crazy gringa tourists like us when to get off the bus).

-- Ride in the back of pickup trucks (after the trolley and two buses) to get to the zoo. Sometimes you pay the driver, sometimes you don't.

-- Watch a man and his small child watching llamas doing the dirty while baby llama also looks on, seemingly confused. Yay petting zoos.

-- Ride buses overnight through the mountains. Actually the buses here are basically just like the coach buses at home, or at least the ones PanAmerica and EcuaTour drive... no breakdowns, and only one stop for passport-check by the police.

-- Tell the tourists that the guide to the Presidential Palace will come at 1:30. Even though at 2 he hasn't arrived.

-- Listen to the guy who tells you "this street is safe" ... not the woman who says "nothing around here is safe at night." Turns out the guy was right... and the view from the hotel/hostel terrace was amazing.

-- Eat grapes from the market and cocado (coconut pieces boiled in cane sugar until they get hard) without washing them and without getting sick!

-- Sulk a little when it's hard to speak Spanish all the time... but not too much....

I've had a bunch of interesting conversations, especially with Joaquin and Luna, about families and money, politics and traveling. I have no idea where I place Yale in the world... more about that probably later.

Meeting with Gina, LCP AIESEC GYE, tomorrow morning at 8, a 30-minute bus ride away (in Guayaquil -- the ESPOL is on the border).. to buy a cell phone!

Okay, time to hang up laundry to dry, tidy my room, and read some papers on statistics and precipitation. Did I mention I have a project now? I'm going to be working on a climate model for the province just south of here. First meeting with the mayor? Next Monday. AHHHHHH!

Hugs to all,

Michele


Mi cuarto... way bigger than I thought it would be, and it came with towels and sheets. Joaquin laughed that I hadn't trusted Samuel when he said there would be everything I needed in the suite (I asked would there be sheets)... but I pointed out to him that, at Yale, having "everything" meant there was a mattress. I'm not sure what we ended up deciding about trusting people (whether to do it or not)... I've definitely been able to take more risks here than I would have felt able to do at home, but partially just because I was in a group.



El grupo... Luna (Islas canarias), Martina (Austria), Joaquin (Ecuador) and Doreen (Austria) on the terrace of our hotel/ hostel thing, with a view of Quito in the background. The two towers are the Basilica.






La camioneta... on the way to the zoo! We had free passes, so we spent... the entrance fee... to get to and from a zoo in Guayllabambas, which is "below" Quito... I don't know the direction, just the altitude.

It can be really hard to be a foreigner... but it's also just hard to enter a group that's already friends. I had trouble at first feeling at home even with these girls, but we still had quite a bit of fun.


Los monos... it seemed like all the little kids of Quito were at the zoo in their various uniforms (some were all blue, some like these...)... I asked if I could take a picture of these two and their counselor(?) told them to make monkey faces for me :)





Guayllabambas (?) There was a trail at the zoo out along a hill... it actually looked a bit like southern California, with agave (omg their flowers are REALLY tall, like 60 feet high) and stuff... the bus we took was toward Guayllabambas, so that may be the city below... *phew* walking at that high of an altitude is hard.








El mercado Wow bright colors... I'm such a tourist... but markets are awesome. This one was indoors. Didn't buy anything (we had just eaten -- oritos [small, sweet bananas] and some sort of bread, plus a granadilla [it's like a pomegranite but with greenish seeds and an orange exterior, plus the taste is more citrus-y] for me).... but it was beautiful.







And, back home in Guayaquil, we had played Jungle Speed with the neighbors (not going to explain that now... )... but you can see what happens when you lose.

Yes, that is "ECUADOR" on my forehead.

:)

Ole.

AIESECing in Kampala

Attention: this may be the most intelligent post ever, since I've just come from a weekend of eating so many fish brains that my coworkers say I'll be a genius.

Or at least this post will serve as a long-delayed "hello" from Uganda, where I've been for the last 17 days getting into my AIESEC traineeship with a renewable energy company that has overtones of social entrepreneurship. Internet has been exceedingly scarce here -- they're in the process of laying cables underground so it will be harder for people to illegally tap into the internet ... and let's just say certain things take their time here. The upshot is I get to walk up to the second-highest hill in Kampala a couple of times per week to use the wireless at a charming hotel. See my blog for some of the pictures.

AIESEC Makerere University (Kampala) has just rounded out a tremendous year, beating out AIESEC Nairobi for the top spot in the Africa GN. It's been exhilarating to be involved -- as their only trainee with more than 3 months AIESEC experience, they've been receptive about including me in their activities.

For one, I got to go on a sales call with three AIESECers to speak with the Vice-President of the ruling political party, whom we met at his PALACE (he's been involved in stealing over $2 million in HIV/AIDS development funds, but remains in high esteem with the people despite his extravagance). Eunice, current OCP of the AfriTour PBOX and VP-TM-elect, managed to get the meeting by meeting the guy's secretary at a nightclub the previous weekend :-p . Anyway, Eunice pitched this program to empower youth entrepreneurship in Uganda's tourism sector. It was a success, and AIESEC MUK seems poised to be the first to realize this new PBOX. woot!

I've spent a couple of evenings sharing Ugandan beer with the CEO of the company I'm working for -- he was involved in AIESEC Kenya's leadership and a former AIESEC trainee to Portugal. He's asking for another three AIESEC trainees next year, with a preference that they specialize in business, medicine, and chemistry, and that they come from Yale. It would be one hell of an opportunity, and we'll see where we can take it.

This Tuesday I'll be running a session to transition the new LC EB into their roles. It'll be a challenge, since I'm only inching up the steep learning curve of their local reality. Frank, the current LCP and MC-VP-ICX-elect, had drafted a two-page chart of key transition areas, for which he budgeted a total of 27 hours of sessions (imagine: three 9-hour days). He had noted about 8 people who he hoped would facilitate, drawn from the outgoing EB and MC members. However, the only facilitators who showed up to the Transition Prep Meeting were me and Frank himself. It's a pity that the outgoing EB seems to have drifted (despite the strong year), and the MC are all full-time students or employed. And in response to the pleading from the incoming EB, we shortened the 27 hours down to about 8. I can tell they're nervous -- there are so few student organizations at Makerere that this will set them apart from many of their friends. But I'm excited about the chance to cultivate some AIESEC spirit among them ... they're already pros at Bebot!

Finally, I've got the green light to go to the Safari East Africa Leadership Development Seminar in Kenya during my last week! Get ready for some wacky roll calls and dances back on campus this fall ;-)

Shout-outs to all who have posted so far -- missing you, and looking forward to seeing more updates on this blog!

Making contact...

Michele has arrived safely in Ecuador. Ray and Drew are livin' it up in Africa. Flip, Michelle, and Eric are networking with Aussies in Mongolia; Alina heads out there tomorrow, and Yin will be there by the weekend. Bjorn reports on Efes Beer and sunsets in Turkey (note: if you add a bit of lemon juice - ask for "limon suyu" - the efes becomes FANTASTIC and the sunsets become a little deeper...remind me to tell you the story of when I rowed to Greece with my friend Neslihan in a dinghy).

Previously hesitating to post here unarmed with an exciting itinerary just like all you cool cats, I am now happy to say I know what I'm doing this summer:

• 16 June: .................Flying to Turkey!
• 17-21 June: ...........I have to give a fairly intensive transition to the new Turkish MC about our Expansion Countries. This includes Berk from LC Bursa who's MCVP LC Development, Jerry from LC Jos in Nigeria and the new Caucasus Coordinator, and Godfrey from LC University of Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania.
• 22 June - 5 July: ...Visiting Bjorn in Izmir! Irakli is also going to come, and we're going up to Sirince, a little wine village near Izmir, to relax and also start our applications for LSE (me) and LBS (him) for next year.
• 6 July - 14 July: .....[The Netherlands?]
• 21-31 July:..............UZBEKISTAN Country Visit
• 1-10 Aug:.................TAJIKISTAN Country Visit
• 17 Aug - 8 Sept:......IC 2008 in Brazil, then touring around with Shannon the Amazonian
• 9-12 Sept:................NEW YORK reunion with my Yale suitemates
  ...then home for a few weeks before the Fulbright Year starts!!

I also just sent in my application for Caucasus & Central Asia Regional Coordinator on CEE GN (Central & Eastern Europe Growth Network)...with help from Michele and Alina who wrote 2 of my 6 endorsements. I should hear about it next week. If I get the position, I'll be receiving my own transition in Rotterdam (where AI is located) in July.

Keep writing everyone! It's great to be able to read all the stories!!!

Cheers from one of the few left in the USA,
and Bjorn, see you VERY soon,
-Juli

First day in Guayaquil!

So I was nervous to the point of being very very unable to deal with any discussion of food this morning (I ate breakfast and then Mom asked me if I wanted yogurt and my stomach did a lovely flip... I didn't feel nervous but my gut sure did!).

This is my first time EVER traveling on my own and also my first time in a Spanish-speaking country. The flight from Chicago to Miami was pretty boring but, between Miami and Guayaquil, I sat next to a young man from Guatemala by way of 15 years in Canada and his baby boy (11 mos, so cute), so we talked quite a bit. I have to find him on the internet because I didn't get to say a proper good-bye -- I was ahead of him in customs... but thanks to AIESEC I have MSN and so I could give him my MSN! So there's another friend, this one in Montreal.

As we were landing it was weird because there were like NO lights below us and then -- all of a sudden! -- lots of lights, mostly it looked like parking lots or baseball stadiums or something because they were grids punctuated by the outline of roads. I was grinning a lot (totally had my mouth hanging open, I was laughing at myself the whole time) but at first all I could really think of was how similar it looked to the US. Then I got off the plane and it was different... the people look so different here! For one, almost all of them are a lot darker than the usual at Yale, for another -- shorter! And also more of them standing around at the airport, but fewer lines, which was awesome. So it was a quick switch from "wow like home" to "wow okay different."

Then Samuel (International Relations guy) picked me up with his brother Javier and we drove to the ESPOL, the university where I'm working. Then followed a 10-minute tour of campus which I understood about half of and will remember none of, a phone call to Mom to tell her I was here and safe -- weird because I was used to speaking Spanish by then -- and a really awkward hello to Luna, my apartment-mate, and Doreen and Marita, two Austrian girls who are our neighbors, and Joaquin, who's apparently showing me around tomorrow. Anyway it was amazing because then they pulled out cards and we played a game like Uno and Speed combined and it was awesome :) What a welcome. I was sitting there amazed that things could possibly be so good -- by the way, my room is AIR CONDITIONED!! did not expect that! and it's BIG! -- and now I'm sitting here amazed at where I am and what I'm doing. I'll post pictures in a bit but I need to get to bed now.

Hugs to all! And I promise I'll edit this probably tomorrow...

The lizard that eats our mosquitos is cackling at me...

~Michele

First Days in Turkey

I flew out of Portland, Oregon at 8:30 AM on Monday, June 2nd. Stops in Detroit, Amsterdam, and Istanbul before catching a small airplane to Izmir, where I met my AIESEC host at 10 pm after 32 hours of traveling.
On the plane I met a woman who was on her way to a conference about persuasion on the internet in Finland - basically, exploring how easy it is to maniuplate us over the net (facebook is one of the hot topics, for obvious reasons.) Sitting to my right was an automotive engineer who was originally from Germany, and has figured out how to take as much time off from works as he wants so he and his wife can sail around the world in a 40-foot boat with just the two of them as crew - the Carribean, South America, Australia - basically anywhere that has water enought to float.

Izmir itself is a strangely fascinating mix of culture - Muslim, Ottoman, Greek, Persian, Kurdish, European, American. Located on the west of Turkey on the Aegean sea, it is Turkey's most cosmopolitan city and its second-largest port. Modern apartment buildings (ornate Turkish rugs hanging from the balconies) stand next to grass fields surrounded by shacks and filled with grazing cows and goats; modern BMW's share the road with peasants driving horse-drawn carts; stray dogs and cats root through dumpsters in the shade of satellite dishes; and everywhere are the minarets and domes of the city's innumerable mosques, from which you can hear the evening prayers blasted through megaphones to mingle with the roar of commercial jets passing overhead.

The AIESECers in Izmir (for those of you who don't know, AIESEC is a student-run international exchange organization that sets up internships across the world [30,000 members, 100+ countries - let me know if you have questions]) are all very friendly, and all speak English with varying degrees of proficiency. The day after arriving my host, Kemal, took me to the AIESEC office where I met a few of the approximately 90 members of AIESEC Izmir, and then to a bar with some friends for my first experience with Turkish beer (not bad, for the record.)

The bars in Turkey deserve some mention. The ones I have visited have narrow doorways that open onto narrow streets crowded with tables for the outdoor customers; the doors lead into a dim interior that usually consists of two indoor floors and an outdoor patio on the second floor. They feel pretty much like walking straight into a pub from the Middle Ages/Lord of the Rings: wooden tables, low chandeliers that do little to illuminate the high ceilings, a bar with various taps behind it, full of music and noisy, intoxicated Turks. A hell of a fun place to drink and talk.

And, of course, there is the fact that Izmir is on the Aegean sea - I've already had a few magnificent sun sets, and what with the palm trees and 80-90 degree weather I definitely feel like I'm on vacation.

Iyi akşamlar
BC

ps. There are pictures to go with this blog under my facebook notes