Andean Dreams: sumak

There is much to share, as always, but my goal for this post is to practice a bit of thrift of word. Since I last wrote (before posting the article), I have hiked Volcan Imbabura with some wild elementary school kids and a couple of scrappy dogs, helped translate for a group of medical students and doctors from University of Florida who came to our community on a medical brigade, participated in the facilitator training for the Alternatives to Violence Project, helped to start a theological discussion and ritual space at the Casa Trans in Quito, had a really lovely visit with my friend Whittney from the States, went to see Manu Chao and Calle 13 in concert in Quito, participated in two ritual baths for the Spring Equinox, and made some really fun new Ecuadoran friends who have taken me to a waterfall, a museum in a cave, a lake, and some thermal pools. This past weekend, I climbed up to the first glacier on Cotopaxi volcano--one of the highest active volcanoes in the world! It was really an experience to touch snow on the equator. On Sunday, I went on the ciclopaseo with some friends in Quito. Every Sunday, the city closes certain main roads and rents bikes along the way for folks to jaunt around. It is really fun, and certainly makes Quito feel smaller. Other than my research, my main occupation lately has been working a lot with the women's jewelry-making collective in my community—Sumak Muyo. I have been participating a little as a fellow artisan by making some necklaces, but mostly working on the marketing side of things. On that note, please check out our new facebook page! (Feel free to “like” it or share it, too!) More on all this below.

ciclopaseando

Hiking Imbabura

a straggler on the hike

The hike up Imbabura was with Mary's host-dad, Oswaldo, and his students from his one-room schoolhouse nestled way up in the cold, foggy flanks of the Imbabura volcano. It took us over 2 hours just to get there, and this is a commute that he does every single day, to go teach a handful of students of all ages. We arrived and the students already had a head-start on us, impatient to get up the mountain. The kids scrambled up the steep path ahead of us in no time, while I slowly lumbered behind, but they thankfully responded to the yell for them to come back towards us after a few hours, once the impenetrable fog rolled in. We shared a feast of government-issue school snacks at the top, and tumbled back down.


at the top, in the fog, eating government snacks

I have talked about the Alternatives to Violence Project in past posts, when I did the basic and advanced trainings. The website I linked above also has good information on the project itself, so I won’t say much about that. But the facilitator training was a really great experience, and I am so excited to serve as a facilitator in the future! I am hoping I can connect with some women’s prisons in the States to facilitate AVP trainings there, among other contexts. It really feels like such a good fit for my passions and talents, and is just so practical, which appeals to me. I feel like so often I am passionately but impractically opining about justice, and this model offers specific, effective tools to bring about paradigm shifts in how people see and experience violence on all levels—personal, familial, structural. It’s really exciting and hopeful for me to be involved in this global movement of passionate volunteers!

Another exciting project recently was working with Monica to help open a theological space at the Casa Trans in Quito. Casa Trans is a residential community for transgender individuals in Quito, and does a lot of activism around gender and sexuality in Ecuador. With our theological training, Monica and I had the delightful opportunity to facilitate an inaugural space for Queer theological dialogue and spiritual reflection at the house. We actually used a lot of the participatory activities we learned in our AVP trainings, and were just generally open to hearing from the group about what their visions were for the space. It was a really positive experience, and very moving to hear about the personal spiritual journeys of all those present. I was struck once again by how much human beings seem to hunger for spiritual meaning and expression, and how much repressive religious spaces and traditions can’t take that hunger away from people, even if they do leave them confused and hurt.

Obviously Whittney’s visit could be a post of its own, but the brief summary is that she came for 5 days, and in that time we covered a lot of ground. The morning after she arrived, we took a bus to Santo Domingo, plunging down into the hot greenery from the cool heights of the Andes. We headed out to an Indigenous community near Santo Domingo, called Chihuilpe. There we met Henry, a Tsáchila leader and musician who works pretty tirelessly to preserve their endangered culture. There are only about 3,000 Tsáchilas left at this point, spread between 8 different communities. The time we spent in the community was admittedly a bit random, but included a nice guided walk with Henry, painting ourselves with the seed that the Tsáchilas traditionally use to make ceremonial black marks on their bodies, a cleansing ritual with the shaman--Don Manuel, and a slightly sleepless night enveloped in mosquito netting and humidity, with unidentified (and heavy) creatures scurrying across the tin roof all night. The next morning, Don Manuel conducted a traditional “sauna” of sorts for us with medicinal plants, we drank some instant coffee, and we headed off.

Henry painting my wrist with the seed

Don Manuel, the shaman

the seed that makes black dye

We caught an 8-hour bus to the coast. It was a beautiful ride to take during the day, to see the many topographies and microclimates roll by, spilling out beside us as if from a spool of multicolored thread. We arrived in Puerto Lopez in the evening and found a cute hostel where we showered and left our backpacks before heading out to enjoy some cold juice on the beach and coming home early to read in bed. (Obviously Whitt and I together really bring out each others' inner party animal). The next day we took a tour to Isla de la Plata (known a bit ironically as “the poor man’s Galapagos”). The tour consisted of a pleasant boat ride to the island, a guided hike around the verdant island with our friendly guide, a lot of Blue-footed Booby sightings, snorkeling, fresh fruit, and far too much sun. On our second and final day on the coast, we caught a bus and then hiked to Los Frailes beach, also part of the Machalilla national park. The hike was incredibly humid, but rewarded with some beautiful beaches along the way, and a summit with cool breezes where birds flew below your line of vision, and the brilliant cerulean sea swept out in all directions, nearly blending with the bright blue sky. We swam in the warm waves and assiduously tried to avoid further burning our crisp shoulders. I ran into a friend from all the way up here in Cotacachi on the beach (a former volunteer at Aya’s organic farm where I was teaching after-school English with Mary), and we split a motor-rikshaw back to town with her and presumably her Ecuadorean lover. That was really fun and worth the dollar. Back in town, Whittney and I ate an unhealthy dinner of arepas (Colombian fried corn patties) and a crepe smothered in chocolate sauce and homemade ice cream. Then we hopped on a bus.

one of the many landscapes on the ride to the coast

approaching the Isla de la Plata

the isla

the famous "blue-footed booby"

hiking to Los Frailes

We took the overnight bus back to Quito, slept for about an hour in the sitting room at our Quito hostel, and then headed out to enjoy the day. We shopped at the artisan market, took the TeleferiQo up Pichincha Volcano, and wandered around the historic center of Quito. There, we ate more fried food. A name we considered giving Whittney’s visit was “Tiff and Whitt’s tour of the fried foods of Ecuador.” It was a great visit.

At the top of the TeleferiQo with Whitt

Finally, I would like to explain a little more about Sumak Muyo. This is a project that some of the women in our community started a few years ago. They gather together in the evenings to make jewelry out of natural materials, mostly seeds. Through the funds raised by their collective project they have been able to build a daycare/preschool for the community, among other important contributions. They have a strong willingness to work, and there are a lot of other women they could invite to make jewelry with them, if they had a stable clientele base/demand. So Mary and I decided to work on marketing their jewelry, and are currently looking into various options for that, including starting an Etsy page. On Wednesday I went with one of the women to open her first bank account, which we will use as the bank account for the group. It is pretty exciting! If any of you have interest in buying some necklaces or other jewelry to support the women, please let me know, and I would be happy to bring some jewelry with me back to the States. While our Etsy page is under construction, you can see some of the styles on the facebook page I linked above. I will be taking more photos and adding them in the next few weeks. Feel free to request a specific style or color!

There is more to say, as always, but for now, I leave you with some more photos. Next update: Semana Santa! (Holy Week)