Due to a lack of updates, I now have much to write about-- read on if you have a lot of time.

All us trainees are now together in Quito for one final week. We’ll be sworn in as real Peace Corps volunteers at the end of this week and then will move to our final sites.

Since my last update, we have left our first host families and have been living out of suitcases for a few weeks. I was sad to leave my family of very generous women I lived with in Puruhantag. My last few days there were during Semana Santa (the holy week leading up to Easter) and during my free days my host family included me in the holiday festivities. One day we made fanesca- a traditional soup Ecuadorians eat for Easter, which includes 12 grains and dried fish. It usually takes all day to prepare (with many peoples’ help) my host mother also took me to see las banderas (dancing with flags, see photo), and on a quick tour of the rose nursery where she works. They were a great family to spend 2 months with- great guides, patient with my Spanish and the two toddlers provided a lot of entertainment and were even good playmates.

After leaving our host families we spent the next 2 weeks on technical training trips split up by program and regions where we’ll be living. Highlights of the trip were days spent in Cuenca, which feels like a very European city. Here we had a lot of good meals, ran a 15km race through the city (which I definitely should have trained more for…) Another fun day was spent hiking in Cajas National Park- a paramo (Ecuadorian grassland) ecosystem. From Cuenca, 7 of us who will be living in el Oriente went to Macas where we spent a fun day hiking through dense jungle and learning about GPS, gave a “charla” (a lesson) at a school with the 7^th graders, saw a presentation of traditional dancing and spent a lot of time eating ice cream.

This week in Quito we had a free day on Sunday so we walked around the historic district and saw beautiful churches. The rest of the week we have full days of interviews, and other logistical presentations. Thursday is swearing in day and Friday we’re off to our lives for the next 2 years!