José y Claudia Trabajamos

Claudia y José

My IU Southeast colleagues Ray and Kyle  advised me to study español at a language school.

There are many schools in Quito but that's two hours total of riding the bus for each session.

My officemate, Fausto, introduced me to Claudia una profesora de español de la universidad de San Francisco and now she and I are meeting twice a week for 1 hour of one-on-one conversación.

Claudia's spouse teaches math at a high school in Quito - sounds familiar, huh?  She once taught high school Spanish in Minnesota.

We've met twice, and I get to about 45 minutes in the session and my brain wants to shut down.  Claudia says: No hables inglés!  So I don't.  It's tough.  At times the words come out reasonably well, but others it's like my head is hitting a brick wall.  Sometimes you'll be half way through a sentence and get stopped dead.  Then you circle around what you were trying to say and come in from a different angle and wonder, why didn't I do that in the first place.

Quito Views

The valley outside of Quito

This week has been busy with writing papers for a computer science education conference - they're due Friday (7 Sept), but it isn't until March 2013 in Denver.

Not to mention going to Quito to get briefed by Security at the U.S. Embassy about how to stay safe.  And, finalizing the registration of my 12-VIII Ecuadorian visa - I ask the local Fulbright person what it means to register a visa that was issued by the Ecuadorian government, I still don't know.

Anyway I saw this view walking back to my house from campus and it makes up for the hard work and time in government offices.

Quito Wildfires

That's smoke in the sky above Quito

This picture was taken from the campus of San Francisco.

Thank goodness it's not like Colorado Springs this summer, but Quito has had some wildfires.  I don't think there's enough trees and brush for it to be like Colorado Springs.

My host Cecilia says it has been dryer than normal.

How a lot of work gets done here

Hard Work!

There seems to be construction going on in a lot of places around here.  It might have to do with the new Quito airport being built near Cumbayá.

You'll see a Bobcat or a backhoe every once in a while, but more often you'll see a wheelbarrow and a guy with a shovel.

Speaking Spanish - warning dense text and no pictures

At USFQ
The faculty that I have met at USFQ all speak English, so I am not getting a lot of practice at speaking Spanish with them.  It’s just more efficient for them to speak in English with me.

However, at lunch the other day I sat at a table with seven different professors and they all talked in Spanish most of the time.  It didn’t bother me that I couldn’t understand much of what they were saying, because I figure this is one way I can get my ear trained to the speed and accent.

If you get them to speak in Spanish to you, they speak rapidly, and then you say "habla despacio por favor" (speak slower please), and they immediately switch to English.

One-on-one Conversation
On Tuesday (9/4) I have an appointment set up to have a one hour one-on-one conversation with USFQ professor Claudia (a Spanish profesora).  I’m hoping that works into a regular meeting.  Also I just learned of a language school here in Cumbayá.  I’m going to give them a call tomorrow (Monday, 9/3).  Another option is to go to Quito where there are numerous language schools.  I’m just hoping to avoid the two hours in a bus required to go Quito and then come back.  But if that’s what it takes, I’ll probably do it.

Grant
I have a grant from the IU OVPIA (Office of the Vice Present for International Affairs) that will help pay for Spanish lessons while I’m here.  Why would they pay for that?  IU takes international studies seriously, check out their “Factbook” web page.  I plan to take computing students from IU Southeast on Dr. Magdalena's Summer in Ecuador program every other year for next some many years.

Miscommunication because of context?
I’m pretty sure that sometimes the person to whom you are speaking in your broken Spanish just cannot understand you because of context problems.  Here’s an example.  When I first got here (10 days ago or so) I asked Estella (Cecilia’s made) about riding the bus to Quito from Cumbayá.  I knew she rode it, so that was not the problem.  The problem was I was asking (in Spanish of course): How often do the buses go from Cumbayá to Quito?  If you’ve seen my post from the other day you know the answer is about 10 every 10 minutes.  So I think the problem was that this question made absolutely no sense to her because busses go ALL the time, not just once or twice an hour (like I was thinking).

Riding the El Chaquiñan Trail

Snapshot of El Chaquiñan

OK, I’ve done three rides now on the El Chaquiñan trail.  It looks like bike riding is going to work out for me, I’m glad about that.

The first ride was a 10K to see if the bike would work out, and then I should go ahead and buy a helmet.  The answer was “yes”, and I knew right then that I needed gloves because the trail is pretty rough and beats your hands up as well as your backside.

El Chaquiñan - 1st 10K

The second ride was a 20K.  That’s a little less than the 15 mile rides that grew to be short rides for me in the Knobs, but I didn’t know about problems with the altitude.  20K worked out about just right.  When I got back home, I was ready to be back home.



The third ride was to Tumbaco (the next town over from Cumbayá) where I rode around the streets to see what’s there.  I found a shopping center that included a multiplex cinema.  If I ever go to watch a movie, I’ll ride the bus for $0.25.

New helmet and gloves

Next thing to buy is a mirror for my helmet.  I just have to see what’s coming up behind me when I’m riding on the streets.

Here's a link to more images found on the web of El Chaquiñan.

Laundry Day

Estella

On Fridays Estella comes from south Quito.  She is Cecilia’s maid and used to come more frequently when Cecilia’s family was all living at home.  

The good news for me is that it is laundry day.

Clean clothes for the coming week

My $17/day pays for my room, breakfast and dinner on Monday through Friday, and laundry.