In your country...are there birds that fly, or no?

Sorry for the delay in update! We had our technical trip and then some of the group came down with some group sickness, so I’ve been lazy this week. We left for our tech trip on Easter Sunday and headed to Puerto Quito which is a little west of Quito. It was super hot there and there were way too many mosquitoes. We all got eaten up pretty bad! We spent three days in Puerto Quito visiting a farm and learning about tilapia, pesticide safety, commercialization, compost, worm beds, etc. and spent our free time in the pool or playing volleyball/futbol. It felt like summer camp – 30 girls in one cabin sharing two bathrooms! I am glad to say that the girls totally dominated the ecuateam in volleyball our last night there. It was a good victory. From Puerto Quito we divided into Oriente, Sierra and Costa tech trips and headed to our next destination: Puyo. We had an insanely good dinner in Puyo at an italian restaurant owned by a legit Italian. We spent a few days in Puyo visiting an orchid park, tree nursery, learning about waorani culture and visiting a nature reserve run by an american and his shuar wife. Everything was incredibly beautiful and the climate in Puyo was perfect. We spent one night mas adentro en the jungle learning about tilapia ponds, compost, bokashi and things of the sort. We were literally in the middle of nowhere but it was amazing fun. We got to cook real american food for dinner and breakfast, swam under a 60 foot waterfall and sang songs by the campfire. It made me miss HPC for sure! After Puyo, we headed to our hostal in Tena (which had wireless internet) and then made our way to my site – the caves! We had a traditional lunch of maito – fish cooked inside a huge palm leaf – and then made our way into the jungle to learn about the different fruits and eat some cacao and guava. After the jungle, we headed into the back entrance of the caves for a few hours. Everyone had a good time, which is obvious, because my site is too cool. After the caves we headed back to the hostal for dinner and a warm shower. Apparently dinner wasn’t a good idea because the people that ate it ended up getting sick the next day. We finally got back ‘home’ and were able to relax and process an amazing trip! This week we’ve had more Kichwa class, final language interviews, final technical tests, final evaluations, etc etc. Everyone is really excited to be in Quito for Swearing-In next week. I can’t believe training is over! I’m sure these next two years will fly by as well. Yesterday we had a ‘sports day’ where we did the ecuapresentation of the teams and chose a ‘madrina’ to represent the day. Of course, Joyce won. Because she’s on our team. And we made incredibly amazing team jerseys. We played volleyball, basketball and some softball and called it a day. Today was our family appreciation day and we had lots to eat and good company to enjoy. Tomorrow we’re off to the capital to finish up training and officially become Peace Corps Volunteers. I will try to update after swear-in but if not, it might be a while – we move to our sites this week! I will find a good internet place asap. Thanks for reading and keeping up with me. Love and miss you all!!