The end has sadly come...

Can you believe it has been 14 months, and I am back in the states?! I certainly can’t.

My last month in Ecuador was filled with traveling, goodbyes, smiles, and tears. We *reluctantly* handed over all of our programs to the new Program Directors. I was like a parent learning how to let go and send my child off to college. It was hard to see our programs, our babies, being taken over by other people, but I am confident that the new PDs will have a great year.

Other than the emotional parental struggles, my year couldn’t have ended better. My 6^th grade Nutrition Education Program proved to be a successful program with a 22% increase in the students’ nutrition knowledge and almost a 100% positive response to the students’ self-evaluation on whether or not they have the knowledge and confidence to make their own healthy nutrition choices.  The bottom line is the pilot Nutrition Program was successful and will be continuing next year! Though the program definitely had its struggles and perhaps the impact we made this year was small, I know we started an amazing project that has the potential to grow and permanently change the health of the entire community.

Even though in my last few weeks in Ecuador I was fortunate enough to travel, I was also working up until the end. For the entire year, I was working with Dr. Escobar, an internal medicine doctor at the local hospital who manages a diabetes club for his patients to unite in their struggles against the disease and learn about new treatment options. Working with him, we decided to start an exercise program for the club to help jumpstart tackling the disease. We got everything set up and under way but I was unfortunately not able to see the program begin in September. It will be an amazing program and luckily I am getting updates from Dr. Escobar. J

This past year has been one of the most amazing of my life. I learned so much about international health and communities, as well as so much about myself. It was a year filled with frustrations, tears, laughter, and love. I will never forget the people I met and friends I made.

I will also never forget your support for me over the past year. Because of you, I was able to live a dream and come away a better person. Whenever I look back on my year in Ecuador, I will think of you and have a feeling of gratitude. Thank you so much!

My last day with the Rumiloma twins-

Samantha and Ronny!

Playground with the kids!

I hope you had a fantastic year and thank you again!

Con cariño,

Krysta

Passing on the baton...

As of last week, the new PD’s have infiltrated Quito and we are starting to pass our wisdom down to them. Last Thursday, I took 2 of the new PDs, Jack and Noel, to the Sangolquí radio station, Super K, to meet Oswaldo and give them a go at their first radio charla. Jack will be taking over my position as ‘radio head’ next year and let me be the first to say I couldn’t have passed this job down to a better person. With this enthusiasm for the job, I have no doubts he will take the position and our relationship with Super K to a whole new level!

Jack and Noel flawlessly gave July’s radio charla on nutrition. They were so relaxed and had not only me, but also the DJ Marcela, laughing the entire time. After their charla I don’t know who wouldn’t want to come hang out at the library with them this coming year! Manna is in for a great year if all programs are treated with such eagerness and motivation as Jack and Noel showed at the radio. I will admit I was worried to be passing on my programs, my babies, to the newbies but I can honestly say I am confident they will take care of business and do things I never even imagined.

Good luck this year Jack! 

The morning DJ, Marcela, and me

Jack and Noel broadcasting live!

un abrazo grande,

Krysta

Forever Friends

As the saying goes, all good things must come to an end. For Adult English, the end sadly came last week. Haley, I and our students ended the course with a blow-out party complete with cake, freshly made hot chocolate with fig tree leaves, candy, cookies, cheese, and without fail, uncooked hotdogs. Yummm! But all in all it was a delicious, sugar-high party filled with story telling and bonding.

Each student received an Intermediate English completion certificate and a hug from Haley and I as a special congratulation. Words cannot express how much I loved teaching this class. Not only were they my students, but they were my friends as well. As I look back on this past year down here in Ecuador, I can truly say that the personal relationships I have made with my students and the community members in general are what I will always cherish long after I leave. Thinking about leaving this country is extremely hard but I will leave knowing that I aided our students in their pursuit to learning English and that they have impacted my life in ways I will be discovering the rest of my life.

And now, it is my pleasure to present the newest graduates of Intermediate Adult English!

Gaston helping Fabiola prepare the 

hot chocalate

Ruth proudly accepting her certificate!

Fabiola and her amazing smile and laugh! 

I miss her already!

Our fabulous graduates! Congrats!

Holding back the tears,

Krysta

All good things must come to an end...

Today marks the end of my Aliñambi Nutrition Education Program. :(  Though it has been a rough few months full of long nights and sore throats after class, I am going to genuinely miss some of those kids!

We spent the last two weeks of class playing jeopardy and taking one last trip per group to the garden and the kitchen. Though the garden is still in it's growing stage and not quite ready to be cultivated, the kids really enjoyed planting and taking care of their respective plots. Hopefully Bryan, one of our kids who lives at Aliñambi, will be able to pick some of the crops over the summer!

In the kitchen, Haley and I made a recipe book for each of the kids full of all the recipes we did in class as well as about 25 more recipes catered to their household cooking abilities. I wish I could have captured all their faces of excitement when we told them about the recipe books! Priceless. Surprisingly, I think the boys were more excited than the girls haha.

The kids will take the diagnostic exam that they took the first day to gage how much they learned, as well as to see how they each responded to the self-efficacy questions (hopefully positively!). When they first took the diagnostic prior to learning anything about nutrition, the average score was about a 50%. To deem the program successful and hopefully carry on another year, we are hoping for an increase of 25% or an overall average of 80%. We shall see next week when we get back the exams! I'll keep you posted! I'm crossing my fingers, yet again, that this program can continue next year and expand to include the families to promote more permanent change within households.

And now, the best of the Aliñambi Nutrition Education Program...

One of the posters I made for the 

hand-washing charla

Some of the girls soooo excited to give

their interviews at local tiendas! 

Such eager students!

Sayuri and Jessica crying. From the onions

or because they're having so much fun? Guess

we'll never know...

Enjoying the fruits of their labor!

Our final class. :( Captures them perfectly...

I was so sad to be ending the class as I probably will not see many of the kids again because they are out on summer vacation now. Though a few come to the library, so I will have a couple more days before the big goodbye.

besitos,
Krysta

'Tis the Season for Money!!!

After months of work, a 12-page document, days of editing, and 'self-efficacy' becoming my new favorite word, my Coca-Cola Grant request is officially submitted!! :) CELEBRATION!

I submitted a grant request to the Coca-Cola Foundation for Manna's nutrition and health programs. Currently our budget is at about $200, and lets just say that doesn't go too far when you're trying to purchase new Women's Exercise equipment, run a nutrition class and trying to open a Health Resource Library. So, for months I have been working on this grant so the next year Program Directors are not held back by money.

My money request came to approximately $17,516.32. Now do I expect to get all $17k? Perhaps not, but even a small chunk of that would do wonders for the nutrition programs and that is the least I can hope for! The budget included things from aerobic steps to photo copies to health conferences for Manna PDs and community members to a weight scale and blood glucose monitor. Channeling the true nerd in me, I am so stoked at the possibility of getting sweet, new medical equipment!

I believe the turn around on notification is 6 to 8 weeks so hopefully by the time my contract ends with Manna in August, I will have heard some (great) news! I will fill you in once I hear something!

I'm so nervous I'm biting my nails...

(This was actually taken in Venezuela after Jackie

and I  got the last 2 seats on this overnight

bus to catch our flight back to Quito!)

Hope you're enjoying the start of summer!
Finger- and toe-crossed Peterson

Summer Library Sprucing!

Two weeks ago 10 eager college students arrived to live in the Manna House (yes, there are currently 19 people living all together in the Manna House) and work with us on our programs and do things us PDs just simply never have time to do.

Haley and I have 2 awesome girls helping us with Adult English and they are already planning and teaching part of the classes. Our awesome students have of course welcomed them with open arms and it's definitely a load off of us during a very hectic time of the year! But it's going great and Sonia and Jenni (our TA volunteers) are doing a fabulous job.

Sonia and Jenni teaching vocabulary!

I also have some volunteers helping me paint the very worn down clinic at Aliñambi. But more will be told of that in a few weeks when we finish, so stay tuned.

One of the biggest changes as happened in the library. When Tulane was here for Spring Break, they painted an amazing mural on one of the walls in the library. Tulane left it up to the PDs to fill in/paint all the bubbles....well it never got done. So we recruited the summer vols to finish it for us and within 2 days, it was transformed! It looks fabulous all completed!

The completed mural! (I painted the Ecuador flag :) )

Apparently finishing the mural wasn't enough and some decided to take on a new project of painting other parts of the library as well. The library really needed some color on its ugly pale yellow/tan walls and its getting the star treatment! It is really starting to look like a library with continued book donations and character being added by short-term volunteers and a wall now devoted to the kids reading club. Its incredible to see what we been done since we arrived last July.

Jenni and Claire working on the 

plant/outdoor themed Adults Corner!

I am sure there will be more to come of the library space with these vols around and a new group coming in in a few weeks so I can't wait to see what else springs up!

Disfrute,

Krysta

The Next Food Network Stars!

With the start of June, we will be heading into our 4th and final month of our pilot Nutrition Education Program at Aliñambi. I can't believe it. We have completed all our cooking classes and garden classes with the kids and are now onto more difficult curriculum here in the last month.

In the kitchen we cooked 5 meals including Honey Chicken with Rosemary, Fruit Salad, Rice Salad with Spring Vegetables, Acelga Soup with Vegetables and the always-a-hit Zucchini Bread. As those recipes were just the tip of the iceberg. Needless to say we cooked up a storm with these kids and they all seemed to love it! Each week we assigned ingredients to each kid that they were responsible for bringing. We wanted them to start to gain a sense of responsibility in the kitchen and start them on the track towards self-efficacy in their nutritional lives. Many didn't know what a lot of the ingredients were so by having them have to search and discover new fruits and vegetables, they will *hopefully* now start to realize the healthy variety available to them!

Cooking with Valeria, Sasha, and Jose!

(I apologize for the scary looking black eye 
I'm sporting...soccer)

Jackie did a great job with the kids in the garden. Group 1's plot is sprouting some carrots, lettuce, and herbs beautifully, though much to the regret of Group 2, whose plot isn't looking too hot. Jackie taught them about the negative effects of pesticides and how they effect our health as well as about composting and she even took on the carbon cycle!

Group 1's flourishing garden on the right, 

Group 2, not so much :(

Many days with this project we get overwhelmed and frustrated. Needless to say we have learned a lot about Ecuadorian school systems and discipline and even a few cultural clashes here and there. One day in the kitchen when we were almost at our whits end after suspending 5 kids from the kitchen the week prior, something amazing happened. I was talking to Jennifer, one of our best students, while she was eating the beautifully prepared meal for the day. In the midst of talking she informed me that she made Potatoes with Rosemary (one of the first recipes we did with the kids) in her house with her dad for Mother's Day. She said she cooked and helped her dad and her whole family loved them! I was so excited and so touched, I was at a loss for words. That day made the entire past months of hardships worth it. If we are even affecting the lives of one of these kids, than it has all been worth it. That piece of news Jennifer gave me made me again step back and appreciate why I am here and how amazing it all really is.

Jennifer giving her stellar interview!

Today was the first Friday on non-kitchen and gardening activities. On Tuesday, I taught the kids how to give an interview and how to professionally conduct themselves. Today, we went out into the community and each of them conducted interviews to food-store owners. Despite their nervousness, most of them did fabulous and it was great to see their sense of accomplishment when they were finished. This is just the beginning of a serious of activities we have planned for the kids in their quest towards self esteem and self efficacy in their lives.

So, only one more month until we wrap up this pilot program and assess its success and possible future. Yikes! I will keep you posted upon its end!

A warm Ecuadorian embrace,
Krysta

One-of-a-kind Interview!

Hey all,
So after much anticipation from many people, my PD interview is finally posted on the Manna blog!  So I'm awkward and don't do too well with public speaking and so interviews on cameras are right along those lines as well. But I did my best to answer everyones questions, which thank you all of those who sent some in! Thanks to fellow PD Sarah for an awesome edit job, I hope you like it and perhaps learn something about me!

Check it out at http://openhandsdirtyfeet.blogspot.com/2010/05/after-many-weeks-of-anticipation-i-am.html!

Enjoy!
Krysta

A Travel Back in Time

About 2 months, Jackie started an annex program for Agriculture in which monthly, she would take kids on paseos (adventure outings) to various museums, parks, etc to give the kids opportunities to experience the agricultural/science side of Ecuador a little more. They have been very successful and this past month we took a very excited group of 15 kids to an interactive Dinosaur museum in Quito, and lets just say, it was so horribly awesome. This interactive "museum", and I use that in the lightest sense possible, was more of a gloried life-size Jurassic Park puppet show (complete with the Jurassic Park soundtrack playing in the background).

The 25 minute tour included a guide that walked us through different scenes of dinosaurs and mega-beasts with varying moving parts and features. I didn't take the whole "interactive" part seriously. When we first walked in, we were standing around listening to a recording about dinosaurs and I was busy watching over the kids and not really paying attention, when all of a sudden a foam boulder came flying at me that a puppet dino flung from over a wall. I screamed louder than any 5 year old there. Needless to say we quickly learned that these larger than life dinos moved and sprayed water, scaring the **** out of many of the kids. As we moved from set to set, kids were hiding behind all of the profes and one girl, Leslie, refused to take her fingers out of her ears the entire time (see pic below).

Overall the outing was great. I personally thought it was so horribly awesome and wouldn't trade that day for anything haha. But after the tour, they had 2 dinosaur rides that the kids throughly enjoyed for the better part of an hour. Here a few snippets of our awesome kids and the awesome museum...

This dino sprayed water at us...didn't see that one coming!

Cowering from a giant moving relative of 

Sharp Tooth (The Land Before Time anyone?)

Our favorite, and one and only, set of twins, Ronny and

 Samantha, fearlessly riding the dinos

Samantha being eaten by her dino!

Exhausted on the bus back home! 

(One's faking, can you tell?!)

Only 3 months and 1 day left of Manna....pretty crazy/scary! It's going to be so hard to leave these kids!

Until next post,

Krysta

Home away from home

In March (yes, I am a month late on this one), I did a home-stay with a member of our community. Back in January we decided to start a home-stay program in which Manna PDs would live with community members for about a week. We wanted to present ourselves with the opportunity to get to know community members outside the Community Center setting and on a more personal level, while at the same time offering community members a chance to get to know us as individuals rather than simply as part of the Manna team or as Profes (what the kids call all of us at the library). Many people have already lived with families and more are to come in the following weeks before our summer volunteers get here. So far for everyone that has done a home-stay, it has been a great experience being able to be part of an Ecuadorian family within our community and see how they live their everyday lives.

The family I stayed with is a family of 4 with 2 kids, Ivan and Emilia, that are frequent visitors to our library and previous students of English class. Emilia also happens to be the smartest 4 year I have ever met. She can read in both Spanish AND English and can put things together that no 4 year old should be able to. For example, one night in home-stay, I was talking about my family and how I had an older brother who was 2 years old than me. Irina (the mom) asked how old he was and I said 26 (because he is almost 26) and then Emilia asked how old I was and I said 23. Emilia's response..."He isn't 2 years old than you, he is 3. If he was 2 years older than you, you would be 24." I stood corrected, by a 4 year old. 

It was an awesome experience to live within the community and see day to day workings. I even got a chance to spend the weekend with the family and experience a typical family involved Saturday with numerous extended family members living in the area. There are so many community members that we are close to and I just wish I had more time here to get to do another home-stay, but unfortunately, Summer Volunteers arrive in just about 2 weeks and then the day they leave in July, the new Program Directors arrive! Scary how fast time flies! But, I wish cherish the time I did get to spend living in the community.

Emilia and I showing off her 

splatter paint work of art!

Ivan in the process of creating his
one-of-a-kind!

Hope all is well and everyone's getting excited for summer (or in my case the dry season...its been down pouring continuously since last night here)!

Saludos,

Krysta

What have you always wanted to know about me?!!

Hey everyone,
If you have been keeping up with the Manna Ecuador Blog, you will have noticed that over the past few weeks Sarah has been interviewing PD's and giving family, friends, and blog readers the opportunity to get those burning questions answered by the Ecuador 2010 PDs. Well, this coming Friday, Sarah will be interviewing yours truly!! So she needs you all, and I need you all, to send in questions for me to answer to Sarah before Friday (email to sarah.scott@mannaproject.org)! They can be questions about my Nutrition work I have been doing, the amazing things one of my English students asks me in class everyday to translate, life in the Manna House, what life's like being a gringo in a foreign country, what color the walls are in my Ecuadorian room....ANYTHING!!

Sarah has some great suggestions as well about types of questions so click on the link below to find you where to send the questions and to read some other great question ideas!
Thanks in advance for sending in your questions! I look forward to hearing from you guys and answering your questions!

Manna Ecuador Blog- Krysta's Interview Questions! <------ Click me!

Check back soon for an update on our Nutrition Program and my last 4 months in Ecuador!
besitos,
Krysta

Getting in the new grove of things

Now that we are about to embark on our 4th week of the Aliñambi Nutrition Program, and I have finally started working at the Selva Alegre Subcentro clinic, I am starting to get into a weekly grove of things. With things constantly changing and programs starting and finishing, a routine is something that is greatly valued down here, though doesn't happen too often for me. But with our nutrition program going strong and a great consistent English class, I can relax a little and get down to working on things I have put off these past few months.

I am currently working on a rather extensive grant from the Coca-Cola Foundation to fund the Aliñambi Nutrition Program for this year and future years (as we want it to be a yearly education program for the students at Aliñambi) as well as funding for our community cooking classes and nutrition charlas. All-in-all it will be taking up most of my free time, but fingers crossed it will all work out for the best as we really need funding for our Nutrition programs! Eek!

After 2 weeks of failed attempts at finding the subcentro (a small branch of the main Sangolqui Hospital in a small village), I finally found it and started working there last week. I am there for about 4 hours in the morning helping out the 1 nurse and 1 doctor in a small one room shack clinic giving vaccines, contraceptive shots, and other medical treatments to the people of Selva Alegre, a small barrio about 45 minutes away from my house. The people I am working with are awesome and so sweet and just plain excited to have the extra help. And in return I am stoked to be working so hands-on in a clinic and to be given opportunities to administer shots and other medical procedures that I wouldn't dream of doing in the states until after PA school. Slightly scary at times the amount of freedom I have in the clinic but the chances to learn are infinite.

So here is an example of my typical week:
Monday: Monday Morning Meeting, lunch, Adult English Class
Tuesday: Aliñambi, lunch, Women's Exercise
Wednesday: Working at the clinic, lunch, Library
Thursday: Working at the clinic, lunch, cooking dinner for the crew
Friday: Aliñambi, lunch, Library
*and throw in some grant writing and class preparation in there and you've got the daily life of Krysta!

Finally, starting tomorrow, Tuesday, I will be moving out of the Manna House for a week to live with family in our community. We are doing homestays with community members to take the opportunity to get to know them better outside the setting of our library and classes as well as to give them the chance to know us more intimately and understand who we are a little bit better as individuals rather than just part of a group of 9 gringos. So I will update you next week on how this adventure goes!

Until next post!
Krysta

Rumiñahui Women's Soccer Team lives on!

Though we finished our soccer league last year without a winning record, in fact, without winning a single game, we still will never regret playing. We had an amazing time and some of the funniest memories of our time here happened on that soccer field from Haley picking up the soccer ball in the middle of the game to our crazy coach Pati smoking as we are warming up to play. Our team has in fact decided to join another league, a harder league that doesn't restrict semi-professional women from playing (pray for us!).

We had our first game 2 weeks ago with our usual outcome of a tie, 1-1. To our benefit though, the team was really good and we were without some of our best players. As well as we played in our first game of this season, I can't say so much for our second in which we gravely lost 14-2. But, we had strangers in the stands rooting for us because the other team was well, nicely put very mean and unnecessarily rude....all because we were 'gringos'. Rough day to say the least. Usually sports is where we can find a common ground here in Ecuador and "fit in" but apparently not always. It was definitely a hard moment for all of us to really be discriminated against during a friendly sporting event, a place we have normally felt welcomed.

Well, now that I have loaded with you with not so happy stories, let me spill some more sad news. My Ecuadorian soccer career has sadly come to an end (well, maybe more like a little pause). During the first game 2 weeks ago, I kicked the ball apparently a little to aggressively and at an odd angel that I ended up hurting my knee. I found out this week that I have a partially torn ligament in my knee and have been banded from even walking places, let alone playing soccer. So I will forever be benched and the team cheerleader/heckler. It's upsetting news, yes, but against my mom's wishes, I will not be giving up physical sports. This is just a set back down here in Ecuador. Perhaps maybe I'll return for a league that is starting up in May, we shall see. But I won't be pushing it as being able to go hiking and explore Ecuador are more important to me than playing soccer. Vamos a ver!

Hope everything is going well with everyone and that no one has been sidelined like me!

And because blogs are boring without pictures, here is one of happier times in Tena exploring some sweet caves. Also because headlamps are the best thing since sliced bread....

Me, Haley and Sarah exploring some caves!

besitos!
Krysta

You Are What You Eat

Charlas! Portfolios! Cooking Classes! School Garden! Oh my! If you think those sound fun, just imagine the excitement and enthusiasm coming from our 6th graders each week as we walk in the gates at Aliñambi to do just those. After 7 months working with Aliñambi and nutrition with little physical evidence, I am thoroughly ecstatic to say the least about starting this Nutrition Program with the kids there.  I believe through these kids is where we will be able to really initiate a change towards healthy lifestyles for these communities.

Along with Profes Haley and Jackie we will be teaching nutrition through charlas (lectures), thought provoking portfolio work, and hands-on cooking classes and a class garden. Every Tuesday I will be leading the class through charlas and portfolio work based on topics from the food pyramid to macro and micronutrients to hygiene. And every Friday Chef Haley and Sous Chef Krysta will be leading the culinary trainees with watchful eyes as they learn to wash and cut vegetables and make healthy meals using all local goods. Farmer Jackie and Farmhand Bibi will be leading the apprentices in designing and building their own garden to include radishes, lettuce, broccoli, cilantro, and basil…can anyone else see delicious salads in our future?!  Yum!

            Today we finished our second full week of class and despite a few punishments after a dirt-throwing jaunt everything has gone great. I truly believe in these kids’ ability to succeed in this program and their capacity to realize they have control over their nutritional lives and can promote permanent change at home.

So we didn’t realize we were not allowed to take photos at the school, so these are a few and probably the only pictures we will have for evidence that this program actually took place. Enjoy them while they’re hot.

Me and a few of our students making 

recycled paper!

Hard at work flattening the newly made paper

Maria, Frida and Valeria

Digging up the plot for our future 6th

grade garden

  The garden starting to take shape

after 2 hours of work!

This coming week the students will be taking a field trip down the street to check out a local producers garden and get some tips for how to have a successful garden!

Until next post,

Krysta

Prayers for Chile

As many of you know I studied in Valparaíso, Chile in the spring of 2007. Being in Chile for 6 months studying and living with a host family changed my world and I didn't even know it until years later. It was the first time I had been outside the States (besides Mexico) and traveled and experienced an amazing country on my own. Most of the reason why I am here in Ecuador volunteering is due to the time I spent in Chile. It is an absolutely amazing country with so much diversity and warmth. I miss it everyday, especially with being back in South America and so close.

Valparaíso is a beautiful historical city with many calling it the heart of Chile. It is built on a hillside over-looking the ocean with old buildings and houses of every color scattered throughout. Due to it's history and current state of many of the old buildings, it suffered fair damage in this past earthquake. Luckily, after talking to many of my fellow study-abroaders, our host families seem to be ok and doing well despite the physical damage. Thank goodness. It is hard for me to write about this with being so close to Chile and not able to be there and helping. There are so many selfless people in Chile that offered their homes to us while we were studying and I forever will be grateful. My thankfulness extends beyond my host family and into the homes of many others. I am so happy to hear from a handful of people that everyone is safe. 

Please keep Chile in your thoughts and prayers as they get through this hard time. And if you ever have a chance to travel down here, make sure Chile is on your itinerary!

Enjoy this photo montage of my happy times in Chile!

The hills and colors of Valparaíso

My CRAZY host mamá!

And my even crazier host sister, Martina

One of the amazing paintings in the Open Air

Museum throughout the street walls in Valpo

besitos + prayers,

Krysta

Move over Rachel Rae!

For the past several months, we have been fundraising to build a kitchen in our 3rd floor space above the library with the hopes and dreams of starting a cooking class with women in our community. Ecuador's produce is something most people in the US would kill to have at their disposal. Many Ecuadorians don't stray from the typical meat, potato, rice, and legume of some sort dish. Very rarely are nutritious vegetables such as zucchini used in their daily diet. Many of the women in our Women's Exercise class have expressed their interest in cooking a more varied diet but that they simple do not know how to cook vegetables like zucchini. Well, Manna Cooking Class 101 to the rescue!!

Thanks to our amazing donors, including my family (thanks mom and pop!), we have raised all the money needed to build our kitchen!! After hours of shopping done by Sonia and hours of scrapping paint off windows and scrubbing down the area on my part, our 3rd floor kitchen is up and running and oh so beautiful!!
And now without further ado, may I present, the Manna Kitchen....

Before (though this picture was taken part way

through the cleaning process, so imagine it

with more paint on the windows and messier)

After...The gorgeous new Manna Kitchen!

(Thanks mom for the stylin' towels and pot holders!)

Brand-spankin' new!

An example of the amazing produce here! Yes, those

are zucchini and that is a normal-size fork! And

we have actually had larger ones since!

A-mazing!

Though our kitchen was first developed with the idea of holding cooking classes for the women in the community (this will still happen hopefully starting in April), the first meal cooked in the new kitchen will be done by my group of 20 rambunctious 6th graders from Aliñambi as part of their Nutrition Education Program! Each week Haley and I will bring a group of 6th graders down to the kitchen to teach them how to cook using a wide variety of nutrient rich vegetables and fruits and how to choose and prepare a well balanced meal. I am soooo excited about this program and teaching kids they have the ability to take control of their nutritional lives and take advantage of the amazing opportunities in food they have here!

Thank you again to all of those who contributed to the kitchen! It will definitely be getting its use this Spring and hopefully not too damaged from a crazy group of 6th graders. :)

peace, love, and nutrition
Krysta

Making a fool of ourselves....on the radio!

As you all know from older posts, the Ecuadorian Radio and I are becoming quite good friends. I have been through 2 great sessions so far since being here, adding a 3rd time this past week. Though, I can't say this one was as successful as the past ones. :/ Oops.

I have been working and coordinating with Oswaldo at SuperK Radio to start monthly charlas on the radio to reach a broader demographic about various important topics including health, agriculture and microfinance, as well as to spread the word about Manna. Being the amazing man and contact that he is, Oswaldo offered us 30 minutes every month to do a conversational segment about basically whatever we want. This past Thursday was our first go at it, and, well, humility sure keeps a girl grounded!

Haley and I arrived to the station cool and confident, though with a few butterflies in our stomachs. The set up was different than normal in that we would be conversing with Marcela, the morning DJ, rather than with Oswaldo. Well, Marcela was in a different room than us, though we could see her through a glass panel. We were instructed that we would be able to hear her through headphones we had put on and everything would go smoothly...or so we thought. As Marcela started the segment, she asked us to introduce ourselves and talk a little about Manna. Well, we couldn't hear anything from the headphones. As a result, she increased the volume in her room so that we could hear her through the panel. But what we actually heard was an echoed, muffled version of her offering up EXTREME difficulty in understanding the questions being thrown at us. So, after talking a little about Manna, we got into the topic of the day, Breast Cancer. Marcela asked us questions and we did our best to deduce what we thought she was asking and formulate some answers. At one point, she asked a question that neither Haley nor I caught a word of, so in a panicked state, I started to ramble on about how a woman's health is very important and we all have the power and opportunity to take control of our health and blah blah blah. Whether I answered her question even remotely, will never be known!

So all-in-all it was a successful segment in that we got across all the information we wanted to about Breast Cancer and though we may never know how ridiculous and spastic we sounded, we can just hope our listeners were thinking, "Man, these girls are hilarious and sound awesome, lets go check out this Centro de Manna in Rumiloma!"

Maybe? Well, a girl can dream right?! 

Haley and I behind the mics!

So, if you happen to get Ecuador Radio stations up there in the states, tune in to 1200AM on March 18th for our next charla!

Hope everyone is doing well and staying warm up there in the states! 

Krysta

Riobamba Retreat Attempt, Take 1

As a group we take 4 weekend retreats throughout our year here to spend some, more, time together away from the stresses of work and the city. This past weekend we headed to the city of Riobamba (about 4 hours south of Conocoto) that is famous for its amazing views of the gorgeous and huge volcano Chimborazo, as well as an icredible train ride through the Devil's Nose and surrounding mountainous landscape. We had high hopes and great plans but most of them were drowned due to rain, clouds, and the fact that the train was sold out for the following 3 weeks. So, instead the girls took shelter in coffee and ice cream shops and enjoyed some quality chit-chat in the comforts of our beds while the boys took in a leisurely 3+ hour nap and reading. So what were we to do now? Well luckily Ecuador is the land of volcanoes and one happened to be currently erupting just outside of Riobamba.

Tungurahua has been erupting since early January, though thankfully without any severe damage done, as the tourist hotspot city of Baños lays at it's base. We took advantage of our suddenly free Sunday to take a bus up to the volcano to get some amazing views of the action. Though I have climbed to the summit of an active volcano and seen the lava in the past, I have never seen an erupting volcano that up close and personal. It was an incredible sight (when the clouds decided to part). Ash was floating through the air and an occasional 'boom' rocked the sky and our ear drums. So even though our original planned weekend didn't turn out, we still were able to take in some of what makes Ecuador truly an awesome country.

Haley, me and Jackie taking in the views

along the way to Tungurahua!

The cows delayed our progress a bit....

The smoking Tungurahua!!

A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!

The group! With Tungurahua hiding

somewhere atrás...

This weekend is Carnaval and we all have already been subject to various water balloons and foam spray attacks by local and passing children. Wish us luck in survival this weekend as we head into the main celebratory days of Carnaval!!

amor + peace

Krysta

Love and Nutrition

As the month of February began this week, my life was filled with teaching English, Estudios Mundiales and Women's Exercise by day, and Nutrition Program research by night. As a result of a meeting this morning with the local school Aliñambi (where all my nutrition research with hopefully show itself in the form of improving kids malnourishment), starting March 1st, along with Haley and Jackie, I will be starting a Nutrition Education Program with the 7th graders.

Dra. Julia at Aliñambi wanted to start a project with the 7th graders that would instill some personal responsibility and empower them to take control of their lives. This is where we came up with the, as I like to call it, "You Are What You Eat" Nutrition Project. This project entails working with the 7th graders for 3 hours a week teaching them about nutrition and the process food takes from planting, to food processing, to consumption, to composting. We are aiming at showing these kids they have the power to take control of their lives and make life changing decisions.

Every Tuesday, I will be alternating weeks between giving charlas on various nutrition topics with hands-on projects in which the students will build a portfolio to be presented the final week. Every Wednesday and Friday the class will be divided into 2 groups in which one group will attend cooking classes with Haley and I, and the other half will work in the 7th grade garden with Jackie. Finally, the kids will be walking around to different 'tiendas' (local food stores that sell everything from cookies to fruit to diapers- a mini Ecuadorian 7-11 perhaps) and interview the owners about what type of food they sell, and what is most popular. They will tie this information to local kids by asking them what they buy at tiendas and why. We want to make kids more conscious of their nutritional surroundings and what is available to them in their community.

If I thought I was busy before, I life is about to get chaotic, but I couldn't be happier. After 6 months of working with health at Aliñambi it is so nice to finally have an amazing project developed and rolling. I love health, teaching, and our community and this project is bringing all those things together!

And even though my bedtime may be getting earlier in these next coming weeks, I vow to uphold my promise to keep you updated more often!

Nutrition!!

Aliñambi!!

Until next post!

Krysta