Partaaaaaay!

I don't think it's just us, but the people we associate with here love to party.  Since Halloween, we have not gone a week without at least one social gathering, and in many cases there are 2 or 3.  Even the students who we volunteer to teach English to in the Artisan Market had a little party with small gifts for the teachers.  There were birthday parties, Halloween parties, Christmas parties, and just hanging out with friends.  Check out our social life in these pictures.  I wish I could figure out how to label them all, there are limits to my technological prowess.

CEDFI XMas Parade

What will everyone remember or forget from this trip?  It's hard to say exactly, but as one of our English friends, Robert, said, I don't think Julian will forget being the volcano in Ecuador.  CEDFI organizes a really great parade that all the kids in the school participate in.  Each class chooses a special theme and then they create a float for the parade that travels through the center of the city.  Julian's class chose to do a theme of the old time Ironworkers (Los Herreros).  However in addition to the carts of Herreros banging away on steel, they had a huge volcano on their float. Julian was selected by his class to be emerging from the top of the volcano.  Eliza's class chose the theme of traditional campesinos called Cuyembenos.  She was dressed in a colorful costume and made a great gringo Cuyembena.  The parade took place on Saturday December 13.  It was an amazing cultural experience and a great prelude to the larger event that occurred on Christmas Eve called Pasa del Ninos.  This is an all day parade of children in costumes on floats to celebrate Christmas.

We miss everyone, especially around the holidays, but we have been enjoying our break.