Christmas in my site

Here are some more pictures of the holiday season spent in Ecuador.
After our tour of the coast, it was time to head to my site to spend Christmas with my host family.

My host family (Aunt Gladys, Me, Aunt Monce, Host Mom Cecilia and brother Joselo) with their Christmas stockings from Dan and I.People in my community are not use to getting presents for Christmas so it was fun for Dan and I toplay Santa Clause for my host-family who has taken such good care of me. As you can see, Joselo was very excited about his new Leatherman tool kit that we got him to work on his bikes. It was also fun to introduce my host family to candy canes, which they found very odd at first. (Thanks Mom for all the Christmas goodies that allowed me to share some of the classic American Christmas traditions with my friends here in Ecuador.)Dan giving lessons to Joselo and the neighbor kids on how to use the new fancy Leatherman. The boys loved Dan and continue to ask me when he will be coming back to play soccer and to show them more bike tricks.My friends in my community threw Dan and I a Christmas party! We all danced until late in the night, played interesting Ecuadorian games and ate lots of Christmas treats. One of the games we played reminded me somewhat of "Truth or Dare." Each person had to choose a balloon and pop it to find a small paper inside that disclosed the challenge/dare. Dan balloon said he had to retrieve coins from a bucket of water with his mouth, which he successfully completed after he got a nose full of water. I lucked out and was only dared to drink a small glass of beer with a spoon. Others had to put on embarrassing performances and dance in front of the group.My good friend Delia had to put on a show as if she were in a beauty queen pageant.My friend Gladys had to put limes under her armpits for 5 minutes. After the balloon game, the party continued with "Amiga Secretas, " which is equivalent to our Secret Snowman. My friend Delia got me a beautiful purse that says Ecuador on it, and I love it! I don't know what I would do with out this fabulous group of girls.

Also, during our time at my site we had a Christmas party for the kids in my community. Maria Belen was chosen to be the "Queen" of the party. (Her and her 4 year-old little brother Alvin are some of my favorite kidsand are always over at my house.)

As I have learned through planning other events and activities in my community, many things tend to run late. At the kids Christmas party, when the food was over 2 hours late, we started running out of ideas of how to keep the kids occupied. We had over 50 hipper children running around on a sugar high looking to be entertained. Someone suggested we have a "Hora Loca," which is a traditional party activity where everyone dresses up in Mardi Grass costumes and dances for an entire hour to loud energetic music. Well, the youth group I was working with happened to have a bag full of costumes that even came complete with two random clown costumes. It was perfect!

After many pleas and begging, my friends and I had convinced Dan and another friend (also male) to dress up like clowns and dance with the kids. As Dan was hesitantly slipping into the clown suit (in what I’m sure felt like 100 degree weather), I helped paint his nose and cheeks red with finger-paint. I knew it was a big favor to ask but I also knew he would soon realize what a great thing he was doing for the kids. The Christmas party would be something they would never forget. Below is the video of Dan being such a good sport and playing limbo with the group. He was so great with the kidos.