I’ve been really busy ever since I’ve been back from my surreal trip to Cuenca’s campo side. I hit my first full year mark working with the FCAE and I went through a personal evaluation. To be honest I wish I had achieved more or at least more visible outcomes. Some projects didn’t turn out quite the way I hoped for such as the Baboso school garden. The very heavy rains that took away the bridge during winter also did its deed on the garden sight and there is not much left to show for. Actually the entire site of the education center of Baboso is being discussed as some experts claim it to be unsafe and suggest the site be moved to a more remote and stable area. Fair enough, in the meantime I have all the tools and will to get this project going but no designated space for it. Some things, if not most, seem out of our control.

On a more positive note I must say that my relationship with the Awá education direction that went through many downs and a few ups seems to be breaking through. I gave a very important (for me…) presentation about the advances of my work on the environmental education modules I have been assigned to work on since my first day on the job. I really didn’t get much support from anybody and was overwhelmed by the implications of this project: environmental education tailored for the Awá, a civilization Ihadn’t heard about before coming to Ecuador. Needless to say I immediately put this project on a shelf and decided to get a grip about what the Awá are all about. I visited their territory on every occasion that presented itself, I moved to Lita to be closer to them and mingle with local teachers and artisans. This helped me a lot and about 4 months ago, through the MIES Esmeraldas project, I started working on the environmental education project again.

I presented to the DEIBNAE what I have so far: a resource book for Awá teachers composed of 9 chapters with 50 activities, 16 of them in the making. It is 81 pages long so far and I am expecting to finish the draft before the next general assembly. They all seemed to like the presentation and thanked me for my work. We put together an action plan to involved them more at this point to make sure the content of the book respects the cultural sensitivity of the Awá and is relevant for them. I felt relieved from reaction, my next year here will be much more productive if only they open that vital space for me and accept my work.

Prior to this meeting I was invited by my buddy volunteer only 1 hour away from me to co-facilitate the GANE small business workshop to his comunity bank socios. My friend Monica also came along as she works in micro-finance and had been wanting to see the game in action for some time. The participants really liked it. We had to facilitate module 1 in only an hour and a half, one team went bankrupt, another barely made it over red line meanwhile one team made it over $1000.  Very intersting results where they learned about the dangers of selling on credit, that was the main learning point as we didn’t have much time to debrief. It was fun to get the other PC volunteer and Monica involed, playing different roles at different times. I think it helped the participants distinguish between the different pieces of the game in a more obvious way than by having one facilitator playing all the roles. Besides it made the game much funer adding this variety of personalities to the mix. In my books, this was my best GANE session in Ecuador so far and I certainly hope that they’ll invite me for round two on a future occasion.

I’m excited about still having one more year ahead of me with plenty of ideas and dreams in my head to make a positive difference for the Awá and Ecuadorians in general. The challenge will be to pace myself and set realistic goals.  But above all, I must try to have as much fun as I can trying my best.