Safety Issues

This blog entry, at least in my mind, is overshadowed by the murders in Newtown, Connecticut. I can’t get the image of someone shooting little kids out of my mind. I don’t care if the NRA thinks this is a necessary price we have to pay for their version of freedom, or whether or not the answer is a society where everyone capable of picking up a weapon is packing heat—although I can’t say that I think that would be a society worth living in. There’s little question in my mind that we adults allowed this to happen to little kids, and we’re all going to hell for it. And I’m not sure that’s adequate punishment.

And so it was difficult to come to terms this week that, more than anything else, I am an elementary school teacher here in Ecuador. There were only two days of classes following the Newtown shootings, but there was the AVANTI Christmas party on Saturday, Dec. 15, and the school Christmas party on Thursday the 20th. Fortunately, life here in Tolte is far removed from the violence prevalent in other parts of Ecuador and the world, and kids here much as children did in the US about 50 years ago, playing wild tag games in the cancha and growing up in an atmosphere of safety and security. But it was hard for me to look at the little kids I teach and separate them from the distant horrors of life in the U.S.

Coincidentally, we did have a sort of village-wide panic over the issue of child safety, induced by AVANTI’s gift of playground equipment to the school and day care center. For reasons known only to the junta directive, and in site of Carolina’s explicit request that they not do this, the entire area under the school’s playground equipment was covered in paving blocks the day that the playground arrived. Explanations that this was a bad idea did no good; apparently this had been contracted as part of some renovation of the center of town. But that wasn’t enough. The playground purchased for the day care center, which was described as appropriate for 3 year olds, was just as high and risky as the one for the school, Prompting one of my friends who has recently been given certain responsibilities for the day care program to wonder if he should denounce the thing as unsafe to his superiors. All of this led Carolina to demand that everything be made safe in time for her visit with her guests on Saturday. Francisco and I passed a bad day together wondering what, if anything, we could do about this mess. Needless to say, we did nothing, apart from worry about what Carolina would say to us when she got here. Well, we did come up with plans to improve the situation at both playgrounds, but nothing was actually done.

Just when we were thinking that things looked dim, Pablo showed up with an L-shaped crib setup Carolina had hired him to build and install in the day care center. Because of the way he measured the space, and then built the two pieces outside of the day care center, there was no way to put the pieces inside the crib room. What we thought looked dim before now looked like merely the start of total humiliation. But Pablo managed to cut one of the pieces in half, and somehow wedge the now three pieces into what turned out to be a not square space by 8:00 Friday night, sparing all of Tolte further embarrassment.

Carolina turned up early Saturday morning with Carla and Terance, and started distributing and organizing various giveaway events of the day. I slipped away to join the pig-killing crew and helped to make the fritada for lunch, but had a moment’s glory involving one of the giveaway items. Carolina had purchased 80 first aid kits, or at least what she thought were kits. Instead, what she got was only kit contents, not individual packages. Terance and I were left to sort the stiff into 80 plastic bags. Fortunately, the Tolte kids are incredibly curious, so, Tom Sawyer style, I invited them in to help us pack the bags. We were done in less than 15 minutes, and Terance was completely astonished.

But that was only the prelude to my great victory. I have always been hesitant to teach any of my students anything just for show, but the opportunity to teach Christmas and other songs in English had sort of presented itself a couple of weeks before Carolina’s visit. I think I gave the song list in the previous blog. While Carolina and her guests were eating their lunch, I brought the grades in one at a time and we sang their prepared songs. The reaction could hardly have been better: “What a great teacher you are!” “Oh, you have a wonderful way with the children!” “I cried, it was so sweet!” I may not have guaranteed myself another year in Tolte, but I sure earned myself a good reference.

And, in spite of the unsafe conditions, the sight of the children playing merrily in their risky new playground was also so heartwarming that no one could stay upset for long. I have mentioned before that Toltenos perceive safety very differently than I do, and the new playground is part of that picture. I have actually seen children walking around on top of the highest beams of the monkey bars.  I’d just like to add that these beams are round. And no one seems at all nervous about this—except me.

I’d also like to mention that one of my micro-enterprise projects actually presented itself in public the day of Carolina’s visit. On Wednesday, some of my friends and I made a shampoo based on medicinal plants, and had it ready to sell on Saturday. I really think this could become something important for Tolte, if we can get the whole thing together. It would provide a solid market for the medicinal plants everyone grows, it is very much a value-added product, and it could provide employment to quite a few people if our marketing is good.  I have never tried to do anything like this even in the US, and navigating the legalities of this project is going to be tricky, but it appears that we can operate in a kind of “gray market” way until we get everything in place. I have high hopes.

The following week did include something new for me. I started going down to the train station to give English classes to the adults who work there, both those from Tolte and those from Nizag. It’s kind of a long way to go, but they give me lunch, and it beats waiting around in the cancha every night for adults who never show up for English class. I’m also giving this information to the people who need it most and can use it every day. I’m happy that at least a couple of afternoons a week will involve something other than hanging around in the library, waiting for kids to take an interest in reading. But I do have plans for initiating a pro-reading campaign in January, and I hope that will change the reading picture.

Of course, going down to the train station and back seemed awfully pleasant last week, with the rainy season still refusing to arrive, weeks after it should have. There has been some foggy rainy weather the last two days, and the trip up and back could get awfully slippery and muddy. Time will tell—I hear the rainy season is different in the station than it is in Tolte, and I’ll have to see.

And now, I’m going to go  to New York. I will travel to Quito tomorrow, and fly to New York Wednesday. I’ll have four days in New York to celebrate my Mother’s 80th birthday, and then two more days of travel to get back. The idea of being able to do this astonishes my neighbors. We Americans enjoy such freedom of movement compared to Ecuadoreans. But I’m glad that my circumstances allow me to spend a couple of days rendering homage to the one who brought me here. Thanks, Mom!