Above, please find the image I sent to my homestay family. I think it's an honest first impression.

In the bubble: "I cannot wait to meet you all!"

To the lower left: "But I do hope that you find this photo funny."

10.21.2017: Play that Funky Music, White Boy.

I’ve been in Ecuador for a month, yet it seems like no time has passed. The Sundays fade into the next Sundays and the Tuesdays march through all the same, with almuerzos ejecutivos and tanta sopa and everything.

But now we’ve finished orientation, which means we’ve just finished practicum which means that we’ve just completed the WorldTeach teacher training which means that now we’re just waiting — just waiting to start teaching. The next "Quimestre," or university semester in Quito, begins Tuesday, October 24.

So while I wait, preparing my class materials — I listen around me; I listen to what’s happening, who is saying what, what that means in Spanish, how I can say it, how I can connect with those around me and learn something.

This past weekend, you could say I learned something. My padre anfitrión (homestay Dad) started playing American music — I should say, started blasting American music — and singing and whistling and dancing along to it. In the time that I’ve known him, he has seemed like a pretty performative guy, with a wild yet caged sense of humor. With a voice so deep and so sonorous, a sharp whistle, and a funny demeanor, the thought of him singing and dancing makes me laugh an appreciative laugh.

One of the songs he played — in addition to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" — was "Play That Funky Music White Boy." When I heard it start blasting from his bedroom around 11:30 a.m. on a Sunday, I told myself that I didn’t want to interrupt his concert — a concert he held while cleaning dishes.

But later in the day, when I returned home around 7 or 8 p.m., I greeted him and my host mother by singing, "Play That Funky Music White Boy." We all commenced to shaking our torsos, mi mamá anfitriona holding her hips, foot forward, las manos straight up in the air with only index fingers pointing, alternating between one and the other, up down up down arriba abajo arriba abajo.

More ridiculous joy to come, I thought to myself. Siempre goza de las cosas pequeñas.

11.1.2017: Apogee

It's November 1, AKA one day before the national holiday El Día de los Difuntos. If you need to compare it to something, think of Mexico's "Day of the Dead."

Why did I just insert images of what appears to be a thick, deep red fruit soup next to a shiny piece of bread shaped as a doll? Six words: Colada morada y guagua de pan.

Colada morada is the name for the fruit soupy thing, and is actually much more elegant and appetizing than the image that accompanies this description. Click here for a recipe (this one calls it "Traditional Ecuadorian Hot Punch"), but the truth is that every chef supposedly has his or her secrets. According to one of my Spanish teachers (everyone in this country is my Spanish teacher), though, the real secret ingredient is mortiño, which is supposed to be blueberry, but whenever I try to compare a fruit native to Ecuador to a fruit I would buy prepackaged in a supermarket in the United States, I do not do it justice; in many ways, piña here is not the pineapple you know in Whole Foods. Same with mortiño and blueberries.

Onto guagua de pan. The word guagua comes from Quecha, one of the several indigenous languages that has influenced the Spanish dialect and culture in Ecuador. Think of the word as the sound a baby makes when it cries: waah waah, guagua. Guagua de pan is pan, or bread, shaped and decorated to look like a lil' babe.

I'm excited to see what happens here during the holiday; schools are closed, which means that I and my students have a four-day weekend. By the way, why did I name the title of this post "Apogee"? That's a new word a student taught me.

11.14.2017: Top 3 TEFL Teacher Comments (in the last 2 days)

Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) requires the teacher to say the darndest things.

If you are suddenly craving an episode of Kids Say the Darndest Things, here, love.

3.) “Thing” is too general. What is it? A cartoon, a carrot, a type of cauliflower? Write as though your reader has no background knowledge in the subject you are writing about.

2.) The verb tense you would use here is the past, because anime’s beginning began in the past and also ended in the past. Anime is not still beginning in the present.

1.) "When you're translating Spanish phrases into English, type the English word into Google to see how it is used. This should give you an improved sense of English phraseology and syntax.

"Another example: To experience: No puedo pasar sin Internet. I can't get by without the Internet. No tenía amigos ni amigas, por eso me lo pasaba mal. You wouldn't say "I hope you pass a good weekend." The only time I can think of when we use 'pass' in regards to an experience is when we're passing gas."

11.22.2017: Characterization

What is characterization? Simply put, the creation of characters. Close your eyes and picture a character (from a book, movie, tv show) that you can remember well. Okay. Now try to fill out the following list:

• Character's name:
• Age (approximate):
• Likes:
• Dislikes:
• Motivations:
• Flaws:

This is one of the exercises we had in class today. Yesterday, we just began our unit on Creative Writing (CW). Of course, the creative process varies per individual, and it can be hard to put rules to it. But I'm going to break it down day by day: Intro, Characterization, Setting, etc... This post by The Guardian helps me get my thoughts straight.

Alright, moving on. What character did you choose?

Believe it or not, these were the two characters (that have been in U.S. mainstream media) that most of my students said they knew. So, we went over their likes/dislikes/motivations/flaws. I've attached this list for Captain Jack Sparrow (right) below.

• Character's name: Captain Jack Sparrow
• Age (approximate): Like 30-60??? Eternal???
• Likes: Rum, women, gold
• Dislikes: Authority, when the rum is gone
• Motivations: Rum, women, gold
• Flaws: LITERALLY ALWAYS DRUNK, mujeriego, donjuán (womanizer), greedy

Later in class, I split up the students into two groups. Each group created a character and filled out the list. Based on this description, a member from the other group drew the character on the board. You can see the drawings here -- 7-9 class blog, 9-11 class blog -- or down below:

Now your turn: What do these characters like/dislike, what motivates them, and what are their flaws?

12.1.17: Diamante December

It's December, and my class wrote a Diamante:

• Dynamite Diamantes (click on the link for the source -- yes, I used Scholastic)

A diamante is a seven-line, diamond-shaped poem that begins with a single word and ends with its opposite. It's a great way to compare and contrast two different nouns:​

Line 1: One noun (or topic)

Line 2: Two adjectives about the noun

Line 3: Three gerunds (-ing verbs) that relate to the noun

Line 4: Four nouns (the first two relate to the noun in Line 1, the last two relate to the noun in Line 7)

Line 5: Three gerunds that relate to the noun in Line 7

Line 6: Two adjectives that describe the noun in Line 7

Line 7: Renames the noun from Line 1 (its opposite)

These rules may be hard to digest at first. Some examples:

Sun

Golden, glorious

Warming, burning, shining

Day, bright, night, crescent

Illuminating, shimmering, orbiting

Silvery, shadowy

Moon

Sighted

Vision, perception

Staring, observing, gazing

Ability to see everything, total visual impairment

Stumbling, groping, touching

Darkness, sightless

Blind

Cool how quickly the feel of the poem changes, right? Here's one we developed in class:

That's right, baby -- the opposite of love isn't hate.

12.21.17: The last day (still sifting through paperwork, trabajo administrativo).

I may be ridiculous, but that is one of the ways I most easily connect with students -- through humor.