El mitad del Mundo y mi corazon

This is the view of the mountains right outside my house. As you can tell the streets are small and the houses are like all smooshed together. I arrived here at night but when I stepped outside the next day I think I litterally lost my breath at the mountains. I´m amazed by them every day. I like LIVE IN THE MOUNTAINS! haha. I´m going to try to get a picture of them at night because the buildings in the city go for years.... so you just see lights all up and down the mountains - it´s my favorite part of Quito I think! We went to a Crepe and Waffle place in the mall last night ( mmm!) And it was higher up with all glass windows so you could see all the lights at night. It reminded me of L.A. and this restaurant in the Mountains ( the Mining company or something) that we used to go to when I was little. I tried to tell my family ..I dont think they got it! lol. " My abuelos vivieron in california cuando estuve una nina......."  I had a fever on Friday so I ended up not going out dancing thursday or to Banos for the weekend. Instead I slept for 12 straight hours ( except when the baby was screaming) and toughed it out to do a little sight seeing in Quito. 

This is a view of the mountains at the Middle of the World= the equator. Ecuador is actually the spanish word for equator. They call it the Mitad del Mundo ( the middle of the world). It was a fun place to go and say you had been to- But it´s kinda like all there is there! lol. And of course we missed out bus stop on the way home. We ended up just outside the south of Quito. ( The mitad del mundo is very north). The south of Quito is the one place they said you jsut never need to be there, for anything, ever. It´s like the ghetto of Quito. Needless to say, the movie continues and American girl and her American friends stand on a street corner having heart attacks as they scramble to find a bus out of there in the dark.

This is a picture in Old Quito. Out of the top of the Basilica. It pretty much just looks like that for miles and miles... houses and houses and more houses on top of each other.

It´s been a hard weekend. Yesterday I think I understood probably .2% of what my family said. My head just kinda quit working. It´s so hard for me cause I can sit and read my econ text book in spanish and get a good 80% of what´s happening. But when the people around me share their lives.... all I get is a word here or there. I hate that. I hate that the most of anything here. I am so passionate about the hearts of people, and I can get everything but that! I can read their eyes, their actions, I see their tears, I even ask them to explain further and still I´m left with so much less than I ask for. It´s weird that listening to spanish is a totally different ability and task than reading it, speaking it and writing it. I would much rather listen than read.

My heart broke a lot this weekend. The mother daughter relationships in my family are so wonderful. They laugh and love and hug and share life everyday together. I found myself so jealous of that. I really miss my mom. Mom´s give life. It´s what they do. There are things they give that no one else can. They are things I need the most right now.

My second heart break has a been as a young life leader watching the unloved, unreached youth of this country walk the streets begging. At 2 in the morning after the discoteca, 6-7 year old kids, in the pouring rain were approaching us to buy chiclets!!!! gum!!! Nobody talks to them. I dont know why but I think you´re not supposed to. I don´t understand. I don´t like it. Why can´t they just be kids and go to sleep.

Anyways, I have class- more on all this later. LOVE AND MISS YOU!!!