Semana Santa

This week has been a weird week and a lot of my friends have been agreeing with me. I think that we've kinda reached the feeling of being close to the end and are just ready to be done with training. This week was also a little bit different because there was a lot more activity going on in the town. Easter Weekend is a big ordeal here. nothing is open thursday thru monday and families celebrate all weekend. We spent the first three days having technical classes which was draining and annoying and then on thursday we just had a half day of spanish class and the afternoon free. it was nice to have a break but i really didn't have much to do because my whole family left for another town for the weekend. my mom was raised in a town about 45 minutes away from cayambe and so their whole family was gathering there for the weekend. So thursday i was home, completely alone, for the first time and it was actually kinda weird and a little scary. but i watched a movie and received some calls from friends in the states which was awesome and i survived the loneliness.

on friday i took a bus to meet up with the rest of my family and spent the day celebrating with them. i had a lot of fun and it was really interesting to experience the difference in traditions. they make a soup called Fanesca, which contains every type of grain that is grown in the area, they only make it during semana santa and its a huge ordeal. they made it on both thursday and friday and eat it for lunch and dinner. i'm surprised they don't serve it for breakfast actually. but its absolutly delicious and about the heartiest thing you'll eat. its also served with mashed potatoes, a hard boiled egg and cheese. and then followed with a delicious drink of milk, rice and cinnamon. needless to say, i ate really well this weekend and could defiantly go 3 days without eating anything more. 

after lunch, there was a church service at 3 which started by proceeding through the town and different houses had a set up the stations of the cross outside of their homes. so we walked to each one and listened to the reading and prayed. after the stations, we went to the church were mass was held. it was a pretty normal service i think, it was all in spanish but from what i interpreted, it seemed normal. the only new thing was when everyone got up to kiss the knees of Christ on the cross. never done that before but it was interesting!  after the service, which lasted til nearly 7, we had dinner of fanesca again, soo good. afterwards, i rode back with some of my family because there weren't enough beds for everyone where we were. there were probably about 30, 35 people there for lunch and more.

on saturday, my family left before me and i took the bus again because a big group of us met up to play basketball! it was so much fun. we had about 14 people so played an actual 5 on 5 game. i feel like absolute crap right now and I'm pretty sure its a result of being so out of shape, from the sun and the attitude. but it was a lot of fun!! after basketball, i went and had lunch with my family, today they eat meat so we had chicken. i wish that i would be around tomorrow to see what they eat. i'm sure its a feast like no other. 

i ended up catching the bus back to cayambe ahead of my family because i need to back my bags for this upcoming week. Tomorrow we leave for a 9 day trip. the first 3 days all 45 of us spend together and then we split off into groups depending on what region we'll be moving to and what program we're in (Ag or natural resources). i'm excited for a change but hope that this crappy feeling of being sick that is starting to set in goes away by tomorrow. not likely, but i sure hope so.

anyways, i hope that everyone has a great Easter weekend! i wish i could be there to celebrate and see everyone but i guess i'll just have to wait :) love!