I was expecting on having a hard time adjusting to a different country, a new culture, and living with a family. It has been shockingly easy, to be honest. I recognize that there are ups and downs in expereinces like this, and I probably owe the ease of my transition to my wonderful host family, my group from LC, and the one and only Amauta. There are many differences between the US and Ecuador, but there are also many similarites. Ecuador is an interesting place because it is prodominently catholic and is more conservative in many ways. The gender binary is so shockingly intense that it’s almost a tangible thing. Wherever you go, you will have a different experience of the world depending on your gender, but in Cuenca it is amplified to the max. I was talking to a Cuencan friend who has lived in the US for a period of his life about this. He was saying its not normal to have a lot of close friends of the other gender growing up, and that he misses the normalcy of having female homies without any weirdness involved. The culture around sex, drugs, marriage and identity issues are very conservative. I’ve talked to my host family about this and it seems to be an interesting culture where everyone does these “forbidden” things but no one talks about it. Things that you might brag about at home, aren’t things you would want to broadcast here.
Family is everything here. Family comes first. At home I feel like people tend to think of themselves first and then family, friends, and responsibilities. My host mom explained it like “We think of family rather than ourselves, because I am my family.” Family and reputation play a huge part in ones identity it seems. Where as at least with me, my family definitely doesn’t define me.
Although certain things are very conservatitive, Cuenca is more free in a lot of ways. People let their dogs run around the streets all day, as well as their children. When we first arrived I remember noting that there are more couples here. Then I realized there’s just a lot more PDA, and everyone is so much more affectionate in general.
Althought the differences can be jarring at times, the similarities are almost more shocking to me. I didn’t have to convert my dollars to anything when I arrived and 911 is the same number. I realized how similar things are when I was walking through a park in Quito. Honestly It couldve been a park anywhere. You had your classic gang of angsty grunge teens, your squad of skater boys, some shoeless dreaded guys smoking, Moms with there kids, joggers, guys playing a game of pickup (volleyball not basketball), and a rap battle type thing. There’s just things like that were I see all your archytypes of people at once, and I think to myself “I could be anywhere.” I’ve realized that no matter where you go you can find your people, which is unbelievable comforting.
PS. This was written my second week in Ecuador