Simply....Amazing
What and amazing day. We began with an early breakfast at the hotel and then went off to the airport to get the “big car”, suitable for driving to Tena. We are fantastic architects and found way to pack 6 people and their luggage into the car. I have to admit that we were amazing. However, more amazing was the driving of Oswaldo! Most of the way is paved now, but we spent about 45 minutes on unpaved roads, with big potholes, washed out places, and scary drivers. Oswaldo only had to apologize a couple of times to me (I am the owner of the car, he says) We saw the new site and spent time talking about how we would modify the project to fit…we saw the old site and agreed that the new site was much better. In the car, as I sat talking in Italian to Oswaldo, Teo and Mee Leng were speaking Chinese, and Veronica and Fernando were speaking Spanish…how amazing is that? We made our way to Tena and had lunch/dinner overlooking the river. Then off to our afternoon meeting with Kallari. We met with 3 of the leaders; the 4th was finding a way to the city. Introductions were made all around and Fernando was an amazing translator. (that’s a lot of amazing people on this trip). We then went out for some more drinks and Diego, the 4th leader, finally came. He told us his story of growing up and going to school without shoes, and now he is the head of an organization that dreams of international endeavors. So, yes, he is amazing too. I don’t feel so amazing in my writing skills…but its 11:30, and we have to ready to go by 745…It will be amazing if we ever get a good night’s sleep!
-Heather
Wow, almost forgot to mention that we were threatened with hot peppers in eye if we don’t make this project happen…I have this picture in my head of sleeping peacefully in Indiana and at 500 in the morning, Ecuadorians creeping in through the window and opening my eye for the pepper! Yikes…we also talked about headshrinkers today, but not threats of that…
-Heather
Wow, almost forgot to mention that we were threatened with hot peppers in eye if we don’t make this project happen…I have this picture in my head of sleeping peacefully in Indiana and at 500 in the morning, Ecuadorians creeping in through the window and opening my eye for the pepper! Yikes…we also talked about headshrinkers today, but not threats of that…