a little more flaco

It is a beautiful Thursday in Duran. I am sitting at ´Cyber Emanuel´ and Emanuel is dancing to Shania Twain´s ¨I feel like a woman.¨ I am pretty sure if he knew the words to the song he would neither be dancing nor listening to the song at all. :) So, Last week was my first retreat group, from Santa Clara. I was glad that it was a small group of nine. They were pretty easy going for the majority of the week. In the beginning they were very much uneasy and unsure of what they could do or say. This awkwardness slowly transitioned into a comfort that I have been familiar with for some time. During the middle of this week I got really sick. I think I ate some bad(but delicious) food at one of my neighbors houses. I was sick for a about 2 days and I lost over 10 pounds, which pretty much makes me antimatter by about now. I imagine that there us much more of this to come in the rest of the year ahead.
Working at Semillas de Mostaza, one of Rostro´s afterschool programs, has been wonderful, but frustrating. Every day we get from 30 to 60 kids ranging from 4-15 years old. right now I am working on activity for the little kids that uses maps. When we started introducing them to other countries of the world they were very confused and asked which country was Barcelona or Emelec(the two futbol teams in Guayaquil). I dont think that they have any kind of concept of how big a city, country, or the world is. So I am printing up a map of their neighborhood(thank you google earth) and having them trace their walking route to Semillas. Then I will show them a series of maps to help them understand how Arbolito (our neighborhood) fits into the city, the country and the world. Hopefully it won´t be too much for them.