More from Guayaquil

It has been a busy few days and we are getting behind in our blog. Janene and I are going to give you a rundown of the last few days.....

On April 28th while Kathleen attended a surgery at the children's hospital, the rest of the team spent some time with the members of Guayaquil Sur Rotary Club. President of the club, Enrique Vasquez and Paco Roseney accompanied Janene, Bev and Ben to women's hospital where they deliver over 27 000 babies a year. It is the 2nd largest women's hospital in South America. We heard that a large percentge of babies are delivered by c-section, but no numbers. The babies are kept in the same beds as their moms and discharged after 24 hours if there are no problems. The hopital also provides immunizations, 3 within the first year as recommended. Moms and babies line up at a gated entrance at the side of the hospital and are quickly seen before the next child moves in.

An excellent project we were able to see was the Mechanical cow. The funding comes from Guayaquil La Puntilla Rotary Club and there is a school program involved. The "cow" uses every part of the soy bean. The process takes half an hour start to finish and it makes almost 100 litres of soy milk per 8 hour shift. They make four flavous of soy milk, corviches and soy meat. A half litre bottle was fifty cents, one litre seventy five cents. They are working to start a program in nearby schools to incorporate the milk into breakfast programs. The place smelled AMAZING and the fresh soy was unbelievable.

After the cow, we attended a health clinic before meeting up with Kathleen at the Guayaquil Tenis club for one of Ecuador's signature dishes - Ceviche - delicious. We then attended a sports complex where children from all over the city are welcomed to be active playing sports such as soccer, tennis, archery, badminton and using the velodrome for cycling. After a rest we attended the meeting at the Rotary club where it was Wives night. It was wonderful to meet families of the Rotarians we have been spending time with and celebrate with them.

The next day was spent with the oldest Rotary Club - Rotary Club of Guayaquil which is 82 years young. We spent the day with president Luis Eduardo Burbano and his daughter Camila who was able to assist us with translation (Muchas Gracias!) as well as Ricardo Koenig and Aparicio Valero Ochoa. This day was special for Ben as we began the day at Fasinarm a school for children with downs syndrome. The club has worked on projects with the school including the provision of computers for students and are working to cover one of the play areas. We visited with the children and handed out stickers and Ben played some Ukelele.

We then moved to the University Hospital which is where Rotary teams are brought in for cleft palate surgeries and eye surgeries. The hospital executive director Freddy Duran met with us and explained his philosophy is "to feel different, think different, be different"and to encourage others to provide service which is one of the reasons he is grateful to partner with Rotary who has a great record of service above self.

We visted a retirement home that is attempting to sustain themselves through gardens and an orchard of banana trees. They are attempting to expand with a tilapia pond using funds from a Rotary grant. They provided us with some delicious traditional snacks before we headed to an amazing project in a poor part of the city.

The Rotarians have created a small city of houses approximately 30x18x8. Families apply to Rotary to be considered and the club provides the down payment. They are also funding a school in the small city for the children to be able to learn close to home. There is a micro credit program which helped a number of women begin businesses out of their homes including shops and a restaurant. The people were all smiling and happy to see the members of the club and it was great to see such positive work being done.

We finished our visits with lunch at a Brazilian restaurant. The restaurant was fun. Meat was brought to the table on swords. We were joined by our friend Hugo throughout the day and we enjoyed our visit and our lunch. We presented to the club that evening and will continue to update the blog about the rest of our travels as we are able....

Kathleen and Janene

PS - The picture is us with our tour guide from University hospital and we are attempting to load the video from the Besitos shop too....

First Few Days in Guayaquil

It has been a very busy first few days here in Guayaquil. We arrived on election day in Ecuador which was a Sunday. We were met at the airport by our contact and chair of the GSE comittee here, Gustavo Perez Reyes, his daughter Paula and Rotarian Hugo Klopstein who graciously assisted Gustavo and our group by translating. We were extremely grateful to be put up in a hotel for our first night for a much needed rest. At the hotel we reviewed our amazing itinerary (Gustavo and the Rotarians here have done an great job!) and we settled in.

First impressions of Guayaquil include the heat - approximately 32 degress celcius and very humid - and the size of the city. The Rotarians inform us that over 3 million people live here. There are stores and restaurants that are familiar to our North American eyes such as KFC, Pizza Hut and of course McDonald's but we are enjoying the local cuisine and have no need for fast food.

Our first full day was spent in the company of the Rotary Club Guayaquil Occidente. The club president Ramiro Roman and club members Hector Plaza and Raul Canizares joined us through the day.

We began at the Children's Hopital in Guayaquil. The hospital is the best in the country and children are sent here from all over Ecuador. We met so many people, doctors, surgeons, physiotherapists, nurses and one very special patient in the burn unit named Jimmy. The emergency room here sees approximately 140,000 patients a year. Most common ailments include dehydration, respiratory illness such as asthma and accidents. Doctor Raquel Moran gave us a tour of the emergency department and informed us it is the best emergency room in the country. They are able to treat many of their patient over the course of four to six hours and they follow up within 24 to 48 hours. Their admission rate is very low and the patients are well cared for.

I was lucky to be able to return to the hospital the following day and observe a surgery performed by plastic surgeon Mario Delgado Panchana on the burn unit. We toured the entire unit and were shown some of the hospital's needs. Janene and I were amazed at the Occupational Therapist's workspace. She uses hand saws, files and heat to mold PVC piping into splints which are one time use only. They are doing great work here.

Lunch on our first day was at a typical Eucadorian restaurant "Lo Nuestro." A cold cerveza and wonderful shrimp, crab and chicken as well as bottled water to round out the meal.

In the afternoon, we were able to visit some sites of a micro credit program started and funded with Rotary grants and by one of our hosts this day, Hector. The first site, twelve woman were working together to make crafts from "foamex" or sheets of foam material. Our second site we were able to watch (and taste) Besitos, small marshmallow like candies made in the home by five woman, and one man. Micro credit provided funds to start up these businesses and allows these woman to bring in an income while keeping their work at home making the whole family strong.

Our day finished with settling in with our hosts and our first presentation at the Guayaquil Occidente Rotary Club. Janene, Bev and I are grateful to the Medinas for our amazing suite on their property outside Guayaquil. We feel very safe and comfortable. Ben is not far from us at the home of Rotarian Roberto Tugendath which is our morning meeting place.

We are learning so much and practicing our Spanish and seeing wonderful things, we will continue to share as often as we are able.

A Grand Farewell!

The last week before our departure simply flew by and suddenly we found ourselves on the plane to South America. Our family, friends, and Rotarians joined with us to mark the end of our long year of preparation to represent District 5050 to the Rotary Clubs in Ecuador.

Participating in Group Study Exchange requires a great deal of time. We had seven team meetings and a weekend retreat, a total of almost 90 hours together. At these meetings we got to know each other, learned about Rotary and Ecuador, prepared biographical information for our hosts, applied for passports, obtained insurance, created our uniforms, purchased gifts for our host families, and developed a brochure and a blog. And we gathered pictures and wrote a script for a power point presentation for the Rotary Clubs in Ecuador…in Spanish!

We delivered our presentation to all present—in Spanish with an English interpretation—and then received two very special lapel pins: GSE Chair Bert van Dalfsen gave us The Rotary Foundation pin and District Governor Larry Stinson presented us with a pin of a lion holding the Rotary wheel which was created by his class of District Governors.

We are on our way and truly want to thank everyone for such a warm send off. Our trip ends on May 25th and we are sure to have lots to share with each of you along the way and when we return.

Three More Days!!

As we wrap up our plans the excitement grows.  We've received our itinerary from District 4400. Here's what our tentative plan looks like:

April 26-30 Guayaquil

May 1-3 Salinas

May 4-7 Quito

May 8-9 Ibarra

May 10-11 Ambato Cosmopolita

May 12-13 Riobamba

May 14-15 Cuenca

May 16 Tomebamba

May 17-18 Loja

May 19-20 Zaruma

May 21 Guayaquil

May 22-24 Manta (District Conference)

May 25 Guayaquil (Departure)

Gloria ti!