Time To Teach

Before I began this trip I had a serious aversion to teaching English. It seems like going to South America to teach English has become some sort of modern day missionary movement and my goal of traveling was to immerse myself in different cultures... not convert them to Englishism. Over the past 7 months I've softened my position - English just opens too many opportunities that anyone who comes to teach really is contributing to the greater good, globalization be damned. I just don't have any interest in centering my trip around it. Still, I figured I might as experience this teaching thing at least once.

Each afternoon at 2pm myself and four other volunteers make the half-hour walk to a local middle school for an hour of English class. My first week I actually worked with the kindergartners but thankfully a new volunteer showed up with girl-scout-troop-leading-experience who relieved me from glorified babysitting duty.

Thinking about it I have minimal experience teaching: I trained a few of our summer interns as well as my replacement at SVB for the last month I was there, I'm a certified Scuba instructor but have yet to teach a real class, and I coached one season of my little brother's soccer team 8 years ago. And while I'm very comfortable with my command over the English language, teaching it is quite a different animal.

The first two days of class were less than productive. There were 5 teachers for about 20 students (aged 11-15 and almost all girls), a pretty solid teacher-student ratio, but we just weren't organized. To be fair we had been given the impression that the older kids had a tiny bit of English experience, but other than one or two of the older girls we were working with blank slates. Our loosest of teaching plans disintegrated after about 5 minutes and we shared quite a few blank looks of indecision between us.

On our walk back to the hostel after back-to-back failures we resolved to sit down and put together a formal lesson plan. Rather than structure the classes around verb conjugation, pronouns, or anything resembling a formal language lesson, we themed our lessons around practical vocabulary and figured the sentence structure would appear naturally by asking questions. After that first updated class we all felt much better, confident that the students had actually learned something. We would continue to refine our strategies after each class but essentially here is how we structured it:

First 5 minutes two of us walk around the room, introduce ourselves, and have the students say their names in complete sentences ("Hello, my name is Billy, what is your name?"). Next we review the vocab from the day before and answer any lingering questions (pretty much everything we learned from the day before is a lingering question). Then it is time for the day's lesson, where we write the vocab on the board, have the class repeat it in English, and then explain the Spanish translation. For the last half of the lesson we break into small groups of 2-3 and go over a worksheet of questions. The small groups are where the real learning goes down since most of the students are too shy speak in front of the big group. Interestingly enough the same students sought out the same teachers each day so I got to know my squad well.

To be honest, teaching was a rush. I found myself getting really into each lesson, high fiving the students when they did especially well, and just having a good time. I still don't think I'll pursue English teaching long term - I'm determined to speak less English in my next destinations - but if the opportunity arises I could consider another short stint as Profe Billy.

Working on the Farm

As promised, here is a little bit more detail about EcoHostel Medellin and what kind of work we actually do on the farm. Paola opened the place about a year and half ago the farm is still young and growing.

The farm itself is quite small - no more than a few acres - but it packs a punch. Tomatoes, cucumbers, potatoes, yucca, mangoes, pineapple, avacados, peppers, onions, and a multitude of herbs and spices are but a few of the many items that grow here. The hostel isn't quite able to fully feed itself from the garden yet but should be able to achieve break-even by the end of Q2'14, with the overall goal of opening a vegetarian restaurant in town sometime in 2015.

Sustainability is unsurprisingly a key theme of the hostel. There is no trash nor is there even recycling: all food scraps go into the compost, and the few inorganic items we do use are stuffed into these bottles which will be turned into bricks for later use.

Accommodation is basic but comfortable. I have my own room and bathroom (I had to pay a little extra for that privilege but after 3 months of dormitories I was craving a little personal space), there is electricity 24/7, and a bounty of hammocks are scattered throughout the premises. I've even befriended a local bat who sleeps in the rafters and keeps the bugs away from me at night. However, the one luxury I truly, deeply miss is a tough one for me to cope with: there are no hot showers. That initial shock is cold, it gets colder, and yes, it stays cold. You know how Oedipus felt when he found out he was banging his mom the whole time? It's a lot like that.

Here's a few activities that we've been up to the past couple of weeks:

Machete Wielding: I had never actually used a machete before, and I must say it is fucking awesome. Just the slightest of swings slices branches with ease and it is incredibly satisfying reeling back and wailing on some thick brush. I've primarily used the machete for separating leaves from dead trees/branches; we use leaves for protecting young plants from being dominated by the sun and also mix them with fertilizer, and the branches provide bonfire tinder (the ash from the bonfires also goes into the fertilizer... everything here is interconnected, just like this atrocious run-on sentence).

Shoveling Shit: There are fields... endless fields. Volunteers pair up into teams of two - a shoveler and a bagger - and we hop over next door where the kindly neighbor lets us clean his cow pastures for him. We make our own fertilizer through a combination of said cow dung, grass clippings, dirt, ash, yeast, sugar, and water. Then we rake the monster pile for about two weeks, sprinkle it around the garden, and enjoy!

Terrace Making: As I mentioned earlier the farm is moving towards self sustenance. A big driver of that will come from these newly constructed terraces. These took a few weeks of the whole team shoveling and we brought in some professional help to craft the railings out of bamboo from the brush down the hill. Each of the terraces will then be layered with multiple layers of leaves, fertilizer, and dirt before the actual crops go in.

Staircase Construction: This goes hand in hand with the terrace making. Walking up and down a steep hill is treacherous, especially when the grass is wet (95% of the time). To alleviate this ailment we constructed a series of steps: used car and motorcycle tires form the shell, a clay brick helps the step hold up to the rigors of erosion, and dirt does the rest.

Straight Up Planting: The most obvious of all... you gotta plant things before they can grow. There are a few small nurseries around the farm - the plastic cups from fruit juices in town make the perfect first home - and from there we transplant the little guys to the big garden or the terraces. Most of the crops can circumvent the nursery and go straight from seed to stomach without the training wheels. Chief Garden Officer Fabian, Paola's boyfriend, makes that call.

There is always something to do around the farm and these are but a few of the many activities that have come up throughout my stay. I've admittedly lived a very white collar life and it feels good to work with my hands on something other than a computer keyboard.

EcoHostel Medellin - On the Farm

From Salento we headed to Medellin for one last fiesta. This was my last stop with Eric, who would fly back to the coast with the rest of our new travel family that we met in Salento. We did an amazing paragliding trip over the city for some spectacular views, but other than that it was mostly relaxing and enjoying the Medellin nightlife.

After the group left I took a week to figure out my next steps. It had been an amazing two months of wandering Colombia and Ecuador but I was ready to find a place to settle down for a while, get back to Spanish, and see something other than a hostel dorm room. Initially I thought about staying in Medellin for a month or two and looked at a few apartments and volunteer opportunities, but ultimately I decided on something a little more rural. I discovered EcoHostel Medellin via Workaway, a website that connects farms/hostels/whoever wants help with prospective volunteers. After a 30 minute skype conversation with Paola, the owner, I committed to six weeks of Spanish classes, farm-work, and an hour of teaching English each day at a local school.

A slightly deceptive title, EcoHostel Medellin actually resides in Amaga, a small mining town about an hour south of the city. The hostel/farm itself is a good 20 minute walk up a dirt road from the town square which makes for some nice forced exercise. Also, there are two rules which would be a serious change: no meat and no alcohol.

I'm here for 6 weeks so I'll go into more detail about some of the activities in later posts, but here is how a normal day goes down. A typical day on the farm is pretty much the antithesis of life on the gringo trail. Breakfast is at 6:30am with the option for an earlier wake up for meditation or yoga.

After breakfast (and dishes, I have breakfast dish duty) I work in the garden for an hour while the rest of the volunteers have Spanish class. My class is at 9:00, I have a little more Spanish experience so I lucked into a private class. Another hour or so of garden work and then it's time to wash up for lunch. We get a little break before making the half hour walk to the high school for our hour of English class.

From there I usually walk all the way to town, stopping briefly at the farm to pick up my things and have a snack. The town actually has free high-speed wifi in the plaza so I head to my go-to cafe and grab either a coffee, a cookie, or both. I recently discovered these donuts filled with caramel which have quickly become a staple of the routine.

I hike back to the farm around 5:30 or so and do some sort of exercise routine before sunset. Occasionally one of the volunteers will lead yoga but most of the time I just do something on my own. The past couple months were less than kind to the body and I have to fit into my suit for a wedding in a few weeks.

Dinner is around 7:30. If it's my day to cook dinner I skip the exercise and get straight to work, otherwise I log some twilight hammock time.

After dinner we go over our English lesson plan for the next day and just chat for a little while. I'm almost always up in my room by 9:30 and passed out by 10:00.

This is the first time I've ever worked on a farm, taught English, or voluntarily given up the delicious sustenance of meat. But traveling is nothing if not discovery, learning, and growth; it should be an interesting 6 weeks.

Tejo - Everything is Better With Gunpowder

My return to Salento was a breath of fresh air in every way imaginable: no more sweating through every article of clothing, no more scratching the eruptions of bug bites, no more throngs of partying gringos. We headed back to hostal La Serrana and I thoroughly enjoyed the view from the mountain hammocks.

Eric and I spent a few days of quality hiking in the mountains. I missed the famous 5-hour summit during my first Salento stint so we had to check that one off the list.

But the highlight of Salento was Tejo. Last time, unfortunately, Tejo night fell on Super Bowl Sunday and I couldn't quite bring myself to sacrifice that national holiday. I did not miss round two. Tejo is essentially a mix of horseshoes, bocci, and cornhole but with the much appreciated addition of gunpowder. Here's how you play:

Two teams stand next to each other and alternate turns tossing a surprisingly heavy stone (maybe about 8 pounds?) at a small metal ring. The ring is embedded in a wall of clay tilted at a 45 degree angle and is encircled by packets of gunpowder. Typically you are supposed to stand a good 30 feet away but we elected for the gringo distance of 15.

                                           

I'm sure there are different point systems but here is what we used: If no team gets a stone in the ring (99% of the time) the team with the stone closest to the circle gets a single point; a stone inside the circle but no gunpowder explosion gets 5 points (0.4% of the time); an explosion but the stone is not fully inside the circle is also five points (0.4% of the time); and the White Whale of tosses, a circle-explosion, was worth 9 points (0.2%, and that is generous). First to 21+ wins. As with most Colombian social activities alcohol is involved; the courts are free to use as long as everyone purchases a drink.

Team Billy/Katrin jumped out to a commanding 11-6 lead by consistently painting the edges of the ring. In one toss Sebastian/Arlen tied it with a surgical drop that did not explode. Unfettered by what was certainly a fortuitous throw, Billy/Katrin resumed the beatdown with un-relentless precision. At 20-12 the match looked all but finished. Of course Sebastian/Arlen threw up a prayer that magically exploded but landed outside the ring, roaring back to contention at 20-17. Just to clarify, these don't sound like those little firecracker pop-rocks that you throw on the ground; when there is an explosion your immediate instinct is to duck for cover.

I'll admit I was a little rattled, my next two tosses were nowhere near the ring and suddenly we were looking at a 20-19 chokefest. Sensing the game was slipping away we paused in silence, delving deep within our psyches searching for the answer. Disney himself could not write such an ending. The stone soared from my hand, climbing ever higher, crying for the descent it so desperately craved. Gravity wrapped his tendrils around the ascending orb, Newton's silent arbiter, embracing my gift with a crooked smile. Silence at the zenith. Down, down, down we go, falling, diving, the perfect parabola sculpted by Da Vinci himself. The shockwave was visceral, visible, a cacophony of elation that rippled through flesh and soul. Heroes make their own miracles.

While we were admittedly impressive, our American-German union was not in the same universe as the local Colombians. After our victory we tried throwing at regulation distance and no one even hit the board. Even more impressive? The locals weren't just a little buzzed or casually sipping on their drinks: they were fucking blacked out. How is it possible to heave a stone an incredibly far distance, land it into an incredibly small area, and not be able to walk in a straight line to the bathroom? Yet another of Colombia's mysteries best left alone.

Costeño Beach - The Land of the Lotus Eaters

I often compare my travels to Ulysses's journey in the Odyssey, except without the Penelope and way more Calypsos (you're damn right I just made an Odyssey sex joke). For those who filled their brains with slightly more useful information than epic Greek poems, the land of the lotus eaters is one of the islands where Ulysses and his men stopped to resupply. On this island grew a special kind of lotus flower, which, upon ingestion, caused the consumer to forget all cares, worries, and every other preoccupation except the desire to eat more. Because Ulysses wanted to get the fuck home he promptly ordered his men back on the boat and bounced. Costeño Beach is the land of the lotus eaters.

First let me be clear, Costeño Beach is awesome. Had I gone straight there after arriving in Colombia I almost certainly would have stayed for over a month. Instead, I discovered this grotto after two months of punishment on the Gringo trail, which while indescribably fun is the antithesis of productivity. After a week I would crack and spontaneously buy a plane ticket to Salento just to escape.

It started innocently enough. Eric, our Colombian friend Keysha, and I took a shuttle to Santa Marta, a reasonably sized, more touristy beach city a few hours east of Barranquilla. Santa Marta itself is a rather forgettable city with mediocre beaches, but it is right next to Tacanga (dusty town with nicer beaches) and serves as the jumping off point for treks to the Lost City (essentially a jungle Machu Picchu). The day after we arrived I decided to explore the mountain town of Minca, a 30 minute jeep ride into the Sierra Nevadas, while Eric and Keysha headed to the beach. In Minca I met another Australian who was also driving a van from Canada to Argentina, and it was he who told me of Costeño. If traveling has taught me any life lessons, it is that you can't go wrong with Australians driving vans down South America.

To get there you take an hour bus ride past the famous Tayrona National Park and get dropped off in what appears to be a random dirt road. Hike a good 30 minutes hike down the road parallel to the ocean and you have arrived.

At Costeño there are no worries. The lifestyle was very similar to Kamala hostel in Montanita except here there was no reason to leave. There is a set menu for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, the beers are cheap and served 24/7, and everything is paid for via tab. Surf lessons are offered twice a day in the morning and early afternoon, although I was never ambitious enough to wake up anytime near 8:30am and by the afternoon any serious movement seemed way too aggressive. Essentially life consists of waking up and having fun... that's about it.

I did do at least one organized activity there and it was without a doubt the best afternoon I have had on this trip. About twenty of us piled into the back of a truck and rode 45 minutes to a jungle trail. After picking up the necessary supplies (and inner tubes) at the nearby shop we trekked through a very mountainous jungle until arriving at the river. I never would have guessed such a simple act of sitting in an inner tube and floating down a river could be so much fun, but it truly was amazing. You slowly meander through lush forest, the crisp water a perfect complement to the radiant sunshine, hearing no other sound besides the laughter of friends. There might have been one or two beers as well. We unfortunately learned an invaluable life lesson in the most miserable of ways possible: full bottles of rum do not float. But the loss of a dear friend only brought the group closer together and we finished the journey all smiles.

Look, I have nothing really bad to say about Costeño; it is an amazing place and I truly enjoyed my time there. Clearly the lotus flower is delicious. But after a week of that place in addition to Carnival and the rest of my Colombian adventures I just needed a change. Back in Santa Marta we bought tickets to fly to the coffee country for some refreshing mountain air. My time on the Colombian coast had come to an end.