Happy Father’s Day!
Today was a relaxing day. As much as we Glimpsers have already trained under the mindset of waking up early to a jam-packed day, we all needed a day away to process this wonderful experience. I woke everyone up at 9:00 AM, or at least I thought so. Apparently Emma, Ellery, and Marelyn had already woken up before me, so that made my job easier. Asha even said herself that she was used to waking up at 6:30 AM. I silently knocked on Madison and Crystal’s door, but they encouraged me to fiercely bang on Asha and Emily K.’s door. Breakfast was filled with everyone’s exciting energy. We had a classic meal of eggs, bacon, and buttered croissant with a side of dulce de leche. Then, we split up into two groups led by our GGLs, Emily and Kate, and prepared for our free time exploring Guaranda.
I was in Emily’s group with Lucinda, Josue, Emily N, Lucy, Kalei, Emma, Ariana, and Asha. What Kate’s group did was confidential and emotional, so I refuse to write about them. Sorry parents. Just kidding! They had a wonderful time exploring, playing in a local park, and buying snacks. In my group, we visited a supermarket called AkÍ to stock up on a lot of delicious snacks. Lucinda and Emily N came out of the store with several heavy bags of chips, cookies, and juice boxes. We tried to find a bookstore for Asha, but we couldn’t find any. We visited two internet cafes, both of which tried to make the calling rates more expensive for the group. Before we went back to the hotel, we checked out a 50¢ store, but nothing there was 50¢. We struggled to figure out the prices of items, but we survived thanks to Josue’s amazing translating skills. Also, a friendly boy from our hotel, who is named “Elvis” guided us to a bakery for ice cream cones.
For lunch, we enjoyed fried pork, chicken breast, locally-grown potatoes and beans, cheese, savory corn, strawberries & cream, and passionfruit juice. Then, we went outside for a second round of free time. Most of us went with Kate to revisit the Internet Cafe, where everyone tearfully and successfully contacted their loved ones. We went on a mission for ice cream, but we failed because most stores here close early on Sundays. We, however, were surprised when we met two friendly Mormons from the US. We also discovered that there is a corner store directly across the hotel that is extremely cheap.
Once everyone got back to the hotel at 5:00 PM, we continued developing our CAP Project. Sorry, no spoilers! I can say, though, that each individual team diligently contributed to the design process, and we are ready to present it tomorrow to German Hinojosa, who is the principal of the school we are working with. Then, we had a talkative dinner filled with deep conversations about our future dreams, as we ate classic burgers and chocolate ice cream. We all were reminded of home because of this filling meal.
Tonight, we had a seminar to mentally and emotionally prepare for tomorrow, which will be one of the most difficult days on this trip. Stay tuned. Yes, we do read comments, including new comments from old blogs.
– Josh Q.
Ellery up early on her own and still smiling ear to ear in the pictures? Amazing! Glad you’re doing so great in Ecuador, Ellery. Love you lots. 💜💜💜 Mom
I miss you Perrisima! It looks like you are having a good time. I can’t wait to hear your food experience lol. I just started summer school today so let the stress beginning once again. But we are counting the days for you to come back. Can’t wait to see you!💕 Love you
-Your big sister Jeanette
Kieran, it was super to hear from you today! Thanks for taking the time to call, it made our day to hear your voice. We love seeing the pics of you and the group! Hope the chill day today was a ton of fun and that it recharged your batteries a bit – y’all have a busy week ahead!! You know i love a dollar store and i can’t wait to hear what you got and the strangest/coolest stuff for sale. dada wants you to know he watered your plants. Noah and i took dada zip lining for father’s day but noah bailed right before we were set to go up to the platform. Dada and i had fun though and Noah read a book by the creeks
Thank you Josh for your informative and entertaining entry! I am glad you all got to be tourists and explore the town on your own and to get to know each other more. Thank you Ariana for the phone call from the internet cafe! It was wonderful to hear your voice and I hope that speaking to Bijan and I recharged your batteries until you come home in one week. Still very curious about what you all have planned as your Community Action Project. Love you so much Ariana!!! Love Mom. P.S. That ice cream looks like it was very delicious and you all look very content eating it!!!
Hi Josh,
Great to read your blog! Nice that you all get a free day today exploring Guaranda & enjoying local snacks. Bring me some if you still have space in your luggage:)
Dad & I just had an early dinner to celebrate his special day. Went to church yesterday after I got back from Seattle.
By the way, got your report card. Great job Josh!
It’s officially been a week and we miss you big time. Continue to have fun & learn on your second week. Good luck on your CAP Project!
Dad & Mom
It was great to hear from you this morning Emily and I was just thinking about you when you called. We all miss you very much and look forward to seeing you in one week! We went paddle-boating at Shoreline today for Father’s Day and it was pretty fun. I told my Mom Happy Birthday from you and she was glad. Mom and I laughed when we saw one post advising people to “rap hard” on Emily K’s door in the A.M.!! Keep up the great work and have fun. Love, Dad
Hi E.P., Thanks for calling and wishing me a Happy Father’s Day! It was nice to hear about how the trip is going for you and your fellow adventurers. Guaranda sounds like an interesting and beautiful place. Good luck with your group project – hope all goes well. Marley got drenched today while I watered the fruit trees – he was very excited. He misses you! (And we do too!)
wow! Well they escaped to different stores to try things and buy goodies, I’m glad you’re translating for your companions Josue, keep doing your Spanish practice and communicate with those beautiful people of Ecuador, talk to those wonderful children there in that country and motivate them to continue preparing and studying, I hope you have eaten cheese and taken passion fruit juice because you like it a lot, we take dad to eat something and we miss you a lot, but do not worry it was not much you missed, you know that what more Dad likes to rest at home. so we came and aunt came to visit us with all her pets and with the 2 of your sister you can imagine the noise of birds flying. I thought you would call us today, the time they arrived and you called us Ecuador, but today we do not receive any. It is well that it is difficult, do not worry, we love you and we miss you, greetings, aunt and grandma angela, many kisses and Hugs, greetings to all your beautiful colleagues GG .. thanks for sharing all this so beautiful! God bless you and keep them.
Hi Glimpsers,
Love to hear that you had a day to explore at your pace…and clearly you all understand the value of snacks! 💗.
Can’t wait to hear about today’s adventures. You are loved.
Hi Madison. Missing you!
Mom
Josh Q—you are so funny! Thank you for another great update. It really is a little like being there with you guys. Okay, not exactly, but still really good to hear what you are doing and planning AND eating. Can’t wait for the big announcement. The community there sounds really special.
Simone, classic Dad yesterday. Will tell u stories when you get home. We are all good. Luv you. Mom
Sounds like you guys had a wonderful day off! Lindsey it was so good to hear from you! We went up to visit Ali for Father’s Day and took him out to a German/Italian/French restaurant. It was good so we’ll go there with you sometime too! Can’t wait to hear about your day today! Love you! ❤️
Hi Madison, it was great to hear from you thanks for calling and wishing me a Happy Father’s Day! Sounds like you guys had a great time exploring about. Look forward to hearing about your day today.
Miss and love you,
Dad
What an amazing free day on father’s day. It was so wonderful to talk to you Asha. Although we couldn’t hear you the second time – probably when you were calling from the Internet cafe. You can’t imagine what hearing your voice does to us. Hope you can now appreciate why I always calll not text 😊
Great to hear about your fun day with shopping ice cream burger and all the great food. Yeah not surprised with the 6:30 am fun fact.
So excited about the CAP project. Will be reading it next.
We didn’t go to Muir Woods. We are saving that for when you get back. We had a wonderful dinner with Ravi in Berkeley.
Lots of love
Mom Dad Ravi Sparky