On being a foreigner and on women´s role.

Before coming to Ecuador, I imagine I would kind of blend in with the people since I have dark hair and brown eyes. This brought me comfort because I don´t like to stand out. Well, I was wrong. I definitely stand out here. The people in Cayambe have darker skin, especially in the villages outside of town (which is where I live). So when I walk down the street or hop on the bus, I get stared at like I´m some sort of weird stranger. The kids automatically assume that I´m North American and that I speak english because they´ll yell "Hello!" to me or "Good Morning" when I walk by. The other day a kid asked me "How are you?" when I got on the bus, which is pretty cute but just goes to show that they have no idea that English is actually my second language and probably don´t know that French is spoken in Canada. All of us Canadians or foreigners are the same to them. It´s disappointing, that I don´t blend in, but I guess I should have expected it. I tried to explain to my host family that Canada is very multicultural and people are of all colors, which they hadn´t really realized before. Anyways, I just wanted to point out that the color of your skin can sometimes change someone´s opinion about you, especially in a place like here where everyone looks alike and there isn´t much cultural diversity.

An interesting thing I´ve noticed since being here is the difference in the role and perception of women here compared to in Canada. I was cooking lunch with my host mom the other day and she was teaching me how to make something on the stove. She asked me if I had an oven at home (because they don´t) and I said yes. She said that if my future husband doesn´t get me an oven like her, I´ll know how to cook on a stove. This clearly made me see how they see a women as uncapable of bying herself an oven. The husband deals with the money and that´s that. I haven´t felt that my host is really authoritive in the family. He respects my host mom a lot and I´m pretty sure they make decisions together. But more and more I´m starting to think that this isn´t the case in most families here. I´ve already heard of a few women being hit by their husband, often when they´re drunk, which is a whole other issue (the rate of alcoholism here seems to be very high). My host family also explained to me that one of the reasons why women have so many children here is because their husbands are afraid that they´ll go running off with another man. Their way of avoiding this is to not let them use birth control so that they have to care for more babies and more children. It´s kind of hard to hear and see all this, since women in Canada have so much independence and respect. A single working woman would not be seen here, while in Canada it´s pretty normal. Anyways, I hope to learn more about this subject in the next 2 months. It´s definitely eye opening!