May 22: Our Last Night

Dr. Wilhelm:  Well this certainly has been a great experience for everyone and I’m glad that some of you shared the experience via our blog.  I wanted to let you know that the students will be doing some reflecting and posting a final post within the next few days upon returning to the states. 

Last night we shared a great dinner and then took some time going around the table and talking about their most memorable experiences.  It was a great time of sharing and even a few tears as we said goodbye to our friends.  This morning we woke up, ate breakfast and then headed back to Quito.  It was about a 5 hour trip this time as it was all uphill.  We’re settled into a hostal for just a short time.  In about an hour the US Embassy in Quito is coming to film a story about us to put up on their website.  We’ll post in the next few days when it goes live.  This trip has certianly made an impact and our culminating concert yesterday was evidence of all the work we have done, and still have to do. 

Tomorrow morning we wake up at 3 a.m. so we can be at the airport at 4 a.m.  The Quito airport is crazy as there are about 5 different screening processes in order to get to the plane.  We arrive back in St. Louis at 5 p.m. and look forward to returning home…we’re all a little tired!

Thanks again for reading!

MAY 21: Our Last Days in Tena

EMILY: Today is our last full day in Tena and it is a bittersweet moment indeed. A summary of events to start out:
Yesterday, we took a bus for half an hour and then a canoe for another half an hour to “AmaZOOnico,” a rescue center for jungle animals that have been injured or been victims of illegal trading to recover and be reintroduced into the wild. We saw tons of cool animals, most notably several species of monkey and an ANACONDA! It was in a tank, don’t worrry. On the way home, we got yet another flat tire (our third on this trip) but made it back to Las Heliconias all in one piece.
Today was the culmination of our trip: the indigenous concert at Colegio San Jose. Each of the groups that we have been recording over the last 2 weeks came and presented a concert at the school. We performed as well! Zach, Justin and I sang a few “Mother Goose Madrigals” from our Chamber Choir repertoire and then we all sang our own version of “Across the Universe.” Justin’s guitar playing impressed all the students and he did a little encore for his adoring fan base of 12-year-old girls. I think the concert was a great success because all though the students may not have fully appreciated the concert, at least they can recognize and identify  indigenous music, something that was severly lacking before.
Tonight we must pack for our journey back to Quito in the morning. Our days in Ecuador are coming to a close and I think we are all a bit sad about it. This experience has been fanstastic for all of us and we are all a bit melancoly about it ending but I also think we’re ready to see our family and friends again.

Hopefully, more of us will reflect here on thier experience but until then..see ya!

May 19th

Justin:  Yesterday afternoon we went to visit more musicians.  The musicians consisted of a man and his children and grandchildren.  They wore traditional clothing and incorporated us into their performance.  We drank chi-cha during one song and learned how to dance their traditional dance during another.  The group used a violin, drums, and a guiro.  They were glad that we were there and it was pleasant to see some younger musicians in a group.  Today we we went to San Jose and all of us taught during the lessons.  It is easier than one would imagine to teach music to a class that speaks a different language due to music being a universal language.  Dr. Wilhelm and Rosa met with the inspector, AKA:vice principal, to discuss entering indigenous music back into the curriculum.  Unfortunately the inspector was not very receptive to the idea.  She did not know anything about music and did not think that it was the schools responsibility to teach their indigenous culture.  She also went on to say that the students were not into music.  After the meeting Cesar, Emily, and I were playing a guitar and singing in a hallway and students continued to stop by in groups while others grabbed their own guitars and played.  The students all appear to have a great time in Cesar’s class.  It is sad that a person that holds such a vital role in education is so distanced from her students.  Tomorrow we are going to an animal rescue site but for now we are about to head off for pizza!

May 18: The Last Few Days

ZACH AND EMILY: Hello again! We know you’ve missed us very much! Here’s an update of the last few days of our journey. So Friday evening, a man called Luis took us out into the rainforest to “rough-it,” as you all know we are certainly the “roughing-it” type. We arrived and went swimming in a BEAUTIFUL fresh water swimming hole. It was one of the most gorgeous places we have ever seen and the water was almost completely clear! It was basically like swimming in bottled water. AWESOME. We had dinner, a marshmallow roast and got to go stargazing. None of us had ever seen so many stars in our lives! “Twinkle twinkle little star…” I think we were all amazed that the stars were actually twinkling! Night time was…interesting since the beds were…not that comfortable. Basically, we slept onplanks with blankets over them. Justin made a fortress of solitude by stealing a second “mattress” from an unused bed and taking a bunch of everyone else’s bug nets. I (Emily) am personally blaming the fortress for the fact that I’m sitting here with now, over 80 bug bites. Fantaaastic. The next morning, Nelson (our jungle guide) got everyone up and took us on a hike to the primary rainforest. Primary rainforest: a part of the rainforest that has not been cut down and reforested. We hiked for about 2 hours before we reached our destination: a gorgeous clearing with a natural waterfall! It was gorgeous. Justin went for a swim in the pool underneath (he’s become the adventurer of our little group) and we all took a break and admired the beauty of this great natural wonder. We hiked back and went for another swim in the watering hole to cool off after our long morning of jungle adventure. We had lunch, then went on another adventure: white water rafting! It was very exciting and the water was very cold. This was because it was glacier water from the volcano, Cotapaxi. It was about a 2-3 level rafting excursion. The whole trip took about 3 hours. We got driven back to Tena where we switched hotels from Los Yutzos to the beautiful Las Heliconias. Before we moved hotels, Genni, Zach and Emily went to pick up the laundry and had an adventure trying to pick up 5 people’s laundry from one lady when she spoke no English and our Spanish is limited. But, all’s well that end’s well and we made a safe move to the new hotel. Honestly, it’s more of a resort than a hotel. Where else in the world can you stay in a suite at a hotel that has 2 pools, a jacuzzi, and a water slide for $14 a night? Fabulous! It does, however, feel a little weird to be staying in such a nice place. I think we’ll live. Sunday was a lazy day for us; we got to sleep in and lounge pool-side for most of the day. Dr Wilhelm gave Brad (Miguel’s 6-year-old son) a swimming lesson as well. All of us got a little sunburnt but no big deal!

Which leads us to today: Dr Wilhelm, Genni and Justin went to teach at Cesar’s school while we stayed at the hotel to transcribe and catch up on our blogging, of course! After lunch, we will go record our final musical group, a family of musicians we cannot record this morning because most of them are in school.

Well, we should be getting back to transcription now. Hope all is well in the states!

May 15: Deeper into the jungle!

DR. WILHELM:  Hello everyone.  Thanks for posting comments.  It’s good to know that some people are reading what we have been writing.  This morning was our first morning to sleep an extra half-hour!  We got up at 8, instead of 7:30 a.m.   This was actually good because we are all starting to get a little tired.  My cold started to turn into an ear infection yesterday so I went to go see a doctor who gave me prescriptions for stronger antibiotics.  The visit cost me a whole $15, without health insurance!  Last night Genni also took a slight tumble at the hotel and sprained her ankle.  I’m happy to report that both of us are doing much better today.  This morning we went to a zoo they have, which is basically across the river from our hotel.  They had a lot of animals and even a lookout tower.  I think the highlight of that trip was the zip line we all took at the end.  We just finished lunch and are about to log off for a day or so as we are heading deeper into the jungle for a weekend get away.  We’ll be traveling about an hour or so away from town to a small typical house in the jungle and spending the night on bunk beds.  Tomorrow morning we’ll take a walk to the primary rainforest, where we can see the canopy and different animls that we don’t see around the town.  Then in the afternoon we are going white-water rafting.  I’m really looking forward to this, since I didn’t have time for it when I was here three years ago for my initial research.  The area around here is one of the best in the world for white-water rafting because the mountains are so close.  You can do anything from a level 1 – 5 course.  The kids keep thinking we are going to do a 5, but I’m thinking a 2-3 will probably be all we will do.  After rafting we come back to the hotel to pick up our things and travel to a different hotel.  We decided we wanted a change of scenery so we are going across town to a newer place that has a huge pool and game area.  The room we are staying in is actually like an apartment.  It has 3 bedrooms and then a common room with our own kitchen.  We may try cooking our own dinner one night, now that we have also found the local market.  And the best part is that it is actually cheaper than we are staying now!  One last thing, the American embassy in Quito heard about our research and are going to conduct an interview next Friday, right before we leave the country.  They are going to highlight our project on their website, which will be a good way to end our trip and reflect on all that we have done.  Chau!

May 13: A New Group

STUDENTS: Today was yet another day of exciting musicing. We arrived at a different musician’s home around 9, at which point we waited about an hour and a half for one member of the group to arrive. This could have been boring but Miguel showed us some cool things about the rainforest and we got to play with some super cool indigenous instruments. Before we recorded, the eldest of the group (a woman) said that because we were studying their indigenous culture, we had to participate with the traditions. We all got our faces painted in the traditional style! We were much exited because the first day when we went to meet this group and get their permission to record, we noticed their faces were painted and were kind of afraid to ask to do it, thinking it might be disrespectful. It was a very cool experience for us all to be included in such an awesome tradition.

When we finally got to record, it was definitely worth it! The group had 6 people in it, including a woman! One interesting thing was that the influence in these songs was not purely Quichua but Andean as well. We could tell this because they included the pan flute in their music. All the songs we recorded today were written by the members of this particular group, called “Wayra Churis.” Unlike our previous recordings, this group wore traditional clothing and included dance in their presentation. They prepared us a FANTASTIC lunch of tilapia, yucca, fern and hearts of palm salad and a million other delicious things! So much food for SO little money- only $2!!! We’re definitely going to have a hard time paying $20 for one meal when we get home J

After lunch, we recorded a few more pieces but this time, a few little girls were included in the dance. They were the daughters of several of the members of the group and were absolutely adorable! Most importantly though, we loved that even at the young age of 3, these little girls were being taught their traditions.  We did all the recording for this group in one day so it was a pretty long day but we all had a fantastic time.

Tonight, we will do some more transcribing and tomorrow, we will go to Cesar’s school with Dr Wilhelm. Fantastico!

May 12: Teaching

DR. WILHELM:  Yesterday the kids went with Miguel to Ruku Llacta to do their recordings and research.  While there I went with Cesar to San Jose catholic school.  I met some of the teachers and administrators and then worked with Cesar to improve his teaching.  I watched him teach a lesson and took some notes.  The next class I taught the lesson demonstrating better sequence of instruction.  The rest of the day he worked on replicating the lesson.  I’m really impressed with his classroom control.  Students really respect him and you can tell that he cares about the students.  It’s kind of amazing considering there are over 30 kids in one class.  Later that afternoon Cesar came to our hostal and I worked with him giving him notes on how to better excute his lessons.  I gave him some homework and today I’m going to watch him teach the same lesson about 3 times in order for him to practice.  Teachers, especially music ones, usually recieve no training in education so they are way behind in terms of lesson presentation.  The students were helpful in demonstrating some of the things they learned at McKendree in terms of order.  So each morning I will go to the school in the morning and teach Cesar in the afternoon.  I’m trying to cram 3 semesters of instruction into a week and a half!!  But I already see improvement so that is a great start.  Next week we are going to work at incorporating traditional music back into the curriculum, one of the main reasons for my research.  It’s an exciting time, though I’m getting a bit sick.  The humidity has made me loose my voice and I have a small cold.  I’m working on drinking a lot of water and taking some medicine.  Hopefully I can shake it fast.  That is the update for now as we are all going off for the day.

May 11: First Day of Work

FROM THE STUDENTS: Today we woke up pretty early to go take a bus to Archidona to record Max Shiguango and members of his family band. We recorded them playing five indigeous Quichua songs. Max played several songs on indigenous instruments that they usually don’t play for non-Quichua people, which was very cool. Zach’s interview went really well and he got some really interesante information. One fact we found quite interesante was that people had previously recorded their music for an indigenous association. Max said the association made over 5000 copies of the CD. He also said he had no idea where the 5000 copies were. WHAAAAT?!
A lot of the members of the group were shamen and they said the group sometimes plays at conventions for the Shamen association, like they get a card. That they can carry. Hilarious. After the recording, we had lunch at a restaurant in Rucu Llacta and it was delicious but we had quite a scare on Justin’s part! With most meals here, aji is served. Aji is a sauce that can be compared to hot sauce. We all know how Justin feels about hot sauce. Well, this was quite exraordinary hot sauce because when Justin wiped the sweat from his eyes (because it was so HOT), it under-eye region swelled up, turned red and STUNG. Good news-All is not lost: It went away after about an hour, we learned that hand santizer serves many purposes, Justin learned a valuable lesson in relation to South American peppers and all of us had a good laugh….even Justin. We had a very nice, looong siesta after which we started transcribing the school song of Cesars school, San Jose. We hate transcription but luckily Juan Carlos is here to help us! Hoorah! We’re off to work on some more transcription so we can go to….RON’S BAR. That’s for serious. We can’t get away from it. It’s a real place. No lie. We’re doing more recording tomorrow! How excite!

May 10: Setting it all up!

This is our post for yesterday, but we have had trouble with internet access…..

GENNI: Today was a great experience. We got to go into the jungle and meet all the musicians we will be working with in the next couple of days.  We also met with the music teacher Cesar and learned about how the children in the schools here don’t know music very well. Our translator Miguel is hilarious. He is so intelligent and knows how to speak in at least 3 different languages. The city of Tena is so beautiful. Our hotel looks directly over the river and the scenery is amazing. The people here are so friendly; when we walk around town most people say hello every time you pass.

EMILY: I. LOVE. THIS. PLACE. Seriously. I almost forgot how much I love it down here. Today was full of adventures, as per the usual. We ventured into the jungle town of Archidona by way of bus, which was a little ridiculous but a new experience! We met several musicians who agreed to help us with our research. Miguel (our wonderful guide) told them that unlike others who have recorded their music before, we are there to help them preserve their culture. Awesome. One man (Max) had worked with Dr. Wilhelm before and was pleased that he had come back and brought more people who were excited about the project. Apparently, it’s very rare for a person to do research like this and return to do follow-ups. After siesta, Miguel brought Cesar (!) to Los Yutzos and we talked about how we can help Cesar to continue his education as a music teacher. I met Cesar last year when we brought him and Miguel to Quito for an Orff workshop at the National Conservatory and was very excited to see him again. We spent the rest of the day hanging out with Cesar and Miguel just playing and jamming out about music! Juan Carlos gets here from Quito tomorrow and we are very excited to get more Ecuadorians excited about our project. Last year when I was here, I really thought it wouldn’t get any better but this is really a once in a lifetime experience. We are all getting to be closer as friends and colleagues. All these experiences are really making us think and talk about our own lives. It truly is an incredible opportunity we have been given. Tomorrow, we go back to Max’s house outside of Archidona to start recording!! Yay!

ZACH: I am so excited to start my research because today we met a few of the musicians. We left pretty early to take the bus to meet and greet musicians that we will be recording. The first group we met was a Quichua indigenous tribe. They all wore traditional gear, which is very interesting because most tribes do not wear the traditional clothing because of the prejudice that is felt toward them.  We had to explain to them that we were not going to steal their music because in the past the tribe has been approached by researchers, and the music has been recorded. The researchers have never come back, and they have no idea what was done with their music. However, we explained the situation, and they seemed extremely ok with it. Whenever we were about to leave, they played a song for us, and it was great! Then, we went to meet another musician, Max. He was very excited to hear from us and to perform so we can preserve the indigenous music. After our siesta, we met Cesar who is a friend of Dr. Wilhelm’s. He was extremely excited to meet us because we have a wealth of knowledge that he would like. He is one of the most passionate teachers I have ever met. He wants to obtain so much knowledge, so that he can provide his students the best education possible. He is a role model that all teachers should look up to. We should always strive to obtain the most knowledge possible, and be a life long learner.  People here are so appreciative for the things that we take for granted.

JUSTIN:  Today was great.  We went out to talk to the musicians in Archidona.  All of the people are very appreciative and happy that we are here working to preserve their music.  We are the means of communication between the school and the musicians.   lt is so much different than the cities we have been around.  The living areas are very primitive and people dress and act very close to their ancestors.  I am going to live here one day.  I had a learning experience today that I am really grateful for. Our guide told us that some of the children at the school here in Tena wake up at 4:00 a.m. and walk to school barefoot.  We are experiencing many things that make us all think about how we perceive our own lives. I find it interesting that many of the people in Ecuador want to go to the U.S. because of our luxuries but they don’t realize that they are happier than most people in the U.S.  They have a strong belief in family and are generally happy and friendly people.  When many U.S. citizens come to third world countries like this, they feel bad that we have so many privileges but are we really so much better off? Cesar is willing to travel four hours through the mountains to continue his education as a teacher if he can budget it.  People here are so appreciative for the things that we take for granted.

May 9: Welcome to the Jungle!

GENNI: Today, we traveled to Tena to get to the rainforest. The scenery on the way over was beautiful. All the mountains and waterfalls, things we don’t get to see everyday.

EMILY: The last two days have been very exciting. Yesterday, we went to see a rehearsal of the Pichincha Chorus and they were AMAZING. They were a 16-person acapella choir and as vocalists, we were really impressed with how good they were. We’d really like to bring them to McKendree to perform! After that, we went to the conservatory of music, lunch and siesta time! The family Genni and I were doing our home-stay with had a barbeque for the five of us and the whole family that evening and we tried burgers with pineapple on them! Delicious! The whole Panchi family was incredibly generous and wonderful! That night we went to a concert of the national symphony orchestra. This morning we woke up and travelled to Tena! After a 5 hour, very scenic, bus ride, we made it! Not much has happened in Tena but we’re stoked to see all the musicians!

ZACH: The past few days have been non-stop for us. Yesterday, we went to a professional choir’s rehearsal. The host mom that Justin and I were staying with was a performer in the choir. They were extremely good, and the most interesting part was that they performed a few traditional Ecuadorian songs. Then, we went to the National Conservatory of Music, which is considered the Julliard of the Ecuador. The building was beautiful, and there were actual people practicing in the practice rooms! That night, we went to a professional concert that was very good. In the morning, we traveled to Tena by van. The drive was unbelievably beautiful, and was definitely once in a lifetime experience.

JUSTIN:  Yesterday started out with us seeing a professional choir.  The choir was amazing and the lady whose house I was staying at was a member in the choir.  They were very inviting.  We sight-sang with the choir while Dr. Wilhelm conducted us and they gave us all CD’s of their group.  We left there to visit the National Conservatory of Music.  It was huge and very impressive.  We ate with some of the families that we were staying with.  They were very nice and made me pasta.  We went to see the national symphonic orchestra after that, and were able to compare the professional orchestras in Ecuador to the orchestras in the U.S.  After that, Genni and I headed out to a salsa club with Juan Carlos.  It was so much fun, and I am terrible at salsa dancing.  The trip today was the best part of the trip thus far.  Everything looked like it was straight out of movie with mountains, waterfalls, and cows in the road.