Banos Ecuador

Arrived in Banos today around 4pm from Quito. Finished one full month of language study with three weeks of that living with a family. Click Here to see some pictures of my recent trip to Otavalo, my host family and Banos. See that I really don´t have much passion for learning to write spanish, so my idea of doing my blog entries in both spanish and english resulted in me simply doing no blog entries at all. My time in Quito was really focused on studying spanish so I spent a great deal of time, including on weekends, with my hoist family. Stela, the 84 year old mother of 10 and her two daughters, Eualia and Emelia, adopted me and we would talk for hours about all manner of subjects. Albeit the conversations were not the most "correct" in terms of depth of vocabulary or proper usage, nonetheless communication with the big "U", UNDERSTANDING. Wow, what a miracle that is, to understand another human being. On the subject of understanding, Henry Block a mentor and friend who I felt really understood me, passed away last week. He had been battling cancer for some time now and his life is a testimony to how much one man can impact the life of countless others. A piece of Hnery will always live inside of me. Henry Block, Henry Block, Henry Block Welcome. The calling of the name three times comes from a ritual I learned in my mens group (The East Bay Nation of Men). For me this ritual helps me to visualize this person and remember them or send them my prayers if they are in need of some form of assistance. Many people would dimiss this type of ritual, ask me if I care? Back to Henry, a truly remarkable man and I am just happy that I got to know him and that he was part of my life, nuff said.