Someone once wrote........
........make the most of every moment. Explore side streets. Take miracle walks.
Perform random acts of kindness: buy fruit and share it, give flowers, pass out
pens, coins and other useful and interesting things. Say hello. Smile. Take
pictures. Share them. Learn about the depth of poverty. Count your blessings. Refuse to take things for granted. Give presents carefully. Play with everything. Share your toys. Blow bubbles. Spread laughter. Be kind to animals. Offer to
help. Clean up your own mess without being asked. Clean up someone else's mess
too. Ask questions. Answer questions. Collect addresses of people you meet. Send them postcards and email from home. Be aware that you are foreign and exotic. Hold babies. Giggle with children. Listen to old people.
Be brave. lnvite a dangerous stranger to dinner. Pay the bill. Learn to say thank you in the local
language. Sing out loud, songs you sang as a child and songs children will teach
you. Try something totally new. Don't just sight-see, sight-think. Donate energy.
Spend time. Give hugs. Be thoughtful about donating, spending, and giving
money. Support good work done by local people, buy a man a bike, pay a child's
school tuition, offer a mother seed money and supplies to start a small business
out of her home. Teach. Learn. Explore your own cultural perspective. Be
subjectively aware. Touch the world. Allow the world to touch you.
Come home safely........and remember, a true gift of seeing the world is to return where you
started and see your place for the first time.
"Un known friend of Scott"
What you need........
........to participate in any of our programs is to read and think about what the letter above says.
Its not the big things that does it, its the small things that gives you back the most. The most important things to bring
when you come to Ecuador is your smile, an opened mind and heart to a culture that is different to yours. An interest in what you are going to work with is of course something that you need and if you have these things you will get so much more out of your experiences and it wont take long before you integrate and you get friends for life.
What we offer........
........is an opportunity to live with an Ecuadorian family while helping street children, learning law in a
human rights project, practise in a hospital or working with animals and nature. The idea is that you should get something
out of your experience in Ecuador whatever you do, ether its an internship, a high school semester, volunteer work or learning Spanish.
We have had great experiences with groups of students that has worked together in a project and together they have explored the Ecuadorian culture and nature on excursions that we prepare for them, with or without guide/group leader.
The limits........
........are few and the possibilities are many. Ecuador is a country that has it all and people love to share their culture and
life with you as long as yo open up to them and share your self.
Some participants come to Ecuador without Spanish but they have a great chance to learn in our Spanish school PUKA INTI located in the central part of Quito at the same time as they practice by helping in a orphanage or street children center.
Upon request we can help arrange Spanish classes in other parts of
Ecuador like the Galapagos Islands, Mindo, Otavalo or Cuenca to mention some.
