2 good things

1. This past weekend, the PrevenSud Foundation from Quito came to Estero de Plátano to give sexual and repoductive education workshops to a group of adults and youth group. I had met the president of the foundation in Quito a few months ago and we eventually organized a date-plan from them to come out to Estero to give their chats. I had given a few sex ed chats to my youth group in Estero, but I am far from a professional at giving chats about that specific topic. I spent most of the last week going house to house inviting people in the community to come to the workshop and trying to explain to each one of them the importance of reproductive education for both adults AND kids.

For example...
- Girls as young as 14 are having babies
- Girls/women here are still having far more children than they can afford to take care of... or to educate
- Many of the young men take part in extremely risky sexual behavior without protecting themselves or their partners

The hardest part about working in Estero is actually getting the people involved. It´s not unusual for 10-15 people to show up to a meeting to which the entire community was invited. BUT I was pleasantly surprised by the turnout in both the adult workshop and the youth workshop. The young woman fom PrevenSud who came to give the workshop explained both the male and female repoductive system, how babies are actually formed, different contraceptive methods available and about HIV-AIDS. I´m am certain that a vast majority of the adults present in that classroom had never recieved any kind of chat or lesson about those specific topics. They giggled and made jokes like kids... while also asking legitmate questions that neither the doctor nor the nurse had ever taken time to answer. The youth workshop was composed of about 30 small people from the age of 11 to 25 who were all extremely attentive and entertained by the chat. It was a good day.


2. In an effort to improve the quality of water used by the people of Estero, and therefore the general health of all of everyone, myself and my co-worker, Kyle have been in contact with a foundation called Agua Muisne. SEE HERE http://www.waterecuador.org/
This foundation, created and run by a brilliant Yale under-grad, builds water-purfication systems in various communities in Ecuador that are without access to safe drinking water. Estero already has a tubed water system, although the water is not treated and is unsafe to drink. And as mentioned before, the river water is extremely contaminated and used to bathe, wash clothes, wash dishes, cook and drink. It is very likely that this system will be built in Estero during them month of October... although at this point we (being Estero) still lack much of the organizational structure necessary. For example, the community has to find a location to put the system, someone to be in charge of the construction, someone to actual run the system and sell the water AND a lot of advertisement and education about the importance of such a water system in the community. THAT is the hard part. THAT is what will be occupying my time during the next few weeks. I would like to be in Estero for the planning, construction and the start-up of this system. Yanapuma will be in charge of the advertisement/education part of the deal as another volunteer will hopefully be coming to continue the sanitation-hygiene classes and workshops that I have already given to a few groups in Estero.

Right now, a 20-liter container of purified drinking water costs $1.50 in the stores in and around Estero... which the majority of the families cannot afford. With this purification system from Agua Muisne, 20-liters of absolutely safe drinking water only costs $0.25. WHAT A DEAL.