Monday I moved houses. Not cos the last one wasn't working out - in fact, it was a really laid-back place, and I felt pretty much at home there - but cos I wanted more of an experience of Ecuadorian culture and more opps to practise the language, and figured what better way to do so than live with some Ecuadorians?

A CouchSurfer who's now living far from the centre and is unable to host offered me her mum's place, so I moved in Monday. I was a little apprehensive about doing so, but the mum was super welcoming right away - telling the American guy who'd come with me to help carry my bags (which seem to have grown somehow!) he was welcome anytime for dinner; she likes to say, ¨nosotros somos todos ninos de Dios¨ - we're all children of God. Right on. So right away my hesitations were eased.

Yesterday I finished my last day of Spanish school and was given a certificate stating I have now reached an ¨advanzado¨ level of Spanish. Yeah, right! But it's definitely been helping living with some Ecuadorians - my host mum is really patient and great at speaking slowly, though there are still times when I don't understand her. Like the time she apparently told me the night before that she was going out for a walk the next morning, and, having a new door with no key, I had to press the button in the house to let her into the apartment block. Somehow I completely missed this - wondered why he husband went outside to demo the buzzer though! - and completely slept through when, at 6:30 the next morning, she pressed the buzzer over and over to try get me let her in. Oops!

The fact that my profesora was really experienced and onto-it - and very, very patient - also really helped with my learning enough to - very slowly - converse. I really enjoyed the school, meeting and lucnhing with the other students who were great to practise Spanish with cos we were more or less on the same footing, and sometimes lunching with the teachers too, who were really down-to-earth.

Interesting fact about Ecuador: family is REALLY, REALLY important here. Makes me realise how little - comparitively speaking - we as a nation value it in NZ. Often kids will live with their parents until they marry. Even if that means, in the case of one of my host mum's kids, until their 30s. My teacher, too, who's not yet married, probably in her early thirties, still lives with her mum. And my host mum's sons apartment is viewable out the window it's so close; and her sister lives two apartments above us. And this seems to be the exception rather than the norm. My host mum also looks after four of her grandchildren every weekday while their parents work. Which makes for fun trying to practise Spanish, though I think the older kids are a little scared of this foreigner who speaks funny!