Photo Shoot

A couple days ago I went along with Cecilia, Jose Abel (my host family), and Cecilia´s sister to check out the farm. After Cecilia´s father passed away, his land was divided between Cecilia and her 10 siblings...it is quite large as you can imagine. This province of Manabi has been blessed with so many rich foods and an incredible number of awesome fruits (papaya, oranges, tangerines, starfruit, pineapple, 16 types of mango, plantains, guanabana, avocado, maracuya, lemon, yuca, peanuts, beans, peas, and the list goes on with exotic names I had never heard of), which all grow right in these people´s backyards. However, along with this amazing blessing of abundance comes the curse of supply vs. demand. The supply of such foods is so great that they have extremely low monetary values. For examples, 100 large oranges go for $3. Most people dont even bother to sell the excess from what their family does not consume in the home..they give it away to neighbors or crazy foreigners like me, or just leave it to rot. Agriculture is really the only opportunity for work in my communities, so the monthly incomes are extremely low as you can imagine, averaging about $50 per family. Anyhow, Cecilia told me to bring my camera to the farm because she thought my mom would enjoy a picture of me picking an orange. These people find it absolutely hilarious that I have never picked fruit before...I cringe when they ask me how much an orange or mango costs in the US supermarkets. We ended up spending a few minutes gathering some fruit to take home, and and a couple hours taking pictures of the gringa with EVERY fruit in about 3 or 4 different poses. My little brother was quite the photographer, demanding me to put my hand here, turn my head there. Despite the photo shoot aspect, it was really great fun. I am constantly mesmorized and awe-struck by the fact that I can walk 20 feet out my front door to pick and eat at orange right off the tree...or that avocadoes grow on trees (haha i never knew)...or that people often invite me to come over and eat the ripened fruit from their yard. And I really liked using the machete...haha I was told I looked like a telenovela character who lives in the jungle and climbs trees. So I suppose my Ecuadorian friends did have good reason to laugh at my giddyness and my silly comments as to how lucky they are to call this land ¨home,¨ and how fortunate I am to live here. I´m sure I looked like a little kid in a candy store. Now if I can just encourage them to to consume the fruit as is, in large amounts, instead of the traditional 1 or 2 servings they eat via sugary-juice without pulp. I am determined to make people acknowledge fruit as a food, and one that should be eaten regularly. It´s crazy that desnutritution and diseases such as diabetes and hypertension are such large problems here, with all these wonderfully healthy and nutritious foods at their fingertips. The pictures are on my webshots under the albulm entitled ¨Manabi.¨ Enjoy! They´re kinda humerous. http://community.webshots.com/user/kenneysarah