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My volunteer report

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elcome To My Home Page Here is my report about the projects I visited. For a brief summary have a look at the "About Page". the coast In all the projects at the coast we stayed only about two days, because we were about to find out what the next volunteers can do there. In first case to have a better coordination in Quito. So it was a very special trip for Ecotracker-volunteers. From Quito we took the nightbus to Borbon and after some hours of waiting at that dirty place we managed to catch the first lancha(motorized canoe) of the day to San Jose. The sun was shining extremly strong for the whole three-hour-ride up the Rio de Cayapas and the narrow canoe of course didn't have a roof. So we were really glad as we finally arrived. San Jose is a remote village in the selva(special kind of forest) where the houses are still built in a traditional way and the first thing I noticed was the red soil. The poeple there are dark-skinned so we with our light skin were a big attr...
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La Chimba by Dan Davis

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I went to La Chimba because it's history of political activism fit in well with my Sociology/Anthropology studies. My aim was primarily to help the community through my volunteer work, and secondarily to find a study topic for the independent study I was doing for my undergraduate work. Once there, the form my work took was teaching English. The classes were fun, but small. The teaching materials were few, and the lessons were comprised of writing on the board with the students copying notes-there were no textbooks. As I had never taught any type of class before this time, each day was a learning experience for both student and teacher. Another project I became involved in was writing a brief cultural history of the town, dating from pre-Inka times to the present. This paper was written at the request of the local director of the indigenous group, which was convienent for me because it fit in well with my studies. In this project, I was given names of possible interview subj...
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Natalia Tomalak The valuable work of our volunteers with the Shuar Indians

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Natalia Tomalak a poland student of ecoturism with the Shwar Chaman in the National Park Sangay My experience with Shuar Shaman and natural medicine took place in Santa Ines between 18th and 25th of January. I stayed with a family of Rafael Shakay whose grandfather was a well known Shaman. Rafael himself is not a Shaman but has knowledge of the medicinal plants and shamanic rituals. There are other members of his family - his uncles that are Shamans. The Shaman in Santa Ines is a young man, that is for shamans, at 42 years old. He lived and practiced shamanism in Tena for many years. Now he just returned to Santa Ines and does not have his sacred place yet. He was chosen to become a Shaman by his father-shaman when he was 5 years old. As he was interested in that, old Shuar shamans started to teach him the techniques, rituals and medicinal plants. He needed 12 years to purify his body by using a special diet, not having relationships with women and many others rest...
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