Family differences

As I’ve gone through the daily motions here, I couldn’t help but noticing a familiar feeling. It was a feeling I had felt before, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Then last night I figured out what that feeling was—studying abroad feels exactly like when you go over to a friends and or relatives house and they do little things differently than your family.

To help you understand lets create a quick hypothetical example: maybe you go to your friend Sean’s house for dinner and you’re having spaghetti. As dinner starts, Sean’s mom mixes the noodles and the pasta together in the kitchen, not like at your house where they are brought to the table in separate bowls. I always found these slight changes of family routine at friends and relatives houses interesting and subtlety unnerving. Well, studying abroad feels the same way, just every second of the day.

So if you want to know what it’s like studying abroad in Ecuador just picture this scenario and include the feeling mentioned above. You go to a friend’s house where, the weather is always perfect in the backyard, the family speaks Spanish, every window in the house has a fantastic view, and you eat as much cilantro as you drink water. Here are some differences in my house that I’ve noticed that may give a clearer picture as well:
· We(the Castillos) don’t have dog food. The dog food in our house consists of left over bones and food from breakfast, lunch, and dinner that are thrown in a big pot on the stove. Over the course of the day various amount of water, salt, and cheese are added to the pot before it is brought to a boil and given to the dog around ten at night.
· The dog never comes in the house.
· It seems that everyone has a dog, but I have never seen a dog being walked.
· Naps are popular. Most people in the house are asleep at some point between 4:30pm and 7:00pm.
· Dinner is a much more relaxed affair, some nights we eat together some nights not. The time often changes as well.
· We eat a ridiculous amount of delicious bread during all meals.
· Every meal I’ve eaten for dinner has had homemade soup before the main course.
· The fridges, we have two, rarely have much food in them at least compared to the US. The mom, Daniella, often goes out before breakfast and dinner to buy what she needs for the meal.
· It seems the people get by on less sleep here. 6 hours or less seems quite common.
· Coffee= Warm milk and instant coffee.

Noticing family/cultural differences like these has always made me question why my family does the things we do, the way we do. And right now the biggest question I have from these differences is this--Is dog food the biggest corporate scam ever perpetrated onto the American public? Because our dog here is unbelievably nice, super fit, and ridiculously intelligent and he eats a pot of table scraps and luke warm cheese every night. I’m just saying, something smells a little fishy.