Falling in Mud 101: La Reina del Lodo...

It's been quite some time since I've written so it is time for an update! As of last wednsday I have officially been in my site for one month! Whoo hoo! One month down and 23 more months to go! I don't how this first month has gone by so quickly. Some days I feel like I've just gotten here. So far things have been going well in ol' Rukullacta. I've been taking it very slow here. Mostly hanging out with the family when I'm not riding on the coat tails of the Technicos. So here is my schedule for the most part. During the week days I wake up around 6 or 7 have breakfast, change, and wait around and read in the hammock for a few hours until Nelson or Silverio comes to pick me up and we either go to a farm to cut estacas, look for guayusa trees, or they give charlas and I hang out and listen. It's been fun so far but I'm still not entirely sure what exactly I'm going to be doing with Runa. Everything still seems really up in the air. But so far I'm enjoying the ride.
I've been sick once since I've been here. Last weekend I had a fever, sore throat, muscle aches, and diarrhia. After that the fever and muscle aches left the diarrhia stayed and continued on...Just my luck. I had been staying near the house for those few days but I'm feeling much better now. It's very difficult to be sick and so far away from home. All I could think about that whole time was about how much I wanted to be home and have a car and be able to get into that car and drive to the pharmacy and pick up what I need and speak in english and come back home and recooperate. Everything here is that much more of a challenge especially when you are sick. That's something I know I took for granted back home...The convenience of everything back in the States.
I am La Reina del Lodo! How did I come across such an awesome name? Well all you have to do is follow a group of Kichwa people about an hour into the Jungle and up and down a mountain when it has been raining everyday for the last week and you are wading through mud up to your knees and then, most importantly, you have to fall...A LOT. How does one walk on mud you ask? I have no idea! I have no idea how they can so easily walk through the forest and barely have any mud on them and I'm covered from head to toe! Mud is a most decieving thing. It looks stable. It lies to you telling you that it's solid ground and it wants you to step on it. "Come forth weary traveler and place your tired sole onto my ever so solid footing" and you believe it! You place your foot on 'solid ground' and before you know it your knee deep in mud and the pressure and suction has made you stuck...Stuckity stuck stuck!...Trying to pull your exhausted limbs from the mud is even worse. It just makes you even more tired trying to pull yourself out and you usually end up getting more stuck. Towards the end of our travels through the bosque I just gave myself up to fits of laughter after falling for the hundredth time, I just laid there in the mud and laughed and laughed. It was laugh or cry at that point and I'll be damned if La Reina del Lodo cries in the jungle especially in front of her coworkers! Needless to say I survived the trekk and am a better person for it. I would never trade that experience for anything! It was awesome. I had never laughed, lept, swung, slipped, slid, pounced, fell, lagged, twirled, stumbled, shouted, smiled, snorted, sighed so much in my life! I loved it! I'm ready for another trekk and know I will be better the next time. I'll keep you updated! And here is a picture of one of the many creatures living in my house...