Something that’s been on my mind a lot lately is how the process of cultural immersion affects relationships both in country and across borders. As we discussed in a class aptly entitled “Culture Shock,” my fourteen classmates and I are little flowers. We have all, by choice, pulled up our roots in the United States and come down here to Ecuador.

We, as inherently social human beings, still have access to all the same resources that we did at school in the United States. However, these “nutrients” in our “soils” have now changed, and we have to relearn how to access them. By moving to Quito, by speaking a language that is not my native one, by by navigating and trying to explore this beautiful but slightly dangerous city, I am relearning everything I learn about myself.

I am constantly exhausted. This exhaustion is not just the ache in my legs after the trek home from school, or the fatigue after a week of class from 6 am- 9 pm in the Cloud Forest. I am tired from constantly having to translate every thought going in and out of my head. I am tired from the unpredictably of it all; my host parents could come in and tell me we are going out for an hour, but we probably won’t be back until after dinner. I might come home at 11 after a glass of wine and swing dancing with friends to find eleven adults and three children in my dining room when I just want to go to bed (these have both happened).

When I walk out of my house every morning, I still feel like I do not know if I am going to get robbed or get totally lost. That’s all part of the experience of being here. The uncertainty just comes with having a host family that I love and that cares about me, and it comes with going out and exploring Quito.

However, with exhaustion comes frustration. Sometimes I will be sitting at the dinner table and not understand a single word anyone says to me. Sometimes I log onto Facebook and start crying when I see pictures of home. Sometimes I just want to lie in bed all day (and sometimes I do). This does not mean that I am not having fun or that I am not learning or that I am having the worst semester of my life. None of these things apply to me. I’m just a student in another country. When I’m exhausted and frustrated, I just want the same support I had at home. I want the sense of success that does not come with constantly blundering my Spanish, I want the sense of security that I do not feel when I leave the house, and I want people to support me, like the ones I left across the equator in California and at Whitman and beyond.

For me, part of being abroad and of adapting to living in Ecuador is realizing that I need to let go. I’m not fluent in Spanish, I am a gringa (a white foreign female) in Quito, and my friends and family who are still in the United States are still wonderful kind loving human beings but they are not experiencing the same things. This weekend I finally realized that in order to delicately dance with this inevitable exhaustion and frustration, I need to open my arms to what is here and not hold on so hard to what is at home.

In terms of success, I have plenty of small successes every day. Sometimes when I come home my host mom and I snuggle and talk about the day at school and laugh. The other day my taxi driver understood where I wanted to go on my first try. While I may not feel secure and while my life may still be unpredictable, I am still in control. I have a map and when I go outside, I know where I am walking. My friend Brenna and I have visited a traditional market and the artisan market. Making plans and going places reminds me that I am still in control of my life. Finally, connections. This has been the hardest for me.

At first, even in my homestay, I felt really lonely. Then I felt jealous of everyone back at Whitman. Then I started going out with my friends here and really opening up to my host mom (after she asked me ten times if I was feeling okay). This is the most difficult, walking the balance between reaching out to my loved ones at home and sharing my feelings with the people who are here with me, slowly spreading their roots into the same soil.

It’s a slow process. I’m re-learning how to interact with the world. I’ve figured out that I can have the best day possible and still cry. I’ve discovered that ice cream will always be the answer. There are difficulties that come with studying here, but all the small successes, laughs shared with friends and families, and discoveries in Quito make it worth it.

It is Saturday morning and I am enjoying one last sunny Oakland morning. Upstairs, two friends from Whitman are sleeping sound after the long drive from campus to wish me off. What is going on? Tonight I will board a red eye flight to Miami, and from there I will transfer onto the plane that will take me to my home for the next 3.5 months: Quito, Ecuador. I will fill those months with studies of ecology and environmental issues as I venture around Ecuador with the School for International Training’s (SIT) Comparative Ecology and Conservation program.

So it is Saturday morning and I am starting to freak out. All the clothes I have carefully selected, my snorkel, a stack of host gifts, and various art supplies for my “natural history journal,” an ongoing assignment, still lie stacked on our spare bed because I have not packed. I am also freaking out about the program. Why did I, an environmental humanities major choose this heavily science-based program? Do I know enough Spanish to pass all my classes and communicate with my host family? These questions have been floating around my head frequently for the last week.

To fight the stress that has been building over my first trip outside the states, I have been thinking about everything I am excited for in Ecuador. Some highlights of the next three months include: living with a host family; traveling to some of the most ecologically unique places in the world, including the Amazon and the Galapagos; getting the opportunity to conduct a month of research on my own.

So follow along on this blog to hear about both my struggles and successes. I will keep you updated as I visit areas of magnificent biodiversity, as well as areas of severe environmental degradation. Maybe I’ll scan in some watercolors from my field journal. Hasta luego!

Show: The Witching Hour
Time: Mondays, 6–8 p.m.
Hosts: Anu Lingappa and Erin Walters

“The Witching Hour” is your local source for wizard rock and “Harry Potter” trivia. Each show is set around a theme, varying from characters, such as Luna Lovegood, to ideas, such as alchemy. The hosts celebrate their relative fame in the wizard rock world; recordings of
certain shows have had as many as 1,000 listeners. The show has many fans, including unsuspected popularity among teenagers in Ohio. The show has been on air for 6 years, and hosts find successors through FACE (Feminists Advocating Change and Empowerment) club meetings. Tune in for Harry Potter music and discussion of both the tunes and the books.

Editor’s note: Anu Lingappa is a columnist for the Pioneer

Anu Lingappa ’15 (left) and Erin Walters ’17. Photo by Tywen Kelly.

While the initial upset to the findings on Whitman’s economic diversity have died down, sophomore Maia Watkins has recently installed an art piece in the Fouts Center for the Visual Arts. Installed last weekend, the art piece consists of 32 student portraits hanging next to each participant’s statement on economic diversity on campus.

Maia Watkins ’17 displays her photographs in Fouts Center for the Visual Arts. Photo by Emily Volpert.

Watkins is an art major and saw this project as her way to be involved with discussions on campus following the publication of the New York Times and Awl articles. She was inspired in part by senior Tyle Schuh’s activist art on alumni weekend. Following the installation, Schuh encouraged students to wear dollar signs on their foreheads. Watkins participated in this but felt unfulfilled.

“Nobody said anything to me about it,” she said. “There was no dialogue, and I wanted to open dialogue in a safe space.”

Watkins decided to use her major and passion, art, to open a dialogue. She has the most experience in photography, and while she has done portrait photography in the past, this experience was different.

“With senior portraits, it’s a different connection than with something people are passionate about,” she said. “It’s more personal than anything I’ve ever done.”

To recruit participants, Watkins turned to the Internet. She created a Facebook event and invited everyone she knew at Whitman. She sent emails to a couple listservs. To reach outside the people she knew, Watkins asked friends to invite people on Facebook and to send emails as well. Ultimately, the participants were mostly friends along with a few other students.

“A few people I had never seen came. That was nice, getting to know a little about them,” she said.

After inviting people to participate, Watkins set up in the drawing studio in Fouts for a weekend. The Facebook event and emails instructed people to drop by to have their portrait taken. To collect the corresponding statements on diversity, Watkins gave participants the option of recording them on the spot or emailing them to her. After collecting the portraits and statements, Watkins printed everything and installed them in the gallery. The installation will remain in the gallery through parents’ weekend.

The next steps are to add finishing touches to the gallery and to put the portraits online. At first, Watkins was hesitant to add a title and artists statement to her piece, but she has realized this will tie the work together.

Photo by Emily Volpert.

“I didn’t want to put my voice above others,” she said.

Putting the portraits online is part of Watkins’ focus of using art as a way to continue the dialogue.

“It’s so easy to share online,” she said. “I think the portrait makes it easier [for participants] to share.”

In addition to making her art visible online, Watkins is hoping to make the physical installation visible to the trustees. Her advisor, Senior Adjunct Professor of Art Charly Bloomquist, suggested installing the piece before the trustees arrived on campus. She is hoping they will stop by Fouts, one of the more noticeable buildings on campus.

Aside from putting the pieces online, Watkins has no other current plans with how to keep generating dialogue on campus.

“In order for change, momentum has to stay,” she said. “I’m not quite sure how to do that.”

Show: Junk Drawer
Hosts: Bob and Spencer Betts
Time: Thursdays, 8-9 p.m.

The show “Junk Drawer” is the audio version of what you would find in your junk drawer — everything you did not know you needed. The father-son duo plays a combination of classic rock to Cat Power. The hosts make playlists ahead of time, incorporating new music they find in the KWCW station. In between songs, “Bob with one O and Spencer with two E’s” provide commentary about the local music scene. If you listen closely, you may hear one of Bob’s subtlely-planned themes, such as songs all including the word “walk” in the lyrics.

Photo by Tywen Kelly.

Show: Naptime Epics
Host: George Felton
Time: Thursdays, 5-6 p.m.

If you enjoy audio books and have an hour to kill on Thursday afternoons, tune in to “Naptime Epics”. Host George Felton is working his way through J.R.R. Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. He reads about a chapter per week, picking up where he left off, and often including a brief re-cap for new listeners. Felton does voices for every character, ignoring the film representations and creating his own. For an hour a week, enjoy a live amateur audio book as Felton makes his way through the third book of the trilogy.

George Felton ’15. Photo by Tywen Kelly.

Show: Hello Newman
Time: Saturdays, 7–9 p.m.
Hosts: Evan Heberlein and Wesley Sparagon

If you are looking for a good way to unwind and get groovy on Saturday evenings, tune in to “Hello Newman.” This show combines ‘90s music and “Seinfeld.” The hosts pick two or three “Seinfeld” episodes and play alternative rock and rap songs loosely related to themes in the episodes. The music is interspersed with witty commentary and improvised public service announcements from the hosts. This show celebrates the culture of the ‘90s with goofy hosts and a good time.

Photo by Hannah Bashevkin.

Today artist and activist Dana Lyons will be offering both a workshop and concert for students. Campus Climate Challenge (CCC) has been working on bringing Lyons to campus since last semester, but many groups on campus have helped to put on today’s events.

Senior Collin Smith was instrumental in gaining support within CCC to get Lyons on campus. Smith was the 2013–14 president of CCC and is heavily active with divestment on campus. Smith first learned about Lyons and his activism in the Northwest from a Whitman alumnus and divestment supporter.

“I got in touch, and I was excited about the concert and the workshops,” said Smith.

Lyons offers a variety of workshops, but Smith picked one entitled “How to make a living as an artist and an activist.” For Smith, this workshop was appealing for the applicability to a variety of students on campus, especially students involved in different types of activism.

“I believe in the power of art in activism,” said Smith. “The workshop will be broadly accessible to activists on campus.”

Campus Climate Challenge contributed 100 dollars to pay for Lyons to come to campus, so between late last spring and early this fall, Smith has been reaching out to other groups on campus to contribute.

“I’ve been impressed by the variety of organizations on campus that thought this would be a cool event,” he said.

Smith reached out to Associate Dean for Student Engagement Noah Leavitt in the Student Engagement Center, who eagerly contributed funding. Smith also sought funding from the Environmental Studies Department, but Adjunct Professor of Environmental Studies Amy Molitor instead directed him to Associate Professor of Art Michelle Acuff, who previously co-instructed a class on art and activism.

“After about five minutes [of talking] she said, ‘How about we give 250 dollars?’” said Smith.

The Whitman Events Board (WEB) co-sponsored the event in contributing 600 dollars and helping to arrange contracts.

“Everyone on the WEB board was excited about the event,” said Nate Higby, WEB co-sponsorship director.

Both Higby and Smith look forward to this event as providing a new form of activism for student activists to engage in.

“A lot of our students are very vocal and engage in spreading awareness, but rarely [do] we see it come through a musical medium,” said Higby.

From an event planning perspective, Higby is excited about the interest and skills Lyons will bring, but he is also hoping that this event will encourage students to think about bringing other activists to campus for workshops in the future.

“Hopefully this year we can get a diverse range of activists on campus,” said Higby. “Dana will serve as a gauge.”