The night before...

Well, it's the night before we are about to embark on this new journey!

Just thought I would add a few last min thoughts as I have realized I had failed to do before...

With that being said...over winter break I got my host family!!...ready...it's a mom Lucila who is a housewife and a dad Mario who is an engineer!  I also will have 3 host siblings (woah I can barely handle the one sis I have...hahah only kidding just said that one for her!) I am actually looking forward to having a "big family". It is 2 host sisters Maria who is 35 and is designer Clara who is 34 and is a psychologist and then a host brother Mario who is 22 and is a college student. Only Mario lives at the house all the time as he is a student but the girls come home everyday they say for meals and family time. (No little kids :( but I am hoping that my older sisters have children!...but also we will be working with an orphanage and at a school there so I will get to know many kids!)...but the most exciting news for me to hear about my host family (other than my host family itself)...is they have a Dog!! I have never had a pet other than a fish my entire life so I am excited to have a dog!! (My friend Becky and I are already talking about how will walk the dog around the city to explore it and how since we both have host brothers around that same age they will become best friends by the end of our stay because we will always be together!)

Anyways...with that being said I just finished packing, and oh boy was that hard! This will be my first time flying outside of the USA so I was lost as to what to pack! (I have only been to Mexico and Canada but to me that doesn't really count!)

And one last thing we have all just discovered is that the travel agent messed up all of the tickets and what was supposed to be all of us flying from our destinations (Chicago, Seattle, and Boston) to Miami and then all 8 of us going from Miami to Quito and meeting our professor in Quito will now not be happening! It is all messed up and we will not all be arriving at the same time to Quito :( as we all do not all have the same connecting flight from Miami to Quito like originally planned! But it will all work out and I will be heading down with 3 others girls that are for sure on my flight from Chicago to Miami and then to Miami to Quito! We will be the last 4 to arrive in Quito and it will be at 11:15pm!

Our first week there I doubt I will have internet access as we will be in the jungle, on the bus to Cuenca, and then finally meeting our host families on friday! (which means I still have a whole extra week of winter break! since my school in Chicago starts on tues and I wont start til Mon the 23rd!) hahaha

I hope you all enjoy my updates and you all have a great week!

 PS  It is still unknown if I will have internet in my house but I will at school so feel free to send me emails, or comment on my blog as I will try to update and check those as much as possible! (my plan is to do it at least once a week and when I get there it will be both in Spanish and English!)