Her name is Máxima. It means ‘she who is big’, and although the meaning of her name doesn’t at all fit her physical stature – more thin and fragile than anything else – there’s no more apt description of her spirit. A spirit she says has been gifted by a loving and merciful God. A…
“But do they even want to learn?” she asked me, more than somewhat incredulous, the sound in her voice and the look on her face making me think that she had already formed an answer to her own question. We were half way through our nine hour bus ride from the city of Guayaquil to…
We have much to learn from the strength and innocence of children, don’t we? We so often see these little beings scurrying around and feel the strong urge to protect them at all costs from the evils of this world. We fear that the world will break them if given even the slightest chance. We see…
There are some stories that are just hard to write. I’ve come across a few of them over my time here in Ecuador and each time I sit down to try to put into words what has happened I find myself struggling to know where to begin. This is one of those stories. Does it…
It was the last place I wanted to be. Whenever it had come up in conversation, I would always tell people that I had never had to spend a night in the hospital. I would say it with that false sense of pride that comes with believing it had more to do with some exaggerated…
Smile, my friend, because when you do you’ll change the world. Perhaps you don’t believe me, and that’s fair, but remember that a smile is never just a smile. At least not the sincere ones. And the one I so often see spread across your face is as sincere as they come. Your smile is…
A few days ago I posted about the devastating earthquake that ravaged Ecuador’s Pacific coast. It was only a minute long but the cost of the physical destruction and the loss of human life will mark this country for a generation. And that’s not hyperbole. The American city of New Orleans, for example, was brought…
Life is a fragile gift. We are given it and free to do with it as we will, but it is never really ours, is it? We can lose sight of that sometimes. But then the earth shakes. It shakes and it shakes and with every violent tremor we are reminded that this amazing gift that we…
His name was Charlie. Although I didn’t personally know him, so I can’t tell you his favorite colour or his favorite food, the sound of his laugh or whether he was looking forward to starting school or not, there are some traits almost all boys along the river share so I can tell you with…
We are not often inspired to think deeply and contemplate life when faced with the mundane routines of the everyday. We call those dull moments ‘mind numbing’ and get through them in a semi-coma like state, hardly realising the excitement of life is passing us by. I admit that on rare occasions a meaningful insight might pop…
Expat life is a funny thing. It has given me the opportunity to learn a new language and intimately engage with a beautiful and vibrant new culture at the same time as having to face such humorous frustrations as having to remember to bring my passport to the grocery store if I planned on buying more than $20…
A quick flicker of the lights and then sudden, absolute darkness. But make no mistake, this was no mere absence of light. This was the kind of darkness that suffocates you and makes you question whether you, and the world you could have sworn was around you but an instant before, even exist anymore. Everything gone…
A spoken word poem We have been given a gift, Not a cheap one from the thrift store, No, this one is worth so much more. You can’t buy it with what’s in your purse cause this gift is called verse. It doesn’t have to be the rhyming kind, In fact, the best…
The hot sun, more focused and potent than ever. “Un sol de lluvia,” he tells me: A rain sun. The suffocating humidity. The slow drip of sweat. A tired hand raised to wipe it away. The smell of fried fish that fills the room and the sound of quiet, satisfied conversation. The incoming, impenetrable darkness of the…
It started as a muffled sound, as if half formed, not yet ready to reveal itself. As I drew closer to the house, however, the sound slowly, tentatively, began to grow bolder. The mid-day sun was at its highest point and life in the village had retreated to the shadows. With every step my feet…
Homeward Bound 