There is great news: I got a job in Ecuador and will soon be working side by side with Luz and Mikey for the Andean Collection in Quito and Otavalo www.theandeancollection.com.
The Andean Collection is a New York based company, which sells fair trade and eco-friendly jewellery produced with Ecuadorian artisans. My job will entail liaising with local artisans and producers, making sure the quality of the products is of the highest standard that that all the materials used match our environmentally friendly policy.
I will also take over responsibilities for the social programme of the company in Ecuador, which includes supervising the provision of scholarships and hopefully other new projects we will initiate.
So many things excite me about this job.
Working with Luz (Mikey will be doing other things as soon as he has finished with a certain project and handed over his responsibilities to me), working full stop, working for a company I like the design and ethical standpoint of.
The only problem I will face at the beginning at least is my level of Spanish. I do speak it now and understand a lot, but I am not extremely fluid in a lot of situations and I have to spend this month studying ferociously.
I will start working in December on a part time basis, so I can look for a house and have some time to get to know Ecuador. From January onwards I will be employed on a full time basis and Sandra is planning to move to Ecuador when her contract finishes in June.
You will learn more about this job soon and I want to say a few things about our trip to Costa Rica.
We travelled from La Ceiba to Tegucgalpa and spent the night with a friend there who showed us around some very cool sub-culture bars. In one of the bars a resistance movement meeting took place, and an LGBT poster informed us about their LGBT friendliness, it was very interesting. The next day we travelled to Managua, the capital of Nicaragua. There we stayed with one of Sandra’s best high school friend Eliza. We stayed there for two nights and it was super nice. We went to see the work the organisation she works for does, which is amazing www.fabretto.com.
We also went to a hotel with pool and ate the best steak I ever tasted (I fantasised about it on the bus the next day).
Then we arrived in San José and spent about 4 or 5 nights there, I don’t remember. We stayed with Sandra’s other best friends from high school. We felt extremely comfortable in Ayse’s house and Nanne also hosted us for one night because the next day we went to the Peace University with her and I attended a lecture with her.
I need to elaborate about our time in San José next time because I need to get back to Las Mangas now on the last bus.
I hope you are all doing well. I have attached a picture of Central America to give you an idea about where I travelled.
Lots of love from Hondurassss,
Chiara