Guardarraya, a fun band we saw at the Cuenca independent music festival
Welcome back to Lo Que Pase. Since our last post, the Beesley family has settled back into a life of routine in Cuenca. The kids are all fully in the swing of their classrooms and now have friends and know when they have assignments due. It’s been a truly amazing process to watch them acquire near fluency in Spanish. And Nick and Susie have become immersed in various projects like volunteering and writing, studying and creating. We’ve started to forget what we miss and almost feel at home here. We’ve been on far fewer adventures outside of the city, which has allowed our Cuenca life to become fuller.
Beautiful Cuenca at night
Chess with the neighbors
Riverside fire with friends
Friday night zumba in the park
Carnaval festivities at Robin’s school
Carnaval!!
Sam with his friends from school. One of these is not like the other…..
Robin with her classmates
Lunch with friends
Sam at school
Susie gives a mother/daughter class at the Cuenca Soup Kitchen
Locke tackling a V2
We had a lovely visit from Dianne and now have 2 loaner kittens living with us
Robin at the river with her friend Sophie. We spend a lot of time at the river.
Locke in his position of comfort, reading with a kitty
Just hanging around
We each seem to vacillate, sometimes even in the same moment, between loving our Cuenca life and counting down the days until we go home. I think that paradox comes from our experience of opposing forces at play. On one hand, our Cuenca life is sweet, full of family time, and free of daily stressors like work and coordinating busy schedules. The climate is flip-flops and sweatshirts carefree and the cost of living is low. On the other hand, no matter how comfortable we get here or how fluent our Spanish is, we will never fit in. We cannot blend into a crowd or go unnoticed on our outings. Sam will always be 6 inches taller than all his teachers and Locke will continue to wear a hood to cover his blonde hair. This experience of always being different is uncomfortable and adds a continuous grind to the backdrop of each day, leaving us feeling worn down and ready to go to a place where we fit in.
The experience of not fitting in is an important one to have. Coming from our home where we are in the cultural and ethnic majority, it is valuable for us to experience how it feels to be in the minority. We hope that we are all learning skills and gaining experience that will be help us be better at empathizing with those who can’t blend in, for whatever reason, on our home turf. We are under no delusion that our experience of being different approximates the experience of many ethnic, racial, and cultural minorities in the United States. For one, even in the discomfort of our “otherness,” our white skin and North American culture gain us status. Many times, restaurant owners have asked to take our picture eating in their place to post on their social media page to use as marketing. The message would be something like, “look, these gringos are eating at my restaurant, so you should too.” It’s a status we don’t ask for and don’t want. We’d rather blend in and be treated like everybody else.
We feel infinitely grateful that we have a home that we can go back to. Over the past year and especially past couple of months, we have become acutely aware of the plight of so many people from their homes. From the Venezuelans we see on many street corners to the Ukrainians we read about, we see those who will live with this discomfort of “otherness” for months and years to come. We recognize how fortunate we are to have the option to return to our home, where we can disappear into a crowd and have easy fluent conversations.
So, we’re still here. We’re still learning each day. We’re starting to feel like we are entering our last chapter in Cuenca, and we have mixed feelings about that. We’ve gotten used to riding the tension between the two truths of our Cuenca life: it’s wonderful and uncomfortable.
Now that you’re up to speed on the basics, dive into Lo Que Pase, where we will again bring you a piece from each Beesley. Our theme this edition is Ecuadorian culture, past and present. Grab a cup of tea and enjoy.
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