Letters from Ecuador: 10.3.2006

Ten years ago this fall, I – freshly graduated from high school – flew to Quito, Ecuador, to teach English at an orphanage. Ok, well, really, I was getting out of my hometown, making my mark, immersing myself in language and culture, learning something new about a corner of the world far, far away from my tiny…

Letters from Ecuador: 9.26.2006

Ten years ago this month, I – freshly graduated from high school – flew to Quito, Ecuador, to teach English at an orphanage. Ok, well, really, I was getting out of my hometown, making my mark, immersing myself in language and culture, learning something new about a corner of the world far, far away from my tiny…

Letters from Ecuador: 9.18.2006

Ten years ago this month, I – freshly graduated from high school – flew to Quito, Ecuador, to teach English at an orphanage. Ok, well, really, I was getting out of my hometown, making my mark, immersing myself in language and culture, learning something new about a corner of the world far, far away from my tiny…

Letters from Ecuador: 9.11.2006

Ten years ago this week, I – freshly graduated from high school – flew to Quito, Ecuador, to teach English at an orphanage. Ok, well, really, I was getting out of my hometown, making my mark, immersing myself in language and culture, learning something new about a corner of the world far, far away from my tiny…

Letters from Ecuador: 9.9.2006

Ten years ago today, I - freshly graduated from high school - flew to Quito, Ecuador, to teach English at an orphanage. Ok, well, really, I was getting out of my hometown, making my mark, immersing myself in language and culture, learning something new about a corner of the world far, far away from my tiny Eastern…

Olympic National Park: Shi Shi Beach Backpacking

Question: Why do people love backpacking so much? And why haven't I done it yet? Having grown up in the Pacific Northwest, it's more than a little silly that I haven't gone backpacking before. I've tent-camped a hundred places, hiked a hundred more, but never the two together. My encounters with backpacking have been purely…

Book: Snow Falling on Cedars

Snow Falling on Cedars, by David Guterson Challenge: A book with weather in the title Rating: 4.5/5 Review: David Guterson wrote the foreward for the book I just read - Wintergreen - so it is fortuitous, or something, that this book came in at the library immediately following. I've always heard this was a good…