The Journey of a Friendly Giant

Ecuador is not a perfect country, I’m not even such a thing exists. Each country has mastered a few things that have made them stand out from the rest. The more I learn about Ecuador, the luckier I feel being here. Though they have yet to develop and improve in many ways, Canada, and the rest of the world for that matter, can still learn a lot from Ecuador as far as the environment is concerned. Frankly, today’s environmental laws are failing. Though Canada's environmental laws were adopted in the 70s, the environment is in worse shape then ever before. The Canadian environmental law has gone through very little changes since its creation over 30 years ago. “Canadian Environmental law lacks in policy innovation and environmental performance.” – Dr David Suzuki, The Sacred Balance  However, since then, countries around the world have sought to replicate these same laws.  Yet, species worldwide are steadily declining, global warming is far more accelerated than predic...

In my Dynamic blog post I spoke about an interactive activity that I was asked to prepare for a group of kids from an environmental club of a nearby community. Since then, thanks to the two supervisors that were also present during the activity, I’ve been asked to do more dynamic workshops three times after that. Each time just as rewarding and inspiring as the first time. Two of the administrators of the programs all recommended and shared my “ tree game ” to other teachers and community members. One of the groups even recorded the entire thing for guidance on how to facilitate the activity in the future. I didn’t blog about them all to not be overly repetitive, however, the most recent event was very different.  This happened about a week and a half ago, in a small beach community named Anconcito that’s located about 2 hours away from Guayaquil. This community, like many others surrounding it, had no street signs, no banks, no clinics, and no hospitals. It did have markets, sm...

Being away from home is amazing, you get to meet new people, immerse yourself into a new culture and way of life, learn a new language and experience more newness than you’ve ever imagined. When things are going well with both your personal life and professional life, everything is pure bliss. However, recent events have made me realize, that when things begin to go wrong, and you feel upset or sad about anything for any given reason, suddenly being far away from home becomes slightly excruciating. At the pre-departure orientation for this internship over 4 months ago, the interns were warned of a “breaking point”, this might be mine. It’s strange to realize how much I rely on my support system at home; my family, fiancé, old friends, my neighbors and that familiar feeling of belonging exactly where I was. All of those things combined bring both comfort and encouragement to me, and I got so used to it, that I barely noticed how helpful and important my support system is in my day-to-...

Communication will always be key. Without it, businesses, schools, households and human relationships would suffer tremendously. Being social beings means that communicating is what we rely on in order to move forward. This blog post will be about the importance of communication through networking, the lessons I've learned so far, and the opportunities I've come across. Cerro Blanco, the dry tropical conservation area where I volunteer, receives interns on a regular basis. Some of them are national from universities across Ecuador, and others are international like my partner Lindsay, and I. When I first arrived, my main priority within the office was to network and advertize Cerro Blanco in any way shape or form. This wasn't the priority that was given to me, but I took the initiative because nobody else was doing it. I started with the basics, updating their blog, their Facebook, website, and brochures. But as time went by, I realized something. . . It all began when Ce...