Finally with the family!

Well folks I finally met my family. It seems weird to travel for a week and just now be in the place I´ll be spending the rest of my summer. So far Cuenca seems like a beautiful city, it´s hard to really explore because it´s been raining non stop and its pretty cold. My family keeps saying they are dying of cold. I told them where I´m from this is nothing! haha I don´t think they´ll ever be visiting the midwest.
Anyway, about the family. We arrived at CEDEI (the university) around 5 oclock last night to meet our host families. I had to chuckle at the way they presented us to our families, pretty much like cattle being auctioned off. We all wore nametags with our name on it and then the host families name. Then we stood in a line and one by one our names were called off with the family name and our family came up to greet us with a rose. It was just funny because you know they are all thinking, I wonder which one is mine?? and we are thinking the same thing of course. But it seems that all the families are a good fit and people are enjoying themselves.
My family consists of a Mother and a Father and three children who all live at home. The youngest is 23 and her name is Rosana. She´s really nice but very busy. She works all day at the bank and then at night she attends university (which alot of people do here) and she doesn´t get home until 10:00pm! craziness. She´s really nice though, sort of hard to understand because she speaks so fast. The middle child is Diego and he is 28. He works full time as some sort of engineer. He is very nice as well. The eldest is Maria Augusta and she is 30. So far she´s my favorite. Very nice and easy to talk to. All of the children speak english and have spent time in the U.S. but they agreed to not speak english with me so that I can improve.
Immediately when I met my Mother we began talking and she told me that I spoke spanish well so now they are speaking fast and whatnot so I´m trying to keep up! I´m not as good as they think. haha. The mother is wonderful, I really like her. She knows about my mom passing away so she is so wonderful and comforting, she tells me that I have a family in Ecuador and that I can come to them for anything. She asked me what types of food I like for breakfast and I told her I really like bread with the yummy sauces (like jelly) used here. She immediatley bundled up and said lets go to the ¨panaderia¨which is a bread shop. We went out on the street and she hooked her arm around mine and we set off. We got to the store and it all smelt wonderful. fresh bread here is amazing. She bought alot of it and said that its mine for the taking. haha. I am just so impressed by the family here, my family in mexico hardly talked to me and they were never home. here it´s expected that I spend time with them because I am a member of the family. We even watched some tv in my mom´s bedroom! haha can you imagine doing that in the states? I have yet to meet my host dad, he is in New York right now on a vacation with some friends. I think he gets back next week.
The house is really nice too. I´m literally a block away from from school, which is amazing. Some people have a half an hour walk, so they have to get up pretty early. I think it took me two minutes to get here this morning.
But the house is very pretty, and larger than I expected since it´s right in the city. It has three floors, everyone has their own bedroom, there are a few bathrooms, some living rooms, everything. Its very nice. My bedroom happens to be the crazy part. I live in what I´m assuming was one a maids quarters or something? Its not attached to the house, it´s out back across a cute little courtyard (not a big one, takes about 10 steps to get across) and then there´s my room. or tiny house i guess. I have my own room for studying, then my own bedroom, and then my own bathroom! Its really nice. That way I can do things on my own time and I don´t have to worry about screwing up their schedules. I don´t want to spend too much time along in my little house though because I dont´want to seem rude, so I will have to sit around with the family more. Which won´t be hard because I already love them.
Oh and the best part! They have a 4 month old puppy! Adorable. It´s a shizu or however you spell it. Her name is camilia and all she wants is to be loved. perfect for me :)
Well I hope you are all still awake after reading this novel! Hopefully I can figure out how to get some pictures uploaded to one of these computers so you can at least see a little bit of what I´ve been up to.
Hope everything is going well for all of you! Take comfort in knowing that the weather is nicer in the midwest than it is in South America! at least my part of south america..hehe
Miss you all and I´m sending love straight north to you all!
linds