14 th June 2008
We arrived!! After a long and sleepless flight, we arrived in Quito. However, there was no time to rest. That same afternoon we met with the local activists to start making the plan of action for the week. Since there is no ship, how are we going to have a successful hotline launch?
Getting Acquainted and Making Plans
We got off the plane after an 18 hour flight, exhausted but excited to have arrived. Margreet was celebrating the longest birthday of her life, which began with a champaign toast at midnight on the plane, and would last about 30 hours, since we had changed so many time zones along the way. Of course there wasn't much time for celebration, since despite having gotten almost no sleep on the trip we had a meeting in the early afternoon with the local activists. We had the meeting in the CEPAM, or Ecuadorean Center for the Promotion and Action of Women, a huge old building where women have been managing women-focused projects for over 30 years.
Finally we get to meet our Ecuadorean counterparts!! After doing a round of introductions, we already start planning out the week, knowing we had to act quickly to take advantage of the short time we have together. It was decided to have the hotline launch on Tuesday, right after a press symposium that the local youth group had organized, and that there would be a stenciling campaign Monday night. We also set up Monday as a training day for the press contact people and the hotline team. Finally, our brains over-saturated with information and ideas and lack of oxygen due to the high altitude, we called the meeting to a close and headed back to the hostal to try to stay awake for long enough that we would get a regular night's sleep and adjust to local time.
first meeting after arrival -
photo by Mrova
