What I have learned about REALLY living on a budget....

Let's be honest, this post is really about how to EAT on a budget. If you know me at all, you know my passion, and my obsession, is FOOOOOOD!

As I sit here writing, half my screen is covered with the blog page and the other half is playing the most current episode of Top Chef (yes I find time and let the internet help me keep up with this addiction. And yes Mom, I am multitasking...sorry!).

Since I've been in Ecuador (almost 4 months now!), I've been learning a lot about myself and my life and all that lovely introspective stuff. One thing I've been learning a lot about is budgeting. As I feel (and I hope my parents would agree), I have always been pretty good at budgeting myself. However, I have been very lucky, and have always been able to splurge on some things, specifically my love for food. When I go to the supermarket, I rarely hold back, and I love going out to eat. Well, especially in the past month I have learned about budgeting on a whole new level. (Let's be clear, mostly because of my stubbornness, and I will make it to my first paycheck on October 31st and counting down, and being screwed out of $200 by my previous landlords, I have brought this budgeting upon myself.)

I know what you are all thinking: "Ecuador must be so cheap/reasonably priced!"
Well you are all right, sort of, but I'm talking about serious budgeting. Learning how to live on $4-5 dollars a day type stuff. Luckily, because of the prices in Ecuador, I only had to slightly modify my lifestyle, meaning that I can still eat fairly healthily, and mostly am sacrificing my laziness (aka going out to eat) and my social life (going out on weekends).

So one of the first things I learned, especially here where imported goods are ridiculously overpriced, it is always cheaper to make stuff for yourself. So 2 weekends ago I made homemade tomato sauce (I did splurge on some wine to add, but luckily as Chelsea and I discovered a few months ago, a decent Chilean cab is under $7). Other than that, luckily all the produce is very cheap here (more tomatoes than I could ever need for a dollar!)

my huge batch of tomato sauce from a few weeks ago!

Peanut butter is SUPER expensive here, but you know what isn't? PEANUT PASTE! Make peanut butter really fast (and more delicious and healthy) by buying peanut paste and adding a bit of oil and honey! Also, dried goods (beans, lentils) are way cheaper in bulk than the cost of one can. One can of beans here is about $1.19 and a huge bag of lentils or bag of black beans that lasts for around a month is about the same price. I did have to learn about the labor of cooking black beans (and by that I mean planning ahead) but lentils cook REALLY FAST! Quinoa, beans, and avocados? Alright not so bad....

Oh wait, one more thing to challenge my budgeting skills? Our fridge has been broken for about 6 days...well now we don't have one because they took it away to fix it yesterday...anyway this means that I can't cook in bulk like I like to, and basically means no beans (they go bad fairly quickly if not refrigerated after cooking). So this means 2 things...
1. I've learned A LOT about how irrelevant refrigerators are. Plenty of the veggies that I love/are nice and cheap here stay good for a few days, or more with out being refrigerated (zucchini, eggplant, broccoli, peppers, cucumbers, pretty much everything EXCEPT leafy greens). Also, when in Rome, live like the Romans...meaning the Ecuadorians almost never refrigerate eggs, or butter (probably mostly because they use margarine, but even real butter), and they don't refrigerate milk (it's condensed milk, refrigerated after opening, but if you buy it in a small juice box size it will last the 2 days you need it).
2. College teaches you the magical powers of ramen. Don't ever forget those magical powers! Ramen noodles don't have to simply be the ramen noodles (usually covered in sodium), but can easily become (slightly more) nutritious by adding veggies sautéed in ginger and garlic, and an egg or two. Similarly, we all know pasta is cheap, but it can be mixed with veggies (and tomato sauce can even be made on the fly when a broken fridge makes it so that your 2 jars will go bad), and always served with a salad (as Phi Phi will tell you, I've always preferred the stuff in the salad to the lettuce anyway).

So, here I am learning about truly budgeting, but counting down the days until I can go out and try new restaurants, find some good sushi, buy some brie (only $3.50 here!), and go get some of my favorite beer from a local brewery with my favorite burger or fish tacos.

See below dinner from tonight (which inspired this post)!

throw some chopped tomatoes, garlic, and herbs (especially red pepper flakes) into a pan with a little bit of olive oil, and sauté for a bit and VOILA, tomato sauce!

pasta with quickly made sauce

salad with just the stuff: tomatoes, cucumber, and
avocado with salt, pepper, oil, and vinegar 

Hello again world!

Hello all, sorry for the long absence!

So much has been happening in the last few weeks, and yet at the same time, nothing quite exciting enough to blog about. I guess you could say in the past few weeks I've been learning a few life lessons as well as cultural lessons.

1. I live in a new apartment! Let's start about 3 weeks ago when my new coworker/roommate Hannah and I started an apartment hunt. It lasted for about a week, but similarly to last time the Sunday paper was the best bet. We found a nice 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath about 2 blocks away from work, AND my gym! This is GREAT because it makes it easy to go back and forth during the day as well as saving money on transportation to get home at night. We are subletting the 3rd bedroom.
Cultural life lesson: Furnishing an apartment in Quito is quite an adventure. We took the apartment because it was very nice and of course, location location location!!! But....it was not furnished. In Quito this meant no stove (there was a fridge, but it needed to be fixed) and a simply EMPTY apartment!! The landlords promised to fix the fridge and get us a stove (which both happened VERY QUICKLY AND WHEN WE ASKED!!!) Luckily there is San Roque, a slightly sketchy market near the Centro Historico FULL of every type of furniture. There is a lot of nice wood furniture, and since it is a market, bargaining is the name of the game! So...two full size beds, and a 6 top dining room table and six chairs all acquired for under $400!!! Mattresses are also super cheap (a new one for $100). We also found some great stores along one of the main avenues for all the kitchen essentials we could need (super cheap). So though furnishing an apartment wasn't ideal, it wasn't the worst thing ever.
HOWEVER, obviously, cheap furniture comes with a price...this price being that the screws don't fit properly, and some of the parts aren't even properly aligned...SO be prepared for quite the DIY project.
*Note for a another less happy cultural life lesson in dealing with landlords/moving/LACK OF TENANT RIGHTS, feel free to ask how things ended at my previous location/with my previous landlords, but that rant is not for here....

kitchen, smaller than the old one, but still good!

small balcony outside the living room/dining room

my bedroom, no bed for me, I'm still in the (poor) college mindset

living room/dining room area, big and open, with minimal furniture!

2. Things that we think of to be easier in the US are quite a bit more complicated here, but if you want a Visa, no problem, step right up!! (alright this may be a bit of an exaggeration...but...)
Cultural life lesson: Always expect things to take WAY LONGER and be WAY MORE COMPLICATED than you would expect (but when something is supposed to be long and complicated, have no fear, it will get done almost immediately!). As I went into in a recent post, I am very lucky because my job is sponsoring and helped me get my one year visa. For anyone who has done extensive traveling/lived abroad, you know what a hassle a visa can be. Lucky for me, the process was fairly fast and painless.
THE FOLLOWING PROCESSES PROVED TO BE MORE COMPLICATED THAN GETTING A VISA...

• Getting internet. Not only is my generation (and every one else pretty much now too) addicted to the internet, but it is 100% necessary for me to keep in touch with all of you at home, as well as do my work including lesson planning, looking up listening and video activities, etc. So when we moved into the new apartment and there was no internet set up yet, that was fine. Our landlord said it would just be a few days...WRONG. After over a week we called him and he said it couldn't be done for at least another week, at which point we said that's fine we will just go do it ourselves! WRONG AGAIN! Some companies are simply flaky, while others are technically run by the government meaning that you cannot sign up for their services if you don't have a cedula (Ecuador's ID #, similar to a social security number). So we called our landlord after having many problems with our tails between our legs, and he promised to do it, and 2.5 weeks after moving in, we got internet. YAY! RECAP: Time it took to get a visa...1 week with about 6 hours of waiting total between 3 visits. Time it took to get internet: 2.5 weeks, multiple trips all over Quito to different providers, and ENDLESS WAITING IN THAT TIME!
• Getting a bank account: Once again my amazing job has provided me with the resources to set up a bank account. No I am not a resident, but I am still able to get an account and ATM card through them. They have a system, which has worked until now. Multiple confusing trips to the bank (talking with the woman who I was supposed to talk to many times) left me asking if I really could just go to customer services and open an account like a normal person...OF COURSE I CAN'T! It was quite the process, but finally it was sorted out. RECAP: Time it took to get a visa...1 week with about 6 hours of waiting total between 3 visits. Time it took to set up a bank account...2 weeks, 5 or so visits, and 4ish hours of waiting time.

LIFE LESSON- Acquiring a visa may be easier than you thought in Ecuador (though I do know that not everyone gets through as painlessly as I did...)

3. Ecuadorians (not just Ecuadorians, but also many other cultures around the world) have a much less strict schooling system. This leads to A LOT of whining and complaining in the classroom (here so endearingly called Ecuawhining, and it doesn't just happen in the classroom...).
Cultural life lesson: PUT IN MY FUTURE SYLLABUS THAT WHINING AND COMPLAINING WON'T BE ACCEPTED IN CLASS (in fact you will get a 0 for your participation grade that week...) I didn't think I would have to do this...but I learned quickly. The whine is a long drawn out "TEAAACHERRRRRR" followed by what ever issue they have with the assignment, grade, or anything else you try to do in class. Fulbright has extremely high standards, which makes it fabulous to teach there, but the students think they can pull the same old stuff and the teachers will just cave. I really had to learn to be strict and lay down the law with one of my classes.
TAKE NOTE: Being female, a new teacher, and young (probably 95% of my students are older than me, though I refuse to tell them my age to make the situation worse), basically equals NO respect so LAY DOWN THE LAW!

though my birthday was between cycles, there was a Fulbright birthday celebration for me and another teacher whose birthdays were during this time.

Culture shock/life lessons aside I am really enjoying my job. It gives me a lot of freedom to be creative with my teaching and have fun with my classes. I AM LEARNING SO MUCH ABOUT ENGLISH GRAMMAR! Today will be awesome because there is a HUGE soccer match between Ecuador and Uruguay to qualify for the World Cup. I'm not the biggest soccer fan, but it's always fun when EVERYONE is excited!

Also, I look forward to seeing most if not all of you in 2 months!! I have the whole month of December off. My first stop will be San Diego to see my mom and grandpa (and all you other San Diegans!) and then I'll be roaming the North East for 3 weeks or so!