by Yamini Manikoth
In the spring of my junior year of high school, I had the privilege of being a part of the visiting members of a literacy program between my writing school and an orphanage in Quito, Ecuador. It was a chance to get to see the kids in person and to lend a hand if we could. I’ve compiled a series of photos as a glimpse of my time in the city.
Quito, Ecuador, is the second-highest city in the world, and the orphanage sat near the peak of a mountain, looking down at it. The elevation was a nightmare on my persistent fatigue, but the view of the sky was incomparable.
Some of the children we worked with were too young to read to or read with. Engaging with them was mostly about getting to hang out with them while the other babies were being fed or washed. We had conversations, they and I, and tragically I feel it may have been the only time my Spanish was up to par for the discussion at hand. Here, one of the children and I review colors with the help of the balls from the playpen.
One of the things we were consistently encouraged to do was have the kids read to us as much as possible, rather than the other way around. Here I am being walked slowly through a copy of “Buenas Noches, Luna,” waiting for little hands to move so that I can turn the page.
One of the annual projects for the visit was to encourage the kids to tell their own stories, which we then turned into books! I worked with Jayco, who had strong opinions on my bad taste in comic book characters. On the day where Jayco wrote down his story with me, he had far more interesting things to worry about.
“Que historia quieres, Jayco?” I asked him: what story do you want?
“Una vez había una niña,” he said: once there was a girl.
“Una niña que?” . . . a girl who?
“Una niña que se llama Caperu Cita”: a girl who is called Little Red Riding Hood.
“Maravilloso! Y…”
“Y?”
“Una vez había una niña que se llama Caperu Cita, y…” At this point, Jayco had found himself very concerned with a ball being kicked around in the playground. “Que es el resto, Jayco?”
“Y nada,” He tells me, wriggling out of his seat.
“Y nada?”
“Y nada, y nada, y nada, y nada, y nada.”
There once was a little girl called Little Red Riding Hood, and nothing and nothing and nothing and nothing…
Sometimes kids would just much rather be playing outside.
We had a day for tourism as well, a chance to simply view the beautiful, historic city.
This is Basílica del Voto Nacional, the largest church of its kind in all the Americas. When it is completed, they say, the world will end, so there are always more stones left to be mortared and new windows set to be installed.
A personal fact is that I have a bit of a love affair with Gothic Romantic art and the general concept of light. This is one of the most famous rose windows in the world. I wonder if I’ve captured it correctly.
From the top of the church, we could look across the city.
Do you see the figure in the distance?
Here it is! Her name is the Virgen de El Panecillo and she is inspired by Quito’s Madonna. From anywhere in the city you can see her, dancing atop a snake.
This was not our last night in Quito; that came three days later, with a lot of packing, checklists, and tearful goodbyes to tiny faces. But the sky was beautiful this night, and the light of the city wanted me to remember it.
***Due to strict regulations regarding the distribution of images of these children’s faces, there are limited photos I can show of the time we spent in the orphanage itself.
