This post is the culmination of my thoughts surrounding two major news stories that broke during my gap year: one from home and one from my host community. During this time, I used writing as a way to process my emotions surrounding these issues, but never finished the words to point of publication. Now, months later, I felt drawn to return to my unfinished pen scribbles and blog post ideas to try to make sense of how I had been feeling. In this case, I completed the post: polishing my original words and adding new insights that can only be gained from time and reflection.
I first saw the story on Saturday, January 19th, 2019, when a fellow Global Citizen Year participant sent me a news link with the title “U.S. diocese investigating after students mock Indigenous demonstration.” My friend wrote, “for a second I was really worried that was Covington Latin,” the name of my high school. I was initially confused, wondering if my small, Catholic, private Kentucky school really seemed that racially insensitive to an outsider, until I clicked the link. The school in question was Covington Catholic, an all-male high school a far cry from mine, but one that I had passed on my daily drive to school for five years. Covington Catholic is a common name in my hometown; its students are known to be typical winners of football and basketball championships who graduate as pious, God-fearing young men with affinities for partying. Regardless of its mixed reputation, I have friends and neighbors at this school who I know are good people. So, while reading the news story, I was horrified.
The next morning, January 20th, I sat down to breakfast with the thought of this event in my mind. Then, I heard a phone buzz as one of my host sisters received a notification of the breaking news that a Venezuelan man had stabbed his pregnant Ecuadorian girlfriend the night before in the city of Ibarra, 45 minutes from our house. The woman and the baby died. We were horrified.
I couldn't ignore the parallels of these stories: just days apart, spanning continents, but taking place in both the community in which I’d been raised and the new community I was immersed in.
Based on these headlines, our emotional reactions were justified. Yet, neither of the articles told the full stories.
Eventually, the Covington Catholic case was settled by the release of a video showing mocking from both the students and the indigenous group, complicating the situation. Regardless, the Catholic Diocese of Covington gave an official apology statement and everyone seemed to move on. However, I was still appalled that the image of teenagers from my hometown was colored by ignorance of indigenous people as I was devoting eight months to living with an indigenous host family.
Meanwhile, in Ibarra, the murder was met with intense public outrage. Even though this event was a matter of femicide, sexism, and machismo, it was treated by most Ecuadorians as one of racism. Further news stories and gossip only focused on the nationalities of the man and woman, dividing Venezuelans and Ecuadorians even farther apart. As a result of the tension, Ecuadorian residents of Ibarra rioted against the Venezuelan migrants, ransacking local Venezuelan-owned businesses and houses. The mobs dragged their mattresses onto the streets and burned them. Many Venezuelans were forced to leave the area. In fact, a Venezuelan staff member of Global Citizen Year who lived an hour away in the city of Otavalo also fled to the capital of Ecuador in order to stay safe. He returned a few weeks later.
Even though the crazed reactions to these stories later calmed down, both stayed in my mind. During this time, as I was constantly reflecting on the differences I saw in my new life and forming opinions about Ecuador, I made a point to ask questions to Ecuadorians about their thoughts of the U.S.
Once, when I asked an Ecuadorian friend of mine if he would ever consider going to the U.S., he told me, “No, they don’t want me there.”
Another time, a local friend asked me if I liked the U.S. president, Donald Trump. I asked him in return, “Do you think I like him?” His response was, “Well, you’re friendly with Latinos, so I guess not.”
Stories like that of the Covington Catholic students could prove their stereotypes right: Americans are racist and insensitive.
Yet, stories like the femicide in Ibarra could prove our stereotypes right and confirm the concerns that many well-meaning family and friends had expressed before I left for my gap year: Ecuadorians are dangerous and violent.
Of course, neither of these blanket statements are true. The truth is much more complicated and could never be fully expressed in a headline. However, as an American living in Ecuador, it was frustrating to hear stories that reaffirmed the negative stereotypes about my communities that I was constantly trying to question.
Now, months away from my experiences abroad and amid my first semester in college, I still struggle to tell the difficult stories from my gap year, just as I often don’t want to acknowledge the difficult realities about my own country. However, I know that looking at the messy truth of an issue is essential: contributing to the wisdom of the cliche that the first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one. Ecuador is far from perfect. So is the United States. However, there is value in understanding this imperfection and striving to do better. I believe that this is the best and only way forward.