"¡Mi Pablito Chiquitito Precioso Lindito!"

In Ecuador, when a woman is pregnant, you do not ask her "when she is due." You ask, "¿Cuando viene la luz?" Literally, that means, "When is the light coming?" I always thought that was a pretty cool way to say it and it has never been more evident to me that "a light" is exactly what a baby is than now. It has been a new experience for me, being around someone who is expecting baby every day leading up to the birth. Sure, I have visited my aunts when they were expecting my cousins, but I think I was too young to really understand everything that was going on. So, really, this is my first real experience with the excitement of not only a couple´s first child, but a first grandchild as well.

Soledad, my host sister, did not think she was capable of having kids for about the first six years of her marriage. However, just when she had almost given up, she got pregnant! So, besides the fact that this baby is she and Raoul´s first and the first grandchild for my host mother, Hilda, it is also more or less a miracle baby--definitely "a light" if ever there was one.

I have watched the way my host family has prepared for this baby the past few weeks, feverishly anticipating the arrival of their "light." Soledad was always so incredibly overjoyed to talk about the baby, to show me the baby clothes they had bought and the nursery they had painted and decorated, anything and everything related to the new baby. For the first time, I saw a baby moving inside its mother--little Pablito definitely enjoying kicking and punching and wiggling around in Soledad´s stomach and it was a crazy and intense experience to be able to literally see the baby moving under her skin.

Finally, we had an exact date to expect the coming of "the light": Thursday, April 17 at 8:30Am (she had a C-section scheduled). Soledad had been having contractions off and on for about a week, had ceased being able to sleep at all since no position was really comfortable, and looked as though she was about to pop--she is a very petite lady and sometimes I wondered how she remained upright! So, last night, just like every night, Raoul and Soledad came over to have merienda with us--some pan, queso, tea, coffee. We sat around the kitchen table, talking and laughing like always, but it finally came time for Soledad and Raoul to go home. Soledad looked so nervous and she told me that she was very excited but that the only thing she was nervous about was waiting those long moments to hear her baby cry for the first time because, for those moments that would seem like forever, she would be wondering if he was okay.

Denisse, Hilda, and I all told her that everything would be fine and to not worry about anything. Soledad and Raoul kissed us all goodbye and Hilda leaned down and kissed Soledad´s stomach, like she had done almost every night, one more time and whispered to the baby, "¡Mi Pablito chiquitito precioso lindito!" and said a prayer for him. So, with one last nervous wave goodbye, Soledad and Raoul went home.

I went to class this morning as usual and as I was walking down the streets of Quito on an especially warm, sunny, gorgeous day, I looked at my watch and thought, "Welcome to the world, Pablito!" when I saw that Soledad´s C-section would have already been over. After class, I went directly home since I had told Hilda I would be back for lunch. As soon as I walked into the kitchen, Hilda ran up and hugged and kissed me and told me that the baby had arrived, that everything was fine, that Soledad had cried and cried when she saw Pablito for the first time, and that he was a gorgeous baby. To prove it, she immediately pulled out her cell phone and showed me a picture she had taken on it of the baby--a tiny, pink little bundle wrapped in a white blanket with a patch of dark hair on top. As I sat at the table while Olgita, the maid, and Hilda finished preparing lunch, the phone was ringing off the hook and there was more than one occasion where Hilda had the house phone held up to one ear and her cell phone held up to the other, talking to two people at once. There is absolutely no doubt: this kid is going to be the most loved and most spoiled kid in existence. :)

Soledad comes home from the hospital with the baby on Saturday and she and Raoul are going to be living with Hilda and the rest of the family for the first month while they are getting used to the baby. I cannot wait to see Soledad and little Pablito! Raoul asked me last night if it was a tradition in the US for people to smoke cigars after a baby is born and I said, more or less, though perhaps those pink and blue bubblegum cigars are perhaps more popular. Made me wish I had a couple blue ones to give them when they come home for the hospital, but I do not think they sell them here. But I know what I am going to send them as soon as I get back to the States!

What a happy day! Take care, everyone, and until next time, ciao!

-Alex