Mindo and Same

Zip-lining in Mindo

Mariposa

Taxi ride back to the hostel after tubing

The porch of our hostel.

Same, the beach! (Pre-sunburn)

Walking to Casa Blanca via the highway. The tide was in so we couldn't walk via the beach and, yes, this is a completely normal thing to be doing.

Giant snail Ale found.

Whenever I see a traffic cone, I think of Matt.

(There are lots of traffic cones in Quito.)

Hello, everyone! So I've already been in Ecuador an entire month! I can hardly believe it. Time flies when you're having fun and this has certainly been a fun few weeks.

Two weekends ago a group of about fifteen of us took a 2.5 hour bus ride to Mindo, a Cloud forest and “bio-diverse paradise.” We stayed at a lovely hostel and we were very taken care of, for only $6 a night. There were hammocks next to hummingbird feeders. It did rain a lot night, though, and I forgot my rain jacket. I mean why would I need a rain jacket? “Cloud forest” in no way implies the possibility of precipitation.

We went zip-lining though the jungle and our guides let us do tricks: I went headfirst with my arms out like superman and upside down. For some of the longer zip-lines, we could see the cables disappearing into the fog. A bit eerie. I have to say though, it was really fun but nothing compared to jumping out of airplanes! We went extreme tubing though a river that was full of boulders. Our guides would jump out of our huge tube/raft apparatus, kick off a boulder, spin us around, and hop back in. It was intense. I just giggled the whole time. We also visited a butterfly farm and an orchid garden.

This past weekend we went to the beach in Esmeraldas named Same (sah-may). The bus ride there was supposed to be seven hours but we ran into a bad car accident on a mountain highway which caused us to move only ten miles in five hours. It took fourteen hours to get there. Mer. However, the beach was beautiful. I keep having these surreal moments where I look around and think, “This is my life. This is happening. I’m in Ecuador” and look around and take it all in. It happened again when I was in the ocean and turned around and saw the view of the shore. Breath-taking.

Our hostel had its own beach and no one was there besides our group so we had the beach to ourselves. It was a very relaxing weekend. I laid out it the sun, read, swam, crashed into some waves, swung in the hammock, and got a sunburn. It was nice. We visited Casa Blanca for dinner the first night (the sea food is really good on the coast. So good in fact, there isn’t much of a need for vegetarian options. I ate plain spaghetti noodles.) And the next day we visited the well known tourist beach, Atacames. I much preferred our little private beach. The next morning, the boys made “scrambled pancakes” for breakfast and we had a spaghetti dinner overlooking the beach the next night.

The past two work weeks were pretty routine. I’ve started running though and I can definitely feel the altitude difference in my breathing. Running in the park is an experience: I have both seen a man peeing on a tree and another man not wearing pants (I think he was changing into soccer shorts).

Carnival is next weekend, a huge celebration is Quito. We’ll actually be using the break to go to the Amazon since we won’t be missing class but some people, mainly kids, have started celebrating early. My friend and I were walking home from class together and we saw this big group of school girls in their uniforms. They were all about seven years old, I’d guess. We chatted with them a bit and then they handed us some water balloons, joking that we should throw them at random people on the street. We laughingly went along with it until one girl got antsy and launched a balloon at her friend. And then the balloons started flying. I managed to stay relatively dry but then someone produced a can of silly string. I got covered. This all went down in the middle of the street. Scenes from Pam’s random life.

I’ve been trying to help Rebe with lunch when I don’t have much homework to do. The first day she let me fill a water pitcher. Today, she let me make salad (except for cutting tomatoes; she did that). And I learned how to make fresh apple juice. Other flavors to come. However, after being with Rebe throughout the hour and a half process of making lunch, I got personally insulted when Jose came home and said he wouldn’t eat the rice she made because it had carrots in it. I mean, seriously? Rebe didn’t seem to mind at all.

By the way, Jose and Daniela, thankfully, behave contrary to typical Ecuadorian couples in that they do not engage in excessive amounts of PDA. Mostly Jose calls Daniela his “gordita” (she is not even a little bit fat) and Daniela tries to get me to call Jose a “joda.” Except I know what it means (translation: bad word).

FACTOIDS! (Warning: some of these factoids are PG-13)

· Rebe came in my room the other day holding an (unopened) condom, asking me to explain what it was. She said she found it in her son’s pocket. She looked surprised and a little sad when I told her. Definitely an awkward moment.

· Prostitution is legal here. They have a health card that has to be updated each month to say that they are disease free. They typically charge about $1 per half hour. (I learned this in grammar class; I am not doing that sort of field research for my factoids. Not quite THAT dedicated to this endeavor. )

· Fifteen years ago, homosexuality was a crime here. Suspected homosexuals could be jailed.

· If a mother goes to jail and has no where to send her kids, they go to jail with her. When they are 12-13 years old, they are kicked out of the jail. There are no government programs available to support them.

· Petroleum is stored in barrels and transported in the back of pick-up trucks. They usually have a rope or something to secure them together. They drive really slowly and honk ever five seconds so no one runs in to them. And sometimes they shout, “Gas, gas!”

· Continuation of the above factoid: One of these slow moving gas trucks was driving just faster than my walking pace alongside me as I returned home. The man in the passenger seat gave what my ROTC Sexual Harassment Awareness PowerPoint would call “elevator eyes” and with a creepy smile gave me a nod of approval.

· “Piropos” or catcalls are much more common and culturally acceptable here. Some are creepy but some are nice. Pretty much all of them are creepy to me though because I’m not used to it yet. But there are definitely worse things than being called linda, preciosa, or bonita as I walk down the street. One time this seventy year old man on crutches said “Hola, Hermosa” with a toothless grin.

So this weekend I’m staying in Quito for the first time. But details to come in the next blog!