Saturday, March 13, 2010

Papallacta and Liga Madness

Juice with Samantha

Very cold river

Antisana. You can only see it on a clear day and there aren't many clear days. We were really lucky to have the fog clear for a bit to catch the view. Beautiful.

Tree with some really cool flowers.

Waiting for a bus back to Quito in the middle of nowhere, literally.

Emily snapped this photo when I wasn't paying attention. Kind of like it. I was enjoying the view.

Game

Go Liga!

Estadio Olimpico. I always just tell Taxi drivers to take me here. I live right behind it. Super easy. Everyone knows Estadio Olimpico.

Hello, everyone! Hope you are doing well! I am doing just fine. So today marks the halfway point of my days in Ecuador. It’s all downhill from here. It’s crazy that it’s already been so long.

Well, this past weekend I went to Papallacta, natural hot springs located in the colder, upper parts of the Andes. Emily, Samantha, and I hopped on a bus and were relaxing in the hot springs about three hours later. There were about twenty different pools of various temperatures and a really cold river. Later we got massages at the Papallacta spa, but only because they were such a good deal. Pretty hard to pass up. Anyway, Samantha left early so Emily and I were on our own for the evening. There was a really nice hotel in Papallacta but it was super expensive (the price of typical hotel in the States) so Emily and I stayed in a hostel and pretended we were staying in the hotel. We had dinner there and chilled in their lounge until we were ready to head back to our hostel to sleep. I think we confused the hotel workers when we left at 10pm after being snuggled up on their couches all night.

We returned to Quito just in time for the Liga v. Quito Deportivo fútbol game. Both teams are from Quito and it was one of the games in the “Classic Series.” It was intense. The stadium is just a block away from my house (kind of like living in Wrigleyville) and everything was just crazy. Emily and I scalped some tickets and bought some Liga jerseys (a mistake, I didn’t realize that I lived in a Quito Deportivo house). Just getting into the stadium was intense. Emily and I were cutting it close on time and were unaware that all of the entrances into the stadium, save one, close once the game begins. People were going crazy.

Do you know that scene from Titanic when the ship is sinking and the crewmen, scooping coal in the lower levels of the ship, are freaking out because all of the doors are shutting and trapping them? This was EXACTLY like that (minus the sinking ship). It was chaos. People were frantically running from door to door pounding and screaming to be let in. People in the stadium were lowering ropes for bags and buckets of beer. Police on horses. Fire extinguishers (but no fire). It was a madhouse. Eventually everyone got in through the one door that was open and made their way to their unassigned seats. Just our luck, another near-riot broke out in our section of the stadium. The fight was so big, the entire stadium could see it (we had friends on the other side of the stadium). People all around us were fighting and pop bottles were being hurled so that they would explode all over whoever they landed near. I was legitimately worried at one point. Ecuadorian SWAT team members came and calmed the situation. Regardless of the commotion, the game was fun. Liga won.

The next day was Sunday so I went to mass with Marcela. She arrives to every mass a half hour early to say the rosary and she prayed the rosary aloud for us both. After mass we went to the hospital (the best in Quito) to visit Daniela and her new baby (not the Daniela who is my host brother’s girlfriend but the Daniela we hosted the baby shower for). He was lovely and doing well. Afterwards, we met up with some of Marcela’s friends to go out to lunch for Fanesca, a traditional Ecudaorian Catholic meal typically served during Holy Week but because it’s so delicious you can now get it throughout Lent. It was really, really good. It was kind of like soup and stew, but cheesy and it had all sorts of stuff in it. Way too complicated for me to ever make though. Que lástima.

I am on the hunt for a rope to climb (I have to climb a rope to pass Air Assault in August) so I visited Quito’s sport complex, Concentración Deportiva de Quito, where all of Ecuador's Olympic athletes for nearly all sports train, including squash, speed skating, and jujitsu. Although they didn’t have exactly what I needed, they got me set up on some climbing structures and gave me all sorts of tips. They recommended I talk to the military high school here in Quito. Not sure how I feel about that. We’ll see how desperate I get.

Other than that, I’ve mainly been going to classes. I can’t get out of Quito this weekend because I have way too much homework. Club de Andinismo didn’t have any one day excursions going on this weekend so it looks like I’ll just be doing some mini-excursions around the city in between working on my two presentations, essay, project, and studying for an exam. Joy.

Anyhow, here are some FACTOIDS!

· The Condor, a vulture and Ecuador’s national bird, is near extinction. There are only somewhere between 17 and 27 remaining in the world (all along western South America). Needless to say, they are extremely rare. But I saw one when I was in Papallacta! Pretty cool.

· At the fútbol game, after the ref made a call that angered Liga fans, the men behind us began repeatedly screaming, “Homosexual! Homosexual!” at the ref.

· Rebe’s annual salary is $3,740. Marcela told me; I didn’t ask. Rebe’s monthly salary is a below-poverty line weekly salary in the States. Things might be cheaper here, but the cost of living in Quito is definitely not that much cheaper.

· I achieved my goal of winning all of the records for Buscaminas (Minesweeper) on all of the computers (6-7) in the IES computer lab. Sadly, it didn’t even take that long. I played way too much Minesweeper in middle/high school. But in my defense it’s been years since I’ve played.

· Ecuador has only ever won two Olympic medals, one Gold and one Silver, both by the same man, Jefferson Pérez. He won them in the speed walking event. Pérez is a national hero. He can walk twelve miles at a sub 6.5 min mile. Embedding was disabled on the best YouTube clip I found but here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2urNVmKnEaQ Check it out! His skillz are ridiculous. This isn't his Olympic win but after this 20km race his whole body seized up and he had uncontrollable spasms. Extreme.

Well, I should probably get to work! Blogging is so just much more enjoyable than psychology projects, though. Meh. ¡Hasta luego!

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Canoa and the TSUNAMI (warning)!

Beach sunsets. I'm a fan.


Tree house hostel.

Cliffs.

Friends

Wow! It’s already March! It’s going to be time to fly home before I know it. I’ve already been here almost two months. I hope everyone back home has had an excellent two months, as well!

This past weekend Marcela went to a wedding. I was really hoping I was invited, but alas, I wasn’t. It would have been super cool to see an Ecuadorian wedding though. I did, however, get to help Marcela and her friends make THOUSANDS of tiny candies for the reception. My hands were red from rolling so much dough.

So instead of the wedding, I went to a beach called Canoa for a few days. We left late Thursday night and spent the night on the bus. Friday morning we took a boat across the river and then another thirty minute bus ride to get to Canoa. Our hostel was really cute. It looked like a tree house. Friday went really well. I got a little sun-burnt but nothing too painful. I did lots of wave crashing, my favorite beach activity. I tried surfing but soon realized it isn’t the sort of activity you can pick up without instruction and I wasn’t too interested in paying for lessons. We had pancakes and spaghetti again and watched the sunset over the Pacific.

Saturday, however, I awoke up to a 6:30am text message from the Embassy’s Alert Service saying, “A massive (8.2 to 8.8) earthquake in Chile has caused a Tsunami warning for Ecuador’s Coast from 1200 to 1330. If you know anyone there you should warn them.” Why, yes, I do know someone on Ecuador’s coast. ME! Like 300 yards away from it! Our group was assessing the risk when we got text messages from Gladys, our program advisor, saying “The students at the beach should return to Quito immediately.” Definitely didn’t freak us out. I called Gladys to see what was up and told her our tickets out weren’t until the following morning. She said that we should be fine and to go ahead and stay put but be sure to keep our phones on us. Four of the fourteen decided that they would rather be safe than sorry and left for Quito anyway. I decided to stay because, after doing some research and talking to locals, we determined that there wasn’t any real risk along our stretch of beach. Staying was definitely the right decision. The waves were stronger than the day before but they were nothing dangerous. I’m still going to say that I survived a Tsunami (warning), though.

That night, after another sunset on the beach, we went out for dinner at a little seafood place and one of the guys made a really good homemade torte for dessert. Later a few of us went on a midnight walk along the beach down to the cliffs and came across a little fresh water lagoon that feeds into the ocean. Really neat. Plus we found the oar that one of the guys lost earlier in the day kayaking which was good since it would have cost $100 to replace. All in all, a very successful walk on the beach.

The next morning we woke early to catch the bus and boat back to the bus station and we were back to Quito by 4pm.

Exciting news from the USA: I got a slot to Air Assault School! Looks like I’ll be at Ft. Knox for the first two weeks of August. I have to say, joining the Army seems to have been a pretty good move. So many of the experiences I most value were provided to me by the Fire BN. Ecuador. Airborne. Bataan. Norwegian. Not to mention all the people I’ve met and paying for my crazy expensive tuition. And now Air Assault. Thank you, Uncle Sam. It’ll be useful to remember how much I am enjoying all of the perks of being in the Army, especially this trip, because the next foreign country the Army sends me to will likely be Afghanistan.

It’s crazy how varied a single life can be. I feel like profoundly lucky to be living the life I am. Why do I get to vacation through Ecuador only visiting extreme poverty instead of growing up with it? My life and accomplishments can’t be explained by my hard work or anything I’ve done on my own. There is something bigger than myself at work here and I feel luckier each day. And I am definitely feeling some pressure to make something of myself and do some good in the world with all these opportunities I’ve been given.

Okay, now for a bit of a jump. From a sort of serious moment to….

FACTOIDS!

  • While running in Parque Carolina, I saw a fleet of men in wheel-chairs, all wearing orange jumpsuits. There were about ten of them and each one had an identical sign attached to his wheel-chair like a billboard, sticking up about eight feet in the air, promoting a special offer from a cell phone provider. They just rolled around the park in a line to show off the signs. Seriously one of the more bizarre things I’ve seen. Still not quite sure what to think about it.
  • Walking home from my night class at PUCE, I saw a guy about my age strapped to a stop sign being thrashed by three of his buddies. The scene was accompanied by both screams and laughter from the victim. And confusion from me.
  • On the Ecovia, two guys my age were passing boxed wine back and forth and drinking it out of Dixie cups. Classy wine tasting on Monday night public transportation. I’m kind of concerned as to why no one was concerned.
  • Today, I found out that babaco, a delicious fruit that we really don’t have in the US, is illegal to import. Something about fruit flies. I’ve pretty much decided that I have to spread the babaco love and am plotting ways to smuggle one into the country. Marcela is providing me with tips, garnered from first hand smuggling experience. They are pretty giant fruits but there will be a babaco in my suitcase, I guarantee it. USA, prepare yourself for dulce de babaco! (Update: After reading about invasive species in my Biodiversidad class, I have aborted the Babaco mission).

So I’m getting ready for another weekend outside of the city. I’ve come to the realization that Quito is one of the lamest parts of Ecuador. If you live in one of the most beautiful and bio-diverse countries on the planet, why would you want to live in the city? But I have to balance my desire to get to know the country with the treacherous bus rides that accompany weekend traveling. You can’t travel anywhere without hours of winding mountain roads. I never got carsick in the states, but then again, most highways in the states are straight and flat. This weekend I’m headed to Papallacta for a night. It’s not too far away and it promises to be super relaxing.

Con amor, chao! (Not to be confused with the Italian “ciao.”) ¡Hasta luego!