(To have been posted Sunday night... oops!)
Today our morning started out, as I’ve already told you, waking up an hour early. We ate breakfast at our hotel, Hotel San Vicente, and then made sandwiches to take with us on our tour of the Vocán Sierra Negra. They were tuna and queso fresco sandwiches. Not normally one of my favorites, but once we got to lunch time, they were great!
We left the hotel with our guide, Javier, at about 8 am. Turns out our group included the people that we came over on the boat with, the Brits, Katy and Simon, and the ‘intellectuals,’ Maria and José who live in Canada but are from Venezuela originally. We also picked up four more people from other random groups: three more Brits, Tiffany, Nicola (lovely British name) and Claire, and one American, Jenna, from Los Angeles. Together the ten of us and our guide went into the ‘highlands’ of Isabela Island to see one of the volcanoes that created the island, Volcán Sierra Negra. It was a little bit cloudy on the coast, but it was almost completely covered in clouds and mist inland.
The first part of the trip up the volcano was on horseback. It was a few people in our group’s first time on horses (including Slocomb) but everyone did very well. It was raining on the way up, so the path was extremely muddy. I felt bad for the horses, but I was very glad not to be climbing up on foot. At the first part of the trip, my horse decided to chill out alone between the groups which was fine with me. When we got a little further up, the guides wanted us to all stay together, which my horse wasn’t so cool with. He was quite figety and kept trying to go around the other horses. He even bit one other horse’s tail and tried to bite another’s neck. He got the nickname “demon horse,” which I understand. He was a great horse to ride, but he just wanted to be alone!
When we got to the top, we weren’t able to really see anything because of all of the mist and fog. We went over to a ‘parasitic’ volcano, Volcán Chico. The last time that the larger volcano, Sierra Negra, erupted was October 2005, but the last time Volcán Chico saw any action was back in 1979. Before that, there hadn’t been anything for many hundreds of years, so we could see the difference in the ‘old’ lava and the ‘new’ lava because the iron in the old lava had oxidized and turned red. We also got to see into the crater of Volcán Chico and the lava tunnels all around. The colors were incredible! Bright reds and oranges and some blues all surrounded by lots of black. There were even ferns growing inside the crater of the volcano, suggesting that they were among the first plants to arrive in Galapagos after the islands were created by volcanoes. It was also interesting because Galapagos is known for being a place with such great ecological diversity, but it all started out as lava fields.
We all had brought sandwiches for lunch which we ate in the rain under a tree. We did get to see a few little birds while we were eating lunch, but they were mostly more interested in trying to eat our lunch than in being observed or photographed. We were hoping that the weather would clear during our hike to Volcán Chico or lunch, but it didn’t. So we didn’t get to see the crater of Volcán Sierra Negra (the second largest volcanic crater in the world), but we got some idea of the scope. On the way down, we walked a little bit (about 3 km in the mud, good times!) around the crater. Even though we were going circularly, the circle around the crater was so large that it seemed like we were walking straight!! It was still raining and very muddy on the way down, and our guide was very determined to get down the mountain as fast as possible. There wasn’t anything to see, but it was still too fast for me. I kept being afraid that I would fall in the hurry or lose the guide who was so far ahead. I suppose he wanted to get to the next thing (snorkeling), but I guess I’m just not as fast a walker as our guide is.
That afternoon we went out to Concha de Perla to snorkel, just the six of us in our group: Maria and José, Katy and Simon, and Slocomb and myself. On the walk on the pier to the snorkeling sight, we came across a sea lion just chilling out on the pier. He didn’t want to move for us, but since sea lions can be aggressive, we scared him off onto a rock. It was Slocomb’s, Maria’s and Katy’s first time snorkeling, but it still went okay. Katy didn’t really go for it at first, and José didn’t stay out very long. But Slocomb, Maria, Simon and I, along with our guide Javier (same one as the morning), went all around the bay. We got to swim with a couple of sea lions, which was incredible. The sea lion we saw on land was so ungainly and awkward, but the one in the ocean was incredibly graceful and agile. Javier told us that when you are in a group, the sea lions try to come play with you. Apparently when you’re by yourself, they’re not quite sure what you are. Anyway, we got to play a little with the sea lion and see tons of fish. We even saw a manta ray and a starfish that was black and bright orange. Everything under the water was so incredibly colorful! It was still cloudy and cold, but we still had a great opportunity to see lots.
We came back to the hotel for dinner and to hang out. There is a hot tub, and Slocomb and I tried to use it. Unfortunately, the water heater wasn’t working, so it was really just a cold tub. I decided to take a hot shower instead... The hotel here is nice and cute, but not something to write home about, just like the food. Its plentiful and good, but nothing super exciting. Except for the tres leches cake last night for dessert. Yummy!!
This morning we left the hotel at 8:30 to go to Tintoreras Islet, an island formed by lava pushed up above the surface of the water by tectonic movement. The islet is the major breeding ground in this area for the marine iguana, and right now is the mating season, so it was absolutely crawling with iguanas. One of the first iguanas we saw was perched up on a rock like it was doing a push-up. It was so still and almost posed for our cameras. I guess either the animals are just used to people or they just aren’t that worried about us. We also got to see a few Galapagos penguins (which are the second smallest species of penguin, by the way) and sea lions. There is also a canal on the islet that is a great resting area for white tipped sharks, so we saw several of them asleep in the bottom of this shallow canal.
After walking around on the island for a little while, the boat took us out a little bit to snorkel again. There were tons of fish again and a bright purple starfish. We even saw a sea turtle, which I swam with (or near, I suppose) for a good five minutes. It was so graceful, and all of its flippers were so effective. I mean, I’m a pretty good swimmer, but you could tell which one of us was adapted to living in the water.
We decided that we’d had enough of Tintoreras, so we went back to Concha de Perla again to see if we could see anything else there. It was mostly the same animals and fish as yesterday, lots of damsel fish with their yellow lipstick. Simon got to see another turtle and got some underwater photos of it (very cool). Snorkeling is becoming one of my favorite activities because it involves the chill-ness of swimming, meaning no noise or business, with a bit of social interaction. We were all swimming closely together and pointing out the cool things that we were seeing. But it was still so quiet and relaxed. That also might have something to do with our group. Even though we come from three different countries and cultures, we have become friends very quickly. Also, everyone is so very interested in seeing everything that we can in this wonderful place. Maria and José and Katy and Simon really have been wonderful to travel with and have made this experience all the more special.
Anyway, we returned back to the hotel about 12:30pm for lunch and a rest before going back out to see more of Isabela. I was thinking about taking a nap, but the six of us ended up hanging out at the lunch table talking about history and politics until it was almost time to go.
This afternoon, we went to the giant turtoise breeding center here on Isabela Island. Because of the introduction of cats, rats, and dogs, there are a lot more predators for baby turtles here than before. Primarily, the center focuses on breeding and protecting new turtles. Their lives are extremely dangerous until about age 5 when their shells are hard enough to protect them from some of the predators. There are also many adults in the center (for breeding, obviously), but the national park service is working on restoring the wild populations. After the breeding center, we went further into the national park and ended up seeing three wild giant tortousies near the road!
Part of Isabela Island was used as a penal colony from 1946 to 1959, and one of the projects of the prisoners was to build a giant wall from lava rocks around their encampment. Even after a year of work, the wall was only a quarter finished, but they stopped work. Our guide told us that some of the rocks weighed up to 100 kilos (220 pounds) and that the prisoners had to carry them on bare shoulders because they did not have any other means of carrying them. Also, at the beginning, they were able to find the rocks nearby, but as time went on, they had to go farther and farther to find the stones. Apparently it was a brutal project simply designed to work the prisoners to death. And now it is an important reminder of the not so glamorous history of the Galapagos.
On the way back to town, we decided to walk along the beach in the national park area because it was so beautiful and pristine. Along the walk, we came upon an injured shark that had washed up on the beach. Simon was brave enough to pick it up and take it back into the ocean. Unfortunately, it had been out of the water so long that it was very disoriented when it got back into the water. It eventually started swimming away in the right direction, but we can only hope that it makes it.
We finished our walk back to the hotel in time to relax a little before dinner. At dinner it was very interesting because Maria and José ended up talking a lot to the French couple sitting near us. Besides the fact that Maria and José know so many languages (and feel comfortable using them when they are needed), it is interesting how many people from random places are here. Besides the several Brits we have met, there have been several people from France and even people from the Czech Republic. I suppose that Galapagos has the same appeal the world over.
Tomorrow we have to wake up early to go back to Santa Cruz Island (another heinous boat ride), but we’ll get to spend another day with our group before they head back to mainland Ecuador. Slocomb and I will be going to Floreana Island that day to do some more snorkeling. Our trip is already half-way done. We have seen so much already, but the time has really flown!
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Sunday, December 13, 2009
First day of Galapagos
Blog post - 12/12/09
I am writing right now from our plane to Galapagos. We got to sit to first/business class somehow; we are actually sitting in the bulkhead seats (row 1) in the front of the plane. Slocomb says its the first time he’s actually been comfortable on a plane.
We left Cuenca last night about 6pm in a full buseta, which meant that it was not nearly as comfortable as the previous two times we had gone to Guayaquil. Then, it was only us on the way to Guayaquil, and only two other people on the way back. Last night, there were five other people in the buseta. One of the guys on the buseta was from Chile, but spoke English very well. He used to work in port management, so that’s where he learned English. But after he found out that we spoke Spanish, we switched to Spanish (my preference because I need to practice!). Its not really offensive when people assume that we don’t speak Spanish; the reward is people’s faces when they realize we do speak Spanish.
Another person on the buseta was a woman from Cuenca who had known some of the CEDEI teachers from years past. She was very talkative (which was helpful for keeping the driver awake) and she did her nails while we were on the buseta. And when I say did her nails, I don’t just mean painted her nails. She glued on French tips, filed, buffed, and painted her nails on the buseta. Surprisingly, there weren’t any fumes (which was nice), and the filing/buffing wasn’t actually that annoying. I think it was because Slocomb and I knew we were on vacation, so the annoyances didn’t bother us. We entertained ourselves by making and eating sandwiches (which the nails woman commented on, saying, “Poor us, we don’t have any food!”) and by watching New Moon on my laptop. We found a bootleg copy (like every movie in Ecuador) that actually was in English. The audio wasn’t perfect, and there were a couple of times that I missed what they were saying, but it was good none the less. Also, hearing bachata and regeton on the radio the entire time might have messed with my listening skills. I still want to go back and see it in theatres again (because there were some moments that just didn’t look good on my little 13 inch screen) and because I kinda feel bad for buying a bootleg copy. Oh, well. When in Rome... one buys bootleg copies of movies...
Last week was a crazy week. It was our last week of school for the year, so we had lots to do. Jen (one of the other international teachers) wanted to help the kids make a nice present for their parents for Christmas, so we helped out with that because it was very labor intensive. We ended up making calendars decorated with the kids’ hand-print art work and also ornament balls with eight sides or so decorated by the kids. They turned out so well, but poor Jen was stressing the whole week trying to get everything done. As it turns out, we didn’t finish, but the national teachers are going to finish them with the kids and give them out next week.
I also had one of my graduate school applications due this week, which I finished and turned in on time, thank you very much. I’m a little worried because only two of the recommendation letters has been turned in, but hopefully my professor is working on it. UCLA (which is due the 15th) also recieved all of the stuff from me, but none of the stuff from my professors. I don’t want to hassle them about it because I know that its a crazy busy time of year. Luckily, the schools say that when the recommendation letters arrive doesn’t really impact whether or not the application is considered ‘on time,’ but I still want those letters to be there before they consider my application. I feel like I am a strong candidate based on my statement, transcript, and GRE scores (which I wish were better, but whatever), but the recommendation letters are a huge deal for applications. Oh, well. Its out of my hands now.
Also last week Slocomb and I found, leased, and moved into a new apartment. We had been thinking about moving for a while because we needed more space and our own space. Living with the Colomas worked out really well because they were able to show us a lot about Cuenca and living in Ecuador, but it was hard for Slocomb and I to go from living independently (with roommates, true) at Emory to being back in someone else’s house. It was a good experience, but four months was enough.
Our new apartment is gorgeous!! Slocomb doesn’t want us to put up pictures on the internet yet because he wants his family to see it first-hand when they come to Ecuador for Christmas. I will put up pictures in a couple weeks though. It is in the middle of town, which is really nice and convenient. It is very close to a lot of shopping, which is a lot easier that at the Colomas, which was at the top of a vicious hill. It was always a pain to walk up the hill with shopping or groceries, but since the new place is in the flat part of town, we don’t have to worry about that. It is on the fifth floor, but there is a new-ish elevator, which was incredible handy while we were moving all of our stuff. The huge advantage on the fifth floor is that we’re up away from a lot of the street noise, and we have an incredible view. From the living room and foyer, there are two walls of windows essentially, so we have an almost 180° view of the north and west sides of the city. To the north, we see the cathedral, which is half a block away. We can see all of the domes (there are three large ones, contrary to what a couple of guidebooks I’ve seen say), and the long wall. To the west, we see a good bit of the city and towards Cajas, the national park. We haven’t gotten to really experience the sunset because its been cloudy all of the evenings we were there, but I have a feeling its going to be a gorgeous one. On the tour that we took with CEDEI at the beginning of our time here, our tour guide took us to Plaza San Francisco and showed us the view of the cathedral of Cuenca (you know, the one you always see on postcards). Well, our view from the apartment is that view but better because we are above the buildings that block the view. It is incredible. The apartment building is just off of the Plaza San Francisco, one of the major open air markets in town. It is very convenient to be able to pop downstairs to buy things. It is very busy during the day, but everything closes up at sundown. There is plenty of light in the Plaza after sundown, but most of the ‘shops’ stay set up, so the view down to the Plaza isn’t really all that pretty. It is very Cuenca, in my opinion. All of the semi-permanent shops where you can (in the day time) find just about anything. It really is a wonderful location.
In our new apartment, we are about three blocks from the building where we take Spanish classes, so we can actually go home for lunch now before classes. We still have to take the bus to school, but I’m pretty sure we can get away with only taking one now instead of two (saving us about $20 a month). There’s a washer and dryer in the apartment, so that is really nice. And the owner of the hostal upstairs has offered to let us use the wi-fi for no charge!! We’ve had some problems with the hot water heater and dryer, but hopefully we can get those worked out soon. The hot water heater overflowed on Thursday when we turned it on for the first extended period of time. There was water all over the kitchen and into one of the bedrooms, which of course is carpeted. Our apartment kinda has that wet dog smell right now, but Slocomb is going to get some air fresheners and maybe a fan when he gets back from Galapagos on the 18th. Also, the dryer wasn’t blowing hot air the other day. We’re not sure if this is because the hot air runs on gas (because we turned the gas off after the hot water heater funness), or something else. Our landlord is going to bring in a technician to check it all out soon. And everything will be functional when Slocomb’s family arrives on the 26th. Or else...
We got the keys to the apartment on Tuesday, and moved all of our stuff on Thursday and Friday. Things are still very disorganized, but Slocomb is going to take care of a lot of the stuff when he goes back to Cuenca. And then when I get back after new year, we can finish putting everything together. Setting up an apartment takes a long time, especially when one of the inhabitants is going to be gone for almost three weeks. But it’s something very exciting to come back to.
At school this week, we spent a lot of time preparing for the special Christmas pageant that took place last night. Slocomb and I had to miss it because we had to leave for Guayaquil, but we did get to see the rehearsal yesterday. The whole school day yesterday was spent in the park (and I forgot my sunscreen, so I have intense sunglass lines right now) preparing. Unfortunately, we didn’t really plan ahead that well for the rehearsal. We all arrived in the park about 8:30, but the rehearsing didn’t start until almost 11. Bad idea when you have 110 kids. I brought books and coloring books (thank God!!), because I realized that if the kids were bored, it was going to be a lot harder to keep things in order. I learned that from my mom; bored kids are obnoxious/trying/bad kids. Another frustration was that two of the international teachers had to leave at 10:30, meaning that we were down two sets of hands. Also, two more international teachers decided they needed to leave at 12 - not really sure why. I think they felt that had too much to do before leaving Cuenca (today, I might add), so they decided to peace out early. Unfortunately, Slocomb and I were the ones who actually had to leave Cuenca yesterday and move the rest of our stuff from the Colomas to downtown. But we got roped into staying longer because the rest of the teachers didn’t want all of the international teachers leaving super early. What really made me mad was the unfairness of it all. I mean, I completely understand that the national teachers wanted us to stay, but it was obnoxious that it was okay for some of the international team to leave and others not too. I guess thats one lesson that I’m learning here in Ecuador: fairness rarely matters in real life. Which is a bummer, because I like fairness. But I’m on vacation now for another three weeks, so I’m not going to think about school.
One last thing about school, actually. We had our Christmas party on Thursday night at the director’s, Ximena’s, house. I think I’ve mentioned that we’ve been having power outages to try to conserve electricity in Cuenca (because all of the power is from hydroelectric sources and there’s not been enough rain to run them as much). Ximena’s power was supposed to be off from four until seven, but the power didn’t come back until almost 8:30!! That’s the first time I’ve heard about that happening; normally the power comes back right on time. Dinner, of course, got delayed as a result, but we just hung out and chatted for the first hour until the power came back. We also finished our secret santa exchange. I had Prisci’s (the first grade teacher) name, and I bought her a pair of silver heart earrings. They were really cute; I was tempted to keep them! Jen had my name, and she got me some earrings with real tiny flowers in them and a beautiful pink and purple scarf. She did a really good job throwing me off of who had my name; every day I got a little present with my name spelled “Lesli” on it (which is how they spell it in Ecuador usually so I assumed it was a national teacher). Very tricky, Jen! Slocomb got a new wallet from his secret santa, but I’ll set him tell you about that.
I guess this is the time for overall first semester impressions. Well, its different, especially the work culture. In the states, all of my work experiences were very supportive of their staff and very quick to solve any problems. In Ecuador, it seems much more like a solve your own problems at work kind of place. Which is fine, and works well for me, except when it comes to things like pay checks (we were almost a week late in getting our December paychecks - which was really hard because we needed to pay for our new apartment, etc). I have learned to be more independent and use the supplies I know I can get for myself fairly easily.
As for Ecuador in general, I have seen that people are very nice and very generous. People actually give money to people begging in the streets and people juggling at traffic lights. But people are also very self-interested. It seems very much like an every person (and family) for his/herself or themselves. In a place where there honestly isn’t enough to go around all of the time, this attitude makes sense. Even thought times are hard right now particularly, Ecuador is prospering. The attitudes just may not have kept up with the prosperity.
Thirdly, it makes a huge difference if you try to speak Spanish and are interested in the culture. When he’s feeling up to it, Slocomb almost always tries to talk to the cab drivers, usually about soccer. And it makes a big difference. If you get a cab driver talking, you usually have a much better cab experience - and sometimes pay less. People in Cuenca stereotype ‘gringos’ frequently, based on their previous experiences with them. And a lot of Americans - or estadounidenses I should say - come to Cuenca to see the sights of a UNESCO world heritage sights. Fewer are like us, who come to live in Cuenca, speak Spanish, and find out a little of what its like to be Cuencano. Yeah, we want to see the sights too, but for Slocomb and myself, the people are the interesting part. And when Cuencanos figure that out, it completely changes their relationship to us. We’re not going to stop being ‘gringos,’ but we have stopped being tourists.
I am writing right now from our plane to Galapagos. We got to sit to first/business class somehow; we are actually sitting in the bulkhead seats (row 1) in the front of the plane. Slocomb says its the first time he’s actually been comfortable on a plane.
We left Cuenca last night about 6pm in a full buseta, which meant that it was not nearly as comfortable as the previous two times we had gone to Guayaquil. Then, it was only us on the way to Guayaquil, and only two other people on the way back. Last night, there were five other people in the buseta. One of the guys on the buseta was from Chile, but spoke English very well. He used to work in port management, so that’s where he learned English. But after he found out that we spoke Spanish, we switched to Spanish (my preference because I need to practice!). Its not really offensive when people assume that we don’t speak Spanish; the reward is people’s faces when they realize we do speak Spanish.
Another person on the buseta was a woman from Cuenca who had known some of the CEDEI teachers from years past. She was very talkative (which was helpful for keeping the driver awake) and she did her nails while we were on the buseta. And when I say did her nails, I don’t just mean painted her nails. She glued on French tips, filed, buffed, and painted her nails on the buseta. Surprisingly, there weren’t any fumes (which was nice), and the filing/buffing wasn’t actually that annoying. I think it was because Slocomb and I knew we were on vacation, so the annoyances didn’t bother us. We entertained ourselves by making and eating sandwiches (which the nails woman commented on, saying, “Poor us, we don’t have any food!”) and by watching New Moon on my laptop. We found a bootleg copy (like every movie in Ecuador) that actually was in English. The audio wasn’t perfect, and there were a couple of times that I missed what they were saying, but it was good none the less. Also, hearing bachata and regeton on the radio the entire time might have messed with my listening skills. I still want to go back and see it in theatres again (because there were some moments that just didn’t look good on my little 13 inch screen) and because I kinda feel bad for buying a bootleg copy. Oh, well. When in Rome... one buys bootleg copies of movies...
Last week was a crazy week. It was our last week of school for the year, so we had lots to do. Jen (one of the other international teachers) wanted to help the kids make a nice present for their parents for Christmas, so we helped out with that because it was very labor intensive. We ended up making calendars decorated with the kids’ hand-print art work and also ornament balls with eight sides or so decorated by the kids. They turned out so well, but poor Jen was stressing the whole week trying to get everything done. As it turns out, we didn’t finish, but the national teachers are going to finish them with the kids and give them out next week.
I also had one of my graduate school applications due this week, which I finished and turned in on time, thank you very much. I’m a little worried because only two of the recommendation letters has been turned in, but hopefully my professor is working on it. UCLA (which is due the 15th) also recieved all of the stuff from me, but none of the stuff from my professors. I don’t want to hassle them about it because I know that its a crazy busy time of year. Luckily, the schools say that when the recommendation letters arrive doesn’t really impact whether or not the application is considered ‘on time,’ but I still want those letters to be there before they consider my application. I feel like I am a strong candidate based on my statement, transcript, and GRE scores (which I wish were better, but whatever), but the recommendation letters are a huge deal for applications. Oh, well. Its out of my hands now.
Also last week Slocomb and I found, leased, and moved into a new apartment. We had been thinking about moving for a while because we needed more space and our own space. Living with the Colomas worked out really well because they were able to show us a lot about Cuenca and living in Ecuador, but it was hard for Slocomb and I to go from living independently (with roommates, true) at Emory to being back in someone else’s house. It was a good experience, but four months was enough.
Our new apartment is gorgeous!! Slocomb doesn’t want us to put up pictures on the internet yet because he wants his family to see it first-hand when they come to Ecuador for Christmas. I will put up pictures in a couple weeks though. It is in the middle of town, which is really nice and convenient. It is very close to a lot of shopping, which is a lot easier that at the Colomas, which was at the top of a vicious hill. It was always a pain to walk up the hill with shopping or groceries, but since the new place is in the flat part of town, we don’t have to worry about that. It is on the fifth floor, but there is a new-ish elevator, which was incredible handy while we were moving all of our stuff. The huge advantage on the fifth floor is that we’re up away from a lot of the street noise, and we have an incredible view. From the living room and foyer, there are two walls of windows essentially, so we have an almost 180° view of the north and west sides of the city. To the north, we see the cathedral, which is half a block away. We can see all of the domes (there are three large ones, contrary to what a couple of guidebooks I’ve seen say), and the long wall. To the west, we see a good bit of the city and towards Cajas, the national park. We haven’t gotten to really experience the sunset because its been cloudy all of the evenings we were there, but I have a feeling its going to be a gorgeous one. On the tour that we took with CEDEI at the beginning of our time here, our tour guide took us to Plaza San Francisco and showed us the view of the cathedral of Cuenca (you know, the one you always see on postcards). Well, our view from the apartment is that view but better because we are above the buildings that block the view. It is incredible. The apartment building is just off of the Plaza San Francisco, one of the major open air markets in town. It is very convenient to be able to pop downstairs to buy things. It is very busy during the day, but everything closes up at sundown. There is plenty of light in the Plaza after sundown, but most of the ‘shops’ stay set up, so the view down to the Plaza isn’t really all that pretty. It is very Cuenca, in my opinion. All of the semi-permanent shops where you can (in the day time) find just about anything. It really is a wonderful location.
In our new apartment, we are about three blocks from the building where we take Spanish classes, so we can actually go home for lunch now before classes. We still have to take the bus to school, but I’m pretty sure we can get away with only taking one now instead of two (saving us about $20 a month). There’s a washer and dryer in the apartment, so that is really nice. And the owner of the hostal upstairs has offered to let us use the wi-fi for no charge!! We’ve had some problems with the hot water heater and dryer, but hopefully we can get those worked out soon. The hot water heater overflowed on Thursday when we turned it on for the first extended period of time. There was water all over the kitchen and into one of the bedrooms, which of course is carpeted. Our apartment kinda has that wet dog smell right now, but Slocomb is going to get some air fresheners and maybe a fan when he gets back from Galapagos on the 18th. Also, the dryer wasn’t blowing hot air the other day. We’re not sure if this is because the hot air runs on gas (because we turned the gas off after the hot water heater funness), or something else. Our landlord is going to bring in a technician to check it all out soon. And everything will be functional when Slocomb’s family arrives on the 26th. Or else...
We got the keys to the apartment on Tuesday, and moved all of our stuff on Thursday and Friday. Things are still very disorganized, but Slocomb is going to take care of a lot of the stuff when he goes back to Cuenca. And then when I get back after new year, we can finish putting everything together. Setting up an apartment takes a long time, especially when one of the inhabitants is going to be gone for almost three weeks. But it’s something very exciting to come back to.
At school this week, we spent a lot of time preparing for the special Christmas pageant that took place last night. Slocomb and I had to miss it because we had to leave for Guayaquil, but we did get to see the rehearsal yesterday. The whole school day yesterday was spent in the park (and I forgot my sunscreen, so I have intense sunglass lines right now) preparing. Unfortunately, we didn’t really plan ahead that well for the rehearsal. We all arrived in the park about 8:30, but the rehearsing didn’t start until almost 11. Bad idea when you have 110 kids. I brought books and coloring books (thank God!!), because I realized that if the kids were bored, it was going to be a lot harder to keep things in order. I learned that from my mom; bored kids are obnoxious/trying/bad kids. Another frustration was that two of the international teachers had to leave at 10:30, meaning that we were down two sets of hands. Also, two more international teachers decided they needed to leave at 12 - not really sure why. I think they felt that had too much to do before leaving Cuenca (today, I might add), so they decided to peace out early. Unfortunately, Slocomb and I were the ones who actually had to leave Cuenca yesterday and move the rest of our stuff from the Colomas to downtown. But we got roped into staying longer because the rest of the teachers didn’t want all of the international teachers leaving super early. What really made me mad was the unfairness of it all. I mean, I completely understand that the national teachers wanted us to stay, but it was obnoxious that it was okay for some of the international team to leave and others not too. I guess thats one lesson that I’m learning here in Ecuador: fairness rarely matters in real life. Which is a bummer, because I like fairness. But I’m on vacation now for another three weeks, so I’m not going to think about school.
One last thing about school, actually. We had our Christmas party on Thursday night at the director’s, Ximena’s, house. I think I’ve mentioned that we’ve been having power outages to try to conserve electricity in Cuenca (because all of the power is from hydroelectric sources and there’s not been enough rain to run them as much). Ximena’s power was supposed to be off from four until seven, but the power didn’t come back until almost 8:30!! That’s the first time I’ve heard about that happening; normally the power comes back right on time. Dinner, of course, got delayed as a result, but we just hung out and chatted for the first hour until the power came back. We also finished our secret santa exchange. I had Prisci’s (the first grade teacher) name, and I bought her a pair of silver heart earrings. They were really cute; I was tempted to keep them! Jen had my name, and she got me some earrings with real tiny flowers in them and a beautiful pink and purple scarf. She did a really good job throwing me off of who had my name; every day I got a little present with my name spelled “Lesli” on it (which is how they spell it in Ecuador usually so I assumed it was a national teacher). Very tricky, Jen! Slocomb got a new wallet from his secret santa, but I’ll set him tell you about that.
I guess this is the time for overall first semester impressions. Well, its different, especially the work culture. In the states, all of my work experiences were very supportive of their staff and very quick to solve any problems. In Ecuador, it seems much more like a solve your own problems at work kind of place. Which is fine, and works well for me, except when it comes to things like pay checks (we were almost a week late in getting our December paychecks - which was really hard because we needed to pay for our new apartment, etc). I have learned to be more independent and use the supplies I know I can get for myself fairly easily.
As for Ecuador in general, I have seen that people are very nice and very generous. People actually give money to people begging in the streets and people juggling at traffic lights. But people are also very self-interested. It seems very much like an every person (and family) for his/herself or themselves. In a place where there honestly isn’t enough to go around all of the time, this attitude makes sense. Even thought times are hard right now particularly, Ecuador is prospering. The attitudes just may not have kept up with the prosperity.
Thirdly, it makes a huge difference if you try to speak Spanish and are interested in the culture. When he’s feeling up to it, Slocomb almost always tries to talk to the cab drivers, usually about soccer. And it makes a big difference. If you get a cab driver talking, you usually have a much better cab experience - and sometimes pay less. People in Cuenca stereotype ‘gringos’ frequently, based on their previous experiences with them. And a lot of Americans - or estadounidenses I should say - come to Cuenca to see the sights of a UNESCO world heritage sights. Fewer are like us, who come to live in Cuenca, speak Spanish, and find out a little of what its like to be Cuencano. Yeah, we want to see the sights too, but for Slocomb and myself, the people are the interesting part. And when Cuencanos figure that out, it completely changes their relationship to us. We’re not going to stop being ‘gringos,’ but we have stopped being tourists.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
What's up with us...
I am writing right now from our plane to Galapagos. We got to sit to first/business class somehow; we are actually sitting in the bulkhead seats (row 1) in the front of the plane. Slocomb says its the first time he’s actually been comfortable on a plane.
We left Cuenca last night about 6pm in a full buseta, which meant that it was not nearly as comfortable as the previous two times we had gone to Guayaquil. Then, it was only us on the way to Guayaquil, and only two other people on the way back. Last night, there were five other people in the buseta. One of the guys on the buseta was from Chile, but spoke English very well. He used to work in port management, so that’s where he learned English. But after he found out that we spoke Spanish, we switched to Spanish (my preference because I need to practice!). Its not really offensive when people assume that we don’t speak Spanish; the reward is people’s faces when they realize we do speak Spanish.
Another person on the buseta was a woman from Cuenca who had known some of the CEDEI teachers from years past. She was very talkative (which was helpful for keeping the driver awake) and she did her nails while we were on the buseta. And when I say did her nails, I don’t just mean painted her nails. She glued on French tips, filed, buffed, and painted her nails on the buseta. Surprisingly, there weren’t any fumes (which was nice), and the filing/buffing wasn’t actually that annoying. I think it was because Slocomb and I knew we were on vacation, so the annoyances didn’t bother us. We entertained ourselves by making and eating sandwiches (which the nails woman commented on, saying, “Poor us, we don’t have any food!”) and by watching New Moon on my laptop. We found a bootleg copy (like every movie in Ecuador) that actually was in English. The audio wasn’t perfect, and there were a couple of times that I missed what they were saying, but it was good none the less. Also, hearing bachata and regeton on the radio the entire time might have messed with my listening skills. I still want to go back and see it in theatres again (because there were some moments that just didn’t look good on my little 13 inch screen) and because I kinda feel bad for buying a bootleg copy. Oh, well. When in Rome... one buys bootleg copies of movies...
Last week was a crazy week. It was our last week of school for the year, so we had lots to do. Jen (one of the other international teachers) wanted to help the kids make a nice present for their parents for Christmas, so we helped out with that because it was very labor intensive. We ended up making calendars decorated with the kids’ hand-print art work and also ornament balls with eight sides or so decorated by the kids. They turned out so well, but poor Jen was stressing the whole week trying to get everything done. As it turns out, we didn’t finish, but the national teachers are going to finish them with the kids and give them out next week.
I also had one of my graduate school applications due this week, which I finished and turned in on time, thank you very much. I’m a little worried because only two of the recommendation letters has been turned in, but hopefully my professor is working on it. UCLA (which is due the 15th) also recieved all of the stuff from me, but none of the stuff from my professors. I don’t want to hassle them about it because I know that its a crazy busy time of year. Luckily, the schools say that when the recommendation letters arrive doesn’t really impact whether or not the application is considered ‘on time,’ but I still want those letters to be there before they consider my application. I feel like I am a strong candidate based on my statement, transcript, and GRE scores (which I wish were better, but whatever), but the recommendation letters are a huge deal for applications. Oh, well. Its out of my hands now.
Also last week Slocomb and I found, leased, and moved into a new apartment. We had been thinking about moving for a while because we needed more space and our own space. Living with the Colomas worked out really well because they were able to show us a lot about Cuenca and living in Ecuador, but it was hard for Slocomb and I to go from living independently (with roommates, true) at Emory to being back in someone else’s house. It was a good experience, but four months was enough.
Our new apartment is gorgeous!! Slocomb doesn’t want us to put up pictures on the internet yet because he wants his family to see it first-hand when they come to Ecuador for Christmas. I will put up pictures in a couple weeks though. It is in the middle of town, which is really nice and convenient. It is very close to a lot of shopping, which is a lot easier that at the Colomas, which was at the top of a vicious hill. It was always a pain to walk up the hill with shopping or groceries, but since the new place is in the flat part of town, we don’t have to worry about that. It is on the fifth floor, but there is a new-ish elevator, which was incredible handy while we were moving all of our stuff. The huge advantage on the fifth floor is that we’re up away from a lot of the street noise, and we have an incredible view. From the living room and foyer, there are two walls of windows essentially, so we have an almost 180° view of the north and west sides of the city. To the north, we see the cathedral, which is half a block away. We can see all of the domes (there are three large ones, contrary to what a couple of guidebooks I’ve seen say), and the long wall. To the west, we see a good bit of the city and towards Cajas, the national park. We haven’t gotten to really experience the sunset because its been cloudy all of the evenings we were there, but I have a feeling its going to be a gorgeous one. On the tour that we took with CEDEI at the beginning of our time here, our tour guide took us to Plaza San Francisco and showed us the view of the cathedral of Cuenca (you know, the one you always see on postcards). Well, our view from the apartment is that view but better because we are above the buildings that block the view. It is incredible. The apartment building is just off of the Plaza San Francisco, one of the major open air markets in town. It is very convenient to be able to pop downstairs to buy things. It is very busy during the day, but everything closes up at sundown. There is plenty of light in the Plaza after sundown, but most of the ‘shops’ stay set up, so the view down to the Plaza isn’t really all that pretty. It is very Cuenca, in my opinion. All of the semi-permanent shops where you can (in the day time) find just about anything. It really is a wonderful location.
In our new apartment, we are about three blocks from the building where we take Spanish classes, so we can actually go home for lunch now before classes. We still have to take the bus to school, but I’m pretty sure we can get away with only taking one now instead of two (saving us about $20 a month). There’s a washer and dryer in the apartment, so that is really nice. And the owner of the hostal upstairs has offered to let us use the wi-fi for no charge!! We’ve had some problems with the hot water heater and dryer, but hopefully we can get those worked out soon. The hot water heater overflowed on Thursday when we turned it on for the first extended period of time. There was water all over the kitchen and into one of the bedrooms, which of course is carpeted. Our apartment kinda has that wet dog smell right now, but Slocomb is going to get some air fresheners and maybe a fan when he gets back from Galapagos on the 18th. Also, the dryer wasn’t blowing hot air the other day. We’re not sure if this is because the hot air runs on gas (because we turned the gas off after the hot water heater funness), or something else. Our landlord is going to bring in a technician to check it all out soon. And everything will be functional when Slocomb’s family arrives on the 26th. Or else...
We got the keys to the apartment on Tuesday, and moved all of our stuff on Thursday and Friday. Things are still very disorganized, but Slocomb is going to take care of a lot of the stuff when he goes back to Cuenca. And then when I get back after new year, we can finish putting everything together. Setting up an apartment takes a long time, especially when one of the inhabitants is going to be gone for almost three weeks. But it’s something very exciting to come back to.
At school this week, we spent a lot of time preparing for the special Christmas pageant that took place last night. Slocomb and I had to miss it because we had to leave for Guayaquil, but we did get to see the rehearsal yesterday. The whole school day yesterday was spent in the park (and I forgot my sunscreen, so I have intense sunglass lines right now) preparing. Unfortunately, we didn’t really plan ahead that well for the rehearsal. We all arrived in the park about 8:30, but the rehearsing didn’t start until almost 11. Bad idea when you have 110 kids. I brought books and coloring books (thank God!!), because I realized that if the kids were bored, it was going to be a lot harder to keep things in order. I learned that from my mom; bored kids are obnoxious/trying/bad kids. Another frustration was that two of the international teachers had to leave at 10:30, meaning that we were down two sets of hands. Also, two more international teachers decided they needed to leave at 12 - not really sure why. I think they felt that had too much to do before leaving Cuenca (today, I might add), so they decided to peace out early. Unfortunately, Slocomb and I were the ones who actually had to leave Cuenca yesterday and move the rest of our stuff from the Colomas to downtown. But we got roped into staying longer because the rest of the teachers didn’t want all of the international teachers leaving super early. What really made me mad was the unfairness of it all. I mean, I completely understand that the national teachers wanted us to stay, but it was obnoxious that it was okay for some of the international team to leave and others not too. I guess thats one lesson that I’m learning here in Ecuador: fairness rarely matters in real life. Which is a bummer, because I like fairness. But I’m on vacation now for another three weeks, so I’m not going to think about school.
One last thing about school, actually. We had our Christmas party on Thursday night at the director’s, Ximena’s, house. I think I’ve mentioned that we’ve been having power outages to try to conserve electricity in Cuenca (because all of the power is from hydroelectric sources and there’s not been enough rain to run them as much). Ximena’s power was supposed to be off from four until seven, but the power didn’t come back until almost 8:30!! That’s the first time I’ve heard about that happening; normally the power comes back right on time. Dinner, of course, got delayed as a result, but we just hung out and chatted for the first hour until the power came back. We also finished our secret santa exchange. I had Prisci’s (the first grade teacher) name, and I bought her a pair of silver heart earrings. They were really cute; I was tempted to keep them! Jen had my name, and she got me some earrings with real tiny flowers in them and a beautiful pink and purple scarf. She did a really good job throwing me off of who had my name; every day I got a little present with my name spelled “Lesli” on it (which is how they spell it in Ecuador usually so I assumed it was a national teacher). Very tricky, Jen! Slocomb got a new wallet from his secret santa, but I’ll set him tell you about that.
I guess this is the time for overall first semester impressions. Well, its different, especially the work culture. In the states, all of my work experiences were very supportive of their staff and very quick to solve any problems. In Ecuador, it seems much more like a solve your own problems at work kind of place. Which is fine, and works well for me, except when it comes to things like pay checks (we were almost a week late in getting our December paychecks - which was really hard because we needed to pay for our new apartment, etc). I have learned to be more independent and use the supplies I know I can get for myself fairly easily.
As for Ecuador in general, I have seen that people are very nice and very generous. People actually give money to people begging in the streets and people juggling at traffic lights. But people are also very self-interested. It seems very much like an every person (and family) for his/herself or themselves. In a place where there honestly isn’t enough to go around all of the time, this attitude makes sense. Even thought times are hard right now particularly, Ecuador is prospering. The attitudes just may not have kept up with the prosperity.
Thirdly, it makes a huge difference if you try to speak Spanish and are interested in the culture. When he’s feeling up to it, Slocomb almost always tries to talk to the cab drivers, usually about soccer. And it makes a big difference. If you get a cab driver talking, you usually have a much better cab experience - and sometimes pay less. People in Cuenca stereotype ‘gringos’ frequently, based on their previous experiences with them. And a lot of Americans - or estadounidenses I should say - come to Cuenca to see the sights of a UNESCO world heritage sights. Fewer are like us, who come to live in Cuenca, speak Spanish, and find out a little of what its like to be Cuencano. Yeah, we want to see the sights too, but for Slocomb and myself, the people are the interesting part. And when Cuencanos figure that out, it completely changes their relationship to us. We’re not going to stop being ‘gringos,’ but we have stopped being tourists.
We left Cuenca last night about 6pm in a full buseta, which meant that it was not nearly as comfortable as the previous two times we had gone to Guayaquil. Then, it was only us on the way to Guayaquil, and only two other people on the way back. Last night, there were five other people in the buseta. One of the guys on the buseta was from Chile, but spoke English very well. He used to work in port management, so that’s where he learned English. But after he found out that we spoke Spanish, we switched to Spanish (my preference because I need to practice!). Its not really offensive when people assume that we don’t speak Spanish; the reward is people’s faces when they realize we do speak Spanish.
Another person on the buseta was a woman from Cuenca who had known some of the CEDEI teachers from years past. She was very talkative (which was helpful for keeping the driver awake) and she did her nails while we were on the buseta. And when I say did her nails, I don’t just mean painted her nails. She glued on French tips, filed, buffed, and painted her nails on the buseta. Surprisingly, there weren’t any fumes (which was nice), and the filing/buffing wasn’t actually that annoying. I think it was because Slocomb and I knew we were on vacation, so the annoyances didn’t bother us. We entertained ourselves by making and eating sandwiches (which the nails woman commented on, saying, “Poor us, we don’t have any food!”) and by watching New Moon on my laptop. We found a bootleg copy (like every movie in Ecuador) that actually was in English. The audio wasn’t perfect, and there were a couple of times that I missed what they were saying, but it was good none the less. Also, hearing bachata and regeton on the radio the entire time might have messed with my listening skills. I still want to go back and see it in theatres again (because there were some moments that just didn’t look good on my little 13 inch screen) and because I kinda feel bad for buying a bootleg copy. Oh, well. When in Rome... one buys bootleg copies of movies...
Last week was a crazy week. It was our last week of school for the year, so we had lots to do. Jen (one of the other international teachers) wanted to help the kids make a nice present for their parents for Christmas, so we helped out with that because it was very labor intensive. We ended up making calendars decorated with the kids’ hand-print art work and also ornament balls with eight sides or so decorated by the kids. They turned out so well, but poor Jen was stressing the whole week trying to get everything done. As it turns out, we didn’t finish, but the national teachers are going to finish them with the kids and give them out next week.
I also had one of my graduate school applications due this week, which I finished and turned in on time, thank you very much. I’m a little worried because only two of the recommendation letters has been turned in, but hopefully my professor is working on it. UCLA (which is due the 15th) also recieved all of the stuff from me, but none of the stuff from my professors. I don’t want to hassle them about it because I know that its a crazy busy time of year. Luckily, the schools say that when the recommendation letters arrive doesn’t really impact whether or not the application is considered ‘on time,’ but I still want those letters to be there before they consider my application. I feel like I am a strong candidate based on my statement, transcript, and GRE scores (which I wish were better, but whatever), but the recommendation letters are a huge deal for applications. Oh, well. Its out of my hands now.
Also last week Slocomb and I found, leased, and moved into a new apartment. We had been thinking about moving for a while because we needed more space and our own space. Living with the Colomas worked out really well because they were able to show us a lot about Cuenca and living in Ecuador, but it was hard for Slocomb and I to go from living independently (with roommates, true) at Emory to being back in someone else’s house. It was a good experience, but four months was enough.
Our new apartment is gorgeous!! Slocomb doesn’t want us to put up pictures on the internet yet because he wants his family to see it first-hand when they come to Ecuador for Christmas. I will put up pictures in a couple weeks though. It is in the middle of town, which is really nice and convenient. It is very close to a lot of shopping, which is a lot easier that at the Colomas, which was at the top of a vicious hill. It was always a pain to walk up the hill with shopping or groceries, but since the new place is in the flat part of town, we don’t have to worry about that. It is on the fifth floor, but there is a new-ish elevator, which was incredible handy while we were moving all of our stuff. The huge advantage on the fifth floor is that we’re up away from a lot of the street noise, and we have an incredible view. From the living room and foyer, there are two walls of windows essentially, so we have an almost 180° view of the north and west sides of the city. To the north, we see the cathedral, which is half a block away. We can see all of the domes (there are three large ones, contrary to what a couple of guidebooks I’ve seen say), and the long wall. To the west, we see a good bit of the city and towards Cajas, the national park. We haven’t gotten to really experience the sunset because its been cloudy all of the evenings we were there, but I have a feeling its going to be a gorgeous one. On the tour that we took with CEDEI at the beginning of our time here, our tour guide took us to Plaza San Francisco and showed us the view of the cathedral of Cuenca (you know, the one you always see on postcards). Well, our view from the apartment is that view but better because we are above the buildings that block the view. It is incredible. The apartment building is just off of the Plaza San Francisco, one of the major open air markets in town. It is very convenient to be able to pop downstairs to buy things. It is very busy during the day, but everything closes up at sundown. There is plenty of light in the Plaza after sundown, but most of the ‘shops’ stay set up, so the view down to the Plaza isn’t really all that pretty. It is very Cuenca, in my opinion. All of the semi-permanent shops where you can (in the day time) find just about anything. It really is a wonderful location.
In our new apartment, we are about three blocks from the building where we take Spanish classes, so we can actually go home for lunch now before classes. We still have to take the bus to school, but I’m pretty sure we can get away with only taking one now instead of two (saving us about $20 a month). There’s a washer and dryer in the apartment, so that is really nice. And the owner of the hostal upstairs has offered to let us use the wi-fi for no charge!! We’ve had some problems with the hot water heater and dryer, but hopefully we can get those worked out soon. The hot water heater overflowed on Thursday when we turned it on for the first extended period of time. There was water all over the kitchen and into one of the bedrooms, which of course is carpeted. Our apartment kinda has that wet dog smell right now, but Slocomb is going to get some air fresheners and maybe a fan when he gets back from Galapagos on the 18th. Also, the dryer wasn’t blowing hot air the other day. We’re not sure if this is because the hot air runs on gas (because we turned the gas off after the hot water heater funness), or something else. Our landlord is going to bring in a technician to check it all out soon. And everything will be functional when Slocomb’s family arrives on the 26th. Or else...
We got the keys to the apartment on Tuesday, and moved all of our stuff on Thursday and Friday. Things are still very disorganized, but Slocomb is going to take care of a lot of the stuff when he goes back to Cuenca. And then when I get back after new year, we can finish putting everything together. Setting up an apartment takes a long time, especially when one of the inhabitants is going to be gone for almost three weeks. But it’s something very exciting to come back to.
At school this week, we spent a lot of time preparing for the special Christmas pageant that took place last night. Slocomb and I had to miss it because we had to leave for Guayaquil, but we did get to see the rehearsal yesterday. The whole school day yesterday was spent in the park (and I forgot my sunscreen, so I have intense sunglass lines right now) preparing. Unfortunately, we didn’t really plan ahead that well for the rehearsal. We all arrived in the park about 8:30, but the rehearsing didn’t start until almost 11. Bad idea when you have 110 kids. I brought books and coloring books (thank God!!), because I realized that if the kids were bored, it was going to be a lot harder to keep things in order. I learned that from my mom; bored kids are obnoxious/trying/bad kids. Another frustration was that two of the international teachers had to leave at 10:30, meaning that we were down two sets of hands. Also, two more international teachers decided they needed to leave at 12 - not really sure why. I think they felt that had too much to do before leaving Cuenca (today, I might add), so they decided to peace out early. Unfortunately, Slocomb and I were the ones who actually had to leave Cuenca yesterday and move the rest of our stuff from the Colomas to downtown. But we got roped into staying longer because the rest of the teachers didn’t want all of the international teachers leaving super early. What really made me mad was the unfairness of it all. I mean, I completely understand that the national teachers wanted us to stay, but it was obnoxious that it was okay for some of the international team to leave and others not too. I guess thats one lesson that I’m learning here in Ecuador: fairness rarely matters in real life. Which is a bummer, because I like fairness. But I’m on vacation now for another three weeks, so I’m not going to think about school.
One last thing about school, actually. We had our Christmas party on Thursday night at the director’s, Ximena’s, house. I think I’ve mentioned that we’ve been having power outages to try to conserve electricity in Cuenca (because all of the power is from hydroelectric sources and there’s not been enough rain to run them as much). Ximena’s power was supposed to be off from four until seven, but the power didn’t come back until almost 8:30!! That’s the first time I’ve heard about that happening; normally the power comes back right on time. Dinner, of course, got delayed as a result, but we just hung out and chatted for the first hour until the power came back. We also finished our secret santa exchange. I had Prisci’s (the first grade teacher) name, and I bought her a pair of silver heart earrings. They were really cute; I was tempted to keep them! Jen had my name, and she got me some earrings with real tiny flowers in them and a beautiful pink and purple scarf. She did a really good job throwing me off of who had my name; every day I got a little present with my name spelled “Lesli” on it (which is how they spell it in Ecuador usually so I assumed it was a national teacher). Very tricky, Jen! Slocomb got a new wallet from his secret santa, but I’ll set him tell you about that.
I guess this is the time for overall first semester impressions. Well, its different, especially the work culture. In the states, all of my work experiences were very supportive of their staff and very quick to solve any problems. In Ecuador, it seems much more like a solve your own problems at work kind of place. Which is fine, and works well for me, except when it comes to things like pay checks (we were almost a week late in getting our December paychecks - which was really hard because we needed to pay for our new apartment, etc). I have learned to be more independent and use the supplies I know I can get for myself fairly easily.
As for Ecuador in general, I have seen that people are very nice and very generous. People actually give money to people begging in the streets and people juggling at traffic lights. But people are also very self-interested. It seems very much like an every person (and family) for his/herself or themselves. In a place where there honestly isn’t enough to go around all of the time, this attitude makes sense. Even thought times are hard right now particularly, Ecuador is prospering. The attitudes just may not have kept up with the prosperity.
Thirdly, it makes a huge difference if you try to speak Spanish and are interested in the culture. When he’s feeling up to it, Slocomb almost always tries to talk to the cab drivers, usually about soccer. And it makes a big difference. If you get a cab driver talking, you usually have a much better cab experience - and sometimes pay less. People in Cuenca stereotype ‘gringos’ frequently, based on their previous experiences with them. And a lot of Americans - or estadounidenses I should say - come to Cuenca to see the sights of a UNESCO world heritage sights. Fewer are like us, who come to live in Cuenca, speak Spanish, and find out a little of what its like to be Cuencano. Yeah, we want to see the sights too, but for Slocomb and myself, the people are the interesting part. And when Cuencanos figure that out, it completely changes their relationship to us. We’re not going to stop being ‘gringos,’ but we have stopped being tourists.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Slacking...
Obviously, I have been slacking on blogging, but here's a link to my photos from Otavalo.
Otavalo photos
We went there last weekend to celebrate my birthday and to shop for Christmas presents at the famous market.
More details to come later... When I finish my grad school applications...
Otavalo photos
We went there last weekend to celebrate my birthday and to shop for Christmas presents at the famous market.
More details to come later... When I finish my grad school applications...
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Catching up...
(FYI, This was supposed to be posted on the 12th, but the internet has been really sketchy the past few weeks)
Okay, so I’ve been slacking on the blogging recently, and I’m sorry. We’ve had a lot of things going on these past few weeks (including me starting grad school applications), so I haven’t had much time to write. But here goes my attempt to make up for it.
Another note, we went to the beach two weekends ago, but I’ll write about that trip in a separate post.
Things in Cuenca
Ecuadorians have a special food tradition for All Saint's Day, which of course was November 1. All over the country people make and eat "Guaguas de Pan" (bread babies in a mixure of Spanish and Quichua) and Colada Morada (or Purple colada).
The babies kinda reminded me of king cake at Epiphany/Mardi Gras, and the Colada was amazing! It was made from all different kind of fruits and is really complicated apparently. I'll have to try to find a recipe and make it, but a lot of the fruits can't be found outside Ecuador. Bummer...
November 3 is the celebration of the Independence of Cuenca, so there was a lot going on that weekend. We went out of town (to the beach... see other post to come) for most of the weekend, but we did get to see President Correa speak and some of the festivities on Tuesday night, including dancing and singing and lots of traditional Ecuadorian celebrations. It was the most tame celebration, because everyone had to go to work the next day. Apparently Thursday through Monday nights were pretty crazy in Cuenca, but we were out of town, so we had no idea.
Last weekend we mainly hung around town, washing clothes and doing other chores. Sunday for lunch we to Paute (a town about an hour and a half by bus from Cuenca) because they supposedly have the best hornado in the area. Hornado is essentially just pulled pork - and they pull it off the pig right in front of you. It was really good, but I think mainly because of the sauce - tomatoes, onions, and cilantro in vinegar. Hornado is also traditionally served with llapingachos, which are pretty much just fried mashed potato cakes. So good...
The bus ride to Paute was one of the more interesting aspects of the trip. In Cuenca, people are generally used to Americas (or white people) being around, so they might stare at you a little but not too much. However, I guess the people on the bus to Paute had never seen a white person before, ever. They stared at Slocomb and me like we had lobsters crawling out of our ears (to quote one of my favorite movies - A Christmas Story). It was quite uncomfortable. Also, the bus stopped about every 10 minutes or so to pick people up or drop people off on the way to Paute. It was weird because most of the people that got on after we left Cuenca stood in the aisle. Slocomb and I have learned to prefer the back of the buses because people are less likely to stand back there.
We finally got our uniforms for school on Friday, so I’m very excited about that. I don’t have any pictures yet, but it is essentially a black track suit with aqua sleeves and accents. We also have a grey t-shirt (i bought two) and polo shirt. I’m excited because it means I don’t have to wear my own clothes to school every day. At least two days a week, I have something else to wear!
Friday night we had dance class where Slocomb and I worked some more on dancing together. We essentially have a private class because none of the other international teachers want to take dance classes. We’re working on the meringue right now before moving on to salsa. Slocomb and I still need to work a lot more on our dancing because we have very different styles of dancing. Mine is mostly influenced by the ballet classes I took when I was young, meaning that I take small steps and try to be very light on my feet. Slocomb on the other hand played basketball when he was young, so he’s good with the footwork, but not so good with the artistry of dance. And then there’s the problem that I don’t exactly like to follow... but we’re working through that. Hopefully this week we’ll get some time to practice...
Party bus/tour (and aborted trip Thursday)
Saturday morning I went to a birthday party for one of my students. Apparently, he specifically asked that I and the national kindergarten teacher, Vero, come to the party. I was actually very honored, so I decided to go. Turns out that it was a good thing because there were about 40 kids there and only the birthday boy’s parent and grandparents in addition to a couple of teachers. Also, there is a new student in the kindergarten class who only speaks English, so I spent most of the time with him (since I was the only adult who spoke English). We all went to a movie - The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - and then to KFC for a small snack and cake. The movie was in Spanish, but either my Spanish has gotten really good (unlikely) or TMNT is the same in any language (more likely). It ended up being sort of like another day at school in that I was supervising lots of kids, but it was a lot better because I didn’t have to try to teach anything or be in charge. It was also fun to see my students in their ‘natural environment’ - meaning not in a classroom.
Today we went to the international food fair at the Mall del Río. They had food from all over, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Spain, Taiwan, Japan, and a bunch of other places. Interestingly, the United States table was all desserts. A lot of people think that there’s no such thing as traditional American food, but they could have had hamburgers or hotdogs or (even better) turkey and dressing and other sorts of Thanksgiving foods. Either than or the American-Eucadorians have figured out why Americans have such weight problems - the really traditional American foods are all cakes and pies!
We ended up spending a good bit (on Ecuadorian standards - $16) on food there, and everything was good except the paella. I didn’t think that it was that bad, but Slocomb (having lived in Spain and having eaten lots of real paella) thought it was gross. But it was a fundraiser for the cancer society, so it was worth it.
We walked around the mall a little bit afterwards, and it was all very similar to American malls (including the prices...). There weren’t any stores specifically that I recognized, but it was mostly clothes and toys and other quasi-luxury items. I don’t really plan on shopping there, but it was interesting to see.
After the mall, we went up to the University of Cuenca to meet up with some of our co-workers to play racquetball. Slocomb played with Pepe and Jonathan (who apparently used to play competitively)... Pepe is sick, so he was dragging a little bit, and it was only Slocomb’s second time playing racquetball ever, so Jonathan pretty much cleaned the floor with them. But its really good exercise and its always nice to hang out with our Cuencano friends.
I went swimming while the guys were playing racquetball. I only swam about 1200m - not a whole lot for me, but considering that I haven’t worked out really at all since we got to Ecuador, it was pretty good. Towards the end of my workout, there were these guys, probably about 20-ish who got in the pool and were horseplaying like crazy. The first indication of trouble was that they all dove into the 4-foot pool. Not smart. And then they were just swimming across the pool the short way (so opposite the lap swimmers) and getting in people’s way. One actually ran straight into me while I was swimming a lap. So I decided to intimidate them a little and swim a few lengths of butterfly (the international don’t mess with me stroke). They left me alone after that, and one of the other patrons told me that I was a very good swimmer. I haven’t really thought of myself as a good swimmer since I got to college because I’ve always been surrounded by friends who are better than I am (and working out with some of the swim team was bound to give me a complex), but I was definitely the best swimmer in the pool today. While it seems like a good few people swim for exercise, it was clear that no one had ever swam competitively. I guess when there are only one or two lap-sized pools in the city, swim team becomes somewhat impossible. Just an interesting cultural thing - in a town where people could definitely afford to participate in competitive swimming, they all pretty much prefer to play soccer. I wonder if I could make some money on the side teaching swimming... Not that I have the time...
That’s pretty much all that’s been going on recently in Cuenca. We also went to Playas during the long Fiestas de Cuenca weekend, but I’ll write about that in a separate post. We are also planning a trip to Otavalo (north of Quito - actually in the northern hemisphere) for my birthday in a couple of weeks. And we’re planning to have a big Thanksgiving party for our co-workers, mainly because I want to have Thanksgiving food and the only way I’m going to get it is to fix it! So lots of fun things coming up.
Funny kid story to make you laugh: There is this one preschooler who loves drinking water. Like loves it. If there’s not a cup handy, he will put his mouth straight onto the spigot out of the big 5 gallon jug and drink it that way (gross - and I’m trying to work on this habit with him). The consequence of him drinking all of this water is that he has to pee all of the time. So one time last week, he had a cup in his hand (probably because he had just had a bunch of water) and was literally 3 feet from the bathroom when he realized he had to go. I guess he didn’t think he could make it (or wasn’t aware how close he was to the bathroom), so I ended up catching him peeing into the drinking cup. I helped him to the bathroom and made him pour out the contents of his cup, but while I was flushing, he was already back at the water jug filling the cup up again!!! So I took the cup away and tried to explain to him that he couldn’t drink out of the cup that he had just peed into. He was quite skeptical of my hygienic suggestions, but he was okay once I got him a new cup. Lord only knows what he did with the new cup. Sometimes these kids crack me up...
Okay, so I’ve been slacking on the blogging recently, and I’m sorry. We’ve had a lot of things going on these past few weeks (including me starting grad school applications), so I haven’t had much time to write. But here goes my attempt to make up for it.
Another note, we went to the beach two weekends ago, but I’ll write about that trip in a separate post.
Things in Cuenca
Ecuadorians have a special food tradition for All Saint's Day, which of course was November 1. All over the country people make and eat "Guaguas de Pan" (bread babies in a mixure of Spanish and Quichua) and Colada Morada (or Purple colada).
The babies kinda reminded me of king cake at Epiphany/Mardi Gras, and the Colada was amazing! It was made from all different kind of fruits and is really complicated apparently. I'll have to try to find a recipe and make it, but a lot of the fruits can't be found outside Ecuador. Bummer...November 3 is the celebration of the Independence of Cuenca, so there was a lot going on that weekend. We went out of town (to the beach... see other post to come) for most of the weekend, but we did get to see President Correa speak and some of the festivities on Tuesday night, including dancing and singing and lots of traditional Ecuadorian celebrations. It was the most tame celebration, because everyone had to go to work the next day. Apparently Thursday through Monday nights were pretty crazy in Cuenca, but we were out of town, so we had no idea.
Last weekend we mainly hung around town, washing clothes and doing other chores. Sunday for lunch we to Paute (a town about an hour and a half by bus from Cuenca) because they supposedly have the best hornado in the area. Hornado is essentially just pulled pork - and they pull it off the pig right in front of you. It was really good, but I think mainly because of the sauce - tomatoes, onions, and cilantro in vinegar. Hornado is also traditionally served with llapingachos, which are pretty much just fried mashed potato cakes. So good...
The bus ride to Paute was one of the more interesting aspects of the trip. In Cuenca, people are generally used to Americas (or white people) being around, so they might stare at you a little but not too much. However, I guess the people on the bus to Paute had never seen a white person before, ever. They stared at Slocomb and me like we had lobsters crawling out of our ears (to quote one of my favorite movies - A Christmas Story). It was quite uncomfortable. Also, the bus stopped about every 10 minutes or so to pick people up or drop people off on the way to Paute. It was weird because most of the people that got on after we left Cuenca stood in the aisle. Slocomb and I have learned to prefer the back of the buses because people are less likely to stand back there.
We finally got our uniforms for school on Friday, so I’m very excited about that. I don’t have any pictures yet, but it is essentially a black track suit with aqua sleeves and accents. We also have a grey t-shirt (i bought two) and polo shirt. I’m excited because it means I don’t have to wear my own clothes to school every day. At least two days a week, I have something else to wear!
Friday night we had dance class where Slocomb and I worked some more on dancing together. We essentially have a private class because none of the other international teachers want to take dance classes. We’re working on the meringue right now before moving on to salsa. Slocomb and I still need to work a lot more on our dancing because we have very different styles of dancing. Mine is mostly influenced by the ballet classes I took when I was young, meaning that I take small steps and try to be very light on my feet. Slocomb on the other hand played basketball when he was young, so he’s good with the footwork, but not so good with the artistry of dance. And then there’s the problem that I don’t exactly like to follow... but we’re working through that. Hopefully this week we’ll get some time to practice...
Party bus/tour (and aborted trip Thursday)
Saturday morning I went to a birthday party for one of my students. Apparently, he specifically asked that I and the national kindergarten teacher, Vero, come to the party. I was actually very honored, so I decided to go. Turns out that it was a good thing because there were about 40 kids there and only the birthday boy’s parent and grandparents in addition to a couple of teachers. Also, there is a new student in the kindergarten class who only speaks English, so I spent most of the time with him (since I was the only adult who spoke English). We all went to a movie - The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - and then to KFC for a small snack and cake. The movie was in Spanish, but either my Spanish has gotten really good (unlikely) or TMNT is the same in any language (more likely). It ended up being sort of like another day at school in that I was supervising lots of kids, but it was a lot better because I didn’t have to try to teach anything or be in charge. It was also fun to see my students in their ‘natural environment’ - meaning not in a classroom.
Today we went to the international food fair at the Mall del Río. They had food from all over, Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Spain, Taiwan, Japan, and a bunch of other places. Interestingly, the United States table was all desserts. A lot of people think that there’s no such thing as traditional American food, but they could have had hamburgers or hotdogs or (even better) turkey and dressing and other sorts of Thanksgiving foods. Either than or the American-Eucadorians have figured out why Americans have such weight problems - the really traditional American foods are all cakes and pies!
We ended up spending a good bit (on Ecuadorian standards - $16) on food there, and everything was good except the paella. I didn’t think that it was that bad, but Slocomb (having lived in Spain and having eaten lots of real paella) thought it was gross. But it was a fundraiser for the cancer society, so it was worth it.
We walked around the mall a little bit afterwards, and it was all very similar to American malls (including the prices...). There weren’t any stores specifically that I recognized, but it was mostly clothes and toys and other quasi-luxury items. I don’t really plan on shopping there, but it was interesting to see.
After the mall, we went up to the University of Cuenca to meet up with some of our co-workers to play racquetball. Slocomb played with Pepe and Jonathan (who apparently used to play competitively)... Pepe is sick, so he was dragging a little bit, and it was only Slocomb’s second time playing racquetball ever, so Jonathan pretty much cleaned the floor with them. But its really good exercise and its always nice to hang out with our Cuencano friends.
I went swimming while the guys were playing racquetball. I only swam about 1200m - not a whole lot for me, but considering that I haven’t worked out really at all since we got to Ecuador, it was pretty good. Towards the end of my workout, there were these guys, probably about 20-ish who got in the pool and were horseplaying like crazy. The first indication of trouble was that they all dove into the 4-foot pool. Not smart. And then they were just swimming across the pool the short way (so opposite the lap swimmers) and getting in people’s way. One actually ran straight into me while I was swimming a lap. So I decided to intimidate them a little and swim a few lengths of butterfly (the international don’t mess with me stroke). They left me alone after that, and one of the other patrons told me that I was a very good swimmer. I haven’t really thought of myself as a good swimmer since I got to college because I’ve always been surrounded by friends who are better than I am (and working out with some of the swim team was bound to give me a complex), but I was definitely the best swimmer in the pool today. While it seems like a good few people swim for exercise, it was clear that no one had ever swam competitively. I guess when there are only one or two lap-sized pools in the city, swim team becomes somewhat impossible. Just an interesting cultural thing - in a town where people could definitely afford to participate in competitive swimming, they all pretty much prefer to play soccer. I wonder if I could make some money on the side teaching swimming... Not that I have the time...
That’s pretty much all that’s been going on recently in Cuenca. We also went to Playas during the long Fiestas de Cuenca weekend, but I’ll write about that in a separate post. We are also planning a trip to Otavalo (north of Quito - actually in the northern hemisphere) for my birthday in a couple of weeks. And we’re planning to have a big Thanksgiving party for our co-workers, mainly because I want to have Thanksgiving food and the only way I’m going to get it is to fix it! So lots of fun things coming up.
Funny kid story to make you laugh: There is this one preschooler who loves drinking water. Like loves it. If there’s not a cup handy, he will put his mouth straight onto the spigot out of the big 5 gallon jug and drink it that way (gross - and I’m trying to work on this habit with him). The consequence of him drinking all of this water is that he has to pee all of the time. So one time last week, he had a cup in his hand (probably because he had just had a bunch of water) and was literally 3 feet from the bathroom when he realized he had to go. I guess he didn’t think he could make it (or wasn’t aware how close he was to the bathroom), so I ended up catching him peeing into the drinking cup. I helped him to the bathroom and made him pour out the contents of his cup, but while I was flushing, he was already back at the water jug filling the cup up again!!! So I took the cup away and tried to explain to him that he couldn’t drink out of the cup that he had just peed into. He was quite skeptical of my hygienic suggestions, but he was okay once I got him a new cup. Lord only knows what he did with the new cup. Sometimes these kids crack me up...
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Anecdotes from the weekend...
What has come to pass... Since last time...I guess I’ll start from last Friday. That was the next eventful thing. Friday night Slocomb and I went to a Deportiva Cuenca soccer game with our friend Jonatan from school. We sat in the Tribuna section (meaning better than general admission but not super expensive), which meant that we were under the roof. It turned out to be a semi-cold evening, so I was glad we were sheilded from the wind. Before the game, Jonatan introduced us to a yummy burger place across from the stadium, so it was a very productive trip out.
The game was played against a team called Olmedo. I think that they are from near Quito, but I’m not sure. Every year in Ecuador, they play a tournament called the Cuadrandulares (groups of four - there are two groups of four). This game was the final of DC’s quadrangle, so they are getting to play the winner of the other quadrangle for the championship (this Sunday, I think). Anyway, it was a pretty important game. DC scored early in the first half, but right before the half, Olmedo scored. DC was awarded a penalty shot (which they made) in about the 75th minute, and Olmedo wasn’t able to recover, so DC won 2-1. Part of the reason that Olmedo wasn’t able to recover was because they were given two red cards (meaning that by the end of the game, Olmedo was playing with 9 players instead of the usual 11) and about 9 yellow cards (warnings). DC got two yellow cards as well, but no reds. DC also just out-played Olmedo. DC kept possession for most of the game, meaning that the goalie was on the other side of the field by himself, doing calethenics to keep warm! It was pretty funny to see that and it was a fun game to watch.
After the game, we met up with some of our other friends from school to go out for a little while. We walked from the stadium to the place we were meeting them, meaning that we walked a long way down Calle Larga where all of the clubs are. It was interesting because there were tons of people just outside on the street socializing and whatnot. Nothing sketchy going on; just a very vibrant street.
We went out with the student teachers from the University of Whitewater as well as Pepé, the music teacher. Jenn and one of her friends met up with us later too. When we got to the first club, they wanted us to pay a $5 cover and buy two drinks in addition. So, essentially it was a $10 cover. Not a big deal in the States, but when you only make $16 a day, a $10 cover is a bit expensive. So we went to this other place that we like, Once. But when we got there, they said they were having a private party. Pepé and all of the girls gave the bouncer a sad face, so he let us in. So we spent a few hours at Once, relaxing and hanging out. And the best part was that for 9 people, the bill was only $37. Woot.
This weekend we just hung out and did almost nothing. Which was really nice. We did some laundry and I cooked some chili. We did go out Sunday afternoon for lunch and to find some information about the biennial exhibition that’s going on in Cuenca right now (its pretty much just a huge art show). We normally don’t go into town on Sundays, and apparently no one else does either! The downtown was practically deserted! And we had to really search for a place to eat lunch because almost everything was closed. We ended up eating at this touristy place on the main square. It was pretty nice because they served traditional-ish Ecuadorian food but in a way more palatable to tourists than going to the market to buy the stuff. If I were just traveling to Cuenca, I would probably feel comfortable eating Ecuadorian food there. But since I live here, I’ll just buy it at the market for a quarter as expensive!
Yesterday was a long day. One of the national teachers at the school is out sick with and infection of some kind, so I spent a good bit of the day in her classroom helping out the student teacher. And I was back in that classroom today because Tami is still sick. Even though it is hard to be in the class all day with almost no break, it was really good because I think the boys in the class got a lot more used to having me around. I may try to be around more often just because it makes the class more responsive to me when I’m trying to teach if I been around not trying to teach.
One of the other teachers asked me today why I was spending so much time in the preschool classroom. I told her that because the national teacher was gone, I felt like it was our job as international teachers (meaning not in a classroom all of the time anyway) to step up and help out. I look at is as a team effort and also a reciprocal one. I have vacation days that I plan to take full advantage of and (maybe) some sick days too. So I hope that the other teachers will be able to help me out. In return, I’ll help them out when they are gone for one reason or another. The teacher I was talking to didn’t understand why I was inconveniencing myself for something that wasn’t strickly my job. I guess we just have a different understanding of what’s part of our jobs. Which is really frustrating. True, no one asked me to spend extra time in that classroom. But since I’m expecting them (the national teachers) to help me, I am obliged to help them. Also, I feel like the national teachers work really hard to start with. They are in the classroom for the whole day, while the international team only has an average of two or three teaching hours a day. And we have built in vacation days (which the national teachers don’t). So I feel in all fairness, we should pick up the slack when necessary. Anyway, rant about work ethic over.
Yesterday afternoon we went to one of our favorite restaurants in town, Moliendo Cafe. Not only do they have really good food, but they have wonderful Columbian coffee. And in a country where Nescafe is pretty much what people drink, real brewed coffee is an amazing treat. My Spanish class yesterday didn’t go very well (because everyone was tired and it was all about irregular verbs - uuggghhh), but its all good. I have class again tomorrow, so hopefully we’ll all have more energy.
Today we went to a Cuban restaurant next to the building where Slocomb and I have class. Its mainly just a burger kind of place, but the burgers were really good. They also have batidos (essentially fruit milkshakes that are very common in the Carribbean), which Slocomb says taste like real Carribbean batidos. Not sure how Slocomb knows what they’re supposed to taste like (except that he has a Cuban friend or two)... but whatever. We got to talking with the owner (well, Slocomb got to talking to the owner because I couldn’t understand his Spanish at all), and his is one of those really sad immigration stories. I don’t how when he moved to Ecuador, but he owns a restaurant, so its obviously been a good bit of time. But his family (wife and children) are still in Cuba trying to emigrate. He told us that on Sundays, when everything is closed and people spend time with their families, he just sits at home buy himself. And the saddest part is that his wife just had a baby. Back in Cuba. Anyway, Slocomb and I plan to go back to the restaurant (especially for the batidos). I’m hoping that we can become friends with him and spend time with him on Sundays so that he’s not all alone thinking about his family far away.
Anyway, on a happier note, Slocomb and I are going to Las Playas (a beach town about 5 hours away) this weekend. We have Monday and Tuesday off of school for the celebration of Cuenca’s independence (in 1820), so we’re going on Sunday and coming back Tuesday in time for the huge fireworks display planned). Anyway, here’s hoping we don’t get too sunburned.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Cajas
This past weekend, Slocomb and I went with some of the CEDEI study abroad students as well as the student teachers from Wisconsin to camp in Cajas, the national park about 30km west of Cuenca.
We started out Saturday morning (with a frustrating attempt to get a taxi - Slocomb called for one and since they have our phone number, they sent it to our house instead of the place where we were meeting Kelli and Johanna, the student teachers) a little late. But we drove out of town (to the west) and into Cajas.
The first place we stopped was called Tres Cruces (three crosses), and it commemorates all of the people who died trying to get from Cuenca to Guayaquil and vice versa. The altitude in Cajas is a good bit higher than in Cuenca, so the temperature can be frigid. And before reliable transportation and good roads (the current one wasn't finished until 1985), it was a very dangerous trip. Tres Cruces is also the highest point in Cajas, and you could definitely tell by the alititude and temperature.
Next we embarked on our hike. We each were provided with rubber galoshes, which actually came in handy. Cajas was formed by glaciers in the last ice age, and there are still a lot of lakes in the park. Also, we're moving into the rainy season, so the ground was very moist.
We saw lots of different species of trees and plants (almost no animals, strangely enough. Slocomb thinks that our speaking English scared them away). Part of the hike was through a Quinua forest, which was very surreal. The trees, even along the trail were so close together. It reminded me a little of Roan Mountain when the rhodedenerons are blooming.
The hike lasted about 3 hours (plus a stop for lunch). Our stopping point was (theoretically) the camp site, which was a small field above a large lake. We didn't hike all of our stuff in; the bus met us about 10 minutes away from our campsite, but we still had to pack all of our food and tents, etc., in the last 10 minutes). The site had no running water, so we were all on our own for bathrooms. Slocomb and I brought a 5L jug of water, which was really handy. We were both really thirsty because of the hike and the altitude. Everyone was jealous of our ingeniousness.
We spent most of the afternoon setting up camp and hanging out. Slocomb's and my tent had some issues (one of the tent poles appeared broken), but we got it worked out. I stayed at the site to chat with some of the other people, and Slocomb went down to the lake to fish. He only ended up catching one fish, but I'm pretty sure he had an awesome time.
We had pasta and soup for dinner, some of which we had to cook over the fire because the stoves weren't strong enough to make the water boil. But after we put the pasta water over the stove, it boiled very quickly. Slocomb and Ryan (one of the study abroad boys) were the fire builders, and the did an excellent job.
Pretty soon after dinner and cleaning up, I went to bed. I had a headache (from the altitude), so I had no energy. I'm not sure what all happened after that, but you can ask Slocomb.
We woke up quasi-early the next morning (as one always does while camping), and spent most of the morning doing breakfast and breaking down camp.
I guess it wasn't a very eventful camping trip, but it was incredibly beautiful.
On the way back to Cuenca, we stopped at the sanctuary of the Virgin of Cajas. About 20 years ago, a young Cuencana had a vision of the Virgin Mary in that spot, so now there is a large outdoor sanctuary there. I'm not sure how I feel about these appearances of the Virgin Mary, but it was an interesting cultural experience.
After that, Slocomb and I came home to rest and get ready for the week. And then the week started, and now it is Tuesday. How the time flies!
We started out Saturday morning (with a frustrating attempt to get a taxi - Slocomb called for one and since they have our phone number, they sent it to our house instead of the place where we were meeting Kelli and Johanna, the student teachers) a little late. But we drove out of town (to the west) and into Cajas.
The first place we stopped was called Tres Cruces (three crosses), and it commemorates all of the people who died trying to get from Cuenca to Guayaquil and vice versa. The altitude in Cajas is a good bit higher than in Cuenca, so the temperature can be frigid. And before reliable transportation and good roads (the current one wasn't finished until 1985), it was a very dangerous trip. Tres Cruces is also the highest point in Cajas, and you could definitely tell by the alititude and temperature.
Next we embarked on our hike. We each were provided with rubber galoshes, which actually came in handy. Cajas was formed by glaciers in the last ice age, and there are still a lot of lakes in the park. Also, we're moving into the rainy season, so the ground was very moist.
We saw lots of different species of trees and plants (almost no animals, strangely enough. Slocomb thinks that our speaking English scared them away). Part of the hike was through a Quinua forest, which was very surreal. The trees, even along the trail were so close together. It reminded me a little of Roan Mountain when the rhodedenerons are blooming.
The hike lasted about 3 hours (plus a stop for lunch). Our stopping point was (theoretically) the camp site, which was a small field above a large lake. We didn't hike all of our stuff in; the bus met us about 10 minutes away from our campsite, but we still had to pack all of our food and tents, etc., in the last 10 minutes). The site had no running water, so we were all on our own for bathrooms. Slocomb and I brought a 5L jug of water, which was really handy. We were both really thirsty because of the hike and the altitude. Everyone was jealous of our ingeniousness.
We spent most of the afternoon setting up camp and hanging out. Slocomb's and my tent had some issues (one of the tent poles appeared broken), but we got it worked out. I stayed at the site to chat with some of the other people, and Slocomb went down to the lake to fish. He only ended up catching one fish, but I'm pretty sure he had an awesome time.
We had pasta and soup for dinner, some of which we had to cook over the fire because the stoves weren't strong enough to make the water boil. But after we put the pasta water over the stove, it boiled very quickly. Slocomb and Ryan (one of the study abroad boys) were the fire builders, and the did an excellent job.
Pretty soon after dinner and cleaning up, I went to bed. I had a headache (from the altitude), so I had no energy. I'm not sure what all happened after that, but you can ask Slocomb.
We woke up quasi-early the next morning (as one always does while camping), and spent most of the morning doing breakfast and breaking down camp.
I guess it wasn't a very eventful camping trip, but it was incredibly beautiful.
On the way back to Cuenca, we stopped at the sanctuary of the Virgin of Cajas. About 20 years ago, a young Cuencana had a vision of the Virgin Mary in that spot, so now there is a large outdoor sanctuary there. I'm not sure how I feel about these appearances of the Virgin Mary, but it was an interesting cultural experience.
After that, Slocomb and I came home to rest and get ready for the week. And then the week started, and now it is Tuesday. How the time flies!
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