La Costa

I have now seen all 3 regions of Ecuador
I'm living in the Sierra, high up in the Andes Mountains.
I had a short, but bug/heat/sickness filled stay in the Oriente (rain forest).
And I spent the last week on La Costa.

Last week, the whole group hopped a half hour flight (it would have been a very long 10 hour bus ride with a group that gets nauseous in traffic) to the coast.  The whole group went in order to conduct village studies.   Essentially, we were broken up into pairs, assigned to a family in a small, rural town, and were there to observe and learn about life on the coast for a week.  It was supposed to be a practice run in fieldwork before our month long independent projects. But before we began our assignments, we made a pit stop...

Guayaquil is Ecuador's largest city, and located right on the coast of the Pacific.  We stayed there for a night before starting our village studies.  Once we arrived in Guayaquil, I had my first of what was to be many, many plates of fish, followed by cake for Matthew's 21st birthday.   We spent the rest of the day on a boat cruise down the Guayas river, a VIP tour of a closed pottery museum, a walk through a very unique park in the center of town, and a trip up to the top of a lighthouse that overlooked the whole city.

The food is really different on the coast- everything is fish or crab or shrimp, while a can of tuna is usually all the fish I see in Quito.  Instead of bread on the coast, there's plantains.  And a lot of them.  Of course though, there is rice everywhere in Ecuador.

Not the traditional sort of 21st, since the drinking age in Ecuador is 18/ there really is no drinking age here.

The "Captain Morgan," named for the pirate who raided Guayaquil.  And yes, it is the same guy who they named the rum after.

Some of the ceramic pieces from the pottery museum.

Guayaquil

Something is a little off here...

In the center of a bustling metropolis is a the Park of Iguanas.  I asked our guide why the iguanas stayed in the park, when there were no gates or fences keeping them in.  She then asked me if I would leave a place where I was fed everyday and could lounge all the time long while people took photos of me like a celebrity. 

444 steps to the top of the lighthouse

It was just a bit windy up at the top of the lighthouse.   

The following day started out with a trip to the Parque Historico in Guayaquil.  The park was a mix between a zoo, a garden, and a museum.  During part of it, you walked through mangroves and forests with animals on either side of you.  In another section, there was a path through plants of coffee and chocolate, palm trees, and all sorts of flowers.  The last section was of houses that in the past, had been the houses of plantation owners and workers.  They had all been restored and preserved for people to walk through.

 

This was the biggest bird I have ever seen in my entire life- it was probably about 3 feet tall.

Crocodiles just laying out.

The gardens in the the Parque Historico

The closest I have gotten to rowing this fall has been seeing these dugout canoes.

An old plantation house.  On the inside, there was a huge ballroom, complete with bar, pianos, and couches that must have made for the quite the 18th century party.

The tile floor in one of the houses

 We left the Parque Historico, and started our 2 hour bus ride up the Ruta del Sol- translation, the route of the sun.  The ride took us farther and farther from the big city, as the highways turned into two laned roads that cut through small, rural pueblos.  At one point, the bus took a turn and we came up beside the Pacific.  It was our first glimpse of the ocean thus far in Ecuador, and I thought that I could stay here forever. We stopped for lunch at a small seafood restaurant on the beach, and I'm pretty sure at that moment while we were eating our giants plates of fish and bananas for 3$, feet in the sand, watching the waves of the Pacific roll in, the whole group was content.

Reality came crashing back over us when we got back onto the bus and our directors told us that they were going to start dropping off the pairs in about a half hour.  Before I continue, I think I need to paint a picture of the village study and what we were expecting.  Essentially, we had been briefly briefed on the task at hand- go in, live for 4 nights with a family, and learn about life in the village.  Now, it sounds like a vacation on the beach for a week, but everyone in the group, especially myself, were freaking out.  Each pair of people received a name of a town and a family, and we were to be dropped off by the bus somewhere in the vicinity of the town and had to find our house.  We had never met or spoken to the family's before, so essentially, we were going in blind.  And to make matters worse, people on the coast speak really fast Spanish and slur their words.
I was in the first pair to be dropped off.  I thought I was going to throw up everywhere because I was so nervous.  I apparently wasn't too good at hiding the nervousness, because my directors tried to assure me that it was going to be fine, the people are nice, and it was going to be a great experience.  My directors have been doing this for more than 10 years, and they're not ones to sugarcoat things, so I should have known to believe them, because they were right.

San Pablo, Ecuador

Gabby and I got off the bus in San Pablo, a small fishing community of about 2000.  There was literally nothing in the town except for cabana seafood restaurants and beach.  We lived for the week with Yolanda, a 70 year old widow who decided 8 years ago that she was going to turn her passion fro cooking into a business, and so opened a cabana on the beach.  She worked from 7 am until 6 at night, and had anywhere from 1 to 5 other women working in the kitchen with here every day.  Gabby and I shared a bed and slept on the second floor of the restaurant at night, listening to the waves crashing literally a few feet below us as we fell asleep.  During the days, we walked on the beach, swam in the ocean, lounged in the hammocks, searched for ice cream, and watched the women work. We ate lots of seafood, rice, and bananas, regardless if it was breakfast, lunch, or dinner.  I would confidently say that in four days, I ate atleast 75 shrimp, 2 octapus tentacles, 3 small fish, 10 medium sized plantains, and a small mountain of rice. At the end of the day, after everyone left for the night , Gabby and I would eat dinner with Yolanda and listen to her stories.  She had this quiet passion about her for the work she did, and a kind way with how she interacted with people.  The people in this country still amaze me every day- there is no reason for them to be nice and open and welcome strangers into their house, but time and time again they do.  We were only there for 5 days, but it was sadder to leave Yolanda and the other women in the restaurant than my other family in Los Chillos after living there for a month.  She opened up her whole life for the two of us to share in for a few days, and it is experiences like these that I will remember long after I leave in December.

Our living quarters on the second floor of the restaurant.  Yolanda had one bed, Gabby and I had the other, and the mice and cockroaches shared the floor.

One morning, Gabby and I removed the heads from 20 pounds of shrimp.  It was only a small delivery.

Cabana D' Yoly

The restaurant

The beach

Lines and lines of fishing net

One morning, we watched 16 guys spend hours pulling in a fishing net off of the shore.  People came in pick up trucks to take the fish to sell.  Other people came with plastic bags and took fish for themselves and their families.  I even saw one guy putting fish down his shirt because he didn't have a bag.  The whole thing lasted all morning, but by 11 the net was back in the boat and the fishermen rowed away.

At the end of the five days, we said goodbye, and hopped on a bus to meet back up with the group at a hostal about an hour away.  We arrived at Hostal Azalunas in Las Tunas, another small pueblo on the Ruta del Sol to find that everyone had survived their experiences, and had a great time, although it was nice to be in a place with running water and real showers.  We spent two days there, debriefing about our experiences, and gearing up for our next adventure, which will start next week.  We also found some time to swim in the biggest waves I have ever seen in real life, and celebrate Taylor's 21st birthday.

Hostal Azulunas

I didn't want to leave the coast.  For one, the plane that we had to take back was a 36 seater and much too small to feel safe in.  But more than my fear of crashing into the ocean, I didn't want to leave the way of life that characterized the coast.  The people were friendly and laid back, and didn't need much to be happy.  After regrouping at the hostal, we talked a lot about poverty.  To anyone passing by, the pueblos we stayed at would appear to be poor- I'm sure that's how my pictures make it seem.  But the thing is, when you see people living life fuller than so many others that have all of the money in the world, it makes you wonder who really is better off.  

Checking out for a week

I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden papers, quizzes, and work snuck up on me. I still have not had a chance to post much about my new fam, and my other adventures in Quito. I'm heading to a rural fishing community on the coast for a week, and will once again be without internet. Once I'm back, I will have pics, videos and lots of stories to share.

Welcome to the Jungle

The political unrest pretty settled down, borders reopened, and we were able to head to the rain forest.  It was about a 6 hour ride from Quito to Tena.  In between, we made a pit stop in Papallacta for a swim in the natural hot springs and a pb&j picnic lunch.

On the ride to Papallacta

Papallacta

Soaking in the hot springs

When we got to Tena, we ditched our bus for a motorized canoe.  We rode up the Arajuno River until we arrived at the Arajuno Jungle Lodge.  It was a surreal experience from the moment we arrived.  There were wood cabins with thatched roofs and hammocks, and a base lodge with an outdoor area for meals.

Outside of the lodge where we ate dinner

 

The "dining room"

My cabin

 We were greeted by Tom, a Nebraska native who owned and operated the lodge.  He came down to Ecuador with Peace Corp in the 80s, married an Ecuadorian, and never left.  By his side was Mona.  She's a three year monkey who lives on the property and causes mayhem, but is tolerated because she is adorable.  She hangs from trees, roof rafters, and of course, all over the visitors.  She has a tendency to steal things, so we were told to make sure we locked cabin doors and hid the keys.  One day at lunch, we were being particularly lax, and Mona took the last burrito.  I thought the guys in my group were going to kill her. 

MONA!

 One of our days was spent in an indigenous community downstream where we participated in a "minga."  A minga is a communal work group- the idea of community, participation, and solidarity is huge in indigenous communities.  People work together on this communal farm in addition to their own work.  While sifting through soil, everyone choked down some of the chicha, a traditional drink made from fermented yucca, that the women had made for us.  After a morning of manual labor, we got a small Kichwa (Kichwa is the other language of Ecuador, spoken by a lot of indigenous groups here) lesson alongside a third grade class.  Nobody could pay attention, so school turned into recess and we all went outside to play.  All little kids, regardless of where they are from or what language they speak, love to be chased around and piggy backed.  They are exhausting.

When we got back to the lodge, we went swimming in the Arajuno.  It's a tributary of the Napo River, and although there is plenty of wildlife lurking below the surface, our directors assured us it was safe since the piranas were vegetarian (unless you are bleeding perfusely) and there hasn't been an anaconda sighting in years.  It was a little less than convincing, but it was the only way to beat the heat and humidity of the tropics.


The other days were filled with jungle hikes, ecology lessons, and a trip to a wildlife rehabilitation center.  From what I heard, it was all a good time, although I don't know for sure because I was in bed. There were 5 of us that got sick, and were out of commission for a while.  I spent my sick days with Brett (another girl on the trip) on the bunk beds sipping gatorade trying not to throw up everywhere.  We were kept company by the millions of ants and handful of cockroaches that had infested our cabin only separated by a mosquito net covering the bed.

Although I did miss the hikes, I was able to see plenty of wildlife.  One night, I was about to walk into the bathroom, when someone pointed out the GIANT tarantula on the wall.  It was literally the size of my hand.  I'm pretty sure the whole Amazon Basin heard me scream.  I have a bad history with spiders, let alone giant maneaters.

My least favorite part of the jungle

Mindy being a lot braver than I will EVER be

In addition to the spiders, there were plenty of other insects.  Giant cicadas loved the candles that we used for light during dinner, so it was a constant fight to keep them out of your soup.  There were little black flies that left every one covered in bites.  I chose bug bites over heat, and opted for shorts over my long pants and knee high rubber boots.  I definitely paid the price though.  The rain forest is surprisingly hot (90s) and lacking in rain (it only rained the last morning we were there).

The Arajuno River

On the Arajuno with Jeanette

At the lodge after dinner with Taylor

Up on the observation tower with Taylor, Gabby, and Chris

View of the Arajuno Lodge complex from the observation tower

The tree in the middle of the photo has yet to be named and identified by ecologists.  It was right outside of my cabin door.

Life is definitely not easy in the rain forest, but nonetheless I am definitely glad to have gone.  I remember when I was a little kid in elementary school, there would be a jar at the end of the lunch line where you could give extra coins to save an acre of the rain forest.  The rain forest has been this place that I have always heard and read about for as long as I can remember, so to actually be here was amazing.  The forest was beautiful and filled with so much life, it's hard not to appreciate it all.  The nights in the rain forest were my favorite-on the one hand, there is so much noise from the sound of the insects and other animals.   But it is peaceful and quiet, too.  The only motor for miles is the one in the canoe.  And the stars- it was the first time I have seen stars since being in Ecuador (and although I think they are clearer up in Maine), it's pretty amazing to sit up on top of a wooden observation tower, above the canopy of the jungle, and look up at the stars.

I Am Still Alive

I´m currently living with an 80 year old grandmother who lacks internet in the house, so posting is a bit rough right now. I am in fact still alive though, and Ill update about the rainforest and my new homestay as soon as I get the chance!

Es Tranquilo

Ecuador is filled with volcanoes, many of which are still active. There's tidal waves and landslides, social conflicts and military uprisings. The people though, insist that their country and their way of life is "tranquilo," and they pride themselves on their calm, laidback lifestyle.

It's once again "tranquilo" in Ecuador, and I'm officially off of lock down and in Quito. Things are about as normal in the city as I guess they could be 3 days after an attempted military coup. Thursday night on the news I heard the President scream to an enraged mob "hear I am, here's the President, kill me if you are brave enough" and I watched in real time a member of the military die in a firefight. Friday morning the city was already being cleaned up, the President was back in Independence Square, and although there was still an uneasiness in the air, it became safe enough for us to be in the city and cross province borders.
It was all so surreal. It's hard for me fathom that this is just a part of normal life-the last 3 presidents were ousted by the people, so for the people here, a military coup is not that crazy. I don't know if I could ever get used to this type of instability.

Before arriving in Quito a few hours ago, I had to say goodbye to my host family in Los Chillos. I can't believe it has already been a month and it's time to move on. Saturday was a day of major ups and downs, literally, and gastrically. I climbed Ilalo (the volcano near my house) for the second time, only this time we went to the peak (3060m = major UP). Once again I was trailing my host father the entire way, and once again we went down the mountain "mas rapido"- translation: at a sprint. I couldn't keep pace on the way down either, and in my haste I rolled an ankle and went tumbling down quite a ways (major down- about 15m). I made it back to the house slightly bruised and covered in dirt, and was "surprised" (they had told me about the surprise fiesta the day before) with a party by my two younger cousins, Mateo, 11, and Daniela, 10. They had set up a table, chairs, and umbrellas out in the yard with snacks, homemade juice, and a cooler full of ice cream. We all danced and I listened to Mateo talk about the love of his life. They had also set up a slip and slide so we went sliding across the plastic tarp covered in soap about 100 times. For two little kids, they knew how to throw a party. I felt a little old for the slip and slide, until my 23 year old host brother and his girlfriend came out an joined (major up of the day).

I went inside after the fiesta for a traditional Ecuadorian lunch. I had accidentally told my host father at the beginning of the week that I was willing to try any food once, one thing led to another, and the next thing I knew I was in the kitchen washing cows feet for soup. The soup itself wasn't bad, but the cows' feet were AWFUL. They cooked down to the texture of gelatin. I thought I was going to vomit everywhere when I tried to eat them, and jello has been forever ruined for me. I felt bad, so I put on my game face, stopped chewing, and just started swallowing the meat flavored jello pieces. Apparently I didn't have a good poker face because my host father put down his spoon, started laughing, and told me that I didn't have to eat it if I didn't like it (major low).

It was a little sad to leave today after being with my host family for a month. I'm so pumped to go the rain forest tomorrow, and I'm excited to be staying in Quito afterwards because I think the city will be a lot of fun, but it was weird saying goodbye to the people I have shared the past month with. I was a bit skeptical of staying with a host family at first, but it turned out to be a great experience.