banos pictures!

baños!

a is for adrenaline. b is for baños.

i'm kind of a homebody. i mean, i love to travel and go on adventures, but i also love resting and staying in for a night of sex and the city and takeout. that is why last weekend, i almost did not go on our last group trip, to baños. it had been a long week - the first of work, complete with two days of puking my guts out and sharing a tiny hostel room with two other people... i wasn't exactly a walking mountain dew ad. not to mention that we had been on multiple-hour buses for what seemed like the past 67 consecutive weekends.

but, everyone else was going. and i'm 24 and still a sucker for peer pressure.

friday night, we got on a bus around 10:30pm. four hours later, we're in banos. not to worry - breakfast wasn't until the ripe hour of 8am, to be immediately followed by some sort of outdoor adventure. do they have red bull in ecuador?

the next day, somehow, i'm up at at 'em right on time for coffee, juice and bread (a typical ecua-breakfast, a sorry excuse for one, if you ask me). at breakfast our options were presented to us: repelling down waterfalls in t minus 20 (a 3-4 hour feat), or a leisurely hour-long horseback ride up the mountain, taking off in an hour. most of the group chose the latter.

naturally, i chose the former.


and i was so glad i did. repelling down waterfalls is f-u-n. we went down four, the last one being about a 150 foot drop. we also made friends with our guide, paolo, who proceeded to invite us to go climbing with him (for free!) that afternoon.

um, ok.

we hiked to a wall that looked just like the one from princess bride. amazing. i had so much fun, it made me want to start climbing regularly. the funny thing is, i didn't once feel tired or notice my fatigue that day. adrenaline is real thing, my friend. and while red-bull is hard to come by here, there is a strikingly similar knock-off that tastes pretty good. pretty, pretty good.

that night we had a typical ecua-night... dinner and dancing, which was a mix of regular and salsa. by 12:30, i was having to prop my eyelids open with toothpics. i finally called it a day and hit the pillow, maybe harder than ever.

in the end, i was definitely glad i chose to forgo a little rest to experience a once-in-a-lifetime kind of weekend.

"those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music."

--angela monet

colombia, in pictures.

colombia

bureaucratic. backwards.

in a place where there are Ms on women´s bathroom doors, and a Cs on the faucet knobs that makes hot water come out, a girl can´t help but think that this country is a little, well, backwards. my experience today confirmed this theory.

let me start from the beginning.

about a month ago, i ordered a pair of shoes online. about a week ago, i received a slip in the mail that told me my package was at a nearby post office. i expected this part. so today after class, i finally had time to go pick it up. or so i thought. i arrive around 11:30. the first office i went into directed me down the street - for international packages.

i walk into a warehouse that has several workers and customers, but it is absolutely unclear where i should go or who i should talk to. in my best spanish, i explain my situation to a random worker. he says something back to me that i didn´t understand, but sends me to another worker. i explain again, and she helped right out! she even went and found my package! i fill out some paper and think i´m getting to take my shoes and go. nopers. she proceeds to take my package into a little room filled with other packages and a line of people standing at the door. ok, i think. this is just how it works in ecuador.

after 45 minutes, the line has not moved. finally, the people in front of me start questioning the workers. they were speaking muy rapido, so i didn´t pick up everything that was said, but the next thing i knew mrs. postal worker looked at me and said, regresa a la dos y media. or something like that. claro, gracias, i said, happy to get outta there.

dos y media, yo regreso. i wait a few minutes, go back and forth between two desks a few times, fill out another paper, wait a little more. i even watch them open my package to make sure it´s really zapatos and not weed. finally, mrs. postal looks at me and hands me a slip of paper. necesita ir al banco de guayagil a pagar.

lord have mercy. ok, going to the bank. donde esta? i asked. jibberish was the reply. perfecto. i proceeded outside to ask the guard. he at least pointed, and i at least got the gist of what he said.

after a few blocks, i decided to ask another guard where it was just for good measure. besides, guards are usually good sources considering they stand on the sidewalk all day, doing i don´t know, looking around? they generally know their stuff. oh, not this mr. man. as certainly as i asked him where the bank was, he pointed in the opposite direction i was going, mas debajo. seguro? si.

the journey continues.

so, when i get to exactly where mas debajo is, i ask yet another good samaritan where the damn bank is. to my detriment, he points up. straight back up to where i came from, but on the other side of the street, he said. alrighty.

still walkin. four more blocks arriba, i peer across the street, and i see gloryland - el banco de guayaguil... directly across the street from mr. man. he sees me again, and i told him where the bank was.

i pay, return to the post office, wait a little more. what do you know, by 3:30, i have my package in hand... four hours to pick up a package from the post office. four freakin hours.

all for a pair of $35 shoes i bought on clearance.

the significant part of this insignificant story is that this is how everything works in ecuador. if i want to make copies at work, i fill out a form, give it to a secretary, wait a few days, go back and check on it, wait a little more, check on them again, and then maybe get the copies. í´m big on efficiency, and this is just inefficient. i´m not sure what to do yet, but i am working getting the system changed.



"bureaucracy is the death of all sound work." -- albert einstein

colombia, colombia.

colombia has always been a place that brings up thoughts of danger and drug wars. a place that only reporters and world leaders dare to venture (hyperbole, LC). it is understandable why one should think it terribly bad judgement to travel there. but as usual, i went against that better judgement and took the risk of visiting colombia.

and although we ran into one or two situations*, i am very glad i took the risk. beyond the surface of cocoa fields and violent crime, colombia is a vibrant country with so many hidden treasures. crowded streets lined by brightly colored buildings, intricate, ancient architecture, rich tradition, and some of the most beautiful countryside i've ever seen.

we crossed the border on a sunday afternoon, and decided to stay in ipiales, the first town across the border to avoid travelling at night. the town was sleepy on sunday afternoon, but we managed to find some dinner and hostel, seedy as it may be. the next morning, we strolled around impiales, dipping into lots of tiendas and using all of our brainpower to convert pesos to dollars.

it wasn't long before we noticed a certain picture that kept reappearing. it was painted on the wall of our hostal and photos of it hung in restaurants. as we checked out of the hostal, we asked the manager about it. he said it was a church about 15 minutes away by taxi. no question where our next stop would be.

the cab pulls into what seemed like a little parking lot for the town. all we could see were descending cobblestone streens lined by little panaderias and textile shops. the cab drier pointed down, and motioned us to walk down the path to the church. raindrops fell as we walked to the secret church that spanned a beautiful ravine.

the church had amazing intricate details - you will have to look at the pictures to see what i mean, which are coming soon. we continued to hike to the other side of the church. olga, danielle's host mom, was a little misguided and thought we were supposed to catch our taxi on the other side. it was a mistake - about a 45 mintue detour - but for me, a welcome one, as i enjoyed exploring a little more of the countryside.

las lajas cathedral

next, we headed to pasto, a town about two more hours into colombia. pasto is larger and much more bustling than ipiales. we checked into a much nicer hotel - $30,000 pesos a night per person, which comes out to about $18 dollars a person. a welcome change from our $6 run-down, mold-infested hostal from the night before.

we spent a day in pasto mainly shopping. kind of an odd thing to do in colombia, but the peso is weak, and there were some great deals. our favorite store we found was sicily... check it out.

although our stay was short, and we didn't really see the "best" parts of colombia, it was evident the country has a lot more to offer than cocaine. it is a beautiful place and one of the largest manufacuturers in south america... made me think about how political unrest, violence, poverty have such a strong effect on a society. the governement there is making progress, but still has a long way to go. a good reminder of what makes the world better, and what terminally cripples it... spurs more thought on how i want to use my life on earth for good.

i am glad to have had the opportunity to go to colombia, and i am even more thankful for the lord's provision while we were there - how he watches over us in our naivety.


and one last thing. we were happy to get back to quito, where we felt safe and comfortable. where, for the first time, felt like home.



"though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not." -- ralph waldo emerson



*another story, for another time.

updates.

it's been nine days since my last post, and i have absolutely no idea where to start with this one... a lot has happened! i'll try to keep my thoughts in order...

last monday was a rough one. it was the first day of the last week of the TESOL course, and everyone was exhausted. i was looking forward to finishing up and getting setteld into the apartment the following weekend. since our lease was supposed to start friday, august first, we called our landlord on monday to see when we could get the key. turns out that he accidentally wrote down september first on our lease instead of august first... so come friday, we had no place to live. a little stressful, made worse by the fact that my host family forgot about me that night and didn't feed me dinner. monday, monday.

syd, leah and I on the last day of class, on the terrace of the *experimento, where we spent many a coffe break.

fast forward to the weekend. leah, dani and i had a fun day saturday. now officially homeless, i packed up all my belongings and headed to dani's house. her host mom, olga, graciously let leah and i sleep there for a night. we had a good day, made pizza with pedro (the man who lives in dani's backhosue, and has a pizza shop), watched movies, and even got facials from olga, who is an esthetician.

we had plans to go to the beach the next day, but after a long hard week of class and a full day of moving, 6 hours on the bus did not sound fun, especially considering we only had three days.

but for some reason, the next morning, 4 hours to colombia sounded perfect. so sunday morning, we headed out with olga on a whim (sorry mom). interesting to say the least. and it definitely deserves its own blog, which will come soon.

fast forward again to wednesday. we are back from colombia. with no place to live, leah's mom has generously used her amex points for us to stay at the nicest hotel in quito... it is amazing! we are in a suite with a fully kitchen, living room, huge bedroom and two bathrooms. my favorite thing has been the showers. after six weeks of hit or miss showers with little to no hot water, absolutely no water pressure, or water that just stops running right when i am soapy and hot, high-pressure shower is pure bliss. we have had a great time, taking full advantage of the jacuzzi, room service, and cable.

speaking of that, i have some things to get back to right about now. colombia blog coming soon.

oh, and, i'm thinking of adding a spanish word of the day. slash word of the blog.

today's word:

chevere = cool; banging; tight. to be used in informal settings.

*the "experimento" is where we took our TESOL course. it is officially called "the experiement in international living." you can check it here.