I forgot to post this when it was taken back in January, but here's a picture from the Delaware group's cocktail at the school. Me, mom, and Rachel:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1292.jpg
In completely random not-really-news, watching the Ecovía slowly fall apart is a rather entertaining thing. Each bus has its own problems, and there are many buses. Some of them have dented ramps, or ramps where the traction stripes have rubbed off (those are really fun in the rain). One or two of the stations have lost bars out of the spiky exit turnstiles. I have no idea how you rip a bar off one of those things, but apparently someone figured it out. They must have been having a violent day.
Honestly, that amuses me more than the problems with the buses, because those turnstyles are the nemesis of a lot of people. If you are not paying very careful attention when you go through, the result can be your foot jammed underneath the thing with a severe pain in your heel, or a sharp smack in the face with a metal bar.
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
Las Moiras
I’m over my cold (three and a half weeks later) and my cough is nearly gone. I actually felt well enough to go out on Saturday night – Liz’s sister’s birthday is on Tuesday, so we were partying in her honor. The four of us from Keene went, plus Eduardo, Liz’s two sisters, her brother-in-law, and two of their friends. Mauricio, the bro-in-law, led us to a bar called Las Moiras. For the first couple of hours it was just a bar, but once more people showed up, it turned into a dance club.
It was a whole lot more fun than Tonic, and a safer place to be than Nobar. We met a woman named Linda from Kentucky, who was there on vacation with a friend who lives in Quito. She was grateful to run into other Americans because she spoke no Spanish, so she hung out with us for the rest of the night. I lost track of time and was startled when Marie informed me it was 2:30am. I wasn’t tired when I got home, either, and I didn’t end up falling asleep until almost 6:00. As a result, I slept in rather excessively late the next morning, but I was up in time to have lunch with Lucía and her son Paulo, and his wife and two kids. The kids, Andrea and her brother (whose name I’ve forgotten, if I ever knew it), are a lot friendlier than Camino, so hopefully I’ll get to know them better, even though they don’t come around as often.
Me, Linda, and Braulio:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1468.jpg
Me and Marie:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1465.jpg
Me and Liz:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1456.jpg
Liz, Marie, me, Braulio:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1441.jpg
Class was deadly boring today; I consider myself lucky to have survived. Tony and Maicol, the two Chinese guys, are doing their project this week, which is on Ecuador’s main exports. “Doing their project” means that Monday and Tuesday they get the last part of class to present on their topic, and on Friday we’ll have a group debate. Unfortunately, not only was their presentation not too well-prepared, but Tony really struggled giving it. He didn’t seem to understand most of the questions we asked, and his Spanish is so heavily accented that most of the time I don’t understand him. I ended up with a beautiful flower drawn in pen on the handout he gave me…and no more clue on the exports of Ecuador than I had before. (No, I promise you, Texaco is not an Ecuadorian company that exports bananas. Really. Maicol still doesn’t believe us on this point.)
Note for Dad: I received the tax forms today (oh goody!), thanks for the help. I’ll follow your (and mom’s) advice and give them to Craig to mail. And by the way, mom’s last name is Bermeo, not Bermed, and I live in Jipijapa, not J1p1japa. But it did get here, so I guess the post office doesn’t care too much…
Me, mom, and Rachel at the Delaware group's cocktail last month:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1292.jpg
It was a whole lot more fun than Tonic, and a safer place to be than Nobar. We met a woman named Linda from Kentucky, who was there on vacation with a friend who lives in Quito. She was grateful to run into other Americans because she spoke no Spanish, so she hung out with us for the rest of the night. I lost track of time and was startled when Marie informed me it was 2:30am. I wasn’t tired when I got home, either, and I didn’t end up falling asleep until almost 6:00. As a result, I slept in rather excessively late the next morning, but I was up in time to have lunch with Lucía and her son Paulo, and his wife and two kids. The kids, Andrea and her brother (whose name I’ve forgotten, if I ever knew it), are a lot friendlier than Camino, so hopefully I’ll get to know them better, even though they don’t come around as often.
Me, Linda, and Braulio:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1468.jpg
Me and Marie:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1465.jpg
Me and Liz:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1456.jpg
Liz, Marie, me, Braulio:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1441.jpg
Class was deadly boring today; I consider myself lucky to have survived. Tony and Maicol, the two Chinese guys, are doing their project this week, which is on Ecuador’s main exports. “Doing their project” means that Monday and Tuesday they get the last part of class to present on their topic, and on Friday we’ll have a group debate. Unfortunately, not only was their presentation not too well-prepared, but Tony really struggled giving it. He didn’t seem to understand most of the questions we asked, and his Spanish is so heavily accented that most of the time I don’t understand him. I ended up with a beautiful flower drawn in pen on the handout he gave me…and no more clue on the exports of Ecuador than I had before. (No, I promise you, Texaco is not an Ecuadorian company that exports bananas. Really. Maicol still doesn’t believe us on this point.)
Note for Dad: I received the tax forms today (oh goody!), thanks for the help. I’ll follow your (and mom’s) advice and give them to Craig to mail. And by the way, mom’s last name is Bermeo, not Bermed, and I live in Jipijapa, not J1p1japa. But it did get here, so I guess the post office doesn’t care too much…
Me, mom, and Rachel at the Delaware group's cocktail last month:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1292.jpg
Friday, February 22, 2008
More Adventures in Paperwork
As nice a place as this is to visit, I must say I wouldn't want to live here. I know, it's cliché, but the reason so many clichés exist in the first place is that, like stereotypes, there is often something to them. The way of getting paperwork and the suchlike done around here is so frustrating and inefficient.
I went to register my visa at Dirección de Extranjeros today, getting my professor's permission to skip class to do so, and they told me that I had to make a deposit in their bank account first. That I had known, but I had to go there to get the account number. Once they found out that I was late to register and had to pay the fine, though, they told me that I had to go to Dirección Nacional de Migración. That office also closes at 12:30, so in the interests of time I took a taxi. It turned out to be on the other end of town, northwest of my house, and all they did was give me a slip of paper with their bank account number on it. Why the hell did I have to go all the way there for that?
I walked back to the Ecovía and made the trip to Banco Pichincha, where I stood in line for half an hour, made my deposit, and went on my way. By then it was lunctime, so I headed home to eat, but I still have to go to Banco Internacional to make the original deposit for Extranjeros. That I can do anytime, but the problem is going to be getting back to Extranjeros itself. They are only open until 12:30, and my classes run until 12:15. My prof isn't going to be happy if I ask to skip another class, but I'm going to have to at least leave early sometime next week, probably on Monday. Then the office will steal my passport for three days (yes, just to put a stamp in it), and when I get it back I can finally go for my Censo card.
On the bright side, literally, we actually saw the sun for a whole five minutes today. Of course, it's pouring again right now, but I'm getting used to that. I'm going out to a dance club tonight with the Keene crew and a couple of other people, which I hope will be fun.
I went to register my visa at Dirección de Extranjeros today, getting my professor's permission to skip class to do so, and they told me that I had to make a deposit in their bank account first. That I had known, but I had to go there to get the account number. Once they found out that I was late to register and had to pay the fine, though, they told me that I had to go to Dirección Nacional de Migración. That office also closes at 12:30, so in the interests of time I took a taxi. It turned out to be on the other end of town, northwest of my house, and all they did was give me a slip of paper with their bank account number on it. Why the hell did I have to go all the way there for that?
I walked back to the Ecovía and made the trip to Banco Pichincha, where I stood in line for half an hour, made my deposit, and went on my way. By then it was lunctime, so I headed home to eat, but I still have to go to Banco Internacional to make the original deposit for Extranjeros. That I can do anytime, but the problem is going to be getting back to Extranjeros itself. They are only open until 12:30, and my classes run until 12:15. My prof isn't going to be happy if I ask to skip another class, but I'm going to have to at least leave early sometime next week, probably on Monday. Then the office will steal my passport for three days (yes, just to put a stamp in it), and when I get it back I can finally go for my Censo card.
On the bright side, literally, we actually saw the sun for a whole five minutes today. Of course, it's pouring again right now, but I'm getting used to that. I'm going out to a dance club tonight with the Keene crew and a couple of other people, which I hope will be fun.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
The Bank
It’s raining here again, and mom says it’s supposed to continue for another two weeks, complete with hail. Lovely. At least I won’t have to worry about making my sunburn any worse. It’s been quiet this week, probably because it’s the first week of classes. The new section of level 5 that Marie and I are in is going fine. The group isn’t as diverse (five of us from the US and two guys from China), but I can’t really complain. We’ve started reading a novella called El Túnel, which I hope turns out to be interesting.
Since I don’t have a whole lot to report in terms of events, I’ll put up another installment of my random notes on life. I’ve been keeping a list of the most amusing mistakes I’ve made, although I’m not keeping up with it as much as I’d like. For your own amusement, because being a tourist can be hilarious business sometimes, here are some of my favorite oopses.
“No recuerdo mí nombre.” This means “I don’t remember my name,” and was said to our program director María Isabel. I was trying to tell her I didn’t remember my phone number.
“Cuando era niño…” Means “When I was a little boy.” You can guess what I was trying to say; I made that mistake to my mom and her maid, and Meri hasn’t let me live it down yet.
“¿Quiero que me la lleva?” I was trying to help out mom by offering to carry a basket in from the car so she didn’t have to. I meant to say, “Do you want me to carry that?” but what came out was, “I want it to carry me?” She didn’t bother to point out what I’d said, but I figured it out myself about thirty seconds after the fact, by which point I already had the basket in the house and it didn’t matter anymore.
I asked Meri last week if she liked meeting all the exchange students who cycle through this house, and she said yes – because they make funny mistakes. Apparently she gets her kicks out of hearing us butcher the Spanish language, which I thought was pretty damn funny myself. I’m sure she’ll get her share of laughs off of me before I leave.
~Later same day~
I had to go to the bank today to cash some travelers’ checks, to pay for the obscene fine the visa office is going to levy on me tomorrow. That was a project in itself that left me in a rather sour mood. I went to the window and was told to see the lady at the desk. I sat for an hour waiting for the lady at the desk to be available, and when she finally got to me, she told me to see the gerente. It was only a five-minute wait for the gerente, who scribbled something on each of my checks and sent me back to desk-lady.
Desk-lady spent half an hour filling out paperwork, and then told me she needed my passport. I keep it locked at the house for safety, but she wouldn’t do anything without it, so I went home. It was half an hour to get home, and I grabbed my passport and went out again. Walking back to the Ecovía, a car drove through a puddle on the edge of the sidewalk and doused me in several gallons of water. So I showed up back at the bank another half hour later, soaking wet this time.
I returned to desk-lady, who spent another fifteen minutes filling out paperwork, and then handed me everything and told me to go to the window. I don’t think the guy at the window had ever seen a travelers’ check before, and he too spent a while shuffling papers. Then he handed me a paper and told me he needed authorization from desk-lady. Back to desk-lady, authorization scribbled on paper, return to window-guy. Window-guy shuffles more papers, hands me a receipt, disappears. He returns, gives me my cash, then calls over desk-lady. The two of them confer, type, shuffle papers, and finally send me away. By that time I’ve spent about two and a half hours on the whole project, and I’m starting to feel like a cat that’s had a bath: soaking wet and pissed off. I am never going to travel with travelers’ checks again; they are a terrible idea, invented solely for the amusement of natives to laugh at frustrated foreigners.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Start of Semester
I’m back in classes again after a week of vacation…oh goody****! Yes, I know, that’s what I’m here for, but I was getting used to my time off. Anyway, there are two sections of Level 5, and yesterday Marie and I were together in a very large class (twelve people), with two new professors neither of us had had before. I liked that group of people; there were five of us from the US, two guys from Japan, a girl from Russia, a girl from Germany, a girl from China, and a nun from Kenya and a man from Ghana, who were both missionaries.
Today, however, our second professor complained that she couldn’t possibly teach that many people at once, and Marie and I were switched to the other section. I can’t help but think about the lecture halls of ninety-plus students at Keene. I think Yolanda would die of a heart attack if presented with one of those.
Now we’re in a much smaller class, only eight people, and not nearly so diverse a crew. There is one saving grace, though, and that is that we ended up with a teacher I had last session and loved. She’s big on projects, which I’m not too fond of, but I like her as a teacher, so it’s okay.
I’m sitting in my new favorite internet café right now, but while the coffee is good, the internet part isn’t working. The staff is aware of the problem and trying to fix it, but at the moment I’m one of only two customers who show any sign of sticking around until it’s fixed. The other four got up and left in frustration, and I would probably do the same except that I haven’t been online in a week, and I keep hoping it will magically start working again.
After my last time online, when my computer froze into a hopeless, helpless state of virus, I was reluctant to connect it to a network again, but it’s actually my best hope for fixing it. Craig tried to help me fix it over the phone last night, but between the two of us we couldn’t kick the bug. Leave it to me to pick up a virus that will not only annoy me but destroy my computer. He’s going to bring Windows discs when he comes to visit, and we’ll wipe the hard drive and reinstall everything. All I need to do is keep the poor thing alive for the next nine days…wish me luck!
The Beach
For starters, an adorable cat that I met on Thursday morning behind my house:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1352.jpg
I finally managed to actually go and do something this weekend – I went to the beach with Marie. The four of us went shopping on Thursday, having failed again to ride the teleférico (this time Pichincha was too cloudy to bother), and Marie told me she was going to the beach with her friend Eduardo and his friend Nelo, and she begged me to come along.
It took some prodding, but eventually I decided to go. The original plan was to leave Thursday evening for a three-hour drive to…well, we weren’t actually sure where. I headed to Marie’s house and had dinner there, and then Eduardo called and told her that it was too dangerous to drive at night, that we ran the risk of getting car-jacked, and he would rather leave at 6am on Friday morning. So I stayed at Marie’s that night, and got up at 5:30am. The guys, of course, didn’t actually show up until 7:15, by which time Marie and I were grousing about how we could have gotten another hour of sleep apiece. The drive turned out to be not three but five and a half hours, and we had lunch in Atacames at 12:30.
We got spectacularly bored in the car and started taking pictures.
Of each other:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1364.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1365.jpg
Of ourselves:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1367.jpg
...making funny faces:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1368.jpg
Of the view:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1370.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1375.jpg
Gum anyone?
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1373.jpg
Of each other taking pictures:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1374.jpg
Marie takes a nap on my lap:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1380.jpg
After lunch we finally reached Eduardo’s aunt’s condo in Casablanca. It reminded me a bit of being in Grand Cayman, the house and the beach and the weather. It was probably somewhere around eighty degrees and humid, the kind of humid where you get out of the shower and can’t dry off, no matter how many times you run the towel over yourself. We spent a while sunbathing on the balcony, and then went for a walk on the beach. I waded into the ocean and had a good time playing in the waves, though I refused to actually swim.
Marie and Eduardo:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1383.jpg
Lounging out on the balcony Friday afternoon:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1384.jpg
View from the balcony:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1385.jpg
A walk on the beach:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1393.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1396.jpg
Nelo, me, Marie, and Eduardo:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1394.jpg
Just before sunset we walked back to the house and jumped into the “hot tub” (the same temperature as the pool, actually) and hung out there until after the sun went down. That night we went out to a bar in Atacames to dance, and honestly I wish I’d stayed at the condo. I was already tired when I went, and I didn’t wake up any after we had eaten a pizza and reached the bar. Eduardo bought us a round of caipirinas, then spent the rest of the night continually handing me mine when I didn’t drink it. It wasn’t that I forgot it was there, it was that I thought it was disgusting! What can I say, I don’t like tequila, and tequila with aguardiente is even worse.
Marie and I were both tired and ready to leave by midnight, and the guys told us we would leave soon. At 1:30, I was still sitting there, getting attacked by flying ants and playing with my cell phone. Finally Marie told Eduardo again that we wanted to go home, and that time he got the hint and we went. Of course, by the time I was in bed, I wasn’t tired anymore…go figure…and I was up until 4am.
The original plan was to leave on Saturday afternoon, but of course the only point of having a plan around here is that you know that’s what will NOT happen. I slept in, hung around reading for a while, then went for a walk with Marie and Eduardo to find lunch. We found an awesome little seafood place on the beach, where I got some of the best fried fish I’ve had in a very long time. I also got a coconut, where the vendor cuts off the top and sticks a straw straight into it. You drink the coconut milk, and then get it cut in half so you can eat the actual coconut. My camera decided to start working again in time for me to get a picture of it. It had been taking blank pictures the night before, but I think it just didn’t like the change in altitude, and the iris stuck shut for a while until it adjusted.
Coconut!
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1404.jpg
Inside the coconut:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1407.jpg
Lunch, best fried fish ever:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1409.jpg
I was happy with the previous day’s decision not to bathe myself completely in the ocean when we saw, on the way to lunch, a large pipe pouring something liquid and black into the swimming area. It looked suspiciously like raw sewage, so when Marie asked me if I wanted to go swimming again, I said no. Not waiting to catch my second wind this time, I went to bed obscenely early.
Sunset in a hammock:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1410.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1411.jpg
Sunday morning I got up, managed to find some granola for breakfast, and then spent way too long reading in the pool. I went to find my sun block when Marie warned me I was turning red, but it was too late. We left the house around 3:30, had lunch/dinner in Atacames, and were finally on the road home by 5pm. Given that dark comes around 6:30, I wondered what had happened to their dire warnings about carjacking. Nobody seemed concerned, though, so I didn’t ask. I read my book until it was too dark to see, and then put on my iPod and started texting Craig out of shear boredom.
Lunch in Atacames before leaving:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1412.jpg
We were into Pichincha province and under half an hour from Quito when all the cars in front of us stopped and put their blinkers on. Nelo stopped behind them and got out to see what was going on. After a minute or so he came back, and the entire line of cars turned around and went the other way. In less than five minutes, the same thing happened again. Stop, wait, turn around. Now think about this: once you have turned around twice, you’re repeating what you did the first time. At that point I was really wondering what the hell was going on.
Halfway back to the original stop point, a policeman directed us down a little dirt side road. We drove maybe half a mile, and then someone on the side of the road waved frantically. Eduardo rolled down his window, they conversed, and then we turned around again. I couldn’t imagine where else we could possibly go, but it turned out that we had missed another dirt path. Eduardo explained to us that there was a protest going on in the main road, and we had to drive around.
Eventually we made it back on track, and they dropped me off at my house. By that time we had been in the car for six and a half hours…so much for the three-hour drive.
All the bouncing on the poorly-kept roads through the small towns had pointed out to me just exactly how much my sunburn hurt now. Once I was in bed, Craig called to ask how the beach trip had gone. By that time I was dehydrated, shaking, tired, in pain, and starting to go into shock. I tried to hold myself together, but it wasn't five minutes before I found myself in tears. He convinced me to make the trip to the kitchen to get water, even though I could barely walk, and kept me awake long enough to drink it. By the time he told me it was safe to go to sleep a couple of hours later, that I had recovered enough that I wouldn't die before morning, I felt a lot better.
I bought aloe today for the sunburn, but I really can’t tell how much it’s helping. I know I didn’t dare take a shower today because I already feel like I’ve been skinned alive, and the water in my shower isn’t exactly gentle. I’m glad I got to the see the sun, though; apparently it poured rain in Quito the entire weekend.
This has not been my week for technology, either. On top of my camera having that temper tantrum, my watch rusted and then stopped, and my computer has caught a whole array of viruses that I can’t seem to get rid of. The camera is behaving at the moment, and I can get a new watch, but I’m not happy about the computer. I think what happened is that I picked up a virus on my flash drive from one of the café computers, and then transferred it to my own machine. When I got my computer on broadband last week, the one virus downloaded others for company, and now they are having a grand old party in my hard drive. I need to connect it to a network again so I can download virus updates, but I’m afraid that it will also download more trojans at the same time. I love technology – when it works.
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1352.jpg
I finally managed to actually go and do something this weekend – I went to the beach with Marie. The four of us went shopping on Thursday, having failed again to ride the teleférico (this time Pichincha was too cloudy to bother), and Marie told me she was going to the beach with her friend Eduardo and his friend Nelo, and she begged me to come along.
It took some prodding, but eventually I decided to go. The original plan was to leave Thursday evening for a three-hour drive to…well, we weren’t actually sure where. I headed to Marie’s house and had dinner there, and then Eduardo called and told her that it was too dangerous to drive at night, that we ran the risk of getting car-jacked, and he would rather leave at 6am on Friday morning. So I stayed at Marie’s that night, and got up at 5:30am. The guys, of course, didn’t actually show up until 7:15, by which time Marie and I were grousing about how we could have gotten another hour of sleep apiece. The drive turned out to be not three but five and a half hours, and we had lunch in Atacames at 12:30.
We got spectacularly bored in the car and started taking pictures.
Of each other:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1364.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1365.jpg
Of ourselves:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1367.jpg
...making funny faces:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1368.jpg
Of the view:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1370.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1375.jpg
Gum anyone?
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1373.jpg
Of each other taking pictures:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1374.jpg
Marie takes a nap on my lap:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1380.jpg
After lunch we finally reached Eduardo’s aunt’s condo in Casablanca. It reminded me a bit of being in Grand Cayman, the house and the beach and the weather. It was probably somewhere around eighty degrees and humid, the kind of humid where you get out of the shower and can’t dry off, no matter how many times you run the towel over yourself. We spent a while sunbathing on the balcony, and then went for a walk on the beach. I waded into the ocean and had a good time playing in the waves, though I refused to actually swim.
Marie and Eduardo:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1383.jpg
Lounging out on the balcony Friday afternoon:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1384.jpg
View from the balcony:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1385.jpg
A walk on the beach:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1393.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1396.jpg
Nelo, me, Marie, and Eduardo:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1394.jpg
Just before sunset we walked back to the house and jumped into the “hot tub” (the same temperature as the pool, actually) and hung out there until after the sun went down. That night we went out to a bar in Atacames to dance, and honestly I wish I’d stayed at the condo. I was already tired when I went, and I didn’t wake up any after we had eaten a pizza and reached the bar. Eduardo bought us a round of caipirinas, then spent the rest of the night continually handing me mine when I didn’t drink it. It wasn’t that I forgot it was there, it was that I thought it was disgusting! What can I say, I don’t like tequila, and tequila with aguardiente is even worse.
Marie and I were both tired and ready to leave by midnight, and the guys told us we would leave soon. At 1:30, I was still sitting there, getting attacked by flying ants and playing with my cell phone. Finally Marie told Eduardo again that we wanted to go home, and that time he got the hint and we went. Of course, by the time I was in bed, I wasn’t tired anymore…go figure…and I was up until 4am.
The original plan was to leave on Saturday afternoon, but of course the only point of having a plan around here is that you know that’s what will NOT happen. I slept in, hung around reading for a while, then went for a walk with Marie and Eduardo to find lunch. We found an awesome little seafood place on the beach, where I got some of the best fried fish I’ve had in a very long time. I also got a coconut, where the vendor cuts off the top and sticks a straw straight into it. You drink the coconut milk, and then get it cut in half so you can eat the actual coconut. My camera decided to start working again in time for me to get a picture of it. It had been taking blank pictures the night before, but I think it just didn’t like the change in altitude, and the iris stuck shut for a while until it adjusted.
Coconut!
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1404.jpg
Inside the coconut:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1407.jpg
Lunch, best fried fish ever:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1409.jpg
I was happy with the previous day’s decision not to bathe myself completely in the ocean when we saw, on the way to lunch, a large pipe pouring something liquid and black into the swimming area. It looked suspiciously like raw sewage, so when Marie asked me if I wanted to go swimming again, I said no. Not waiting to catch my second wind this time, I went to bed obscenely early.
Sunset in a hammock:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1410.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1411.jpg
Sunday morning I got up, managed to find some granola for breakfast, and then spent way too long reading in the pool. I went to find my sun block when Marie warned me I was turning red, but it was too late. We left the house around 3:30, had lunch/dinner in Atacames, and were finally on the road home by 5pm. Given that dark comes around 6:30, I wondered what had happened to their dire warnings about carjacking. Nobody seemed concerned, though, so I didn’t ask. I read my book until it was too dark to see, and then put on my iPod and started texting Craig out of shear boredom.
Lunch in Atacames before leaving:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1412.jpg
We were into Pichincha province and under half an hour from Quito when all the cars in front of us stopped and put their blinkers on. Nelo stopped behind them and got out to see what was going on. After a minute or so he came back, and the entire line of cars turned around and went the other way. In less than five minutes, the same thing happened again. Stop, wait, turn around. Now think about this: once you have turned around twice, you’re repeating what you did the first time. At that point I was really wondering what the hell was going on.
Halfway back to the original stop point, a policeman directed us down a little dirt side road. We drove maybe half a mile, and then someone on the side of the road waved frantically. Eduardo rolled down his window, they conversed, and then we turned around again. I couldn’t imagine where else we could possibly go, but it turned out that we had missed another dirt path. Eduardo explained to us that there was a protest going on in the main road, and we had to drive around.
Eventually we made it back on track, and they dropped me off at my house. By that time we had been in the car for six and a half hours…so much for the three-hour drive.
All the bouncing on the poorly-kept roads through the small towns had pointed out to me just exactly how much my sunburn hurt now. Once I was in bed, Craig called to ask how the beach trip had gone. By that time I was dehydrated, shaking, tired, in pain, and starting to go into shock. I tried to hold myself together, but it wasn't five minutes before I found myself in tears. He convinced me to make the trip to the kitchen to get water, even though I could barely walk, and kept me awake long enough to drink it. By the time he told me it was safe to go to sleep a couple of hours later, that I had recovered enough that I wouldn't die before morning, I felt a lot better.
I bought aloe today for the sunburn, but I really can’t tell how much it’s helping. I know I didn’t dare take a shower today because I already feel like I’ve been skinned alive, and the water in my shower isn’t exactly gentle. I’m glad I got to the see the sun, though; apparently it poured rain in Quito the entire weekend.
This has not been my week for technology, either. On top of my camera having that temper tantrum, my watch rusted and then stopped, and my computer has caught a whole array of viruses that I can’t seem to get rid of. The camera is behaving at the moment, and I can get a new watch, but I’m not happy about the computer. I think what happened is that I picked up a virus on my flash drive from one of the café computers, and then transferred it to my own machine. When I got my computer on broadband last week, the one virus downloaded others for company, and now they are having a grand old party in my hard drive. I need to connect it to a network again so I can download virus updates, but I’m afraid that it will also download more trojans at the same time. I love technology – when it works.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Pichincha - or Not
Having run out of minutes for my cell phone, I decided yesterday morning to take a walk to El Jardín to get it recharged. Of course, there’s no need for me to go that far just to buy minutes; there’s a store that literally backs up to the house that cells Movistar cards. But I still haven’t figured out how to get the card code into the phone myself, and if I go to the kiosk in the mall, they’ll do it for me. Besides, I didn’t have anything else to do and figured a walk would be a good activity to take up some time.
I had forgotten exactly how long the walk was until I made it – over forty minutes, and I keep up a pretty good pace. I got to the mall and got my minutes, and while I was there, Marie called and invited me to meet her and Liz at 1 o’clock to go up Pichincha on the teleférico. So I repeated the forty-minute walk in the other direction, told Meri I wouldn’t be home for lunch, and met Marie and Liz at Quicentro. Marie’s guidebook said that we could catch a bus straight to the teleférico from Quicentro, but when we asked a guard if that was true, he told us to go to Avenido Colón.
Colón is mostly in the Mariscal, and Marie’s mom had told her that we could also catch the bus from the Rio Coca station of the Ecovía. So we took the Ecovía to the station and asked someone there how to get where we were going. He told us to take the trolebus, which proceeded not to show up for over half an hour. Eventually we got on a different bus, which took us to Estación Norte. There we switched to the actual trolebus, and rode that as far as Colón. Having successfully made a large circle around north Quito, we caught a bus for Avenido Occidental. That dropped us off just a little too far to walk to the teleférico, so we grabbed a taxi to take us the rest of the way.
By that time it was nearly 3 o’clock…and when we finally got there, we were told that the teleférico doesn’t run after 1:30 – only on Tuesdays! Tired, frustrated, and sunburned, we had the taxi take us back to Colón, where we all caught our respective buses for home. Rather like our adventure to La Mitad del Mundo, we put a whole lot more effort than was entirely necessary into getting where we wanted to go, but at least we now know more about the bus system.
And actually, I didn’t go straight home; I took a walk down 6 de Diciembre and into the Mariscal first, looking for hotels on Craig’s behalf. I had only intended to walk as far as Eloy Alfaro from Naciones Unidas (probably half a mile), but once there I figured why not walk the rest of the way to the Mariscal. By the time I realized it was a whole lot farther than I wanted to walk, I was most of the way there already. I checked out Akros Hotel, Hotel Embassy, Hotel Reina Isabel, and Hotel Bonaventura, then went home before remembering that I had also wanted to check the ones on 12 de Octubre.
The other three went out to El Nobar again last night, and I considered going, but after my rather long walk around most of Quito, I was tired. Deciding that kicking this stupid cold was a better idea than getting drunk again, I stayed home and went to bed early. Not generally my style, but my reward is that I’m coughing less violently this morning than I have been for the last ten days. I think I’ve been sick for thirteen days now, but I’m finally starting to feel like I might actually get over it soon.
On a less cheerful note, I think my computer has a virus. It’s only been connected to broadband once in the whole month I’ve been here, but it’s just my luck that that one time would be enough to get it a disease. After all, I’ve been disgustingly sick, why not my laptop too? Of course, to be able to fix it, I have to connect it to the web again to be able to download virus and spyware definitions. I just hope that whatever’s screwing with it isn’t a trojan, or connecting it to broadband might just download a whole lot more unsavory crap. I REALLY don’t want to have to reinstall Windows while I’m here. Sure, I could do it, but I don’t have original discs or any of my software, and I’ve never made the Microsoft activation call that I’m sure they’d stick me with from outside the country.
Later update: asked Craig about the virus (so handy to have a boyfriend who's even geekier than I am!) and he said I probably picked it up off one of the local computers via my flash drive. When I remembered that McAfee said it had deleted something off the flash drive, I figured he was probably right. But that doesn't help the fact that my computer is still acting funky.
I had forgotten exactly how long the walk was until I made it – over forty minutes, and I keep up a pretty good pace. I got to the mall and got my minutes, and while I was there, Marie called and invited me to meet her and Liz at 1 o’clock to go up Pichincha on the teleférico. So I repeated the forty-minute walk in the other direction, told Meri I wouldn’t be home for lunch, and met Marie and Liz at Quicentro. Marie’s guidebook said that we could catch a bus straight to the teleférico from Quicentro, but when we asked a guard if that was true, he told us to go to Avenido Colón.
Colón is mostly in the Mariscal, and Marie’s mom had told her that we could also catch the bus from the Rio Coca station of the Ecovía. So we took the Ecovía to the station and asked someone there how to get where we were going. He told us to take the trolebus, which proceeded not to show up for over half an hour. Eventually we got on a different bus, which took us to Estación Norte. There we switched to the actual trolebus, and rode that as far as Colón. Having successfully made a large circle around north Quito, we caught a bus for Avenido Occidental. That dropped us off just a little too far to walk to the teleférico, so we grabbed a taxi to take us the rest of the way.
By that time it was nearly 3 o’clock…and when we finally got there, we were told that the teleférico doesn’t run after 1:30 – only on Tuesdays! Tired, frustrated, and sunburned, we had the taxi take us back to Colón, where we all caught our respective buses for home. Rather like our adventure to La Mitad del Mundo, we put a whole lot more effort than was entirely necessary into getting where we wanted to go, but at least we now know more about the bus system.
And actually, I didn’t go straight home; I took a walk down 6 de Diciembre and into the Mariscal first, looking for hotels on Craig’s behalf. I had only intended to walk as far as Eloy Alfaro from Naciones Unidas (probably half a mile), but once there I figured why not walk the rest of the way to the Mariscal. By the time I realized it was a whole lot farther than I wanted to walk, I was most of the way there already. I checked out Akros Hotel, Hotel Embassy, Hotel Reina Isabel, and Hotel Bonaventura, then went home before remembering that I had also wanted to check the ones on 12 de Octubre.
The other three went out to El Nobar again last night, and I considered going, but after my rather long walk around most of Quito, I was tired. Deciding that kicking this stupid cold was a better idea than getting drunk again, I stayed home and went to bed early. Not generally my style, but my reward is that I’m coughing less violently this morning than I have been for the last ten days. I think I’ve been sick for thirteen days now, but I’m finally starting to feel like I might actually get over it soon.
On a less cheerful note, I think my computer has a virus. It’s only been connected to broadband once in the whole month I’ve been here, but it’s just my luck that that one time would be enough to get it a disease. After all, I’ve been disgustingly sick, why not my laptop too? Of course, to be able to fix it, I have to connect it to the web again to be able to download virus and spyware definitions. I just hope that whatever’s screwing with it isn’t a trojan, or connecting it to broadband might just download a whole lot more unsavory crap. I REALLY don’t want to have to reinstall Windows while I’m here. Sure, I could do it, but I don’t have original discs or any of my software, and I’ve never made the Microsoft activation call that I’m sure they’d stick me with from outside the country.
Later update: asked Craig about the virus (so handy to have a boyfriend who's even geekier than I am!) and he said I probably picked it up off one of the local computers via my flash drive. When I remembered that McAfee said it had deleted something off the flash drive, I figured he was probably right. But that doesn't help the fact that my computer is still acting funky.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Random Bitching
This is the second weekend I’ve spent laid out sick in bed. I woke up feeling worse yesterday and stayed home all day, leaving my room only to eat. Today I feel a little bit better, but only a little. I still have a cough that’s going to give me a six-pack if it doesn’t break me in half first. The result of all this is that I actually have very little to update with. My friends have invited me to go out a couple of times, but I’ve been sick for ten days now, so I’m refusing to go out until I get better.
Got up this morning and had breakfast by myself, since mom was getting her weekly massage from the girl that comes to the house. About an hour after I ate, she knocked on my door and told me to come eat. I explained that I already had, but she told me to come downstairs anyway, and insisted that I have tea and more bread, and made me another one of those awful combination juice-Parmalat drinks. I asked how she slept in reply to the same question, and she told me she slept with María del Camino, her granddaughter, who had come over obscenely early this morning. It’s quite common here for people to share their bed with random relatives, but I still find it a little freaky. I can’t imagine sleeping in the same bed as my grandma!
Camino ate lunch with us, and I still can’t figure out whether she’s just shy or doesn’t like me. I get along pretty well with her younger sister Isabela, but Camino hardly ever talks to me, just to Lucía. On the rare occasion that she does ask me something, I usually don’t understand it the first time, but when I say I don’t understand, she doesn’t slow down or speak any more clearly, just repeats herself. Maybe she’s frustrated with me being the stupid gringa who doesn’t understand anything…
Mom is starting to drive me a little nuts, too, but I’m sure that will be fixed when I can actually get out of the house again and not eat all my meals here. She means well, of course, but she’s impatient and often seems not to listen or pay attention. She’ll call me to come down to the kitchen and eat, and I reply that I’m on my way, and she immediately calls for me again. I end up having to yell really loud to get her to hear me, and then I feel bad for yelling in the house.
She also has that classic “Italian-mother” tendency of trying to force me to eat more. I eat plenty here, but she’s always trying to get me to take more food. After I’ve already finished lunch, she’ll offer me every plate and pitcher on the table in turn, and I have to politely refuse every one in turn because I’m already stuffed. Normally all this stuff wouldn’t bother me, but while my body is still sick and content to hang around the house, my mind is perfectly fine and really wants to be elsewhere.
A random picture of me and Mark at Azuca (Mark was from the Delaware group):
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1329.jpg
Friday, February 8, 2008
Birthday
First of all, thanks to everyone for all the cards and birthday wishes I've been getting! It's good to know I'm remembered even when I'm 5000 miles away. I came down to breakfast yesterday morning to find that my mom had made me a cake (with trick candles, of course).
Cake!
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1333.jpg
I had my examen de ubicaciòn (placement exam) in the morning, and I placed into Spanish Level 5 (out of 7 levels). Kate and Erin also got me a cake, and after classes, the seven of us sat out on the quad and polished it off. Then we had an orientation session by an assistant to the US Consul, which was utterly unhelpful (I should have copied Braulio and skipped). After that they took us on a tour of campus (also unnecessary and unhelpful, as we only need to know about three buildings and we've already used them all).
During lunch, we went shopping so I could get a bathing suit. Of course, when we got back to school, Marìa Ìsabel told us we weren't going to the beach. But we at least had fun being squished on the Ecovia.
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1334.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1335.jpg
We skipped the last session and I went home to take a nap. I figured mom would wake me up for dinner, but she didn't, and I woke up at 8:16pm to the realization that I still had to eat dinner, and had no time for a shower, before meeting my friends in the Mariscal at 9. I got there late, more like 9:30, and us three girls hung around and celebrated my birthday. Braulio was going to come, but couldn't, because the locks had been changed on his house that day and he didn't have keys yet, so if he went out, he wouldn't have been able to get back home. Still feeling sick and wanting to get better, I just had one drink, and we were all home by midnight.
My birthday drink (a Hummer):
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1337.jpg
Alcohol or water? Let me think...
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1339.jpg
I considered skipping the first orientation session for today, because it started at 8am, but I dragged myself out of bed and went, because it was labeled on the agenda as "Orientaciòn Mèdica." Thinking that we might be getting essential health information, like how to use our insurance cards and where to go in an emergency, I went. I shouldn't have bothered; it was some freaky guy speaking kindergarten-level Spanish and telling us not to drink the water. An hour in, Marie and I were trying not to laugh, not looking at each other for fear we'd explode. That was when I dropped my pen, leaned over to get it, and came up short when I smacked my forehead with impressive force on the chair in front of me, which I had somehow failed to see. At that point we gave up and just laughed hysterically.
The course was a complete joke, because after all, if they were going to warn us about bad food and worse water, they should have done it when we arrived three weeks ago. The reason all the orientations are now is that all the other exchange students just arrived this weekend; Keene and Oregon are the only ones who have been here for three weeks. We did get three extra credits for the last three weeks of classes, but we should have had our own orientation.
We skipped the second Orientaciòn Mèdica in favor of snacks, came back long enough to sign up for our U classes, and then took off again. We were supposed to be back at 2pm, but skipped that one too and came back at 3 for the Clubs and Sports session. That was short, and Liz and I decided that we want to join the Spanish Dance club, which is Flamenco.
Cake!
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1333.jpg
I had my examen de ubicaciòn (placement exam) in the morning, and I placed into Spanish Level 5 (out of 7 levels). Kate and Erin also got me a cake, and after classes, the seven of us sat out on the quad and polished it off. Then we had an orientation session by an assistant to the US Consul, which was utterly unhelpful (I should have copied Braulio and skipped). After that they took us on a tour of campus (also unnecessary and unhelpful, as we only need to know about three buildings and we've already used them all).
During lunch, we went shopping so I could get a bathing suit. Of course, when we got back to school, Marìa Ìsabel told us we weren't going to the beach. But we at least had fun being squished on the Ecovia.
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1334.jpg
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1335.jpg
We skipped the last session and I went home to take a nap. I figured mom would wake me up for dinner, but she didn't, and I woke up at 8:16pm to the realization that I still had to eat dinner, and had no time for a shower, before meeting my friends in the Mariscal at 9. I got there late, more like 9:30, and us three girls hung around and celebrated my birthday. Braulio was going to come, but couldn't, because the locks had been changed on his house that day and he didn't have keys yet, so if he went out, he wouldn't have been able to get back home. Still feeling sick and wanting to get better, I just had one drink, and we were all home by midnight.
My birthday drink (a Hummer):
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1337.jpg
Alcohol or water? Let me think...
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1339.jpg
I considered skipping the first orientation session for today, because it started at 8am, but I dragged myself out of bed and went, because it was labeled on the agenda as "Orientaciòn Mèdica." Thinking that we might be getting essential health information, like how to use our insurance cards and where to go in an emergency, I went. I shouldn't have bothered; it was some freaky guy speaking kindergarten-level Spanish and telling us not to drink the water. An hour in, Marie and I were trying not to laugh, not looking at each other for fear we'd explode. That was when I dropped my pen, leaned over to get it, and came up short when I smacked my forehead with impressive force on the chair in front of me, which I had somehow failed to see. At that point we gave up and just laughed hysterically.
The course was a complete joke, because after all, if they were going to warn us about bad food and worse water, they should have done it when we arrived three weeks ago. The reason all the orientations are now is that all the other exchange students just arrived this weekend; Keene and Oregon are the only ones who have been here for three weeks. We did get three extra credits for the last three weeks of classes, but we should have had our own orientation.
We skipped the second Orientaciòn Mèdica in favor of snacks, came back long enough to sign up for our U classes, and then took off again. We were supposed to be back at 2pm, but skipped that one too and came back at 3 for the Clubs and Sports session. That was short, and Liz and I decided that we want to join the Spanish Dance club, which is Flamenco.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
The Hair Battle
I did it – my hair is my own again. It took a cup of home-made banana vinegar (the only thing mom had in the house) and two and a half hours of sitting on the floor with my head between my knees, breaking my back. But I can run my new brush through my hair no problem. The old one finally went in the trash after completing this last unfortunate duty.
The process:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1323.jpg
Yup, this’ll larn me all right.
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1327.jpg
The process:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1323.jpg
Yup, this’ll larn me all right.
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1327.jpg
Monday, February 4, 2008
El Nobar
I have a four-day weekend this weekend, because we have Monday and Tuesday off from school for Carnaval. Of course, I’m also still sick, and I haven’t started to feel better yet. Friday night I was considering going out, but decided not to in favor of sleep and getting better.
Saturday mom and I spent the afternoon at my sister’s house in Campo Alegre. She told me we were going for lunch, and I hadn’t realized she intended to spend the entire afternoon, or I would have brought something to do. As it was I ended up spending most of the afternoon on the couch watching TV with my nieces, feeling completely the part of a lazy American. I did get a compliment that made me really happy, though. When we sat down for lunch, Sylvie (my sister) asked me for my name in English, and Lucía corrected her, “No no, she speaks Spanish very well.” After I had said a couple of things, Sylvie agreed, and told me that I speak without an accent!
While I was there, Marie called and invited me to come to a punk club with her that night, so I agreed to meet her there at nine. At the appointed time, I arrived on the appropriate street corner to find Marie and Braulio, but no club. No one they asked had even heard of it, so when Liz finally caught us up we walked down to the Mariscal to find a different bar.
We ran across Dragonfly, which Rachel (the other exchange student living with Lucía) had recommended to me. It turned out to be really good; we had a couple of drinks and then went looking for a dance club. I wasn’t intending to dance, since I still didn’t feel well, but somehow once we got into El Nobar, I didn’t feel sick anymore. We danced and drank until 2am, and then took a taxi home. I was a mess by the time I got home, because while I was there, I got a bucket of sugar-water dumped on my head (apparently a fairly common occurrence). It got into everything – my clothes, shoes, purse, hair, camera, cell phone, leather jacket, you name it.
I also learned a rather rude lesson about mixing your alcohol. Of course I’ve been told by many friends, “Wine before beer makes you feel queer, beer before wine makes you feel fine,” and, “Don’t mix milk drinks with non-milk drinks.” But what reason could I possibly have to listen to the advice of those more experienced than I?
Lesson Learned #1: Don’t get drunk when you’re already sick. It makes the hangover, and the cold, that much more hellish.
Lesson Learned #2: DON’T mix milk drinks with non-milk drinks. Really. Don’t.
Lesson Learned #3: Don’t take a hot shower when you’re already tipsy; it just makes you more drunk.
It turns out that Blue Curacao, chocolate ice cream, orange juice, Triple Sec, chocolate liquor, Kahlua, vodka, Aguardiente, and milk are a very unfortunate combination. It probably all would have been fine without the milk.
Us three girls:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1306.jpg
The result of all those things, at the club:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1311.jpg
And if anybody has any tips for getting sugary dread-locks out of your hair, I could really use them. Three washes with shampoo and two with bar soap have just barely made it manageable.
The result of getting a bucket of sugary syrup dumped over my head, two days and five hair-washings later:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1320.jpg
As Craig said, "Well, that'll larn ya!"
Saturday mom and I spent the afternoon at my sister’s house in Campo Alegre. She told me we were going for lunch, and I hadn’t realized she intended to spend the entire afternoon, or I would have brought something to do. As it was I ended up spending most of the afternoon on the couch watching TV with my nieces, feeling completely the part of a lazy American. I did get a compliment that made me really happy, though. When we sat down for lunch, Sylvie (my sister) asked me for my name in English, and Lucía corrected her, “No no, she speaks Spanish very well.” After I had said a couple of things, Sylvie agreed, and told me that I speak without an accent!
While I was there, Marie called and invited me to come to a punk club with her that night, so I agreed to meet her there at nine. At the appointed time, I arrived on the appropriate street corner to find Marie and Braulio, but no club. No one they asked had even heard of it, so when Liz finally caught us up we walked down to the Mariscal to find a different bar.
We ran across Dragonfly, which Rachel (the other exchange student living with Lucía) had recommended to me. It turned out to be really good; we had a couple of drinks and then went looking for a dance club. I wasn’t intending to dance, since I still didn’t feel well, but somehow once we got into El Nobar, I didn’t feel sick anymore. We danced and drank until 2am, and then took a taxi home. I was a mess by the time I got home, because while I was there, I got a bucket of sugar-water dumped on my head (apparently a fairly common occurrence). It got into everything – my clothes, shoes, purse, hair, camera, cell phone, leather jacket, you name it.
I also learned a rather rude lesson about mixing your alcohol. Of course I’ve been told by many friends, “Wine before beer makes you feel queer, beer before wine makes you feel fine,” and, “Don’t mix milk drinks with non-milk drinks.” But what reason could I possibly have to listen to the advice of those more experienced than I?
Lesson Learned #1: Don’t get drunk when you’re already sick. It makes the hangover, and the cold, that much more hellish.
Lesson Learned #2: DON’T mix milk drinks with non-milk drinks. Really. Don’t.
Lesson Learned #3: Don’t take a hot shower when you’re already tipsy; it just makes you more drunk.
It turns out that Blue Curacao, chocolate ice cream, orange juice, Triple Sec, chocolate liquor, Kahlua, vodka, Aguardiente, and milk are a very unfortunate combination. It probably all would have been fine without the milk.
Us three girls:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1306.jpg
The result of all those things, at the club:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1311.jpg
And if anybody has any tips for getting sugary dread-locks out of your hair, I could really use them. Three washes with shampoo and two with bar soap have just barely made it manageable.
The result of getting a bucket of sugary syrup dumped over my head, two days and five hair-washings later:
http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh276/keskipper/100_1320.jpg
As Craig said, "Well, that'll larn ya!"
Friday, February 1, 2008
A Rainy Week
I'm holed up in what must be the worst internet cafê in Quito (see how I couldn't get the right accent on cafe because this keyboard is completely screwed up), and also the most American. My mom had a coupon for a half hour of free internet in the Mariscal, or the tourist district, so I set out to find the place. Find it I did, but it's really not great. The only attractions are that it's cheap and they actually serve food and drinks here. But I can outtype this poor old computer without even trying, and sometimes it gets so overwhelmed that it just forgets half of what I've typed and drops it. It doesn't even have USB ports, meaning I can't upload my latest photos.
As long as I'm complaining, it's freezing cold (by Quiteño standards) and pouring rain, and it's been raining all week. I caught a cold from Liz's brother and I feel disgusting, complete with nasty cough. At least I can sleep in for the next few days, since I have Monday and Tuesday off from school for Carnaval. I'm considering going to Ambato over the weekend, because there's an awesome-sounding fruit parade that I want to see. My mom said it would be cheap to stay there, but Liz's sister said it would be expensive because it's a party weekend, so I may be staying here. Meri keeps asking what my plans are for the weekend and I have to keep saying that I don't know. I was considering going out to the bar tonight, but since I'm sick I think I'd rather stay in and sleep. The weather's supposed to be better next week, so maybe (I hope) it will start this weekend.
I could have sworn that I had something interesting to say; in fact, I know I came up with something earlier, but I seem to have forgotten it completely. The days are all starting to run together here; life is actually surprisingly boring in this town. I finally went back to the post office today to buy stamps, and I once again managed to make myself that unpopular foreigner. First the guy told me to go to the desk in the corner to get stamps to sen d to the US, but there wasn't anyone there, so he waved me back. Then I had to pay with a 20, 'cos it was all I had, and he got pissy about that too. I would have thought that at least the post office would have larger change than the small stores, but apparently not. Now that I've blown my daily budget on stamps, though, at least I can send postcards! However, I don't think I'll do it again anytime soon, given how expensive stamps are.
Anyway, I really only have one more class for this cycle, which is on Wednesday. Thursday we have final exams (yeah, for a 3-week class, w00t), and then Friday we have placement exams to get into U classes, followed by a full day of orientations. Like that's not enough, Saturday is also a full day of orientations. Some birthday I have to look forward to! I think Friday night I'll drag my friends out to the bar, no matter how early we have to get up on Saturday.
I've confirmed my mailing address, by the way, so I'll post it again for your reading pleasure.
Kati Skipper
c/o Bermeo
Paris 747 y Luis Pasteur
Jipijapa, Quito
ECUADOR
On a side note from a few minutes later...there is one thing to be said for this place, and that is that they have very good hot chocolate.
As long as I'm complaining, it's freezing cold (by Quiteño standards) and pouring rain, and it's been raining all week. I caught a cold from Liz's brother and I feel disgusting, complete with nasty cough. At least I can sleep in for the next few days, since I have Monday and Tuesday off from school for Carnaval. I'm considering going to Ambato over the weekend, because there's an awesome-sounding fruit parade that I want to see. My mom said it would be cheap to stay there, but Liz's sister said it would be expensive because it's a party weekend, so I may be staying here. Meri keeps asking what my plans are for the weekend and I have to keep saying that I don't know. I was considering going out to the bar tonight, but since I'm sick I think I'd rather stay in and sleep. The weather's supposed to be better next week, so maybe (I hope) it will start this weekend.
I could have sworn that I had something interesting to say; in fact, I know I came up with something earlier, but I seem to have forgotten it completely. The days are all starting to run together here; life is actually surprisingly boring in this town. I finally went back to the post office today to buy stamps, and I once again managed to make myself that unpopular foreigner. First the guy told me to go to the desk in the corner to get stamps to sen d to the US, but there wasn't anyone there, so he waved me back. Then I had to pay with a 20, 'cos it was all I had, and he got pissy about that too. I would have thought that at least the post office would have larger change than the small stores, but apparently not. Now that I've blown my daily budget on stamps, though, at least I can send postcards! However, I don't think I'll do it again anytime soon, given how expensive stamps are.
Anyway, I really only have one more class for this cycle, which is on Wednesday. Thursday we have final exams (yeah, for a 3-week class, w00t), and then Friday we have placement exams to get into U classes, followed by a full day of orientations. Like that's not enough, Saturday is also a full day of orientations. Some birthday I have to look forward to! I think Friday night I'll drag my friends out to the bar, no matter how early we have to get up on Saturday.
I've confirmed my mailing address, by the way, so I'll post it again for your reading pleasure.
Kati Skipper
c/o Bermeo
Paris 747 y Luis Pasteur
Jipijapa, Quito
ECUADOR
On a side note from a few minutes later...there is one thing to be said for this place, and that is that they have very good hot chocolate.
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