Teleférico Re-do and Cotopaxi: Crossing off "Never Have I Ever's"

Seeing as that we only had two weekends left in Quito, I decided to stay in the city this weekend and cross off some more "Quito Bucket-list" tasks.

Friday morning I journeyed with Jacqueline, Hannah, and Katie S. for round two of the Teleférico. When we first got to the base of the mountain, we were treated to the sight of painters painting a bunch (79, to be exact) of giant clay hummingbirds. After talking to one of the artist's, we learned that the hummingbirds are one of the many things for the festivities for 6 de Diciembre (the founding day of Quito) where the Quiteños rage for two weeks straight (I feel like we need to start celebrating the founding day of Duke in the same manner...). Here's a taste of the beautiful works:

The painted hummingbirds

Me with one of the artists.

As we rode up the Teleférico and hiked around, we had beautiful weather.

Quito from 12,943 ft.

After hiking five of the six kilometers to the top of Rucu Pinchincha, we stopped for a quick picnic snack break. Afterward, we decided to head back and couldn't have picked a better time because the temperature dropped and the clouds quickly started to roll in.

In a cloud!!

The moment we got back to the lift cars, it began to pour, which was complemented with huge bolts of thunder and lightening. This only made the ride back more exciting as the Teleférico routinely stopped to leave us hanging hundreds of meters high in the air for a couple minutes. Who says near death experiences can't be fun!?

Once safely back on the ground, we found a nice lady to hitchhike with (Never Have I Ever #1). She drove us all the way to Gringo Heaven, or American's Natural Habitats, or MCDONALD'S! Hey, it was pouring and we had to take shelter SOMEWHERE. The Ecuadorian McNifica and fries were delicious (Never Have I Ever [eaten McDonald's in Ecuador] #2) although it tastes the same as in the U.S. Sad, I know.

Hamburger Heaven.

That night, in order to continue the gringo-trend, some of my friends and I enjoyed several friendly games of Beer Pong--on my friend's balcony overlooking the beautifully lit-up Centro Histórico and Panecillo (Never Have I Ever [nor will I ever again] #3.


Saturday morning we continued with the hiking mania and took an hour and a half bus to Cotopaxi National Park, which contains Ecuador's second highest summit and active volcano, Cotopaxi. This volcano, which is considered the world's tallest active volcano at 5,897m or 19,347ft, destroyed the town of Latacunga three times.

Being dropped off at the park entrance required us to hire a pickup truck to take us the remaining 17km to the base of the volcano.

Riding in the back. Casual occurrence in Ecuador.

The hour-long ride in the truck was absolutely beautiful and permitted us to see just how immense the national park is. As we got closer and closer to the base of the volcano, the temperature began to drop until we were driving by snow (!). Unfortunately, like a true Wilmingtonian, I was unprepared in a T-shirt, leggings, and a rain jacket. Oops. My mom (and Gabby) would be so worried about me getting sick ;)

Warm (or not), but ready to conquer Cotopaxi!

Still, we all began the treacherous hike up to the first refugio, which our driver told us would take 40 minutes. It ended up taking a little over an hour and the hike was extremely hard. Like, Quilotoa hard. Panting and being pelted by hail and wind, we arrived at the refugio for snacks and the chance to get warm.

After looking at the sign outside of the building, my headache and lack of breathing made sense...we were at 4810m, or 15,780 feet! I only wish I was kidding. No, it was actually really cool and Never Have I Ever (#4) been that high up in my life!

Jacqueline, Noah, Katie, me, Phoebe, Melody, and Tori posing in the sky, basically.

The hike back down was MUCH easier (words can't describe how much easier) and the clouds cleared so we had the benefit of seeing a beautiful view.

The view of the park from the top (please notice the vertical hike up)

The snowy Cotopaxi

After the long ride back in the pickup truck, we were dropped off at the park entrance in order to flag down a bus. Unfortunately, all of the buses were full and alas, the only bus that stopped was...a school bus. Laughing at the irony of being on a school bus on a Saturday, we rode all the way back to Quito (Never Have I Ever #5).

Sunday was spent getting in the Christmas spirit as I helped my mom remove all of the Christmas decorations from storage, put together the tree (oh how I miss our two-story trees at my house), and decorate the entire apartment. Never Have I Ever assembled a fake Christmas tree...in Ecuador?

Just kidding, but hope you are also starting to get in the Christmas spirit as well!

Thanksgiving, meet Ecuador. Ecuador, meet Thanksgiving

As Thanksgiving week rolled around and we passed the three month mark in Ecuador, I started feeling the first pangs of homesickness. Four of my friends had their parents and families come to Ecuador to visit them and although it was great to meet them, it made me miss my family.

In order to try and dispel some of the homesickness, both Kaitlyn's parents and Katy's family took us out to Crepes and Waffles on Monday night. Full of crepes and satiated with love from the adopted families, I was ready to start cookin' for T-gives.

The day of Thanksgiving I woke up early in order to walk to the market to buy sweet potatoes. If you were wondering, the 45 minute walk was WELL worth it to obtain my favorite food (Mom, if you're reading this, I want sweet potatoes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner the day I get home). At the bright hour of 9:30am, Noah and Hannah arrived at my house to commence the cooking. We spent all day (literally) cooking my sweet potato casserole and broccoli casserole, Noah's scratch made pumpkin pies, and Hannah's challah (a type of Jewish bread served on the Sabbath).

Hannah and Noah and our domination of the kitchen.

After five hours of cooking, we arrived at the house of Guapulo where the Thanksgiving festivities were going to take place. There were over 60 people in attendance, comprised of students and their host families. With three turkeys, stuffing, salads, and TONS of different sides and desserts, all of the gringos felt very thankful for being surrounding by so many loving families and having the ability to have such a wonderful experiences abroad.

Almost everyone listening to the pre-meal speech

Noah, me, and my host mom and our table!

The post-apocalyptic dishes table

Community Service and Classes

Monday morning I met with the woman from my community service, Acción Ecológica, and talked about my project. Since our community service ends on November 30th, I am only going to have time to research the green economy. So far I have done a lot of research on Rio + 20, why agriculture is key to the success of a green economy, and the different agricultural policies that are being pushed for the UNCSD conference and just need to compile my results in a report. Although I have liked my community service and I have learned a lot, I still feel like I haven't really contributed that much to the organization or the community. Regardless, it's been a cool experience.

The outside of Acción Ecológica

Inside the building (the brooms are a joke about alternative energy)

My classes are also going well. Although I don't like our required course (The Construction of Pluricultural Nation-States in Andean America: Debates and Emergent Experiences, which I still have no idea what it means), I really like my other three classes. My Impresos class works with Photoshop and Illustrator and not only is it really easy, but it is extremely helpful and I hope to apply the things I've learned next semester at The Chronicle office. The other class that I take at Salesiana is Castellano, or Spanish grammar. Finally, I am taking a class at FLACSO, a graduate school, and my Agroecología class is turning out to be really interesting, although a little bit difficult to pay attention to considering each class lasts three hours. In general, my classes are a piece of cake compared to Duke. Four hours of homework per week compared to four hours of homework per night at Duke? I'll take the study abroad way any day.

Montanita: NOAH! QUIERES UN TRAGO?

"Vamos a la playa
A mi me gusta baila
El ritmo de la noche
Sounds of fiesta!"

Every time we talk about going to the beach, invariably someone will sing this "famous" song by Loona. If you don't know it, watch it so you will never feel left out when you're about to go to the beach. It's basically a classic.

Regardless, this past weekend I left Quito in the dust and headed to the beach with my friends for my friend Noah's 21st birthday. Thursday night we met at the bus station at 8:30pm and although the bus ride was terrifying (complete with sharp turns, high speeds, and leaking gasoline...no joke), we made it alive to switch buses at 4am and then to finally arrive at the beach at 7am.

Montanita is known as "gringolandia" (the loving name given by my host dad) and is not only filled with white people, but also tons of hippies. Despite this, at 7 in the morning, the town was desolate so we wandered around and found a ritzy hostel ($5 per night) and some classy breakfast ($1.50). While it was still cloudy we walked around the beach and walked along the rocky parts (with tide pools just like Maine!).

Once the sun came out (a foreign concept while we were in Canoa), we grabbed our suits and headed to the beach. We spent the rest of the day bathing in the sun, reading, and going body surfing, only breaking to get ceviche for lunch. The weather was great and the water was also perfect. Qué suerte!

At night we met an Ecuadorian guy named Leo who was also staying in our hostel. As the sun set, we pregamed with Leo and did some more relaxing.

Relaxing in the hammocks

After walking around town, having piña coladas, and watching some street performers, we decided that we were too tired after our epic bus ride, and ended up going to bed fairly early. Little did we know, the night was far from over because our friend Leo decided to come in to our room, not once, not twice, but THREE times throughout the night. Some would say that his first visit at 4:30am screaming, "NOAH, QUIERES UN TRAGO? NOAH! ES SU CUMPLEANOS! NOAH!" was comical, but after his third visit bright and early at 5:30 in the morning, it was slightly difficult to not get up and murder an Ecuadorian.

The morning started with a run (or really, Leo started off the morning and our run was the second thing on the menu) followed by another relaxing day at the beach. When it got cloudy in the afternoon, we got lunch and wandered around the town looking at the many street vendors. Although we had some relatively awk conversations with some of the millions of high hippies selling jewelry (#casual), it was fun.

The church and one of the streets of Montanita

Gringo-landia.

At night we played a game of Circle of Death and then went out to walk around the town.

Hanging out on the porch.

The entire day Sunday was spent on buses (12 hours total, woohoo). Still, the beach turned out to be relaxing and fun and was the perfect way to mark the three month mark of our time in Ecuador. Unfortunately, this means that we only have one month left here! And so the bucket-list compilations begin...

More pizza, food and puppies!

Sometimes when you're really stressed out and things aren't going your way, you just have to sit down with some comfort food and cuddle with pets to improve your mood. Or if you're studying abroad and your biggest stress is deciding between going to the beach or going to the Amazon rain forest over the weekend, sometimes you just want to eat some pizza and play with puppies.

Tuesday began normally with an exceptionally exciting Curso Principal (please read my sarcasm here). But after class, I went with Katie and Tori to the Foch in order to watch the fútbol game being played in Quito that we could not attend. After an Ecuadorian win (si se puede!), we went to a pizza restaurant to meet with one of the study abroad directors from Duke. Free pizza, pasta, and wine guarantee a happy group of study abroad students.

Wednesday night was another night of free food (my fave, as you all probably know). Jacqueline's parents, who were visiting for the week, took us out to a delicious Mexican restaurant. For dessert (okay, the SECOND dessert), we indulged in the sweet treat of visiting with Luis' golden retriever puppies.

The fan club with 8 of the puppies

With 3 beautiful biting babies

Mom, can we keep them??

Next in the works: vamos a la playa a Montanita!

Playa de Oro: Breakin' It Down, Gringo Style

After a short week (turned even shorter by two day flu, my latest Ecuadorian illness) all of the gringos stumbled to the bus for a midnight departure for our trip to the province of Esmeraldas. Around 9 in the morning and probably about 3 hours of sleep total, we arrived at a small town and "all aboard!" we all loaded in to the now familiar canoes. We rode for an hour in the bright green river that get its emerald color from the rocky bottom.

As we arrived at Playa de Oro (direct translation: Beach of Gold), an Afro-Ecuatorian community, a small group of community members were playing music and singing to welcome our arrival.

We settled into our cabañas, which were luckily outfitted with running water and mosquito nets, a huge step up from the Amazon.

Next we had a delicious meal of fried fish and rice and then settled into our seats for a charla. This chat was about a form of poetry that the Afro-Ecuadorians write and how they use it to pass down stories from their ancestors. Although one of the men from the community showed us several poems that he had composed (which we were actually more like spoken word, a form of poetry that is performed like rap), everyone was dead tired and had heard about la palabra in class one too many (...or ten times too many) times and had trouble staying awake. After the marathon of the talk, we were given the first of many spurts of free time, something that was a foreign concept on all of our other group trips.

After dinner we went on a walk around the community, which is composed of a bunch of wooden building on stilts (a lot of them had DirectTV...in the middle of the rainforest?), a school, and a soccer field where we watched a game between some of the adults in the community.

Some of the houses (with their satellites)

The soccer field/the town center

Friday morning (after almost 11 hours of sleep, a big record for group trips) we woke up and got ready to go on a long hike through the thick jungle. We rode in the canoes for another hour until we passed all forms of civilization and were in the middle of the jungle.

Hannah, Tori, Melody, Kaitlyn, me, Jacqueline, and Stephanie cheesin' before the hike

We then commenced on a two hour hike through the wonderfully muddy rain forest where we learned about different types of trees, saw a tiger footprint (!), and got to swing on a homemade vine swing.

Fearless me

We hiked down a treacherous hill and arrived at a beautiful waterfall. After the sweaty hike, the brisk water was a welcome invitation and when the clock changed to 11:11 on 11/11/11, I felt so lucky that I couldn't even think of something to wish for.

The steep hike down to the stream

Basking in the beautiful waterfall

After making it up the rough and muddy hike back, we went to pan for gold. Although the men from the community made it look easy, it was nearly impossible. We obtained about 5 specks of gold from all of our hard work...the first step towards paying off my Duke tuition! Not.

Panning for gold...like a boss

We returned to the camp ravenously hungry and were treated to shrimp with rice, yum! Following lunch, we spent the almost the rest of the day catching up on reading, gossip, and creating friendship bracelets. Although it was really nice to catch up with everyone, it was rather unfortunate that we did not spend more time with the community members, which we were, after all, there to learn about.

After our long descanso, we rode across the river in order to learn how to make sugar cane juice. This involved using a wooden machine and sending the sugar cane stalks through wheels to squish the juice out. Qué rico!

Sugarcane machine

Everyone helping to spin the wheels to crush the stalks

The "fruit" of our labor. So punny.

At night, the rest of the community crammed into the main building for a jam sesh. A group played three different types of drums, the marimba, and a guitar while a group of six teenagers dressed in traditional outfits performed several dances.

After their beautiful performance, they asked us to dance and attempted to teach us the dances. Attempt is the key word here. Even though the steps were relatively simple, I quickly decided the rest of the community probably came to observe (aka laugh at) us for the night. I totally can not blame them because a bunch of gringos stomping around in large rain boots was probably well worth their while.

Saturday morning we woke up, ate breakfast and packed our stuff. After another canoe trip, we piled back on the bus and rode to Borbón to see Papa Roncón, who, from what I can tell, is famous for teaching other people how to play the marimba so that the traditon would never be forgotten. Regardless, we arrived in the middle of the coastal heat to Papa Roncón's house for lunch. After we waited around for awhile (apparently this was the theme of the trip), Papa Roncón didn't seem to be feeling very festive so he only played a couple of songs on the marimba.

Later we rode the nine hour bus ride home in tune to my ballin' 90s playlist I created. Although we said "Bye bye bye" to the "Wide Open Spaces" of Playa de Oro, "Hakuna Matata" because a trip to the beach was in the planning stages for the next weekend...

Quirks about Quito

 After spending almost 3 months in Ecuador (time really does fly when you're having fun), I've been compiling a list of quirky things about the country. Although I absolutely love Quito and Ecuador, there are some downright strange things...

Not refrigerating milk or eggs. 
Really? Who does this? I guess it is interesting because I learned that you actually don't HAVE to refrigerate milk or eggs, but it still is rather unnerving to purchase lukewarm milk.

More on milk--they only sell it in bags or boxes.
Screw cartons, Ecuador is all about the bags and boxes. I still have an irrational fear of bagged milk and have yet to go within three feet of the stuff.

Buses don't stop.
I might have mentioned this before, but public buses don't stop for people to get on or get off, they only slow down. You know you're a true Ecuadorian when...you can jump on and off of moving buses. Additionally, the buses don't stop at designated stops and will stop anywhere in the road to pick up/drop off people. Although I actually really prefer this system because it is SO much more efficient, it is a wee bit dangerous.


No one has small change.
Never have I ever felt like such a high roller with my $20s before coming to Ecuador. No one EVER has small change, which means less than $10. What is even more frustrating is that the ATMs only gives out $20s. Because of this, I am always on a quest to break my $20s by spending $1 on water on random corner stores. The epitome of this quirk was in Canoa when my friend got 75 cent eggs and they didn't have change for her five dollar bill.

Panaderías on every corner.
This one is actually not a complaint, quite the opposite really. The bread here is incredible...they don't do any of the nasty Wonder bread where the only wonder is how anyone actually enjoys packaged bread. Every day my family buys fresh bread from one of the thousands of panaderías and every day we have a different type. The only complaint I do have is that I am constantly attracted into panaderías after smelling the delicious aroma on the street. Luckily it's hard to spend more than 35 cents on a delicious piece of bread.


Paying to use the bathroom.
I refuse to give in to this on principal. Although I know that I've been spoiled in the U.S. where there are lots of public bathrooms, I hate paying for a bathroom. The other funny thing about bathrooms is how we have begun to classify them. You know it's a fancy bathroom when there is toilet paper. When there is toilet paper, soap, AND towels (a rarity that has been stumbled on five, maybe six times), it's basically a 5-star bathroom. And another prevalent bathroom occurrence-lack of a toilet seat. I still have yet to figure out the point of installing a toilet sans toilet seat. At least my legs are getting stronger...

Buying bottled water.
Okay, so I know this one is pretty obvious and that I knew about it before coming to Ecuador (which is a third world country with non-potable water), but it still bugs me. As an environmentalist (well, I like to think of myself as one), I hate buying bottled water based on the detrimental affects that bottles have on the environment. As a penny-pincher, I hate spending money on water. Plus, I just plain miss the taste of tap water, which I think is way better than bottled.

Yield to pedestrians? False.
In the U.S. (and especially at Duke), I always love to say my favorite law is "Yield to pedestrians." Here, you will find out VERY quickly, the cars do not stop. Ever. The second week I was here I saw the bloody aftermath of a student who had been hit by a car in front of Salesiana University. Think you can cutely wave and step in front of an old man driving a car? Think again because he WILL run you over.

La Festival de la Mama Negra, or Fistfights with Midget Women

After "finishing" the Quilotoa loop Friday afternoon, we all caught a $1.50 bus back to Latacunga where the rest of the group headed back to Quito. Hannah, Luis and I stayed in Latacunga in order to attend La Festival de la Mama Negra the following morning. During the evening we walked around the large city, which had really pretty architecture that reminded me of Spain, and tried the famous dish, chugchucaras. This delicious heart attack-on-a-plate dish is composed of fritada (fried pork), fried plantains, popcorn, fried potatoes, and...lettuce- no just kidding, as if there wasn't already enough fried stuff, it also includes fried empanadas.

In the morning we woke up early and got to the festival around 9am. There were hundreds of people in the streets and lots of street vendors set up in anticipation for the big parade. The festival is known for two things: hundreds of roasted pigs and people that offer you drinks and whip you if you don't accept them. (All of the following pics are from Hannah):

One of the many pigs (and skin) sold on the streets

We found a corner to stand and watch the parade and spent the next hour and a half fighting off a constant stream of rude Ecuadorians demanding to "pass" by us (aka stand in front of us). Although it was relatively funny at first (gringos vs. Ecuadorians! Gringos win!), it was still really frustrating and stressful.

The corner where we stood/fought a war

Unfortunately, when the actual parade started, the people only got worse. After a group of women came up and started yelling, pushing, shoving, poking, and scratching us, the surrounding Ecuadorians started yelling at them too. It escalated so much that they had to call the police over. I only wish I was kidding. When they finally shoved us out of the way (literally), we thought the struggle was over. But for the next 30 minutes, a constant stream of extremely rude Ecuadorians continued to push their way through us. The highlight of the day (and probably the whole feriado) was when a 4-foot tall indigenous woman punched me in the back six or seven times. I gave her the award of being the best Grumpy dwarf impersonator of the festival.

Despite the horrifically rude crowd, the little parts of the parade I could see were really cool. There were lots of marching bands, people dressed in crazy colored costumes dancing, and of course, the decorated pigs.

Decorated pig in the parade

There was even one pig that was not only covered in colored fabric, but was also surrounded by a ring of roasted cuys! After we couldn't take the horrible crowd anymore, we abandoned the food for a new quest: street food.

Luis and I enjoying delicious festival food

After we left la gente loca of the Festival de la Mama Negra, and arrived back in Quito, we opted for a more chill night, brah. Some of the girls got together and went to Chelsea's house to make breakfast for dinner. The menu included cinnamon and chocolate chunk pancakes, fruit, and juice. We finished the relaxing night with a screening of the Disney classic The Little Mermaid (I am horrified to say that two of my friends had not seen this quintessential movie...my peers, don't let this tragedy ever befall your future children).

The girls and I indulging in the wonderful pancakes

Calderón and Quilotoa

After a long two day school week, it was finally time for un feriado, the holiday for Día de los Muertos! Wednesday morning was the actual day for Día de los Muertos, and I and nine more of my friends met at the bus station in order to go to Calderón, a parrish on the edge of Quito that does the traditional celebration in cemeteries for Día de los Muertos. Although we accidentally went to the wrong bus station (oops, add another 45 minutes to bus all the way to the other side of Quito and another 25 cents), we made it to the town around lunchtime. We went to the center of town to find lunch, but instead we all enjoyed some healthy fried street food in the local market. After a rather disappointing morning, we went to the main event- the cemetery!

There was a large line to get inside the cemetery and inside, there were even more people! Lots of families were sitting around the graves of their loved ones and sharing lunch and drinking colada morada, which is the tradition for this holiday.

Colada morada drink and a piece of bread on a gravestone

Almost all of the graves were covered with lots of different colored flowers and purple wreaths (purple signifies death). I also thought it was extremely interesting to see how intricate all of the graves were:

One of the beautiful gravesites

Next we went to a nearby market/festival. There were hundreds of florists and people selling wreaths and religious paraphernalia. There were also lots of food and craft vendors, who sold clothes and key chains and the traditional marzipan figurines, which are intricate crafts made from bread.

After returning to Quito by bus (which cost a whopping 30 cents), I finalized the plans for the surprise birthday party for my friend Tori's 21st birthday. We went to Crepes and Waffles, which a Columbian based company that desperately needs to franchise to the U.S. Crepes, waffles, and birthday candles under one roof turned out to be an excellent night.

Crepe with strawberries, bananas, chocolate, and mora ice cream

The girls and Tori with her birthday crepe (they I.D. you to be sure it's your birthday)

The next morning I met up with nine of my other friends at the bus station. After the words "So far everything is going so smoothly!" slipped out of my mouth, we had to wait in line for over an hour for the bus to Latacunga, of course. Latacunga was our first stop on the way to Quilotoa, which is a small town of 150 people that is there for the sole purpose for tourism. The Quilotoa loop consists of a giant lagoon (inside a volcano!) that you can hike all the way around. When we arrived around 5pm, it was so cloudy, you could barely see. In fact, we were at such a high altitude that we were actually in a cloud!! That night, dum dum duuuuum, we finally tried cuy (guinea pig)! After all of the hype around trying cuy, it was actually kind of gross and was just chewy and salty.

The way it is traditionally served (pic from Google Images)

Our cuy was cut into pieces. Jacqueline, Bethany, and Hannah with the plate of cuy.

 Friday morning we woke up early in order to start the long hike around Quilotoa. The view from the top was absolutely beautiful- the most beautiful thing I have seen in Ecuador.

The group at the top!

The hike takes 5-6 hours and several people had told us that it was much easier to go to the right. As we began the hike, we were all laughing about how we would never want to climb back up because it was SO steep. After we hiked almost down to the waters edge, we realized that there was no other way to go except back up. We had thought that the hike was along the waters edge, but unfortunately it was at the top. Since there was nothing else we could do, we hiked down the rest of the way to the water (which is green with spots of blue from the sulfur) and then turned around. 

Success! At the bottom...

After the brutal hike back up, we rested for a bit and then decided to do part of the REAL 6-hour hike. We hiked for about an hour (which was SO much easier than our previous hike) and enjoyed some beautiful views and a pot-luck picnic of snacks.

Beautiful scenery on the backside of the crater

Chow down of snacks