Wed Dec 27

Ok, that last entry was ridiculously long, so I’m going to try to keep this one to a more reasonable length. Dave told me I’m going to scare people away if I keep writing pages about the most mundane parts of our trip. I know that no one really wants to read about them in excruciating detail, but the mundane parts of the trip are my favourite parts (I also like the slow parts in books and movies) and this is, after all, my diary as well as our blog. Anyway, I’ll take a stab at brevity and see what happens.

Today we got up at around 9 am and had breakfast upstairs in our hostel. They make the most delicious homemade bread here, I love it so much. The coffee is almost bearable, too! Dave needed to work for a bit so I went to an internet café and posted up our blog. After that, we set off on a hike up one of the mountains. It was a beautiful hike with the most amazing views of Baños and the surrounding mountains. Despite the fact that it was a very sttep climb, it was a pretty easy and relaxing hike.

















We had planned to do a 3 hour hike, but after about 40 minutes we reached a plateau where there was a church on the side of the mountain. Beside the church there were also two quirky little homes that doubled as cafés. Both were painted in very bright colours and advertised food and beverages, but they appeared to be empty.




















We were both really hot and thirsty, so we approached the more colourful of the two buildings to see if anyone was there. We walked up the rickety steps to the deck, where there were a few tables, a lot of random junk, and what might as well have been a petting zoo. There were two (very aggressive) large white ducks, a big rooster, a hen, several tiny little chicks, two dogs, and three cats. The ducks were chasing the hen and chicks incessantly, and the rooster would occasionally step in to fight the ducks. One of the cats was sleeping in a big nativity scene that was set up outside the house. That was pretty funny because it was a pretty elaborate nativity scene, complete with all the main characters, little farm animals, and even some hay. And then there was this big cat that had knocked over Mary and the Wise men and had made a nest in the corner. We pointed out to the woman of the house that the cat was in the manger, and she laughed and responded that the cat thinks he’s el Niño Dios (Baby Jesus).

One of the other cats was absolutely nuts. As the woman of the house later told us, the cat “no es normale.” With every step he took, he lifted alternate paws and swatted at the air, as though he was constantly swatting at invisible flies. He was also licking something invisible in the air in front of him and making other strange movements. I asked the woman what was wrong with him, and she told me a very elaborate story, which of course I only understood a small part of. The gist of it was that the cat had gotten brain damage when he was a kitten, and he’s been insane ever since. Very sad.

Anyway, we sat on their deck and chatted (or tried to chat) with this very nice woman for quite awhile. The deck was right off of their living room, where they were sitting watching some kind of crazy soap opera on TV. Dave ordered a beer, which turned out to be gigantic, so I helped him with it. I ordered a pineapple juice, but when the drink arrived I realized that it had probably been made with tap water (a definite recipe for illness). The people who lived there were so nice that I didn’t want to offend them by not drinking it, so when no one was looking I dumped it down a crack between two boards on the deck. That seemed to have been a good idea, until one of the dogs came over and wouldn’t stop sniffing and licking at that spot on the deck.

After sharing a giant beer and chatting with this woman for about half an hour, we got lazy and decided to head back to town instead of finishing our hike. Back in town, we had a snack and then we went for massages (after all, we hiked for a whole hour and a half…we clearly deserved massages after that level of exertion!). I am absolutely obsessed with massages, as most people who know me know, so of course I had to take advantage of the good massage prices here. We could only get half an hour each, which cost $12 per person. Carmen was very nice and gave a decent massage, although not fantastic (Nicki, I miss you!!!). She did jump up on the massage table and straddle me at one point, which I found funny (and Dave was disappointed that that move wasn’t something special she did just for him, especially given that she asked him to remove his underwear prior to the massage!), but other than that it was just a regular old massage.

After the massage and a bit of shopping, we met up with a Swedish couple (Bibi and Tobias) who we had met and chatted with on our hike. They told us about this crazy restaurant they had found, so we met them there. The restaurant is in an artist’s house. The exterior of the house is painted bright, bright yellow, and the restaurant itself consists of a fairly small room with half a

dozen tables in it. The room is filled with his artwork, all of which is for sale. We marvelled at the number of different styles reflected in his paintings – if one looked at his room full of paintings, s/he would assume that they were done by about half a dozen different artists. The price variation was amazing, too: the paintings ranged from $25 each to $25,000 each. I’m not kidding! (In the photo, the painting with the large pink frame is the one that was $25,000!)

Anyway, the meal there was a real experience. The owner of the house brought out these hand-painted work-of-art menus for us to peruse. Everything had crazy names like “Explosion Vegetariano” or “Concierto en A Major” with no description of what the explosion or the concierto entailed, so we basically just had to guess. When the artist/owner came out to take our order, we tried to ask him about the dishes, but it was difficult to understand what he was saying because he spoke (in Spanish, of course) so excitedly and in such detail about each dish. Dave just ordered what he recommended and I ordered what Tobias was having (they had arrived before us and were eating when we arrived).

We were the only ones in the restaurant – Tobias & Bibi had been there 3 times already and were alone each time. Anyway, about an hour later our food finally emerged, looking like works of art. They were both delicious vegetarian concoctions. Despite having read that Ecuadorian wine is to be avoided at all costs, Dave and I also ordered a glass of red wine each. Dave was able to choke his down (“Just pretend it’s not supposed to be wine and imagine that it’s some kind of exotic local alcohol!”) but I could not tolerate it. After careful analysis, I have come up with a recipe for replicating this wine: ½ cup of grape Kool-aid, ¼ cup of Coke, 1/8 cup of grape cough syrup, ¼ cup of rubbing alcohol, and a dash of the cheapest cooking sherry you can find. The experience was fun, though, and we stayed late and chatted with Bibi and Tobias in the hopes that the pouring rain would subside enough for us to make it home without getting drenched. No such luck. Anyway, so much for brevity – maybe next time. Hasta luego!

Tuesday, December 26, 2006 – Bus ride to Baños

For the rest of the day yesterday we basically just hung out in an internet café. It was raining for much of the day, we had checked out of our hotel, and we both had computer/internet work to do. Dave was still sick and feeling pretty miserable, so it was a good way to spend the day. We had decided that we were going to take a night bus to Baños; otherwise, we would have arrived in the middle of the night because we were late leaving Cuenca. So, essentially, we just killed time until it was time to go to the bus station. Not much was open, given that it was Christmas, but we did manage to find a pizza place for supper. After supper and a bit more internet café time, we shared a taxi to the bus station with another backpacker. We arrived at around 9:30 pm and bought a ticket for the last bus, which was departing at midnight. To get to Baños, we had to take a 6 hour bus ride to a city called Riobamba, then take another bus for 2 hours to Baños. While we were waiting for our bus to come, Dave was feeling pretty sick, so he stretched out on some seats and slept while I talked to some Canadian backpackers for awhile and then read my book.

At midnight, we got on our bus. I wanted to read, but the reading lights didn’t work. Dave decided to pull out his laptop and work, which he would never normally do on a bus here (that’s basically an invitation to get robbed after getting off the bus), but we were in the very front row and no one could see us. Plus, everyone around us was sleeping (and snoring) anyway, so it was safe. After about an hour I went to sleep and Dave slept after working for about two hours. I thought the sleep that I was having was uncomfortable, but little did I know we were about to become even more uncomfortable. At about 5:30 am, we awoke to the driver yelling something. Dave said he thought he heard the word Riobamba, but I (perhaps not ready wake up?) said I didn’t think so. After all, I said, our bus is supposed to get in at 6:00 am and it’s only 5:30 – since when do buses arrive half an hour early? Luckily, Dave decided to ask the driver, and he was right.

We quickly grabbed our belongings, got off the bus, and stepped into the cold, dark, rainy world. Immediately, I noticed that we weren’t at a bus station – we were merely on the side of some road somewhere. And not a main road, either – a very residential-looking road. I was still reluctant to believe that we were even in Riobamba (I mean, how could I have been wrong and Dave right? Ha ha!), but I asked a fellow passenger who confirmed that we were, indeed, in Riobamba. I asked her where to get the bus to Baños and, from what I understood, she said we would need to get a taxi to a different bus terminal. By this point, the bus had driven off, the two taxis that had been there when we pulled up had picked up other passengers and left, and there we were: Standing, half-asleep, on the side of the road, in the middle of nowhere, with our giant backpacks, in the dark, freezing cold, pouring rain. I was grumpy as hell.

Before we had a chance to freak out too much, a car pulled up and a guy jumped out into the rain. “Taxi?” he asked (perhaps a bit too eagerly, I thought). Hell, yes, we wanted a taxi! But this was no taxi. Taxis here are yellow and they have a light on the roof and writing on the side. This car was white, with no light and no writing. He had opened the front passenger door and Dave looked in and confirmed that, despite external appearances, it had all the taxi equipment inside. I looked suspiciously at him, gestured at his car, and said (in my horrible, broken Spanish) something that translates loosely into, “You no taxi.” “Si, si! Taxi!” he said, and opened the trunk for our bags. He asked us where we were going, and when I told him that we needed to get to the bus station to get the bus to Baños, he said, “Ok! 3 dollares!” Dave and I looked at each other, looked around at the deserted street, and said, “Ok!” We hopped in, and off we went.

I was half-expecting him to drive us to a dark alley somewhere and rob us – strangely enough, Dave and I were actually laughing about this possibility in the backseat of the cab. (Don’t worry, we didn’t really think that was going to happen, or of course we wouldn’t have gotten in.) Anyway, turns out the robbery scenario couldn’t have been further from the truth. This guy really wanted to be our friend. Well, more accurately, he wanted us to help him get papers so he could go to Canada! He didn’t speak a word of English, and of course our Spanish is horrible, but we gathered that he really wanted to go to Canada but couldn’t because it is so difficult for him to get a tourist visa. (Apparently, it takes about 4 years for Ecuadorians to get a tourist visa to visit Canada). I believe he was asking us to help him with paperwork or to get papers or something like that, but we really didn’t know exactly what he wanted. I think he wanted us to sponsor him or something crazy like that. He was very nice, and very persistent – he tried and tried to explain what he wanted from us, even throwing in offers to teach us Spanish and show us around the city. I felt really bad because he had a certain desperation in his eyes, but I knew he wanted something from us that we weren’t in a position to give him. So, I took the gutless way out and just pretended I couldn’t understand him rather than saying no to his pleas. How mean of me, I know. Dave is off the hook, because he really didn’t understand what the guy was saying! Anyway, the guy was visibly disappointed, and I felt a bit guilty that we couldn’t help him. But, Dave did give him a good tip, at least!

The bus to Baños was there when we arrived at the station, and we hopped on. It was FREEZING cold. Ecuador is turning out to be a good deal colder than we had hoped for, especially in the early mornings and nights. Not only were the bus doors open, but one of the windows wouldn’t shut all the way. I hoped that it would get warmer once the bus started driving, but alas. I think they had the air conditioning on! We could see our breath! Even the traditional Ecuadorian folk tunes that were blaring from the speakers weren’t heating the bus up. I took my shoes off and curled up into a tight ball in my seat, which helped a bit. Thank god the bus ride was only 2 hours! Once the sun came up the scenery was beautiful and Dave took some nice pics from the window of the bus. Note the snow-capped mountains...not what we were hoping to see, but beautiful nonetheless.

We got into Baños at around 8:00 am and found a place to stay called Hostal Plantas y Blanco (Hostel Plants and White…named for the spotless white walls and plants that are throughout the place). This place was recommended to us by the Canadians in the bus terminal in Cuenca, and it was a good recommendation. Rooms with a private bathroom are $15 a night, a price that includes free internet access. There was also a nice café and terrace on the top floor, where we immediately went for a cheap and delicious breakfast. Dave was feeling better, so he ate a big plate of fruit, a move that he would regret for the remainder of the day. The photo below with the waterfall in the background shows the view from our breakfast area.

We had a “nap” after breakfast…and woke up at 3 pm! We quickly got dressed and went out to explore the town. What an amazing place this is! The town has some really beautiful churches, lot of great little cafés, restaurants, and shops, and a fair amount of interesting artwork. Here are a couple of interesting murals that we saw.

This poster of Bush was in a coffee shop that we went into – notice the writing on the outfit calling Bush a terrorist, a Nazi, and the devil. Dave tells me that the Superman outfit is known in Cuba as the ultimate symbol of American imperialism, and we guess that it’s probably the same thing here. Here are some pics from our walk around town.

After a short walk around the city, we decided to go for a walk up one of the mountains. The mountains and volcano dwarf the town and make for spectacular views. The scenery is so beautiful. Our walk ended up being fairly short, partly because we didn't want to get stuck up there when it got dark, and partly because Dave’s intestinal distress was back in full force. We (ok, Dave) did manage to take some nice pics while we were up there, though.

After our walk, Dave went back to the room while I wandered around a bit more. I chatted with a guy named Angel who worked in one of the many outdoor adventure places around town, and he helped me make up an adventure-filled day plan (more on that later). Interestingly, Angel’s brother moved from Ecuador to Vancouver, but found Vancouver too expensive so he moved to Halifax (where I was born and raised, for anyone who doesn’t know!). As a result, Angel knew all about Canada and Halifax, which I thought was hilarious. Most Americans I meet have never heard of Halifax, and here was an Ecuadorian who had never been out of his country who knew all about it. Angel also told me that he really wanted to visit Canada, but that it would take years for him to get a tourist visa.

That night, Dave was still pretty sick so we just went out to grab a quick bite to eat. At the restaurant, we couldn’t decide on what to eat…should we have the chicken plug, the Mexican plugs, the chicken with cream in fungi, or the chicken to the pinecone? Decisions, decisions.

After supper we went back to our room, where I pigged out on this sugar cane taffy that is famous here until I felt as least as ill as Dave. (The photo shows one of the taffy-pullers at work.) Dave worked while I wrote this LONG blog entry, then we headed to bed. We have some fun adventures planned for the next couple of days – more on that later. Buenas noches!

More Cuenca photos

These first photos are of some of the beautiful churches in Cuenca.

These next ones are of the Ecuadorian dancers we saw on Christmas day. If you look hard, you can see that one of them is wearing a balaclava (I don't know why, but I love that!).

These next ones are a few more of the Pase del Niños.

Monday, Dec 25, 2006 – Feliz Navidad!!!

Today we woke up bright and early. We were supposed to go for a hike today, but Dave is still feeling sick (although better than yesterday) and I need to enter my final grades. So, we grabbed breakfast, packed up, and headed to an internet café, which is where I am now. On the way to the internet café, we saw more kids dressed up and more floats – apparently the celebration is not limited to the parade! We also saw some Ecuadorian dancers in a park. There was music blasting from a vehicle with a loudspeaker hooked up to it, and people were crowded around the dancers. The dancers were good – from what we could see. They were wearing a strange mix of traditional tribal clothing and toques (I think that’s one of those words that we Canadians use that Americans find funny – not sure what they call it though. Maybe something clever like “winter hat?” Ha ha, just kidding guys.) Anyway, one of the dancers was even wearing a balaclava, for unknown reasons. Did I mention that it is about 28 degrees Celsius (82 Fahrenheit) here?

The internet here is SOOOO slow, so I have been trying to enter my grades for about 2 hours – I’m about halfway done. At home, the entire process would take maybe 15 minutes. Oh well. After we finish up here, we have a 6-8 hour bus ride ahead of us. We’re headed to a place called Banos – it’s a little town near a volcano with hot springs, mountain biking, hiking, and other fun stuff. We’re going to spend a couple of nights there. We’ll miss Cuenca – it’s been so good to us – but we are looking forward to letting the real adventures begin! Merry Christmas everyone!

Sunday, Dec 24, 2006 – La Pase del Niños

Dave awoke feeling sick today. I hope it passes, because our fun is just about to begin! I went out for our cappuccinos while Dave napped. There is a noticeable excitement in the streets today, likely because of the parade and because it’s Christmas Eve. There were some tents set up with whole roasted pigs, exactly like there were in Cuba last year at their Christmas Eve celebration.


There also seemed to be a lot of ice cream – everyone was eating ice cream and I saw a couple of women carrying large boards on their heads that were piled high with big mounds of ice cream. Wow, I just said ice cream a lot in one sentence.

Just last night I was mentioning that I hadn’t seen any indigenous men yet. Well, they’re here today. They are dressed in black felt shorts with bright knee socks pulled up to meet the shorts, black felt jackets, and black felt hats. They also have long ponytails. I’m not sure if this is a special traditional Christmas costume (for the parade?) or if this is their regular tribal clothing. Either way, they look amazing.

When I was on my way back from getting cappuccino, I saw an indigenous family with a father, a mother breastfeeding an infant, and two beautiful little girls. They were all dressed in their tribal clothing and looked so nice, but they were obviously poor. I smiled at the little girls because they looked so cute, and immediately their parents sent them over to me with their hands out. I always have a hard time when it comes to people begging when I’m travelling. On the one hand, I know I am incredibly wealthy compared to these people, and I would love to give them money. I feel a tremendous sense of guilt that comes from being born into privilege. On the other hand, “they” say it’s bad to just hand out money to beggars, as it creates a dependence on handouts from travellers and traps them in a cycle of begging. It’s especially bad to give money when parents send their kids over to beg, as it can result in parents using their small children as a source of income, even keeping them out of school so that they can go beg from tourists.

Here, we haven’t seen much begging at all – probably less than walking down any street in Manhattan (or any downtown North American street, for that matter). In some places we’ve travelled, however, we have been practically swarmed by people begging for money, followed by droves of kids begging for pens, candy, money, etc. In cases like that, where begging is so prevalent and you’d be screwed if you pulled out your wallet, I almost never give money. But when there are two cute little girls with their hands out while their parents await sheepishly in the background looking at the ground, I feel compelled to give money. I would feel guilty all day if I didn’t. I dug around in my purse and managed to find two 50 cent pieces – not much but all I had. I gave one to each girl and they responded with big smiles. Then I remembered that I had Dave’s camera with me, so I asked the parents if I could take the girls’ picture. I felt like a bad person as soon as I asked, but at the same time they were so cute that I really did want a picture of them. The parents said ok, so I snapped a quick pic – the girls didn’t seem to like having their picture taken. Of course, the parents asked me for more money after that, but I didn’t have any (and not sure I would’ve given it even if I did). I felt weird about the whole situation – like I had participated in some watered-down form of child prostitution, or like I had bribed them or something. Ok, I’m being melodramatic, but I wish I would have just given money without asking for something in return. But I didn’t, and now I have a photo of two cute little girls.

This afternoon, we went and checked out the parade, which is called Pase Del Niño (Pass of the Child). It was so much better than we had anticipated! Pretty much every kid in town was in this parade, and they were dressed up in all different kinds of costumes! Some were wearing
traditional tribal clothing, some were wearing Christmas costumes (almost every infant was dressed as an angel and we also saw several shepherds and Wiseman), and others were wearing very random costumes such as clowns, gypsies, or Winnie the Pooh characters! Many were riding on horses or donkeys, others were walking or being carried by their parents, and the lucky ones were riding on floats made out of cars (they call these carros alegoricos, which means allegorical cars).














































The horses are covered with silk or woven blankets and an array of different foods strung together – these are offerings to the Christ child. I guess I should mention that that is the purpose of this whole parade: to honour Niño Dios (“God as a Child” aka Baby Jesus). They have these Pase del Niños all over the country, but this one is the biggest and the best. It has been a tradition for many years, and the literature they distribute on the parade is very open about the fact that the celebration is a mix of many different traditions, including Christian and pagan, and that it evolves to include new traditions and “modern cultural elements” without “losing its splendour.” I won’t say too much more about the parade, because the pictures Dave took will be more informative than my rambling.

In the photo below you can kind of make out see a few pictures of Popes throughout the years - there were a lot of Pope floats, some of which included kids dressed up as the Pope, priests, and nuns.

















Many of the young girls had dolls strapped to their backs...practicing, apparently.






































































In these two pictures below, notice the chili peppers stuffed in the chicken's and pig's mouths and other holes! There was a lot of that going on...






























Some dogs were getting into the fun as well!









































Of course, Henry and EO couldn't help but to join in on the fun.















Dave was feeling sick throughout the entire parade, so we only stayed for about an hour or so. He went back to our room while I wandered around a bit more before getting back to work. I worked for the rest of the day while Dave alternated between sleeping and getting sick. He must’ve eaten something bad yesterday, because he was in very rough shape. I just graded for the rest of the day/night (yes, it is taking me FOREVER!!!! I am obsessed with giving feedback – it’s like a sickness I have!) with the exception of a brief outing to buy Dave Gatorade and crackers. But, the good news is that I finally finished my grading at around 2 am – YAY!!!