Some Guano

OK everyone, sorry I haven´t posted in quite some time...lately I have been overtaken by a wave of blog lethargy, this changes now (after some prodding from 4 continents).

I now impart to you another segment of the eternal battle over my eating habits with my host mom...in dialogue...

Charo: So do you want me to make you something for dinner?
Nate: No, that´s ok, I´m just going to make a ham sandwich, I´m not very hungry.
Charo: No omelette? I could heat up some soup?
Nate: No, I´m really ok.
Charo: Ok, I´ll just make you some fried bananas and heat up some rice...
Oh well, I guess it´s nice that someone´s looking out for me...I guess.

Does anyone know that Jerry Seinfeld stand-up routine about New York cab drivers (this serves a purpose, I promise)? In said routine he talks about how cab drivers can be driving 50 mph backwards the wrong way up a one-way bridge and instead of feeling fear you just laugh and think, "Well, I wouldn´t do that in my car." Although this sketch comes to my mind often here, never was it more pertinent than this weekend when (after realizing the road had been washed out) we were part of a huge line of vehicles snaking up a windy side road from Juan Carlos´university to return to Riobamba (I´ll explain later). The woman driving had a splitting headache and we couldn´t stop to change drivers but she was still passing semi-trucks on jack-knife turns with a hundred meter ravine on the inside of the curve. I´m sure that at several points (probably the ones where we were 3 abreast on a road built for 1) we had a tire over the edge but we were laughing the whole time and at no point did I even clench my fists (which I do in the US riding with anyone in the calmest conditions).

Alright, back to the beginning. On Sunday night I got back from a whirlwind weekend in which I travelled four hours north of Quito for Thursday and Friday and four hours south Saturday and today (four hours doesn´t sound very substantial by US measurement but I easily traversed half the length of the country and visited three distinct climate/culture zones). Thursday morning we left early for our second program outing to Mascarilla in Chota Valley. These visits are for a class called "Democracy and Social Change" and we´ve been spending a lot of time talking about the roles and experiences of minorities in Ecuador. We visited Mascarilla to look at an Afro-Ecuadorian community and specifically a women´s cooperative that has culturally and economically revitalized the town. It was an interesting visit and I think everyone had a good time, but the trip left everyone a little uncomfortable with the concept of ethnotourism.

Immediately when we arrived in Mascarilla we headed to a preschool where we served as living, breathing jungle gym equipment for a couple of hours. When we got there the kids sang a few songs for us and then came our turn to entertain them. We sang a few songs and then played Duck, Duck, Goose (or Pato, Pato, Ganzo), which was met with huge success. I´m used to working with older kids here so I´d kind of forgotten all of the songs and games...now if they´d started punching each other in the face or had wanted to learn to walk on stilts, that would have been a different story. After the preschool we took an afternoon-long tour of the cooperative and visited various workshops, including those of shampoo/lotion, jewelry, pottery, and card-making. It seemed like a pretty cool organization but again, I´m not quite sure what I think about the commercialization of culture, which I´ve experienced a lot here.

That night before dinner we were treated to a dance performance and tried to learn a little bit ourselves. Anyone who knows me won´t be surprised to know that within 5 minutes I was dancing with a bottle balanced on my head with the best of them...most of the town turned out to watch us struggle (what better way to pass an evening?) and it was almost refreshing to have the oggling-tables turned. The next morning we made clay masks (mine was an angry Frenchman, but not really purposefully) and visited the town store where the cooperative sells their various products.

We then drove back to Quito, went out, got home late, and I left for Riobamba at 7:00 the next morning. The Riobamba trip really reminded me how much I love travelling alone. I was going to meet Juan Carlos but it was fun to get lost and ask around and only have to worry about myself, I really enjoyed it. Anyway, when I got there I hopped on another bus to la Laguna de Colta and Santiago de Quito. Santiago de Quito was the original capital of Ecuador (it´s seriously about 15 houses now) and is home to La Balbanera, the first Catholic church in Ecuador. Juan Carlos teaches at Jatun Yachai Wasi ("wasi" is one of three Quichua words I know...ahem, "wasi"=house, "yaku"=water, and "sisa"=flower), a university next to Laguna de Colta that teaches traditional Andean knowledge in areas such as agriculture, medicine, and construction. I visited with some of the students for a while, chatted with the llamas, and sat in the cold and read while Juan Carlos held class.

The next day I walked around Riobamba looking for the party celebrating the city´s independence day (I told you, every day you can find a different one) but only encountered closed museums, full churches, and quiet parks it being Sunday and all. It was a really pretty though and from anywhere in the city you can see snow-capped volcanoes and the volcano Chimborazo (the point farthest from the center of the earth because the planet bulges a little at the middle). I then found another bus to visit the town of Guano, touted by many as the friendliest town in Ecuador. Guano is also known for a long history of rug-making. I found the store recommended by my guidebook and talked with the owner for about an hour. He´s a fourth-generation rug maker (he emphasized several times that everything is made by hand) but none of his sons are interested in taking over the business. As with many industries in Ecuador, when the country underwent dollarization, the process by which Ecuador adopted the American dollar, rug-makers couldn´t afford to stay open. Guano, which was once home to more than 80 different rug-making workshops, now only supports about 15. Needless to say, I bought a rug.

That night we drove back to Quito in time to start another week. This week I really have to start my independent study project and start organizing interviews and school visits. It´s also really hit me lately how little time I have left here. Two more normal weeks, a half week before another class trip, a week vacation, and my last week...my kids are already starting to ask when I´m leaving (and not in a "can you just leave already?" kind of way) and although some things are starting to wear on me or frustrate me here, it will definitely be hard to leave. With that, I´ll try to post again within a sooner time frame! I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and I´ll see most of you in less than 5 weeks!

Coming Soon: Sumo (a friend from Carleton) comes to visit, and taking into account my lack of blogging expediency, Thanksgiving