Matagringo

I met a great group of Ecuadorians through the International Students Club at UEES where I´m taking classes. They´re all very friendly and invited us Americans to a party last Thursday. I wanted to go and called the other Americans who each gave me an excuse for why they couldn´t come. Not to be discouraged I grabbed a cab, negotiated the price of $2 like a good traveler and arrived at Frutabar. I didn´t see the people I was looking for and was about to leave when one of them spotted me. I tried to explain to them that the other Americans didn´t want to come and as I struggling through some haggared sentence one of the girls laughs and says to me, ¨You know we speak English right?¨ Doh... Needless to say I was going to try it in Spanish and the other´s were more helpful.

La Fiesta
After frutabar we went to Chapus the discoteca next door. The first time I had met the group at UEES, I told them that I wanted to learn to dance so they wouldn´t let me sit and chat. It turns out I´m pretty good at dancing Reggeton which is very popular here now. It´s easy because it has a heavy beat and is a lot like rap. They got a kick out of my dancing anyway and I enjoyed the attention. The party at Chapus was winding down but the Ecuadorians weren´t tired yet (although I may have been) so we headed to Skyy Lounge named after the vodka. The Ecuadorians wanted to get me a drink that they called a matagringo in order to slap the whitey right out of me. It came in a flaming shot glass that the bartender dropped into a glass of Pilsener (the local beer). ¨Todo?¨ I asked incredulously, but unwilling to disappoint I chugged it down and got laughs all around because of the look on my face. They loved it and I had a great time. I caught a cab with one of the students that lives in my ciudadela and when I got home I drifted off to sleep with the reggeton beat pounding in my head....to wake up to the pounding of a chuchaque in the morning.