The Mzungu learns Lumasaaba

Mulembe readers! Whitey (now Mzungu rather than gringo, but equally assured I’m not to take offense) is at it again, this time for a 5 month stint teaching in Uganda, East Africa. I’m currently being oriented to the language, culture, and expectations of the job in Kampala, the nation’s capital before shipping out to Mbale, the second largest city in the east of the country this weekend.

The weather here is perfect with temps generally in the 70s-80s. I‘ve spent the week adjusting to the humidity, however, which leaves me drenched in sweat at the start of meetings each morning from the 400m uphill climb. This is hilarious to my new hosts who consider the weather ‘cold’ currently (Saipan cold, anyone?) and peel off a jacket when arriving to work to reveal full suits underneath. I get a friendly prodding from Eric each morning that maybe I’m sweating a little less today. On day one of orientation, he proudly announced that Ugandans are known to be the friendliest people in the world, with 57% of respondents to a 2017 BBC poll giving the highest rating (compared to 26% average globally) and no respondents rating it negatively.  So far in my experience, I have no reason to doubt him (but I did look up the stat in order to report it accurately here).

Today I had my first lesson in Lumasaaba, a Bantu language with multiple dialects spoken by over 2 million people in East Africa. Gisu is the dialect most common to the eastern region of Uganda where I will be working.  My friendly language instructor greets me with “Mulembe Mike - I’m Frances, but you can call me Mango… not orange.” Mulembe, meaning “peace,” as I’ll soon learn, is just the beginning of an extended greeting ritual that should be conducted each day upon first meeting your co-workers. I’m told this exchange is an important part of building rapport with coworkers and patients alike. For your enjoyment (and my practice) I’ll share it with you here!

Mulembe Mike - Mulembe Frances

Nakhusimile (glad to see you) - ninase nakhusimile (also glad to see you)

Wakonele uryena (how did you sleep?) - nakonele bulayi (I slept well)

Bengo baryena (how are they at home?) - bengo balayi (they are well at home)

Wakinyala (thank you for your works/well done) - ninawe wakinyala (also thank you)

Frances and I repeated this exchange maybe a dozen times until he was satisfied that I was sufficiently versed in this important greeting. Then he tells me, “or you can just say Kamakhuwa? (any news?) to which the appropriate reply is Kasila! (Nothing!/no news!). He says, “I didn’t want to teach you that first because then you might get lazy.” At which point I stifled a laugh. 

While at first glance there may not seem to be much rhyme or reason to the exchange above, my patient tutor broke down all the words into their roots until I was beginning to see a pattern and able to create short sentences of my own. The language is largely phonetic, so Frances was pleased with my pronunciation given my experience with Spanish. Verb conjugation continues to pose a challenge, but there’s more lessons to come. Wish me luck!

Semana Santa Costa Rica Style!

Semana Santa, the week leading up to Easter, is a big deal to Ticos. Thursday and Friday are a national holiday but many take the entire week off to head to the beach or visit with relatives. For us tourist/exchange students this means a shorter week at work but longer lines at the bus terminal. Where to? La Fortuna, Volcan Arenal and Monteverde cloud forest.

La Fortuna is a very touristy town mere kilometers from the base of the active volcano Arenal. The volcano is known for its largest eruption in 1968 when its ashes covered much of the region and buried two nearby towns. More recently, lava flowed in 1991-92 and gaseous eruptions killed tourists in 2000. Today, the mountain is home to numerous naturalist tours and hikes as well as many extreme sport activities such as rappelling and zip-line canopy tours. Arriving in the afternoon on Wednesday, I wandered the streets of La Fortuna in search of something to do. Drawn in by the accented call from a pretty Tica shouting "Tours, zip-lines!" I approached the desk and was shortly suckered into a package "deal" that would keep me entertained for the next two days.

Day one consisted of rappelling. For those of you who may not know, rappelling is the act of lowering one's self down a sheer rock face with the support of little more than a rope threaded through a body harness. That’s right, your gringo friend with a fear of heights entrusted his life to a couple of ropes… The good news about rappelling is that since it is all done facing the wall it’s actually pretty easy to avoid looking down entirely. This particular tour was made up of a trek through the beautiful forests at the base of the volcano interspersed with rock faces ranging from 50 to 200 feet in height. Not to worry, they started us off nice and slow with instructions on the proper technique and the height of the rappels increased gradually, allowing us to adjust as we went.

Day two was an all-inclusive "combo" package that started off with zip-lines. This activity is similar to rappelling in the sense that you’re in a harness hanging by a cable high above the ground. The main difference? You’re facing forward and moving at speeds up to 75 kph (or about 45 mph). Talk about a ride! After a couple of lines we took a "break" to rappel 260 feet down the sheer rock face of the canyon over Rio Fortuna. Although this was the largest rappel I had completed, the way down was not the most memorable part. Once reaching the bottom in a semi-controlled fashion we were met with an unpleasant surprise. How do we get back up? Oh, that’s right; just climb the 260 feet back up a free hanging ladder loosely slung to the rock face. This was hands down the most frightening experience I have ever had. The man ahead of me would periodically shake the ladder forcing me to grab a hold tightly. My life depended on the sureness of my footing and a single cable attached to the guide below me. As I reached the top I had a new found appreciation for solid ground. After several more zip-lines that provided an incredible view of the La Fortuna falls from different angles, we stopped at a hut built in the style of the Maleku native tribe of Costa Rica. They taught us the traditional greeting “Capi, capi” and a bit about their history and culture. The day was finished off with a swim in the pool at the base of La Fortuna falls and then a horse-ride back to base camp. Top that off with a traditional casado of rice and beans and I was one happy camper.

Our transport to the Monteverde cloud forest gave us another extraordinary view of the volcano from Arenal lake, an artificial body of water that covers what used to be the town of Arenal prior to the eruption of 1968. In Monteverde, we chose a much more subdued series of walking tours including an evening tour where we were able to see several giant tarantulas, a sloth, a cute raccoon and a kinkajou, or honey bear, which is a relative of the raccoon. A walking tour over the “hanging bridges” proved to be fairly tame when compared to the other high flying adventures from the weekend. Here I also had my favorite meal of the weekend, an arugula and fig hamburger garnished with plantain chips, delectable. The last evening, outside our hostel, we were treated to a closer look at the two-toed variety of sloth as one shambled along the power-line toward its favorite tree just across the street. This poor fellow only had three limbs, having lost one to electrocution according to the owner of our hostel. Furthermore, our guide the previous night must have been right about sloths being blind as his destination was one sad looking excuse for a tree. There certainly wasn’t enough foliage to make the dangerous trip over the power-lines worth it. Treacherous is the life of the urban sloth!

All in all, I had a great weekend with lots of time spent over and under the trees.

Puerto Viejo

Last weekend Megan, a classmate, and I hopped a bus to Puerto Viejo, the Caribbean costal town with a reputation for parties and great surf. We got in late and unfortunately were met with rain and a mile long hike to our hostel, Rocking J’s. Other than the anticipated collection of European and American tourists, this hostel was unlike any other place I’ve stayed. The décor included tiled mosaics covering the walking paths and carved out trees for benches. It was almost completely open air and offered campsites and hammocks along with a couple of enclosed rooms. Feeling adventuresome I decided to brave the $5 hammock which I only partially regret due to all the mosquito bites I’ve been itching ever since.

The next day we were treated to clear blue skies and decided to venture out from Puerto Viejo to Manzanillo, a town and national park just down the coast. A group of us, including several Brits, a Canadian and a guy from Seattle that Megan had rounded up the night before, rented cruisers (you know, the bikes that brake when you pedal backwards) for $4 and hit the road. On the way, we happened across a pack of howler monkeys in the trees. They look like you’d expect monkeys to look with gangly limbs, long, agile tails and big balls (as Megan graciously pointed out and insisted: “well they do!”). However, what’s unique isn’t their appearance but rather the sound they make that has earned them their name. It’s a deep, eerie, guttural noise that starts from an individual monkey and is then compounded as others join in. It sounds like something you might expect to come from a creature in your favorite horror flick. Occasionally, as we biked, we’d hear the noise come from deep within the forest, each time giving me the creeps.

The second most notable part of the trip for me was… breakfast! At the hostel, the most popular item on the menu consisted of gallo pinto (rice and beans), huevos revueltos (scrambled eggs), fresh fruit, tortillas and coffee. Lather that in salsa picante (the Canadian’s idea) and you’ve got “El Desayuno Mas Famoso de Puerto Viejo. “ Yum.

Sadly, much of the rest of the weekend was slowed by torrential rains allowing me to meet my alcohol quota for the whole trip, engage in broken conversations in English with some of the foreigners at the hostel and finish Running with Scissors. As it turned out, that was for the best as getting back early made it possible for me to see Shakira live in concert! And yes, I’m still bragging about it! :D

SHAKIRA: Rock Goddess

O.M.G. That about sums up how I feel after seeing Shakira live in concert last night. Thankfully, it was raining in Puerto Viejo this weekend (more on that later) and I took the early bus back to San Jose just in time to find out that Shakira would be playing at the new Estadio Nacional as the final inaugural event. Having been a long-time fan, the 13 year old girl in me was thrilled. The event started at 7:00 and Katie and I made a mad dash to the stadium as soon as she arrived home from her weekend trip. With the Minnesotan fear of having arrived too late at 7:30 we quickly picked up some scalped tickets, armed ourselves with Bam Bam noisemakers and glow in the dark bracelets and then headed to join the crowd. As we waited for the show to start we were subjected to all the commercialized accoutrement one would expect. A warning was shown on the large screens that in case of seismic activity we should remain calm and in our seats… We treated ourselves to foot long hot dogs and café con leche. We were giddy. The slightest change in lighting on stage caused us all to smash our Bam Bams together and howl.

And then, right on Tico-time at 9:18, there was a stir in the crowd. The cameras zoomed in on a figure dressed entirely in neon pick. It was the gorgeous Shakira, singing Pienso en Ti while making her way through the crowd and onto stage. Once on stage, everything went dark and there was a pause. In the next instant we were bombarded with flashing lights, booming bass and Shakira’s rock hard abs and hips in all her gyrating glory. Her dress was gone, replaced by skin-tight leather pants and a glitter top. The crowd was losing their minds.

Ten orgasmic minutes go by when, without warning, the sound cuts out and the projection screens go black. If you ever want to see a stadium full of teenage girls turn into a pack of angry wolves, give them ten minutes of Shakira and then rip it away. She returned about 5 minutes later with an apology and the show went on.

Many theatrics followed including a scene where she faked her own death and was resuscitated on stage with invisible paddles showing off her iconic chest thrusts. She invited several young girls to dance with her and taught them to shimmy. There was belly dancing during Gitana, again highlighting her abs. As she hit the climax of Sale el Sol the glitter top came off, ripped down the middle in a show of her bestial strength. That outfit now ruined, next up was a pair of green and black Zubas with matching top. Throughout it all there was much dancing, howling and Bam Bam banging from the crowd. At this point, Katie and I had completely embraced our inner 13 year old. This was much to the chagrin of the 50 something French tourists ahead of us, in who’s ears we banged the noisemakers. The encore consisted of all-time favorites including Hips Don’t Lie and Waka Waka. As we exited, a fireworks show surpassing any I had seen in the US lit up the sky in celebration of the new stadium.

Later, as we walked home, the adrenaline of the night began to fade and I realized that I had lost my voice, my neck hurt, and my 27 year old body was tired from a weekend of boozing at the beach. The tween in me didn’t care; she had never been happier. Smiling, I fell asleep humming the tune to Waka Waka.

Pura Vida!

Your favorite gringo is back on the trail! I’ve just completed the first week of my latest adventure in Costa Rica and have been loving every minute of it. I've taken the first couple of days to get settled in with my host family, orient myself to San Jose and start work at the hospital.

My host family is fabulous. They live just west of the center of San Jose conveniently located near four different American fast food chains (Quiznos, Wendy’s, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut), specifically for my pleasure... My family is used to having students from the U of MN and I’m currently living with Katie, a classmate of mine. My host mother talks constantly about Sam (also a classmate), who stayed here before me and what a great guy he is, so I’ve got big shoes to fill. :) As with my previous host stays my mother is always concerned that I’m enjoying her meals and that everything is “todo bien?” My host father and I have bonded over billiards. We play Bola Negra, the Costa Rican equivalent of 8-ball with one additional rule. The player hitting stripes must hit the 15 ball into the right side pocket while the player with solids must hit the 1 ball into the left side pocket. It’s fun and adds an extra challenge. My host father is hilarious as he can never keep the 9 ball straight and is constantly asking whether it is the 9 or the 6.

Work at the Hospital Clinica Biblica has been slow to start. I’m working with a pediatrician in Urgencias which is just like it sounds, lots of runny noses and children with diarrhea. We have had a couple of good learning cases and I’m gaining a bunch of new Spanish as the docs are very patient and willing to explain anything I don’t understand. I’ll be working in Urgencias for one more week and then on to an Ebais in La Carpio. This is a small clinic in one of the poorer areas of town that serves all ages free of charge. From what Katie has told me, the clinic sounds a lot like my experience in Guayaquil so I’m excited to compare the two.

The evenings have been busy! Tuesday I went with Katie and my friend Rula from NYU (who also happens to be here studying medical Spanish) to live music at the Jazz Café. The band was a Latin fusion group complete with French horn and flute. The only thing that was missing was more cow bell! Ok just kidding, there was lots of that too… ;) Wednesday the three of us attended an album release party for a local rapper named Sirius. His album titled Get Sirius has tracks in both English and Spanish, sometimes interchanging between the two during the same song. The opening DJ played tons of early 90s hip-hop which took me back. Sirius was fun but you could tell he was still new to the rap scene. His mic kept cutting out and yet the vocals played on… He also had a couple of hip-hop dancers for added entertainment that were dressed in sliver baseball caps worn backwards and white sneakers. What a hoot!

My weekend in Puerto Viejo was a blast. There's more to say than I have time for at the moment as I'm off to see Shakira (!!!!!!!!) but I'll post again soon! Thanks for reading. :)

Ecuador by the Numbers 2

So believe it or not I´ve been in Ecuador since the beginning of July having a blast. I´ve been meaning to update this but have very irregular internet access so my apologies! I think that this is once again the best way to hit the highlights of my trip so far. Here´s Ecuador by the Numbers 2!

4,300. The height in meters from which I viewed Quito after ascending Mt. Pinchincha on the Teleferico
2. The number of times my Guayaquil host brother has used the ¨this is my gringo friend¨ excuse to get himself out of a moving violation
3. The number of pregnancies I have witnessed in the Obstetrics ward at Hospital Pablo Arturo Suarez
4. The number of times I have been asked to draw blood from a patient in the emergency room
0. The number of times that I got up the guts to actually do it...
9. The number of hours between Guayaquil and Quito by bus
3. The number of times I will have made that trip by the end of this weekend.
9,000 (aproximately). The number of pirated movies my host father has from the store on the corner
$1.50. The cost of each of those movies
$0.50. The cost of my daily commute
19* C The average temperature in Quito
100% The chance of rain at least for a few minutes on any given day in Quito
24 Days left in Ecuador

That´s all for now folks. I´ll do my best to add to this before my trip is up but don´t hold your breath. Please leave a comment if you get a chance, or shoot me an email. I´d love to hear from you and will get back to you as soon as I can.

Signs of being abroad.

Sometimes I think that the fact that I am abroad becomes most obvious when I try to do something that would be considered quite simple at home and yet I find it really difficult here. Here are a few examples:

1. Grocery shopping for peanut butter. Peanut butter is apparently not very popular here. In a mega grocery store of more than 40 aisles we searched up and down for a good twenty minutes before finding the last two Planters Creamy containers. And they were'nt like the jumbo size you crave when you just want to eat it straight. No, these were two 8 ounce jars of peanut butter.

2. Jogging. If it's not the difficulty of jodging dog shit on the sidewalk, then its a matter of having inhaled enough second hand smoke the night before to kill a small child on the spot. Or more likely I'm just a fatass.

3. Going to a movie. This wasn't actually difficult so much as peculiar. Here all the seats in the theatre are assigned. So, imagine me sitting in a completely empty theater. Two old ladies walk in from one door, a guy from another. All three off them checked their tickets then eyeing each seat as they walked down the aisle came and sat right next to me. The four of us watched the movie in a row while the whole rest of the theatre was empty.

4.Buying food. "What?" you might ask, in the world of declicious beef cuts and 3 course meals for $6 US you're having trouble finding a meal? Well, at least when I want one. It seems that just about the time I get hungry in the late afternoon all the food joints have shut down and only search cafe con leche and medialunas (croissants). Even worse, they give you funny looks if you ask to eat anything substantial at that time. I can't tell you the number of days I've gone without lunch due to the simple fact that I missed the lunch dinning window.

5.Riding a bus. I thought riding a bus in Guayaquil was bad (and it was) but here they at least pretend to have a system, albeit a broken one. The entire system consists of a Guia'T or guide to all the bus routes in the city. Easy right? I wish, walking down the street with GuiaT in hand (dog shit is a problem here too) trying to find both where I'm starting, and where I'm trying to go on this tiny map and then find a bus that passes through both little squares is a nightmare. In fact, in the past I've walked in the general direction of where I want to go and arrived before figuring out how to get to the damn place by bus.

For now that's all I can think of but I'll add more as they come to me. I'm off to Iguazu the amazing water falls on the border with Brazil so I'll post an update when I get back to BA.

The Passion of the Boca Juniors!

Latin Americans are passionate people, passionate about love, food, music, religion, and above all else futbol. It's a passion that one is born into. In Ecuador I was inducted into the cult of EMELEC, the team of my host family. Here in Buenos Aires, it's Boca Juniors, you're either for them, or you can get the hell out. Futbol carries with it a history and culture of fanaticism as old as the sport itself, with futbol stars taking on unrivaled idol status. Boca boasts Diego Maradona, known worldwide for his incredible goal in the World Cup of 1986, later as a shortlived TV star and more recently for his fall from grace into drug addiction. However, to speak ill of Maradona is akin to speaking ill of one's own mother, and will surely result complete in social isolation.

Needless to say, one of the first stops recommended by my Ecuadorian host family was La Bombonera stadium, home of the Boca Juniors, so when I discovered that there was a game scheduled this Thursday (yesterday) against a Colombian team (Cucuta) in the semi-finals of the Copa de Libertadores you can imagine I was thrilled. Getting tickets however would be a whole different story. I basically spent the last two days trying to organize a group of people to go, but when I came up with a pricetag for the seats ($130 pesos or about $43 US per person) I got a less than enthusiastic response. I figured it was a lost cause, but early yesterday morning my Colombian friend said that there were tickets being sold at the door for $30-60 pesos. It was 3:15 and the boxoffice opened at 4:00. I threw on my jacket, grabbed my Giua"T" and hopped a bus to La Boca. By the time I got there fog had decended on the city setting an erie mood in a neighborhood known to be less than friendly to strangers. Feeling completely out of my element, I asked a police officer where I could find tickets. While he asked a fellow officer a young Argentine came up to ask the same. I told him I was looking as well and we set of in search of the box office, the whole while him explaining to me the pantheon that was Boca Juniors. After doing a complete loop of the stadium we discovered that all the regular tickets had been sold out and we would have to resort to a scalpers offer of $60 pesos. Santiago, my new Argentinian friend, had only come with $25 pesos and assumed defeat. I offered to help him with the price of the ticket if we could negotiate with the scalper to lower the price since we were buying three (for the two of us and my friend). He kindly declined, saying that he couldn't accept my money, but I tried again, finally convincing him that he could be my personal guide to the game. Thrilled by the idea, he agreed that he could explain everything that was going on and commenced to do so emphatically. He explained that Boca had to score 3 goals today in order to go onto the finals of the Copa de Libertadores because they had lost 3 to 1 to Cucuta on their turf. He named all of Bocas top stars and gave me the numbers to look for on the field. I couldn't have paid for a better professional guide.

And it's a good thing that I had found Santiago too, because purchasing tickets was only the first obstacle, the next step was to find our way into the behemoth that is La Bombonera. Making another whole loop around the stadium, asking police officers as we went, we finally found the line to the popular section. While waiting, we received regular updates as to the status of the game from Santi's father by text message since he was watching at home where he heard that they were considering cancelling the game due to the weather. Futbol fans can be an irritable bunch, and don't like it when their teams lose, especially at home, or when there favorite passtime is cancelled due to weather. Without any word for certain we packed into gate 12, described to us by Santi as the home of a band of hooligans that refer to themselves as "La Doce" or "The 12" playing on the idea that they are the 12th member of the team (11 on the field, the 12th in the stands). Certain that we were going to die at the hands of an angry mob if the game was cancelled, my friend and I kept our mouths tightly shut.

Once inside it was a sight that is difficult to describe. Ticker tape and huge banners bearing the Boca colors blue and yellow stretched from the upper section to the field. Young men, hanging on precariously at best, shimmied along the tops of walls in order to hang more banners with players names and and the like. Cheer rousers led chants and passed blue and yellow balloons to the fans to be inflated. As game time neared and the stands slowly filled becoming a claustrophobics worst nightmare, I worried whether the guy that had just pushed his way in front of me and had settled his elbow sharply into my hip was going to stand there the whole game. Thankfully he moved on, meanwhile, the crowd was becoming more and more animated, shouting victory chants and your mama insults at the opposing teams goalie. At one point he got pegged in the shoulder with a wad of ticker tape and just lost it. Holding his shoulder, clearly in pain, the horde in the stands mercilessly took up a victory chant telling the goalie not to cry, "you don't have a goalie, you've got a crybaby." The game had yet to start...

Once the game commenced the fans in my section kept up a continuous bruhaha of chants, songs and cheers, groaning at each bad call from the ref, and gasping at nearly missed goals. Santi, although only attending his second game ever, knew all the chants and belted them at the top of his lungs. Finally in the last five minutes of the first half, Riquelme, Boca's top star, scored the first goal of the game off a beautiful penalty kick into the top corner of the net, soaring over both the wall and the diving goalie. The stands errupted at once, turning into one mass of jumping people. I felt the stands themselves shaking under me and I lost my balance landing all my weight on the person in front of me. As the crowd swayed the other way I righted myself with the help of an elbow to the gut. Everyone was estatic, Santi was near tears.

Two Boca goals and 45 mins later I had become accostumed to the shaking of the stands, the jumping of my neighbors, and the hand permanently rested on my shoulder. It had been an incredible experience, one that I promised Santi that I would never forget. On the way home, my friend and I caught a cab and exclaimed to the cabbie what a night it'd been at the game. We were partly thrilled to still be alive, but mostly filled with la pasion!

Settling in.

Finally, after an incredible weekend of partying and getting to know Buenos Aires I have moved from an air mattress on Caitlin's (ty so much!) floor to a place with a room of my own. I'm living with a couple of American guys (well, technically one's Canadian) down here playing American football, a Canadian down here to ride horses for show and a South African from Praetoria working as a laptop salesman. The move was nice because it gave me a whole new neighborhood to get to know with its own set of gorgeous parks, monuments, restaurants and clubs. Beyond the new housing set up I've picked up a cell phone to keep in touch with all my new friends and bought shampoo for the first time all trip! I even got my laundry done at the lavanderia around the corner so I'm sporting clean clothes, imagine that. All in all, things have settled down and I'm enjoying myself greatly.

Bienvenidos a Buenos Aires

So far Buenos Aires has been absolutely beautiful. I've seen a couple of the main plazas, the Presidents palace aka La Casa Rosada (Pink House), the house of congress, the Bombonera where the fabled futbol club Boca Junior plays, the neighborhood around it from which the team gets its name and some other random sights. Yesterday I went with Caitlin's roommates to a neighborhood called San Telmo. It was very European looking with cobblestone streets and big mansions with open air gardens and stuff. Most of the places had been converted into groups of shops for things like antiques, fragrances, knitted goods etc. The sort of place my mother would absolutely love. We also celebrated Caitlin's birthday yesterday and went out to an incredible dinner of steak, apps, and four bottles of wine and champagne that cost all of $60 pesos per person, or about $20. Food prices here are amazing, as well as prices for living space, but clothes are more expensive than at home. Which sucks since it is fall here, and nearing winter and I've got only 2 pairs of long pants, 2 long shirts and a light jacket. So far I haven't been miserable but from what the locals tell me this is just the beginning.

Montañita Redux

Visiting Ecuador again has been a blast. Just seeing the city and visiting my host family brings back so many good memories of my first time here. I´ve been staying with my host uncle´s family in their small Villa in a gated community on the outskirts of town and hanging out quite a bit with my host uncle´s son. This past weekend we decided to make a trip to Montañita, that fabled town of endless beach, hippys and dancing late into the night. Upon arrival I was surprised to see how much the little town had changed in two years. It had grown to about double the size it had been and many of the hostals had been newly renovated and expanded. Where just two years ago the town had the reputation for being a getaway for hippys (read drug addicts according to my host family), today one finds police patrolling every street on foot and motorcycle. For everything that has changed, more has stayed the same. The hippys were still there, (although their drug trade was by necessity not so explicit), the ceviche still upset my stomach and the bump and grind of the discos still lasted well into the wee hours of the morning.

Machu Picchu

Honestly, I have been trying to figure out how to describe my experience walking the Inca Trail and visiting Machu Picchu and I can´t come up with a good way to do it. So instead of giving a play by play I am just going to post pictures of the hike, some of the people I met, our guide and finally the Old Mountain itself for you all to see. There really are no words to describe the experience and honestly the pictures won´t do it justice either. It really is an incredible site worthy of the title Wonder of the World. So I think you should vote for it at www.new7wonders.com


With pictures!

Sacsayhuaman (sound it out)

The trip has started off great. Lots of family time... We´ve spent the last few days in Cusco the tourist mecca of Peru. Our first day took us to the ruins of Sacsayhuaman (don´t say it wrong, the locals get offended) just outside of town where I stood a foot from a real live condor hugged a 128 ton boulder transplanted by the incas on rolled logs and met Jose. Maybe it was his terrible english accent or just his love of the subject matter but we ended up spending the next two days with him. He took us around to similar ruins in the Sacred Valley in the shapes of llamas and pumas and through"cheap" mercados. On our second trek to the sacred valley we saw a Catholic church built on the stone foundation of an Incan temple, a site of concentric circles that the Incans used for agricultural experimentation and the salt mines that provided salt to the entire Incan empire and is still used to this day for the inhabitants of much of Peru. Needless to say, with the altitude combined with the long days, I´m pooped. Looking forward to our four day trek along the incan trail to Machu Pichu!

El gringo returneth

As anyone who has checked this in the past year and a half (sorry Lauri!) has probably guessed, I am no longer in Ecuador. But good news! I'm headed back to the land of choclo, locro and the matagringo for more adventures this summer! So check back!

More Photos (Lots)

Hey everyone, I got more photos uploaded to Ofoto. Just click Here.

As before, click the View Photos Without Signing In button if you haven't and don't want to make an account.

Enjoy!

Turkey Day Ecuadorian Style

First off, Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone reading this!

Despite all odds I had a great thanksgiving. It started off on a pretty sad note when we found out that even TGI Fridays doesn´t have a turkey and mashed potatoes meal until the christmas season. A little bit bummed but determined, we headed to Mi Comisariato in search of a turkey substitute. We came up with a pre-cooked chicken, a bag of potatoes, corn and beer. We mashed the potatoes (I did the mashing), and dumped in the corn. By the time we got to the chicken it was cold, but still tasted good. Although maybe lacking by US standards foodwise, I spent the time with good friends. Plus, the beer helped.

Needless to say, I´m very happy that I will be spending Thanksgiving day 2006 with my family in the states.

"Nos esta' saludando!"

Everything has been great as of late. My work at Luchadores has really picked up with the arrival of the two new PAs. They're having the hardest time getting accustomed to things in their new job of all the PAs that I've worked with so far. I think it's really a matter of attitude and preparedness. I don't think that they knew what to expect (perfectly normal) but instead of dealing with things, accepting them as they are and working around the system it seems that they spend a lot of time and energy trying to make things fit their way of thought. Too bad really, they'll probably learn the least here of all the PA students that have come.

As far as my job, their arrival has made everything much more interesting. Everyday is a new experience. I now spend a lot of time translating, and today finally translated an entire sex-ed talk to a group of 10-13 year olds. It was great, the kids were very well informed and had answers for most of our questions such as what is AIDS, how to prevent it and how to avoid pregnancy, etc. The PAs brought a banana and a box of condoms which the kids got a real kick out of. I think that we also taught the teachers a thing or too, judging from the initial look of surprise on their faces when they learned that you can use both condoms and other forms of contraception in unison.

Yesterday, I got a kick out of the docs reaction to what I imagine is a fairly common occurence in hospitals and clinics everywhere when the newborn that he had just finished examining started peeing all over everything. The father and I laughed as the doc exclaimed "Mira, nos esta saludando!" or more or less, "Look guys, he's waving!" All good fun, I'm looking forward to work tomorrow.

Ecuador by the Numbers (by Lizz)

4-Times we’ve seen Cuy (roasted Guinea Pig) for sale and Mike hasn’t eaten it

444-Number of stairs up Las Peñas for the best view of Guayaquil

2000AD-Year the Malacon in Guayaquil was constructed

900AD-Year Ingapirca was built

13-Bodies buried alive in a sacrificial tomb at Ingapirca

36-Number of hours we have spent riding buses in the last 7 days

6-Types of different transportation we’ve taken (bus, pirate ship, train, taxi, trolley, car)

2-Tourist sites claiming to be El Mitad del Mundo (Center of the World/Equator)

0-Actual number of sites exactly on the Equatorial Line (0´0´0)

$0.25c-Typical cost for a bottle of water

$0.50c-Asking price for 2 large pineapples

1.5 Lbs-Largest piece of meat Mike has ever eaten (a T-bone steak at least 1 1/2 inches thick!)

6-Dole banana plantations we’ve passed throughout the country

2-Times Lizz´s forehead has sunburned and peeled, despite wearing sunscreen

5-Hours riding on the roof of ¨El Nariz Del Diablo¨ train through the mountains

33 C-Degrees it is currently in Guayaquil (91 F)

9-Boys in one family we met in Otavalo...they also have 1 daughter

6:30AM-The earliest we’ve gotten up, in order to visit Otavalo market

7-Number of Catholic churches on one street in Quito, all built over historic Incan religious sites

50-(At least) the number of Chinese restaurants we’ve seen in Ecuador

1-Number of times we´ve eaten Chinese

5-Indigenous groups in Ecuador

2,800-Altitude in meters of Quito

6-Volcanos we passed

1-Volcanos Lizz actually saw

12-Number of students Mike´s host family has had over the years

1st-Mike´s rank amongst these students in terms of conversational and Spanish speaking ability (According to his host father)

6-Days Lizz has left in Ecuador :(

Cuenca

After an hour and a half of packing we embarked on our one week adventure to the Sierra; first stop, Cuenca. An uneventful 5 hour bus ride left us tired and hungry (although we did miss out on $.50 pineapples). Upon arrival we decided to walk from the Terminal Terrestre to the center of town, no small feat. About half way there, and looking like the tourists we are (envision huge green rucksack towering above my head) a Cuencan with a friendly smile asked us where we were headed. We struck up a conversation, me doing most of the talking with Lizz´s interjected ¨¡Si!¨and ¨¡Que bonito!¨ He gave us the grand tour, pointing out banks, churches, telephone cabinas and the local gradeschool as well as the building that his rich relatives own (he was a self-described ¨pobre¨). Finally leading us to the main square and afterwards to a hostel that he highly recommended we said our fairwells. After checking in at the Hostel ¨La Monastería¨we headed down the block to eat dinner, Chinese of all things! A delicious meal of chicken fried rice and Jugo de Piña was more than enough to fill us up. We took the rest to go and gave it to a delighted mother and daughter who approached us asking for ¨comidita.¨ Now we´re off to bed early tonight so we can get up and head to the Incan ruins of Ingapirca in the morning.

Lizz Arrives!

Lizz arrived yesterday in the madrugada (butt crack of dawn). After trying to sneak on ¨contraband¨ (a leatherman), having to deal with a customs form entirely in Spanish, and surviving the turbulance of hurricane Wilma she arrived, haggared, (Lizz´s word choice) in Simon Bolivar International Airport, Guayaquil.

Yesterday´s Highlights:

-Visiting the popularly named Iguana Park (Parque Seminario)
-Walking the Malecón 2000
-Climbing the 400 some steps of Las Peñas, for the best view of Guayaquil
-Riding ¨El Morgan¨pirate ship and getting ripped off like the gringos we are
-Watching game one of the World Series of Baseball with my host family
-Trying to explain chewing tobacco and sunflower seeds