Monday (10-13-2008) Loja

Ryan taught a class at 8 am. I slept until 9:30 and got up in time to meet Saula, our host and the head of Ryan’s school. She showed me where I could find some bread to eat in the house and I had some coffee and got ready for the day. Ryan came back at 10:15 and we walked around the town. It’s filled with internet cafes, winding roads and lots of shopping. We went to lunch and I had a tamale and horchata, a tea that is an extremely bright shade of pink. My entire meal came out to under a dollar. Amazing. We walked to the Mercado (Market) and walked through rows and rows of fruit vendors all selling the same items. We went to the carne section, a vegetarians’ absolute nightmare: with pigs’ heads cut up and hanging from hooks, through the seafood section and through stalls of clothing and shoes.

Eventually we joined up with Saula, her older son and her husband for lunch and had broccoli soup, rice and steamed radishes with cilantro. This was cooked and served by
their maid with home-made juice of Tamarindo, a fruit that is like a bitter-sweet date that grows in a pod.
Interesting facts about tamarindo:
In Madagascar it grows on what they call the Killy tree and comprises 50% of a lemur’s diet.

It is apparently good for the kidneys and has traditionally been used to reduce malaria fever.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamarind).
I have never in my life heard of this fruit or many of the things that they eat in Ecuador. The food here is novel and amazing to me. So much better than in the states where everything is processed.

Saula gave us the run down of possible things we should consider doing while in Ecuador. She was going 2 hours away to a different town for some school related business and offered to take me with her. I declined because I don’t feel comfortable enough in my Spanish or sense of direction to walk around a strange town where the most interesting thing to see is a Basilica. So instead I chilled around, took a much needed nap, organized the things I packed and typed up my blog onto a word document so that I can transfer it eventually to the internet.

Ryan came back around 8:15 and we searched for a place to have dinner. We desired tacos and beer but this fell through because apparently most of the dining establishments close very early on Mondays. We came back to Saula’s and ate some leftovers: white corn (which at first I thought was chick-peas) with home-made cilantro sauce, chicken and pasta with tuna in it and ketchup. There was some sort of mashed root that I couldn’t place that we ate. All of the food, including the juice is made from scratch in this house-hold because it is prepared by Maria, the maid. The idea of canned soup is laughable from their perspective. The house is gated and lovely and I feel very safe and happy to be here.

Ryan received tragic news around 10:15 pm that his grandmother had passed away. This wasn’t completely unexpected but it’s a shame because he can’t go home for the funeral. I’ve met his grandmother a few times and she was a lovely woman who remembered my name. We went up on the rooftop, sat surrounded by the mountains and finished the bottle of wine while eating my last bar of Hershey dark chocolate. Then we both called it a night.

Some interesting observations on Ecuador:
Wild dogs are rampant in this country in just about every city, but they’re mostly tame. We witnessed a brief dog fight in Montanita but they don’t attack people. Here are some pictures of some of the wild dogs that I have seen:




Okay, the one to the right isn’t wild. That’s TiTi—Saula’s family’s dog. Isn’t she cute?













Titi is like a muppet.













More observations:
The water flushes straight down (as far as I’ve noticed)—but this could just be the ones at Saula’s house.
It costs five cents to get toilet paper at the bus terminal. You put your money in a dispenser machine before you enter a stall. It looks a lot like a machine that would sell feminine hygiene products.
Toilet paper is not flushed here. It is put in the trashcan.
The custom is to greet every person you know or meet with a kiss on the cheek. I still haven’t quite figured out how to not make this awkward or who kisses whose cheek and how to do this without risking both trying for a cheek and kissing somebody on either the neck or the lips.
They just passed a law requiring that all cars have license plates and all drivers must buckle up. They also banned tinted windows and talking on a cell-phone while driving.