Soccer and Crucita

I went to a Liga game on Tuesday. Liga, officially Liga Deportiva Universitaria de Quito is the most popular soccer team in Quito. We're also the best. Anyway, the game I went to was the round of sixteen of the Copa Sudamericana which is the equivalent of the UEFA cup in Europe. Its just one step below the Champions League, and Liga is the defending champion. We had lost the first leg of the round of sixteen 4-2 so we had to win 2-0 or 3-1 or better. We had purchased tickets for the top section of the stadium so we could observe La Muerte Blanca (literally White Death, its the nickname of the crazy Liga fans). However the stairs were closed off and we were informed that we had to sit in the lower section. So we ended up sitting right next to La Muerte Blanca. It ended up being awesome. They were singing the whole game and before it started some climbed the fence in front of the field and emptied maybe twenty fire extinguishers into the air. We ended up winning 6-1 so there were six goals to celebrate. After goals some people would just chuck their cups of beer into the air regardless of whether it was full or not. I only got sprayed with beer twice though. All in all it was amazing though.

This weekend I went to the coast with my Volcanology class. We went to a small town called Crucita. The hostel cost ten dollars a night and was directly in front of the ocean. I thought it was funny thinking about how expensive that location would be in the USA. The water was not cold at all so that was pretty sweet. Unfortunately we didn't have a lot of time to lounge about on the beach though. We went in the bus around and looked at rocks. We did stop at a very secluded part of the beach with huge waves where we stayed for a little bit. The food was very good as well. Although everyone warned us about not eating at sketchy restaurants, I ended up eating at one for breakfast. The breakfast they served me was fried fish and fried bananas. It was very good but not what I would typically think of as breakfast food. We had been promised to go paragliding on Sunday, but there wasn't enough wind, so I was really disappointed. The bus ride there and back was incredibly long. It was around eight hours. The scenery was pretty awesome though. The bus ride really let me appreciate what everyone said during orientation about Ecuador's biodiversity. We started out at the coast and made our way through jungles until we climbed up high into the mountains.

Our isolated beach with cool rocks

A side alley in Crucita

The beach across from our hostel

Banos

So I had a pretty action filled weekend. On Thursday I went to a Capoeria show at a club. Capoeria is a kind of martial arts/dance thing. For anyone who has played Tekken, its what Eddy Gordo does. To be honest, that's the only reason I went. The performers came from around the world, most of them were from Brazil though. The performance was very impressive with the exception of one guy who was dressed as a farmer and rapped terribly for 45 minutes.

On Friday my day started out in Andinismo where they had attached a rope from the top of the gym. Class consisted of us tying the correct knots and then climbing the rope to the top by using these knots to support us. It was pretty awesome. I decided to go to the town of Banos (Banos is spelled with a ~ over the n, but I don't know how to type that) with several of my friends that afternoon. We left our bus station close to our homes at 3. Unfortunately our bus passed through a pro-Correa demonstration, so we were considerably delayed. The bus had to go a different route, and we arrived at the Quito bus station almost 3 hours later. The actual bus to Banos was surprisingly very comfortable. It was the first time I actually had leg room in a bus in Ecuador. We arrived in Banos pretty late and found our hostel and ate dinner. The hostel was very nice, but not really secure. There were several times when nobody was inside to open the locked door for us, so on several occasions one of us jumped the fence to open the door.

On Saturday we rented bikes to go down "La Ruta de Cascadas" (Waterfall route) It went along an actual street but the scenery was amazing. True to its name, there were tons of waterfalls that you could see. There was a cable car that some of us took to get up close to one huge waterfall. From there we could climb on the rocks next to it, so that was a lot of fun. There was also a five year old girl operating the cable car on one side so that was kind of funny. After that excursion we continued biking until we got to a bridge. This bridge was the site of "puenting" (literally bridging). What puenting is though, is bungie jumping without a bounce and off of a bridge. You pretty much swing around after you jump off. Naturally I decided to do this. After I had my harness on and stood on top of the bridge and looked down, I figured it wasn't the best decision I could have made. The guy in charge was just saying "tranquilo, tranquilo" but I was terrified. Eventually I made the leap down. It was probably the scariest thing I've ever done in my life. It was awesome though. Apparently there was another place that is much higher but we didn't make it there. A couple of my friends also went puenting, so I now finally have a good response when someone asks me if I would jump off a bridge if my friends did.

After that adrenaline rush, we continued on to another waterfall called "Paillon del Diablo" or something like that. It was a huge waterfall and we were allowed to climb behind it in tiny passages. It was an incredible experience. After the waterfall, we took a bus back to Banos. We ate lunch really late and then I went dune buggying with some other people. We took these dune buggies down a road and went past the zoo. The zoo was labeled "animal prison" on the map so I thought that was pretty funny. We went through a tiny little town where we were chased by dogs so that was fairly exciting. We then went down another trail where we had great views of the river. When we got back to Banos, we got a little lost so we were just driving through traffic in these little dune buggies. We got back eventually though. Our dune buggy was pretty old and beat up though. They were literally fixing it right before we got to ride it.

That night we rented a bus to get a good view of the volcano. Unfortunately there was clouds so all we saw were clouds and fog. We did get canelazo which is a type of really good tea. It was possible to put in aguardiente, which is a really strong sugar cane alcohol. It literally means fire water. Somehow one of my friends ended up with a full cup of that, and it was not drinkable at all. On Sunday we went hiking. The mountain we climbed was really steep and the trail was slippery. The view at the top was great though. We then took the bus back to Quito.

Our group that hiked on Sunday

Our dune buggy

Swinging after puenting

Scariest moment of my life

Santo Domingo

On Saturday I went to a small indigenous village close to the Ecuadorian city of Santo Domingo. The tribe was called Tsachila. There are only about 2500 of them left and they're trying to preserve their culture. The village leader gave us a tour of the main sights there. He was dressed in a blue skirt and had black stripes painted all over him. He also had his hair partially dyed red. The plant they use to do this is the same plant that we gave ourselves war paint with in the jungle. Anyway, the village was pretty interesting. They gave us a musical demonstration where they had a xylophone and drums and rain sticks. Then they danced for us too. We then got a spear throwing demonstration where we were allowed to throw it as well. Then another villager gave us a talk on the politics of the community and cultural customs such as weddings and funerals. After all that, we got to be "healed" by the village leader. The healing consisted of us going down five at a time in a dug out hole with a thatched roof. There was some kind of incense burning that smelled really good. Then the shaman guy started whistling this tune and shaking leaves over us. He then rubbed wet rocks on our faces and necks all while whistling this tune. I thought it was hilarious. I didn't want to be disrespectful, but I was struggling not to laugh. I nearly lost it when he started spitting water all over us. I managed to hold my laughter in, but it was hard. Anyway, after being healed we left the town to go have lunch.

Lunch was in a property that was started 60 years ago by some rich crazy Russian woman who wanted to live in the jungle. She built a hostel and golf course in the middle of Ecuador. The place is still owned by her son, Sergei. After eating, he gave us a tour of the area. Apparently its a mecca for bird watchers. The grounds were pretty cool, and Sergei was pretty passionate about his work there. He was a pretty cool guy who was in the Ecuadorian special forces for a while. Apparently part of his training was being able to survive in the jungle for several months with minimal equipment. He had a pet dog, Rodolfo who absolutely loved me. He would follow me around the whole time and whine every time I didn't pet him. In the tour of the grounds we got to eat fresh tangerines which were very good as well.

We then went back to Quito. The bus rides we take to and from these places are really amazing. The views are awesome, I really didn't realize what a beautiful country Ecuador was before I came. We took the bus through mountains and there were picturesquely placed houses really in the middle of nowhere along the roads. There were also tons of waterfalls along the road. The one thing that bothered me though, is that outside of Quito it seems that everyone is living in poverty. The little that I saw of Santo Domingo was poor and rundown. Going to Tiputini, the city of Coca was the same way. Most of these other cities seem to be slumtowns. When I went to Mindo, I had talked to a guy from Santo Domingo and when I mentioned I went to USFQ, he made some remark about me being a rich kid. That really struck home when I was looking at the surrounding areas. I feel like the university is really way too decadent comparatively to the poverty in Ecuador. Having a lagoon and waterfall that goes off every 30 minutes is really unnecessary when the rest of the country is full of poverty.

Rodolfo

Lizard chilling in the bathroom

Monkey in the village

Tsachila performing

Papallacta and Cuicocha

So this weekend I had two field trips for Volcanology. On Saturday we left for Papallacta at 6:30 in the morning. The highlight of Papallacta is that it has hot springs which are naturally heated by the nearby volcano. But before we were allowed to relax there we made several stops to collect rocks. Our professor, Theo seemed to delight in forcing us to climb ridiculous slopes for no real reason. We had to scramble down one hill to get to a river where we had to find some green rocks. It turned out that they were all at the top anyway. I enjoyed it though. We made one stop where we climbed up a nearly horizontal slope which was really muddy and slippery. We ended up having to use vines and brushes to climb up. After we got to the top of this slope, we then proceeded to go down another. A problem was that there were over 50 people there, so there was a lot of waiting for people to get down. It would have been a lot more fun with about ten. Anyway, while we were waiting for people to get down, Theo would shove us into each other in an effort to speed things up. This only resulted in people getting mad. After we finally got down, it turned out that we had just gone around in a circle for no apparent reason.

To get to the muddy slopes we had to cross a bridge. We had the option of crossing a fairly new and stable one, or running across a wooden one with missing planks. Naturally I decided to cross the sketchy one. At one point I heard a board break as I stepped on it, but I managed to get to the other side alive. For lunch we stopped in a small town where we had almuerzos. The soup that they brought ended up having chicken feet in it. I wasn't sure whether you were supposed to eat them or not, so I took a bite out of one. It did not taste very good. The main course was trout which wasn't too bad.

After collecting a few more rocks we went to the hot springs. They were pretty awesome. I had kind of envisioned them to be carved out of the volcano, but they were more like swimming pools, so that was a bit disappointing. Supposedly to get the full healthy experience out of them, you're supposed to lie down in a freezing river next to them and then jump back into the hot springs. Seven times. The river was really really cold. But I decided to get the full experience so I ended up doing it all seven times. Theo mentioned that they usually had competitions on who could stay in the river the longest, and claimed that girls always won. After hearing this, we ended up having a competition. I was the only guy willing to try it, and then there were three other girls who joined me. Two left fairly early, and then I was stuck in this freezing cold river with the other one who was just as stubborn as me. After fifteen minutes of torture, Theo insisted that we leave as a tie. Apparently the previous record had been two and a half minutes. It was a nice excuse to leave, and the hot baths felt amazing afterwards.

On Sunday we went to Cuicocha. I had already been there with the Boston group so it wasn't all that exciting. We had to draw faults and folds at various stops. We ate at a road side restaurant thing that was terrible. I ordered empanadas and got some tiny cold ones in a container so that was abysmal. I would have preferred chicken feet. One exciting thing I did see was in a remote little village we drove by was an Ecuadorian with a Bayer Leverkusen jersey so that was pretty cool for me. I had thought that I was the only fan outside of Leverkusen, but apparently there's at least one in a small Ecuadorian town.




One of many slopes we had to climb

Most awesome bridge in the world

Lunch

A volcano whose name starts with A. I don't remember the rest.