We
started off the weekend by wondering to a bar near our school called the beer
house, which seems to be the only bar in Ecuador where you can get dark beers…which
seem to be a weird concept here.
Although beer is huge here, there are only a few kinds, all of which are
light. It’s a strange contrast to
abundance of choices in the US, and the plethora of different breweries in each
state. Anyway, the beer house is my
favorite bar in Cuenca at the moment.
It has a sandy area with hammocks to drink your beer…need I say anymore?
We
then went to the first fútbol game of the season, my brother, his friends, my
cousin, and my friends. The season
kicked off with an introduction of the players, a ton of music, fireworks,
crazy fans, beer and excitement.
Cuenca also won against Peru.
It was pretty fun and exciting, and I caught a soccer ball.
Constantly
throughout the week, my mom reminded me not to make any plans on Saturday,
because we were going to go to a barbeque at her cousin Nora’s house in the
early afternoon (Nora is a wonderful, funny, crazy, caring woman, I have instantly
bonded with here). Of course, due
to Ecuadorian time, I definitely could have made plans during the day, as we
didn’t leave the house until 6ish.
It was a really fun night.
My sisters, brother, and cousins, and I played rounds of pool,
ping-pong, and wii, which by the way it is impossible to learn the controls in
Spanish, and I got my ass kicked.
Nora also has an open bar at her house, bigger than any bar I have seen
in Cuenca thus far.
It
was a barbeque, so when my uncle brought a round of delicious, pesto hotdogs, I
figured that was dinner, and I was pretty full and content. However, I was quite wrong, and a
sit-down dinner of chicken, rice, corn salad, etc was still to come, along with
dessert. It was all fantastic, and
we all left stuffed to the brim.
It was especially fun to see my host mom with her cousin. Nora is a wild, non-stop talking,
funny, awesome women, who definitely brings out the crazy in my mom. Together they are non-stop stories, disses,
laughs, and craziness. Finally we
were able to break the two-apart, and returned to the house around 1 in the
morning.
A
few hours later, the next morning, I dragged myself out of bed at 4:45 am to go
on a hike to Cerro Punay, Chimborazo.
I still have no conception of where this is or what this is, but it was
pretty neat. My friend Katie and I
signed up to go with a local hiking group. It was three hours away from Cuenca, in some beautiful
mountainous area. We met a lot of
fun people, many Ecuadorian, and many from other random parts of the
world. The hike was up and down
the mountain of Cerro Punay, which back in the day, when the world was covered
in water, was the only peak that stood above the water. At least I think that is what our guide
told us in Spanish… We also saw
some remenants of Incan creations, including… and small “stadiums” Climbing up
and down was really neat, because the ecosystems changed drastically. We climbed from dark green leafiness to
brown prairie like grasses. As we learned
in our biodiversity class, climbing vertically 600 meters is equivalent to
traveling horizontally 1000 kilometers as far as ecosystem and climatic changes…pretty
neat. Other than that, I can’t
tell you too much about the hike, because we were in complete fog and rain, and
could barely see a few feet in front of us. Going down the mountain, every step
felt like you might step off the mountain. It was also a steep down, and complete mud, and everybody
slid and ate shit numerous times, myself included. The hike was fun, beautiful, and interesting, and it was
really nice to be away from the busy city for a day.
