Halloween was the first real even that I’ve had to miss being abroad, but I had actually had a very eventful Halloween despite being in the Southern Hemisphere. As usual, I’m writing all of this a month later and as expected it’s a novel so apologies but I hope you enjoy!
To start, people here actually celebrate Halloween. My neighbors have had a giant blow up pumpkin and ghost in their yard for the last month (another thing Ecuas love.. decorating for holidays months in advance, my Christmas tree has been up since the first week of November) and I saw signs around for Halloween parties and they were selling costumes at the mall so I figured I would get my students some candy to celebrate and we had a vacation for the entire next week so it seemed like a good time for a present. We had a quiz in all of my classes, and as students gave me their quizzes I gave them their Halloween candy. Unfortunately for me and for one of my students, I caught him cheating on his quiz. I have told everyone since the first day that if they cheat I throw their tests away in front of the class. I said it the first day of class, before the last test, and right before they took my quiz. I clearly have been dreading the time when I catch someone cheating because I really do love all of my students and I already feel bad when I have to yell at people for talking during class. But, I saw one student look at the paper next to his twice so I knew I had to enforce my rules. I grabbed his test, crumpled it up, and threw it in the garbage can in front of the whole class. The student didn’t say anything but was clearly embarrassed and it was definitely a miserable situation for the both of us. If things weren’t awkward enough, I had to hand him his Halloween candy on the way out the door and awkwardly mumble ‘Happy Halloween…’ What unfortunate timing. However, the mood of the class brightened when the next girl who left the class responded to my Halloween gift not by saying “Happy Halloween, teacher!” but rather just yelling “Haappppyyyy teacher!” My students only know the English that I’ve taught them in the last six weeks, but even they realized how ridiculous this situation was. I had to give them a fake stink eye to get them to keep focusing on the test, but we all had a good laugh about it and as other people left they yelled “haaapppppy” too. A hilarious/awful/it was going to happen sometime just unfortunate someone had to cheat on the day I’m giving them candy experience.
The next lag of my Halloween weekend took a turn for the worse. I hadn’t been feeling that well in my last class, but one of the other WorldTeach volunteers was in town visiting us so we had planned to go out to eat and go get drinks after class. After two bites of dinner I realized that food was not an option and had to go home and spent the next four days lying in my bed eating almost nothing. Food poising is definitely inevitable in this country, and I actually really had good timing because I didn’t have to miss any classes or wasn’t sick on a 12 hour bus ride so I’m definitely thankful for that but it was pretty miserable. I watched five movies and a season of Arrested Development in 48 hours and literally couldn’t do anything else. But, by Saturday afternoon I was feeling better enough to eat saltines and to be sitting instead of just asleep in my bed which was great because Saturday was my host mom’s birthday. My host sister Johanna flew in from Quito and a bunch of aunts, uncles, cousins, and my grandmas came over for a big dinner (which I couldn’t eat, so unfortunate. There were even three cakes, I was legit pissed) which was really fun. After everyone left at about I figured we would just go to bed, but Johanna asked me if I wanted to play cards. I was obviously jacked because I haven’t gotten to spend any time with her and Paul is really busy with work and school and we don’t really hang out or talk so I was really excited for some family time. We went to Paul’s room and the three of us played cards until 1 in the morning, it was so much fun. We played an old maid-type game for awhile and then they wanted to play something else. Johanna suggested rummy and although I haven’t played it that much I knew how to play so I was all for it. The only problem was they didn’t remember how to play so they asked me to sum it up for them. I’m not sure what rummy they were playing, but it was definitely not the rummy that I knew how to play. I usually don’t have problems with my Spanish anymore (aka I can always get my point across even if I say things wrong) but I failed miserably at explaining rummy. Paul laughed at me so hard (which is so exciting, I’ll take being super embarrassing so that we can be friends) and told me to explain it in English because they literally had no idea what I was talking about. I’m not sure how much English they know, but they both took WorldTeach classes when they were younger and if they went all the way through the program they’re really good so I embarrassingly couldn’t explain it in Spanish but they got it in English. Fail for my Spanish-speaking abilities but I made so much family progress I was so excited about it.
Both of my parents work for the Manabi (my province) Swim Association so we all went to Bahia for the annual swim tournament in the bay. There’s a big river in Bahia and every year swimmers from all over Ecuador come to swim from one side of the river to the other. Paul and Johanna both competed there when they were younger and Paul won once but now neither of them swim anymore but it was still really cool to watch. I still wasn’t feeling well so I had to go take a two hour nap on the beach but when I woke up I was hungry and didn’t feel completely exhausted for the first time in four days which was excellent timing because after the day at the beach we came back to Portov to go out for Halloween. My host mom told me I couldn’t go out if I wasn’t feeling better but I ate soup and rice for dinner and actually was feeling better so I got to go out. I didn’t realize that people actually dressed up here and Johanna and I looked all over Bahia to find devil horns or something to wear but there was nothing but unfortunate masks for kids and scrunchies (no one believes in pony tail holders here and everyone wears 100% scrunchies, it’s awful) so we just wore black and went out to the bars. It was so much fun because Johanna and her boyfriend and Paul and his girlfriend (named Paola, yess) came out (I found out Paul had a girlfriend on Saturday.. they’ve been dating since before I got here. Solid communication) so that was really fun to go out with my whole family! We went to this bar called GLAM which was pretty glamorous and they had an extreme Halloween party with ridiculous decorations and girls dressed in trashy costumes just like in the US. It felt like home and that was nice. There was even a costume contest where people went on stage and danced to see who won. It was the first Halloween that I didn’t eat candy and that I didn’t dress up which is extremely disappointing but I actually had a really good time and I was so glad I got to spend time with my family.
Monday was the last day of my vacation that I spent in Portoviejo and just planned to get ready for the next week’s lesson before traveling to the Sierra to spend the rest of my time off in Banos but I didn’t end up getting much done. My host cousin Fernando was in town from Navy school in Salinas and Johanna was disappointed that I hadn’t really hung out with any guys since I’ve been here so she set me up on a date with my host cousin. We went to a movie (Losers, it was horrible, don’t go) which wasn’t very good but it was really fun to hang out with him and he was really nice. We decided to go out that night again and went to go have a few drinks and I was planning to come home at 11:30 or 12 because I had to get up at 5am to travel to the sierra, but at 11 Johanna called me and her and her boyfriend and Paul and Paola came and met up with us. Everyone in Ecuador was on vacation for the holiday but nothing was happening in Portoviejo so they said we HAD to go to the beach. I was literally ready to fall asleep, but even Paul told me to go so I decided to suck it up and head to the beach. Portov is about half an hour from the beach, so we got there a little after midnight and hung out there until 3am. I was ridiculously exhausted but really glad that I went and had a lot of fun.
After sleeping for one hour on Monday night, I got up at 5am to leave for Banos at 6 am. We were told it would take about 8 hours to get there, but apparently that’s just for executive buses (which we thought we were on… and definitely were not). We finally arrived in Banos at about 6:30, more than twelve hours later. It was a ridiculously miserable day of traveling but I finally had my appetite back so after we met up with Jen and Cate (the Manta girls who I hang out with all the time) we went and ate some great pizza and went to bed at 8:00. We didn’t really get to see any of the city because we got in when it was dark (thanks, Ecuador) but in the morning we saw why people from all over the world come to Banos. It’s a small town that’s right in the middle of these giant mountains that are so green and there are waterfalls all around and it was just insanely beautiful. Banos is a few hours from Quito and is one of the most touristy places in Ecuador for its extreme sports and nightlife. It’s still really weird to see any other white people or foreigners because there aren’t any in Portoviejo, but Banos is full of people from all over the world. This also meant that there was food from all over the world which was fabulous for us. Jen had been to Banos twice when she studied abroad in Quito and knew of a great breakfast place.. which was literally the best breakfast of my life. I haven’t had whole grain anything since I’ve been here and they had fabulous bread and great eggs and great juices, it was so awesome and we went there every day that we were there.
After breakfast, we went to go figure out our plan for the activities we wanted to do. Jen wasn’t feeling very well and had already done all of the sports the year before so Cate, Heather and I signed up for a white water rafting and canyoning package for $50 (I love this country). The first day we went white water rafting and it was absolutely incredible. I had only been once before in Wyoming and that was more like a leisurely boat ride in a flashy raft but this was legit white water rafting. It was just the three of us and two Ecuadorians and a guide and we spent about half an hour learning how to raft and then just got right in. The river was so gorgeous and just cut right through the mountains – I couldn’t stop thinking about how fake my life is and how ridiculous it is that I’m here right now because it was just so insane. We rafted for about two hours and when we got done not only did we have to climb up about 20 feet of rocks to get back to the van but we had to climb up while carrying the raft. This was the first of many times we realized that fake mountain climbing is part of every single activity you do. That night we took a chiva (chiva means goat and also means party trolley) up to the volcano. We brought a box of wine and some candy bars and we drove straight up a mountain for about 15 minutes and arrived and what would have been a gorgeous view of the volcano.. but it was super cloudy so we couldn’t see anything. We got a free drink up there and naturally someone started a bonfire so we hung out on top of the mountain for awhile and then headed back down.
The next day we started off the day with canyoning which was the most extreme thing I’ve ever done in my life. I didn’t really know what canyoning was, but soon found out that it means you repel/jump down waterfalls. Huge waterfalls. Heather, Cate, and I had our own private guide and after getting suited up in full canyoning gear we extreme hiked up a mountain for about 20 minutes and got to the first waterfall. We had a five minute training about how to repel, and then literally just went for it. The first waterfall was about 20-30 feet tall and the biggest one was probably about 75 feet. It was literally insane an exhilarating and one of the coolest things I’ve ever done. We repelled down five waterfalls in total; some of them we just went down the rocks next to the waterfall but others we had to jump directly through the water to get down. So crazy and so amazing. And the views, as you could imagine, were incredible. By the time you got down one waterfall, you were almost at the next and it was absolutely amazing to wind through the forest with the greenest vegetation in a massive canopy over us and the water rushing down the mountain. I still can’t get over it and am so glad I had the opportunity to experience it.
In the afternoon, we rented bikes and took a four hour bike ride right in the mountains. We didn’t go literal mountain biking, but the road cuts right through the mountains so we were literally right below the mountains and along the river which was incredible. We stopped a few times along the way to take pictures and to ride a cable car down to a waterfall (never have I ever seen so many casual waterfalls as I have in this country). At the very end, we were exhausted but decided to venture on a hike to one last waterfall that was absolutely gorgeous. We hiked back up and stopped for some banana empanadas (heaven) before we rode back to town in the back of a truck with our bikes.
Friday we headed to Ambato, a town about an hour away from Banos that’s the 4th biggest city in Ecuador. There are six volunteers placed there so it was really exciting to hang out with our friends that we hadn’t seen since orientation. We walked around the town for awhile and went to the creepiest museum of my life (the majority of it was filled with animals with two heads or too many legs or one eye) but were really just excited to see everyone. We went out for a real Mexican dinner which was incredible because despite the fact that you make think every Latin American country eats tacos constantly they actually never do. We all went back to our hostel to hang out before going out to a bar and spent the whole time telling ridiculous stories about our students or about weird people we’ve met. Overall it was just a great night and it felt good to have a night where it felt like I was just hanging out with people at college especially because we’re still in the awkward making friends stage which leads to a lot of uncomfortable situations.
We left early in the morning to go to Guayaquil so we could eat lunch on the way back instead of just a power 12 hours of hell. This seemed like a great idea until I got robbed in the bathroom at the bus terminal in Guayaquil. Guayaquil is the biggest city in Ecuador and its bus terminal is also really big which means there are always a ton of people there. The bathrooms are always completely packed and of course Ecuador doesn’t believe in having toilet paper in the bathrooms so I had to get mine out of my string backpack and when I put everything back in my wallet was sitting right on top of everything. I had to push through a bunch of tiny old ladies to get out of the bathroom, and when I was trying to get my wallet out to pay for my personal pan pizza (yep, pizza hut in the Guayaquil terminal, awesome), I realized that I didn’t have my wallet. I looked through all of my stuff and ran back to the bathroom and asked if anyone had seen a blue wallet (of course whoever took it was watching me frantically search the bathroom) and clearly no one said anything so I knew that it had either fallen out or someone had taken it. There was a zero percent chance that anyone would turn it in so I immediately called my parents and Paige to get someone to cancel my credit card. Luckily, they were able to cancel it within the hour and I only had about $4 and my ID card (worth a dollar) in there so it really went as smoothly as it could have gone. I was feeling really stupid about the fact that I could have just lost it until I got a call from my director Kate on Monday morning; whoever had taken my wallet called her because she was the first number on my emergency contacts card and tried to get a bribe to return my ID and my wallet. The wallet itself was the most valuable thing and clearly we weren’t going to meet some rando at the embassy to get it back so the lady said she was just going to throw it away. It’s unfortunate to know that I’m definitely a target and that I need to be careful around absolutely everyone here, but it’s also almost comforting because the majority of the crimes that happen in this country are old ladies pick pocketing people in the bathroom. People here aren’t trying to hurt anyone, they really just need money to survive and gringas like me are easy targets for a reason, especially while traveling. I’ll definitely be smarter next time I travel and hopefully I don’t have any more problems. Overall, an extremely amazing trip and I just love when I can say ‘I can’t believe that this is really my life’ every minute. Missing everyone and hoping everyone had a happy Thanksgiving, I’ll write about my ecua-thanksgiving soon! LOVE.
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