Excuse me, your name is what?

So, this past weekend, while partying on the Chivas Bus in Baños, (see previous post) I met a nice Ecuadorian girl. We met on top of this mountain while drinking an alcoholic fermented sugar cane drink and gazing at the giant glowing cross of glory. Oh yeah, and there was this cool view of the town of Baños as well. To say the least, it was an interesting experience. I was drinking this exotic alcoholic beverage talking (read: flirting) with an exotic girl while viewing an exotic town all in the backdrop of a giant, glowing, Catholic religious symbol. The irony was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

This is a picture of the giant glowing cross. It was also where I met "her."

But that isn't the best part. Our conversation was pretty basic, not because I lacked the language skills, but because we were acquaintences and were doing the whole "basic shallow question thing." (Or at least that´s what i'm telling myself). We talked about Ecuador, why a white kid like me was in Ecuador, what Ecuadorians thought about white kids like me that were in Ecuador, and Ecuador. Anyways, we seemed to hit it off pretty well. So, when the Chivas bus people offered to take us to a club they just so happened to own also, me and the girl (who doesn't have a name yet) decided to go together. We met up with some of her other friends and the 4 of us went to this club. It happened to be a salsa club. salsa. I really don`t know the first thing about salsa. And she does. Apparently like 6 years of lessons or something. But she offered to teach me and my two left feet how to get down Ecuadorian style. It wasn`t too pretty, but I managed to keep her interested in me. After about a half an hour of dancing, she finally asked for my name. I told her, and she told me her name was "Nena." Cool name I thought. So, the rest of the night, I would call her "Nena" while we were dancing, drinking, or talking. I said it rather frequently and she and her friends seemed to think it was cute. Score!!
By the end of the night, we decided to exchange numbers. We both live in Quito and both wanted to hang out again. So she writes down her cell and house number and writes "Nena=Yess." Um, okay. Maybe like "Yes, i´ll call you?" She didn´t really speak english so I just excused it as a funny attempt at an English joke.
The next night at family dinner, my family asked me about my weekend. My host brother asked me what I thought about Ecuadorian girls, and I said I liked them and that I got a girls number in Baños. He said cool, and I explained how I met her. My host mom asked what her name was, and I responded "Nena." My host mom asked me to repeat myself and I said it again. Nena. My brother told me that`s not a name. Sounds normal to me, right?
Earlier that day, I called her house. An older lady answered, and I politely asked "Me gustaría hablar con Nena, por favor." (I would like to speak with Nena, please.) The woman on the other line seemed rather confused, and said somthing in spanish I didn't quite understand. I became a little discouraged, thinking she maybe gave me a fake number. (If you´d like to, put in that spanish phrase into any spanish-english translator. Or just read on)
Anyways, at family dinner, my host mom asked me to show her the paper that "Nena" wrote her name and number on. She told me, rather bluntly, that Nena is indeed not a name. She read the Nena=Yess thing and started busting up laughing. So, pensively, I asked what "Nena" meant. It means "Baby" in an endearing way. yeah. Baby. WTF!? How was I supposed to know that?! So, what was her real name then? As my host mom so eloquently described to me that "Yess" is a common abbreviation for "Yessendra." Her name is Yessendra?! How I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. I still haven't called back yet. Don't know if I will, but this Yessendra girl sure has a sense of humor. Maybe she is worth my time....

My Adventure to Baños, Ecuador

This past weekend, I visited the town of Baños, Ecuador. It`s known as the "gateway to the Amazon," and for good reason. It`s, well, literally on the edge of the jungle. And its a pretty fricken sweet place. Although its really touristy, its got a lot of character. There`s this really cool colonial church in the center of town and tons of great little family owned restaurants. I ate a great breakfast for 2 bucks that included fresh juice, a pancake, a coffee, and this sweet rice stuff. Super good deal.


The courtyard of the colonial spanish church
The inside of the colonial spanish church

Baños is about 3 hours away from Quito. The bus ride over on Friday night was pretty uneventful, as was my first night there. I quickly discovered the vast amount of activities you could do: White water rafting, (class 4), jungle tours, horse back riding, rapelling down waterfalls, ATVing, hiking, mountain biking, swimming, natural hot springs, and more. So, the first night there, my friend and I decided we were going white water rafting. So on Saturday, we went. We got a deal with this one Ecuadorian dude named Juan Carlos. he sold us the trip for 2o bucks, including gear rental, roundtrip transportation, and lunch.
Chillin with a friend during orientation

Once we got through orientation, we went to the river. The views were unbelievable. The river literally runs through the jungle. We heard exotic bird calls and saw some snakes in the river. I was literally waiting for Indiana Jones to pop out of the temple of doom. The rapids were pretty fierce, and my buddy pushed me out of the raft about a 100 meters away from a class 4 rapid. Luckily, I paid attention during orientation and was able to get back to the boat relatively quickly. Once the rafting was over, we ate lunch on the river. I had the best river trout i´ve ever eaten in my entire life. We drank this weird looking red juice that was super good. It was possibly one of the best meals i´ve eaten so far.

Rafting on the river


That night, we decided to do this thing called "chivas." Its this party bus that takes you to the top of a mountain that overlooks the town. Baños became a holy site for Colonial spanish catholics when the Virgin Mary magically appeared in a waterfall. So they built this big cross on top of the mountain. Then some people modified the cross and now it glows, exuding rays of gods glory across the sky. Que lindo.
The Holy waterfall where the Virgin Mary appeared. The giant glowing cross is located on the top of the waterfall, on top of the mountain. The cross overlooks the entire town of Baños

So, in an interesting way, the local economy has benefited in numerous ways from this holy appearance of the Vigin Mary: Thousands of religious folk flock to Baños to pray under the cross while drunk American tourists party their brains out at the same time on the Chivas party bus. Hey, I got really drunk for 3 bucks. Not a bad deal.
The Chivas bus. It was the same bus that took us to the river for rafting and to the mountain for partying

Anywho, that was my weekend to Baños. Twas a lot of fun. Hope you had as much fun reading this as I did experiencing it. Tune in for more adventures!!

About my Program

I am studying abroad through my university, Pitzer College. I arrived here on August 24th and my program ends on December 20th. My program is called "Pitzer in Ecuador: Andean Studies" and is laid out as follows:
I have a home-stay with an Ecuadorian family, (which I will elaborate on in more detail later) and take three classes. My classes began in late august and run until the end of October. Every monday, wednesday, and friday from 9am to 12pm I study Kichwa, the indigenous language spoken by over 2 million people in the Andean Region. Due to the importance of this language to the Andean region, it fits in nicely with my "Andean Studies Program." My second class, which is every Wednesday from 4pm to 6pm, is called, well, "Andean Studies." This is a class that highlights the political, social, and economic characteristics of the region. We read case studies on race, or discuss current political events. It's a pretty cool class. My final class, is called "Qualititative Research methods" and is taught every monday from 4pm to 6pm. This class is designed to help us for our final class, which is a 25 page independent research project which is carried out during the last month of my program. In this class, we learn how to do research.
After my classes end, we go on our program study trips. From October 31 to November 7 we go to Maachu Pichu. From November 9 to the 19th we have a rural indigenous homestay in a village called Cotacachi. We live with bilingual families who speak Kichwa and Spanish. Its an opportunity to contextualize our language! From the 21st to the 24th we go the the Amazon jungle. Then, from November 25 to December 17, we conduct our independent research project.
MY HOST FAMILY
So, my host family. Well, my house is really nice. It`s three stories and has 5 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms. I have one whole level to myself and a private bathroom.
My bedroom

The view from my window


I have a host mom, host dad, host brother who lives with us, and another host brother who lives next door. My host mom is named Cecilia. She is, well, a rather strong woman. She expresses her opinions freely. She pretty much wears the pants in the relationship. At times it can be a little difficult to bear, and at that point, I pretend that I don´t understand what she´s saying. I mean, she tells me to do my homework and to call her anytime I go out to make sure i´m not dead. But she cares. Which is nice, since i´m the 39th host student she´s had. Yes. 39th. First one came in the spring of 1990, when I was a mere 2 years old.
My host dad is pretty laid back. He´s a gynecologist, as is my host brother (who doesn´t live with me) and my sister in law. yeah, I´ve got three in my family!! Which is good, in case I have any problems...haha. Him and I talk about American sports and watch the Dodgers together. He also knows a lot about the US cuz my whole family has been to more places in the US than I.
My host dad and I
My host brother who lives with me is named Gabriel. He´s really awesome. He´s 28. Unlike his older brother and his father, he decided to sell cell phones instead. Go figure.
My other host brother (the gyno who doesn´t live with me) is really nice as well. His hame is Nelson Xavier. His wife, Mercedes, is cool also. She´s a gyno also. They´re really cool except when we´re all eating dinner together and the topic turns to "How was your day at work?" Then the topic of conversation gets, well, a little, hairy...
My cunada, Mercedes
We also have a live in maid named Milagro. She´s 17 and lives with us. Well, she lives in a modified closet. She´s pretty cool but as of today is "sick." She says she has embrujada, which literally means being possessed by a witch. So she went back to her village to get treated by the local shaman. My mom is convinced she`s pregnant, yet interestingly, the three doctors in the family, don´t think so. And after all, they really should know...
My maid and I

So that´s my family!!!

And that's my program!!
I guess I should also include some other cool contact information, if ya'll are interested:
My mailing address is:
De las Hiedras
N44-43 y Rio Coca (7A)
Quito, Ecuador.
My Ecuadorian cell phone # is:
099735134

About my Blog

Well,
after realizing that I had been saying the same thing to about a thousand people about my adventures in Ecuador, I realized that creating a blog would make my life a lot easier. And give me something to do when I'm bored. Although it only took me about a month into my trip to create this thing, it's finally here. I don't know how often I'll update it, but hopefully a lot. Every time something interesting happens i'll enter it here.
If you'd like to e-mail me, my e-mail address is
jbrown@students.pitzer.edu
I check it everyday, so shoot me an e-mail!
I also have skype, which I go on frequently as well. My skype name is
jabrown100.
Thanks for checking out my blog!!