Gquil & Day of the Dead

Not as much to say this week in comparison to others.

My weekend in Guayaquil was pretty sweet. I stayed by Carla and Tom’s place. They live towards the southern end of the city. On Friday night we all went to Guayaquil’s malécon, which literally means breakwater, but it’s more like hanging out on the boardwalk. Later on we met up with Lisa from Montañita and BobbiLe from Puerto Viejo who had also decided to spend the weekend in Guayaquil. We all ended up at this cool little place called The Dog’s Blue Eyes, which was this kind of hipster jazz bar. A small band was playing and I learned that the lead person was a really popular musician; his name is Napoleon, but everyone calls him just Napo.

On Saturday we did a whole bunch of really touristy things in Guayaquil. Around 10:30 we picked up Lisa and BobbiLe and went to Parque de las Iguanas, which is this park downtown that’s absolutely teeming with iguanas. Big ones, baby ones, whatever you want. They’re all over the place. You have to be careful walking under trees or you’ll get crapped on. They must have been feed around the time we arrived, because most of the iguanas were snarfing down cabbage on the grass, all clustered together with big hunks of the leafy vegetables hanging out of their mouths. Over a ways some children were feeding nuts to an animal I’ve come to call the “super-squirrel.” The super-squirrel is a black, brown and gray squirrel—mostly black—with the most interesting tail I’ve ever seen. It seems to have taken on another dimension that other squirrels back home can’t achieve. The coolest thing about the super-squirrel, however, is how gently it took the nuts out of the children’s hands. It’s a nice super-squirrel.

After that we all loaded up the Tiara and headed to El Parque Histórico, which is a sort of nature preserve in the middle of the city. It was way cool. Besides all of the interesting Ecuadorian animals I got to see, the park runs through a mangrove, which is a type of landscape I’ve never seen before. Because so many rivers touch the Pacific in the same location that Guayaquil’s at, much of the city is near mangrove. There’s actually a ferryboat that will take you across the main river running past the city, El Río Guayas, and into some thicker mangrove. I really want to take that ferry next time I’m in Guayaquil.

I would describe mangrove as a raised root system above a muddy plain. Species of trees spread their roots out above ground instead of below it, which creates a complicated wooden puzzle at ground level. As you might be able to imagine, this provides a lot of protection and cover for smaller animals. The most common animal I saw in the mangroves was crabs. They dig little holes in the mud and hide in them. Their little holes are absolutely everywhere. None of the ones I saw—and I saw a lot of crabs—was bigger my thumb.

The highlight of the day was watching a smaller-sized snapping turtle hunt down these crabs. It was hilarious because crabs are so stupid! Imagine me on top of a bridge hanging over the water, screaming at the stupid crabs because they won’t run away from the comparatively gigantic snapping turtle that’s chasing them into their holes. Now imagine the snapping turtle in the shallow water gaining enough steam to make a go at the comparatively faster crabs. A wave of crabs sidles sideways away from the turtle, attempting to keep the distance between them and dark-tongued death. Three feet later the turtle stops, and all the crabs stop too. Stupid crabs! Keep running! The turtle is only resting long enough to chase after you again! It won’t quit coming after you if it’s still hungry! I couldn’t have been happier when the turtle finally got one. I must have been watching for ten minutes. It opened its mouth up wide and chomped down on one of the little crabs, two gigantic bites, before swallowing. The chase continued until the turtle and the wave of crabs had disappeared beneath the bridge I was standing on. I was slightly disappointed until I’d walked fifty yards down to the monkey island.

We were all pretty tired and hungry after El Parque Histórico, so we took a little drive and Tom dropped Lisa, BobbiLe and me off to get some grub. Lisa had left me a somewhat confusing text message sometime on Friday that said something along the lines of, “I’m in Gquil now, Mark. I’m having mac attacks so we have to get our eats on today.” What was this “mac attacks?” I’d never heard that before. It turns out Lisa was talking about gorging ourselves on Big Macs at McDonalds. Places like Montañita and Santa Elena just aren’t big enough to have a McDonalds so you’ve got to get your mac on in a city. Let’s just say I was less than enthused about eating a Big Mac. I haven’t had one since I was like twelve. But Lisa was pretty convincing between all the mac attack talk and just being so damn excited about it.

Even if I doubted it at first, going for a Big Mac was the best thing ever! Besides the raw deliciousness and having the opportunity to say “mac attack” about half a million times throughout the process of actually eating it, going into McDonalds in Ecuador is like teleporting back to the United States. There’s ketchup everywhere (including over the advertisements of th wall), the menu is more English than Spanish and they even play North American music over the restaurant speakers. All the Ecuadorians that come into McDonalds dress like North Americans too. I was home again! It only took a Big Mac to bring me back.

We spent the rest of the afternoon checking out the colonial part of Guayaquil. Much of the city’s original colonial structures have burned down since those times, so this part of the city isn’t exactly what it used to be as far as sheer size is concerned. But the great news is that the city has gone through a serious renovation effort to beautify what does remain. Framed pictures hang on colonial buildings, showing what each of the structures used to look like only a short time ago. Each of the pictures seems to scream, “Look what I’ve done with myself!” The entire colonial center is like one of those wonderfully optimistic Weight Watchers commercials. My favorite part is the beer factory turned trendy apartment complex. Check out the picture above.

My class’s first midterm was this Monday. I’m quite pleased with the results. Minus some problems with some of the grammar points we’ve touched on, my students did a fantastic job. The test asked them to write a paragraph on a specific topic, and I was especially impressed with how each of them was able to write. Prior to taking the test, this was the section my students were most concerned with, but this section turned out to be their shining achievement. The final is scheduled for November 14^th, so I’ve got to power through another four chapters with them before beginning the next module.

We’re taking a little break today in class. They wouldn’t be able to concentrate today anyways, given that it’s Halloween and they just got finished taking the test. Once I’m done here I’m going to bake a boxed cake for them. We’re going to eat cake and watch The Exorcism of Emily Rose in English—only a buck twenty-five from my local movie store. I know they’re going to beg me to turn on the subtitles, but I think I’m going to be a hardass about it. We’ll see. Maybe I’ll crack. They did so well!

More importantly, I’m going to dress up. Since I don’t exactly have all the clothes I have back home, or the wardrobe choice that Madison has presented in past years, I’ve decided to take the lazy—yet cost effective—route. I’m going to wear a bunch of goofy beach stuff, put on sunglasses and swimming goggles, throw my camera case over my shoulder and smear a little sunscreen on my face. There’s no better costume that I can pull off here than being a gringo. All I’m really doing is making it more obvious. My students are going to love it. I bet my director and all the secretaries are going to love it even more than they do.

As far as how I’m doing personally, now that I’m almost exactly two months into this experience, things are going fairly well. I feel confident teaching and even if I do attract a lot of attention, I’m getting used to it. I do miss home a lot, but the good news is that I have a medical school interview at UW-Madison scheduled for December 21^st, so I will be home for Christmas. They’re the only school to get back to me so far, but I’m hoping I’ll get some more takers before all is said and done. Christmas is definitely I’m looking forward to.

The only thing getting me down lately besides life’s usual little tricks is the weather. I can’t remember how much I’ve discussed this, but where I’m located on the coast it’s pretty much eternally cloudy this time of year. In all the time that I’ve been here, I can only remember one day of consistent sunshine and one day where it was off and on, peaking out from behind sheets of cloud. I joke that I have to travel to see the sun. It kind of sucks, though, knowing that I’m going to have to wait another month before the clouds recede. And, even once they’re gone, the sun is going to be relentless. I can’t say that I’m going to appreciate this new climatic extreme. Oh well. For the time being, I’m patiently awaiting the sun’s grand unveiling. The way everyone’s explained it to me is that, on whichever day Mother Nature deems best, the clouds part and that’s it. The sun is out to stay until the beginning of July. This is going to be a good day for Mark.

My host mother is currently in the United States with her sister. I mentioned a number of posts ago that Sarah’s sister, Paula, is pregnant. I don’t know how they’ve done it or which state they’re in, but the two of them are somewhere in the U.S. now, so the child will be born a citizen. According to Elsi, Paula has reached the fifteen-day mark. We’ll see how close she actually comes to the doctors’ prediction.

What’s more, I’m going to have a new neighbor! An English twenty-two-year-old is going to be living here as of tomorrow. I have no idea what program he’s with, but he’s going to be doing the exact same thing that I’m doing now; he’s even teaching at the same school. I just got a call from Tom telling me to hang around tomorrow morning because he’s pretty sure the new guy speaks close to zero Spanish. Guess who gets to be his translator. I hope I don’t mess anything up for this guy! I’m excited not to have to think in Spanish all the time.

This weekend I’m headed to Cuenca, a city in the mountains about five hours east of here. It’s supposed to be a beautiful city—something like four rivers run through it. I’ll actually be able to take off for Cuenca on Friday morning because it’s a national holiday, Day of the Dead. I’ve talked to my students about it and the people that choose to celebrate the holiday bring flowers and food to the graves of their relatives and family members. But, beside the three-day weekend, Day of the Dead isn’t the real reason I’m headed to Cuenca. The city is celebrating their Independence Day on November 3^rd, and I’ve heard it’s supposed to be a pretty culturally cool thing to check out. I’ll find out.