New Years, Ecuador Style

Searching Google News for information about Yasuní-ITT, the proposal by the Ecuadorian government to protect one of the most biodiverse places in the world by asking developed countries to pay the country to keep the oil in the ground.

Instead, I found this article, in the Boise International Travel Examiner about spending New Year's Eve in Ecuador. I the article has a great glossary of the things you are likely to see.

Below are some pictures of my New Year's Eve. I spent it in Conocoto with my friend Grace and her cousins (Grace is camera shy, so only her cousins made it into the photos.)

Me and Sam dancing with Michael Jackson.

Viejos- literally "the old ones"- are constructed at the end of the year. They are often important figures that reperesent the past year. This year, Michael Jackson, who's music can be heard almost everyday, was a common viejo.

Cousins Monica, Caro, Sam & Pakita and me in front of a viejo.

This viejo is dressed in the jersey of Liga Deportive Universidad de Quito, commonly know as Liga, one of the most popular teams in Quito. Liga just wrapped up a successful campaigns in the Recopa Sudamerica and Copa Sudamerica, two of the three premier tournaments on the continent.

Post midnight, the viejos look like this.

To bring in the new year, the viejos are burned, allowing for a new year of new figures to arise.

Stuck Inside of Miami, with the Quito Blues Again

About a month ago, my family came to visit me for Christmas. We ended up having a wonderful time- going to hot springs, Christmas Eve service (in English!), and making a bbq chicken dinner (we're not fancy) on the 25th. But getting to that point too a lot of patience. You see, the padres thought they had a fool-proof plan: arrive from Detroit late on December 19, stay for 8 days, and leave early December 28. The only problem with this plan was that Ecuador wants passports to be good for 6 months past their return date, with theirs expiring in January. Call it the "if you gonna go to Ecuador, you need a passport valid for six months" rule.

The padres didn't know this, of course, until they were sitting in the Miami airport, waiting to board their flight to Quito Saturday afternoon. As the plane was boarding, they got the sad news that they would not be going to Ecuador that day; they needed new passports first. Fortunately, they were in Miami, one of 18 passport offices in the US (sorry to break it to you Mom, there is now one in Detroit). After a marathon session that included a hour and a half in the parking garage, they got their new passports Monday, and were able to secure a flight to Quito on Tuesday. Thus, their eight day trip was cut to five, which meant we had to cut some trips and cram the rest of everything into the remain days. All in all, it was a pretty good Christmas, as we were able to spend it together, checking out the library and cooking dinner together.

Inspirational songs for this post
"Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again" by Bob Dylan
"If You're Gonna Play in Texas" by Alabama.

Holiday transportation

As in New Years Day tradition, I took in the Rose Bowl Game. As we do not have a television, let alone cable, I trekked into Quito to watch Ohio State take on Oregon in Big Ten-Pac-10 battle that I've watched since I was 7 with my dad, so while I've seen little football this year, and I don't particularly like Ohio State, not watching wasn't much of an option.

I should mention that bus service on a holiday is not what is normally is- fewer buses running fewer routes, which can make for some interesting traveling. From the time I left my house, it took over an hour to get into the bus terminal, causing me to miss much of the first quarter. It was fortunate that traffic was light once I switched buses and got to the bar, so that minimized the that amount of game-time slipping away. I did, however, spot a great (?) bit of America on the Ecovia- a Jeff Gordon hat.

Once the game finished, I paid my tab and quickly made it back to the Ecovia, catching of of the last two of the night (at 8:20, how late of me!). We pulled into the bus terminal and exited through the emergency door, rather than the usual exits (all the other buses were parked in way of the platforms) and I caught the final bus from the terminal back to the valley. This would have been great if the bus then left; however, we waited 15 minutes for others to find their way to the bus before we left.

Moral of the story: if it's a holiday or the day after (I had similar problems last week on Dec. 26), don't rely on buses to go where you want them or to get you there quickly, it's just not in the cards.