The Old and the New

If you were a street cleaner like this woman you would earn $320 per month. The average person takes home $700 - 800.









Food and lodging are affordable, even inexpensive. But most products such as televisions (and there are lots for sale) are very expensive.

Visiting a country in transition is both fun and challenging. You have the eyes of a child where for the new and different.You have a sense of wonder. But it's hard to get a fix on things. When we first arrived in Cuenca I thought the whole city was ancient like the historic centre.

But then we took a taxi to a theatre showing a Vive el Cine festival movie. What a surprise to tumble out of the taxi and into a shining indoor mall nicer than the Eaton Centre.









So the old and new exist together comfortably.






























Ecudorian history has been convoluted and often violent. It explains why art over the last 30 or 40 years depicts darkness and the quest for change. You often see the word 'revolution' woven in somewhere.








Here's what has been going on over the last 1000 odd years. Around 1000 CE, tribes in the north formed a kingdom which was absorbed into Inca Empire and then conquered in 1532. The Spaniards thrived by exploiting the Indians who mostly died from European diseases anyway. The Spaniards carted away all the Incan temple gold and generally made life misable for the indiginous who survived.

But people can be supressed for only so long. The first revolt against Spain happened in the early 1800s. Then Ecuador joined Venezuela, Colombia, and Panama in a confederacy known as Greater Colombia after the collapse of which Ecuador became independent.

Ecuador had 48 presidents during the first 131 years of the republic. Conservatives ruled until the late 1800s then during the next 50 years Radical Liberals implemented freedom of worship, speech, and the press.

The country was under military rule in the 1970s but the last 30 years of democracy hasn't amounted to much for the country because of a weak executive branch and a strong, fractious Congress. Sound a little like our country to the south? In May 1999, Ecuador and Peru signed a treaty ending the nearly 60-year border dispute.









But then El Nino struck in 1998 causing $ 3 000 0000 in damage. The price of oil, Ecuador's main export, plunged, its 1999 the 43% inflation was the highest in Latin America and the government was nearly bankrupt, the currency lost 40% of its value against the dollar, and the poverty rate soared to 70%.

There were massive strikes in March 1999. Men left in droves to work in Spain and other European countries. They are returning now. In fact there is a Welcome Home ministry of some sort.









The current president who is in for another four years has been trying to boost economic growth and root out corruption in the country's political system. Voters approved of referendums to rewrite the constitution. The right wing say the reforms are a power grab. Same old as they say.












Monica, a 40s something business woman, cheekily named the hotel she owns, the one where we are staying, "Santa Monica," St. Monica. She says that women can do anything, although she admits puncturing the glass ceiling is harder here than in Canada.

Cuenca is a mecca for immigrants, mostly from the U.S. We've met quite a few and among them Stuart White, the owner of an alpaca farm, textile gallery and rental apartments has been the most fascinating.














Thirty years ago, he took a sabbatical from his post as a geography prof at the University of New Mexico to conduct research in Peru. He returned some months later to fulfil his contract, moved here and bought a hacienda six hours north of here.

Then he brought alpacas in from Peru, married an Ecuadorian, created a family an alpaca wool business and now has over 700 alpaca. The family owns a textile gallery where at present Rommie Gerber-Reddington from Austria via Australia displays her lovely felt work.




















Stuart is just completing another rental apartment -- all exquisite granite and wood.








Stuart's appartments.








Many indiginous woman sell their wares on the street.






Transit police use Segways.






Elegant cars --







and restaurants






mix with people who have to work hard to make ends meet.



















There are no strollers here.














Ecuador is 95% Catholic.

Tomorrow we are going to hike and explore Parque Nacional El Caja, about 35 kilometers west of here by bus. It's 2000 feet higher than here. Yikes.

I lost my cell phone a couple of days ago. So I can't use BBM to keep in touch with Susan and family who are still in Burma. Rats.







Our grandsons in Burma.

Brian's wife and our grand daughter, Saphira, moved to Brazil last August. Brian is joining them in Sao Paulo in early December.






Saphira in an art gallery in Sao Paulo.













Our family is all so spread out. I hope I can hang onto my head, my camera and iPad so I can stay in touch with you!

Hasta pronto.

Cuenca

The couple with whom we booked our homestay two months ago were at the terminal, our names in hand. They seemed pleasant enough. With fingers crossed, we imagined a comfortable room with two beds or a queen, a desk and night tables with lamps for our two weeks here.

But miseries of miseries, you couldn't have swung a cat in the room we stepped into: a double bed, a small closet mostly full of their stuff and one night table with a shadeless lamp. We knocked heads when we turned around. And to boot the house was a one hour round trip on foot to the school. Bob lost sleep that night wondering how we'd escape the arrangement graciously.

The next morning we broached the subject directly, got a lift to the school and for the same amount of money we're now in a large spiffy hotel room with ensuite in the centre of the historic district, five minutes from the school. All it took was some convincing and help from the school.




I love international aircraft.


There are mountains off in the distance.


All the buildings in the historic town have non descript exteriors with old doors edging to the sidewalk. Amauta is our school. I have four hours of classes with a very pregnant instructor. Bob has two hours with a non pregnant one. At the end of our class today, I said to mine in Spanish, "Please keep the little one in there for at least another two weeks." She's due in three and is a good instructor.





Looking up from the central courtyard.




Corner of central courtyard.




Beautiful stone work.



Store windows in old town have a 50s feel.







The view from our hotel room.


There's a one week indie film festival on now. We've seen two. Both were excellent. People are friendly and the population young. We've only seen three smokers since arriving in the country.

No one, especially the kids seem overweight. But they consume a lot of junk food and diabetes is a problem. The government is mandating the nutritional labelling we have in North America, especially the fat, sugar and sodium content. Last year, there was a 35% tax hike on liquor to discourage underage drinking. Good things are happening here. See you soon.

Street Scenes in Quito

Quito is built on the side of several non active volcanos and so you earn your exercise stripes here. Today is the first day I've felt myself mostly because of altitude issues but also because of all the ascending and descending we've done both here and in Mindo.




Making sorbet on the street.


Even last night when we thought we were in for a rest, we discovered part way on foot to a restaurant that it was 800 feet of stairs above our B and B. No rest for the wicked. We've felt safe here and this is because corruption is down somewhat and police salaries have increased.

Many houses in Mindo have outdoor rooms and no window glass on the first floor. So if you wanted to enter a home with a closed door, you could just jump through the window frame.

On Sundays one of the major streets is closed to traffic so cyclists can enjoy what they love to do. Maybe one day in Toronto???





The black and gold statues are people and however they can coat themselves with all that paint is beyond me. You'll also see some art for sale on the street.





























This afternoon we fly to Cuenca.

Hasta pronto


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Time and Curiosity

When the bus dropped us off here the first day I felt as though we'd landed in the middle of nowhere -- all out of kilter. We shouldered our backpacks and bumped our luggage along streets of half completed houses and as this eco lodge finally came into view with its third floor missing, I wondered how in the world I'd last here three nights.









But time has a way of altering perspectives and at some point during the next day I'd convinced myself that we had everything we needed here: a roof that didn't leak, clean sheets with no bedbugs, a fulsome breakfast, potable water and an on site ornithologist who is mentioned in The Rough Guide to Ecuador and the Galapagos.














Irman, the birder said we must meet him no later than 6 am the following morning in the dining area for our three hour, 7 kilometre trek up into the cloud forest. Otherwise we'd miss the Toucans and many other exotic birds.















It's no wonder people flock here for birds, waterfalls, butterflies and zip lines because Mindo, one of Ecuador's top five tourist destinations, is the go to place for all of these. You come here to soak into raw nature and I suppose as a sidebar to learn how people can live simple, healthy lives without a Starbucks on every corner.








As we are discovering, though, Mindo is undergoing a huge transformation and within a year or two, the main street will gentrify for the tourist industry. Little run me down vegetable shops sit next door to potentially spiffy buildings.








I say "potentially" because people here dream big, plan little, and often run out of money. Maybe their work ethic will develop as Mindo does.

I realized four things during the birding tour: the birds are so near and yet so far, you need sharp eyes, keen ears and tons of experience to have a hope in finding them, the experience is richer on foot than in a van and finally my camera lens is woefully inadequate for capturing the image of a bird 100 feet in the sky. Irman carried a powerful telescope with Leica lens and a tripod. And we saw in the flesh many of the exotic birds National Geographic photographers capture.


Yesterday we crossed the valley in a cable car to find a few of Mindo's famous waterfalls.


























The climb there is not for the faint of heart -- up and down a narrow, slippery trail. But nature at its most beautiful doesn't often land on our doorsteps does it? Along the way we met a woman from San Francisco who is completing her master's thesis on sustainable tourism and another woman, a chemical engineer working in polymers who is here building irrigation systems for Engineers without Borders.







Then wonder of wonders Bob and I signed up for zip lining over the forest canopy. What an experience that was! Three lines with a lot of climbing in between. The last line is the rapid one and for that one you place your gloved hand on the cable behind your head. To brake you pull down on the cable.

But you mustn't brake as you approach the platform at the finish or you'll get stuck in mid air. I braked out of terror, got stuck swinging in mid air and had to be clamped to a guide to be tugged in. Gads. But, I've come a long way from the days when I crawled on my hands and knees over bridges and shrieked in small engine aircraft.

Ecuador is developing fast. Americans are retiring here in droves because the country is beautiful and health care is free -- free for everyone, even tourists. A coffee shop owner, originally from Germany said that you could live bare minimum here easily for $500 a month.










Here is a new five bedroom house listed at US $68 000. You could buy it for $50 000 cash. So if you have some wanderlust and a bit of cash your pocket, this would be a fantastic place to settle, at least for now because word is getting around!


Cheek by Jowl



























The Beauty
































We need more time here and may return. Our bus leaves for Quito this afternoon. We'll miss Mindo's lushness and easy rhythm.

Mindo

Our B&B owner warned us before we climbed on the bus for Mindo, "Watch your things and don't fall asleep." So I wrapped my purse strap around my leg and settled in for our 2 1/2 hour 5 000 foot descent to Mindo, looking forward to feeling normal again. I'd felt as though I'd been on a two day bender with altitude problems.





I looked around the bus. In front of us there was a breastfeeding mother, toward the back of the bus two young women from an Eastern country and in the middle two other couples. Where are all the thugs I thought, disentangling my leg from the purse strap.




Banana loved by Hummingbirds


Mindo is famous for its exotic birds and butterflies. It's a very small town built around tourism with some buildings finished and many under perpetual construction. In Ecuador, interest rates for loans, including mortgages are 18%. So people pay cash for what they can. I guess that's why so many houses are unfinished.




We're on the second floor



Bob organized all aspects of this adventure and I trusted his better judgement. But when we arrived where we are staying now, I said, "You've got to be kidding." But then I thought, Nothing ventured nothing gained. "We're on the third floor?" I asked.




Ginger added to some chocolate



This afternoon we toured a chocolate making factory and saw the whole process from fermentation through to the final product. Fascinating. We leave at six tomorrow morning with a bird watching guide for a three hour hike under the forest canopy. I hope to post some colourful photos for you.






This is a Stevia plant. The factory is experimenting with it as a sweetener for chocolate.