Homebound

After lots of planning I have finalized my trip back to the United States for medical school interviews. One week from today I will be flying to Georgia for an interview where I will stay the night with a friend of mine (shout out to Michael T.) who goes to Emory. The next day I will be flying out to stay with my cousin (shout out to Rosie) who conveniently attends Wake Forest while I interview there. On the third day I will be flying back to New York for an interview and I will stay at home (shout out to Swamy and Marianne Surasi) for the remainder of the week. I have already started putting together a list of things I miss living in Ecuador that I will do when I am back in the States. The list includes, but is not limited to:

• Eating cereal and bagels
• Drinking apple juice (clear, clarified apple juice— not the opaque, syrupy garbage they drink here) 
• Watching late night American television
• Droid
• Driving a car
• Using a dryer
• Having solid bowel movements

Reflections on Ambato

The first month when we lived in Quito I was concerned about leaving to go live in Ambato. Quito is a huge city and they have pretty much anything you could want to buy or do if you are willing to search around for a bit. After living in Ambato for a month now, I have decided that I like living here.

One of the big differences living in Ambato is that it is not a tourist attraction. There is not really anything special to see or do here, so almost everyone in the city lives here. It is nice to not encounter any gringos around and it is fun when all the Ecuadorians are not jaded about meeting foreigners. That's not to say that there are never foreigners in Ambato, but there are few enough that it is still a treat to some Ecuadorians to be meeting an American.

For example, yesterday I went to the centro in Ambato to buy a suit for my interviews (yup, definitely forgot to pack that). Before I went I looked up all the relevant Spanish phrases I would need to know for buying a suit ("Nothing touches this body but pure silk.") so the conversation with the saleswoman started off pretty well. As we went on she threw me a couple of wild card questions like asking me about how I want the pants hemmed and I stumbled.

In Quito, a salesperson would at that point immediately begin speaking in English (if they hadn't already assumed you spoke English from the start) and not think twice that you are not Ecuadorian, but this woman didn't make the connection right away. After all, why would an American be buying a suit in the centro of Ambato, let alone be in Ambato in the first place? She asked me confoundedly, "You're not from here?" and I made her guess where I was from. She guessed Australia. I'm not sure why she guessed that, but I'll take it as a compliment since I've never met an Australian person I didn't want to be best friends with.

And I know what you are all wondering so I'll just put your mind to rest now. Yes, I look awesome in a suit.

Quito Revisited

On Saturday night I took a bus to Quito to meet up with some of the other volunteers and hang out together like we did the first month when we were all there. The bus ride is about two and a half hours long, so we spent the night in a hostel so we could stay out late and hang out the next morning as well.

I joined some of my friends since they already had a hostel room and paid for my bed. Sure enough, in typical Ecuador fashion, someone wasn't paying attention and put me in a room that was already full. Late that night, after waking up the strangers sleeping in our room and discussing the situation with them, two of my friends decided they would share a bed and the situation turned out fine. The next morning when they checked out they just explained to the guy that they were only paying for one person since they shared a bed and he didn't contest. I was pretty upset about it the night before when we realized we didn't have enough beds and we all paid for one, but in retrospect I guess that's what I should have expected from a hostel called The Magic Bean that charges ten dollars a night.

I have already talked about how crazy the regular public transportation buses are, but the buses that go long distances from city to city are also absurd in their own respect. When the buses make stops in small towns along the way to pick up passengers, food vendors usually jump on the bus and try to sell stuff. Today on the bus back from Quito, it started off pretty reasonably.

Some guy came on the bus and was trying to sell bottles of water to people. Next a girl came on and was selling fruits. That would be unusual in America, but it was not surprising for me in Ecuador. Next a woman came on and was selling hot tortillas of something in small plastic containers. That was the first thing that kind of impressed me because hot food is a step up from what I would normally expect to see hawked on a bus. Still, the food was well contained and easily carried by the seller.

The next person that came on the bus really got my attention. He was holding a big aluminum tin filled with fried chicken and french fries. He walked up and down the aisles and people were actually buying meals from him. I thought it was done after this, but the last guy that came on the bus had a hand full of chicken kebabs. On paper, he wasn't really that much more ridiculous than the fried chicken guy, but the image of the kebab vendor holding chicken on sticks at the front of the bus made my day. Keep in mind that all these people walked on and off the bus at the same stop. I would have killed to have had a video camera to record the parade of people selling food at that stop.

Back to the Grind

It was a fun weekend, but now I've got some quizzes to grade and some lessons to plan for this coming week. At least I have the motivation that after the next four days I will be back in the States for a mini-vacation in the Land of the Free. I won't be in Georgia or North Carolina for very long, but if you are in NYC any time from Oct. 20th to Oct. 23th let me know, otherwise you probably won't see me for another ten months.