Word Recycle

I entered a travel writing contest about a month ago and just recently found out that I was not selected as a finalist. Since I wrote an essay for my application and it has to do with my experiences in Ecuador, I figured I would post it here so people could read it.


A Different Breed of Freedom

Life in the United States is on-rails. The American dream is a roller coaster that promises happiness to anyone willing to work hard enough to pay the park entrance fee (or jump the turnstile when no one is looking). Once inside, you learn the rules and understand that you have to wait in line just like everyone else in the park. When it is finally your turn, you file into the cart and strap yourself in. Remember, arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times. The rides are sometimes scary, but somewhere in the back of your head is the knowledge that you are on a track, and nothing can go wrong.

Ecuador has no rails. Life in this country is like playing on a trampoline in someone’s backyard. The amusement is cheap and accessible to just about anyone walking by, but there is no guarantee that it won’t collapse. There are no lines or any system that polices who gets to enjoy it—whoever can jump on and not get shoved off does whatever he wants. No maneuver is prohibited, no matter how ill conceived: back flips, mid-air chicken fights, flying dives into a nearby kiddy pool, or what have you. The taste of complete freedom is sweet, but along with it comes ample opportunity for dangerous mishaps (see: any episode of America’s Funniest Home Videos).

My point is that, as an American, I pride myself on all the sophisticated freedoms I am granted in my homeland. Lofty ideals like freedom of speech and the right to a fair trial come at a price, however, and there are some more basic freedoms that must be revoked in order to preserve our first-world way of life. This is usually done with the ends of fair treatment and safety in mind, but it has taken living abroad for me to realize that we do not enjoy every flavor of freedom available to mankind in the States. Nowhere has this been demonstrated to me more clearly than in third-world traffic.

I am from New York City, a place where the public transportation system tirelessly pumps the human life force of the city to every extremity of its five boroughs. There are precisely timed schedules, time-saving Metro Card swipes, and safety regulations abound. If a train doesn’t come on time or someone gets hurt due to reckless driving, the city is sure to have a mob of outraged citizens on its hands. Public transportation in New York is sometimes described as “crazy”; I think a better word is “busy”. No matter how packed the train gets, you can be certain that someone is carefully monitoring safety. Even though you might get pushed around a bit at rush hour, there is always an overarching order to things that the people respect.

Public transportation is Ecuador? Now that I would describe as crazy.

Let’s talk for a bit about the bus system, which is the form of transportation I utilize most frequently in my South American foster home. A new dimension of freedom is apparent even before the bus is boarded because in Ecuador, bus stops do little to control where buses stop. At any point on the route, prospective passengers can wave the bus down and board. Bus stops be damned; I’m free to get on the bus wherever I want in Ecuador!

Another consequence of not having bus stops is (you guessed it) the buses don’t stop. If you’re an old lady or you are carrying a baby you may get the luxury of a full stop and three seconds to get your feet off the ground. If you are anything else, you had better be ready to get a running start and grab on for dear life because that driver isn’t waiting for you to get behind the white line.

The same goes for getting off. Once the driver acknowledges that you want to exit the vehicle be prepared to hit the ground running because he wouldn’t want to (gasp!) make the bus come to a complete stop just for you to get off.

Jumping onto and off of a moving bus is the kind of freedom I yearned for as a kid. This was the kind of thing I saw people do in movies and television, but in the States the ride never starts moving until the safety bar has been securely locked in place. It appears to be such a simple action, but there are too many restrictions in the U.S. to even think about a driver not coming to a complete stop for a passenger.

Passengers are not the only people to take advantage of the freedoms allowed on buses. Vendors jump on buses at red lights and walk up and down the aisle to shamelessly hawk merchandise: candy, fruits, CDs, and pretty much anything else they can carry on board with them. On longer bus rides from city to city, bus vendors up their game.

I was once on a bus ride to the capital city and a man walked on with a large tin filled with fried chicken and French fries. People were buying hot meals on a bus ride from some guy who just jumped on from the side of the road. Did he have a permit to prepare food and sell it on a bus? I can say with confidence that he did not, but true freedom doesn’t require permits or licenses—if it is physically possible (and anything short of murder), no one is going to stop you from doing it in Ecuador.

When buses aren’t an option, taxis are the next best way to get around town. It’s easy, just wave one down, hop in the back seat, and fasten your seat… wait, where’s the seatbelt? Oh, that’s right, taxis never have seatbelts because no one cares. The law might technically oblige everyone to wear a safety belt, but in the incredibly rare instance that a car is pulled over, it’s nothing that can’t be solved by throwing a few bucks at the ambitious policeman.

But the freedom doesn’t stop at what happens inside the vehicle. Stop signs and red lights are best described as suggestions in Ecuador, and drivers ultimately pass through them as they see fit. That is not to say that Ecuadorian drivers are all blowing through red lights and stop signs, railing pedestrians and crashing into other cars at every intersection. They take precautions to prevent such disasters.

I can recall one salient example of a taxi I was in whose driver used an ingenious technique to prevent collisions. As he ignored a stop sign or red light, he would hit the panic button on his keychain so his car would emit a loud siren. This would (presumably) alarm possible side-coming traffic of his intent to ignore traffic conventions. I didn’t see him get into an accident while I was in the cab, so I can’t really say it was a bad method. What I do know is that it was a bold demonstration of the kind of freedom in this country that is unfathomable in my own.

I have learned from my experiences with third-world traffic that freedoms of every variety do not coexist in the United States. It is nice to know that life in the States is safe because everyone is on rails, but sometimes it is fun to jump off track and see what you can do when no one is around to stop you. Now if you’ll excuse me, I just had a great idea involving a trampoline and I need to find a hose to fill up this kiddy pool.