The Inside Scoop

 Píllaro

After having visited many different parts of Ecuador and seeing the diversity of its natural attractions, it is not surprising to me that tourism is a major Ecuadorian industry and that many students here study tourism in college. My Ecuadorian friend Lis studies tourism, and her class projects frequently take her to lesser known events/places in Ecuador to do reports and investigate how the tourism industry could be expanded to benefit the residents of relatively obscure areas.

Last weekend I went with Lis and a couple of her friends to a festival in a nearby city called Píllaro. That particular weekend was the celebration of an indigenous religious ceremony called Inti Raymi, which in the indigenous language Quichua means "Festival of the Sun." It was typical Ecuadorian celebration fare, which included a parade and music. The parade was largely unremarkable except for the children on the floats. The kids were all dressed up in suits and fancy dresses, and they were given bags of candy to throw into the crowd. The kids couldn't have been older than three years old, so it was hysterical to watch a kid try to throw a hard candy to someone screaming in the crowd, but given young children's underdeveloped throwing mechanics, only manage to spike it into the face of the nearest parade-watcher.

More interesting than the float was following Lis and her friends around the town before the parade started. They were interviewing people to find out more about the history of the celebration and how it has changed over the years. Everyone we talked to was very happy to discuss the history of their town with us, and they even served us lunch before we left.

Christina, Lis, Judi, and myself enjoying our chicken soup

During the parade, a bunch of people dress up as different characters that have to do with the tradition of the festival. One of those characters was called el mono (translation: the monkey). The first time I saw him I thought he was a child because he was so short, but it turned out to be an adult. He was wearing a white costume with a mask that only had slits for eyes and a sewed up slit where the mouth would be. It seriously looked like something from a horror movie that would give me nightmares for the next week. I think he was supposed to represent some kind of demon, so he was also speaking in a very bizarre, high-pitched voice the whole time. Attached to his waist was a rope that lead to a bottle of alcohol out of which he was pouring shots for everyone in the room.

It took so much of my courage and focus to stand next to the terrifying mono long enough to take a picture that I couldn't think of a funny pose to do with him.

We stayed in town for most of the day interviewing people and taking pictures. I think it is awesome how tourism students in Ecuador have so many opportunities to be involved in tourism at a local level and actually get real world experience in their field of study. Being a pre-med always felt superficial because we were never (in the U.S. anyway) allowed to do anything, only shadow and observe in hospitals. I obviously understand why it is like that for medicine, but studying and doing assignment must be a lot easier when you are actually involved in hands-on projects like the things tourism students organize.

Spell Check

In the United States, proper spelling is incredibly important for all kinds of writing, save for very informal correspondence between friends. I've heard people say that even one spelling mistake will get your resume thrown in the trash, and I know I'm not the only one who puts on his judge-hat when I see that someone has mixed up "there" and "their." Despite the fact that spelling in English is frequently un-phonetic and doesn't allow for consistent spelling rules, people still consider bad spelling a sign of an uneducated person.

In contrast to the United States, spelling couldn't be less important in Ecuador. People seem perfectly content to write down words as they sound, and I frequently see mistakes with letters that sound the same (s/z, ha/a, v/b) on official signs and in writing from well educated people.

One example was when an Ecuadorian friend was interviewing a guy about the traditions of Inti Raymi. He was telling her some of the Quichua names for things and she was having difficulty understanding what he was saying because the words were unfamiliar. Instead of asking him to spell it out for her, she just had him keep repeating it until she was satisfied that what he said matched up with what she had written down. In a similar situation in English, I feel like most people would just ask the other person to spell the word out.

When people don't understand what I am saying here in Ecuador, I sometimes try to spell it out. From these instances I have realized that Ecuadorians are terrible at writing down letters as they are dictated to them. Every time I buy something and they want to know my name, I say my name and they always ask for it again. When I try to spell it out letter by letter, they usually mess it up and put "c" instead of "k" or mix up some of the vowels. The other day I was spelling my name to the lady at the cash register of some store and when I got to the "i" she asked if I meant i or igriega (translation: y).

I couldn't figure out why someone would be so confused about writing down letters in her own language, but I think now that it has to do with how people understand language here. Maybe they don't read/write as much in Ecuador as we do in the U.S. and that's why they put so little emphasis on the written word, or maybe it is just a consequence of the fact that, for the most part, words in Spanish are phonetic, so even misspelled words are read correctly. In any case, I have definitely noted how much more I as an American value orthography than Ecuadorians.