Slice of life

Today, I happened to be walking to Spanish class during an extremely important soccer game.  The Ecuadorian national team was playing a qualifying match for the World Cup against one of their arch-rivals, Colombia. On top of this, for what I believe for the first time ever, Ecuador is in first place in the pre-World Cup competition.

I have never seen the city so dead. I got home from school in record time because the roads were empty, because every good citizen-soccer fan had found a spot indoors to watch or listen to the game.  The manic stream of narration of the announcers over the radio followed me through the city in a percussive, rhythmic accompaniment - filling up the school bus, and emanating from every storefront and security guard's booth.

Time stood still. The usual snaking lines of rush hour traffic had disappeared, and the busiest, most life-threatening intersections had transformed into empty, quiet lanes more suited for a stroll in the country.  The usual masses of pedestrians and shoppers and coming-home-from-workers and vendors and hawkers and beggars that I usually dart and weave around on the sidewalks were also nowhere to be found.  The streets were deserted. The city seemed empty. It looked the way New York looks the morning after a big snow storm - only the few and the bold venture out, along with those who have absolutely, positively no way of getting out of going to work.   And when I arrived at Spanish class, naturally, all 3 evening teachers were clustered around the laptop, breathlessly rooting for the team. I hovered with them for a while, becoming temporarily a part of Ecuador's collective soul, a witness and a participant in the 90-minute freezing of time and city life.

(Just don't ask about the results of the game.)

Easter Eggs

I know by now that there are no right or wrong choices in life; only series of possible pathways, each with their own upshots and outcomes, pros and cons. No black and white, only infinite shades of infinite colors.

I also know by now that it's not healthy to compare your life to other people's Facebook versions of themselves. Through the carefully-manicured filter of social media, it's easy to begin to believe that other people spend 100% of their time opening yoga studios, becoming published authors, training for half-marathons, garnishing elaborate dishes they made from scratch for their loved ones, getting glammed up in order to attend fancy parties, becoming betrothed, getting hitched, and reproducing.

But let's be honest. If you were to look at my Facebook feed recently, sure, you would see me climbing Machu Picchu and befriending alpacas in Peru. And I did do these things! Yay for me! Truly, it was super cool, and I'm happy to let the world think that I live in my hiking boots and totally go hiking, like, all the time and that my life here is nothing but adventures and alpacas and breathtaking vistas...

But what you won't see on Facebook is me eating leftover pizza for breakfast, lunch, and dinner today because it was easier than going grocery shopping. You also wouldn't see me playing a game on my phone for 2 and half hours (it's called Twenty, by the way,  if you need a new time-sucking digital distraction, and I would estimate that it is approximately as addictive as heroin). My Facebook feed won't tell you that I spent an entire day watching old episodes of X-files on Netflix... Okay, fine, an entire weekend...and I also didn't post about having to spend a morning re-entering grades in my Excel spreadsheet after incorrectly saving them.  And you wouldn't find out about me accidentally dying a quarter of my wardrobe light pink through imprudent laundry-related executive decision making.

That's because Facebook, when it's not about bitching or moaning or ranting or raving, is largely about celebrating accomplishments and milestones, and that's fine. It's the highlight reel. And it's a perfectly good way to catch up on important events in the lives of your friends and acquaintances. But it can be a little disconcerting to see everyone else's good news and Hallmark moments all concentrated in one place, peering in from the shadows of your own quotidian life. The contrast tends to be especially stark because, more often than not, you're peering in from your lumpy, crumb-covered couch while wearing pajamas in the afternoon, or from your bumper-to-bumper rainy bus ride home. For these reasons, it is important to remember that social media is more advertisement than documentary.

That said, Easter Sunday on Facebook was a tidal wave of family portraits and precious memories and traditions and tenderness and adorable children all tied up in ribbons and bows and miniature neckties.  Some of my peers are already starting their second round of baby-having, and babies are something I'd actually quite like to have myself, assuming I one day find a partner I think highly enough of to want to create additional human beings in their image. And of course, it was also a reminder that I'm just a smidgen under 3,000 miles away from my family and our usual Easter traditions. Easter eggs have been on my mind.

As you might know, in movies and TV shows, "easter eggs" are inside jokes or little shout-outs or homages to other works in the oeuvre that the creators throw in maybe for their own amusement, maybe for the benefit of devoted fans. Just something to make them smile, if they catch it. They're usually gone in an instant.

I think it is the responsibility of each one of us to find the easter eggs hidden in our own lives - the little surprises and hidden moments that maybe no one else can appreciate except for you, because you're the only one who knows where to look. These are not summits or climaxes of the sort you'd post to Facebook.  They wouldn't even breach the consciousness of others not in the know. They're just the little incidental perks of the path you have chosen. So, in the spirit of Easter, here is a list of the easter eggs from my life recently:

* the opportunity to spend more time together one-on-one with my beloved Auntie than we ever have before
* an Easter Sunday that was perfect for the context (the context being that our flight coming back to Quito from Peru got us back to my apartment at 4 in the morning.) Aunt Jane and I slept late, symbolically ate a hard-boiled egg each, talked to my mom on the phone, and went out for pizza
* learning how to make fast guacamole, and access to avocados whenever I want
* learning how to cut mangos, and access to mangos whenever I want
* getting compliments from native Spanish speakers about my Spanish
* owning a soccer jersey and going nuts along with the real soccer fans when the announcer goes GOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLL
* having a washer and dryer in my apartment (doesn't get old)
* teaching and really getting to know 14 lovable, well-cared-for, amusing lil' knuckleheads
* the absence of winter and associated unwelcome meteorological events

In conclusion, I guess what I'm saying is this:   Each of us can only travel one pathway at a time.  It's pretty easy to unwittingly become jealous of other people's paths - maybe the ones you've always wanted to take, or that you kind of always thought you'd be on by now, or an unfettered dream unlikely to ever come true for you, but it already has for someone else... but that jealousy is kind of pointless.

You only get one life, but it is singular. I might have been one of about a zillion tourists visiting Machu Picchu, but I was there with MY friends, MY eyes, MY thoughts and feelings, MY sweaty underclothes. Maybe every tourist came home with dozens of pictures of Inca rocks, but I have pictures of the ones that I saw, that I liked. Your history is your own, so own it. Make yourself proud. Follow the path that presents itself to you. But don't regret things that never were, and don't wish yourself into other people's lives, because you'll end up missing out on the easter eggs all around you.

Guest blog by Aunt Jane!

Quito, not quite

You know how it is when you visit a new place and you say to yourself, this place is rather like this one or that one?  I’m not so widely traveled that I have a hundred examples, but I’m pretty sure Quito is unique! My first morning here, I looked out Mara’s living room window onto a whole new world. Either beautiful or threatening depending on the weather, the dormant volcano, Pinchincha, looms large in the background with, before it, shiny modern high rises, freeways and MacDonald’s billboards, along with boxy, cement-gray, utilitarian apartment houses, laundry hanging on lines, tiny patios filled with exotic plants, vacant lots, and a bazillion yellow taxicabs. Cars are small, homes are small, streets are narrow. Quito houses more than two million people (and about half that many stray dogs) in a basin among mountain peaks that could comfortably manage maybe half that many.  It’s an intriguing, vibrant mix of fancy and plain, ancient and modern, rural and urban, indigenous persons, life long residents and ex-pats.

The amazing natural environment surrounding Quito notwithstanding, the city itself is not pretty, but has large areas preserved for public parks, designed with fitness, fun, and family activities in mind. The parks are well used, filled with families and groups, walking, picnicking, playing sports or participating in yoga or zumba classes. A striking feature of Quito is its family life, especially clearly demonstrated on weekends in the parks.

Quito is the oldest, highest continuously inhabited capitol city in the world. Old Town is a warren of Spanish Colonial buildings, most of them beautifully restored and maintained. Traffic is tight and scary in Old Town with many traffic police (traffic is all they’re good for, I’m told) trying to keep things moving. Walking is the way to go here, and walking is when the richness comes out. The Spanish Colonial buildings are homes, offices, and government buildings, including the governor’s palace, with ornate details and wonderful windows and doors. Walking among them, you encounter all kinds of street vendors, from young men hocking selfie sticks and burner cell phones to women of all ages in western dress or traditional indigenous attire, everywhere, selling fruit, vegetables, handicrafts, cooked meat on sticks (oh, no, no, no), bottles of water and scarves, everywhere scarves. I even saw a woman walking among the cars, offering toilet paper for sale.

Churches are everywhere, especially on the Street of the Seven Crosses, and each one has a plaza, either ‘grande’ or ‘pequeno’, some of which cover cemeteries from Colonial times, not of the Spanish, of course, but of the Indian people. The Spanish were buried inside the churches, as close to the main altar as they could afford to get. Every church seems to have its legend, and most of the interiors are incredibly ornate, gold-leafed, arched, high-ceilinged affairs. My local guide for one day, the lovely, fun and knowledgeable Lourdes, said, “That’s what they used to believe the Lord needed. We know better now.”

As you walk along in Old Town, you pass tiny stores without names or windows, jammed into what I can only characterize as storage units with garage doors. A few had more room and beautiful old wooden doors, but most were a tenth the size of the smallest New York bodega. My guide and I visited one specialty cheese store with a line out the door (there’s only room for one or two customers inside). I don’t know how she finds it among all the other nameless, identical stores around it.  Lourdes showed me other stores with just one purpose – to provide Baby Jesus dolls and cribs, glass display cases and costumes for the dolls. They are taken to church at Christmas time and otherwise proudly displayed at home. The costumes range from christening-like gowns to chefs’ hats, cowboy outfits and you name it. I kid you not.

Another specialty shop was all about spices, in their unprocessed form. (Stevia leaves taste sweet - I know, duh, but it’s the weirdest anyway.) Great big bags of spices unknown to me weighed out into little plastic bags and sold for an unbelievably low price.

Before I came here, an acquaintance had given me a veiled warning about the food – “no me gusta,” she said, but I have encountered only deliciousness, thanks to Mara, her friends, and Lourdes. Empanadas, llapingachos (isn’t that a great word?) and, oh my goodness, locro de papa (potato soup), plus a new favorite ice cream flavor, fig! Lots of options in the meat, beans, potato, and rice departments, so don’t even think about low carb eating here. You’ll walk it off anyway. Mara took me to the farmers market, the mother lode of amazing fruits and vegetables. Indescribable, but fabulous. Ecuadorian food, not a problem for me. Me gusta!

            Getting around here involves a lot of walking and a lot of taxi rides. There is a street car system and buses, but of limited scope and not especially useful, depending on where you are and where you want to go, of course. Driving would be truly frightening. (Lourdes drove us around. I had to keep complimenting her on how brave she was!) We have used cabs a lot, and they are very inexpensive. We paid about $3.50 for a ride that would have been $25 or $30 in Los Angeles. Tipping is mostly round up to the nearest dollar or ten percent in restaurants. The currency, weirdly, is American, the most popular item being dollar coins. All those dollar coins we hated in the States? They’re here! Twenty-dollar bills are a problem, being mostly too big, and forget about fifties unless you’re buying large! The price of food is shockingly low. Last night’s dinner, at a popular chain that specializes in Argentinian meat, cost about $6.00 per person and that included a delicious sandwich, fries and a beer each.

            Lourdes also took me to La Mariscal, a neighborhood pretty much designed for tourists, locally known as “gringolandia”. She helped me with my shopping at the artisanal market, bargaining my purchases from $18 down to $5, while charming the heck out of the vendors, scolding them for not teaching their children their native tongue (Quechua), and complimenting the quality of their products. She knew exactly where to go and how much to pay.  It was fun to watch! She told me, “I say to them, I am not gringo! No gringo prices for me!” It was a hoot.

            Mara is an excellent hostess and we’ve had such a good time! Her apartment is cute and convenient, though itty bitty like everywhere here. She keeps it well-organized, as is necessary in small spaces. She has adapted very well, and her Spanish is very, very good and getting better daily. A cab driver asked Mara where she was from and how long she had been here. He was surprised it was only since August. (My pitiful beginning level of Spanish has grown by leaps and bounds, to a level slightly less pitiful. I’d like to come back here for a longer stay and take a Spanish immersion course. Ecuador is known for its beautiful, crisp, clear Spanish. There are Spanish language schools all over Quito.)

Mara’s school is beautiful and her kids cute. They respect and obey her without being afraid of her – a fine line she walks perfectly. I attended her class’ science fair and was very impressed with the quality of their work and how much they could explain about the scientific method and what they had learned from their experiments. While I was in her classroom, there was an earthquake. It wasn’t a big scary one, but it was significant. Mara and her students were so engaged in preparation for the science fair that they didn’t even feel it! Now THAT’S a teacher!

            Tomorrow, we’re off at the crack of dawn for Peru and our Machu Picchu adventures! I will try to write again about that, with perhaps more success in describing uniqueness than I have had here - Quito, but not quite.  You’ll just have to come yourself. I know someone who would love it!