david's web-log

(This one is for you Nimithri).

The picture I snapped above is of a National Geographic Survey map found on the wall in our hotel room in Cuenca, Ecuador. The map was printed in the U.S.

There are indeed many subtle, yet noticeable, differences between life in the U.S. and the U.K. In the U.K., for example, the etiquette of the road has apparently been passed on to the behavior (behaviour?) of pedestrians, where one is always expected to pass on the left side of an escalator or stairwell. (Feigned British accent.) It would be quite rude to do otherwise!

Another wonderful difference I noticed was the look of maps, which in the States are invariable U.S.-centric. When I see a world map, I expect to find the only country that matters right smack in the epicenter: Yep, you guessed it, America. Is this an arbitrary geographic formulation? Yes. Have we capriciously sliced the world’s biggest landmass into two halves, placing each on the fringe of our map? Yes. Have we ignored the strictures of longitude and international agreements to standardize time? Yes. Does America care about these things? No.

In Britain, I learned that the horizontal center of the map was placed at 0 degrees longitude, a convenient, if more sensible, reason to place England near the middle. But who said America was sensible? Britain, I’ve got my eye on you.

Although it would be amazing if candy corn grew on trees, alas, these flowers are not the delicious Halloween treat you and I crave/devour/gluttonize each October 31 starting at 6:00 p.m. My internet-y efforts at identifying the particular type of flower has not proved fruitful (bad pun intended), but the picture was taken in in the Ecuadorian city Mindo.

“City” is probably a grandiose word to describe Mindo. Pueblo, or village, might be more apt since it sports approximately one main street and a population of 1,200 or so according to my local and most decidedly unscientific surveying. Located in Ecuador’s sierra, perhaps 50 miles (or, more relevantly, a two-hour bus ride) northwest of Quito, Mindo is known as a “cloud forest” because, well, clouds often linger at the canopy level of the forest.

It’s truly a stunning area. At least two friends in Ecuador have opined that Mindo is the most spectacular place they’ve visited in the county. I’ll withhold judgment until visiting the jungle, but it certainly will be in the running. More pictures of Mindo to come.

We found this delicious little computer store near downtown Cuenca, Ecuador. Why a person would name their store after a virus is beyond me. At first I thought maybe there is spectacular translation problem going on here—that maybe a virus in Spanish really doesn’t mean the same thing at all. Heck, maybe viruses are good!

However, I have consulted with experts, and it seems the word for computer virus in Spanish actually is, perhaps unsurprisingly, spelled exactly the same as in English. Although it must be said that, compared to their English counterparts, Spanish viruses are generally much trendier, more into paella, and bigger nappers. In short, being a Spanish virus is a better lifestyle.

You—yes you!—can own this home. I must say that I adore the hand-painted signs such as this that appear throughout Ecuador, even if it might be a little counter-productive to spray-paint a for-sale sign on the brick wall of the property being sold.

On a slightly unrelated note, I’ve been told that houses in this neighborhood sell in the range of $5,000 to $10,000. So they’re not considerably expensive by American standards, but they can be expensive in a locale where few households earn more than a few hundred dollars each month. (This particular photo just shows an empty lot, however.) If interested in the property, remember to first dial Ecuador’s international dialing code of 593.

Note: This missive turned out longer than anticipated. The take-home message is that I’m currently volunteering in Ecuador, I’m having a great time, my Spanish is improving (though it had nowhere to go but up), and I’ll be posting a new photo every day henceforth if you want to check in. ¡Adios!

Hi everyone (i.e., my meager readers). I don’t usually post these type of entries on my blog, but since time is limited, I feel like it might be the best way to share info and correspond. So forgive the vanities of presuming you care about my day-to-day adventures. Onward!

I got into Quito last week on Wednesday. Since there aren’t lots of direct flights from Lansing to Ecuador (ha!), I flew from Grand Rapids to Miami to Quito. On the final flight from Miami, I was sitting next to an Ecuadorian couple who had immigrated to the U.S. some 10 years earlier. The lady, who was grandma-age, assumed from my Spanish mumblings that I spoke the language. She proceeded to give me a five minute summary of the history, geography, and tourism of Ecuador. I nodded as if I understood. I mostly did not. She later gave me her phone number (score!) and invited me for dinner. I have yet to take up this offer.

My arrival in the Quito airport was another adventure. After getting off the plane and going through customs, I found myself on the street surrounded by an army of taxi drivers. I thought the volunteer organization had arranged for someone to pick me up, but of course at first there was no one there with my name on one of those paper signs. On an unrelated note, ever since my “retirement” from investment banking, I’d thought I would never have a chauffeur waiting for me again at the airport. Clearly, I didn’t consider costs of labor in developing countries. Coming from Europe, the differences in prices between Ecuador and London were quite striking. For example, it cost $10 for a ride from the Quito airport to the house of the family with whom I’m staying. The ride itself probably took about 35 minutes. A similar taxi-ride in London might fetch $100 or more. Nevertheless, the driver showed up, and I got to the home where I’m staying safely.

The prices of other things are impressively wonderful as well. A great meal of pinchos on the street—kebab with corn and potatoes on the side—is less than $2. A Coca-Cola is 25 cents. My nine hour bus ride though the Andies from Quito to Cuenca was all of $8. I can get used to this.

As I mentioned, I’m staying with an Ecuadorian family in the south of the city. Quito is interesting for many reasons, but one of them is that it’s built in a valley between two mountain rangers. For this reason, the physical city itself is really slender —much longer than wide. The stereotypes are as follows: the rich people live in the north; the central of the city holds the most colonial heritage; the south of the city, where I live, might be considered to be poorer; anything south of the city, or neighborhoods built up the sides of the mountains, are really poor. Of course, these are generalities, but I think they’re for the most part accurate.

So back to the family. I’m living with a family who also run the foundation with which I volunteer with. I won’t bore you with details here, but the Quito Project is a collaboration between this foundation and the University of Michigan. Together, they serve a neighborhood called San Martin, in southeast Quito. There are three basic elements to speak of here. First is the medical clinic, which is operated by U-M medical students and doctors. The second part is tutoring, done by U-M students and alums interested in education. The third part is the “public health bit.” Basically it consists of a resource assessment (fancy way of saying “door-to-door” survey) of the neighborhood we serve.

What I’m doing then is helping out with this survey. My day-to-day volunteering then consists of walking around the neighborhood, talking with people, and helping to complete the survey. It was originally conceived by academics at U-M and is being primarily carried out by Amarilda (a social work student also at U-M) and Armando (a public health student from Berkeley). They are my commiseraters. Armando is my roommate as well. They are both very interesting, and describing either of them in a sentence would be impossible.

One good thing about helping out with a survey is that I have no choice but to practice my Spanish. Even in the week I’ve been here I’ve seen that my vocabulary and ability to understand native speakers has improved a lot. Today, in fact, I did my first two surveys without much help, so that was exciting. Part of the reason I’m getting better is obviously just hearing the language while living in the country. But it’s also been invaluable to have native or fluent speakers around me all the time to correct my butcherings. I’m not nearly fluent myself, or even proficient, but definitely getting better.

One last thing I wanted to mention is that I visited Cuenca, a city in the south-central Sierra of Ecuador, over the weekend. Cuenca is famous for being a colonial enclave, one of the beautiful, plaza-filled cities that the Spanish built after bullying most of South America. The bus ride was about 9 hours long, so we ended up taking the red-eye and arrived at 8:00 in the morning, upon which we started the sight seeing. The trip lasted two full days in total. The first day was spent going to nearby Ingapirca, which are the most famous Inca ruins in the country. Interestingly, the Inca were actually only in what-is-now Ecuador for less than 100 years before the Spanish, under Pizarro began their conquest. In fact, the Inca subjugation of the previous tribes in the Ecuador-region was perhaps just as brutal as that of the Spanish. For example, one legend has it that the Inca invasion was so brutal that enough people were slaughtered to turn lakes red. Anyway, the ruins were nice to look at, but we were told that they don’t compare to the those in Peru. The second day in Cuenca was spent gazing at colonial Churches, visiting Cuenca’s popular museum, and generally exploring the city.

One final note about Ecuador before I sign off from this missive. The country can basically be divided into three regions: the coast (left), the sierra (central), and the jungle (east). Quito and Cuenca are both in the central sierra. I’ve promised myself, however, to visit both the coast and jungle before leaving.

Well, if you’re still reading, thanks for stopping by. As I mentioned earlier, I’ll be putting up a new photo everyday henceforth if you want to check in. Ciao.