Since Semana Santa…Last weekend I went to Tena with a few friends. Tena is about 5 hours from Quito, sits on the edge of the jungle, and is known as the rafting capitol of Ecuador. It would obviously be a sin, therefore, to go there and not raft. So on Saturday we hired ourselves a company and took to the jungle rivers for a full day of battling the rapids. The trip included lots of paddling, a decent amount of screaming, and even a little bit of swimming. At one point, in the middle of some rapids, our guide had us all stand up on the edge of the raft and grab hands. Somehow, by the grace of God alone, nobody fell out. Not long after, however, as we bruised our way through another set of rapids we turned around to realize our guide had fallen out. An entire day of rafting and he was the only one who ended up in the water unintentionally. That is poetic justice my friends.
Our guide purposely would lead us into giant rocks like this...all in good fun. After an intense day on the river we thought it would be nice to have a classy dinner, instead of paying the usually 2 bucks at some tiny random restaurant. After searching our travel Bible (Lonely Planet) we found a great restaurant on the banks of the river that runs through town. The setting was gorgeous, the food was great (best tilapia I have ever had, and I’m not a big fan of fish usually), and a bottle of wine shared among friends made for a great evening and the perfect way to wrap up a great day in Tena.
This weekend I opted to stay put in good old Quito, and spent some quality time with friends and my host family. On Thursday I went out with my host sister (finally) to her favorite discoteca, which is apparently one of the best in Quito. Thursday is ladies’ night, which means all girls get in for free before 10:30. It also means there is a line at least an hour long to get into the club. Lucky for me my host sister has some serious connections and we walked right in without waiting at all. Somehow we also managed to get wristbands for the VIP lounge, which meant avoiding the extremely crowded/hot/stinky main dance floor. I actually had a really good time, and it was nice to hang out and get to know my sister better. I am still amazed at how she goes out every single Thursday, Friday and Saturday, though. We didn’t get home until 4 in the morning (I was ready to leave the club by like 1:30, but going home that early is unheard of here apparently), and I was absolutely exhausted. My sister then proceeded to make some pasta, which meant we didn’t make it to bed until around 5. One hour later she was up and getting ready for school and 12 hours later she was home getting ready to go out again. Insanity. Just watching her put on her make-up to go out again on Friday made me tired.
I opted for a more low-key Friday and invited a few friends over to my place hang out and relax. We got ourselves some delicious hot dogs, made some chocolate chip cookies, and had a nice girls’ night chatting away. Just a side note on how great my host mom is—I hadn’t even asked her if I could have friends over, and when she got home from work I was a little nervous that she might be upset we had taken over the kitchen. I have no idea why I was worried. She comes in, hugs my friends, tells them they are her hijas (daughters) and should make themselves at home. I even had a friend spend the night (taxis are such a hassle and sometimes not safe to take alone when it gets to be late), and in the morning she had our maid make us both breakfast and said my friend is welcome over any time. From some of the stories I have heard about other host families I feel really blessed to have the one I do.
Saturday my friend and I hit up one of the malls in Quito in search of a dress for her sister’s wedding. No success, but fun nonetheless. We then made our way to the movie theater to see Gone Baby Gone. There were slim pickings for movies, so it was either that or School of Scoundrels. The movie was pretty good, but it was set in a rough neighborhood in Boston so there was so much slang I didn’t know I sometimes had to actually read the subtitles to understand.
Today was a total family day at my house. My host mom loved the cookies I had made with my friends (and Mariapilar and her friends had devoured them when they got home from the discoteca on Friday), so she wanted to make some more with me. The batch we made together turned out even better than the ones I had made with my friends, and it was really nice to talk to her for a while. After dragging my host sister out of bed we hit up the mall (again) to look for shoes for Mariapilar’s prom dress. I also tried some empanadas de morocho (morocho is some type of corn apparently) for the first time. Oh fried goodness—they were amazing. Considering they came from a street vendor and had more grease than a super-sized order of McDonald’s fries, however, I’m shocked my stomach hasn’t returned them yet.
Good weekend in Quito—a little dancing, a little baking, a little bonding; all of which will make it a little harder to go home in a month.
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