A weekend of firsts

What a weekend. Quite a few "firsts". First trip to the store by myself. First taxi hailed. First drink ordered (Gin and Tonic of course). First Ecuadorian club experience. First Ecuadorian mass. First time wearing a cowboy hat and Incan poncho while riding a horse through the mountains. I've become more or less comfortable traveling around the city. I can tell cab drivers where to go easily enough, and I live near a major intersection that they all know very well. Cabs are pretty cheap, unless they try to rip you off. Last night a bunch of us met up and went to a bar. It was one girl's birthday so it called for a celebration. After hanging out there for a while, we headed over to a club, where we met some Ecuadorian guys (Fernando and Joel). From there we went to another club, which was a pretty crazy experience. I'm talking strobe lights, loud music, the works. The only difference, everyone was Ecuadorian, and about half the music was in spanish.

But here's the interesting part, the other half, at the club and the bar, was in english. They played American music. At the bar I got the chance to embarrass myself by singing along to Rick Astley ("I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling...") It's funny how far-reaching American culture is. Today a friend and I took the teleforico, which is kinda like a ski lift, up to the top of the big volcano that lies to the west of the city. It was beautiful on the way up, but at the top we were surrounded by clouds. We went along the path until we came upon some indigenous looking people and a stable of horses. They asked us if we spoke spanish and we said yes and they said that for five dollars a piece we could ride horses through the mountains. Naturally, we agreed, and as a bonus they let us wear ponchos and hats! On the way back we made some more Ecuadorian friends. We had a nice conversation about sights in the city and the great fruits of Ecuador, and the city Cuenca which apparently I need to visit.

My confidence with my spanish is like a pendulum. Twice I have been told my locals that I speak spanish very well. And yet so many times I have to ask people to repeat what they said. And a big gathering, forget about it. I can sometimes get the gist, sometimes not. The whole language thing can be frustrating. Sometimes I feel like I'm advancing. Sometimes I feel like I'm just getting more comfortable saying what I already know. Sometimes I don't feel like I'm moving forward at all. Thankfully, everyone here is really really understanding about the language thing.

A final reflection. In the book on Ecuadorian culture I read before coming here the author discussed demographics, saying that natives and indigenous made up the majority, Afro-ecuadorians were a minority, whites a smaller minority, and if you were asian you would definitely stand out. But this hasn't been my experience. I haven't seen a lot of Asians, but I see some almost every day. But whites are incredibly hard to come by. I am truly a minority here. My physical features are different, my culture is different, my language is different. The only thing that is the same is my religion, which is refreshing, although counts for little outside of mass. This is really the first time that I have experienced being a minority, and it is certainly an eye-opening one.