Weekend Ramblings

No pictures this time but hopefully still entertaining. This week has been a hurry up and wait type of week and there has been rain, rain, and more rain so work has been slightly postponed. This weekend a few of our group traveled to Saraguro for their Sunday market, a town named after the Saruguro people of Ecuador. Saraguros are mountain people and have a very unique style and culture which they still keep strong ties with. The typical attire for men is long black shorts with a collared shirt, and for women the attire is typically a white blouse with a very brightly colored skirt. All wear black poncho type shawls for the rain and have the same material for hats, and all have long black hair that is in a single braid. The market had just about every fruit and vegetable available in Ecuador and was quite the experience. Many pigs saw their last days and were roasting on spits scattered throughout the market. After taking our picture with a giant statue of a piece of corn we made our way back to Loja for the afternoon. The taxi ride back was also an experience as our one handed driver decided to give us random tours through random towns, stop and chat with people on the street, and try and put random strangers in our small cab when we were already full with 4 people. After returning from the market we made an authentic Ecuadorian soup with all of the goodies acquired from the market and it was AMAZING - and I also made my first pie which turned out to be a great success. Only about 3 weeks left here - time has gone by so fast!

Cuenca

Hello everybody,

What a fun and exciting weekend our group had in Cuenca, a UNESCO world heritage site a few hours north of Loja. After an exciting and harrowing bus ride we spent an afternoon ziplining and browsing around local crafts and goods markets surrounding the hostel we stayed at. My first experience ziplining was quite the trip as the lines went through cool forest and over some large expanses. Our hostel was located in historical downtown and we had great views of some of the surrounding buildings and markets. Cuenca is most notable for its colonial architecture from the Spanish occupation of the city and is nothing less than spectacular. Many churches of grand proportions dot the city, as well as a number of museums. On Sunday we visited Ingapirca, one of the remaining Incan ruin sites in Ecuador. It does not have the scale of Machu Picchu but was still interesting and a fun trip and there were llamas. Pictures attached are of a few of the churches, and the picture with the Ecuadorian flag was from our hostel.

Ecuador sites

I do not have a lot to say in this blog except to provide a few more pictures of the sites and sounds in Loja. Loja, and especially the Universidad Tecnica Particular de Loja (UTPL - where I work), has great artwork and architecture. These pictures show "La puerta de la ciudad" (gate to the city), and of the "Gran Libertador" (Simon Bolivar). Most cities in Ecuador have a Sucre street, Simon Bolivar street, and a few more of the more famous persons of Ecuador and South America. If you are into some cool art you should check out Eduardo Kingman who was born in Loja and lived mostly in Quito. He has some pretty spectacular paintings that are very unique and I enjoy his work a lot. Our group is visiting Cuenca this weekend so I will have some cool pics soon after.

diet and exercise

For anyone confused about the picture with feet and a red line - the red line is supposed to be the equator. So I had feet in both hemispheres for the picture! I am one of only a few members left of our group not to get sick yet and I attribute that to eating everything put in front of me. Generally speaking there are a few rules to live by here: 1) do not eat the lettuce; 2) street meat is probably not the best choice; and 3) the hot yellow drink (canelazo) gives wicked hangovers - probably because it is made from fermented sugarcane. Other than that everything is fair game. My diet consists strongly of a few basic food groups including meat (lomos, carne asada, pollo, etc.), rice, potatoes, bread, and fruit. A full meal of most of the above that will even fill me up is usually only $4. I also look forward to getting the opportunity of trying chicha whenever I get the chance. How to counteract this barage of good food and drink? Plenty of exercise. I have been enjoying the mile walk to and after school as well as the steady climb of working in the steep paramo ecosystem. Most of the walk includes climbing up steep ridges, wading through chest high schrubs, slopping through mud, following rivers found in previous landslides downhill to the road for fun, and battling through alleys of foliage that can be up to 15 feet high. But once you hit the ridges and the wind battles the foliage down to knee height (similar to krummholz in the alpine USA) there are great views of the surrounding valleys and mountain ranges. So I guess the steady regimin of calf exercises balances out the high carb and protein diet I have come to love. Attached are a few new picks. One is from my first study site at night prior to running down the mountain because nobody had lights, and the second shows some of the typical plants found within this area.

Life in Loja

If you have ever wondered what happened to all of the Sacajawea dollar coins in the USA, you would be happy to know that they are all here in Ecuador. Ecuador switched its currency fairly recently to the US dollar and it seems that the most popular form of currency is the coin. Both Ecuadorian coins and US coins are in abundance and I have enjoyed my newfound fondness of the 50 cent piece. Life in Loja is surprisingly nice and ALL houses are equiped with CFLs for lightbulbs, there is a very regular and extensive recycling and trash regime, most people have cell phones and at least one computer per household, and much more. Not quite the third world kind of atmosphere I was expecting prior to arriving. Field work has started for me and things have gotten off to a fast and enjoyable start. The paramo is quite an extraordinary place and the vegetative diversity is amazing. For example, in my study plots which are 1.5 m by 1.5 m in size (5 x 5 ft) we generally have 15-20 different species of plants. I have sampled at two plot locations so far, one 30 meters higher than the other, and the two locations have drastically different plant communities, most likely due to impacts of water availability, temperature, and wind conditions. Today is my first day in the lab analyzing plant specimens we have collected so I will let everybody know how those turn out. What else about Loja. It seems that every car in this city is equipped with the same ultra sensitive alarm system that decides to go off every time a motorcycle, truck, or car with a load muffler goes by. Thus, at all times of the day and night there is usually at least one car alarm going off per block. Also, stray dogs love to bark and poop on the streets everywhere so you have to watch where you step in the city. One of the nicest aspects that I have noticed in Ecuador, and maybe this is common in other Latin American countries, is that there are a number of large plazas in the downtown areas that have beautiful monuments and are usually bounded by grand churches and other buildings. The colors of the buildings are very fresh and inviting and it makes the city look awesome. The layout of Loja is very similar to Quito and much of the architexture is similar. All for now, adios.