Another Trip to Macará - I'm Finally Legal!

We just got back from yet another trip to the border town of Macará. It was the final leg of our year-long journey to obtain my resident visa. I have written a little about this process in previous posts, including the one about our trip to Quito last July and another about our trip to Peru last January. Well, last month, the migration office in Quito finally stamped my passport and I am now a permanent, legal resident of Ecuador. But, since I had originally entered the country as a tourist, I was now required to leave and re-enter again so that they could register me as a resident in the computer system (apparently that can only be done at the border, not in Quito). And, I was told, if I waited until after my old tourist visa expired (April 11) I would end up having to pay another $200 fine the next time I tried to leave the country. So we decided that a quick trip to Macará wouldn't be a bad idea (good thing it is only a 4 hour drive away).

I was a little worried about taking the trip because we are in the middle of the rainy season and landslides are quite common. A bad one can block the roads for several days. Luckily, the day we chose to drive down it did not rain and all the landslides from the previous weeks rain had been cleared. It was the first time that I had been in that area during the rainy season and the change was amazing. All the trees had green leaves and there were flowers and new plant growth everywhere. The hills, which I'm used to seeing as dry and brown, were green and exuberant. It looked a lot more like the tropical rainforest than the bosque seco (dry forest).


Here's a picture from the road, green hills in the background:


And the ceibo trees:


Here's one of the several landslides that we passed which had been caused by the previous week's rain:

On the way down to Macará, discussed how to handle the border crossing. I needed to get a stamp from both the Ecuadorian side as well as the Peruvian side. We had heard that officially I was supposed to spend at least 24 hours outside of the country, but neither of us wanted to do that again. Everyone had given us advice on what to do; we should drive to the nearest city in Peru and eat lunch and then go back; we should cross the border and then walk back to Macará, spend the night in a hotel, and then walk back over the border the next day and act like we were coming from Peru; we should bribe the guards; etc. We couldn't decide what was best, so we decided to just go to the border and see what happened. We had brought some money with us to bribe the border guards if necessary, even though Lucho admited that he was not very good at doing that kind of stuff.

The first official we spoke to, on the Ecuadorian side, was typically unfriendly and unhelpful, but after Lucho asked if his boss was in town he seemed to lighten up a little (probably wondering if we knew him or not) and told us that he could help us so long as we were able to get the stamp from the Peruvian side. So we crossed the international bridge over the Macará river (which was brown and swollen due to the rains - I held on to Christina's hand very tightly) and made our way to the Peruvian border office. Lucho did all the talking while Christina and I watched the angry river below. Lucho asked the guard if he would stamp my passport with an entrance and exit at the same time. Then he pulled out a $10 Peruvian sole note (worth about $3) and told the guy that he was welcome to keep it for his trouble. The guy looked at it and asked, "Don't you have one of those, but in dollars?" Luckily, we did. So he gave us the needed stamps, and we headed over to the Ecuadorian side. The official there stamped my passport and we gave him $5 for his trouble (we were going to give him the $10 bill, but we had already given it to the Peruvian guy so he was out of luck on that one). Success!!

Macará is a rice-growing region and there are lots of picturesque, terraced rice fields on the outskirts of town. Here's a couple of pictures of some rice fields we on the way back to the hotel after our sucessful venture at the border:




We also visited a rice-processing plant. Here's a shot of the workers spreading the rice out to dry on the concrete patio:

This is the inside of the processing plant:

We ended up buying a 100 pound bag of rice from them for $30. The rice from Macará is very good and now we have enough to supply us, and the rest of Lucho's family, for several months.

It felt great to get all that paperwork out of the way. But when I looked at my U.S. Passport the next day I realized that it expires this August (I had forgotten all about it while I was working on my Ecuadorian paperwork). So now we're planning a trip to visit the U.S. Consulate in Guayaquil. I guess it will never end...

The Joys of Hard Labor

One of the strategies I use to help me adjust to life in Ecuador is to find things that I really enjoy doing, and do them as often as possible. This includes spending time with Christina, hanging out with other English speakers, surfing the internet, and cooking. Lately Lucho and I have found a new pastime - working in the yard.

In some of my previous posts I mentioned that Lucho's family owns a small "vacation house" in Malacatos. We go there occasionally on weekends to hang out. It is a small brick and concrete building built in the traditional style of the countryside. There are three rooms and a kitchen that open out to a main courtyard and a bathroom to the side. Here's a photo:

The place is actually in pretty bad shape due to neglect - it has been visited very rarely over the years. At one point the bugs and dust were so bad that I avoided going there. But a few months ago Lucho and a hired hand spent a couple of days cleaning the place from top to bottom, and now it is livable.

The place has a very large front yard, also neglected. A couple of years ago someone had planted two ficus trees and they had taken off, shading the whole yard and killing most of the grass and other plants. We've been talking about cutting down those trees since we've been here, and a couple of weeks ago we finally did it:

That has motivated us to fix up the whole yard, and we've been going there once or twice a week to clean things up. It is a somewhat daunting task. Besides the two huge tree stumps and roots (which extend to about 1/4 of the yard) to remove, there are piles of rock, wood and other miscelaneous items lying around that need to be cleaned up.

Fortunately there are also several banana trees, an orange tree and a mandarin tree that we will keep. Lucho's mom brought a few flower plants from her yard in Loja, and we also planted a lime tree. The climate in Malacatos is perfect for growing things, it is warm and there is lots of sun for 12 hours a day, every day. Here people use the term "se prende", which literally means "turn on" like a lightbulb, to describe if a plant survives and grows after it is planted. I like that term. Our lime tree has definitely "turned on", it grew two new leaves in the space of a week. We plan to plant a few papaya trees, an herb garden, and lots more flowers.

But our first task is to clean up the piles of debris that have accumulated in various corners of the yard. Last Thursday we spent several hours removing a huge pile of rocks that someone had left under the orange tree. There were lots of creepy-crawly things living under the rocks, including a few huge spiders.

Here's a picture of one of the spiders (Lucho wouldn't put his finger near it to indicate its size, but it covers about 2/3 the height of a normal sized brick):


Here's a photo of our lime tree that has "turned on":


It was a great work out, and very satifiying at the end of the day to see what we had accomplished - including this big pile of rocks!!

The Tooth Mouse??

About a week ago while I was brushing Christina's teeth I was surprised to see something that looked like a new tooth coming in. "It couldn't be," I thought, "she's only five." But, surprise, surprise, it was a new tooth. And her baby tooth in front of it was really loose.

So I told her the story of the Tooth Fairy, and how she brings presents to little kids who put their teeth under their pillows after they come out. The Tooth Fairy was one of my favorite stories when I was a kid, and I firmly believed in her for probably longer than most kids do (I also remember believing in Santa Claus for a long time too. I even remember getting in an argument with another kid at school about him. She said that he didn't exist; I said that he did). I finally had to admit that the Tooth Fairy didn't exist when I lost a tooth while I was away at summer camp, and despite the fact that I put it under my pillow that night there was no toy to greet me in the morning, just my tooth.

At any rate, since I loved the Tooth Fairy so much I was sure that Christina would too. And she got very excited when I told her the story, especially when she realized that she was going to get a new toy. The next day she was going to school and I was telling her to make sure to show her loose tooth to everyone at school. I wasn't sure how the Tooth Fairy was translated into Spanish so I asked Lucho. "Oh, we don't have anything like that here... Well, I guess we have 'el Ratoncito de los Dientes'." "What??" I thought, "the Little Tooth Mouse!?? What does that mean?"

I asked around a bit and found out that there is a story behind the Tooth Mouse. Apparently his house was destroyed and he goes around collecting children's teeth to use as building blocks for his new home. In return for the tooth he leaves a gift under the pillow. According to Christina's 8 yr-old cousin, this story is much more "logical" than the Tooth Fairy story (actually I've never heard a story explaining the Tooth Fairy's motive for giving gifts for teeth; there might be one, but I'm not familiar with it). I thought about the idea of a Tooth Mouse for a while and I guess it makes sense that a little mouse would be able to sneak under a pillow easily and take a tooth without waking the child. And to be fair, the term "Tooth Mouse" is probably not a great translation. The idea is something more like, "the cute little mouse that collects teeth." Mice can be cute, but..., well..., it's just not the same as a fairy (at least in my mind). To me, they are much more exciting and magical than mice.

Christina's friends at school filled her in on the "Ratoncito de los Dientes". Apparently he prefers to leave money rather than toys, although one friend told her that she got candy (hmmm). I thought about having the Tooth Mouse come into our house to take Christina's tooth, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. In this house, I decided, we are going to have the Tooth Fairy! And she was going to bring a toy, not money or candy. I guess those childhood fantasies just never die.

My sister-in-law - who fortunately is also a dentist - looked at the tooth and said that it should be pulled out soon since the adult tooth was coming in quickly. We've never been able to get Christina to sit in a dentist chair for long, but with the promise of a toy from the Tooth Fairy she allowed my sister-in-law to clean her teeth and then pull out the loose tooth. Thanks to some anesthetic spray and a quick pull Christina didn't feel a thing. She was thrilled to have the tooth out and kept looking at herself in the mirror.

That night she put the tooth under her pillow and in the morning she woke up to the toy that the Tooth Fairy had left her. Now she is telling everyone that "el Ratoncito de los Dientes" is called "the Tooth Fairy" in English.

Ahhhhh....

One of the things that I should have added to my Top 10 List of Things I Like About Ecuador is the fact that there are a lot of spa-type treatments (manicures, pedicures, facials, etc.) available for a relatively good price. I often go to a local beauty salon for a manicure/pedicure that costs about $6. And the other day I got a pretty good facial for $15. It is important to look around and find a "good" place because you never know if the technicians have been professionally trained or not. But the woman who gave me the facial seemed to know what she was doing and the atmosphere of the salon was comfortable.

So today I finally got up the nerve to do something that I've been wanting to do since I moved to Ecuador - get a massage. When I got my facial I had asked the woman what other services she offered and she mentioned that they did massages. I asked her how much they cost and she told me $10. I was a little skeptical because even in Ecuador $10 seems very low. Even less than the facial! After thinking about it for a few weeks, curiosity got the better of me and I called and made an appointment.

When I showed up at the salon this morning the owner was there waiting for me. She was listening to Salsa on the radio and I was a little worried that I was going to end up tapping my feet during the massage, but as soon as I was ushered into the room she switched it to the typical New Age background music. While I was waiting on the massage table she dimmed the lights, and lit some incense (which actually smelled good). It was starting to feel like that familiar, relaxing atmosphere.

I'm always nervous when I get a massage for the first time from someone new, and this time was even worse because I wasn't sure what to expect. But once she dimmed the lights and set the mood I started to relax. The actual massage was pretty good. She had obviously learned all the techniques somewhere. (Of course it was nothing like the massages I used to get in Humboldt County from Dorothy, a friend of mine who worked out of her little Victorian house in Ferndale. There was always a fire going in the wood stove making the room toasty warm. After an amazing massage she would cap it off with a surprisingly accurate Tarot reading. It was always a spiriual experience.) Today's massage, on the other hand, was similar to what I've experienced at the spas in Sacramento. Good but not great. And even though she answered her cell phone once and managed to send two text messages during the massage, I still enjoyed it (somehow she was able to send a text with one hand and continue to knead my back with the other - I just had to laugh because that would be such a huge faux pas in the States).

In the end, I left the salon feeling much more relaxed and calm than when I went in. It was definitely worth the $10. I think I'll go back again (maybe next week).

One year anniversary - top ten lists

On February 27th we marked our one year anniversary here in Ecuador. At the time I was in the middle of a big translation job and wasn't able to update my blog. Translating documents from Spanish to English is a new thing that I've been getting involved in lately. So far I've been enjoying it; the work is fun and frustrating at the same time (I think that describes most of the things I do here in Loja). Anyway, in honor of being here for one year, I've put together these two "top ten" lists - "Things I Like About Living in Ecuador" and "Things I Miss about the USA," (not in order of importance):

Things I Like about Living in Ecuador
1. Living in another culture, with its daily challenges, rewards and frustrations.
2. Being around a big family, especially because there are lots of kids for Christina to play with.
3. Watching Christina become bi-lingual and bi-cultural.
4. Being involved in many different things (work, restaurant, etc.) instead of one job all day long. (I have to say that after a year I have never missed sitting in my cubicle at work. Not once.)
5. Having more time to spend with Christina.
6. Meeting people from all over the world who are living in or visiting Ecuador.
7. Being able to hire someone to clean the house and help make lunch every day.
8. Being able to go to a "real" local market with lots of fresh fruit and vegetables for sale.
9. Living in such a beautiful, mountainous part of the world.
10. Living in a small town where people are friendly and everyone knows everyone else.

Things I Miss about the USA
1. Spending time with family and friends from the US.
2. Living in a culture that I am familiar with.
3. Being able to buy anything that I could need or want, either at a local store or online, some things being much cheaper (such as clothes or electronics).
4. Breathing relatively clean air, that isn't full of smoke from car exhaust and dust from ubiquitous construction projects.
5. Living in a city with well-constructed and well-maintained public infrastructure (roads, sidewalks, public buildings, etc.).
6. Being able to accomplish day-to-day tasks (such as buying something in a store or conducting a transaction at the bank) quickly and efficiently.
7. Being able to drive in a relatively safe environment. Driving is easy and orderly. People stay in their lanes, stoplights work, signs are present and easy to read, and the roads aren't full of potholes. Drivers give pedestrians the right of way.
8. Being annonymous; not being stared at all the time.
9. Going out for a coffee at Peet's, a bagel at New York Bagel Boys, or out to eat at a good pizza joint, a good Mexican place, a microbrewery, etc.
10. Visiting all my favorite places like San Francisco, Humboldt County, Oregon, etc.