helado de muerte
quito, ecuadorlife's been a whirlwind....we said goodbye to our apartment (i went through each room, and told each one why i liked it) and began the frenzy of making our new 1920's place in northeast a home. we welcomed ruthie & trishawna as roommates, and then immediately left to visit peter's parents in ecuador. we're exhausted, but similarly exhilarated by everything we've seen - old spanish haciendas from the 1600s, the indigenous quicheua selling their alpaca wares in the god-forsaken blistery highlands, jungle trees so thick with humidity you can touch it, ecuadorian emergency rooms at 3:30 AM for peter's special case of stomach sickness (we're blaming it on some ice cream we ate at a market - peter has begun referring to it as "helado de muerte" - "ice cream of death") .....even right now, your typical latino music is playing on someone's radio outside the apartment.
the poverty didn't begin to bother me until this afternoon, our last day here. we were by a market in a park in the central city, and two little boys approached us with heavily accented "hello" and "what's your name"s. they wanted to shine our shoes. we'd been approached so many times before, but i don't know why these boys seemed different. peter & i showed them our chacos, saying that we didn't have shoes to shine, but they insisted. we started to walk away from them, but then i started crying behind my sunglasses....uncontrollably - there was no way my 50 cents would get these boys what they needed (no doubt, they were working for someone else and wouldn't see much of our money), nor could i even begin to help every other begging child and adult we had seen.....we eventually made our way back to the little boys, and happily our sandles to be shined, and they ran towards us.....we talked about their favorite soccer teams and how old they guessed us to be - either 18 or 29 years old - they weren't sure which.
it's so overwhelming, i don't even know what to do. so much of it is cultural, which i can't and wouldn't want to change. but other things could be different here ....i wish i was idealistic enough to do something bigger about it.
posted by jessica @ 2:25 PM
2 Comments:
Wow Jessica. You have been up to a lot. I know how it is to leave your apartment. We will be moving in October when our lease is up (to where we are not sure of yet), but even thought my apartment is a mass produced cookie cutter apartment like every single one in a 10 mile radius, I will still miss it. It's my first apartment where I lived alone, where we first brought our pup Reggie home, lots of good memories.
Thanks for sharing some of the experiences from your trip. How long were you there? When you have time, it would be great to hear about your new house and neighborhood. =)
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