Having had the runs two days before I left Ibagué, 30 hours of bus travel in 48 crashed my antibiotic-depleted immune system. But that didn't bother me as I had come to rest and do something as close to a meditation retreat as I could, without actually doing a retreat. Fate in the form of a small lad scouting for tourists brought me to La Faccia, a lovely hostel I felt comfortable in immediately. A room of my own and a pretty beach...
Rested and refreshed, I felt ready to head to my next volunteering project, Sky Ecuador (Sumak Kawsay Yachay ¡ a beautiful life through education in Kichwa). The eight-hour bus ride from Ecuador's north coast into the mountains involved lots of uphill on not-too-scary roads and some beautiful rainforest. When I got to the main road going south from Quito, I was shocked by the extent of the development. Not high-rise, but lots and lots of low rise, semi-constructed houses. Latacunga, capital of Cotopaxi province, seemed to just flow into the next place without much if any space between settlements. My hostel, Pachamama, I managed to find in the near dark, without much in the way of signage (i.e. zero), but it was all worth it when I saw it in the light.
This is the view off to the left of the deck. You can see that this part of Salasaca (the name of the indigenous people who live here and the place) is very rural despite being part of the built up plateau-valley going south of Qutio.
We are above a valley which is quiet apart from the occasional loud, late disco in the social club.
The house isnt what you'd call traditional but it is very pretty indeed. And very big. Enough for 15 volunteers. There is a whole level below this cut into the hillside we sit on. After missing hot water in Ibagué, hot showers made their return. Good news as the Andean sun can by quite shy, staying away for days as we are in the clouds quite often, being at nearly 3000m. Cold showers wouldn't have been fun.
The house has some stunning art done by the brother of the owner. The owner started Katitawa School in1997 when there was little, if any local education provision. Now it finds its niche working with children who would just get lost in classrooms of 35 and more. Also, some children for whom the free lunch every day makes a big difference to the family budget.
I couldn't resist putting up the leaving posters from Ibagué. Makes my room look brighter. I share with two other volunterers. The school year was just finishing as I arrived in June, building up to the Inti Raymi or sun festival, which marks the end of the old year and the beginning of the new in the Incan calendar. There was also the graduation ceremony at the school, so lots of stuff to help out with, but a decidedly easier workload.
This is Holly walking up to the school with the delightful Ligia. As you can see if you look closely, traditonal dress is used by pupils at the school. And the air was pretty thin for this bit of the walk, I can tell you. Good exercise. Holly and I worked with the pre-kinder class who were from 3-6. There were 10 kids in the group and they were delightful.
So it was very special to see them do their end of year parade for the Inti Raymi. I didn't get to know the bigger kids as well but...
...these little munchkins were all in my group. Cristian (4th from left) was just so cute. Almost running wild when I arrived, with a week of more structure and praise his behaviour transformed dramatically. As I was sitting on the lawn one day with other people all sitting around, he came over, hugged me and said, 'te quiero' which means for those that don't speak español 'I love you'. Bless his little cotton socks. Meant a lot to me, I can tell you.
Still at the Inti Raymi, above we have some of the parents and local dignitaries. The guy with the mike is called Raúl. He is one of my evening one-one students. He is also the inspector of schools for the local area so an important man to have on side. Like most of the others, he is bilingual in Kichwa and Spanish and also learning English.
Here you can see the traditional hats of the parents and of the kids for their dancing presentation.
The dancing presentation by the bigger kids. There were only 35 on roll last year, including the 10 from kindergarten so the groups for the older kids tended to be about 4.
The kichwa teacher is a highly committed guy called Rufino. He is a bit of a local historian too and in the town's parade a few days later, he was providing commentary from the podium as the various floats with bucolic scenes, complete with chickens strapped on went, past the local and international dignitaries.
More traditoinal clothing...
These were actually made by the kids for the festival. Very creative and when I saw real ones made by adults at the parade, I was impressed by how well Rufino and the kids did. The kids are doing traditional dance with shaking bells on the legs too.
Incredible!
Here the girls are eating the tradional corn and both corn and chicha (fermented corn drink) were passed round to all the parents. Lots of the day was conducted in Kichwa, including the ritual of leaving out food which was done on a specially constructed Andean cross mosaic out in front of the school.
And below you can see the traditional cook up. Meat from a whole sheep plus spuds and beans. Stones heated by fire, then food on top, covered and left for a couple of hours.
As I got a nice little contribution from the UK tax man, I decided to go to Quito to see if I could get anything cheaper for the Galapagos than I was finding online.
This is Quito from the roof of the impressive Notre Dame de Paris-esque basilica. May not look much but I was really impressed with Quito. Bogota was pretty scary outside of a very small area, but Quito I found less so. Its centre is much smaller I guess and it's just generally a smaller city.
These beautiful Spanish colonial buildings and the sun made walking around the Old Town a real treat.
The pretty museum of the town below was a little long on multi-media effects and a little short on information about pre-Colombian cultures. The museum was originally a hospital and they had some good info on that.
One of the several pretty squares in the old town, I felt very safe here although a bit dodgy on some of the side streets. For anybody who didn't realise going out after dark on your own in a South American capital is basically asking to be robbed. Overall though, I felt pretty safe in Quito, but I certainly didn't do anything like that....
The Basilica....The first pic was from the windows above the nave. You could also cross above the roof of the nave to get to stairs going even higher. Well you could, if you weren't a great big scaredycat like me...
Not bad, eh?
And when I walked over to the gringo part of town called Marescal, I went through two or three nice green spaces like the one below. Failed utterly to get anything sorted for the Galapagos. But did learn a bit more about it.
And also went up the Teleferiqo (sic) where I got great views over the city and had the prospet of hiking to the peak behind the woman's head. It was 4200m when you got out the lift so I reckon I made it to 4500m. Probably the highest I've been in my life.
and the south of Quito again.
and the north...
my path leading away...
and nearly at the peak....
Which brings me to the end of this round of blogging. Hope you enjoyed it. More soon :))
without any major development and as much local tourism as foreigners. Just the job. Many thanks to Flor for the recommendation. Managed to listen to almost all the retreat talks from Wat Kow Tahm's beginners retreat which I did for the first time in 2005 in Thailand. More or less in order too. And was able to do sitting and walking meditation and yoga. Oh and had my first surf lesson.
This is the view off to the left of the deck. You can see that this part of Salasaca (the name of the indigenous people who live here and the place) is very rural despite being part of the built up plateau-valley going south of Qutio.
We are above a valley which is quiet apart from the occasional loud, late disco in the social club.
The house isnt what you'd call traditional but it is very pretty indeed. And very big. Enough for 15 volunteers. There is a whole level below this cut into the hillside we sit on. After missing hot water in Ibagué, hot showers made their return. Good news as the Andean sun can by quite shy, staying away for days as we are in the clouds quite often, being at nearly 3000m. Cold showers wouldn't have been fun.
The house has some stunning art done by the brother of the owner. The owner started Katitawa School in1997 when there was little, if any local education provision. Now it finds its niche working with children who would just get lost in classrooms of 35 and more. Also, some children for whom the free lunch every day makes a big difference to the family budget.
I couldn't resist putting up the leaving posters from Ibagué. Makes my room look brighter. I share with two other volunterers. The school year was just finishing as I arrived in June, building up to the Inti Raymi or sun festival, which marks the end of the old year and the beginning of the new in the Incan calendar. There was also the graduation ceremony at the school, so lots of stuff to help out with, but a decidedly easier workload.
This is Holly walking up to the school with the delightful Ligia. As you can see if you look closely, traditonal dress is used by pupils at the school. And the air was pretty thin for this bit of the walk, I can tell you. Good exercise. Holly and I worked with the pre-kinder class who were from 3-6. There were 10 kids in the group and they were delightful.
So it was very special to see them do their end of year parade for the Inti Raymi. I didn't get to know the bigger kids as well but...
...these little munchkins were all in my group. Cristian (4th from left) was just so cute. Almost running wild when I arrived, with a week of more structure and praise his behaviour transformed dramatically. As I was sitting on the lawn one day with other people all sitting around, he came over, hugged me and said, 'te quiero' which means for those that don't speak español 'I love you'. Bless his little cotton socks. Meant a lot to me, I can tell you.
Still at the Inti Raymi, above we have some of the parents and local dignitaries. The guy with the mike is called Raúl. He is one of my evening one-one students. He is also the inspector of schools for the local area so an important man to have on side. Like most of the others, he is bilingual in Kichwa and Spanish and also learning English.
Here you can see the traditional hats of the parents and of the kids for their dancing presentation.
The dancing presentation by the bigger kids. There were only 35 on roll last year, including the 10 from kindergarten so the groups for the older kids tended to be about 4.
The kichwa teacher is a highly committed guy called Rufino. He is a bit of a local historian too and in the town's parade a few days later, he was providing commentary from the podium as the various floats with bucolic scenes, complete with chickens strapped on went, past the local and international dignitaries.
More traditoinal clothing...
These were actually made by the kids for the festival. Very creative and when I saw real ones made by adults at the parade, I was impressed by how well Rufino and the kids did. The kids are doing traditional dance with shaking bells on the legs too.
Incredible!
Here the girls are eating the tradional corn and both corn and chicha (fermented corn drink) were passed round to all the parents. Lots of the day was conducted in Kichwa, including the ritual of leaving out food which was done on a specially constructed Andean cross mosaic out in front of the school.
And below you can see the traditional cook up. Meat from a whole sheep plus spuds and beans. Stones heated by fire, then food on top, covered and left for a couple of hours.
As I got a nice little contribution from the UK tax man, I decided to go to Quito to see if I could get anything cheaper for the Galapagos than I was finding online.
This is Quito from the roof of the impressive Notre Dame de Paris-esque basilica. May not look much but I was really impressed with Quito. Bogota was pretty scary outside of a very small area, but Quito I found less so. Its centre is much smaller I guess and it's just generally a smaller city.
These beautiful Spanish colonial buildings and the sun made walking around the Old Town a real treat.
The pretty museum of the town below was a little long on multi-media effects and a little short on information about pre-Colombian cultures. The museum was originally a hospital and they had some good info on that.
One of the several pretty squares in the old town, I felt very safe here although a bit dodgy on some of the side streets. For anybody who didn't realise going out after dark on your own in a South American capital is basically asking to be robbed. Overall though, I felt pretty safe in Quito, but I certainly didn't do anything like that....
The Basilica....The first pic was from the windows above the nave. You could also cross above the roof of the nave to get to stairs going even higher. Well you could, if you weren't a great big scaredycat like me...
Not bad, eh?
And when I walked over to the gringo part of town called Marescal, I went through two or three nice green spaces like the one below. Failed utterly to get anything sorted for the Galapagos. But did learn a bit more about it.
And also went up the Teleferiqo (sic) where I got great views over the city and had the prospet of hiking to the peak behind the woman's head. It was 4200m when you got out the lift so I reckon I made it to 4500m. Probably the highest I've been in my life.
Ooh, that's Quito, behind me.
and the south of Quito again.
my path leading away...
and nearly at the peak....
Which brings me to the end of this round of blogging. Hope you enjoyed it. More soon :))
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