La Mitad del Mundo

First full weekend in Quto! Before I start with the good parts I have to take back some of my success that I declared after returning from La Mariscal on Friday night. Saturday afternoon we had a group gathering and learned that after the cab driver let me out he proceede to completely scam Sheena and Kola. Turns out Kola ended up paying him $20 for a ride that shouldn´t have cost more than $4! In retrospect I see our deal breaker probably was when I was telling the cabbie that we each were going to three different locations one address was read right off a piece of paper, serving as our surrender flag. Knowing that we all had a limited amount of Spanish it was too easy for him, not to mention we´d been in the city hardly a week. Live and learn I guess. I still feel pretty good that I got us in a cab period.

Anyway, back to good stories. Saturday morning the entire Ceiba goup gathered at el Jardín Botánico de Quito for a little introduction into the environments and plants we soon will be adventuring off amongst. The botanical garden was very pretty, lush, green, and in the middle of a large park, La Carolina. There were tons of families and friends out in the park playing soccer, and Ecuadorian version of volleyball, biking, walking, eating street food and just enjoying one another´s company. Meanwhile our Ceiba family toured the garden and saw many tropical plants, a few temperate trees that can survive down here, and a dry environment plant display, as well as as fantastic greenhouse filled with orchids, aroids and bromeliads. There also was an ethnobotany area that had crops native to the region.

After the botanical garden we headed to the mall to eat at the highly anticipated Crepes y Waffles. I didn´t think crepes or waffles sounded all that amazing, after all I´ve eaten a lot of both of them in my day. I was wrong. The crepes have almost anything with them that you can imagine. Curried chicken, peanuts, salsa, avacado, cheese of many varieites, mushrooms, spinach, tomatoes, fruits, vegetables galore and things I can´t even remember. There were so many combinations of crepe fillings, either sal o dulce (salty or sweet) that I didn´t even get to the waffle part of the menu. In the end I ordered the ¨Crepe Poblana¨a crepe filled with salsa, avacado, cheese and a special sauce. Half-way through my crepe I switched with Christa and had half of her curried chicken, raisin and peanut crpee. ¡Que rico! Just when we thought that we were full, the ice cream menu came back around. When I say ice cream I don´t mean just a scoop of this or that, this was ice cream in a fancy glass dish with artfully arranged pieces of fruit, cake, cookies, chocolates or caramel. It was all about presentation and taste, guilt free of course! My ice cream was topped with a colorful paper parrot!

Following a more then satisfying lunch we said goodbye to Joe and Cath and hopped on the Ecovía destined for a market in La Mariscal. Well Karl and I hopped on, but everyone else apparently decided to wait for the next one. Anyway, knowing sort of where to go, we got off right at the park in La Mariscal. THere was a market at our stop so we wondered in expecting that the rest of the group would come soon. We walked through the whole thing and still nobody came. We walked up the street thinking there was another market, but no sight of anyone or another market. I dwadled as much as I could, then told Karl he could go if he wanted, I´d get home fine. Solo I went back in the market, bought a couple of things and then feeling defeated got back on the Ecovía and headed home.

Turns out there are two markets that close togehter and the one where the rest of Ceiba went was ¨inside¨ not just tents set up in the pakr like the one Karl and I landed at. Oh well, just one more place I can look forward to visiting later in the semester. Saturday night was low key for me, I stayed in and practiced my Spanish. Not incredibly fascinating but very necessary.

Today Sunday, eight of us bussed north of Quito to La Mital del Mundo, The Middle of the World. It´s where in 1736 Charles-Marie de La Condamine measured the equatorial line. Too bad for him, modern GPS units show the line to be 240 meters away, across the highway. Still, not too shabby for 1736. Besides a large monument, an orange line on the ground, and flags from around the world, there´s quite a bit to see at the La Mitad del Mundo. On Sunday afternoons there is live Andean highland music and traditional dancers. There are also tons of souvenir shops, restaurants and plenty of people watching. We strolled around the monument, took some photos, ducked in a few shops, watched a couple of dances and then grabbed lunch at a restaurant that sort of overlooked the stage area. After lunch we did a bit more shopping and then hailed a bus back into Quito.