My Aunt Emma died yesterday.  I did not know her well so I can't say I'll miss her, but it is sad nonetheless. 

I wrote this last year after I met her for the first time.

Not my forte, but my fort: my first little watercolor/pencil (very quick, about an hour) of Cerro Santa Ana in Ecuador, the birthplace of Guayaquil.

The popular vote was to keep my travel stories here and open.  This is probably the first time I ever followed a poll's advice.  I can not guarantee it will stay open for long though ...

Los ojos de mi tía

or

My aunt’s eyes

or, perhaps more appropriately,

Why I suck

 

 

 

Mother of God's visits normally occurred near here on Thursdays and Saturdays.


More info

My uncle (a certified city boy) couldn't understand why the gringos love Baños, Ecuador and didn't recommend going there. Fortunately my cousin (Felipe), who knew his customers, took us there for 2 days anyway. PERFECT! Culture! Volcanic eruptions! Excitement! Peaceful and powerful water falls! Night life with salsa bars, dancing and bad karaoke! Food -- local/tipico and vegetarian! and internet bars! WOOT.

My last day in Baños I woke up very early (along with the bunnies that ran free around the hotel grounds) to catch a glimpse of the waterfall at sunrise I had heard the waterfall all night and had gazed at it under a full moon the night before, so I wanted to be the first to greet my soothing friend. It was one of the most perfect mornings of my life.

Daule and Babahoyo rivers merge downstream to form the larger Guayas River. (Stella took this picture with my camera).

( Read more... )

How did she go from this:


to this so quickly!


(I'm planning her 9th birthday at the end of the month. Jesoos Crackers)

I spent too many hours reading while listening to the sounds of the Pacific.

Ruby jumps from one hemisphere to the other at the imaginary Equinoctial line or parallel zero ( 0 0´0¨) in Quito, Ecuador.

I´ve eaten so much my figure looks sort of like this.

( Read more... )

Not sure when I´ll have access to a computer again. Ciao. Besos and all that.

Me (warning Ruby of traffic in Ecuador): You must be careful. Cars here don´t stop for pedestrians.
Ruby: Why don´t they stop for presbyterians?
Me (laughing because I know she meant pedestrians): Because it is a Catholic country sweetheart.

I am traveling to the country where I should have been born. To the place I should have grown up and learned the language and culture flawlessly. A place where every move I made would have been protected by several generational layers of family: cousins, second cousins, honorary family, grandparents, great great grandparents, aunts, uncles, godparents. Instead I was raised alone and thousands of miles from people who looked just like me and faraway from an extended family that would have been my safety net if I fell (became orphaned, needed a kidney, needed a job). Yet also I was free from their antediluvian expectations, and those judgemental appraisals from old fashioned relatives and community members, whose take on you might be so much less pleasant than the strangers I grew up around.

I love America and its Utopian dream of racial equity and political freedom. I admire its banishment of a caste system, and the pull-yourself-up-from-your-bootstraps dream. I was born here; I am an American. I have the American mentality of thinking -- if I try hard enough I can accomplish anything no matter what my skin color, my gender, my socioeconomic background or connections. I still believe this despite seeing much evidence to the contrary. But all my life I couldn't help but feel that I slipped in through the back door of a beautiful whitewashed two story house and pretended to be part of the family already living there. I am that bastard child that looks a little different but accepted at arms length - sort of, anyways. I watched my beautiful stepsisters and stepbrothers blend so effortlessly with the crowds, while I stood by the wall waiting to be asked to dance. I longed to be and look just like them.

So soon I will be the American with the thick gringo accent but the Indian nose, vaguely Asian eyes and skin the color of those around me. I will witness what I was supposed to be if events that happened before I was born had been only slightly different. I wonder if in two weeks I will feel that I missed out having the easy peace and sense of belonging, or relieved about my narrow escape.