In mid October we went on field trip to the Amazon for 3 days and aside from getting very sick on the last day it was educational. Still not so sure what made me sick but almost all students got the same symptoms within a few days of each other. Apart from that, we spent time visiting a small community where we learned about the farming system called Chakras and the many plants in the forest. We toured through a women's farm in the jungle. Immediately we learned that Chakras are very different than traditional farms. She didn't plant crops in clean and neat rows in a pasture. Rather, Chakras are a plot of land where all kinds of different plants and crops grow in no specific order or in ay specific pattern. Everything is within close proximity to each other growing and feeding off of the life of the plants around one another. It was beautiful because her farm didn't need to look like a farm, it looked like the jungle and she takes from it what she needs. There were plants and trees of all varieties. We chewed on the leaves of a cinnamon tree and ate the fruit of trees I had never before seen. The woman, who was considered the local expert on medicinal plants because she knew them all, explained to us the function and importance of nearly every plant we came across. Some helped aid a headache, others help women with menstrual pain, and others are great stomach pain remedies. She continued to explain how absolutely everything she needs is in the forest and the people in her community are healthy because of it. When they're ill, in pain, or in need of food, they turn to their Chakras which provide for them. This was the most rewarding aspect of my time in the Amazon. Being able to see people using what they have and needing very little else because they make use of nature for what she is meant for was a beautiful contrast to hearing so much about people taking advantage of Nature for what she has but shouldn't necessarily be used for.
October ended with Halloween or as its known here: Dia de los Muertos or Day of the Dead. This actually takes place on November 1st. It is tradition here to eat and drink certain things on the days leading up. Wawa's de pan are bread in the shape of mummified children which are decorated and often contain a sweet filling in the centre.Coloda Morada is a drink which is made up of many blended fruits, and sweetened and then served hot. Both are delicious. On the 1st of November people head to the cemeteries with these foods and others. Cemeteries are filled with people spending the day eating and visiting with their dead loved ones. This is because many Indigenous people in Ecuador have long believed that a person's soul carries on after they die and they still have connections to them in which they can feel their emotions and thus they want to make sure they are fed and happy on the day to celebrate them.
November was mostly uneventful. I did, however book an 11 day trip to Chile in December from the 5th-16th. Stacey and I will fly to Santiago and spend half our time there and taking day trips outside the city. We then fly to Punta Arenas in Patagonia where we spend the second half of our time hopefully touring national parks and penguin colonies. I will soon be planning the remainder of my Christmas holiday touring parts of Ecuador I have yet to get to.
Last weekend I took a rather spontaneous trip with some friends to the southern city of Cuenca. It is beautiful there. We took a tour of the city by double-decker bus and ended at a beautiful look out high above the city. The next day we spent with a guide on a private tour of Parque Nacional Cajas. The park is located in various areas within the mountains outside Cuenca. At the highest point we reached we were around 4800m above sea level. Compared to the 2000 something meters in Quito it was quite the change! The simplest of climbs caused me to lose my breath so quickly. The weather in the mountains is cold, not Canada type cold but at least chilly and very windy. We went for a long hike through the mountains in the park and learned about much of the foliage there. Hiking wasn't difficult but as soon as a slight change in the terrain was noticeable, we could tell this meant a sudden loss of breath. It amazed me how difficult it was to climb a small hill knowing that in Canada this is never an issue because the altitude is so different. Near the end of our hike we had to climb up quite a ways as we had been working our way down and around the mountain. Never before have I dreaded climbing like this, but with reason. Every 100 Ft or so we would have to stop to catch our breath. Despite having spent many years of my life running cross-country I have never before struggled to catch my breath like I did then. This of course was made up for by the beautiful views which surround you at every angle.
Upon returning to Quito I have done little other than catch up on school work and try to figure out my placement. As a student who had expected myself to be living in Ghana this year rather than Ecuador, I am always finding new struggles. I knew it would be difficult to be here and that I would have to constantly adjust myself and especially my mind but I think the aspect of my placement has been the hardest. I had known what I would be doing for placement if I were in Ghana and I had known for some time but had to switch my mind so suddenly to think in terms of Ecuador which has left me quite lost many times. Unfortunately, In Ecuador I cannot work in elephant conservation, so I've had to find a new interest. I am and have been very interested in sustainable agriculture due to its importance in world food systems. I am trying to find my placement within this field but I fear that I may be unhappy and not enjoy it because I had my mind set on something different for a long time. It hasn't been easy to be here and I have not been able to simply let go of my want to be in Ghana. Because I had to make a decision so quickly about coming to Ecuador, I had little time to switch my mindset and I knew this would catch up to me and cause me confusion. I am dealing with this and trying to find a way to balance myself. I have to try hard to let my mind be here in Ecuador instead of wandering so much and hopefully once my mind can be less nomadic and find its home, it will be easier for me to discover where I am supposed to be for the second half of my journey here.
This hasn't been much of a critical examination of my experiences but more of an outline of how my last month and a bit has been but there is plenty more to see here and plenty more to try to understand.
