Monday, July 21

Last night I dreamed that Andy Goldsworthy had a brother. For those of you unfamiliar with his work, Andy Goldsworty is the relatively famous and rather pompous artist that makes truly unbelievable sculptures out of nature. According to my nighttime subconscious, this brother was attempting to follow in Andy's footsteps by making a cool arrangement of dry linguine on his kitchen floor. He came into the Chatham Marketplace, determined for me, and me alone, to advise him on what quantity of dried pasta he would need. He was very preoccupied by telling me how large his daughter was because evidently, in the event that she lie on his kitchen floor, he would need to change the amount of pasta in the sculpture to take into account the addition of her massive body to the dimensions of his work...what does it all meeeeeeeeeeean? haha

This morning Azucena wasn't awake, so I made myself breakfast- fried whole grain bread with a creamy scrambled egg and sliver of tomato. A glass of peach yogurt and tea for warmth. It was nice to cook for myself. Its been a while.

Daniel picked up Lau Lau and I in his car and took us to Casa Amigos. I'm not entirely sure why we didn't take the bus except that it was about six thirty in the morning and may have been too dangerous. After we waited all around a little at the center and I (successfully) taught the kids a song in Japanese, we altogether caught a bus to the bottom of a mountain named Ongui. In the bus I had LiliBeth and Wendy on my lap and they requested that I sing 'yesterday' by the Beatles. So I did. They then requested that I translate it into Spanish. So I tried. It was really a beautiful thing- us in our bus seat cubbyhole snuggled up singing this song (together to the best of their ability). An old woman observed the whole scene and smiled wisely down at us.

The first ten minutes of the vertical mountain roads seemed hardly bearable. The girls clung on to my arms, adding to the load. It turned out to be the perfect time to really get to know them. We talked about their families, where their moms worked, and a little about their own work on the streets. Little LilyBeth doesn't sell candy on buses anymore because she almost got hit by a car once. wow.

Thanks to the whining and panting of small children, Antonio as our leader decided against climbing the entire mountain to the top and instead took a route south up and across mountains. The higher and deeper we climbed into the euchalyptus-scented mountains, the more blissful I became. I talked to Paul (one of the tutors my age who used to be a student at Don Bosco) about his growing up in an isolated mountain home. His entire life was agriculture and animal husbandry and morning classes in a small school and walking everywhere. We meandered, sometimes on paths, sometimes not, through cascading hills of wildflowers and swishy grasses, small farms with husband and wife laboring together. After about four hours of solid walking, sliding down hills, and climbing up steeply cut earthen steps, we came to a small mountain church that turned out to be the gateway into the entire central cordillera- the unpopulated Andean valley lush with volcanic ash from GuaGuaPichinca (guagua being Quitchuan for baby). Baby in name only, GuaGuaPichincha (along with mother Pichincha) reached its craggy-cratered head far above the clouds that were rolling in from the coast. What a sight! I sat there on a grassy sloping cliff ledge and could hardly tear my eyes away- drinking in the humbly magestic vista for over an hour. A gaggle of boys who sometimes think they're tough came to sit with me and after a while started begging me to sing. I did for a little while- slow songs and spanish songs and songs with a dancy-rhythm.

We ate hot-dog sandwiches and I had to laugh when I found out the Ecuadorian love of cilantro really stops at nothing! Some of the kids tried to fly the rather pathetic tissue-paper kites we made back in the classroom. "A" for effort.

On the way back we decided to slide down a good portion of the mountain. I haven't felt so wild and free and at home since being here. Back on the communally-constructed (minga) stone paths, I got Wendy into the "pick up the litter" game. She would frequently detach her hand from mine to fetch a strewn plastic wrapper to which I would exclaim something about a "regalo" (gift) and excitedly pocket it.

Lots of botanical talk with Antonio has led to a newly acquired set of vocabulary that I will probably never use.

We walked all the way back to Casa Amigos- down the mountain through the poor neighborhoods spotted with heaps of trash. Eight hours in all. My legs are feeling a bit dull and uncertain but the rest of me feels wonderfully refreshed.