El viaje de enfermedades

So what have I been doing for the past month that I haven’t possibly been able to update my blog? Well I went on a technical trip, which more correctly should be called a sickness trip.

So on this trip, there were 6 of us trainees, 2 Spanish facilitators, and our boss – more or less. And everything was going grand until this one morning after a dinner of mystery meat. It went pretty much like this: So there we were… in Cajas National Park in southern Ecuador near Cuenca. 9 of us plus a current volunteer who will be working at Cajas. We were staying in a cabin in the woods, so we had a catering company come in to make us lunch, which was amazing. Then they left us dinner to heat up that evening. After a long, vigorous hike in the park, and a trip into town to get materials to make s’mores, we sat down to dinner. If lunch was delicious, dinner was anything but. It consisted of rice, a bland vegetable salad, and this mystery meat – thin slabs of gray meat in gray meat sauce. "Hmm, this meat looks strange." "It smells strange too" "And it tastes strange too." "It’s tongue," remarked one of the facilitators – one of the 2.5 Ecuadorians in the room. So of course we all kept eating it. Some even went back for seconds. I guess we were hungry.

Did I mention that of all the six different places we stayed on our trip, this cabin was the only lodging without bathrooms? Mmm, mystery meat plus lack of bathroom…good combo, that one. So the next morning we wake up, moaning and groaning. Everybody has stomach pains, and without going into too much detail, there was a constant line of people running to and from the cabin and the woods, which became our makeshift bathroom. Needless to say, if you ever visit Cajas National Park, there is one trail which you won’t want to hike cause the smell on the first 10 minutes of your walk will make you want to puke.

But even though we were all a pretty miserable bunch that day, it didn’t take away from the beauty of the park:


On this trip we visited a number of parks and reserves, as well as some organic farms. I finally got to see some llamas up close and personal:


And I can now tell the difference between llamas and alpacas. This is an alpaca…I think.

At one more touristy reserve, I got a chocolate massage. It sounds better than it actually felt…or tasted.


And I looked like a monster afterwards.

At this same reserve we took a hike to learn about orchids, and encountered a plant that the natives use to dye their hair.


You probably can’t tell, but I have red achoite in my hair. Don’t worry Mom, it washes out.

Here Stephanie made herself a tattoo:


All in all, it was a great trip. We found out that we all got ghiardia, so we got the necessary medication, and most of us got significantly better within 24 hours. In the 9 days of our trip, we got to see a lot of Ecuador, both cities and countryside. We stayed two nights in a convent in Ambato, where we had a 9 pm curfew. I learned how to whistle through my fingers. I learned how to play Dominos. I saw a toucan. I went to a frog concert. That’s right, a frog concert. I watched cable TV. And I don’t think I ate rice more than twice during the entire trip!