South American Bus Fail

Television Screen Nightmare

Women screaming, babies crying, bombs exploding while men shoot, fight, stab, rape and murder their way through the most excruciatingly bad Asian movies ever made. These movies are served up on almost every bus I boarded in South America, with children's eyes glued to the screens for the duration of their trip. In the first five minutes of every movie there is a gun involved and someone is shot. The drama continues in this fashion, culminating in scores of people of a darker persuasion murdered in order to rescue three white people, one of whom is usually a beautiful woman with an impressive cleavage and a rubber mouth. The amount of blood and gore expended to make the save could fill five bathtubs.

This is what to expect after the bus leaves the station when the overhead television is switched on and the fun begins. It's torture for the ears, too, as these lackeys play the videos at ear-shattering volumes while the screen looms down at you from overhead. The screen can be suffering from gray or red sheens, grainy or pock-marked, nothing is clear and there is no getting away. Suffer or disembark. If you're particularly unlucky, the bus may have more than the one screen. And if you complain, people look at you as nothing but an American spoiler.

For some reason, it's not okay to experience silence anymore, to read a book quietly in your seat or look out the window at the landscape. We must be filled at all times, full time, our brains engaged in mind-numbing activity as we soak it up. Smoking is not permitted on buses, don't want to ruin the children's lungs, but this soul destroying, violent nonsense is permissible.  I soon became exhausted with asking bus drivers to either turn it down, or slow down.  Bus rides in South America can be an unsettling experience, that is, if you live to tell about it.  Which brings me to the next part of my story.............



The Bus Drivers

I've been on hundreds of buses all over the world, but the worst drivers are here in South America. If they're not drinking while they're driving, or drinking at the many truck stops, they're hung-over and sleepy. And if they're not grouchy and moody, they're manically smoking and drinking coffee and talking with the sidekick helper, or one of the passengers sitting on the dashboard.

On a bus ride to Guayaquil, the bus driver was playing chicken with another bus driver as we were coming down a steep mountain from Zaruma. I looked out my window to see a bus staying beside ours for a good ways down the mountain and I thought the bus just couldn't get up the piss to pass when I realized our bus driver wouldn't let him pass. The driver and his lackey were laughing and pointing out the window to the other driver.  It was great fun!  Except these roads are dangerous with blind corners at steep curves and the two of them laughing their faces off was unsettling.

I waved to get the sidekick's attention and he stumbled laughing through the aisle. In Spanish I said, 'es peligrosos,' and in English, 'it's not funny cocksucker.'  Oh, they slowed down in good time and we obviously made it to our destination, but these are the kind of scenarios you're likely to encounter, all in good fun, in South America.

 

Quito City

Quito, the capital of Ecuador, is one of the most beautiful capital cities in the South American Andes, sitting at the base of Mount Pichincha. Diverse, cosmopolitan, rich in culture and colonial architecture, it has an altitude of 9200 feet, making it the highest capital after La Paz, Boliva. The weather is mild all year round with its two seasons: wet and dry (winter and summer), with the dry season lasting from June until September. Quito has been named the 'Heritage of Mankind' by the United Nations and has a population of approximately 1,500,000. Women travelling alone won't be hassled here and I felt totally safe day and night. Of course, ask the hotel staff where you shouldn't go at night alone, it always helps.
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I didn't stay in Quito very long, only for a few days. But when I was there I stayed at La Real Audiencia which was expensive for me - $26.00 a night, but by the time I got to Quito I wanted hot water in a clean shower. The place was polished and the staff were very helpful. They had a restaurant/bar upstairs where they served breakfast with great coffee.



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There were many accordion players on the street in Quito, but the one who impressed me most was the fellow with the white accordion - he really knew how to play. It seemed peculiar that every accordion player was blind. Maybe I should give up playing the accordion forever or I'll go blind, or maybe I'll just keep on playing until I need the proverbial glasses.



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New Year's Celebrations in Zaruma

By midnight on New Year's Eve in Zaruma, it was just too dangerous to be on the street what with all the staggering drunken men, the liquor bottles being smashed on the boardwalk and the trucks racing through the streets. I plopped my feet up on my balcony railing and watched the show.

A half dozen pick-up trucks filled with drunken revelers raced back and forth, up and down the main street, cheering and screaming as they chucked things on to the road, clinging to the sides of the truck. A few almost fell off and as the night wore on the trucks grew more crowded with men clinging to the roof and windscreens.

Men staggered up and down the wooden boardwalk openly guzzling liquor and urinating on to the road. They dumped their booze into plastic cups and smashed the empty bottles on the street. So many smashed bottles that I thought it was part of the annual ritual. Out of nowhere, an old woman appeared and stepped into the street and put a small bag down. She almost got run over as she stood there clapping her hands and doing some strange little dance. When she finished her weird performance she picked up her bag and moved down the street half a block and did the same thing all over again.

At the other end of the street, somebody had lit a pile of garbage and a fireball quickly shot up to a second floor window. I ran into my room and gathered up my money, passport and flashlight and stuffed them into my purse and prepared for evacuation, just in case. But when I flew out to the balcony again to check the fire, the flames had been doused and the garbage was sizzling and smoking on the pavement. It was 1:30 in the morning and the party showed no sign of let-up.

A drunk tottered down the street trying to stay upright, but he tripped and fell backwards, his arms flapping at his side as he tried to grasp a telephone post. He was half on the boardwalk and half on the street and as he lay there semi-conscious, trucks screamed by, narrowly miss his head. Nobody realized he was there. Another crowd was staggering up the street so I was relieved thinking that they'd rescue him, but they just shuffled up the street beside him and left him there. Two boys then approached him and poked at him with a stick like they would a dead fish before they ran off laughing. It seemed that nobody was interested to see if he was even dead or alive, until finally two men stopped and stooped over him. They called a name, slapped his face, yelled at him some more, then pulled on his arms and helped him up. They struggled under his weight but finally, with his arms wrapped around their necks and their arms wrapped around his waist, they staggered off. I noticed more smoke coming from the other end of town but I said the hell with it and went to bed.

I fell asleep before the revelry was all over, but when I looked at the street the next morning it looked like a building had collapsed. It was going to be one hell of a clean-up. Those few that weren't hungover were out there sweeping up glass and garbage and paper cups and empty whiskey bottles and hosing down storefronts and sidewalks. Some men had already started drinking again. I told the proprietor of my hotel about the man laying on the street and asked if anybody had been killed in town amongst all the fires, bottle-throwing, and drunken driving. He said that nobody had been reported missing or dead, unlike the previous year, so it had been a great success.

Zaruma, Ecuador - Guys As Dolls

Zaruma is a high-altitude gold mining town with very steep, winding streets. All the buildings are of wood construction. There's a museum which details the history of the gold mine, which is still the major employer in the area. There were no touristos here. You can get here via the bus from Machala (about 100 kms).

The mist rolls in quickly from the surrounding mountains and it gets quite cool at night. The dim lighting in town was soothing, not garish; however, the town can lose power at any moment so always carry your flashlight if you're afraid of the dark. Wherever I was in South America I NEVER left my hotel room at night without a flashlight, are you kidding?


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Left to right: beautiful Maria from the museum; photo from the bus to Zaruma

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I arrived in Zaruma at the end of December and was just in time to witness their New Year's celebrations. The men dress up as women on the last day of the year and by their happy faces I think they prefer the dresses to their normal attire. Why they dress up as women I don't know. The locals started drinking in the morning and by midnight the main street was littered with cigarette butts, trash, empty booze bottles and broken glass. It was the most blown-out celebration I've ever seen.
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Here's a few more of the guys. They all wanted their photograph taken and your happy picture-taker was only too willing to oblige.
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Every family makes a paper mache representation of something they'd like more of in the coming year; some of them were very elaborate. If it's money, they'd make money. The fellow who made this wanted to have a better sense of humor so voila - Homer Simpson. On New Year's Day it's smashed to bits. This thing stood about five feet.

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Horseback Riding Vilcabamba

Of course no trip is complete without going Vilcabamba horseback riding. I went with one of the local Ecuadorian guides. I told him I didn't want to get 

too high up there and this is where he took us. It was incredible, but scary at times. I was sorry that I had decided to go for a full day because by the end of the day, I could hardly sit on the horse I was so sore. The next day after, I literally couldn't move. So stretch your muscles, or go for the half day, or be prepared to suffer!
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Here's Oskar our guide, and this is where we stopped for lunch.




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We saw wild horses on our walk and this cow was peering at us from around the bend. He was so cute! I went with two other German girls. It was so steep in spots that once when one girl stopped to fix her camera she slipped backwards on her horse and I thought she was going to go ass over tea kettle into the gorge. And it was a long, long drop.

Mauricio, the Madman of Las Ruinas

Front path to Las Ruinas

One day I wandered around Vilcabamba, over a bridge by a river where women were slapping their wash against the rocks and then further into the bush where I discovered another hotel, the Las Ruinas de Quinara. I remembered the name because when I first arrived in Vilcabamba on the bus, the American fellow with whom I was sitting told me not to stay at Las Ruinas, but I never discovered why.

I walked down the overgrown pathway and up a few stairs to the front desk where I called out a few times. A housekeeper came out of a room and nodded that she would get the proprietor. The hostel was a jungle, filled with plants and flowers; hummingbirds buzzed around the open roof and brightly colored blankets covered the sofas. I loved it, so after looking at a room I said I'd be back the next day.

After I had been there for two days, I found it a bit eerie that I was the only one staying there, wandering around this huge, empty hostel, the only one at breakfast, no one in the pool, or checking in, until I heard the story of the hostel from Jorge over a few drinks at the bar the next day.

Jorge, who was from Spain, told me he would remain in Ecuador and run the hostel until the owner of the Las Ruinas finished his jail term. Trouble had occurred years before when the owner was accused of having killed someone, after which he left Ecuador for a few years to cool it out in America. Evidently, his rich family protected him. Now, he had been in jail for a year for not only having drugged and raped one of his hotel guests, but for having assaulted and almost killed a man who had talked about it afterwards. Jorge said the only reason he stayed was not because he liked the owner, of course, but because he loved the hostel and thought he could better protect people by staying.
'And when is dude getting out of jail?' I asked.
'Tomorrow.'

When I got up and went downstairs the next day there he was, fresh out of jail and drinking whiskey, sitting around the pool with an Ecuadorian woman; he wasn't wasting any time getting started on the celebrations. He looked up when I walked by.
'Do you want a drink? Anything you want,' he said.
'No,' I replied, 'but thanks.' And I left for the day.

When I returned that night he was in the hot tub with two women. They were screeching with laughter and drinking whiskey.
'Take off your clothes and get in,' he said when he saw me.
I ignored him and kept walking. The plump Ecuadorian woman was drunk, she'd been drinking all day with him. I sat with Jorge up at the bar beside the pool and he made me a drink.
'The owner only offers free liquor to women,' he said.

An American expat, who called herself a medicine woman and who was an old friend of Jorge's, was sitting beside me smoking and drinking red wine. After we had chatted for a while about all things spiritual, she told me that I was ready for the magic cactus ceremony. I was fascinated by her long dark hair and dark eyes. She wanted me to come over to her house the next night to try some, warning me of the pain I'd experience as my ego dropped away, but that I’d feel wonderful the day after.
'I'll only charge you sixty dollars.'
'Maybe,' I said.

Annie and Gustavo

At the same time, Mr. Hottub was stinking drunk and flitting back and forth behind the bar mixing drinks and getting cigarettes for himself and the ladies, a cigarette dangling from his lips as he danced around behind Jorge juggling all the bottles. We ignored all the screeching coming from the hot tub as we drank our wine. The medicine woman had gone through quite a bit of wine and was wobbling on her chair but finally, after falling backwards and almost knocking herself out on the flagstones, she left.

I said good-night to Jorge and headed up to my room, but as I passed the jacuzzi I hesitated and stepped back into the shadows when the Ecuadorian woman stepped out of the tub naked, her plump body glistening in the light of the moon. She wrung the water out of her hair and roared with laughter down at Mauricio. The hot tub overflowed with bubbles, and when I saw Mauricio's face as he leered at her body like a hungry wolf, I knew instantly that everything that had been said about him was true.

'Hey! C'mon! You over there! Why don't you come and join us?' he said, holding up his glass of whiskey and laughing.
'No, but thanks anyway,' I said, and continued on to my room.

The next day I checked out and paid the bill. The charge? Sixty-six American dollars for five days of room, breakfast, drinks and videos. The entertainment? Free.

Pool tables/recreation area

Breakfast area

Annie doing the chicken dance

Jorge

Vilcabamba, Ecuador - Jose

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I watched this lad, Jose, the local shoeshine boy, as he tiredly trudged home to his family with two loaves of bread, bought with money he had earned shining shoes from morning to late afternoon in the suffocating humidity of the village square, stopping to peer in the windows of the school, knocking and tapping on the windows to the children inside at their desks, wishing he were in there, too. His wish, his longing, his aching to be part of a world that was, I suppose, out of reach for him, was heartbreaking.

A friend that I made in Cuenca is doing important work with KIVA, an organization that helps people with small loans so they can get their businesses off the ground. Please read about the important work that they've been doing with people around the world.

Vilcabamba, Ecuador - The Town of Very Old People

Vilcabamba, in the valley of Podocapus National Park, is just south of Loja, in the southeastern province of Loja. It has two seasons: wet and dry, and although I was there in December it was still dry and extremely hot. The valley is famed for the longevity of its local people and it's rumored that many folks have lived to be over 100 years of age, with the oldest up to 135 years. Some of the oldest inhabitants of the world live here, attributed to the peaceful nature of the environment. For this reason, it's been labeled the Valley of Longevity.

There's an ex-pat community here from America and Europe operating restaurants, tours, hostels, horse-back riding tours and offering aromatherapy and massage. There are also a few shamans who can give you a "tour" using the San Pedro cactus; however, the place is losing its charm as word gets out about Vilcabamba.
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It's a slow-moving, ramshackle town, a place where things don't get done in a hurry. It reminded me of Quepos, Costa Rica, one of my favorite places.




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The back of somebody's house.


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Some interesting front doors.


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The amazing countryside around Vilcabamba.




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So many exotic flowers! All these shots were taken at the Las Ruinas de Quinara.






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The Madre Tierra (top two pictures). It had a beautiful spa and everywhere you walked there was something to see, or somewhere peaceful to sit.

When I first arrived I stayed at the Izhcayluma Hosteria (bottom two pictures). It wasn't that expensive, and it had a spectacular view of the countryside, particularly El Mandango, the rockface that you see on the bottom right. There's a path you can follow that winds its way to the top. I was going to climb to the top of it with two friends, but I grew tired after looking at the first 50 feet and with 3,000 more to go, I quit. It was just too hot.




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I guess this guy was one of the old-timers. I wondered how old he was, as well as the dog that never moved lying on the road.