21st Birthday

Felsha's overseas birthday, reminded me of an overseas call I made.

Aunt Mary got married around March of 1978 . I did not attend: I had an ongoing contract to teach at Tonga High School. In '78 we corresponded by aerogram-- a sheet of lightweight, pale blue paper, which was both letter body and envelope. A sleek aeroplane was printed next to the postage area, Had I posted weeks in advance, it would have arrived in time for Mary's Connecticut wedding!

To be at the once-in-a-lifetime wedding, I scheduled an overseas call. To make one in the Kingdom of Tonga, I needed to visit the Central Telecommunications Office. It was at the far end of a new limestone road, at the edge of developing Nuku'alofa. Telecom Central had a dish antenna as larger than an elephant, aimed at the blue sky above the South Pacific.

After the hot bicycle ride, it was a relief to step off the glaring limestone roadway into the shade of Telecom Central. To gain phone access, you needed to prove that you had cash. A stout clerk, aware of her importance as the Kingdom's gatekeeper, took my five pa'anga, and indicated my position in the phone queue. The phone cubicles had sound absorbent tiles, like the ones in a language laboratory, but the cubicles were open to passersby. I could overhear different conversations with destinations like Auckland and Melbourne. Most of the sessions sounded precious. When my turn came, the mighty o/s operator assigned me a numbered cubicle--in Tongan. I felt proud and grateful I could understand her words.

After a few clicks and whistles, I could hear a Aunt Sandy over celebration hubbub in Connecticut. All the family was there, and certainly-- Aunt Mary was getting married!

Leaving telecom, feeling cooler, I stepped back into the limestone sunlight. I glanced to the motionless satellite dish. The behemoth had assisted me, and I was thankful.

Pontifica Universidad Catolica Ecuador

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Pix from Quito

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Sunday Night

9:15pm, an earthquake! It shook our 6^th floor apartment softly, rocking the bed and alerting me that there was an earthquake. My host-mom became terribly frightened and began moving around in a slight panic. My host sister (Gaby) and I didn’t pay too much attention to it.

“Guapolo: A Mixed Celebration”

This past Saturday night, I joined a few friends and went to a local indigenous festival mixed with Catholic tradition. Held in the bottom of a valley a few minutes from my house, Guapolo is one of the ferias I have heard so much about—a feria is a local indigenous celebrations mixed with Catholic celebrations. Guapolo was a festival honoring the Virgin Mary.

We took a taxi as far as we could before being let out a ways before the festival. Walking down the hill into the valley, we could hear music playing from a live band and could see hundreds of people dancing and milling.

Arriving to the bottom of the valley, there were hundreds of people congregated right outside a beautifully lit white church and a stage up front. A live band was playing Ecuadorian music and people were watching, dancing, and drinking. There were people dressed in costumes, varying from clown suits (complete with papier-mâché masks), people dressed in animal type costumes (a full fur suit—like big foot), and other type of costumes.

To the left of our entrance, right next to the church, was a bonfire that was being attended to by little kids about 7-12 years of age. A pile of eucalyptus tree branches had been made and kids were throwing the branches onto the nearby fire. As we made our way to the bonfire through the throng of people, fireworks began to go off near the stage. The types of fireworks that produce golden sparks and spin around were being thrown around the crowd!

After making it safely away from the fireworks and to the bonfire, we watched as a large structure made out of wood (it looked a bit like 4 ladders put into square form) came out into the middle of the audience. A picture of the Virgin Mary was on each side and from the structure began to spew fireworks again, showering all nearby audience members with sparks!! People were cheering and dancing around the fireworks and they continued to go off for a couple minutes.

After awhile of watching the festivities, we made our way back up the mountain, stopping shortly in a bar that had live music. Although we left around 12am from the festival, I understand most people stayed, partying early into the hours of the morning (7am)!

“Bodybuilding—South American Style”

On Saturday afternoon, I accompanied my trainer from the gym and his friend to the South American Bodybuilding competition. It was held in a public gymnasium in downtown Quito and was quite full. The competition started at 4pm and had weight classes from 65-100 kilos in 5 kilos increments. The male part of the competition included a short “dance routine”—a short 45 sec. piece of music accompanied by dancing/flexing action to show off their body. Hilariously, many of the men used slow, love music (Celine Dion, Eric Clapton, Pussycat Dolls)! At the end of the 45 sec. performance of the last participant in that weight class, they would all come out together and stand in a line flexing specific muscles.

Although women did compete, there were only 2 groups of them and they were classed according to height not weight. They came out various times, in different “wear” each time—something along the lines of a bathing suit with sparkles. Some of the women were too muscular (so I thought, as an audience member and non-bodybuilder). Some however, looked fantastic and I hope they preserve themselves at that stage and don’t go any further!

Although not something I take very seriously, it was quite interesting to see the bodybuilders compete. What they can make a human body achieve was quite astonishing and left me in awe of my own.

“Bienvenidos to Pontifica Universidad Catolica Ecuador (PUCE)”

Yesterday evening, we had the official welcome function from PUCE and it was a hoot! Arriving around 7—the invitations said 7, but this is a polychronic culture after all—we settled into the “cocktail dress” event. After a short introduction from the President of the college, we were called by our affiliated organizations through which we came to PUCE and received an embroidered hat and backpack with PUCE’s name. And then the wine began. The waiters who were serving us gave us each a glass of wine (red or white) to begin the night and then the wine kept coming! A few appetizers were passed around (ceviche, empanadas, and shish kabobs). However, the amount of food couldn’t rival the amount of alcohol being given away and glass after glass, the waiters kept filling up our glasses.

After everyone started dancing and loosening up, Cuba Libres came out as well! This function was hilarious in the fact that it was just an excuse to drink an outrageous amount of alcohol and the entire faculty to see the students as such. I can definitely say that I was drunk at the end of the function, out on the dance floor not caring about much. When the function ended around 11:30pm, most of the students headed down to the Mariscal and continued to dance the night away until 2 or 3am.