Science Off The Grid

So I haven't posted in for-fucking-ever but that's okay because really last week was basically one of the coolest weeks of my life and the rest of my time before that is pretty irrelevant.

Last Saturday morning we left to spend a week at Yanayacu biological research center as a part of one of the biology course we are doing this semester. I mistakenly told people we were In the amazon, but that was untrue, Yanayacu (located near the bustling metropolis of Cosanga) is actually located in the cloud forest, a higher altitude ecosystem than the rainforest, meaning the weather is colder, less humid, and less malarial. We learned the hard way that "less malarial" does not mean "less mosquitos".

The station is run by a bird nut named Harold Greeney, Cosanga's local loco gringo who spends his free time wandering through the jungle looking for bird's nests. There was one occasion where we ended up lost on a hike in the forest because Harold ditched us to chase after a bird.

Getting lost included, the week was absolutely incredible. The diversity around Yanayacu was incredible - the area beats themselves in Audobahn bird count world record every single year. We spent our days hiking, collecting caterpillars, watching hummingbirds, finding frogs in the forest, and just playing cards around the station surrounded by more fucking unbelievable species of moths than I've ever seen in my life. 

Unfortunately for you all my camera was on the fritz again, so Facebook stalk my classmates this week for pictures.

On Thursday, we were actually able to do a day trip into the amazon basin and holy fuck. It was humid and hot and we were all absolutely disgusting within the first ten minutes of our full day hike but it was absolutely worth it. The tropical rainforest was like nothing I'd ever experienced - it almost felt prehistoric. As we were traipsing through creek beds and mud pits and ducking under vines and bushes I couldn't help thinking back to my days with Morgan crawling through creek beds in Yost park pretending we were jungle explorers and now, that's real life. We ended the day stripping down to our underwear to swim in the Napo river.

Harold has given me several names of researchers who come to Yanayacu to study plant chemistry and I'm already in the process of trying to figure out how I can come back and do work that's really meaningful to me. I am so glad that there's a biology portion to this trip. It is absolutely reaffirming my choice of major, being here - I do miss chemistry a lot, and I think if there was no science at all on this trip I'd be going completely crazy. Even if watching caseik nesting behavior was a little more macroscopic than what I am used to, it was amazing to be RIGHT THERE in the middle of the forest watching science in action. It's an incredible world and there's so many exciting things to discover. I have never been a particularly outdoorsy person and I never would have thought that field research would appeal to me, but being out there cut off from everything except the people we were with and the jungle around us was absolutely addicting and other than the fact that every article of clothing I owned was soaking wet by the end of our stay, a week wasn't nearly enough.

"The Portland Of Ecuador"

So here I am, a little more than a week settled into my new life for the next three months in Cuenca. It has been kind of a blur but I love it. There's something about this city that is so relaxed and laid back yet I never feel like I'm lacking for things to do. It helps that I have 14 other Lewis and Clark students on the exact same schedule to explore the city with. Though very few of us knew each other very well before the trip, we're all getting very close, very fast (that especially might have come from surviving the near-death-experience of Mindo together, see previous post).

So like I said, we're never lacking in things to do or people to do them with. There's cute cheap little handicraft shops on every corner, more ice cream than you could ever eat in a lifetime, parks everywhere in the suburbs, and several beautiful rivers criss crossing the city.

And oh my goodness is there a nightlife. It's ridiculous. Bars are cheap, I have yet to spend more than two bucks on a drink, and bars are everywhere. But it's not just confined to the establishments, either. There's no laws against drinking in public, and no one seems to care about public intoxication or noise. You go downtown at midnight on a Friday or Saturday and the entire street is a party, filled young Cuencanos who seem to have far more energy than us boring Americans - the town is still buzzing by the time we call it a night at 1 or 2 am.

It's also tremendously easy to get around - I live pretty far from the center of town (luckily near 3 other students) and a taxi will cost the 4 of us three bucks all total. Ridiculous compared to the states.

The less luxurious option are the 25 cent buses which will get you ANYWHERE you need to go. You do, however, have to put up often with standing room only. And here in Ecuador, at least on public transit, there's no concept of "personal space" - at rush hour you're crammed into the bus with people pressed up against you on all sides, pushing you and leaning on you, fighting for space to hold on to something other than each other.

The crowd can sometimes be a blessing, because when there's no sardine effect to keep you upright these busses can be downright treacherous. Bouncy and jerky, the rough starts and stops (seemingly at random) test the balance of even the most seasoned Ecuadorean public transit commuters. I somewhat enjoy it - it's a nice challenge to see if I can center myself enough to fight the forces of physics that threaten to topple me into the lap of the nearest old woman.

Midway on my life's journey I find my center on a Cuencan bus in the hopes that not all balance and dignity will be lost.

Mindo, que lindo!

Heya friends (and by friends I mean parents since I'm not sure if anyone else is reading this)

The last five days have been super crazy - we got to Cuenca and met up with our host families on Thursday but before I write anything going into that experience I wanted to talk about our trip to Mindo, the cloud forest.

Mindo is one of the most biodiverse places in the world, with something like over a hundred different species of orchids and like 60 types of hummingbirds or something crazy like that. Ecuador in general ranks among the most biodiverse countries, particularly in relation to its size. The "hotel" (really a collection of small cabins) we stayed at was called the Mariposaria, which had its own butterfly house. The first night we were there we got to experience the weird phenomenon where at around 6pm all the butterflies lose their shit and start flying everywhere all at once. It was about 50% awesome and 50% terrifying - a lot of the butterflies were actually huge, like the size of a bat (disclaimer: I know very little about bats and am prone to exaggeration) and really into flying as close as possible to our faces. Unfortunately, it was dusk and there wasn't good enough lighting to get decent pictures of the craziness. We got to return in the morning though, when the sun was out and the butterflies were a little less in sane and more willing to chill out, let us hold them, and open up their wings to pose for a photo shoot. 

That day we were also supposed to go for a short three-mile hike to swim in a waterfall in the forest. Awesome, we were all pretty stoked on that. 

(This is my stoked face)

So we we crossed the river and started our hike which we discovered was, yes, three miles... Straight up a mountain. Those of us who aren't so accustomed to hiking agreed that it was one of the hardest hikes we've ever done, especially considering some of us are still adjusting to the altitude.

Once we dragged ourselves to the top, we were excited to see that we got to take another bigger gondola like the one pictured above to get to the waterfall on the other side of the valley. Until we realized the gondola was broken. Since the group attempting to fix it seemed incredibly perplexed, we decided to start on the hour-long hike to the waterfall instead, all the way down and across the valley in the hopes that once we made it there and swam for a while they would have the gondola up and running again (spoiler alert: nope)

After a hike that was already pretty much double what it was supposed to be, the swim in the waterfall was one of the most refreshing things we could have asked for. But afterwards, when we realized that we were going to have to hike back up the mountain, the happiness was starting to wear off. We had been told we'd be back to the hotel for lunch by noon, and at this point it was after 1 and most of us were exhausted and hungry. I had a few snacks in my backpack that my mom had given me for the airplane ride a few days previously that I was able to share, but two power bars, flaxseed sesame cookies, and a bag of caramels still spread pretty thin among a group of college kids. Most of us had already long since finished the bottles of water we brought, and none of us had come prepared for the afternoon rainstorms.

Finally, exhausted and soaked with rain and sweat, we made it back to the gondola (still broken) and were able to catch rides from there back to the hotel three hours later than we were supposed to. In all, I think we hiked around 8 miles, more than half of it very steep uphill hiking. It was by far the most intense and painful hike I have ever been on, but there's something really rewarding about thinking you're going to collapse/pass out and then by some miracle not doing that. 

They Put Mayonnaise On Everything Here

Hello, friends. I'm on my second day in Quito and so far I'm not dead yet.

If I die here, though, it will almost certainly be automobile-related. Crossing the street is an adrenaline rush every time and the drivers here seem to think that lanes and sidewalks-being-for-pedestrians-only are kind of just loose guidelines and not real rules.

Other than that, South America is pretty bitchin so far. This week is just chill touristing in the Quito area before we head to Cuenca where we'll be studying for the rest of the semester. We are staying at a hotel called Cafe Cultura, and it is the most charming and adorable thing I have ever seen. 

Yesterday we got to relax and sleep in before we went to a museum and talked for a bit about Ecuadorian history. That bit was pretty exciting for me - I haven't taken a history class since senior year of high school and I do miss it sometimes. Afterwards we just got to walk around and explore the neighborhood by our hotel - there was a handicraft market that everyone misheard as a "handicapped market" when one of our trip leaders was telling us to check it out. Beyond that, an excellent park with a bunch of awesome playground equipment that would be way too dangerous for wussy American children. It was all splintery wood and slightly rusty metal but I got my tetanus booster and we were able to join the Ecuadorian children in their playtime before the afternoon rainstorms rolled it. After siesta and dinner we just had some group bonding time where we played a game of picture telephone in Spanish and realized how much work we all have to do. Lastly, we ended the night with a group of us girls just sitting drinking tea and gossiping about our love lives. I didn't know most of the people on the trip coming into it, and I was pretty nervous about that, so it's nice how quickly we're getting comfortable with each other.

Today we actually had to get up and do things, so I dragged myself out of bed at 7:30 with my body still on pacific standard time thinking it was 4:30. We went on a full city tour, which excitingly enough involved a LOT of cathedrals. I'm not a spiritual person, at all, but I never tire of cathedrals (as any of you who went to Europe with me after graduation remember). The ones here were built more recently than most of the European cathedrals, but they're done in mostly the same style. One of them on the outside instead of having carvings of religious figures had carvings of animals native to Ecuador - it was pretty cute.

Tomorrow we head out of the city for an overnight trip to Mindo, the "cloud forest". It's supposedly one of the most biodiversity places in the world, with 63 species of hummingbirds alone. Rumor has it, there may be an opportunity to go zip lining. We'll see if that pans out.

And yes, Mom, the food is fine.

Winging It

Haha, get it, because I'm on a plane...

I'm sorry.

But get this - I'm on a goddamn PLANE bitches.

They let me on here and everything. I only had to explain to three different Delta airlines representatives that, no, I don't have a visa yet, and yes, that's really okay. There was a terrifying moment about ten minutes before I was supposed to board where it seemed like they weren't going to let me on the flight, but here I am, flying. They say you can do anything you put your mind to. Here's hoping I don't get turned away at the gate in Atlanta.

Aside from that moment of fear, traveling is going smoothly so far. Coincidentally, my parents were headed to San Francisco this weekend for a memorial service, so they booked a flight leaving a few hours after mine and were able to come through to my gate with me. Seeing as I'm a 21 year old "adult" who has never travelled alone, it was very nice. 

Now, here I am on what they claimed was an overbooked flight with an open seat next to me and a nice bald southern man on the other side of that open seat who offered to let me use his iPad (I declined). The flight left on time and is actually scheduled to arrive 20 minutes earlier than the itinerary said it would. There's 6 different TED talks I can watch for free. I'm leading a charmed life this morning, even if I had to get up at 3AM to earn it.

Favorable luck so far gives me confidence as I'm flying off into the unknown. More than just an unfamiliar country, this is a truly weird experience it denies me my fundamental nature as a planner. 24 hours from now, I will be in Quito, Ecuador. I have no idea what I'll be doing. I'm so used to knowing down to the hour what I'm doing with my life. Even if I don't STICK to my schedules, I always have them. The information we were given about this trip ahead of time has been relatively vague, and I think that is what has been allowing the fear to overtake the excitement for the most part - because it still doesn't feel real. "Ecuador" and "study abroad" are still just nebulous abstract concepts. Tomorrow, and every day forward for the next ~100 days, does not even exist in my mind. It's blank space.

But maybe that's for the best. Blank space to be filled with a reality unclouded by expectation. Here's hoping I brought enough underwear.

UPDATE: I anticipated being able to find wi-fi to post this at the Atlanta airport during our ridiculously long layover. I was wrong. So very wrong. It's a primitive world out there. All I wanted in life getting off that plane was a goddamn Starbucks where I could drink some frilly iced bitch drink, enjoy free wifi, check in with my parents, and escape from the ridiculously muggy airport.

But as the philosopher Jagger once said, "You can't always get what you want."

Instead I missed the tram and ended up walking from one end of the HUGE airport to the other, which took a good 45 minutes, basically delirious from sleep deprivation, heat, caffeine withdrawal, claustrophobia, and the general overwhelmed feeling of oh-shit-this-is-for-reals. There was no Starbucks to be found. Thankfully, when I arrived (4hours early) at the gate for my flight to Quito, the group from the San Francisco flight was there. Even though I don't know most of the people on my trip very well, familiar faces were a welcome sight. As the afternoon wore on the group came together (with our trip leader showing up last) and I think finally being together as a group ( minus a few who went early) calmed all of our nerves.

So here I am, on plane #2 with three hours and change till we land in Ecuador. It's 8:30 pm EST which means it should feel like 5:30 pm when in reality it feels like 3 in the morning.

And our trip leader still has no idea what we're doing tomorrow. WINGIN' IT.