NvEoUlMkAeNrN

Weekend Weekend

Friday was uneventful. School. Lunch. Internet. Oh, Dinner.
Michael, Brigithe, Katrinna, Kate, Janis, Emily, and Volker went to Mongo’s, the all-you-can-eat select-your-own-bowl-of-meat-and-veggies Mongolian BBQ place, staked out a large table in the back and played cards for about 4 hours. Asshole was the game. It was fun. A standard Asshole game.

The notable quote was definitely Michael talking about whether he should get his California vehicle registration renewed for while he’s driving through Peru and the rest of SA. “I may have to pay something… If I don’t pay something”

Oh right, later that night we headed to the dreaded Blooms again. I see the same characters there every time. One guy, I can’t help calling him Status of Liberty is this big latino guy who does his hair up in this spiky Statue O.L. style and ends up there every night. Then there’s haughty dreadlock guy who thinks he’s better than everyone else. Hmm, maybe that was me a few years ago. The music wasn’t so bad this time. Cover was only $2 and It was fun dancing to the music up in the corner where the girls would show up from time to time when they’re have too much of the machismo on the dancefloor.

Late night kebabs on the way home and all is golden.

I didn’t really pursue doing anything with Beth on the weekend and wasn’t really sure what the hell to do because I wanted to stick around and play some ultimate on Sunday. Michael, Briithe, Katrinna, and Kate were headed to the big market in Otavalo so I figure why the hell not and I check it out.

Late risers on Saturday. I needed some rest. We eventually get to Otavalo at 2pm or so, the market starts shutting down at 6pm. We walk through the Market a bit I bought 2 bags and a necklace. Looking at clothes was painful. I ran into the same problem as in Bali. Either too small or the quality was CRAP. Shirts with single seams that I know will come off after the first washing, yes, even a handwashing. It’s a shame about all the nice fabric they use to make this clothing. I’m sure I would have found a store that caters to consumers of quality clothes somewhere in Otavalo but I didn’t have the time to wander around for too long. Maybe I’ll go back on a lazy day.

The best thing we found,… well, Michael found it, was a bunch of 13 nacked baby dolls. They were perfect for the rear-view on his jeep. Haggle Haggle Buy. It was only later that we discovered that these damn babies are squirt guns. We did a whole series of photos - hell of a good time - i love getting together with someone else who shares my passion of taking pictures os silly things :)

Oh shit would you look at the time, 6:15 already. Kate and I, the going back to Quito contingent, said our goodbyes and hurried back to the bus stop to catch a bus back to Quito. Hmm…. The lot is nearly empty. Crap. Ask around, no more buses to Quito. Luckily we were near the Pan-American highway and took a quick cab out to it and within 3 minutes we were on a $2 bus back to Quito.

I actually had the presence to ask the bus driver what the best place to get off in Quito was. We were taking a cab any way - we were able to avoid the super-seedy bus terminal by jumping off the bus at a highway interchange and hopping into a beautiful old unmarked rogue Datsun station wagon cab to take us back to the hostel. I’ve heard some sketchy things about cabbies gone bad from time to time… but hey, ya gotta have some adventures too.

Indian food for dinner. Sleep. Wake at 7:30 and meet the ultimate players at 8:30 at the Mr. Bagel on Portugal Street.

One of the guys works at the German School in the Cumbaya (sp) valley adjacent to Quito and we all drove over there to some lush field at the expensive high school for all the rich kids of germans/swiss/austrians/… working in and around Quito. Goddamn, you get winded playing 3 games to 10 and 1 game to 5 at this altitude without subs. Good fun though and I was already feeling a lot better than I did on Thursday. The dog was running around chasing birds the whole time. Baby was lying in the shade. I was teaching thumbers.

Kick ass ice cream and some quiche bridged me over to the BBQ that the ultimate crew was having. Sure enough, it was a BBQ, burgers, beer, wine in a cool little apartment overlooking the aforementioned adjacent valley. I don’t remember hardly any of these people’s names. It’s hard when I meet 15 people at the same time. Maybe little by little I’ll get it down. Lots and lots of teachers among them. So many. Teachers and a few were in the flower business.

Monday morning I packed up all my things and stashed them at the hostel before going to spanish school. Yay, I got to learn to speak in past tense on Monday. I’ve been so cripppled without it. I should be studying rather than writing this.

At 3pm I went to the school and Jose (manager/owner of the school) picked me up on Ecuadorean time and we cruised over to Marisol’s house where I will live for this week. It’s a nice little 3rd floor pad above a noisy street, well, at least I’m carrying my earplugs for a reason. We went grocery shopping and cooked dinner. There’s also a 19 year old girl from the US that lives there and being the sucker that I am I can’t remember her name either. I’ll wait deparately until Marisol calls her by name another time. It’s good to get away from the Hostel for a bit. I spend more time studying Spanish and speaking it. It’s not so easy to get distracted.

Oh, and she already had a mini-plug audio cable plugged into her reciever so I was able to rock some jazz for dinner over the mp3 player without a hitch.

On and on and on, I’ll head to ultimate soon and return to the house for dinner… I’m starting to have to decide where I want to go after this week. Hmmm… Some friends went to the hot springs in Papallacta last Sunday and gave great reports. Alex and Becca say I should check it out too. Maybe I’ll find a chance to do that this weekend.

Michael emailed to check If I want to meet him in La Paz in early March to drive around the Atacama Desert in his Jeep… oy, that’s really hoofing it through Peru. I have some thinking to do. And flights to Bogota at $154 dollars. Stabbing up there might be nice as well, everyone whom I’ve talked to who was there has loved it.

Posted by volker at February 10, 2004 04:56 PM