Cotacachi

So this weekend we decided to stay close to home and only took a Saturday trip. After much deliberation and watching Eddie Murphy and Asineal Hall’s “Coming to America” we decided on Cotocatchi; a small indigenous town just outside Otavalo. As a side note DVDs here are all pirated and there are done extremely well and extremely cheep. SO well they even make sure to copy the anti-pirating at the beginning of the movie! Most movie stores sell their movies from $1.50-2. Pretty good! So we set out at about 9am yesterday on an amazing drive North on the Pan-American Highway that passes through a number of Countries on the West Cost of S. America.

The drives here are beautiful and the bus rides are worth so much more than they charge, (which is generally $1 an hour,) You would have to pay 40 or 50 or even more in the US to see the kind of landscapes, colors, plants, towns and people. We arrived in Otavalo, got some lunch and pie all amounting to $6.50 (large helpings) and we started looking for a cab to Cotacachi a 15 min ride. On the way we saw the end of a wedding where after the pictures outside the church they bride and groom got into a pick up truck traditionally decorated as any wedding party car would be, except it was a pick up. Otavalo is full of little indigenous people who will hip check the heck out of you if you get in their way. If we were playing hockey a little 70 year old 4-foot nuthin grandma would have thrown me over the boards! The first cab we found we asked for a ride and he said yes, but when we asked how much he looked at us so confused and started saying “no… no no no” we then were as confused as he was and asked again how much? He replied, “Uhhh, I cant take you I’m from Ibarra,” a city north of Otavalo. “Ok….” We replied and walked away still puzzled and laughing. We then picked up a cab that also contained the cab drivers son and wife, so all seven of us, the 3 Ecuadorians and 4 gringos packed in and headed to Cotocatchi. $5 and 1 mins later we arrived on a street made up of only Leather shops.

A whole street devoted to pissing off green peace and animal rights activists! They made everything you could make out of leather and much much more and though the deals were unbeatable, I retrained my Twohig shopping gene and walked away from wallets, briefcases, baggage, slippers and saddles. If only I had a horse! Next we went to Cuicocha, a Volcano surrounded by a lake south of Otavalo and took a $1 tour around the lake. Then I played with a baby llama and we hopped on a bus and headed back to Quito. You don’t actually need to go to a bus station to pick up a bus, you can stand on the side of the highway and pick up anyone that drives by, by just pointing at them.

On a side not a number of us were featured in the last Universidad de San Francisco de Quito news paper in an article labeled “Tan cerca pero tan lejos” (so close yet so far) The article describes the distance between USFQ nationals and us gringos, but as you can see in the picture most of the blame is set on the gringos. PS the picture was taken the first week of school, yet the article came out last week, we obviously would have not integrated by the first week. Oh well you know the liberally media! It didn’t bother me too much because most of the people I go to school with are really Ecuadorians, they are gringos who actually can speak Spanish, are really rich and snobby, want to live in California and be trendy. I was just happy to get a half page photo! Soooo yea hope all is well back home! I love and miss you all see you soon!