More Las Tolas - weeks 4 and 5

A few more weeks in Las Tolas and I have to be the most relaxed I´ve ever been in my life. The school is closed and I spend my days helping Madge around the house, playing an addictive game called Damas with Magde and the kids. I also go horse riding on my own for hours with the most lazy horse you could imagine, Camilla, who likes to stop regularly for food and sugar breaks.

That night I had a very very peculiar dream that I was travelling to Mexico in the back of a truck and trying to smuggle some puppies with me across the border. My stash of puppies was about to be discovered by the border patrol when the ground started shaking violently and me and my little buddies escaped across the border and headed towards Big Gay Al´s animal sanctuary. The dream made me wake up suddenly and I couldn´t get back to sleep, it was 5am but I just got up, sometimes I like being the only one up floating around. Later on I went over to the artesanias to help make jewellery, Mariana and Rene asked me if the earthquake woke me up! They told me these were quite frequent, but not to worry. I also found out that getting stung by scorpions was also a potential hazard of living in Las Tolas, Mariana has been stung 3 times and Renee 5 or 6, but not to worry as a scorpion sting is only 1/6th the strength of a fatal snake bite. I now look under my bed every morning and night and shake all my clothes and shoes before I put them on. I haven´t seen one yet.

It was confession day today and the Padre was in town to take confession from all the good sinners of Las Tolas. Madge asked me if I was going to confession as well, i just looked at her, but she was only joking of course. Sister Luz was also staying and we had a kick about with the kids later on. Sister Luz is probably the sweetest and kindest looking person I´ve ever met, and nothing like those scary Irish nuns we´ve all heard about, so when she asked me if I would come to mass the next day, I really didnt have the heart to turn down the request. I took a book along (not the good one) and sat at the back, a mass hour is around three times longer than a normal hour. Unlike any other mass I had ever been unfortunate enough to attend, the priest washed the feet of twelve people a the front of the church and just when I thought things couldnt get any more exciting there was a question and answer session with the Padre, at this point the episode of Father Ted popped into my mind when the Bishop asks Dougal whether he has had any doubts about religion. Dougal says "Well, you know the way God made us all right and he's looking down on us from heaven and everything. And then his son came down and saved everyone and all that, and when we die we're all going to go to heaven." "Yes. What about it?" asks the bishop?, Dougal replies "Well that's the part I have trouble with."

The next day I went to Mindo again, for the project to build the greenhouses. For other tourists its famous for butterflies but for me its the only place for miles (a 2 hour journey) with internet. After making our 2 hour trip, the electricity in the whole town was out, the journey wasn´t completely wasted, one of the hostels let me have a shower for free. After washing out of a bucket for a week, this was worth the four hour round trip, which had to be done mostly by hitchiking.

I started having guitar lessons most evenings this week with Rene at Rene and Mariana´s house, after just two lessons my fingers were really sore and on the third lesson they were too sore to hold down the strings, Mariana got some plants from her Garden and boiled them up and got me to stick my fingers in the water, the next day my fingertips were rock hard and didnt hurt when I had my next lesson. Boiling herbs and plants for various ailments is a common here and they make various conconctions which can remedy upset stomachs, bruising, bites, stings, inflamations and rubbish guitar playing.

Ive been reading the Open Veins of Latin America by Eduardo Galleno, since Ive been here and its a really popular book and everyone i´ve met and talked to has either read or knows of it. It as it covers lots of the history from the time the continent was pillaged and the people enslaved by the conquistadors and in more recent times the role the World Bank has had in creating poverty. The book also goes into the the many oppresive regimes installed and supported since 1945 by the US government in response to every democratic attempt by a country to trying to stop thier country´s resourses and people being exploited. Im also reading a collection of 30 short fairytales in Spanish, one story takes me about 40 minutes - and hour to get through, Gustavo who is eight pointed out that he could read the enitre book in a day. He thought he was really smart, but then I beat him at Damas.

As the weekend approached everyone was getting excited about the religious weekend, the Padre and sister Luz were making home visits, everyone was cleaning frantically and preparing bunches of herbs to hit themselves with at the service. Although I can be a bit naughty sometimes, a weekend of flaggeolating myself with herbs was not my idea of fun, so I decided to head into Quito for a few days to use the internet, buy a guitar and get a shower. My trip to Quito was uneventful I just wanted to spend hours interneting, phoning and doing a bit of shopping. It was great to stay in a hotel for the night and enjoy being in the lap of luxury. I also bought myself a guitar for $40 so I can practice every day while im here.

When I got back to Las Tolas I had another few days of intense and stressful jewellery making, guitar, kick abouts, horseriding and reading fairy stories. We spent one day visiting Olga (Madge´s mum), on the way (about a 45 minute walk) Madge told me what all the plants were on the way, there were oranges, coffee, plantains, bananas palms, tomalos (sort of half orange half tomato), and sweet fruit called guabas, there were loads of other plants used for remedies and a plant that had glue in the leaves, we also found some tree moss, which although didnt have any medicinal qualities, I managed to find some comedy value from.

When we got to Olgas, I met Margarita the talking parrot, who was really entertaining and enjoyed chasing the dogs around trying to peck them, when we laughed she copied us laughing. She was cute but Rudie would have her. We had some fruit Id never seen before, (not even in the exotic section of Sainsburys) called granadillas, which Olga picked from her garden, then we went into the forest to pick guabas, they grow everywhere they are a long green fruit that have large black seeds covered in a sweet pulp which is the bit that´s eaten and im always eating them or looking for them.

The next day I decided to get some more dog food from a town called Pacto (about an hour and a half away), I bought 20 kilos as there are lots of hungry dogs and Madge is getting annoyed with me throwing half my meals outside for them. The journey there was great and I got most of the way back on the back of a truck and then had to wait for the next lift for the remaining 5 miles up hill to Las Tolas. One of the guys from village was on his way back up and offered me a lift, unfortunately he was riding a moped so I said thanks but I would wait for one of the camionettes, but he insisted that me and the dog food should get on. This added not far off 90 kilos to his moped, the trusty little moped eventually got us home, after a few stops to pick up the bag of dog food. When I got back and explained the Madge that Id made the 40 mile round trip to get dog food she looked at me with a mixture of pity and worry.

On Friday we organised a Las Tolas rubbish clearup, we got a bag and split up into two groups for either side with a couple of us trailing behind to clear up any bits missed. We cleared up ten bin liners full of mostly plastic bottles, cans and sweet wrappers from the road and front gardens. At the end we were all exhausted as the sun was beating down and it took ages to collect all the rubbish and I got the kids pop and crisps afterwards, as a reward for thier hard efforts. Later on when I went outside, I found all the empty drink bottles and crisp packets in the road.

The kids were back in school the following week so on Sunday a group of 17 of us we went swimming, the nearest pool is about 15 miles away in the grounds of a big hostel. There was a monkey slide two pools a games rooms and a small waterfall only ten minutes walk into the jungle. It was a brilliant day and I won all of the swimming races.

I get cabin fever her after a few days and have to head off, but I love coming back. I´ve decided to stay on another month here and go off visiting various places and then come back in between.

I want to help out in the school here in a couple of weeks and I dont want to leave just now as Madge spoils me rotten, I get on great with Rene and Mariana, I like Camilla the lazy horse, I love the food, playing guitar (I know lots of chords and two songs now), making jewellery, I´ve got to know and like the children and its a hippy rainy la la wonderland.

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