Not your typcial thanksgiving

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dance party

Not your typical thanksgiving

I’m back in Otavalo, Ecuador putting some finishing touches on the website I’m making for kurypachamama. My original plan was to attend a potluck dinner at the South American explorers club but it got cancelled, probably due to the lack of kitchens in Quito hostels. I had to resort to plan B and stay in Otavalo for turkey day, which turned out to be a hell of a time.
The family I’m staying with was throwing a graduation bash for their son who just graduated from college, so although I didn’t get to eat turkey I still had a big meal.
The party started around 7:00 with a bunch of family and friends arriving periodically and joining us at the long table. The first plate at every meal in Ecuador is soup and today was no different. A nice corn based soup with onions, tomato, avocado, and chicken and last but not least…cubes of cow blood, I think Campbell’s should send a rep down to Ecuador and steal this recipe. With ingredients like cows blood, I’m pretty sure the cans will be flying off the shelves. The cubes were of Jell-O texture and actually tasted fairly decent. I didn’t want to refuse the soup, as I didn’t want to offend the family. After the soup came the main meal which I was excited for. The BBQ was going for a few hours cooking all the meat for roughly 20 people to eat and it smelled delicious. I can definitely say that was the first time I ate Sheep. I didn’t know it was sheep until after I took my first bite and told them how good it was.
So after munching down cubes of cows blood and eating sheep, the only thing missing from a thanksgiving dinner was the alcohol and it was abundant!! We started the night with a toast for the graduate with some champagne that was impossible to open and continued to drink a few bottles of the bubbly before we hit the wine. Once again in Ecuador, the popular thing to do is buy really cheap fruit flavored wine and walk around with a Dixie cup passing out shots for hours on end. I really enjoyed the progression of drunkenness throughout the evening. The music kept being turned up a tad louder and the dancing feet tapped a lil quicker as the boxes of wine went down smoother and bottles of rum appeared from nowhere. A few hours of dancing with old Indian ladies, lots of rum and a little more wine sent me over the edge and it was time for bed. Nonetheless it was a fun time and definitely a thanksgiving for me to remember. Obviously they don’t celebrate thanksgiving here but I was definitely grateful to have this opportunity and thanks to everyone, especially mom and dad for getting me to this point. I’ll be home in about 2 weeks and I’m getting real excited to see everyone and have a few, or ton of beers with ya’ll.

cath ya'll on the flip, keep spreadin good vibes
ps. thers a video. i think the link is in the upper left corner

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Photos

dinner time
grabbin some grub

Aprendiendo
learning how to weave a scarf

damn bottle
the famous champagne bottle that refused to be open

salud
one of many dixie cup shots

word
my partner in crime

hola
The graduate with his uncle

Comments

[Kate]

I cannot believe you ate jellied cow blood, that is crazy. But I'm glad you had a great time!