"Hey, remember the time when we...."

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...hiked around Machu Picchu?
...crawled around in a mine in Bolivia?
...stood on the largest salt flat in the world?
...sat in the sun on a lovely Peruvian beach?
...stood on the Equator?
...hung out at the Panama Canal?

Anne and I were doing a lot of that last week, not just because we were maybe running out of things to talk about after being together 24 hours a day for 31 days in a row, but because we were realizing how many different, incredibly random things we did during our trip.

Our last few days were spent in Quito and the other little towns I've already kinda described, including a quick trip to Otavalo on Friday to see their market that is to be one of the best in Latin America. And it was pretty impressive, but we were feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the crafts and ponchos and llama decorated clothing. Plus, I was running out of money and also had little to no room in my (large!) backpack that I knew I would soon be wearing back all the way to the US. So I bought my final Christmas present and a pair of earrings for myself and called it good. We desperately searched the town high and low for one more mango smoothie (eventually finding one!) before catching a bus back to Quito. We were pretty happy it was our last bus ride. We had been on too many buses at that point. Saturday on the plane we tallied up our adventures and here's what we came up with....

Days: 31
Countries: 4
Cities: 18
Hemispheres: 2
Time zones: 2
Types of money: 3
Bus rides: 19
Train rides: 4
Plane rides: 5
Boat rides: 4
Cable car rides: 1
Average daily food cost: $5
Average daily lodging cost: $7
Creepy staring men: countless
Times Anne sneezed: 3-6/day
GOOD cups of coffee (my opinion): 1
Ugly hairless Peruvian dogs we saw: 2 (thank goodness)
Hours Anne and I spent together: 744

We also figured up the hours spent on buses, but Anne has that total and she also is planning to figure out the miles we covered. Cause if you look at a map, you can see that just traveling up the coast of Peru was no small feat. But it was all necessary given the time we had and the budget we were working on. I've had lots of people ask me already what it's like to travel with just one other person for that amount of time. And I have to say that it's fabulous...if you're with the right person! And Anne and I consider each other to be that person. Yeah, not every moment was happy-go-lucky, but sharing similar interests in what we saw, having the same (enormous) non-picky appetite, and almost always being up for the same adventure, whatever that might be, made it soo fun and perfect! We're both going through withdrawals right now as we've returned to our separate states and have had to go back to "the real world." Eventually we'll probably stop emailing each other little emails every few hours to say the latest thing on our mind, but one thing's for sure: you become incredibly bonded with someone, in so many different ways, after experiencing a trip like ours together! Now if I could only convince Anne to move to Atlanta with me next year.... :-)

Well, I figure I should conclude this blog with our last tales of the trip. Friday night after we got back from Otavalo, we decided to take the trolley back to the area our hostel was located in. It would've been quite direct...had we gotten on the right one. But I failed to notice that the dark green trolley we were in would not stop at the stop we needed like the light green trolley would've had. So this meant that we went past where we needed to be and by the time we got off to hop on the return DARK green one, we realized it was going to be harder than necessary to return. But we had no idea just how hard it would be. It was pouring at this moment and rush hour on a Friday, so all of Quito wanted to be on the trolley. We squeezed into the little terminal with everyone else, creepy men included. One was staring at us in such a way that we both knew we should leave and try to get a taxi. Plus every trolley car that was coming by was packed full. We knew we didn't want to have our faces pressed against the glass too and have our personal space violated, so we left and went to hail a taxi. But this simple task was not so simple. We stood out there, in the pouring rain, for probably 45 minutes. Every taxi whizzed by us, leaving us desperate, cold, and a little more soaked. All I could do was laugh at the situation cause I knew if I stopped laughing, I would become grouchy. So I refused to see anything but humor in the situation as we darted across the road time and time again as several taxis would stop to let people out at the trolley stop. But right before we got to each one, someone else stepped in. After having that happen a few times, I became a stronger fighter. At one point I saw a taxi get over in the lane next to the curb and when it slowed down, I took off sprinting. Accidentally dropped my brother's Christmas gift and when I paused to try to pick it up, Anne screamed, "I got it! GOOO!!!" And so I went sprinting down the block, through the puddles, past all the locals who probably thought something like "Crazy gringa." While running I couldn't see what the taxi had done, as the trolley terminal blocked half the block, so it wasn't until I got to the end of the block that I saw the taxi had turned and...not stopped. Dang. Eventually Anne came down the block and we just stood there and laughed. A minute later though, a taxi driver saw me, kinda slowed down and turned. I started walking over to him, but right then some woman came out of no where and headed to the taxi. Again, I took off sprinting, muttering it was MY taxi!!!! I was ready to take her out if necessary (ok, not really, that's not my style, but I wasn't going to give it up without an argument). Turns out, the man had just gone off duty and was heading home. The woman wanted to go the opposite direction. Turns out our direction was the opposite too, but I think I must have looked pretty dang pathetic at that point and the man took pity on us and drove us back. He was so sweet about it! When we got back to the hostel we were soaked and were going to warm up before starting to pack when the owner of the hostel came and invited us to dinner. It's a brand new hostel and he and his family have only had it for 70 days now. And they had invited us to eat with them since it was our last night. SO sweet! And delicious! So we had a fun family-style dinner with some of the other guests, a Danish family and then headed upstairs to pack. Nothing like experiencing the generosity of the Quito locals on our last night there!

3:30am came early and we were up and headed to the airport. We were ready to fight to get me on the flight that night and fighting is what we had to do. There was laughing, crying, yelling, and just overall feelings of frustration. A regular telenovela, I tell ya! I finally had to give in and pay the fee to get on the flight. All of this took way too long thanks to the incompetence of the girl behind the counter and so after we had paid the airport fee to leave ($40!), we rushed up to immigration and only had 20 min. before our plane left. I was worried we wouldn't get through the long line in time to catch it. But Anne assured me not to worry, as everyone else in line was on our flight, too. So there I am in line, trying not to worry, when I look over and see a seemingly normal guy in his 20s come through the doors. He was wearing an Inca-Cola t-shirt, so I figured tourist, but when I saw him sign an autograph and take a picture with one of the airline employees, I hissed to Anne, "It's somebody famous." I wasn't sure who though...until I saw a red head walk through the doors. Then I knew. It was RBD, one of the biggest (if not the biggest) pop groups in Latin America!!!! The six singers who make up RBD got their start on the Mexican telenovela Rebelde a few years ago and their fame has exploded in Latin America. I knew they had played in Quito the night before because we'd seen their posters all over town and Aaron and I had even talked about trying to get tickets. So anyway, I squealed with delight and whipped out my camera as fast as I could to get a shot. The group was escorted quickly through customs and they were gone almost as quickly as they had appeared. After they were gone I was aware that the guy in front of me in line had either thought I was cute for getting so excited or lame for being another star-struck RBD fan because he just kept kinda watching me and I felt like he was judging me. He was clearly a musician, as were his 6 or 7 guy friends with him, and a few minutes later I thought, "Hmmm, maybe they're who opened up for RBD." I told my theory to Anne, who could've cared less, but humored me with "Yeah, maybe." Well, a couple minutes later, after seeing a "RBD Brazil Tour 2007" badge on this guy's backpack, I decided to ask him about it. And so started the embarrassing conversation that went like this (this was all in Spanish).....

Me: Did you all play with RBD last night?
Dude: (turns around with a funny look on his face) Yes.
Me: Ah. And you guys are.... (hoping he'll finish theh conversation with the name of their group)
Dude: (after a long pause and a blank stare) Musicians.
Me: Oh. Cool. And what's the name of your group?
Dude: (LONG pause and a look that said I was stupid) We're RBD.
Me: *BRIGHT RED* Ohhhh....haha. Ah, ok, well, I'm a fool.....
Dude: (silence)
Me: So, uh, where are you all playing next? *Awkwardness*
Dude: Lima tonight, Chile tomorrow, then Europe.
Me: Oh, cool.
Dude: (Gives me a look that tells me I'm an idiot and should've know who he was because clearly he's awesome)

I haven't felt like such an idiot is such a long time. I don't know if it's because it was so early in the morning, I hadn't eaten and I had been so emotional with the airline people while fighting for my ticket, or the fact that I've only heard RBD's songs (which i love and can totally sing along with) and only seen one of their videos once, but it just hadn't even popped into my head that maybe they were the band that the six beautiful people sang along to. IDIOT. As Anne said, my question was "bold." I think she meant to say stupid, haha. So yeah, of course they were all on our flight, which meant that 1) I got to see all the singers sitting in first class when we boarded, 2) I had to walk past Dude again, as he stared at me probably thinking I'm a stupid American and 3) we were surrounded by other band members when we got to our seat, one of whom I gave gum to so he'd switch seats with me so I could sit by Anne (gum saves the day once again, Kyle!). So yep, that's my final memory of South America. Never a dull moment.... :-)

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Photos

Ecuador means...
...Equator in Spanish.

Standing on the Equator
Friendship across the hemispheres. A cheesey, but necessary photo.

Shopping at the Plaza of Ponchos
Very exciting stuff. Look at the enthusiasm on this woman's face.

Mmmmm
The last mango batido (smoothie) we had! We walked around town for almost half an hour looking for the place that could make us one. That's dedication. Or obsession?

Packed and ready to go
This shot was taken on the last morning to show that 1) I actually got some sun in South America, 2) My jeans were still wet from the rain the night before, and 3) My backpack grew SO much during the trip thanks to all my Christmas shopping.

The end of the road
Back in the US and clean!!

RBD!!!!!
The best stalker photo I could get.

Comments

[Hey Foonk]

Too bad Maha and I weren't there! We would've told you who they were ;)