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Published: April 16th 2006
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Hello folks!
Another week has passed, more epic thunderstorms have occurred, more piglets have been born, and here I find myself in Quito to witness the Easter processions and take some time out from the reserve.
We had another massive thunderstorm last Sunday night, and woke up on Monday morning to the biggest landslide yet...the old chicken house had fallen into the river below (see picture). I couldn´t believe my eyes when I saw the destruction. Luckily we built the chickens an a new house last week, so they weren´t affected by the rain! Also we are fighting a bit of a running battle with the steps up to the volunteer house, as with every rain storm we lose a little bit more of them. El Maestro, the chief builder on the reserve, has been spending quite a bit of his mornings this week rebuilding the steps so we can get to and fro... poor guy! Hopefully the wet season won´t last too much longer.
So, what have I been up to this week? Well, it´s been busy and varied as usual. On Monday morning I did some more admin (editing a handbook for volunteers), and in the afternoon,
after cleaning the house with the others, I wrote the first stage of the plan for the nursery school, adult education centre and improvements to the local school. Tuesday was a very different day, as one of the pigs was in labour. She had produced three live piglets overnight (and what cutes they are - see pictures!), and so I spent the day as a piggy midewife, along with Meghan, the Volunteer Coordinator. Bromelia, the pig in question, is the oldest pig on the reserve, and is grandmother or great grandmother to most of the other pigs. Unfortunately, due to her age, she had a really difficult labour, and the rest of the piglets were born at huge time intervals, and dead. It was a difficult day as we were worried about complications and the time her labour was taking (about twice as long as usual, with several hours separating the last piglets). Despite there being only three survivors, the piglets are doing well and Bromelia is healthy and happy too. This will be her last litter of piglets though.
Wednesday was another busy day, with the morning spent doing some homework on tropical fungi in preparation for some
The View From the Hill
The valley views from La Hesperia are amazing, as you can see. research we are planning to carry out on the reserve later in the month. The afternoon was a team effort, with all the volunteers going out to the far pastures to plant laurel trees that had grown too big for the tree nursery. If you are interested, the method for tree planting is: First machete some dead branches to make markers for the new trees, then gather cow shit (or other animal derived organic fertiliser) and leaves to fertilise and mulch the trees, and then get down to the business of planting the baby trees in holes about three foot deep. Being the tree-planting experts that we all are, we finished planting early and climbed up to the higher pastures just above to take in the breath-taking views of the valley and the moutains all around. It is quite something to sit on a hill and watch the black vultures soaring on thermals a hundred feet below...
Thursday was hike day, so we decided to do the waterfall hike along one of the rivers on the reserve. Because of the huge amounts of rainfall the water was really high and fastflowing, and the hike was difficult. At one point,
Bromelia's Piglets
Despite a difficult labour, Bromelia's surviving piglets are getting stuck in! when negotiating a tricky crossing I fell into the river with my camera, and it has stopped working, which is really rather horrible. (I am praying it will work when it dries out) After hiking a a bit further one of the other volunteers, Sandra, and I decided to go back as we felt the water was too high to continue. The other three went on, but had a couple of hairy moments after we left them, so I think we made a good decision. After the hike, Sandra and I headed to Quito, as it is Sandra´s last weekend in Ecuador and we wanted to see Quito´s Easter processions on Good Friday.
As you all know, it´s Easter all over the world, but in Ecuador, as in most predominantly Catholic countries this is taken a lot more seriously than in the UK. This week is ´Semana Santa´ (Holy Week), and is a big holiday here. It has been very quiet on the streets since the morning of Good Friday, with most of the the shops and restaurants closed over the holiday. Ecuadorians eat a special meal during Semana Santa called fanesca, which is a plain soup made with
Bromelia and Blanco Chillout
Having babies is tiring, as you can see! twelve grains or beans to symbolise the twelve apostles, and with optional additional elements that recall the last supper. In Quito, fanesca was on sale everywhere instead of the normal fare in restaurants and cafes. We were served it on Thursday lunchtime at the reserve, and it tasted really good. There is no meat in the soup, and the only fish that can be added to it is strongly salted cod.
So, after arriving on Thursday evening and doing a bit of grocery shopping, Sandra and I, plus two other girls, Connie and Carrie, who we met at the hostal, came with us on Good Friday morning to the Old Town to watch the Good Friday procession. It was a very strange experience, with locals dressed either in purple robes with pointed hoods that covered their faces, or were dressed as Christ and carried huge wooden crosses or wooden beams across their sholders through the streets. Every few ´christs´there was a marching band playing a dolorous and out of tune funereal march. The atmosphere was solemn and surprisingly affecting, with the men struggling under the weight of the crosses, walking as they were in bare feet, and some wearing
manacles and chains. The ages of the participants included young and old, with disabled and able-bodied travelling together. The suffering was palpable, with the more extreme participants flagellating themselves with leather thongs or nettles. I guess their reason for participating was penance, but it was a truly surreal sight. While watching the procession I made my second starring role on Ecuadorian TV (an interview as to what I made of it all). I hope it oesn't get aired, as I hadn't a clu what to say! After the procession passed we escaped the huge crowds and found the most famous ice cream shop in Quito where we chilled out and ate fabulously-flavoured fruit sorbets of fruit such as taxo, guánabana and naranjilla (the taste of none of which are easy to descibe!!). Once we got back to the hostal we all had a huge and leisurely lunch from supplies Sandra and I bought at the supermarket the night before. It was truly a feast!
So, after a quiet evening and a pizza with other folks from the hostal, Sandra, Carrie and I got up this morning and went to the Teleferiqo, Quito´s cable car ride to the top of
Watching the World Go By...
Sandra, Connie and I take a rest from procession watching... Pichincha volcano. The altitude at the top was 4100 metres, but there is a walk to the crater of the volcano, which is higher still. The views of Quito from the volcano saw the city spread as far as the eye could see - it was jaw-dropping, just like the view from the airplane when I left last time! At the top we walked up about half way towards the cloud-covered crater of Pichincha, before the hail fell. We decided to turn back and instead went on a horse ride along the side of the volcano to a small waterfall a little way away. The landscape here is very sparse, almost like a bog in the UK, with tufts of huge grasses sticking out of the ground, and big mossy plants and flowers that sink underfoot. As we rode we could see clouds rising as they formed on the ridges of the mountains. The warmer, wetter air from the city below rose upwards along the higher slopes, condensing into wisps of clouds as it does so. It was an amazing sight. After braving the huge queues we finally came down on the cable car when the clouds drew in. It was a brilliant but exhausting day. The altitude has really taken it out of me! I'm going to rest tonight and then head back to the reserve in the morning.
That´s it for now. Hope you´re all well.
x A
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John Campbell
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Spooky
The Good Friday procession reminds me of spooky things that go on in the Outer Hebrides in the dark months. They chain up the childrens swings on Sundays you know jxx