living in americ(oup d´état)a and a lake in a volcano

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well it´s been an eventful week and a half for all in ecuador and quito especially so why not discuss it in blog form I thought.

There were sporadic demonstrations in the streets of quito the past few months, but it all started to heat up a week and a half ago whilst I was asleep early ready to get up and go to visit the valley of the volcanoes (as it is known) 2 hours to the south of quito. Whilst I was asleep a state of emergency was temporarily called by young lucio guittirez (the president of ecuador) until the US stepped in and said dont be silly, and then it stopped again.

Meanwhile I was soon off on my way to see quilatoa a volcano that has a lake inside it, which was absolutely quality. By now having seen the majority of the countryside in ecuador it is easy to get complacent about wonderful scenery, but the site of an emerald green lake in the middle of a volcano with no one else around really was something. I decended to be in the middle of the crater, but unfortunately went the wrong way primarily, as there is a lovely rolling path that leads downwards, but it is badly signposted so after a while I went the wrong way clambering down a narrowing crevice, with the thought ´this isnt very tourist friendly´ going through my head every time I had to jump down a 6 foot drop, I kept on scraping myself and knocking my knees together every time I jumped these mini abysses, it was a bit like a student theatre version of touching the void, but instead I was just hurting myself a little bit each time. Eventually I got to a greater than 6 foot drop and thought, no, I dont think this is right, it wasnt I climbed back up eventually and went the ´lovely´ way. I stayed in a hotel where I got fleas, which I noticed when in quito because I kept on getting bites but theres no insects here. I washed all my clothes but it turned out the fleas were now actually a part of my body, so I lived like an actual dog for a while, but I believe they´re all gone now.

In the valley of the volcanoes (as it is known) there are pretty much only indigenous people that live there, all of whom that I met were very friendly, welcoming, even docile one might say. But on staying in different hostels outside of quilitoa I heard two stories one of a dutch family being mugged and killed by a group of indigenous on the road to quilitoa from a nearby town, and another of a german who was mugged and then stoned to death for his camera. The two stories might be true but at the same time there is so much casual racism apparent at times here towards the indigenous that I am lead to believe the contrary. Anyway the rest of the quilotoa circuit (as it is known) is pretty uneventful, just villages with few inhabitants, but they have good markets on sundays but I missed them all.

On my return to Quito I found out that a state of emergency had been called and recalled over the weekend.

The week before this there had been a strike in Ecuador which was dubbed a failure by press and public alike, and during this time the government had produced some awesome pieces of propaganda about how good they were. The advert is Two builders (representing the proletariat) are at work and one (the stupid one) says he´s going to strike on tuesday and the other guy (the wise one) reels off all the things that the government has done for the people, interest levels havent rised, petrol hasnt risen, all points to do with the financial situation in ecuador. This point of view of the wise one is shared by almost all the taxi drivers in quito who dont see the point of striking and all that.

After the strike was dubbed a failure this seemed to fuel the fire of the people´s discontent who then just formed protests organically (I use that word to indicate that they had no leader, it just happened, not sure if it works here which accentuates that these people really dont like lucio). My personal opinion on the matter (which I share with the ecuadorean who I am living with, although we disagree on a nuance of democracy) is that yes the government is bad, and rife with nepotism (Lucio literally employed his family in government, literally. He gave jobs to uncles, aunts, brothers children, mates, cousins, everyone), and the people have a right to protest and tell this guy that hes really rubbish, but a coup (golpe de estado) will not help the situation. Lucio was the result of a coup, two years later, he is gone, the president before lucio was inaugurated as the result of a coup, he was binned by the people two years later as well un circulo vicioso one might say. The point on which the lady in my house and I disagree on is whether the people gathering together and removing a president forcedly from office is democracy or not. She believes it is the epitome of living breathing democracy, as the people are literally hands on ruling their country. I personally think that the people just needed to wait three years and actually vote someone in to office properly, democracy with a soft touch yes, but Im sure that in the long run it might be better.

Anyway there was a massive protest last week tuesday, with between 100 and 200 thousand attendants, who gathered in the parque carolina and then after a while thought lets go to the government building. At this point stories differ, some media sources say that the protest was utterly peaceful and unprovoked the police began to use tear gas to disperse the crowds for no reason at all. Others at the march saw that the majority of the people were peaceful but some students began to throw stones at the police (which wasnt wise) who then started throwing tear gas at them. (Apparently the order to use violence was also given by Lucio which didnt really further enamour him with the people). But whichever way you look at it the police definitely want tear gas crazy. They were prone to use it before in the old part of the city so about once a week on my way to the volunteer project the bus would drive through an area with people choking and people would quickly try to close the windows before the gas entered. The police actually at times fired tear gas deliberately in front of and behind the masses (in the recent protest this is) which negates the point of using it as a dispersant, they also sprayed water over the people who were struggling to breath anyway, apparently tear gas and water dont mix great too (dont know if any chemists are reading this and would care to explain...?). A chilean reporter died of a heart attack brought on by the fumes, someone else died too, and there was 200 wounded or cases of asphyxiation.

After this Lucio, charming lovely man that he is, paid 5000 heavies to come north from guayaquil to protect the poor lad. The heavies were plucked from prisons, were ex cons and then an assortment of people who wanted to get some cash. He also bought an army of indigenous by means of rice and tuna. Essentially he was creating or rather exacerbating the rivalry between the main land (tierra) and the coast (costa). The following day the people of quito barricaded the roads to stop the heavies arriving, mothers skived off (se echaron a la pera) work to park their cars in the middle of the road to stop coaches approaching.

But some if not all the coaches eventually got through, and then stupid things started happening, a gang of four stationed themselves in the edificio de ministerio de bienestar or social welfare I guess (do we english have a social welfare minister? I couldnt think of one guess it falls under someones jurisdiction though), and one of the four started taking pot shots at the people in the streets which was just utterly unnecessary, at the end of the day the majority of the people were just unhappy with the fact that the president was plain lazy, and was just watching the coincidental bouyance of his economy around him and not doing much more for the past two years. Lucio also pardoned and allowed back in to the country a certain abdalá bucaram who had robbed the country blind a while back and had been living in a 5 star hotel in panama every day since he was banished. This had irked the people somewhat as well. The edifico del ministerio de bienestar was later attacked by the mob, and I saw one poor lad on tv who left in a hurry and a group of lads started to beat him senseless with blocks of wood, causing the police nearby to again use tear gas to stop them.

The congress quicksharp removed lucio from office who quit afterwards I believe as some vain attempt to pretend he wanted to go. He was sacked for absence of office I believe, but that wasnt true they just needed something to pin on him, and within half an hour they had inaugurated a new president, whom the people didnt like either.

The police and the army removed their support from Lucio who the had to run like a bastard to stop the people from lynching and probably killing him (cant say for sure but probably someone would have). He tried to get to the airport but the people flooded the runways to stop that, so he got back in his helicopter (he went to the airport in a helicopter) and the people carried on searching for and chasing for him like an episode of catch the pigeon.

Lucio got offered political asylum by brazil and hid in their embassy for ages, and then went to brazil in the middle of the night with his tail between his legs (humillado y derrotado).

But now the people have changed their mind again. Before lucios removal the city was filled and I mean filled with the sound of ´lucio fuera´ or out with lucio, and they had a little beat going on to accopany it too, so every car in every street constantly beeped the tune so all you could hear was lucio fuera everywhere you went. But now that he´s gone it´s changed to ´todos fuera´ or ´why dont you all just go away´ (referring to the congress). so it´s calmed down a bit, but it´s not over yet. Thanks for reading.

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Photos

quilotoa
lake in the middle of the volcano

cabañas in the middle of the volcano
Unfortunately I found out about this place AFTER I´d paid for fleas.

lady in latacunga cooking my meal
The ingredients here all go in to make the cholesterol fest that is chugchacara. A speciality of latacunga, part of the quilotoa circuit (as it´s known)

Comments

[anonymous]

Hi Alek - thanks for the continued updates on your trip. It looks totally fabulous! - andrea b - warwick su