condense-ation

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I was just robbed. It was unglamorous, i didn´t even know it was happening. A guy came up to our table and passed out little forms that said he was deaf and he needed money... my bag was hanging on my chair, and when he came back to collect money he was oddly friendly to us when we declined to hand anything over to him... gave us a thumbs up with the one hand that wasn´t occupied stealing my stuff. I don´t really care about the money, but in that bag was my book that I was really into reading and my journal. I had spent some solid time writing a descriptive blog entry about the past while and recorded it in there, so here´s the bare bones, i just got robeed version...

After leaving Quito Zoe, Robin (Zoe´s mom) and I headed off to a jungle lodge in the ecuadorian amazon. The lodge was perched on the side of a cliff, so we had a view over the trees with the brown rivers winding through them, snakes in the grass. The clouds always looked huge, and looming like they wanted to pass on some kind of message to you, storyteller clouds, that would open up at night and pour down so much rain that you had to yell if you wanted to hear the sound of your voice. I learned that older children who come from indigenous communities in the surrounding area are punished by either; A) a spiny plant that rashes up your skin when you touch it or B) hot chili being shoved in their eyeballs... harsh! When you walk in the jungle sometimes you can´t see the sky because the trees are so thick, and spider webs are everywhere catching the light of the sun with their dew drops. We went white water rafting one day, the highlight being that our boat flipped over discarding all of us into the river... it was fun, in that I´m doing something so stupid that there´s nothin i can do but laugh kind of way.

From the bus ride from Tena to Banos i met an amazing woman on the bus named Gloria... I had bunch written down about her in my journal as well. I said Hi to Gloria without expecting it and she looked surprised, immedetely warming to me... we talked for the next 3 and half hours straight. Gloria lives in alittle house and makes jewlery sometimes, she also likes eating salad a lot because she loves vegetables and believes in the energy of food, which is why she mainly avoids meat. She got married unexpectedly, she wanted to be single until she was 27, have some independance, but she fell in love. When she had her kids she wanted to dedicate everything to being a mom, she believes in making sure you have the time to share, teach, and listen to your children... make sure your around for those moments when they share a random idea, or want to tell you how they´re feeling. Gloria now volunteers with kids who´s parents are gone or not really present in their lives. A lot of them are off in different countires working for a bette life for them, but whenever they ask the kids always choose there parents over a fancier education or nice clothes from Spain. Gloria sat kind of staright up in the bus seat, and clasped her hands gently together... she had eyes that were magnified by her glasses, brown and encouraging. Her lips were painted a shiny pink and they were perfectly outlined. When I talked she really listened to me, with all of herself, like what i had to say was the most important thing in the world. She told me that i was someone who is going to learn a lot in my life and that I shouldn´t be afraid of that, and not be weirded out if people looked or treated me differently because, she said, I have something special. We talked about knowing eachother in another life, because those connections, when you look into someone´s eyes and feel understood seem to monumental to be called coincidence. Gloria said, gracias a dios (thanks to god), quite a bit... when I asked her about religion she said she believed that God was whatever you wanted to be, some kind of force that brings us closer to ourselves and those around us. Gloria laughed in a light hearted way that would light up her whole face, throwing her head back slightly. She often feels the most comfortable around younger people, it´s something she can´t explain. I loved the human-ness of her... asking me if her makeup looked alright, being open about her lonlieness she felt from divorcing her husband, how she deals with not having sex. I also loved how she was confident in what she had to teach or share with me but not at all imposing about it. At the end of the ride i gav her a piece of smooth glass that i´ve been carrying around and she gave me a bracelet from her wrist. Robin said afterwards that I´d met a guardian angel.

Banos was where we spent our last days with Robin. It´s a pretty touristy town nestled amongst the mystical green mountains. We ate in the same cafe every night, eating and talking and drinking wine. I love the way Zoe laughs around her mom, so freely. Being with Robin was wonderful, her open spirit and eagerness to learn is infectious. One day i saw a group of men lawn bowling in an abandoned house lot, they had etched out the point circles in the gravel, a slightly crooked bull´s eye.

Zoe and I are now alone, in a beachy little town called Canoa. It´s extremely touristy due to a national holiday that has brought the entire country to the coast. Despite some nice things we´re not really feeling it... we´re both feeling a little exhausted of the transient hostel scene. There´s nothing wrong with it, but I´m tired of having everything done for me, of not feeling that challenged. We´re thinking that we´re going to find a spot in Bolivia to settle down for a while, to have a base to do stuff from instead of thrying to make these temporary spots feel like home.

A little stream of conciousness...

Reggaeton beats blaring through the walls of our tent. Bitten, the bugs are biting me all over and I´m sweaty. Watching the sunset through salty tears, up and down up and down, when did my emotions allow themselves to change so quickly. Waves pounding my body and burning my eyes... the euphoria of standing up. Culture culture, what is it? The people look like lemmings on the beach, crowding it´s sandy shores, garbage floating in the ocean... but still the random kindness, people reaching further then they need to.

All my love (no one can ever steal that!!)

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