Hola!

As you might surmise from the title of this post, I had to say goodbye to the community of Búa today and have just arrived in Quito. We´re staying at a different hostal this time but it´s conveniently located inbetween an internet cafe and El Fuego Discotek.

We completed our cabaña two days ago and had the whole of yesterday to visit the local school and participate in some local ceremonies. It was a wonderful way to end the three weeks with the T´sachilla community. The men all love feights of strength, so much of the afternoon was dedicated to arm-wrestling and tugs-of-war!

The T´sachilla men about to lose at tug of war!

The T´sachilla men about to lose at tug of war!

About to lose an arm-wrestle to Freddy, the 44 year old iron man.

About to lose an arm-wrestle to Freddy, the 44 year old iron man.

It was a tough morning saying goodbye to all of the wonderful people in Búa. We all received necklaces for luck and a final spiritual clensing, which consisted of the local shaman shaking leaves all over me, spitting chewed-up ginger root on my face, and giving me a serious pat-down with a solution that smelled eerily like vick´s vaporub. Needless to say, I felt very cleansed.

Ben and I making like the Búa. Note: harder to get out of hair than was expected.

Ben and I making like the Búa. Note: harder to get out of hair than was expected.

We will be in Quito until Sunday night, when we board an overnight bus to the northern coast, one of the only sections of Ecuador where the rainforest streaches all of the way to the coast. There we´ll have our own house to live in while we work on a cacao farm. We´ll start work early in the morning so that we can get off early and enjoy the beaches that we will be close to. Goodbye Oregon pale, hello bronzed overtones.

Hope that all is well for everyone reading. More to come tomorrow.

Buenos,
Alán