I know that I have not written in a while and that is because I have been on the cost staying at an eco reserve called Lalo Loor. So here is a little of what I did:
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| Fruit Market |
We started on Thursday morning and took about a 6 hour bus ride to the coast. On the way, we stopped at a fruit market with a lot of local fruit. There, I tried yucca bread, which has a weird rubbery taste, but is very good. I also tried a few new fruits and some coconut balls that were similar to macaroons.
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| Lady selling Peacock feathers |
We also stopped a few times to see a cacao plantation, chicle trees (rubber and gum), sun coffee, oil palms, and palm hearts. We learned about sustainable ways to make all of these things. It was very interesting.
The guy working with us was a 35-years-old 12-year-old named Maximo. Everything that came out of his mouth was a joke, and you could not take him seriously. He was funny, and gave me the nickname “Dena-mita” or “dinamita”, which means dynamite in Spanish. Our TAs are really cool, and their names are Diana and Emilia. Dena in Spanish is closest to Diana, so some people call me that, but after Maximo, they can remember my name easier as the Dena in “dinamita”! I love it. I also learned an Ecuadorian card game called “quarenta” or 40. We played cards a lot.
The next day, we went on hikes through the reserve. My group saw a lot of birds and monkeys, and learned about a cool spider called a golden orb spider that weaves with gold web.
Lalo Loor is named after a man named Lalo Loor who owns all the land and asked CEIBA to manage it because the land all around him is being deforested for wood or to make pasture for cows. (He actually has his own yogurt business, and we ate a lot of it!) People sneak in to cut his wood, but the local police do not do much about it. Sometimes they will confiscate it, but then sell it themselves, so not much is helped in that situation.
We happened to be in the area for a special occasion called Carnival, which is a huge celebration throughout Ecuador in which everyone drinks and celebrates all over. Many people come to the beaches and spray everyone with water or throw water balloons at them. I’m lucky to have only been hit by a squirt bottle and not a balloon like two of my friends were.
We were also at Lalo Loor for a celebration of the completion of a special project called the three forest trail in which an American guy who came to Ecuador for his girlfriend who was in Peace Corps decided to help out the land by building a trail that stretches across three forests. This helps because of all the tourists that come help show that there is an advantage to not cutting down trees and using forest for lumber. They kicked it off with a celebration in the town of Tabuga with all of the locals and the locals from the town next door. This experience was amazing because I will be working in the town, so I met a lot of the locals at the party. It reminded me of a wedding with all the champagne and generations of families there. I met a boy named Arturo who had a mullet sort of thing and looked like he was from the old TV show Saved By the Bell. We danced Latin American style. The locals were very friendly and welcoming, and he asked me all about my family and what the US was like. It was hard because I am used to telling people about my sister having a chromosomal abnormality, but these people are not educated, and if they are its only high school. Obviously, their education is not at all like one you would receive in the US, so I had to really choose how to explain anything to him, but he was very interested in everything I was saying, I just wish my Spanish was better.
I also ran into the Herpetologist/Photographer that I had met at Tiputini named Paul Hamilton. Him and his assistant brought out a giant snake to show the community. It was an indigo snake which is a very big and harmless snake. I held it and it wrapped around me as all the kids stood around petting it.
Also, I danced with a lot of the little kids. But the end of the night I got everyone to dance with them, and we had a lot of fun with the 5-10 year olds. They LOVED us. They do not see white people often, so it’s cool to them to see any “gringos”.
I met Kari, the girl from Peace Corps with whom I will be working in Tabuga. (Kari’s real name is Kara, but she had to change it because in Spanish, Caro/Cara means “expensive face”, and that would not be a good name.) We finalized my internship plans for mid-April. I will be working in the Library and with medicinal plants and publishing a catalog of all the plants they know in English, Spanish, and just visual for those who cannot read. I also am going to try and fund-raise for the library because the better the library, the better education the people can receive, and then more opportunities will be available for them.
We also had the opportunity to do some work either in the garden at Lalo Loor, observe monkeys, cleanup the Tabuga river, cut new trails, work on exhibits in the Eco-center, or try and destroy a lot of the abundant the invasive snails. I chose to work on the exhibits in the center because a lot of kids come through. I walked around and gave all of my ideas for each exhibit because I saw a lot that could be improved. The Peace Corps guy I worked with, whose name was James, was very excited about my ideas and told me he had never thought of a lot of it before, and was impressed by how fast and how many ideas came to me. I felt I had really helped because a lot of kids will come and see the exhibits I helped design.
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| Map of Lalo Loor |
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| Frigatebirds |
Another day we took a day trip to the Mangroves around here which are another type of forest. They are really interesting and have seeds that float through the water and plant themselves in the ground of the water and just sprout from the seed, so basically, the seeds are just little trees. These are the only plants to give “live birth”. There are red, black, and white mangroves. We also saw a ton of Frigatbirds, which have these weird bent wings and fly in abundance around the mangroves.
The tide was so much further in the middle of the night, so Cath took us down to show us the algae because it lights up when you kick the water. It looks like a hundred fireflies in the water, and when the waves come to the sand, they glow. It is an amazing site, and a marvelous place to sleep. I was tent-mates with my friends Francesca and Jennifer. We opened the tent up to see the stars, and in the morning, we woke up before the sun came out to watch the sunrise.
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| Beach at Sunrise |
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| Our tents along the beach |
We are on our way back to Quito, and our final exam for the terrestrial part of the course is on Friday! I have a lot of studying to do, and then Spring break for me starts Friday as soon as we get out of the exam!
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| Sunset |
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| Enjoying a run into the water |
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| My favorite photo I have taken |
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| Mangroves |
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| View from the very top of the Mangrove Island |
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| Stuck in Carnival traffic, we decided to get out and play |
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| Everyone got out of their cars to walk around |
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| I watched the beautiful sunset from a hill |
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| James from Lalo Loor and our crazy guide |
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| Some little girls I was talking to before my mangrove boat arrived |
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| Can you spot the monkey? |
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