Arrival

Hola con todos! (Hello everyone)

I arrived in Ecuador last night at about 11:30 pm after a very smooth day of travelling from Toronto, to Atlanta, then finally Quito, Ecuador. I occupied the three hours spent in Atlanta by lurking on random travellers with my new zoom lense. >.< When we left the airport, we had to split into two different vans, to be transported to our hostel. Of course, I chose to take the second van, which happened to be across the road and up a hill, which took much effort with the combination of Quito´s high altitudes and my inability to pack lightly. The van ride was interesting, as we all piled in the seats that had seatbelts which did not seem to connect anywhere in particular. A wonderful ´curry spice´aroma filled the van as our perspiration clung to our long-worn clothing.

Our hostel, Hostal de la Reina

This morning, we ate breakfast at a restaurant across from the hostel, which consisted of very flat grilled cheese (filled with queso blanco, which is a popular Ecuadorian cheese), eggs, coffee and juice. We had a choice between tomato, orange, papaya, pineapple and apple. We were informed that the tomato was much different from what we are used to. The tomatoes used are grown specifically for the juice. Since I love tomato juice, and very much fear the onset of scurvy with my limited access to citrus fruits and berries, I decided to go for the tomato, hoping it would improve my defecit of vitamins. Although I do like tomato juice, I was pleasantly surprised that this tomato juice was almost like a fresh tropical blend. It was slightly thick, like a smoothie, as is all the other juice we have had.

We had some time today to roam the streets of ¨Gringoland¨ which basically means land of the foreigners. The area in Quito we are staying in for the next few days is very much saturated with foreigners, similar to Itaewan in Korea. We often get ¨Hola Guapas¨from some of the young men. One of them walked into a pole as he greeted us... :P.

For lunch, we ate at the same restuarant, and were served soup, rice, veggies and a choice of pollo (chicken) or carne de rez (¨cow meat¨as they call it). I went for the pollo, which was delicious. The soup tasted quite similar to scotch broth, only made from beef instead of lamb. So far, I am very impressed with the food and look forward to expanding my palette further as I spend more time here in Ecuador.