Fiestas of Cuenca

The weekend (and Monday, and Tuesday, and Wednesday) was crazy here. There were festivities to occupy us, special foods to eat, work to get done, and general life inconveniences to deal with. After the indigenous-themed costume party, we got to bed around 2 AM. We were then awake promptly at 7:15 in order to meet Eduardo at 8:00 for a field session in Mazan. Eduardo worked at Mazan in 1994 and 2000, but this was the first time the park was going to let him back in since 2004 (apparently he ticked off the previous director). We got to the bottom of our 4x4 road precisely on time, and then we waited a little bit, and then we laid our seats back for a bit of nap, and then he showed up. Frankly, it would have been very un-Ecuadorian of him not to make us wait 40 minutes. We also had the pleasant surprise of two additional companions for the day: Eduardo’s girlfriend and an undergraduate student from the Catholic university in Quito. Oh well, we bought the five door Vitara for occasions just like this.

Once we got on the trail, Eduardo made sure to share his knowledge with Chelsea. He showed us a few sites that we didn’t know, and he pointed out the ones where he found the most frogs. He found 32 individuals in 2000, so now we have our target (currently we are at 10 different individuals). While showing us a new site, Eduardo found an A. exiguus individual and did a little dance in the trail. Finding even one of these frogs makes it a great day, and we enjoyed our time in the field with the group. After the excursion, we returned to Cuenca for more fiesta-ing.

Chelsea has recently been expressing the difficult time she was going through due to a lack of shopping for fun, but she was to be in luck during the fiestas. Amanda very conveniently mentioned an arts and crafts fair that was being held at a museum close to the Zoo, so we went to check it out. There we found jewelry, woodworking, home decorations, ceramics, and more. Needless to say, Chelsea had a golden opportunity to satisfy her shopping desires. We then heard about a “Noche Cuencana” in a different part of the city, so we walked that way. Apparently a “Noche Cuencana” means singing, dancing, drinking, and fireworks. We didn’t find it, but we did stumble upon another arts and crafts fair in a different museum. They had more goodies for us to peruse, and we returned to the Zoo with a few bags full of purchases. There is also a collection of art galleries and stores very close to the Zoo, and they too were having a special event for the fiestas. Naturally, we walked over there to enjoy the traditional music and live dancing (and to buy more nice things).

Tuesday was quite the eventful day for us. We woke up and went out the trail in the morning to search for frogs. After the nice rainfall the day before, we were confident of making a find. After about 10 minutes of searching, Chelsea found a little juvenile that we’re pretty sure we found about two weeks ago. He had gained a little weight and gotten a little bit longer, so that was very interesting. We then continued searching for another two hours. Believe me, turning over rocks and digging through razor-sharp leaves for two hours is pretty tiring. We then went up and turned over the rock where Eduardo found his frog two days earlier, and, sure enough, the same little guy was still there. So, they weren’t new individuals, but finding two exiguus in one day is a pretty good thing.

Excited by our morning’s results, we then got ready to head down to town for a meeting and more festivities. The only problem is that our car wouldn’t start. I mean, it wasn’t even trying to start. Nothing. Of course it chose to die at the top of the 4x4 road. Of course it chose to die during the five day holiday when no mechanic is working. We then implemented our Ecuadorian-honed plan-changing skills and got ready to walk down the mountain to the bus stop. When we got to the ranger house, the ranger there insisted on trying to help us. So, we walked back up to our house and let him take a look at the car. He decided to try a push start, but this only succeeded in getting the car stuck about 40 yards farther down the road. Well, it was worth the effort. The ranger happened to be heading down for the fiestas as well, so we all walked together (with us giving an English lesson along the way).

Now, in addition to working for the national park, our friend Jose happens to be in a band. Apparently they were all biology students in school. They are also pretty popular here in Cuenca. They also happened to be playing at the concert in the city’s main park. Interested in hearing their music, Chelsea and I made sure to be at the show. They were pretty good, and the crowd definitely loved them. Afterwards, we got to experience Ecuador’s love of pyrotechnics. Let me tell you that this experience makes it readily apparent why we have safety precautions in our country. Here, however, running directly into a crowd while carrying a firecracker-laden, paper-maché cow over your head is just good sport. And letting people stand right next to a tower that spews fireworks twenty yards in every direction is a really good time. Really, it made the 4th of July seem about as thrilling as a session of chair yoga for senior citizens. Oh, and we also enjoyed the fiesta’s typical food: the colada morada and guagua de pan. The colada is made from a black corn flour and pieces of fruit. One time we had it served hot, another time served cold—but both times it was served with a spoon. The guagua (pronounced wah-wah, meaning child) de pan is a piece of bread shaped and decorated with icing to look like a baby. Brad liked the sweets enough to go back for seconds!

Of course, as Chelsea pointed out, everybody was too tired from four days of all-out partying to want to do anything on Wednesday. There were no concerts, no crazy cows, and certainly no firework castles that evening. We just followed the cue and went to sleep early. And so began the adventure of getting our car towed . . .

After conducting several conversations with the insurance company, we finally found out that a tow truck was coming all the way from Guyaquil (5 hrs away) to rescue our car. But it never arrived, it called to say it was 10 minutes away but then had some kind of trouble and they had to send another truck. We started the process at 9:00am, and by 1:00 we finally had a tow truck. Then we had to get it through 2 gates and up 4 km of a 4x4 road to our car. When we got to the car, the driver diagnosed that it was just a bad battery and 2 rangers helped Brad push start the car. We got it going, drove down to an electromechanic, and within 10 minutes he had replaced the battery and charged us $88. Problem solved.

Now, we are preparing for a trip to the Amazon. Brad plans to run a free clinic to provide antiparasitics to the kids and I will study the frogs there. We are both looking forward to the warm weather and to another adventure!