Happy Holidays! I hope that everyone's holiday season has been full of cheer!
I had a very emotional transition from life on the equator to life in below zero (in celsius) weather in good ole Boston. Good-byes were hard. I mean, look at these lovely, beautiful, incredible people I called family for four months:
(The kids- Alex (18), Dany (19), me (20), and Juli (21))
(My Ecua-rents and I)
By the time I got on the plane and that beautiful city nestled in the mountains was fading from reality the farther we rose into the clouds, I had no tears left. Some of those tears went to a screaming fight I had with a cab driver the night before...
It was my last night in Quito. A few hours after meeting up with everyone from the program in the Mariscal (the going out center of Quito), we decided to go our separate ways. Some of us thought of going to a club that my host brother and his friends had gone into an hour or so before. After catching a cab to this club, we were told that the entrance was $12. Too much. At this point, I was very sad at the thought of not being able to say good-bye to my brother. Luckily, he came out for a second and I was able to give him a hug...and bawl my eyes out in front of him and the club security guards and my friends. So after this very difficult moment, it was time to catch a cab home. There were two cabs parked outside the club. My two friends went for one and I for the other. Now, I knew for a fact that during the day it would've cost at most a dollar with the meter to get home from that spot. At night, I would pay $2. Max. How much? I asked. $4, he said.
Four U.S. dollars! Now, in Quito, after dark the taxi meter goes off and you have to bargain for your price. But, four dollars!
(this was all in Spanish, by the way):
"No, sir, $2 dollars, please..."
"No, $4, nothing less!" (He wouldn't even lower the price by fifty cents).
"I know how much it costs to get where I'm going, and it's not $4. No sea malito, $2!"
"No way, $4 and that's it," he yelled out.
At this point, I let it rip:
"You're a bad man. You're a thief. Don't think that you can cheat me because I'm a gringa. I live here. I know exactly how much it costs to get home. You're a bad, bad man."
He kept firing back. And that's when I started to cry. On top of everything he turned to his friend and started calling me a stupid drunk even though I had had only one celebratory cocktail four hours earlier. I bawled. From this cab driver's nonesense, from saying good-bye to my brother, from leaving Quito, from leaving my friends. It all hit me.
My friends and I just walked away, and two blocks later I hailed down a cab that only charged me $2.
Study abroad is strange. You fly into this new place. You know you have four months. And you know that in four months, you'll wake up one day and everything, your friends, your family, your daily routine, the food you eat, the bed you sleep in will be gone. Just like that. I got home to Boston and hated the fact that it just felt like I had never left. But, I really had a life there.
At this point, I would like to make a special shout-out to the country of Ecuador for everything it has taught me about life. I didn't even realize until I got back to the U.S. how much clearer I see certain things about this world.
Quito is one of the most beautiful cities of Ecuador. Hope you enjoy your stay.
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