Mama Tungurahua

Things have very much quieted down (for the time-being) with the volcano.

She has been burping out ash plumes, and is a little gassy, but not much more than that. The chivas up to the mirador are full most nights, although tourism here in Baños is definitely suffering in most other ways. Many communities on the opposite side of the volcano have had devastating problems with ashfall, however.







This is the view from the road to Ambato, which is open.




















This is the view from my living room on a clear evening.


Todo normal.

Ruh-Roh.

Meet Tula.

Volcano, shmolcano; Our school bus is busted!

Up until this school year, Katitawa had a contracted taxi (truck) picking the kids up (some of them live very, very far). Since that money was basically being payed out constantly, with nothing to show for it in the end, we managed to finagle the money together over the summer for a little investment, and now the school has its own bus. A 1972 orange Volkswagon Combi.

Except, now, it is broken. There are kids who can't actually come to school without the daily pickup, because they live at such a distance (and up, and then down several mountains). So we've had to go back to the "old way", which is to pay the taxi. This is costing us money that we don't have (since we invested it in the bus). Long story short: we are short about $250 to fix the transmission and get the bus out of hock.

(Shameless plea for donations follows.) So, if you have an extra $5 or $10 laying around, please think about maybe going over to the Katitawa website and using the Paypal button to donate. (If you don't already have a Paypal account, you can get one at the Paypal Main Page .)

Good night, indeed!

So, about 10 minutes after I finish writing that last post, there is an abrupt knock at my door, which was strange, especially for it being after midnight. It was one of the neighbors, saying only, “We have to leave right now. The volcano.”

I guess I hadn’t noticed that all of the drunk singing people were heading in the same direction; namely, along the evacuation route and down to the bridge to get the hell out of town. Within 3 minutes, I gather a bag of necessities, find some warm clothes, put on my running shoes (as if that is going to help in the event of an “event”) and head outside to see what the hell is going on, exactly. Lots of things, apparently. By this time, all of the metal grates on the businesses are shuddering, as is the ground itself. There is a smoky orange glow coming from up in Mama Tungurahua’s direction. The neighbor’s one car is already packed full with the old people and the kids, and the other neighbor with a car has decided to hang around until it gets worse. This leaves us “middle-aged” people to head to the bridge, as quickly as possible. It takes about 4.5 minutes to get there, walking at a fast pace.

The bridge itself, which straddles the Pastaza River Gorge, was built specifically for evacuation purposes, after the last major evacuation in 1999. Then there is a connected road that takes you up another mountain, and ostensibly, out of harm’s way. There is a more or less steady stream of cars crossing the bridge, along with plenty of pedestrians. Most people are sitting just on the other side of the bridge, watching the lava show, which is more visible from that vantage point, and pretty spectacular, too. Everybody is calm. People are laughing and listening to their transistor radios for more news. “There is an eruption happening”, says the news. Yes, we knew that, thank you. We eventually learn that the alert level for Baños is still only at orange, though, which is good. This also means that the evacuation is not mandatory (which is what happens when the alert level hits red). After walking up the mountain for a better view, and being slightly dissappointed that the activity had diminished, a few of us decide to go back into town to the radio station, which has a direct line (via shortwave) to the vulcanologists. The radio also happens to be in the church, which is an extra bonus, as is the fact that one of my friends is there alone, doing the broadcasts. It is about 4 am at this point. So, I end up at the radio station, hanging out in the control room and drinking wine and listening to the vulcanologists on the shortwave until the sun starts to come up, at which point there is also almost no activity up on the Mama. Time to sleep, finally.

Will post more photos soon.

Viva Carnaval!

Aaaah, Baños. I awoke in the morning (in my very volcanic-ash-filled apartment) to the green of the mountainside, and to the milk lady bleating “leeecheeeee” outside my window. Lots of cleaning to do. And, many dead plants, sadly enough. BUT, the one plant that I thought for certain would be dead, was in fact anything but. And, thus, my little Ascocenda surprised me, with blooms the size of my hand. (This is THE hardest-to-grow plant I have ever had, let alone getting it to bloom… and here it was, so neglected, and had just opened up the day that I got here, as it turns out.) My landlady was so excited about how pretty it was that she pointed it out almost before she even said hello.

Aside from that happy surprise, it turns out that Baños was also having a big party just for me. They are calling it “Carnaval”, or something quaint like that. How nice of them.

Anyhow, Carnaval here is quite the event, complete with parades of half-naked (or in some cases, fully-naked, but painted) women, fireworks, lots of throwing of water baloons, eggs, silly string, and various other spray items (like carioca). It is kind of a zoo, actually. I have never seen more people in the streets here. Oh, and of course, there is the burning things. In fact, there was an entire parade just dedicated to the things that would be burned later in the night.

As I write, Mama Tungurahua is grumbling away, in a series of small explosions. It is hard to tell the difference between that noise, and the firecrackers being exploded all around town to mark the end of Carnaval. The volcano makes the windows shake, though, whereas the firecrackers do not. That said, it is a good night, with the sounds of drunk singing people drifting in through the window, and a brass band playing somewhere off in the distance.

I Heart Guayaquil

So, getting into Quito was quite the issue this time around. First there was the 11 hour bus ride from the Upper Peninsula to Chicago, in white-out conditions. Then, there was about 36 hours of laughing, eating and drinking in Chicago. Then, the Chicago-Atlanta leg of my flight. Then Delta Airlines put us on a broken plane, hoping that the technicians could fix it while we sat there (um, please tell me that they check the planes before they go out to the terminals). After quite some time aboard the broken plane, we de-planed, only to be told that they were looking for a plane that worked. So, we set out very, very late for Quito (about 3.5 hours, in fact). Once we got to Quito, we learned that they had closed the airport to incoming air traffic approximately 3 minutes before our approach (of course!). Dense fog. Freakishly enough for this time of year (again, of course). Also, for those of you who haven’t flown into Quito before, it is kind of like a roller coaster ride, even on a normal day. The airport is set in a valley (at about 10,000 feet) and is surrounded by mountains (which are around 22,000 feet). The pilot has to first clear the mountains, then drop into the valley. Overshooting the runway results in (you guessed it) running straight into more mountains. So, it is an interesting landing, to say the least. Very fast, with a very abrupt descent.

Anyhow, we flew in circles above Quito for about 2 hours, hoping that they’d re-open the airstrip, until the pilot announced that we’d run out of gas if we didn’t head to Guayaquil soon. So, that’s what we did. Lovely, heavenly Guayaquil. At 2 am. Luckily, I had the good fortune of meeting some nice Ecuadorian folks, all of whom were as pleased as I was to be stuck at the Guayaquil airport in the middle of the night, so at least there were some good jokes and laughs bandied about (not too many, though). I tried to sleep on those oh-so-comfortable airport benches, with my belongings both under my head and hooked to my person. Then we all stood in line, hoping for boarding passes, but instead were given the chump prize of a “food voucher”. Considering there were about 200+ of us, and one little café open, I figured I wasn’t going to be eating any time soon, and so went back to sleep (which I would later regret, of course). We were also told we’d be getting on another plane at 5 am, to attempt another landing in Quito. So, since I had people waiting for me in Quito, I could finally tell them what time I’d be arriving. Miraculously, my Ecuadorian cellphone worked. They’d be there, they said. Nice. At approximately 7 am, we finally board the plane. We get to Quito, and are told we’d have only one attempt at landing. The pilot says that he’s going for it. He does. We descend into the valley. People are crossing themselves. I am, too, at this point. I want to frikking land, and in one piece. Through the clouds, the turbulence, the stomach-in-your-throat jolting up and down, the pilot overshoots the runway (he can’t see it, after all). He has to pull up, and fast. We make it over the mountains, at least. But, we are on our way back to Guayaquil. At this particular point, I am not sure which option would have been worse; the mountain, or the Guayaquil airport.

SO, back in Guayaquil, again, we are herded through customs, so as to get onto a domestic flight later in the day. There is an extremely long line for this, as you might imagine. An airport official approaches me, and says that there is an elevator with no line just down the hallway. I sieze the opportunity, and go. As it turns out, I somehow still arrive to the re-ticketing counter late, and at the back of the line. I, along with about a dozen other people, don’t make it onto the 2 domestic flights that Delta has planned for us. We wait. And wait. After about an hour, somebody comes to take our names. Another hour goes by. Then, two. Most of us are fairly pissed off at this point, especially since the domestic airline that we are waiting in line at has no more flights until that night. None of us has slept. One woman has a three-year-old, who is, surprisingly, in better spirits than all of us combined, dancing around and singing. We are a weary bunch, though, at this point, even with the entertainment. Aside from cheerful Anita and her mom and abuela, there is Hendry and Nancy, Quiteños who have been living in Brooklyn for the last 10 years, Sophia and her father (Germans), a young girl from rural Massachusetts coming to Ecuador for the first time, and some English backpackers. The abuelita is pissed, as are the Brooklynites and myself.

Three of us stage a mini-coup, and go storm the Delta offices upstairs. There are about 20 people, sitting in the office, doing nothing. They all look shocked and embarrassed when we trounce in. They tell us, before we even ask, “12:15pm, you have a flight out, just go downstairs and wait”. So, after complaining to them about the ridiculous treatment, we do just that. Until noon, when we realize that we have been bamboozled. We storm back up there (through the security checkpoint where we need little badges to access their very busy offices, of course). Shockingly, they have all gone for lunch, only to have left the baggage woman there to deal with us. We are not pleased. There is nothing that she can do, she says at least 10 times. We will have to speak with the domestic airline to arrange things, she says. We assure her that that is not the case. She insists. We leave, frustrated. Obviously, the domestic (non-Delta) airlines have no idea who we are, nor do they care that we are apparently stuck in Guayaquil for some undetermined length of time. This is clearly Delta’s problem and responsibility, although nobody from Delta ever shows up. It is now 1pm. Finally, the domestic airline takes pity on us, and promises that they will get us on their next flight out, at 5 pm (hurrah, Icaro Air). At this point, just the thought of having a boarding pass sounds extravagant, so we all jump on it. The excitement is, in fact, palpable.

The plane, once we get there via a shuttle right out onto the tarmac, is painted bright yellow, with all of the emblems of the Barcelona soccer team, for some reason. I have never been on a plane like this before. Once inside, it is truly the jankiest plane that I have ever seen. A Fokker, in fact. Quite old, but an all-Ecuadorian crew. This is perfect, I thought. This guy will be able to land in Quito, no matter what the conditions. And after much bumping around (seatbelts were necessary, actually) through the rain and the fog, and through Sophia grabbing my hand in fear, we landed in Quito. Finally. I have never been so happy to not be able to breathe at 10,000 feet before.

And so, my tired sorry friends and I started the 4 hour drive to Baños, at night, through the fog and cold of the paramo, in a car that belches fumes directly into the car itself. Good times, I tell you. Good times.