Los Jordan Polings Vamos al Ecuador

Jonah and I are making a list of door-to-door sales vehicles (and people) that we have seen rolling past our house because. . because, well, why not? It is interesting to live in a world in which not everyone has a personal vehicle with which to acquire goods and services. In a way, it is like going back in time (Laura Ingalls Wilder's books are filled with door to door sales and service people). In another way, it is not that different from online shopping with same day home delivery, except that you actually get to touch and see the product before you buy it. Here is our list so far: 1) The Gas Truck is definitely the vehicle we see the most. It drives around with a hefty supply of orange and blue propane tanks that are used to cook with (not sure if there is a difference other than color). The gas truck comes every morning around 7:00am and then again late in the afternoon. Sometimes it just beep-beep-beeps as it tootles through town. Other times, it plays a weird song about ...

So it turns out Paul and I are not very good baby chicken parents. As you know, we lost one of our baby chicks, Shadow, early on to an unknown illness. We then acquired a sister chick, Nutella, not long thereafter, and we were feeling pretty good about her transition into the family. Unfortunately, a couple of weeks ago, Nutella disappeared mysteriously from outside our casita . We searched everywhere for her. We don't know if little Nutella was taken off by an animal (a dog? a bird of prey?) or perhaps stolen by a human. . .which is kind of what we hope because we like the idea of her still wandering around eating worms and getting fat. And so, Sherman is our only remaining chick. She/he (who knows?) is getting bigger and stronger, growing lots of black and white feathers, but definitely still a bit of a . . . well, a chicken . Sherman brings us much daily joy, perching on our shoulders, almost snuggling, and following us around like we are all mama ducks. However, it seems we...

We went on one of our favorite local outings this weekend, to a beautiful spot called Las 7 Cascadas, a series of seven waterfalls located outside of La Maná, with the highlight up at the top between waterfalls six and seven: a natural rock formation that makes a natural water slide, flowing from a deep pool carved by the seventh waterfall. As Jonah remarked, sitting on the rocks poolside, "Mama, nature is so amazing. It made a perfect waterfall with a pool for jumping, a perfect water slide for sliding, and a perfect pool for swimming." Brynna totally enjoyed swimming in the shallow pool at the bottom, I was in heaven in the upper pool under the crashing waterfall, and the boys (Paul included) went innumerable times down the slide. The only negative part is the evil little black biting flies that are really good at finding bare flesh and don't seem turned off by insect repellent. Thank goodness for long-sleeve shirts and sarapes! Thanks also to Washo's truck, wh...

Ecuador dollarized in September, 2000. And, yes, dollarized is a verb, even if spellcheck disagrees. In late 1999, inflation in Ecuador was out of control; in a matter of months, the value of the sucre , the Ecuadorian currency, plummeted, and the exchange rate skyrocketed from 6,000 sucres to $1 to 25,000 sucres to $1. People were making frantic runs on the banks, and several large financial institutions shuttered overnight. The exchange rate was expected to double again if something drastic was not done. But, when the Ecuadorian President, Jamil Mahuad, announced his plan to do away with the sucre and replace it with the US dollar (as had been done successfully in nearby Panama), huge nationwide strikes broke out. On January 21, 2000, thousands of protesters marched on the capital, took over the legislative palace, and forced the president to resign. After two days of pseudo-military rule, the presidency was turned over to Gustavo Noboa, who, despite serious ongoing opposition, w...

I had a lovely chat yesterday afternoon on our porch with a young woman named Rita, who I met twenty years ago. She was ten or eleven years old when I first knew her, which puts her in her early thirties now. I remember her as a sweet, quiet, and contemplative child, a contrast to her younger sister, Erica, who was loquacious and a bit of a clown. Rita -- her face, immediately recognizable, though aged from my memories -- came up the path to our casita with her barefoot son, Julian, carrying a generous sack of delicious local products: big ripe plantains, dirt-covered camotes , two avocados, and six huevos criollos (blue and cream-colored eggs from her chickens). They were gifts for us. After we reminisced over our shared memories from two decades ago: making pizza crust from cauliflower, eating a stir fry of zucchini and beef, reading children's books in my little living room, Rita described to me her life over the last several years. She is married to a man from a nearby vill...

We had a water-filled last few days. It has been warm and surprisingly sunny (it's often overcast), so we have been exploring our water fun options. Friday, we found a great new swimming hole just a little way up the road from our house, and Saturday, we went with friends to a fun water park in La Mana with slides, statues, and great swimming pools. The two experiences couldn't be more different.  Here are a few photos of both:                          River Fun Water Park Fun

I am a bit of a voyeur. I love peeking inside people's houses, noticing what the person in front of me is buying at the grocery store, and listening in on others'conversations on public transit. I also love looking inside people's refrigerators. I know, weird. I distinctly remember as a teenager gazing in wonderment into the fridge of a family friend at their Costco loot: giant tubs of blueberries and raspberries, big salad kits, over-sized containers of artichoke dip, items and quantities my mom would never buy. I have a friend with a disastrously disorganized house but a pristine fridge, featuring custom-labelled glass jars organized meticulously in rows by color and size. Another friend has a fridge that is always so jam-packed and overflowing with unlabeled items, I have no idea how they find anything. My fridge at home, my mom would be the first to tell you, is too often inhabited by moldy leftovers. Also, I almost always have goopy old cilantro in one of the vegetable...