All of Ecuador

This past Saturday, we spent a lovely day at Washo's brother's banana plantation on the outskirts of La Maná. Pedro, a fit elderly man who must be at least 70, and his wife, Marcelina, poured their bodies and hearts into their successful family-run farm for fifty years. Marcelina died suddenly of a heart attack last year. Pedro, himself, goes to dialysis three times per week in Quevedo.

As is standard in banana plantations in the region, there are densely packed rows of banana trees as far as the eye can see. You walk through the endless trees via banana transport paths, formed by arches of pipe from which a single overhead metal track is suspended, acting as a train rail. Rollers attach to the track to move huge carts of bananas (bunches weigh 40 pounds each, carts carry 25 bunches at a time) along for packing, which occurs every Thursday. There are five kilometers of these paths on Pedro's land.

Pedro's love of his land is palpable. Mid-morning he took us out to his garden, where pineapples, cacao, yuca, and papaya grow in abundance. The cacao was planted by his wife, who tired of endless bananas. Later we trekked across the banana trails to harvest tilapia from fish ponds, pick oranges and mandarinas, and hunt for guanabana and ovitos, yet another new tropical fruit (sour-sweet when fully ripe, otherwise just intensely sour). When everyone else was tired of poking at the tree with long bamboo poles, he didn't stop working until his son-in-law -- the same one who's planning to cut down the tree because it "shades the banana trees to much"-- convinced him everyone else was leaving.

Pedro shared how hard the last year has been. Losing his beloved wife of forty-nine years was devastating, and he is clearly still grieving. Any mention of her name brought his gaze back to an over-sized portrait of her that hangs on the wall and tears to his eyes. Add to that the financial impact of the Ukranian-Russian war -- his primary export destination had been the Ukraine -- and the three-week long national strike in Ecuador, and the year was an economic disaster. At one point, it seemed worth it to destroy his beloved banana crop rather than sell for the price being offered by his vendor. "Such is the life of a farmer," he said, "There are good years, and there are bad years. I've definitely been through them all."

Mid-afternoon, we sat down to eat a big almuerzo, prepared from four freshly slaughtered chickens and yuca harvested that morning from Pedro's garden. Wilma, Washo's sister, who is visiting from Spain, where she has lived for almost twenty years, ate three heaping plates of yuca. We bonded over the unfortunate lack of edible yuca in Europe and the US. "I have to get my fill when

I am here," she giggled, as she took a big bite.

Jonah, as usual, was listening in on our conversation, as he also nibbled on a piece of yuca. "Mom, maybe when we go home, we can bring some yuca with us?" I smiled. "Actually, mom," he revised, much to the delight of the Ecuadorians sitting at our table, "Maybe when we go home, we could bring all of Ecuador with us?"

These are the transport tracks for the bundles of bananas

Nature's tattoos

Chupando cacao (definitely one of Brynna's favorites)

Washo fishing in the tilapia pond

Tilapia

Harvesting ovitos