A
relatively tranquil Day One is winding down in Cumbayá, having followed a long
and at-times harrowing Day Zero.
As we came
in to land around 10 p.m. last night, I looked out from my window seat at the
sea of metropolitan lights. The daunting thought that came to mind was, “Look
at all of those people out there…they all
speak Spanish.” And so they did. Our (or at least my) introduction to this came
in the form of an advertising poster on the side of the jetway. Don’t know what
it says? Gotta figure it out, gringo, bienvenidos.
And because
Ecuador wanted to test me early, I (along with compadres Jacob and Chris) fell
behind the rest of the group (22 strong, in total) as we got in the line for
customs. Upon finally reaching the paperwork checkpoint (and responding to the
official’s “Bienvenidos a Ecuador” with a deer-in-the-headlights “Sí”), I
joined Jake and Chris as we began to search for our checked bags. The screen describing what was on each
carousel was unhelpful, as neither “Delta” nor “Atlanta” could be found. We
bounced from an airport worker to a counter to another counter (Jake doing the
majority of the talking) before we finally found our bags. Standing in line for
the bag scan checkpoint, we could see through the automatic doors an absolute throng
of Ecuadorians. As the last one through, having been separated from the others
by an airport worker with a dozen bags that needed scanning, I crossed the
automatic threshold alone. A narrow open path lay between two massive mobs of
sign-wielding humanity. My 80-plus pounds of stuff and I trundled down the path
before I spied my name. I handed my passport to our program director, met my
host-mom (though it feels odd to call her that, given that she’s in her
early/mid 30s), got in the car, and went home.
Bookmarked. I'll be checking up on you. Sounds like a great time already. Glad to hear you have some buddies down there with you. It would be daunting to be completely alone. Keep your mind open and your chin up. I'll see you on the other side.
ReplyDeleteBrett's comment is cute, and your writing is fantastic. I know the feeling of intimidation, but the forced language use is really fun after a while. I believe in you!
ReplyDeleteYo yo, I hope you like it down there. Check out Monpiche if you can. Cool surfing and whatnot
ReplyDelete