Guanábanas and Guayasamín

This is an entry I started a couple of days ago--sorry for the old news:

Though I’m getting antsy to arrive in Peñaherrera and start teaching, Quito has been keeping me busy and on my toes. Yesterday, Luis took our Spanish class on an expedition to el mercado de Santa Clara, an incredible indoor market whose vendors sold everything from exotic fruits to blocks of cane sugar, herbal medicines, and what we where told was some sort of shark meat. I didn’t have my camera with me, or else I would have been completely overwhelmed with trying to document the interesting sights and beautiful colors. As I mentioned last time, Ecuador is a country for fruit-lovers. A few of my favorites are the tomate del arbol, granadilla, uvilla (tomatillo), and guanábana.

In other news, this morning the group took a trip to La Capilla del Hombre (“The Chapel of Man”), an incredible museum dedicated to the thoughts and works of Oswaldo Guayasamín, a remarkable Quitano painter whose style is evocative of Picasso’s. Before Guayasamín died in 1999, he contributed to the design of the museum, which is a piece of art in itself. The building’s top floor is an enormous ring that is sandwiched between a domed skylight above and a red bowl and flame below that mirrors the skylight. It’s a beautiful piece of architecture that wonderfully integrates the duality of Guayasamín’s work.





















The museum’s title comes from this duality: the human capacity for both cruelty and beauty. Guayasamín uses exaggerated images of hands and faces to express deep emotions, both of suffering and hope. Many of his paintings are responses to horrific genocides and wars:














Others highlight familial love and tenderness:

He also painted many scenes of the city of Quito as viewed from his house, which is attached to the museum. You can compare his depiction (“Quito de la nube negra”) with my photo:

City on a Hill

After four flights and a night spent on the floor of the Bogotá airport, I finally arrived in Quito on Tuesday morning. We’re staying at a beautiful hostel in a gringo-oriented neighborhood near the center of town. I’m not sure whether the best feature of our living accommodations is the fresh-squeezed naranjilla juice every morning or the hummingbirds that like to hang out in the small garden/patio area in front of the hostel:

It’s no surprise that the birds love this garden, because it is full of flowers like these:

Even though we’re in the middle of the city, it’s hard to walk two blocks without seeing an beautiful fruit tree or exotic flower. But of course, what really gives Quito the gorgeous city prize is the Andes mountains. No matter where you might find yourself in the city, nothing can block the view of the mountains above the rooftops:

Since arriving, I have spent the bulk of my time in a conference room at a hotel not far from our hostel learning about pickpockets and unpleasant intestinal ailments. WorldTeach is very interested in us being well-prepared for a couple months in a new country, so our orientation has included lots of talks on health and safety issues, the Ecuadorian education system, teaching strategies, and what to expect as a visitor to Ecuadorian culture. These sessions have felt a little long at times (especially when we were all running on our Columbian airport sleep the first day), but I’m definitely feeling more ready to deal with challenging cultural situations and/or uncontrollable diarrhea. We’ve also started Spanish classes at a local school. Today, my three classmates and I practiced our subjunctive skills by piecing together the lyrics of a beautiful song by the Cuban musician Silvio Rodriguez and learned how to play Ecuador’s national card game, Cuarenta. Our teacher Luis told us that the most important part of the game is the slang-filled intimidation and joking that goes on between players.

Yesterday, the group took an expedition to the old center of the city (“Old Town”), which dates back to the 16^th century. At the main square of the old city, we overheard a band celebrating the contributions of Manuela Sáenz, Simon Bolívar’s longtime love interest and revolutionary compatriot. We also visited La Basílica del Voto Nacional (Basilica of the National Vow), a 19^th century cathedral whose most interesting feature is its gargoyles:

It’s a little hard to tell, but they’re animals indigenous to Ecuador’s jungles and Galapagos Islands. From the cathedral’s plaza, we could see Quito’s Winged Virgin of the Apocalypse standing on Panecillo Hill.

Later, our bus wound its way up the incredibly steep slope, and we saw the aluminum-plated statue up close. The size of the towering structure was dwarfed by the sheer scale of Quito itself as seen from above:

More to come soon, but for now, I'm off to dinner.