It's all happening...

Aiy yai yaii! Ok so I didn't start the blog as soon as I was hoping for, but we also didn't arrive to our first farm as soon as we had planned on. Laura, Suz and I arrived safely into Quito, Ecuador, cowboy hats in hand, late Monday, March 1st. We made our way to Casa Colonial hostel and first started to feel the elevation differences after huffing and puffing up three flights of stairs.

The next morning I woke up with the biggest grin on my face. I can't believe we've actually made it here.
It's all happening.
We met Cass at Centro de Los Muchachos Trabajadores(CMT) in downtown where she volunteers. Niños were hoola-hoopin and happy. We grabbed lunch at Cafeto and had some delicious sandwiches before making quite the trek up the beautiful basillica. We went to the tiptity top, clibming up on thin little ladders with our sandals and nearly peeing ourselves. The view was beautiful though and well worth the possible year it took of my life in fear-related stress.
Duty called for Cass so she hoped on the metro and the tres amigas headed back to the hostel enjoying our afternoon with some guitar playing (complements of suzie) and some reading. For dinner, Cassie hooked it up with free food at her working boys center and we met the other gringo volunteers.

The next morning we woke up early to go meet Laura's sister Sarah and her boyfriend Andy at Plaza Grande. The tres amigas were having coffee at a cafe when some boys with juggling pins and bicycles called us over from a courtyard across the way. Total crusty punks. Suz was in love. They did some juggling for us and I smiled and laughed but remained mute, except for "lo siento, no hablo espanolo." Sad.

We then hiked up a hill probably, but I'd really like to call it a mountain for effect. This thing was huge! By the time we reached the top, nearly dead, the Basillica we had climbed yesterday looked like child's play. At the top was El Paneciello, a large statue of Mother Mary.
On our way down some school children warned us of robbers and murderers along the path and we almost blew it off until an older woman came running down waving her arms and making a slitting throat movement with her hand across her neck. Wow. Reality check numero uno. We picked a safer way down and were grateful to still have our heads and our cash and treated ourselves to a delicious meal outside Plaza Grande.

Laura and I decided it was time for some pampering so we got a $4 manicure but Suz said "it's not for her". shocker. Instead that crustypunk made a new friend at a local tatoo shop, bonding over gauges. haha, love you suz. Laura on the otherhand was stuck with some lovely handpainted flowers on her pink nails.

That night, 6 amigos including Cass, Sarah and Andy went to Ranchos Grandes down the street from CMT. They were pretty embracing of los gringos and offered us shots of some licorice-tasting vodka and taught us how to play a game similar to corn hole in the states, except they threw at a mound of sand. meh. I told everyone Suz was my girlfriend since ¨novia¨was my favorite new spanish word of the day. I don´t think she hated it.