Salsa y picnic

Hola mis amigos,

Last night a bunch of us went salsa dancing at a chevere (awesome) club in Quito. There were tons of locals and everyone here is so good at salsa! I swear it is like in their blood. I, however, was not so good. But Daniel is taking Krista and me to a free salsa club on miercoles so that we can practice more. Should be fun!

Today we went to a picnic with all of the host families in this gorgeous park in Quito. It is way up on a hill so you can see everything (if you can't tell, everything is on a hill here). We got there and parked but then didn't know where the picnic was so in traditional ecua-fashion we walked around until we found it (about 45 minutes). And again, in traditional ecua-fashion, my host-sister who is 8.5 months pregnant walked up the huge hill for 45 minutes too. The park ended up having a llama farm right next to it, which was so cool! And there was an ecua-playground which had no safety measures whatsoever. Their take on playgrounds is "asi es la vida" or if my kid gets hurt then that's life. Everyone played soccer and we all just had a great time and ate a ton. The one thing I didn't realize was how much faster you burn because of the elevation. The part on my hair is super burnt now :(.

Then Krista and I came back and finally got some down time. I unpacked and took a siesta. Then we ate more delicious soup and now I'm writing this.

Tomorrow we are having more classes and then having an Amazing Race Quito! Should be fun!

More Ecua-isms:

1. No one cares about pollution here. The mountains are covered in a smoggy haze all the time. It's still pretty, but gross.
2. Time doesn't really matter here and everyone is on Ecua-time.
3. It is impossible to find change. Everyone needs quarters for the bus and so no one wants to give you quarters. They also hate breaking $20s.
4. They use like 10 blankets at night because it gets so cold and they don't have heating.
5. Asi es la vida. They aren't very empathetic here because everyone just has the attitude of "that's life." It's pretty interesting actually.

Side note: My head is getting super full of Spanish right now. I think I've stopped processing new information and conversations. We'll see if a good night's rest helps.

Pictures: Check out this link to look at some of my pictures! Most are of the historic district in Quito.

Goodnight!