Update...sort of

Well, I've been on vacation a bit the last few days and before that i was just not checking my email much at all. Right now I'm down south in Cuenca for a big Peace Corps (unofficial) Halloween party. This weekend I spent a couple days on the beach outside Machala near my friend Ashley's site. Good time, but it's been a long few days and I'm really tired. My dog seems a bit sick, so I'm hoping that doesn't get any worse. He enjoyed the beach a lot but really hated the water and wouldn't go in except when i forced him in and didn't let him swim back to shore. Well, I gotta get running out of here to drop my dog off at a kennel (the party house isn't very dog friendly...). Wish me luck.

Ciao ciao for now

More pictures to come soon. I hope...

Good times in Licto

So, yesterday was the elections and now the top two presidential candidates take a run-off at the presidency. The two left are a conservative super-rich guy (Álvaro Noboa) who aligns with Colombia's Álvaro Uribe (maybe they're just friends because they share a first name) and a leftist friend of Chavez (Rafael Correa) who plans to 'whip' the corruption out of Ecuador. Anyways, it could go either way, they were both around 25% in the first round, with Noboa on top byt a couple percent. Nov 26th is the 2nd round elections, we'll see what happens. As a disclaimer, as a Peace Corps volunteer, I have no stake in this election, nor do I support any of the candidates. One thing I must say though, Correa's ad campaign has been much prettier than Noboa's. That's all I have to say about that.

So, next, we had a fun little Licto party this weekend. 5 of us hung out on my patio, made a yummy dinner, cooked smores over a bonfire (made by yours truly, who wasn't a boyscout for even a day in his life), and the made some fantastic crepes the next morning. A good time was had by all. Here's a picture of the five of us chilling around a lovely bonfire:

For the occasion, I decided to make a large chunk of jello. It turned out beautifully, although I'm now going to be eating jello for a month. Totally worth it.

A picture with my puppy. This shot was intended to highlight how much bigger he is than he was when I took this picture. He's bigger and just as cute as ever.

Killu and Ruby are lovers. Ruby is my friend Maggie's much younger, tinier dog. They seem to enjoy sharing Killu's bed.

This picture is from about a week ago. I was reading a magazine on my patio for about 30 minutes when I realized my skin was burning off. This is what it looked (and felt) like the next day. The skin that appears in this picture is no longer attached to my body, as it has all peeled off during the last week.

Well, that's this week in news, hope everything is going well...wish me luck on coming up with a Halloween costume. Huge Halloween festivities are to take place down south in Cuenca in a couple weeks.

Update

So, there's nothing huge to update on and no pictures to put up, but here's the brief on my last week.
The interview on Sevilla Futbol Club Radio in Spain went well. It was about 10 minutes long, so I figure at some point here I deserve 5 more minutes of fame in Spain. By the way, I didn't say and 'South American-isms' but the interviewer did say that I was picking up a South American accent (thankfully, he added that in right after he complimented my Spanish).
Next, I played my first game (hopefully not my last) with the Licto soccer team. I didn't have spikes like the rest of the team (which I just went up to Quito to get this Monday), so it was a little embarassing, but overall it went alright. Now that I've got my cleats, hopefully I'll do better next game.
I heard that the language of Jabba the Hutt was based on Kichwa, so I put on Return of the Jedi the other day and couldn't understand a bitt of it...maybe it's because, as I just read on Wikipedia, in the movie, it's Kichwa played backwards...For more info on Huttese, check out Wookiepedia...man, whoever made that up is way nerdier than I am.
Ecuadorian elections are this weekend and liquor sales are prohibited for the next THREE DAYS. Another interesting note, if you don't vote in Ecuador, you basically can't get a job, own property, get a loan, etc. Better get out and vote, niños!
One more HUGE update (huge for me, at least). I FINALLY got a sink installed in my houses. For the last 6 weeks I've had to go into my bathroom anytime I needed water and fill up large buckets in my shower for washing dishes (which, consequently, only happened about every 5 days when I ran out of dishes). Now, with a sink, the Licto Palace is nearing its full glory. All that's left is to fix my shower which just stopped working again, put tile in the bathroom, and paint the place.
Last mini update, my hammock is now functional! Hallelujah! Good times reading books, smoking cigars and drinking amaretto on the rocks, while swinging back and forth in my Ecuadorian hammock. Come try it out!

Panoramicas Chimborazenses...

The other day while I took a grueling (and I mean GRUELING) bike ride of the hill and around the bend to a little Kichwa community called Pompeya, I happened to decide to bring my camera, which ended up being a good idea because I get some good clear panorma pictures.

This is just a view out over the countryside halfway between Pompeya and Licto.

A view of Pompeya (now you know what I mean when I say 'tiny village').

And, a little bigger photo of my home sweet home, Licto, Ecuador. My house is sort of near the middle-bottom-left, if that makes any sense. In any case, this gives you some perspective of how beautiful Chimborazo (my province) really is, even in the bland' town of Licto (that everyone seems to think is ugly). With any luck on my part, you'll be able to click on the picture of get an even larger version.

Well, that's it for now. Reminder: listen to me on the radio tomorrow (Friday), especially if you speak Spanish. See the last entry for more details.

Lictomanta Fotokuna

Well, here are some random pictures as a sort of visual update, since I don't have anything all that interesting to say to update you all. So, here goes nothing:

My re-arranged and slightly more furnished bedroom.

My kitchen, now with a fridge and some art on the wall (cut out of some art books I inherited.) From bottom left, the three sections are: Goya, Pissarro, and Cezanne

Killu is the king of falling asleep in awkward positions.

The other part of my rearranged bedroom. And a puppy on my bed.

Another awkward sleeping position.

The view out my back door on an overcast day. It's nicer when it's sunny.

Awkward sleep picture #3.

One little update that I almost forgot about. I'm going to be interviewed on the radio in Spain this Friday (Oct. 6) on a Sevilla Futbol Club radio station. It'll be at 12:30 Central Time and you can listen online at http://www.sfcradio.com/ (it'll be all in Spanish obviously). Anyways, the program is a weekly program about Sevilla fans spread out all around the world and they decided that they wanted to know more about a American Sevillista living in Ecuador. Tune in! Wish me luck in not using any Ecua-isms or Spanish vulgarities that I didn't know were vulgarities!