Day 31: Loja

This morning I accidentally woke up early and took a walk through the city of Loja....in Ecuador! It is a pleasant town nestled into the green hills of the Ecuadoran Andes. I strolled down the central canal and had breakfast in the main market -- guatita (delicious platano and chicharron meatball), greenish beans mixed with queso fresco, a chicken leg, tomato and onion salad, all on top of rice. With a big glass of fresh coffee -- $1.90. For those readers who tend to keep out of the international finance loop, the national currency of Ecuador is the US Dollar, the Mighty Greenback, the Fightin' Jacksons. They use the exact same currency, with the odd exception of their own unique quarter with a big "25" on it.

I apologize for the lack of posting over the last week. Allow me, if you will, to take you on a little guided tour...

After my last posting I resumed the Great Cassette Search in the city of Trujillo, which was preposturously successful. All of my tapes work (the one I could not remember last time was a random collection of Beatles songs), although the cheap batteries I bought in Lima have already failed. And Yes, I feel super-cool riding the buses and listening to my bright yellow Walkman.

After the Conclusion of the Cassette Search, I went to see 'Angeles y Demonios' at a local movie theater. Not a great movie, but entertaining enough and fun to try and match subtitles to spoken lines. I left the theater right around dusk, and was swept away by an incredible euphoria. Everything was going to be okay, every problem swept under the rug into a deep, dark hole, tomorrow will most certainly be better than today. It was an odd feeling, unexpected but entirely welcomed. The euphoria had slowly drifted away by the next morning, where I took advantage of the first clear day to take a nice long walk on the beach before shouldering up my life belongings and heading on a bus for Chiclayo, even further north along the Panamerican Highway.

Chiclayo was an unremarkable city, but I did enjoy wandering aimlessly around the enormous bustling marketplace a block from my hotel. Speaking of the hotel...nicest one yet. Big rooms, my own bathroom with hot water, people cleaned the rooms every day and left a new ratty towel and cheap bar of soap, like a damn Holiday Inn! There was even a little restaurant in the back of the lobby!

I visited a little museum, the Bruning Museum, to the north of town. It was a really nice museum, with lots of incredible artifacts and well-done maps and dioramas. The artifacts were quite incredible, mostly gold work and pottery dating 1000 to 2500 years ago. The craftsmanship was very delicate and precise. I also enjoyed the little gold statue of a man with a golden penis and two little golden balls.

After Chiclayo I traveled further north to Piura, which was by far the friendliest city I have visited in Peru. I got six replies to my greetings! Six strangers said "good day" or "good afternoon" to me! Another fairly nice hotel, although the rooms seemed to have been constructed from the same thin laquered wood used to make cheap coffins. Piura was very hot during the day, so the thin walls were appreciated. Except, of course, when the older couple in the next room went for a little Sunday Special at eight in the morning. But I digress...

Bought some sweet sandals at the Piura market. They say "Ronaldiño" on them, which to me makes them the Air Jordans of South America. Also made in China!

Hopped the bus across the border to Loja. My first experiences in Ecuador were not of a such a high quality: running from one border office to the next in the mid-day heat trying to unravel customs paperwork mysteries, then dropping the d-word in the bus bathroom while shifting wildly on S-curve mountain roads. The bus guy was not too happy about my excretory deposit, but I felt it was a fair outcome. The on-board entertainment for the past four hours had been music from a CD collection whose name I surmise to be Music Guaranteed to Get You on a Shooting Rampage, Discs 1-8. To be clear: it featured the Macarena, that herpes wound on modern music. My internal argument was as follows: you shit on my ears, I shit on your bus. Which, I believe, was the original formulation of Newton's Second Law of Physics. The rest of the ride got better, both in my stomach and the on-board entertainment. Which sort of proves my point.