Saturday. Had plans to go to the Teleferico which takes you to the top of Pichincha. Woke up at 8:15 and it was cloudy. Checked Facebook and our group's consensus was to save it for another weekend because it's not worth the money to go up if all you can see is clouds. Went back to bed without resetting my alarm thinking I wouldn't be able to sleep much more, but the next thing I know it's 11:30. Haha. Ate breakfast because it was sitting out there for me. Then at 12:30 we went to a market near the Japanese Embassy where my mom works. Bought some fruit. Ate a typical Ecuadorian meal with juice. I was about ready to explode. Two meals in two hours. Guess that's my fault though. While we were sitting there eating, we randomly encountered two of mis "primos" AKA cousins who walked up to our table to say hello. I don't remember the name of the older one, but the younger one is Samuel (3 or something like that). They were out at the market with their parents (my mom's sister and brother-in-law). They were sitting across the eating area from us, but my mom didn't bother to walk over and say hi. She later told me that that sister is "media rara" or kind of strange. That might have something to do with it. After we ate we picked up some veggies and my mom bought me some sugar coated nuts or beans of some sort. I was pretty full, but I didn't want to be rude so I ate them. Delicious. Headed home and unloaded the car. Then mami and I went to her other sister's house. That's where I met my other two primos, Nicolas (7) and Ignacio (6). They have such a beautiful and spacious apartment and the kids are absolutely a-dorable. They are HUGE soccer fans so we spent some time watching a game on TV and then we went out into the hallway and played. It was so cute because when mami told them I was a futbolista, Ignacio was like "You have to coach me!" (in Spanish of course). Haha. Nicolas wanted to watch Monsters Inc., but Ignacio and I played for a while until we had to leave. He beat me 12-11. Close game. I'll get him next time.
On the way home mami dropped me off at Julie's apartment where she, me, and Ashley took the Ecovia to the historical district for our night tour. We started in La Iglesia de San Francisco, the church that the Devil supposedly helped to build. The one that's supposedly missing a brick that people spend their whole life looking for the hole in the facade. We get into the garden inside the convent of the church and there's a man waiting there for us in a black suit and cloak. He then introduces himself to us as the Devil and off we go on our tour. It's been a while so I can't remember everything he told us, but I remember that a lot of what he had to say was quite fascinating. We started with paintings, then sculptures, and then we spent a considerable amount of time talking about the Virgen de Panecillo. There's a large statue of her located on a hill in Quito that we saw the first week we were here, but the statue here in this church is much smaller and much more beautiful. They say this virgin is the most beautiful woman in Quito. Then it was off to another church (can't remember the name) that's located in the main plaza. With every transition of our tour, the Devil would lick his lips, give a deep chuckle, and then turn on his heels, cape flapping, and book it to the next location. They have a tomb in there dedicated to Garcia Moreno, a former president of Ecuador. Right before the people assassinated him, he said "Puedes matarme, pero Dios no muere." "You can kill me, but God doesn't die." Nobody has any idea exactly what he meant by that, but I think those are some pretty chevere famous last words. Then we climbed through the tiny hidden staircases that led us to the top of the church where we had quite the view of Quito at night. Increíble. Our tour ended at an old restaurant where we had hot chocolate and boscochos (flaky breadstick thingies). I'm not a big fan of hot chocolate, but this stuff was the best hot chocolate I've ever had. That doesn't mean I was crazy about it, but it was alright.
El Diablo:
Then we headed to a facility that houses a program that works with elderly people. We spent the first part of our time there getting to know the old folks and such. Then we were paired up and we made little baskets out of that thin, colorful foam stuff. At the beginning, the program director asked the old folks to raise their hand if they had ever had a conversation with a person from the United States. Practically nobody raised their hand. Now I don't want to go around thinking that those of us from the States are super awesome and everyone should have a conversation with us, but I just thought that there were enough estadounidenses to go around and that they would have made it to South Quito before. Guess not. The old folks said that gringos never take the time to go to the South because there's nothing to do and it's the poor part. It was sad to hear that. Ate lunch with them and then we headed home.
In South Quito looking north:
It was on the way home that I had my self-discovery. Granted, a lot of my thoughts make sense in my head, but may not make sense written down. I will try my best though because it's something I feel like sharing. We were headed home on our private BCA bus when all of a sudden a dog ran right in front of us and our driver had no time to react. Bump. I was in no position to see exactly what we had run over. Judging by the reaction on the bus, there was the possibility that we had just run over a small child. When I found out it was just a dog, all I felt was relief. However, there were people on the bus who couldn't even stand to think about the fact that we had just run over a dog. All I could think to myself was "thank the Lord that wasn't a kid." That's when my brain started whirring and came to some very profound conclusions.
Because I didn't feel the same level of pain for that dog, does that mean I won't make a good vet? Is animal medicine really my calling in life? I reflected on this past month in Ecuador and discovered that even though I see a lot of street dogs, they don't seem to be suffering and I don't feel sorry for them. Sure, I hope their happy, but I'm not like "Oh, this breaks my heart." Some people in my program are like that and I think, does this make me a terrible candidate for being a veterinarian? For a split second, I thought "well, what else would I do with my life if I didn't work with animals?" and all I drew was a blank. That's when I concluded that this "indifference" of mine isn't a bad thing, but rather I can use it to my advantage. If I were to care deeply for every animal I treated as a vet or every animal I saw in the pound, my life would be horrible. My ability to distance myself, from getting too attached, will actually probably work in my favor. I don't want you all to think I'm a cold-hearted animal hater, because I'm definitely not. I mean what sort of animal hater would want to be a vet? I'm just realistic. No matter how many street dogs you rescue, there's always going to be more. It's like poverty; there's never going to be an end to it. Death happens. Sometimes you can't prevent it.
That's when I started to reflect on the importance of people on my life. Being here, in a another country, has showed me how incredible people can be. Especially this love-dominated culture in Ecuador. People. I don't know how else to explain how important people are. When I was younger, I used to put my pet right after my extended family and friends in terms of importance and whatnot. But I got to thinking on the bus, would I sacrifice the life of my beloved pet for the life of a complete stranger? This is a hypothetical situation. I don't know when I would ever have to make a decision like this, but without a doubt, right then and there, I knew the answer was yes. There's no way I could choose the life of an animal over that of a human. I had never actually faced this question directly, but I'm sure there were times as a child where I imagine I would have had to think long and hard about that question. But now, I know without a doubt, a complete stranger, an enemy, a person who may not even deserve this type of sacrifice, would take precedence over the life of any animal, yes, even my dog. I went through so many scenarios in my head. What if Hitler were still alive? Would I sacrifice Katy to keep Hitler alive? A man who was responsible for killing millions of innocent people? Yes. As bad as he was, I would sacrifice my own dog to keep him alive. As much as I love my dog (and I love her a lot), it would be a lot easier seeing a person and knowing a dog died for them rather than seeing a dog and knowing that I willingly chose the life of this animal over that of a human. Inside I pray that this was always the way I thought, but like I said, I was never really confronted with the question itself. Now I know where I stand. And it feels good. I hope that makes sense in writing.
"You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself."
- Alan Alda
Yeah. It was one of those days.
More later,
Lizzie
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