Sunday Walk 090510

I'm bored, it's nice out, let's go for a walk.
O.K. There's something I need to get at SuperMaxi anyway.



Quick stop at the flower vendor's stalls.

Looks like a crowd gathering along side of the New Cathedral.
Must be street musicians.


Yep, you were right, but these guys can actually play.
That's why there's a crowd.
Oh, yeah, duh.

Sunday afternoon and the Central Square Park is jammed packed.

Another look at the Old Cathedral.

I don't think people want to see anymore of your boring church pictures, honey.

Let me know when you get to the part where I care what they want to see, O.K.?
Whatever!

I'm not a photograper.

No argument here.
Well, maybe they'd like to know you're walking towards the Justice Building.

I'm sure they're dying to know just that very thing.

Straight on, front entrance view of the Old Cathedral which is where most of the free, classical music concerts take place because of the suberb acoustics.

Looks like I could be first in line to buy tickets for the new play opening this week.

If she's an actor I wonder what her Method is, where does she find her motivation?

Even the old run down buildings are interesting and, see, this one isn't a church.

No, but it's full of amulance chasers.

Yeah, I guess they are similar in that way.

Last time I showed you the back side of the convent where the cloistered nuns hang.

Here are their front doors which...

never open and maybe that's because they're over twenty-five feet tall and heavy carved wood.

Another modern ruin.

Here's the front entrance to the school where Jo and I teach English.

And, right around the corner is one of our favorite watering holes, La Cigale.

This is an apartment building where a few of our teacher friends live.

The only thing Jo likes about this place is they used very old, large photographs to decorate the outside facade.

The city center is up on the top edge of a river ravine, so you're always going up and down staircases. This one has a tree growing in the middle of it. In the background is New Town where we are headed.

And, at the bottom of the staircase one can always find the latest in graffitti.

Also, at the bottom of the stairs is the river with its many bridges and one of our teacher friends, Rachel from England.

Farther down the river bank we go past the grand staircase or escalera which leads away from New Town and back up into Old Town where we live.

Here in Parque de la Madre we walk quickly past the statue of Jefferson Perez, Equador's favorite son. He was the only winner of an Olympic Gold medal in the country's history. It was for Speed Walking.

There is another statue in the park and it's of a Mother with her children awaiting the Father's return. A common enough theme everywhere in the world. The Lady of the Sea statue on the wharf in Anacortes has the same expression on her face as this Madre.

The police had set up a photographic display of all the used and abused people they come across in their work with a little of their crime reports and Jo read (in Spanish) them all.

At the other end of the park is the city's cute little planetarium.

In case you didn't figure it out before, SuperMaxi is the Latin American equivalent of Safeway and here we are picking up some "Lite" Olive Oil. We were at the traditional Mercado or market yesterday and got all our fresh tomatos, strawberries, etc. then.

Headed back home now and noticed this unique juxtaposition of the park's colorful little children's theater and the glass skyscaper behind it. The building in the background is as about as close as Cuenca gets to tall office buildings and it's the only one in the city's skyline. All the other tall edifices are church steeples. And, Jo wonders why all I ever take pictures of are churches.

One more look at the lives of the victims.

Back in Old Town and peeking through the gates of a closed museum

with a combination scarecrow-mobile in its patio garden.

Then a quick stop at the coffee shop haunt of other fellow English teachers in order to swap war stories about our little angles.

Headed for the short-cut through the artisans market in San Francisco square.

Every church has a food vendor outside waiting to feed the hungry sinners and saint alike.

This guy had bags of pink colored popcorn.

Look Jo! A Church.

I'd like to get home sometime this week.

Jo preparing to run the guantlet of handicrafts.

Sweaters from Peru, blankets from Bolivia,

Indigenous tapestry,

flip-flop keychains,

bags for every occasion,

and even unphotogenic school packback merchants.

This is our neighborhood hardware store, kind of like Sebo's Do-It-Center where they sell everything from pistacio nuts to 7 inch switchblades.

Here's the wife's sporting goods store by day and the husband's garage for his taxi by night.

Another universal truth...the best place to dry the laudry is on the rooftop.

As I, also, mentioned last time the 1st Birthday parties are a growth industry here and that means Clowns are always in demand.

And here we are back on our little street after a Sunday stroll.

Say Good-Bye, Jo.

Are you going to put that frikkin camera away now?

Yes, dear. I gotta go, bye.

Get me to the church on time

The best thing about being in charge of a blog is that you can do whatever you want. There doesn't have to be a plot or storyline or any rhyme or reason. There's quite a bit here today and if it makes some kind of sense to you than you're smarter than I am.

We live at 8-25 Estavez de Toral and a day doesn't go bye that there isn't some interesting sight to behold from the balcony.

Our attention was drawn outside by bottle rockets taking off from underneath the windows. We looked to find a procession of people singing and throwing rose petals with a National Police band accompanying them. To make a very long story short, the conquistadors desperately needed to get the locals (in this case-Incas) mind's off their pagan Sun Worshipping and so they had Spain ship them an armada of shrines. I'm sure I mentioned this in an earlier posting, but suffice it to say the traditions live on and each village, church, whatever believes their shrine is the best one.

That free spectacle happened right when we returned from our bike ride. Here we are at the beginning of the ride on our way to worship at the top of a mountain which everyone knows is closer to heaven than waking up Sunday morning laying in a gutter slurring, "I got time for one more".

We're headed to that tree up there,

so we can take in views like these.

We made it to the tree and were told it was not in fact the top. "Just a little further", they said, "on some fun single-track". Where have I heard that before?

Just time enough to change my socks, but I had to endure the Andean dairy cows asking me why it took me so long to get up here, but that's an udder story.

Finally, we did "go tell it on the mountain" many of which have crucifixs at their summits to serve as reminders for the people whenever they cast their eyes and prayers skyward or as a Jesuit Guerilla once told me, "Pray for what you want, but work for what you need".

I don't know if I'd call it a religious experience, but I did feel like I had died

and was looking at the Pearly Gates while waiting to get inside.

Here below are Joella's best biking buddies. She's from Slovakia and is married to an Ecuadorian who went to school in Pittsburg. In a month, they leave for Bratislava to see if he can get citizenship and Jo is already worrying about who she's going to ride with then.

Anyway, that's what happened today.

Now here's some pictures of other rides that took place back in June and July.

Here I am leading Jo downhill through an eucalyptus grove.

They call the last gear you have at your disposal the "Granny Gear". At 10,000 feet, I just stay in it.

Jo loves to smoke the guys on the ascents.

On top of the world, as part of a

gathering.

Joella likes riding.

Most of the churches have large squares in front of them which are free for everyone to use and that's usually where the traditonal dances, concerts of all kinds and parties take place.

I saw a dancer in Lake Patzcuaro, Mexico who wore a similar hat and he told me it represented the rainbow. I didn't get a chance to talk to this fellow to ask about his costume. Anyone want to hazard a guess as to what the chaps made from llama leggings represent.

Then, we went to a birthday party for our friend Chris from Australia. No, he's not drunk ........... I'm just a bad photographer.

All his closest friends were there.

This is Clint, who is also from Australia and a teacher at the same school as I am, with his very pregnant wife, Pia, from Argentina.

Here's Chris again with his great wife, Jen, thanking everyone for coming out to celebrate.

So, the next day after the party of ex-pats we went to a celebration put on by the locals in Paraiso park where (look behind joella) donkeys escaped before their races even began,

kites were flown,

soldiers played music instead of war games,

hand-made wagons rolled

and no one spoke English.

Here they ride the political parties

instead of being ridden by them.

Nice change of pace to be around people living life and having fun instead of mumbling and grumbling about the world going to Hell.

One of the biggest family events here abouts is the 1st Birthday party.

I mean when they hire out a 9-piece mariachi band for the little tyke's shindig it kind of tells you just how important they believe making it through the first 365 days is to them.

Oh, and by the way, these musicians were another surprise I found from my balcony one day.

Simon Bolivar is the main street off of Estavez de Toral and they've been tearing it up for improvements for months now. That's San Blas in the background. If you turn around and look
in the opposite direction you see San Sebastian, our nieghborhood's church.

These pictures don't really do it justice, but the new "calle" (street) was very nicely done and the amount of skillfull handiwork that went into "a street" was incredible.

That white stripe is marble.

My final words will be on churches, hence today's title.

Here's a closer view of San Blas, notice the bells on the top right.

This is San Sebastian up close which is at the our end of calle Simon Bolivar. Everywhere you look there are churches and, as a matter of fact, there are 52 of them over 200 years old in the immediate vicinity all around our apartment. A throw away fact I used in a recently written short story called "Natural Selection".

This is know locally as "The New Cathedral"

because right across, on the other side of the central park is, this, "The Old Cathedral" built with the stones and on the site of the former, main Inca temple.

This is the back side of the New Cathedral with its sky blue domes which can be seen from everywhere in the city and as such are great for helping people who may have lost their way.

Knock-knock-knocking on heaven's door.

Right across another street from here is another church, Carmen of the Ascension, where the flower vendors sell beauty everyday of the year come rain or shine.

Down from there is another church, San Franciso, where artisans from as far away as Peru sell there belts, sweaters, blankets, hammocks and many, many other handmade craftworks.

St. Teresa's

with her yellow dome is right around the corner.

There are churches that look like they were moved here overnight from France's middle ages.

Then, there are churches whose front you can't see unless you're a cloistered nun.

This is St. Dominics where we often go at night for all the free ethnic dancing and concerts in its plaza and lightshows on its tall, broad, white face.

This is a church I'd seen on a tourist poster before, but could never find until I got lost on my bicycle one Sunday morning. It's such a pretty little thing that I'll go back again and when I do I'll be sure to remember it's name afterwards.

O.K. that's enough and I'll just end here with an example what of these fine people paint on the roadside concrete canvas they find instead of tagging it with grafiti.

Hey Pops, could I get a little "Will the Circle be Unbroken, bye and bye Lord" on your big movie house pipe organ?

After awhile crocodiles.