Highlights
- BURNING OF THE DOLLS: Apparently, in Ecuador, they burn
dolls on New Year´s Eve to 
symbolize burning of the previous year??? In Cuenca, there were a few set-ups of paper maché dolls in various positions... in one area of town, there was a tribute to the Simpsons, which I didn´t quite get. And in another area (where we celebrated 2009), there were dolls set up to be in a classroom... again, I didn´t quite get... perhaps due to my lack of the spanish language. Okay, most likely due to my lack of the language. Anyway, there was a huge bonfire and lots of people setting off fire crackers.- STUPID TOURISTS: Yeah, we were the stupid tourists... We saw a bunch of masks being sold
on the streets. Originally thought they were for the dolls, but then thought otherwise when we saw a few people wearing them. "Perhaps people wear them for NYE!", we thought. So we bought a couple for a $1 each. We were the ONLY ones (along with a couple of other tourists) who wore the masks! Eh, whatever... we wore the badge of stupid tourists with pride. :)- SHOOTING AN OLD MAN WITH A FIRECRACKER: Mark bought a firecracker wand where
it shoots out a spark every second (20 in total) that flies about 5 meters (I´m becoming so euro with this whole meters vs feet thing... ugh). And he was having a shooting war against another local on the other side of the plaza... well, one time... Mark brought his firecracker wand back for a bit more momentum and distance, but didn´t realize the wand had shot one backwards and hit a poor old bystander (and left a burn mark on his jacket)! The old man turned out to be okay with it and laughed it off... mostly because he got to feel up this 19 year old girl, who we had met up with earlier. [Photo isn´t of Mark, but of a fellow traveler... but it´s an example of the firecracker wand.]Daily Account
- Dec 30th: We left Banos for Cuenca, which was an 8 hour bus ride... and after visiting about 10 different hostals, we finally found one that was both economical and available! After a tiring day of travel (even though I slept all the way on the bus), we simply ate dinner and crashed. We´re so old... :( The hostal was pretty empty, which was worrisome... Would there be much of a NYE party in this town?
-Dec 31st: We took the day to explore the city... and try to fix the mini laptop we bought, but Mark screwed up royally. The computer repair shop originally told us 20 minutes... it took 6 hours! And the laptop still isn´t fixed! Blah. Anyway, the city is quite cool... very colonial and has apparently won UNESCO´s world heritage award for keeping it´s original charm and culture. The main market was interesting with roasted whole pigs everywhere, along with raw whole chickens. I´ve never NOT wanted to eat chicken so much in my life. Yech! We also checked out the modern art museum, which had a tribute to Herman Crespo Toral (an artist from Cuenca who died earlier in 2008). If you care, his watercolor work was pretty amazing. Anyway, we treated ourselves to some fondue, picked up our nonworking laptop and came back to the Hostal... to find 4 other travelers also looking for some NYE fun - Dennis & Wensus from Canada and Sophie & Dominic (siblings) from Adeladaide. We walked around looking for some fun bars... none to be had, unfortunately. Seriously sad. We found a hookah bar where we chilled and drank for a bit... and finally decided to get some beer to go and roam the streets, setting off our firecrackers. That´s when we found all the staged dolls. Anyway, it was a fun sight to see, but all in all, it wasn´t the best NYE ever... but I don´t think I would´ve traded it in for one back at home. ;)
- Jan 1st: A bit tired, not really hungover, Mark woke me up at the ungodly hour of 7am!!! Seriously, he needs to learn to let me sleep!!! WTF?!?!?! Anyway, we got some breakfast and then I went back to bed. :) But I was soon awoken because the 4 other travelers were getting ready to head to Peru... and Mark & I thought it would be best to travel in numbers when crossing the sketchy border.
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