Vacation with the "Groovy Hipster Parents"....PART 2

From Salinas Beach, we took a rather comfortable, hour and a half bus ride back to the city of Guayaquil to meet up with a friend of ours, who arranged for us to stay with his family for the next few days. They coincidentally also had two other sets of visitors at the same time, 2 German/Swiss brothers and 3 Mexicans. So we were the third group. The family we stayed with were incredibly hospitable and generous, very nice and easy going, which made our stay with them that much more fun and enjoyable. We immediately became great friends with the Mexicans, Debora, Gabriel and Heber. As we were 3 tourist groups in total we decided to all hang out and do the sights together, as our hosts had to work. Hannah and I had done it all twice before, but not with other tourists, so it was even more fun.

Heber, Debora and Gabriel



The home and family where we stayed.

The first night, we went to climb the 444 stairs to Las Penas, an old historic, but renovated, neighborhood navegated by one huge set of stairs. It is filled with homes, shops and restaurants, leading up to the lighthouse at the top, with a great view of the city. Over dinner we got to hear all about where everyone was serving, and what their territory is like. The Germans who are currently serving in Switzerland and Deborah and Gabriel who serve in English territories in Mexico. The common thread was everyone serving where the need is great. It was an encouraging and fun night comparing experiences and stories.

Terrible picture, I know. We're still waiting to get copies of the better pictures from the other people who had real cameras.

Over the next few days, we hung out in the city, walked the boardwalk Malecon 2000, which took us two days to do. We also went to the local craft market. The weather was perfect, if not a little too hot. We had great fun with our new friends. We're trying to convince Debora to come serve here with us...Debora, you still thinking about that??? We still plan on going to visit you guys as soon as we can in Mexico. We'll figure something out. Save some english territory for us, if we can still remember how to do it!!

Debora and Mom played so long without making a single point, the machine eventually just turned off!!...true story.

The boardwalk of Malecon is filled with trendy art, sculptures and architectual designs, including this lit, etched in glass list of names of all the people who contributed to the recent renovation of the boardwalk.

Kingdom Hall down the street from where we stayed.


Finally, it was time to say goodbye to all our friends, as we headed off to the airport to go back home to Tumbaco. As a farwell, we all went to Sweet and Coffee to sit and reminisce about our time together. Some gifts were exchanged, and when no gifts were found, personal belongings were swapped. Debora took the earrings out of her ears and the bracelet off her wrist and gave them to my mom to remember her by...we'll miss those Mexicans. Hanging out with them made Hannah and I miss home even more, as we'd forgotten how much Mexican culture we've got in us. We'd forgotten how many words and expressions we use to use with the friends back home, but now how many strange things we say (in spanish of course) that are so specific to Ecuador. Our spanish has many Kichwa words mixed in, which is the Indiginous language here. The three Mexicans were always laughing at our spanish, as it is so different from the Spanish in Mexico. We haven't said the word "Adios" for 6 months and to use it again was strange.