Beach Bums and Coup d´Etats

Our experience in Canoa ended up having much less to do with soaking up the sun and much more to do with avoiding being permanently sucked into one vortex of a beach town.

Canoa has a population of only 6,000 people, and to us it felt even tinier than that. We would, per usual in this country, have local boys approach us and hit on us unabashedly, but the difference in Canoa was that we would see these same boys everywhere. They all led a lifestyle that somehow allowed them to be free to hang out and flirt all day, every day. They learned where we were staying. We began to believe that Canoa was a town full of people with no ambition whatsoever, and for me personally, the trip became so much aout avoiding frustrating situations with horny Ecuadorian boys that I often forgot that it was supposed to be a vacation. Unlike many of my friends, I, unfortunately, have zero tolerance for the cross-cultural love game that we ran (or, rather, run) into virtually every day. Some girls really play into it, which actually makes them consider staying! It´s really that intense, as I have seen it first hand.

Aside from this, we met so many Americans who had come to Canoa for vacation and either a) gone home, sold everything, packed up their life in the states and come back to this surfer town permanently, or b) never left at all. I felt like I should have been making a movie when I talked with some of these people. Walker, from Seattle, is a 27-year-old college dropout who plays online poker to pay for his virtually indefinite travels. Lenn, a divorced father of 3 grown boys, abandoned his Kentucky life after a vacation in Canoa for his own recently purchased internet cafe and beachside restaurant. He knows that, due to a new highway being built from Quito to Canoa, that the beachtown will soon be way less of a secluded getaway and way more of a flashy tourist attraction. Monetarily speaking, his genius plan is to ride that wave to the top without a hint of shame. Lenn loves himself.

By far the most interesting (and arguably the only inspiring) person that we met in Canoa was a man that we called Tiki Barber--only beause he looked like Tiki Barber--and the name totally stuck. We met him one night early in our trip and from the beginning, my friends and I all agreed that we felt really great vibes from this guy. But it was for some abstract reason that we couldn´t exactly pinpoint. He probably had the most unique perspective on life that I have ever heard, and I would really like to share his ideas after I process them...and remember them all. There will definitely be a Tiki Barber blog post sometime in the near future.

I also just have to throw out there that Canoa is home to probably the best food I have ever eaten in my life. We had phenomenal shrimp or fish dinners for $3-$5, and the veggie food at some of the specialty restaurants was to die for. I think the thing that would keep me in Canoa forever wouldn´t be the laid back, secluded nature of the place, but the incredible cuisine.

After an extremely surprising five days, Lisa and I arrived back in Quito at about 4 am Thursday morning (Katie continued travelling because she´s done at UBECI). We came back at the perfect time, we discovered later-- little did we know that the Ecuadorian government would "teeter on the edge of collapse" later that morning. As foreigners, my fellow volunteers and I were removed from the situation almost immediately. We went to work yesterday morning and, as soon as the staff found out what was wrong, we were "evacuated" to Santa Isavel, another UBECI project area outside of Quito. There we stayed, confused and completely uninformed, until about 2 pm when we could find a bus to take us back into Quito. We were basically told not to leave our houses all night.

As the entire police force went on strike, Ecuadorian and Columbian citizens took advantage of the opportunity and robbed several banks, as well as committed other crimes, throughout Quito and Quayaquil. Several members of the police force found President Rafael Correa in the hospital--where he had already been for some kind of knee surgery--and teargassed him. The air force took over the airport and wouldn´t let any traffic in our out until about 5:30 last night. There were barely any busses or taxis and the streets in some areas we basically deserted. Good times! The UBECI staff tells us that this kind of thing is fairly regular in Ecuador (the last few presidents have had similar issues with attempting to be "overthrown"). I certainly didn´t feel like I was in danger yesterday, and things seem to be improving today, although school was cancelled in a lot of places and we´re not working today either. My host family is very happy that the president didn´t back down. People here are very much in favor of the reduction of police and other government officials´ bonuses and say that Correa is one of the least corrupt presidents yet. So...I suppose we´ll see how everything unfolds.

The airport has reopened, so my parents are coming into town tonight as planned. We´ll see if they can leave the hotel this weekend...!