You know that you´re in Ecuador when... (part 2)
16-11-2015 18:15... you want to write a blog with the title: "You know that you're in Ecuador when..." and there are so many things popping up in your mind that you decide to make a part one and a part two.
... you walk into a store and you wait for five minutes calling if someone's there, and then you walk out.
... you walk into a store and you´re attended to by a nine year old kid.
... you don't know if that is a police motorcycle or just someone who felt like fixing flashing lights on his.
... you don't know if a girl is the sister or the mother of the little boy next to her.
... you know that everyone who's still online in Europe after 7pm, is either working a night shift (ex-)collegues or belongs to the group of friends who like "in the morning I'm tired because I stay up late for no reason."
... nobody knows what the weather will be like. Not even the news.
... the daily talk about the weather is replaced by a daily talk about the recent changes of the volcanic activity of the Cotopaxi.
... nobody really knows if the recent changes of the volcanic activity actually can be dangerous.
... nobody really cares.
... nobody knows at what time the bus comes. Not even the bus.
... nobody really cares.
... that way, the bus is never late.
... you honestly think that that's such a good way to organize things, that you wonder why the Dutch railway services don't use that strategy.
... the episode of "Ecuador tiene talento" makes you wonder if Ecuador actually has any talent.
... you regularly think that it would be faster to use a skateboard than a taxi to move yourself.
... most motorcyclists actually think they're a skateboarder.
... if you have to go upon the way they drive, you wouldn't be surprised if having a skateboard allows you to drive a motorcycle.
... you wouldn't be surprised if not having a skateboard allows you to drive motorcycle.
... you wouldn't be
surprised if that would also allow you to drive a bus, truck or car.
... six people fit in a cab, four people fit on a motorcycle and three rows of cars fit on two lanes.
... everything else that doesn't fit, fits.
... everything else that's not possible, is possible.
... you ex-colleagues decide that even if you've only been here for a few weeks your despedida should be celebrated in La Ronda, the entertainment district in the historical center.
... you're there at half past seven sharp, and as always there's nobody else yet.
... two volunteers arrive and the first thing they say is: "I think they just stole my phone in
the trolley."
... after 45 minutes you call the two people that aren't there yet, and they say: "estoy llegando!" (I'm almost there!)
... you know that that means as much as "I'm planning on going there. Tonight. At some point."
... after an hour the group is complete, and then it takes about another fifteen minutes before you've decided where to go.
... before the first jugos (juices) and empanadas (patties) are served, you're dancing around the chairs and tables.
... the first sip of canelazo burns away the first five centimeters of your throat, so you wonder if maybe they put 40% no-alcohol in it today.
... the dance moves become notably more creative after the first two cups of canelazo (bueno, for the rest: half a cup was my limit)
... you can't go home before everyone has shared a little speech about goodbyes, friendship and family, joy and sorrow, God and everything that has anything to do with that directly or indirectly.
... you get home and you wonder if that little bit of canelazo (in combination with the 2800 meters of height) is the reason you don't feel too well.
... you soon come to the conclusion that there's no way any microorganism has survived the percentage of alcohol in the canelazo tonight.
... nevertheless, you find yourself hanging over the toilet six times that night, because apparently some microorganism with another origin than canelazo is terrorizing your stomach.
... subsequently your landlord´s wife makes you mashed potatoes and vegetables because that will make you feel better.
... you wonder if you should still call your landlord your landlord when he lets you "stay over" for about another month.
... you decide to make them chicken in red wine stew that last Sunday to say goodbye and thank you, and you forgot that on Sundays you have to cross half the city to find a store or a supermarket that's open.
... you find a supermarket after crossing half the city and after about an hour you found all the ingredients you need, and when the cashier sees the red wine he says: "sorry, on Sundays we can't sell alcohol."
... unfortunately, that turns out to be one of those rare situation in which what's not possible is actually not possible, so you leave everything at the supermarket. You don't know if you'll be able to get red wine somewhere, and chicken in red wine without red wine is not quite as good as the real thing.
... you cross half the city and it turns out that what's not possible and isn't actually possible, is actually possible in the store around the corner of your house: you've got your wine.
... you have to cross half the city again to go back to the supermarket where it only takes you half an hour to find everything you need.
... you desperately try to figure out which part of your "yes" or "no" the person in front of you didn't understand.
... you desperately try to figure out which part of his "yes" or "no" you didn't understand well.
... you try to figure out if the person in front of you actually meant something with it when he said "yes" or "no".
... you actually try to figure that out if that's the case with anything the person in front of you says
... you try to remember how and when you forgot that there's absolutely no sense in asking something.
... you take a bite of the tomato you find on your plate, and you only taste lemon.
... you can substitute the word "tomato" in the last sentence by the "salad", "beet root" or "carrot" on your plate.
... because of that, everything else on your plate that doesn't actually tastes like lemon, tastes like lemon too.
... you're still mainly happy that at least there was tomato, salad, beet root and/or carrot on your plate.
... the computer in the cyber tells you there are 382 minutes left to upload your video on youtube. Oh no, 389...
... you use ALT 64 for the @ without actually thinking about it.
... you're annoyed when the keyboard doesn't have a ñ and you're continuously looking for the slash and backslash.
... you even know where the question mark is on the keyboards that have other characters on the keys than the ones that appear on your screen when you press them.
... still the use of "insert symbol" increases drastically.
... you ask what ingredients a certain dish contains and the waiter explains what it it, and although you didn´t understand more than 10% of what he said, you nod and order it anyway.
... you ask what ingredients a certain dish contains and the waiter doesn´t know it either, and you nod and order it anyway.
... you stay twice as long as you planned to again (!). Bueno, but that actually doesn't only happen in Ecuador :P.
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