Saturday, January 01, 2011 |
NEW YEAR'S EVE |
Ventanas was partying at 3 am when I went to bed, an it was still the same after 9am when I got up. Nothing has changed until now, in the early afternoon. Music is everywhere...
Shortly before midnight I took my camera and went out to record the welcoming of the New Year party. Unfortunately I did not recharge the batteries and the camera refused to co-operate just after a few shots... But I think that I covered the most of what there was to cover. The few fires that I encountered were not as spectacular as I expected. And I did not know where to go to see the more dramatic ones.
Thanks God this artistic creation wasn't destined for burning. It was still there half an hour later, when I came back although it was being dismantled. I wasn't the only one driven by curiosity. I noticed a family of six that seemed to be as much intrigued as myself. Did you think that they wouldn't make it without a minivan? These guys will be burned soon... They are burning now. I took the shot from farther away, as they were filled with firecrackers And here is another poor soul. I wonder who he/she was and why he/she deserved to be burned. Of course, since I am making this post, it only means that I came back home in one piece and no-one raped me or took away my camera... At least not yet.
|
|
Friday, December 31, 2010 |
BURNING THE PAST... |
In one of my previous posts I included some pictures of paper heads. I did find some of them well done and interesting. They actually resembled some real faces and you could see that they were made by artists. I was curious about their meaning. It turns out that they are not being sold the whole year around but only in the period proceeding the New Year. I was surprised to learn that they will be burned tonight.
The Ecuadorians say goodbye to the old year by burning some symbols of misfortune. They build dummies that represent a person, an event or activity that resulted in a negative impact on the community or someone's well-being. This might be a politician, a judge, or other community leader (or maybe even a neighbor ?) whose actions you disapprove of. If this is a prominent figure then the appropriate head can be bought and fixed at the top of a dummy to represent the person. Hence so many masks are being sold all over the country. At the midnight the dummies are being burned.
I think that the above explained idea was the origin for all kinds of other figures and creatures being made and sold on the street for the purpose of burning. It seems that nowadays people not only burn the bad figures from the past year, but also all kind of other well known figures from the movies, shows, etc. Therefore, today's burning lost, in my opinion, the significance of burning away the misfortunes of the past. It seems that it just became a very original way of greeting the New Year. Especially that also some fireworks are added into the burning figures and also competition are being held in some places for a most elaborate and most interesting structures to be burned.
I went to town today to take some more pictures. They are without any particular order. Just shots that I found interesting. I hope that they give you a peak into the life in the Ecuadorian rural community. I managed to take some picture of the figures that will be burned tonight. I might go out before midnight to see the happening. If I will be allowed to do that by my mates who are a little paranoid about the danger here.
|
|
Tuesday, December 28, 2010 |
IS IT NEWSWORTHY? |
Some news from the morning paper (not
that I read it myself – my Spanish skills are far below this
level):
- A 33 years old Italian chef from
Toronto met a lady from Guayaquil, Ecuador, over the internet. He
came over this week to visit her. He was killed by the lady's
former boyfriend a few hours after his arrival to Guayaquil.
- An overloaded bus with over 60
passengers fell down the cliff last week. 36 people dead. The latest news is that the driver NEVER HAD A DRIVER'S LICENCE (!!!!)
- A 24 year old woman found dead in her home. Shot in the head.
I am not sure if all the above is
“newsworthy” but I do have the impression that someone's life
doesn't count for much here. Maybe it it the same in “my world”
and I just don't pay much attention to that. I never read the
accidents/crime reports in Vancouver. Yes, the streets ARE being cleaned here. The writing on the garbage cart says that this is a municipal service. By the way the city mayor, Carlos Carriel, didn't pass the opportunity to put also his own name on the cart. In fact the city's website is nothing but one big advertising campaign for Mr. Carlos Carriel. If you've got some power then you make sure to use it well to get more power...
|
|
Monday, December 27, 2010 |
CHRISTMAS AT THE CEMETERY |
The name of the kid I mentioned yesterday is Genderson. If he is not "adopted" yet, you can "adopt" him or any other child of the foundation by going to the page: http://www.fundacion-fushenfu-ecu.org/en/childrens
I wrote "adopt" in parenthesis because it is not a real
adoption. It is so called "adoption at a distance" which means that you
can support the child by donating $34 a month or $408 a year to the
foundation. The funds are used for providing the needy children with a
one good meal a day, as well as for their education and health care, if
necessary.
The English version of the foundation needs a
lot of improvements but I am currently working on it and it will be
updated hopefully soon. The problem is that I don't have a direct
access to the website and all the updates need to be sent to a person in
Poland who is in charge of the website.
On Christmas Day I went for a walk around town and I came across a
cemetery. It was an interesting experience for two reason. First of all
the cemetery looks like I have never seen anywhere before. Some bodies
are buried in the ground the way I am used to seeing, but most of them
are buried over the ground in a special concrete receptacles built on
the ground one over the other. They look in fact like miniature
buildings and the whole cemetery reminds me of a miniature city. The
other interesting thing that I observed that day was that some families
came to the cemetery to share their dinner with the members of the
family who passed away. So they were eating and drinking in front of
the graves, celebrating Christmas Day together...
Unfortunately I did not have my camera with me that day, and I could not
record that. For that reason the next day I went to the cemetery once
again, but there were no “parties” there any more. Following are a few
photographs that I took that day (yesterday). CEMETERY...
VENTANAS STREE SHOTS...
MEAT VENDORS...
VENTANAS PEOPLE...
MEANS OF TRANSPORTATION...
PAPER HEADS...
|
|
Sunday, December 26, 2010 |
KILLERS FOR HIRE |
No, I'm not a good blogger. Within over two weeks that I am here in Ecuador, I only managed to make two posts. OK, here is the third one...
So far there is no news about solving the murder of the Polish priest that I mentioned in my first post here. However people suspect that he was murdered because he tried to seek justice.
He was robbed some time in the past. Instead of just letting it go like most people do here he was seeking justice. He knew the people that robbed him and supposedly he tried to put the legal system to do its job. Unfortunately for him he wasn't a man of influence and neither had he any powerful friends. He received some threatening phone calls to just drop the case. Some of his friends told him to take it seriously and leave the town. He wouldn't... Officially there is still no news about the reason for the murder or who did it. His friends say that it was the natural outcome of his seeking justice.
I am constantly reminded whenever I go into town to be careful. Actually I was advised to never go alone anywhere. Ventanas is a small town in the middle of nowhere and a foreigner sticks here out like a sore thumb. I take the warnings with a grain of salt but I am careful when I walk the streets alone. I try to not take more than $10 with me when going out and hide my camera in the pocket. I also try to have my eyes on my back. So far I felt always safe and the people were always nice and friendly to me. In fact, since the foreigners are so rare here, I enjoy having some special attention from the people.
But when it comes to the crime, it is best to not have enemies here. Jasiu told me yesterday about a case of a lawyer that was killed just a few months ago. One day, after winning a case for his client about some land dispute he was having dinner at a restaurant. Two guys drove by on a motorcycle and shot him dead. Police did find them. It turned out that they were killers for hire from Colombia. They go $60 for the job! No, this is not a typo – it was SIXTY DOLLARS ONLY! In light of this it becomes clear why you don't want to have enemies here. At least not such enemies that have $60 at their disposal. Even for Ecuadorians this is not that much money. A monthly income of a teacher is about $400. Life is cheap here but death comes even cheaper!
I did some internet search. Here are some excerpts from the article “Ecuador police chase Internet-based killers for hire” http://www.zeenews.com/news634557.html:
“Did your boss fire you and you want revenge? Do people refuse to pay money they owe and laugh at you?" read the ad of a hitman offering his services in the Guayaquil area.
The advertiser promises “discretion... 100 per cent efficiency, and we deliver pictures to the client” to confirm that the job was done. [...]
In Guayas province in 2009 there were 321 homicides and 1,032 assassinations, a toll that deputy Interior Minister Edwin Jarrin called "alarming."
Victims include a legislator's wife and a cousin of the head of the National Transportation Council, both shot by unknown gunmen.
Advertised prices range from 400 to 3,000 dollars, depending on whether the victim "has a lot of money, is an authority or is a regular person," Gagliardo said.
To finish this post with a more optimistic note, here is a picture of one of the many children I take care of. His name is... sorry, don't remember - I am still learning them. Isn't the future of Ecuador just bright?
|
|
Sunday, December 19, 2010 |
ECUADOR MEANS EQUATOR |
The Spanish name of the country “República del Ecuador“ literally translates to the “Republic of the Equator.”
Jasiu belongs to a Roman Catholic religious order “Society of the Divine Word” (Societas Verbi Divini) or “Divine Word Missionaries". The first two nights we spent in Quito being accommodated by the missionaries.
The elevation of Quito is close to 3 km. and as a result it is rather cold there. I was very disappointed by the fact that the temperature wasn't any higher there then that of Vancouver that I just left behind...
The second day of my stay, Saturday, December 11, we spent visiting interesting places of the capital. The historical center of Quito, along with Krakow, Poland, were the first World Cultural Heritage Sites declared by UNESCO in 1978.
We visited a few churches. One of them, The Church of the Society of Jesus, is decorated inside with an incredible amount of gold – it reminded me very much of the “Church of Santo Domingo” in Puebla, Mexico, with its “Chapel of Our Lady of the Rosary”.
Of course, it is a must for any newcomer to Quito to visit the Equator Museum. At the equator eggs can be balanced upright on the head of a nail (see picture) , and the Coriolis effect can be observed -- water drains straight down the drain on the equator, while just a few feet south of the equator it drains in a counterclockwise direction, and clockwise just a few feet north of the equator. That is a very interesting phenomenon to observe.
At the same spot there is also a museum of very primitive tribes of the Amazonian people of Ecuador.
|
|
Sunday, December 19, 2010 |
WELCOME TO ECUADOR! |
Welcome to Ecuador. A Polish priest was brutally murdered last week...
After an uneventful, eleven-hours flight from Vancouver, with a stop-over in Houston, I arrived in the capital city of Ecuador late in the evening of Friday, Dec. 10. At the small Quito airport I was greeted by father Jan who asked me to call him by his Polish nickname Jasiu. The Catholic Church sent him as a missionary to Ecuador fourteen years ago. About five years ago he established The St. Joseph Freinademetz SVD – Fu Shen Fu Foundation with the aim of helping needy children. The foundation is the reason of my being here. I came here to volunteer for a month.
To pick me up, Jasiu came from a little place called Ventanas, where I will be spending the next month. Soon after we took our seats in the Toyota he broke the news: a Franciscan priest from Poland got murdered recently. He was buried at the day of my arrival, December 10. It was a very brutal, execution style murder. The murderers broke into his apartment and waited for him while he had a Mass at his church. He was tortured, his fingers were broken, he had many wounds all over his body and his throat was cut. The blood was all over the apartment... Everyone is left guessing about the reason for the murder. He lived in the city of Santo Domingo, over 100km away from Quito, on the way to Ventanas.
From the airport Jasiu took me to the house of the Polish consul, Tomek, where I met several other countrymen, who just came back from the funeral...
Robbery is not a big news in Ecuador. It is a common daily occurrence. First two years of his mission Jasiu spent in Guayaquil, a seaport and the country's biggest city. Within that period of time he was mugged seven times there. The problem is so wildly spread that the police hardly ever even investigates such cases. Supposedly you don't even have a case for the police if you were robbed for an amount lower then $700. But the case in Santo Domingo wasn't a robbery – it was an execution...
It seems that there are some interesting times ahead of me...
|
|
|
301 Moved Permanently
301 Moved Permanently
CloudFront
|