A rainy day in Cuenca rolls in out of the blue (literally) accompanied by thunder and squirts of lightning. Luckily these stints of rain don’t last long and ultimately serve to cleanse the semi-polluted air leaving it crisp. The weather here is fairly bipolar. My host “parent” told my roommate Riley, or Raul in SA, and myself that there are rumors spread both through word of mouth and weather forecasts about Cuenca supposedly leaking 300 days out of the year. The daily trend that I have experienced has mostly included brief spurts of rain, but like cheesecake after supper, the rain disappears as quickly as it arrives. Despite being the third largest city in Ecuador Cuenca maintains a spacious urban sprawl and vegetation is easily apparent. This became popular conversation as we first entered the city. Escaping the fustercluck of Quito was a major relief and the demeanor of my glowing classmates were direct reflections of the warm, heartfelt embrace our new environment. Unlike Quito and Guayaquil, in my opinion, Cuenca slips by under the radar similar to that of Oaxaca, Oaxaca in Mexico. I have found myself creating parallels regarding both the aesthetics and the soul warming sensations of this colonial city to that which I experienced during my stay in Oaxaca.

I was welcomed into my first four days in Cuenca by a mediocre cup of coffee followed by an energizing walk to school. That’s right, schoolception. We spent 2 hours Monday through Thursday studying Spanish in a somewhat immersive context. I began to grasp certain grammatical rules and vocabulary by Thursday, but unfortunately the four days only jump-started my intellectual juices. I hope more Spanish classes will cross my path in the future. Our school schedule was limited to four days because Carnaval began on that Friday. The whole city slows down and shops tend to close in celebration. Before we even departed Quito murmurs of Carnaval were in the air. In Quito children patrolled the streets wielding water guns and dumping buckets of water from rooftops. Flags overarching the roadways bore bright colors and geometric patterns. Jubilation was in the air. I got my first personal introduction while walking down an alleyway with a group of classmates. Three younger boys mirrored our trajectory and it was a matter of fate that our paths would cross. Within five steps from each other I began to inspect the approaching group. I can clearly label the trickster of the group and observe that he has been concealing an item capable of jet propelling foam in a specific direction of his choosing. Simultaneous to my comprehension of this detail I find myself staring down the barrel of his foam blaster and then witnessing the trigger engage as foam erupts out of the chamber headed in no other direction besides my brain case. The kid got me with a direct hit. I laughed. The foam smelled like it was delivered from the dentist. Grape fluoride was the prescription. Mind my words, this was only a preamble for the beast that waited ahead.

Now, let me interrupt this news broadcast and transport your imagination back to Cuenca. During recess at school we caught a glimpse of what Cuenca’s flavor of Carnaval tasted like. For me, I appreciated the aspects of Carnaval that illuminate an ear-to-ear grin on the participant’s faces: Ecuadorian’s danced, partied, and took to the streets, played with squirt guns, and when possible arranged sneak attacks with buckets of water. What I didn’t appreciate, even though it was accompanied by illumination, were those dreaded foam blasters! I cannot rationalize those toxic torpedoes and their existence has me questioning this whole event. The bottle’s labels scream “toxic for human consumption, do not get in eyes or mouth” in bold letters, yet participants, even parents to their children, deliver point blank facials. Nonetheless, even if I went into battle with goggles on and my mouth sealed shut any exposed skin will still be absorbing and processing the subsistence.

The understanding that I have created from this experience is that the “foam blaster” is an extension of machismo culture that runs rampant in Latin America. I became a participant observer during Carnaval and what I gathered is that this projectile machinery becomes an external embodiment of male genitalia and the accompanying personality traits. Now, I base this assertion on the grounds that certain male humans will remain stationary and selectively blast certain female humans based on who they are attracted to, if they are with another guy (in a “I got yo girl” insult), etc. Being a male gifted me absence from the large number of blasts that my female classmates received, even when they were in close proximity to me. For instance, one night we (2 males, 4 females) were getting juice. A guy with a blaster approaches us while we are ordering and carefully blasts each girl. At one point I put my hand in front of the blaster to block the foam, but the guy wouldn’t shoot while my hand was in the way. I kept up with his movements for the most part as he moved the blaster up and down trying to dodge my hand while not shooting, but eventually he got what he wanted.

The other major dilemma that I hold with these foam blasters that litter the streets during Carnaval is that these foam blasters litter the streets during and after Carnaval, literally! These bottles serve two purposes: they are filled with foam waiting to get blasted and then await burial into a garbage hole. I found myself thinking one night during Carnaval while walking the beach and finding it littered with debris, “do we let the trash float into the ocean now and skip a few steps or do we collect it into a receptacle, use fossil fuels to transport it so that it can sit in a hole in the earth while it waits for its journey to the ocean?” I don’t even know if the principal logic is correct, but what remains is that Carnaval intrigued only part of my duality while devastating the other.

As a result of our attempt to escape Carnaval I arrived at the aforementioned thought. I planned a trip to the coast with 5 other classmates: we booked a rental car (surprisingly cheap), a cabin on the beach (surprisingly cheap), and hit the road for the weekend. My ride arrived at 4:30 AM in an economy vehicle that Derrick Zoolander would have exclaimed needed to be at least three times as big. Leaving Cuenca that early afforded us enough time to experience the sunrise while driving through the Andes in Cajas National Park. The reality of being one of four people sardined into the proclaimed two person backseat disappeared while I marveled at the hues of blue and orange illuminating the starry night sky and mountainous landscape. As the sun began breaking over the mountainside it exposed the reality that we were looking down into a blanket of clouds. The road we were traveling on was in pretty good shape considering our distance from industrialization, so we thought. As we rounded a bend at speed we bounced in and out of a deep hole that I thought was surely going to swallow us completely. I suppose we can bless momentum as our savior. The crisp mountaintop chill slowly gave way to heat and thick, tangible humidity as we got further into our descent. The air was warming up and excitement was growing in the car. Once we had made it out of the Andes the morphology of the land took a drastically new form. The skies were filled with black vultures and raptors that took advantage of human development utilizing each segment of power line. Accompanying the change in fauna was a change in flora. Fruiting mango and banana trees were popular attendees. African Savanna-esque trees whose outstretching arms formed a three-dimensional dome and appeared to possess multiple atmospheres within. These trees look to be their own ecosystems within the greater ecosystem. All eyes on deck were optimistically searching for a troop of monkeys whose characteristic habitat seemed to dovetail with the architecture of these trees. These are the kind of trees that Tarzan himself dreams of climbing. These are the kind of trees that appear to be painted on the horizon as their features are brightly highlighted for their unique qualities. Trees are really great things.

The ocean is also a really great thing. We are lucky to coexist alongside it. I missed the feeling of the ebb and flow of the under toe. Watching synchronized platoons of pelicans surf through the wind protection that waves provide. Watching these same pelicans fly high and then perform precise diving incisions into the water. These pelicans have evolved to become quite efficient fishermen. Walking the beach, lounging in hammocks, and reading the day away until the sun falls out of the sky. This trip was performed in good spirits, but reflecting on how it was possible is low key concerning. We are now at the one-month mark of this trip and as a class we have gone to two field stations and spent 2 weeks in Cuenca. The Maqui field station was an exception because it was more of an educational experience due to the extensive knowledge that our guides possessed, but, to be honest, I felt like the last two weeks in Cuenca were filler. We were connected with a Ecotourism group that placed us with host families—each individual in the class surely has a different opinion of this experience— and took us on four or so day excursions. Ecotourism is the key word here. Before leaving on this trip we were collectively uninformed to the extent that this word would be involved in the first four weeks of our study abroad. This could be me craving sentimental value and education in return for the time and money I have invested in this trip that I didn’t feel I received during this period in time. I will leave it at that. Ultimately, I had a good time in Cuenca. Let the image that you paint of my experiences be bright. I made a friend who was able to help me get wire and stones, visited several anthropological and historical museums and I had a somewhat— limited by time—immersive cultural experience.