November 3, 2008

I just returned from an amazing trip to a small town about four hours northeast of Quito. A large group of us volunteers all got together there for a Halloween bash and a white water rafting competition. On Thursday evening, two other volunteer’s, one of the volunteer’s Ecuadorian ‘man-friend,’ and I took a long (and uncomfortable) overnight bus to Quito. Once we arrived, we met up with two more Ecuadorian friends of the other volunteers, spent a lot of time waiting around for them (I was not impressed), grabbed a bite to eat, bought some drinks for the party, and took an afternoon bus to the site.

It was evening when the six of us finally arrived. After we said our hellos to everyone, us girls piled into the room where the other two Machala girls were staying and started getting ready for the party. Since my costume was so simple, I spent a lot of time helping out the other girls. It turns out that I am very good at putting on fake eyelashes. Who knew? Once the five of us were ready, we made another volunteer run ahead of us and make them play a Spice Girls song for our grand entrance. We were definitely a hit!!!

The next morning, we all struggled out of bed and down to the river where we waited forever for the competition to start. There were eighteen teams in total. The run was only about 2 minutes long with two teams going at a time. Each team was to raft twice. The fifteen teams with the best times would raft a long route the next day. Our team (composed of five girls, the Ecuadorian ‘man-friend,’ and the guide) won both heats. We were really proud of ourselves, especially since we were up against teams full of really strong guys. I guess it turns out being light is an advantage!

Sunday morning we all went back to the river where we, once again, waited forever for the competition to start. This time there were only three heats of five teams. My team was the last heat to go. When our heat was on deck, all the volunteers that were going to race piled into the back of a garbage truck (yes, that is right… and no, I don’t want to think of what was in the truck before us) and drove to where the race was to begin. It was a really beautiful ride through the Amazon until we turned onto a dirt path and had to duck down every five seconds to prevent being whacked by branches. When we arrived at our destination in started to pour. Since there was no shelter, we found some banana leaves and huddled under them together for warmth. It definitely was one of those moments when you wonder ‘How did I get here?’ Fortunately, the torrential rain didn’t last longer than 15 minutes. Eventually, the boats arrived and we all carried them to the starting line.

Well, I am extremely proud that our mostly-female team kicked every other male-dominated team’s ass. We won first place in our heat!!! We screamed ourselves hoarse celebrating. When the winners finally announced the overall winners, we won THIRD PLACE!!! The prize was six t-shirts and $100 between us. YAY!!!

Once we divided up the prize money and said our goodbyes we raced back to the hostel to shower, change, pack and catch bus to Quito. Once we arrived in Quito we had enough time to stuff our faces with Mongolian BBQ before we had to catch another long (and uncomfortable) overnight bus ride back to our sites.