Toubab village - Vilcabamba

There was a peace corps legend in Senegal, that somewhere there was a village full of foreigners, toubabs, that lived a simple life in a traditional senegalese village.  Far from the African continent, in Ecuador, I found this hamlet.  Sortof.  Yesterday I was on a 5 hour bus ride from Cuenca to Loja, in southern Ecuador.  At a bathroom break along the way, I met a middle aged American woman who lives in Ecuador.  We got to talking and she asked where I was going.  I said Loja.  She said, "Why?"  I didn't have a good reason so she told me I might as well continue an hour past Loja to the town of Vilcabamba.  She owns a farm 20 minutes south of there, but she said Vilcabamba was a small beautiful town with a large foreigner population.  How big?  600 foreigners. I looked up Vilcabamba in my lonely planet guide at it said it was a town of 4700.  4700/600 is quite a high percentage of foreigners.  Let's be honest, I wasn't going down here to experience Ecuador.  I was going to experience westerners living in Ecuador.

(Quotations are approximate conversation.  What I remember).
 "Why are there so many foreigners?"
 "It is a phenomenon.  No one knows why they end up there, but they just do.  They want a simpler life, they want to be away from the city, and oftentimes they are leaving Europe or the US because they don't like what it is going on there."
"What is going on in the states?"
"Oh the political situation, the forced immunizations of children."  I had to contain myself at that last comment.  I have a rather strong, and negative opinion, of anti-immunization people.  "The people in Vilcabamba are into conspiracy theories.  They fear or dislike government intrusion, or the people that control the whole political process."
(I later asked her about the conspiracy theories, and why she laughed and appeared self depreciative of the things she believes.  She said she knows they are true, and there is no convincing her otherwise.  She said you are an intelligent and good person, and Im not going to convince you otherwise.  So I just don't care what people think.  I really liked this line of reasoning, or rather, I liked her jovial nature.)
"Sounds like a lot of leftwing conspiracies, do you have any rightwingers down here?" I said jokingly.
"None of us believe in that, left or right.  We know who controls everything in the States."
So I said, why not, I'll go check this town out.  We ran into one of this woman's friends on the bus to Vilcabamba, who said she was going there for a memorial.  A child of her friend's died of diabetes.  I don't know too much about diabetes, but I know it is unusual for people to die of it. She is from the Seattle area but left because of the increased radiation coming from Japan to Seattle that the media won't report.

It is a beautiful, hot, dry town.  Considerably lower in elevation than Cuenca.  Mango, banana and orange trees fill backyards and open space (yes i know bananas are not trees).  My American friend gives me a quick tour of the very small town center and explains that there are two types of foreigners here.  One, is healthy, vegetarian and has lots of young children, and they hang out at the Juice Bar.  Yes, there is a healthy juice bar in an Ecuadoran town of 4700.  The other group drinks, smokes and gets rowdy.  They hang out at Charlies bar.  I immediately knew which place I would be spending my evening.  I checked into a french owned hotel, ate some food and then went for a hike.  I came back and ran into my American friend and as it was already 6, we thought we should get a beer.  Certainly were quite a few gringos in this bar.  Actually it was all foreigners.  A couple irishmen were playing chess, drinking scotch (yes), a group of people, most had dreadlocks, drank beer on the stoop and smoked cigarettes, and the place reeked of weed.  There were two no smoking signs in the bar but everyone was smoking something.  I took a beer, start reading my kindle as my friend went to grab her bags.

There is something wonderful and idealic about people moving to a foreign country, to begin a new life in a fashion that suits them.  A number of people I met last night had left the states to move to someplace cheap and beautiful, where they could live off the grid.  Indeed a guy from Tacoma lost his house in northern California during the financial crisis.  He was working on marijuana farms and making a good living.  But 2008 happened, the bank took his house, and he moved here to get off the grid.  He now lives with a group of "like minded people" who work on a collective farm outside of town.  I get that.  I really liked this guy and his Ecuadorian girlfriend, and her young daughter.  I met a number of people, most from America, who lived similar lives.  We told jokes, shared stories, and drank quite a few beers.  I had a fantastic time, and I really enjoyed meeting everyone.  But it was not someplace I could live.  It is a small community, and gossip runs rampant.  But more than that, it was this child dying.  I don't mind people believing conspiracy theories, as long as they are harmless.  For example, my American friend said she believes that a one world currency is imminant, the US dollar will be replaced, and so she has been buying gold.  (By the way, Ecuador uses the US dollar).  But the child dying from diabetes is something else.  As I "read" my kindle, I overheard the bartender speaking to some people about the child who died.  He was livid, angry, and wants the parents prosecuted.  It turns out, the parents did not believe in western medecine.  They tried a number of natural remedies for his diabetes.  The bartender even tells one man, not even attempting to containin his rage, that the parents were making their own insulin and injecting their child with it. I was stunned.  I looked at the bartender and he just nodded a solmen yes back to me.  Not much later I heard a group of people talking about how moving the memorial was, and how it was great for their children to see a dead body and understand what life is.  Indeed that last comment came from a woman who sat down to talk to me. I kid you not, she was from the Seattle area, and she was telling me how there was such "great energy" at the memorial, and it was really inspiring.  Inspiring, I asked?  Because he was such a frail, beautiful child and his body looked like porcelin.  Her young daughter now has a better understanding of life and death.  I wanted to scream.  A CHILD DIED A PREVENTATIVE DEATH!!!  Good energy?  What the....

I asked my american friend about the circumstances of the child's death.  She conceded it was probably preventative but that these are spiritual people and they tried their best.  Though, again, she came back to the fact that the child's dealth was likely preventative.

No problemo - except I don't speak Spanish

When travelling, especially alone, I'm fairly capable of putting my anxiety at rest which is a complete departure from my daily life.  For example, I don't speak Spanish and I'm in a country that does speak Spanish.  I can get around but unplanned events will happen.  To save money yesterday, I decided that to get from my hostel in Quito to the bus station bound for Otavalo, I would take public transportation.  A taxi costs $8.50 and a bus only $.25.  So I got some delighfully vague directions from the hostel staff that involved a bus transfer.  The first leg went as planned, but the transfer made me nervous.  I was going to the station Carcelen but at the transfer there were two buses named Carcelen, one of which was called Carcelen bajo, which happened to be the bus present at the moment.  So I asked th bus driver's assistant, "Carcelen terminal?" and she said, "si", so I boarded.  20 minutes later I noticed no one on the bus had baggage.  30 minutes later the bus was empty in a random neigborhood and the assistant gave me an incredulous look when I asked, again, "Terminal Carcelen?"  "Non" and then some Spanish I made out to be 'you idiot you took the wrong bus.'  So I got off, walked 15 minutes, found a taxi, and my cost savings were diminished.

Bus stations in Quito are unlike those in Senegal.  No one was grabbing my arm trying to get me onto their bus or yelling at me to buy something.  I simply approached a counter that said 'Otavalo', bought a ticket and made my way to the bus.  As I approached the buses 20 or so heavily armed police (all police in Ecuador looked heavily armed to me yet they only carry side arms) and a flock of journalist surrounded a bus and started going through a man's luggage.  Oh wow, is this a bust? Was there a tip and the police invited the news crews?  So I take a seat at my departure gate and watch the police.  No, nothing.  The police then begin searching other people's luggage.  One of the police stared at my overpacked 40 liter bag.  TV crews film and photographers snap pictures of the search on other bus.  My bus pulls up and 10 of us board a bus that can hold 50.  2 minutes later a police man requests we all unload.  As I was the only person with considerable luggage, two police men take my bags and the rest watch.  One begins to methodically remove every article, unrolling my pants, fondling my underwear, reaching into my shoes and removing the stuffed socks.  Another police man went through my other bag. "What's this?" A sleeping bag.  "This?" A tent.  Soon camera crews and a few reporters have surrounded me, filming and snapping pictures, waiting for the chance that I had something illegal and they could capture my guilty face.  After removing every article of a very deliberate and well packed bag, they start asking questions.  "I'm a student."  "Tourist."  One offiicer is looking at, of all forms of ID's I'm carrying, my internation student ID card.  "How long in Ecuador?"  "15 dias,"  which I began to suspect was not the question he asked based on the confused look on his face.  A few more mangled attempts at communication and I was assured, "No problemo."

I was left to stuff everything back into my bag, hands shaking, with an audience of police, reporters and dozens of curious travellers.  I joined my companions on the bus, and we quickly lefy the station.  I had a wonderfully spacious seat with room for my bags next to me.  And the bus driver puts on the most random film I could have imagined, "Street Fighter."  YES!  There is no other film I would have rather watched.