Pretty Things
As promised, here are some more photos from our trip to el JardÃn Botánico. I don't know what any of these plants and flowers are called, I just thought they were neat.
This one looks alien:
Here's a shot of a gorgeous flowering bush:
And the close-up:
It looks cozy in there, like the perfect home for a fairy.
It's a whole village of fairy dwellings:
This is a branch from a strange tree:
I love the flowers:
That color is awesome.
Yay for pretty things!
2007-11-30 13:17:26 UTC
The Naranjilla
Meet the naranjilla:
It looks kinda like a mandarin orange, but it's green and slimy on the inside. I know it sounds gross, but I swear they're good. They make an excellent juice. They're very tart, a little too tart for me, so I add a bunch of sugar. The juice tastes like natural, liquid orange sweet-tarts.
2007-11-30 13:13:20 UTC
Sweet Underdog Dreams
Just another sleepy underdog on the streets of Otavalo:
And another, who was sleeping about two feet away from the first one:
I wonder what the underdogs dream about. I bet it looks a little something like this:
A whole garbage bag filled with treats! This is the stuff doggie dreams are made of. It's like Indian Buffet is for me.
2007-11-30 13:09:19 UTC
Madre de Dios
The people we rent from run a small museum (that no one ever seems to visit) and sell cuyes (guinea pigs). The other day, an old indigenous woman knocked on our door and asked me for a cuy. "Um, sorry lady, but I'm not the guinea pig butcher around these parts." Now, I knew that people in Ecuador ate cuyes, but I did not know that I would be a witness to their slaughter in my own backyard. Holy, holy, holy hell! Last week, I saw the butcher in action. Three little piggies were murdered right before my very eyes! That is NOT something you want to see while enjoying your morning coffee.
An old woman was in the back courtyard carrying a big wriggling sack. The patriarch of the family took a writhing, squealing fat cuy from the sack and proceeded to slice its throat. It convulsed for several long seconds before finally dying. The woman pulled another screaming guniea pig from her sack of victims. And another. I have no idea how many piggies were killed that day but the sound of their screams is going to haunt me. I'm telling you, it's like Silence of the Lambs. If I could have saved just one...
2007-11-27 17:12:03 UTC
House of Horrors
La Parque Carolina also contains the Museo de Ciencias Naturales. The Lonely Planet guide claims that this is the best natural history museum in the country. But then again, the Lonely Planet guide is filled with lies. In reality, the Museo de Ciencias Naturales is a museum filled with disturbingly bad taxidermy. Some of the animals only have black marbles for eyes. Others don't have any eyes at all! The shoddy sewing makes them look like gruesome Frankenstein experiments. In other words, it's pretty awesome.
I don't know what this animal is, but I know it never looked like this when it was alive:
Here's Noah with some new friends:
This monkey is one of my personal favorites:
Here's me with what appears to have once been a retarded tiger:
Finally, here's me and Noah with a dead condor:
After spending an hour with these monsters, I was a little scared and Noah was in a state of shock.
2007-11-25 16:09:03 UTC