Landing in Quito was no drama, cut through the clouds and made a turn, we were there already, it was a gloomy and foggy day, it was not raining. Quito is the 2nd highest capital cities of the world, just below La Paz. Maybe because I have been taking the high altitude medication for the past few days, I did not feel much. I passed through the custom pretty quickly, the line was rather short. Because I only had my carry on backpack, so I just walked out. My airbnb host was supposed to pick me up at 6:30pm, I was kind of early. It gave me time to find the mobile phone store in the shopping mall across from the terminal, I needed a local sim card to put in my phone. Talking to that stuff was a trip in itself. He was really really helpful and did not mind me check the same question over and over. I was like those demanding piece of character, I wanted 2GB data, gave me now, now! English was out of the question, so we pretty much communicated through the google translate apps, now they even translated and spoke back to you in the other language. That was kind of amazing. I needed to wait for half an hour before I could enter some code to activate the plan. I would have to do that back in the city. Got back to terminal to wait for my host to arrive. Again, there were a family of Inka family (indigenous family anyway) standing not far from me, women were in traditional clothes, men were not, one of the men looked more like a motorcyclist with tight torn jeans but with makeup on. They had their phone camera all ready, I thought they were picking up a relative or something... the door swayed opened, an airport staff pushed a cart of 10-15 suitcases or so all stacked up out, they were like chasing after that cart, taking picture, all excited. Not a clue what have just happened in front of my eyes. Things you see in Quito airport stayed in Quito airport.
Giesla, my host, finally arrived, but she did not drive. Instead she hired a taxi, probably a friend of hers. Anyway, she told me that because the traffic in Quito is getting so bad, there was a restriction in place, for some cars with a license of certain numbers (maybe even number car cannot be driven) during rush hours or something like. I heard of that before in another country. Giesla was extremely friendly and helpful, she explained everything to me in Inglés, where to take bus to Middle Earth, the Equator, where to bus to old town. The driver was great too, his name is Darwin, he agreed to pick me up at the bloody 6am on Sunday back to airport when I need to fly to another town called Cuenca. Giesla's apartment looked amazing, and had a killer view. I am hoping that the fog will lift up in the morning, so I can take some picture of this view.
I was already pretty exhausted and hungry, so I just walked down the street and see what I could find nearby, there was this tiny tiny hamburger joint, tiny. There were maybe 7 people waiting inside. I poked my head half way through the door, everyone was looking at me, so I asked carefully to the young cook, hamburger y fritas? Si, Si, come on in, clearly I didn't speak Spanish, this customer, maybe he was the friend of the cook, he was talking to me, asking me to if I wanted cheese, bacon, egg, ... I wanted to say Yes Yes Yes, not because I wanted all of those, but because he was really handsome and friendly. You know how it was like your eyes were fixed on the prey, and everything else..whatever. He asked me where I come from, and about my trip, had me sit me and asked me what I want to drink, we laughed about my Spanish, he said in 10 days, it will be better. His girlfriend was sitting right in front of me, she kind of have that half smile on her face. He introduced himself, Louis, so I told him my name and we shook hand. He was like, if you need any help, we are right here. Oh my god, he is so nice, cute and friendly. Can I have a piece of him to go with my burger, please?
So far, people are nice, weather not so much, end of May usually is their start of the summer dry season, right at the border supposedly, I guess there was a delay of the rainy season. This week I am looking into having some rainy days. I will try to get up early to sightseeing, hopefully there will be some more clearer sky in the morning hours. Tomorrow my plan is to go to Middle of the World, and then visit the Old Town. All by local buses, will see. :) Let's the adventure begin.
