the travel part of travel

you know how i feel about this... the travel part of travel is the worst.

saturday evening a group of us headed to the airport around 7pm. our taxi we had "reserved" for the trip didn't show, which is a bummer because, when you have all of your belongings with you, it is nice to be certain you are with a legit/safe taxi driver. instead we hopped in a tiny unmarked taxi-ish colored car with a guy who the hostel staff assured us was legit.

first thing i did once we were all crammed in the car with our bags was establish a relationship with this guy. they say that is one of the best ways to avoid being robbed/attacked/whatever - make a connection. and so i struggled with my limited (though considerably improved) spanish and he actually turned out to be very nice, correcting my grammar and laughing at my attempts at communication (though, in my defense, he really did understand everything i tried to say to him, and he did not speak english).

the only shady part was when he stopped at a dark gas station  in the middle of nowhere (which is possible when you're on a 1+ hour drive to the airport - the new airport is soooo far from quito!), got out, leaving his door wide open, and disappeared for awhile. lauren, trisa and i sat patiently in the car, our respective doors locked (which i'm sure would do a lot of good given that his was open and inviting people in), and debated if this was the part where he brings guys over to steal all of our stuff. fortunately this did not happen and eventually he returned and drove us the rest of the way to the airport - lucky? i will admit i was pretty darn worried while we waited, the epitome of sitting ducks. but all's well that ends well, right?

at the airport most of our group were lucky enough to get on a plane - slav and i (foolishly purchasing tickets home on sunday morning - because our course director was not clear that we would be done friday), tried to get on an earlier flight (fail) and attempted at least to get our bags checked and make it through security (no luck); it was all futile - fat chance accomplishing any such thing in a place like ecuador. american airlines had no established counter or designated employees and until the check-in window opened at 4am (it was about 8:30pm) we could do nothing.

we hunkered down in a corner for the night, expecting to get some decent sleep - wrong! within minutes of settling down, our bags piled in a corner and us laying in front of them, these two guys walked over. if you know me well, imagine the way i look at ice cream or cookies or good beer :) well this is how these guys were looking at us, or rather, our bags :( now i have a few thoughts to interject here. if i were going to rob tourists at the airport, i would definitely rob them when they arrive, carrying a considerable amount of $$ and all of their new travel gear. I would not rob the departing tourist, who inevitably has a bag full of dirty, disgusting clothes and a bunch of useless souvenirs, without a penny to their name. i wanted to explain this to the shady looking dudes standing over us. they were empty handed except for their cell phones, unusual for most who are traveling, especially in the international wing of the airport. yeah, it was pretty obvious these two were not here to hop a flight, and they were not being so discrete about their intentions. slav and i discussed this openly as they stood there and they soon wandered away, only minutes later replaced by an equally shady duo, who wandered over and like the first two, stood in front of us and blatantly eyed the bags we lay in front of... slav and i again discussed the situation. was their security here? would they harm us or just take our things? do you think they have weapons in their pockets? because again these two were empty handed aside from their flip phones.

when they strolled away the space before us was almost immediately occupied by two large men that mirrored the others only these guys were considerably bigger. ecuadorian men are short, and when i tower a head over them they are definitely less threatening. this was not the case with these two and with a glance at each other and no words, slav and i stood up, gathered our things, and headed over to the well-lit center of the airport right by the guy who checks boarding passes and passports to let people through to security. we stayed here the rest of the night and felt much safer - though after our earlier encounters there was no way i was sleeping, and so i spent the night reading until 4am when we were finally able to check bags and head through security to our gate. there we slept another 2 hours before boarding, which thankfully slav woke me for, because i was sleeping hard enough i was setting up to miss our flight. a two hour delay for fog or who knows what (this is the new airport, so new that when we flew into quito a month ago we flew into a different airport), and we were on our way to miami and home....

as a reminder here is the link to lo's blog she kept during the trip...
http://jardinedelosandes.blogspot.com/