Cheap Travelers

On Thursday my Ecuadorian friend Carolina invited me to a friend’s birthday party in Cumbaya, a suburb of Quito. She picked me up from my hostel and we drove to the valley, into a gated neighborhood with some really beautiful homes. This particular home is the kind that makes me reconsider my ideas of owning big possessions. The party turned out to be a small gathering with close friends, family, and then me. It was really awkward.

I really enjoyed Friday. Following work I had a great conversation with the Israeli from Wednesday and because of that I learned a lot about Israel and its people.

Israeli travelers are known as being the worst among travelers. They can be rude, usually hang in large groups, and don’t make much of an effort to meet others. This is a generalization of course.

I spoke with the Israeli honestly and we spent a long time comparing what people are like in Israel and in America. For instance during the first five minutes he offered to let me stay at his place when I go to Israel. Of course my response was thank you, maybe I will some day. The reality is that if I ever did go to Israel I doubt I would actually take him up on the offer. But when we talked about that later on he told me in Israel if someone says that they really mean it. That’s not the best example to summarize how meaningful the conversation was to me but a lot of what we spoke about provided better insight of Israeli’s and why they may act certain ways.

Like Wednesday I led us out to the disco. But this time I had 15 people (Chileans, French, etc.) following as I walked us to No Bar, a popular disco I heard was fun.

It was full of 40 year olds and when I made contact with one attractive girl I shied away because from a distance I could not tell if she looked good from a distance, or if she was older with wrinkles. My loss maybe? I probably at least should have talked to her.

I rounded up the crew and took them to the safe choice, Bungalow 6. We huddled outside for 20 some minutes until everyone decided the $5 cover with a drink included was too expensive. I went in with a German guy and the rest of them left for somewhere else. Both of us remarked how difficult it is to go out in a big group and were relieved to have broken away. By this time in was past midnight and in Ecuador it’s important to show up early or else the best looking girls will already have found someone to dance with for the night. I did meet a few people but wasn’t overly excited about them.

We left at around three AM for some chicken schwarma, the late night food you find in Quito. The German just spent 10 months in Colombia writing his thesis so we had a lot to talk about.