This past weekend I had three days off work so I decided to visit Cuenca, a small historical city south of Quito. Last Tuesday I was talking to the woman who owns the restaurant next door, Catarina, because I knew she grew up there. It is my favorite restaurant in Quito because the food is delicious and Catarina is super nice and always gives us extra food and drinks. When I told her I was going to Cuenca she immediately got out a pen and paper and wrote down her father's address and phone numbers for all her siblings and told me to call them when I landed. I thanked her multiple times but told her I didn't want to bother her family members though she insisted.
On Thursday night, about 14 hours before my arrival in Cuenca, I went back just to ask Catarina if she had let her family know that I was going to call when I arrived. She said no but that she would call her sister right then and demanded that I accept a free cup of coffee. When she returned she told me that her sister would pick me up from the airport and show me around the city. I didn't know exactly what the appropriate response to that sort of gesture is so I thanked her repeatedly and gave her a big hug.
When I landed in Cuenca I called Catarina's sister Mercy from a payphone since I don't have a cell phone down here and we communicated enough information to hopefully find each other outside of the airport. I was supposed to look for a white SUV and she was looking for a white boy in a blue sweater. Our official meeting place translated too "out front" of the airport. Despite the lack of a detailed plan, 10 minutes later she pulled up and I hopped in. I was accompanied in the front seat by Juanita, her two year old daughter who sat in my lap on the drive home. She took me back to her house which is located within the same cement walls as her father's house. I was told to wait in the living room while her father, Luis, came down. Luis is a very short, round man that hurt his back so he walks with a cane in each hand. After his voyage down the stairs into the seat next to me, he immediately started asking me every question imaginable and telling a ton of jokes in which I'm pretty sure I only picked up about half of.
After about 20 minutes Catarina's other sister, Monica, came back from work to have lunch. The three of us sat down in the kitchen and talked for a while. I figured out that Monica is a lawyer and works for a University in the city. When we were all eating the enormous amount of food she made, she apologized to me for not having my room ready yet but that I could set all of my stuff in there! This was the point where I realized that this was going to a much different weekend than I had planned, but in this case different meant way better because I wouldn't be traveling alone. Their hospitality was like nothing I have ever experienced before and just sitting around talking with them was so much fun.
There is a lot to write for this one so I am going to break it up and post a new section each day until it's all done. Hope this sparks your interest to read more!
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