I don’t recall if we set an alarm on Wednesday. By that point, we knew we didn’t need to. We were started to dial in our daily rhythm. Pre-breakfast in our bedroom, main breakfast with Lucia and her family, then second breakfast (and third coffees) at a cafe in Cotacachi. It was delightful.
I had a bit of work to do that day, but with the time zone difference, there was time to explore a bit with my family first. So we took advantage by going to a little cultural museum downtown. It featured some of the indigenous traditions of the region, as well as several of the more prominent post-independence cultural figures (mostly notable musicians). It was quaint and charming, and almost felt like we were trespassing. Aside from some musicians using an empty area as a practice space, we were the only souls in the building.
There wasn’t a guard out front or even a ticket window. Just a paper sign in sheet on a clipboard by the door. Through most of our time there, I wasn’t sure if we were actually in an exhibit or just an empty office. Our kids, devoid of any inner, “We probably shouldn’t be here voice” led us into a room that seemed to have been recently used for some type of work training, but otherwise wouldn’t have been out of place in Versailles.
I love this town.
But, you know, work. I had some odds and end to take care of, but nothing I couldn’t do from a coffee shop. That said, my main task was to find some type of work space for the next day. I’d be doing some telemedicine, and didn’t want any patients wondering why they were hearing pigs and roosters in the background. I was already pushing my luck with this trip as it was. So I scoped out a few options and had a relatively quiet afternoon.
While I was working, our kids played soccer with the host children and smattering of cousins. The only event of note was that Lucia was out at some sort of community meeting that evening. So the usual dinner cues of lights on in the kitchen and the wafting smells of deliciousness never happened. Turns out she prepped some food for both families ahead of time, but each family was way too polite for that plan to work. The rest of our host family was waiting for us to come inside for dinner, but we didn’t want to seem pushy or anxious. So finally, about an hour after we would have put the kids to bed, we meekly walked into the main house to see if, um, anyone, you know, might be hungry for some dinner. Our host dad was visibly relieved to see us emerge from the guest room, and all 8 of us, famished by that point, inhaled the meal.
Thursday was my first day of true doctor work. As in, I would be sitting at a computer in South America talking with a patient on the western edge of the Navajo Nation. What a time we’re living in.
My set up at the house wasn’t ideal. There was decent internet connectivity, and even the animals in the background wouldn’t have been a strange sound to a Navajo cattle farmer. But our room was pretty much just bed and bathroom, neither of which would have been the most professional background for a physician visit. So I woke up well ahead of both families and made my way into town via a shared taxi.
My explorations the day before determined that best bet for a worksite would be a budget hostel. It took a bit of explaining that I only wanted the room for the day (and that I wasn’t a total weirdo), but we worked out an arrangement. Given the lack of any other options, it actually wasn’t a bad set up.
Work actually ended up going great. Despite my end of the connection being a $10 hostel in a tiny farming town in South American, the only hiccup was an IT issue on the Tuba City side. That will not be a surprise to anyone I work with. But once we got that squared away, I had a decent day chatting with patients. I let my patients know that I was out of town but didn’t want them to go without care, and they were very understanding and appreciative of the unique arrangement. Maybe we can make this a regular thing?
While I was working, Aimee took the kids on a guided hike around Laguna de Cuicocha. The guide was arranged by the same person who coordinated our homestay. So I knew that although the information ahead of time would be scarce, it would be a reliable experience and I didn’t need to worry much.
Connectivity was scarce outside of the city, so I knew I probably wouldn’t hear from them until I got home. So it was a very pleasant surprise when I ran into them at the local market for lunch! They had just arrived and were in the process of connecting up to WiFi to tell me about their hike when the kids saw me walk in. I was in the process of ordering my usual eggs and potatoes when I heard “Dad! Dad!” in very familiar voices before I was tackled by two small children.
Aimee shared some photos over lunch and told me they had a delightful time.
But since the professional hiking guide moved at a much faster pace than our 5 and 7 year old, they were famished. We all enjoyed another massive lunch before I headed back to the “office.”
The rest of my day was a remarkably normal work afternoon, despite the surroundings. Aimee and the kids’ afternoon was anything but normal. In this version of what passes as a work day, the rest of my family went with Lucia to her mom’s farm. But it wasn’t just any farm, it’s an animal farm. The kids got to play with the usual pigs and chickens, but there were also multiple litters of kittens and puppies. You try telling these kids that there’s no way we could get these animals on an international flight home. We’ll see if it goes any better.
Once everyone had made it back home from their respective adventures, we all settled down for a very nice dinner and a lovely chat. We were really starting to connect with our host family and have much more meaningful conversations than the usual tourist/host pleasantries.
Thursday had been a rest day for the festival, but it was in full swing again on Friday. That was immediately evident as I woke for work to the usual animal sounds now joined by a car alarm, super loud music coming from somewhere down the street, and much earlier (yet equally unintelligible) announcements broadcast by the church loudspeaker a few blocks away.
But I didn’t mind the early rise. I had another work day ahead of me and needed to head into town anyways. Again departing before Lucia’s delicious food hit the table, I was at the mercy of whatever I could find in town. The tourist cafes didn’t open until 9, but I knew there had to be something. There was already a lot of activity as the city woke up, and I couldn’t imagine that every one of those people had breakfast at home.
So I headed down to the bus station/main market, and was relieved to see a few food stands already open. In line with me were paramedics, street sweepers, power line workers, and the other people who didn’t have the luxury of waking up slowly. I was dramatically out of place in my buttoned up shirt, but I’d like to think that there was still a bit of camaraderie that crossed cultural boundaries. 6 am is still 6 am.
Five minutes and one dollar later, I had an enormous plate of eggs and potatoes in front of me and knew I’d be good for the day. But like most super tasty food stalls, each one had their thing. The eggs and potatoes place didn’t do coffee, and the coffee place wasn’t open. But thankfully I was now getting the lay of the land and knew I could get a halfway boxed coffee from one of the panaderías.
Caffeinated and satisfied, I set off to my hostel/office. The stairs up to the second floor reception desk (I was working above a diaper store) was barred and locked. Not a huge surprise at that hour. So I rang the buzzer and pressed my ear up close to the speaker, hoping to be able to decipher the Spanish over the buzz of the city street. I couldn’t hear anything, so I said “hola?” into the void and pushed the button again. After repeating that futile routine for about 10 minutes, I took a seat on the bench out front and tried to at least clear out a few work emails over my cell phone.
I tried the door again a few times, and then sent a text message to the phone number listed on the front sign. Nada and nada. Now getting dangerously close to my actual start time (when patients would be sitting in a room waiting for me), I needed to start figuring out a backup plan. There were a handful of other hostels in town, but I had already ruled out a few of them for their limited WiFi, lack of individual rooms, or general creepiness. I walked over to one of the others, and despite the owner being even more confused about why I just wanted a room for the day, we were able to come to an agreement. The internet connection wasn’t quite as robust and the general vibe made me even more glad I wouldn’t be sleeping there that night. But it got the job done.
But as eventful as my day started, at it least it didn’t open with the neighbors slaughtering a pig as Aimee later told me her day did. Our kids are getting the full experience.
The rest of their day was a lot more tranquilo. They made their way into town and hung out at an open air coffee shop with lots of room for the kids to run around. They later even stumbled upon a little playground that we hadn’t seen during our earlier explorations.
There were a couple of other foreign kids at the playground, but this wasn’t their first trip down the slide. They and their parents had been living in Cotacachi for nearly two years as part of a religious-tinged water purification mission. Or was it a water-tinged religious mission? Hard to tell. But the children were delightful and were clearly thrilled to see some other kids speaking English ahead of their return to Minnesota later this year.
Later that day, Aimee helped Lucia capture a few cuy (guinea pigs) to be slaughtered and sold at market. (Remind me never to complain about my work day to her.) Guinea pigs are an unfathomably beloved delicacy around here. You can buy a whole chicken (living or otherwise) for $4, but a tiny guinea pig goes for about 8 times as much. We don’t get it either, but who are we to judge?
But perhaps the most important news of the day was that Mimi had lost a tooth! There had been one hanging on by a thread for the past several days, and it finally popped out over second breakfast. That gave us a great excuse to ask what were the local customs around kids losing teeth. It turns out that the ratoncito (little rat) tradition that we had first learned about in El Salvador was also popular here. Kids here still throw their teeth on the roof and ask that the ratoncito bring them a little token in return. It was a lovely way to wrap up our last night in this charming little town.
Sensing the moment, Mimi said to me after she tossed her tooth on the roof, “I had a really fun time here.”
Me too, Mimi. Me, too.
