Entering a new year

Christmas is not really a big deal here in Ecuador, at least among the indigenous. There are many christians here because of the Spanish, so it follows that there will be celebration for the birth of Christ as well. But overall it is not something that is over done, just a presence.

They have a rather strange way of celebrating during the weeks before, something that really makes no sense to me at all. One of the churches, I am not sure which one, as there are several different religions here, spends each day those last 3 weeks travelling door to door. They bring incense and the baby Jesus and different types of firecrackers. Often the family of the house where they stop provides a meal, the neighbors joining in on the celebration. After the meal, if there is one, they begin to blast off the fireworks some of which sound very much like gunfire to me. Miss Mali and I had a great deal of trouble with this tradition, frightened many times by the sudden loud bangs that sounded off close by.

For  me this resonates a bit too closely to the experience I had as a very young child forced to witness the death of someone dear to me. The method used to kill this man was a bullet to the left temple close range, I was sitting only a few feet away when it happened. I tend to jump at sudden loud bangs of any kind because of this experience. So unfortunately my days were spent fending off the memory of this childhood memory that haunts me still. I wondered many times what this tradition has to do with christmas and the baby Jesus, but I guess everyone has their idea for uniting people in celebration. It was just lost on me.

Christmas has always been a very difficult time of year for me, for reasons I just cannot explain. Once the children were grown and gone, it was almost a relief for me to not have to pretend any longer that it is a season of joy for me. While I do love and appreciate the beauty I see around me during the season, when I am home and alone with my private thoughts, I am faced with the extreme sorrow connected to this time of year. I have not yet been able to recall the trigger which caused this reaction, perhaps I never will and maybe it’s better I don’t. I was just grateful this year when the day came and went putting an end to the violent sounds.

New Years eve is another very loud celebration here. Anyone who has a set of speakers brings them outside and cranks them up full blast. And I mean full blast!! We decided to make our way downtown to see the festivities as we heard that there are lots of parties, dancing and celebration. The people make dummies in the image of people they wish to reconcile with and they burn them at midnight. I believe they put a firecracker inside the body of the dummy which they set off. Many people put in quite a bit of hard work into making these dummies and they are quite impressive. Kind of a shame to burn them……

As we walked downtown each family which had an effigy also had their hands out looking for donations towards their cause. We chose not to participate at least on the way down as it would have been quite an expensive venture given the great number of  hands held out. On the way home though we downloaded our change to the children we met.

    This was a great display, very well thought out and executed. They really put a lot of work into the many details.               I guess even superhero’s have to be released of their duties, if they have not performed to the standards expected of them.                               .    This family was also really well done, but I’m not sure what the robot is there for…..

   This is another thing they do. It’s more like Halloween for us. They dress up just as we do on October 31st and dance in the streets. Actually we saw a great deal of the male population dressed at women (or girls) depending on the age. One young lady was pregnant and looked ready to deliver any day :). We weren’t quite sure why it was just the men dressing up, but I am sure there was significance to the symbolism. Had the music not been so horribly loud I think we would have enjoyed staying longer, but with so many speakers on the streets all at full capacity, it was a bit too much for my senses to take in. We ate at our favourite Mexican restaurant, getting a very wonderful meal once again. We then had a latte at the “Gringo” cafe down on the square and watched the people walking by. There did not seem to be any formal set-up or plan, just anyone and everyone setting up wherever they chose to. Organized confusion…..

When we left the coffee shop we stoped to watch a band playing on a makeshift stage in the square. They were quite good and I enjoyed watching them, but unfortunately we caught them on their last song and no one followed right away, so we continued on our way. We saw many crazy men dancing in the street stopping traffic with their short skirts hiked up or even removed and their hands out to the passengers of the cars. It was a bit too much for me, their gestures quite crude and uncomfortable for me to watch. We never did find out why this was the happening – even the firefighters were participating, but as someone suggested it may be a way of acting really silly in order to get rid of the negative energy or bad spirits. This does make sense to me because this ties into the burning of the effigies as well – start the new year with no bad feelings.

The music played all night until 10:00 or 11:00 the next morning, so I was a bit tired of the rumba by that point. I brought in the new year with a set of good headphones and my own music lol, which helped me to get some sleep. All in all it was a good night, the walk home was fabulous!!! It was a clear sky, there was no wind – the temperature was beautiful for the walk home. We stopped several times to look at the stars, the sky perfect for such an idea. It was incredibly peaceful when we got to a stretch of the back road where no one lived (or at least did not own speakers) and just stood there watching the fireflies and stars in peaceful contentment.

It’s in the moments, this thing called happiness, just string them all together and you end up with a wonderful image of your highlight reel. It was such a short time ago I was making my plans to come here, the reality of it still sinking in. I said my prayers of thanks as I walked up the hill enjoying the beauty of the night and connected to all of the amazing things that have happened to me during these last few months. Truly I am blessed!!!

Happy New Year to all you beautiful people back home. I wish to thank you all for coming with me on my journey, it makes it so much easier to face my fears knowing you are all there. It also makes my heart swell with happiness to be able to share this gift with friends, something I have not had much experience with during my life. I thank you all for your presence, your kindness and encouragement, it means so very much to me!!!! ❤️❤️❤️