This weekend 16th-18th of November I was planning to go to Baños. Well, I was actually planning to go to Otavalo, but something made me change my mind just an hour before departure. I packed a small bag and got on the trollebus south against the big bus terminal Quitumbe. Getting there is easy but far! Just take a trollebus from a 10 de Agosto headed south and get as far as you can, then you will reach Quitumbe - you might have to change the bus one time. From Quitumbe I got a busticket, 3,5$ and I was ready to go.
The bus was more or less comfortable and I got a window seat to enjoy the view since it was only 4pm and there was still at least 3 hours of sun left.
The buses here always takes longer than planned since they do a million stops! They stop random places on the street and pick up more people. They never close the front door and the ticketguy (there is a busdriver and a ticketman) screams out "Baños, Baños" hoping for someone to run after the bus. Besides picking people up, street sellers also get on the bus all the time trying to sell fruits, dinners, beverages and so on. You will never be hungry or thirsty in a bus in Ecuador :) One guy came onto the bus and started talking about three different chocolates he was selling and described each of them. He claimed that one was without sugar for diabetics. Then he handed out one of each chocolate to everyone. Here I read on all the chocolates and of course sugar was the main ingredient in all three ;) He then started talking about his family and prices of the chocolates and in the end he tried to get money from people or the chocolates back. Funny little scenario.
After about about 45minutes a girl came on the bus and sat next to me. I could see the sun was bothering her, so I pulled the curtain. From then on we started talking. 17 year old Adriana. She lived in Quito during weekdays when she studied to be a dentist, and on weekends she went home to her parents, her 12 year old sister and her beloved dog. We talked for an hour in spanish until she had to get off. It made the trip a lot faster and I got to practice my spanish.
When I reached Baños after 4,5 hour (it was supposed to take 3,5) I found an internet cafe where I looked up a good hostel. I went directly to the hostel, checked in to a dorm room and then went out to see the town. The town is beautiful, but very touristed! Most of the food was pizza, sharwarma and other international foods. The rest of the buildings where internet cafes, hostels, adventure companies and very touristic shops with clothes and bags. An old south american guy with a younger (maybe around 40) woman stopped me on the street asking me where I was from. The guy knew a few words in danish and he spoke english. We talked for around 20minutes about everything and nothing, it was very entertaining :)
After saying goodbye, I went on a food hunt, trying to find Ecuadorian food. I found a nice place with great food. Though I could only eat half before I started feeling weird.
- Earlier that day I had been feeling a bit weird and on the bus I had been switching between sweating and freezing. I was thinking that I might have got the flu.
I went back to the hostel where I met James in the dorm room. He was a young solo traveler from Australia. We talked for a bit before he went out and I went to bed. I did not sleep much that night! I kept waking up, sometimes because of noise, but sometimes just out of the blue. It was the longest night ever! This was also the case for my 3 roomates though. Two of the roomates got out of bed pretty easily and left the hostel early. James and I couldn't get out of bed. I tried several times, but it took me hours to get out and I was feeling even worse this morning. James was feeling worse than me though. He had nausea and had to go to the bathroom every other minute.. We decided to go get some breakfast on the roof, before they closed down the kitchen. Up there the view was beautiful. On one side you had a great view of the town and on the other side you had a big waterfall. We got some breakfast and tea and went back down to the room. James told me he was taking a bus to the center of Quito at 2pm. There was only one bus a day that went to the center of Quito, the rest stopped at Quitumbe terminal - I didn't know about this before he told me.
I decided to join him on the bus since I figured it wouldn't be much fun to be sick for another day in a hostel and then go home sunday to reach my classes monday. If I went today I also got to talk to James in the bus to make time fly.
James went to the pharmacy to get something for his stomach and he returned with two kinder eggs\suprises - one for each to make us happy :) He also provided me with a few Ibuprofen in case I was gonna feel worse. We went on the bus together, talking and sleeping all the way to Quito. The bus stopped at Quitumbe and everyone else got off. One girl told us it was the last stop. When everybody had left the bus, I asked the driver how we would get to the center and he said we should should stay in the bus. That's what we did and the busdriver stopped just 2 blocks from my appartment and not very far from James hostel. All of saturday and sunday I was just sleeping, going to the bathroom and sleeping some more..
Being sick with diabetes is a bit of a challenge. I had to take much more insulin than I usualy do and I had to take insulin several times without eating. What doesn´t make it easier is that you have to eat white pasta, rice, white bread etc. when you have an upset stomach. After this diet and a lot of insulin, I was finally feeling better wednesday and in the evening I decided to go to Juan Valdez cafe and drink something without caffeine. I chose a hot chocolate with whipped cream - that was the best hot chocolate I have ever had! (It might have something to do with the fact that I didn´t drink one for more than a year and last time I drank one, it was powder cocoa and hot water) I have never enjoyed a hot chocolate that much! Unfortunately I forgot about the consequences of eating/drinking dairy products while having stomach problems. That hot chocolate made sure I woke up a lot of times to run to the bathroom during the night, great!
Well thursday I was feeling a lot better though and now I feel that I am back to normal and i´m able to eat normal food. I even ate indian food yesterday. Good timing since it will allow me to enjoy my weekend :)
I will upload some pictures soon. Have a nice weekend :)
No comments:
Post a Comment