Dear Friends; We came to Spain a few days ago on an eleven-hour, non-stop flight from Guayaquil to Madrid. With us on the huge, cramped Iberia plane was a French search and rescue team, part of the United Nations’ INSARAG that provides international coordination in earthquake response. The men had just spent ten days in Puerto Viejo, the coastal city most affected by the 7.8 earthquake two weeks ago, a somber reminder of the devastation that has left so many lives and homes destroyed while we take off for a month’s vacation. The men were dressed in their bright red and blue uniforms, heavy boots, helmets, with badges and such. They were treated as heroes and given the roomy exit seats, two of them across and slightly ahead of us (sitting in middle 4-seat rows), so I had many hours to stare at their handsome Gallic profiles and wonder at the terrible things they had seen. (The search for bodies was given up after about a week, when the death toll reached over 650). Interestingly, the men near us were more middle-aged, in good shape to be sure, but not young. At the Madrid airport, they hustled into the “in transit” line for their flight to France while we joined the “exit, non-EEU” line.

This is our fourth trip to Spain but the first time we’ve actually left the airport in Madrid.  Previously, we passed right through to reach other destinations, but this time,we planned to spend four days in Madrid before taking off for points south. And we were not disappointed, beginning with our accommodations at the Hostal Dulcinea on Cervantes street. In this old neighborhood of narrow winding streets, where Miguel Cervantes, of Don Quijote fame, lived and died, as de Lope Vega, a 16^th century scribbler and womanizer who is adored by the Spanish and whose house and garden has been lovingly reconstructed. Thank you our friend, Padre Manuel, for recommending this place. José and María return your greetings.   After four months of local Cañar fare, we were very ready for new tastes and flavors and wines and beers. So – ignoring past experience – we went right out immediatly on arrival and had a big plate of pulpo a la gallega (warm octopus, with potatoes, pimenton, olive oil) and two glasses of wine and beer each.  In Cañar it would have been about 10:00 AM, and that, combined with jet lag, meant a weird night, with my body puzzled about where it was and what was happening. But after a couple of days we adjusted, and last night we went back for more (pulpo that is).While our barrio de letras was human scale and intimate, the Madrid art museums are outsized and overwhelming. The Prado, where I last visited in the hazy past of 1968, with my two sisters, has expanded to become a small city of art. We started in the Valazquez wing, and didn’t get much beyond, a testament to his prodigious output as much as to our limited stamina. But we loved what we saw, drifting through the galleries with flocks of tourists on guided tours – sometimes up to 50 or 60 in a gaggle. We did better the next day, at the Thyssen Collection, although after the 20th century modern I had to retreat to our hotel for a nap and return to see the rest. Another thing I like: museums stay open until 7:00.As I write this we are on the bus to Granada (first photo above) – five easy hours, and for the past hour nothing but olive trees marching up hillsides, around mountains, and across plains. Industrial agriculture to be sure, but the scene is lovely – rows of light olive green against reddish soil, with backdrop of cloudy sky (see the reflection of driver on left side?). The first three days Madrid, with bright sun and warmth, lulled us into thinking we’d hit the good weather, as did half the population of the city, out in the streets and squares and sidewalk cafes. Yesterday and today: chilly and rain and everyone disappeared, with more rain coming for our visit to the Alhambra in Granada. Stay tuned, more to come…

Dear Friends: I’m trying to get this blog out today, first of all to say that while we certainly felt the 7.8 earthquake last night, we are far from the epicenter and we didn’t know of the deaths and damage to the coastal areas until this morning. Thanks to those who quickly wrote to ask if we are OK. I grabbed this image off the web to give an idea where we were are in relation to the center in Muisne. From Guayaquil, we are about 200 km. east, up in the Andes. Michael and I felt many tremors during our years in Costa Rica and last night we immediately recognized what was happening. About 40 seconds of gentle swaying, with power flickering and light fixtures swaying. Our house is built of barraque – adobe mud around a wooden frame – for just this reason.  It is built to “sway” with the earth’s movement instead of coming down, as can happen with adobe block structures. (Our area of Cañar is affected by minute movements, usually unfelt but obvious in the eroded countryside around us.)

In fact, in other Andean countries such as Chile and Argentina, adobe block construction is no longer allowed because so many die in these buildings in strong earthquakes. Now, of course, most buildings are made of poured concerete or concrete block and this was typical damage last night. (image from NYT)

From quick reading on BBC:  (Ecuador) sits on the so-called “Ring of Fire” – the arc of high seismic activity that extends right around the Pacific basin. At its location, Ecuador fronts the boundary between the Nazca and South American tectonic plates. …The Nazca plate, which makes up the Pacific Ocean floor in this region, is being pulled down (subducted) and under the South American coast. It is a process that has helped build the Andes and Ecuador’s many volcanoes, including the mighty Chimborazo.”

Thanks again for all those who wrote with concern. Now I’ll continue working on my  blog for next week: “The Price of Oil, A Walk, and Another Baptism (later today).

Well, we’ve been in Cañar two months now and I already feel time going by faster than it should. I look at the calendar and see March full of activities and events, and even into April. Our day-to-day life is pretty quiet though there’s always something to break the routine. In fact, that’s our favorite refrain when things go wrong: “IT’S ALWAYS SOMETHING….” Last week, for example, workers began taking down trees below us, and left us without electricity, off and on, for several days. The first day the power went off I walked down the road and found a young man up in this enormous tree with a hand saw!  He’d dropped a limb on the lines. CentroSur, the power company, came and reconnected us, but in the days that followed they simply cut the power during the day while the tree cutters were at work (now with the steady drone of chainsaws), and reconnected us at night. Just imagine what this would do to your schedule if you knew that from 8:00 – 4:00 you’d have no Internet, no lights, no fountain, no radio, no working outlets. Well, you’d just do other things. Michael’s stove is gas so he cooked.My laptops have batteries so I kept working until they went out. Then, I suppose, it was time for a glass of wine – and we still have the fire in the fireplace, thankfully. Life could be worse.

We’ve been in the house eight years and the interior garden plants – I remember how excited we were with those first little plantings – have grown enormously – from the macho aloe vera reaching for the sky (with two birds’ nests discovered in it last year) to the jade plant blooming like crazy and dropping baby jade plants to colonize Michael’s side). The oregano, on “my” side, that we were so pleased to think we’d have close to the kitchen, had so completely taken over, even infested with tiny white flies, that it was choking out all other plants. With help fromthis unidentified monster thing: Michael decided to take on the patio garden as a project (after his visa/passport affair was settled, but that’s another story). He tore out this thing, plus all the oregano, though a network of roots lurks just waiting to come up again. Yesterday we went shopping for new plants at Marco’s, our plant dealer who lives up the road, and came home with a tree (another project), 5 or 6 cactus, and other weird spiky sedum things, all for $20 (think what that would cost at Portland Nursery!) The result, earlier today:Meanwhile, not to be outdone, I was out in the kitchen garden thinning the minuscule lettuce plants that visitors helped me plant a few weeks ago.

What do we do for fun, you ask? Well, yesterday we had a tiny adventure when we decided to explore a church that has intrigued us for years, seen from the bus high on a mountain in the town of Biblian, between here and Cuenca.  Michael packed a picnic lunch and we got off the bus at the approximate elevation of the church and started walking. It was still a big climb, and just as we needed to stop to catch our breath we saw this: An old woman in bright colors sitting in front of a yellow house weaving a straw hat. Beside her, a little store with an old man. “Buy a beer!” I urged Michael although it was only about 10:00. I needed time to chat and take some photos. Maria Angelita Dután Zhinun is 92 years old, and has been making hats since she was eight, taught by her mother. 

Her hands are still supple, her hearing fine, her sight good enough to weave, and her sense of humor intact, along with her eagerness to talk. We soon got down to the personal stuff. She married at 16, has had 26 pregnancies, seven left alive, and the old man in the store (her partner) is her nephew. I guess she has outlived all the men her age. She spun other stories about Saint Rocio in the church up the hill, miracles, and stuff. We didn’t get it all, but this stop with María Angelita made the whole day worthwhile.

She liked my blue eyes and asked Michael if that is why he married me. I asked her if we could have a photo together. After, we continued our climb up the mountain to the church, but it rather paled next to where we’d just been.

We had our picnic lunch (with great views), walked on around and down the back side of the mountain and caught the bus home. “We must do something like this again next week,” one of us said, but we both agreed.

I’m going to pass on the Cañar book club this time. I think once a month will do, so please send your latest reads and comments for the next chronicle, on March 20. Meanwhile, stay in touch; I love hearing from all of you.