Bad Day

Let me tell you why today sucks.

It all ties back to food and sleep. See, I'm a very simple man. If I sleep and I eat, I'm happy. However, in Baños, I could do neither. My cheap room, with 4 roommates, was small, cramped, and had no air conditioning or even a fan. By 4am, the heat and sweat-induced humidity became unbareable. I'd burn through all my water, need to get up repeatedly to piss it away, and when I inevitably ran out, I'd be kept awake by antagonistic thirst.

Nor could I really eat. Well I could, but it would do me no good. Up until recently, my bowels have held strong in the face of foreign food. However, I must've ate something bad up in Quilotoa. While I'm not vomiting or have horrible cramps or find myself living on a toilet, I'm unable to keep food in. I eat it, and within minutes shit it out violently. I'm usually hungry, but eating is a liability when most days involve atleast a few hours on a cramped bus.

Here's also why today sucks. In Baños, there's a big celebration for most of October to honor the Virgin Mary. This entails a parade constantly marching around town, typically when I'm trying to make a phonecall on Skype, or setting off small explosives when I'm trying to relax or sleep.

And I had 30 dollars stolen from my bag, presumably by a roommate.

Around lunch I left Baños to travel to Riobamba, to buy a ticket to the steep, occasionally-derailing Devil's Nose train. When I arrive, I learn that the ticketmaster is away, and I'll have to wait half an hour. That's half an hour Latin American time, which was over an hour. When he arrived, he informed us there were no tickets left. I of course couldn't understand his thick Andean accent, and constantly needed to ask selfish ticket-coveting tourists around me to translate for me how I could possibly get one of the non-existant tickets they crave. Doesnt work.

One of the other tourists, an older man with experience written on his face, took me and two girls under his wing and translated for us. He was the one who explained that a woman was scalping tickets outside. He was the one who told me to write my name and passport number on a piece of paper to give to her to transfer the ticket. He was the one who, when the woman told him she had 3 tickets left, said that "I'm here with these two fine girls", and left me out in the cold.

I went back in the ticket office, and tried to ask whether they were selling any later down the route in Alausi. The ticketmaster, a surly man with a cliche mustache, answered me. Except, he never bothered to compensate for my inexperience with the language. I asked him repeatedly to talk slower, but he responded by getting more garbled and dismissive. I was tired and hungry and sick, and in no mood to argue. My will sapped, I lost the ability to speak Spanish, and nearly cracked right there in the office.

Finally, someone decently bilingual spoke up to explain that ticketmaster doesnt know what's going on in Alausi, since the office wont pick up (infrastructure, what's that?), but Riobamba tickets are sold out until early November. Angry and defeated, I considered taking the next bus directly to Peru. Instead, I took the next bus to Alausi, to see if I can get a scalped ticket in the morning.

The 2 hour bus ride had me swimming in my own mind. Being hungry, sick, and tired (both literally and figuratively) left me a broken man. I'd also recently come to the conclusion that I wouldnt be able to apply to graduate school this year, and the incipient depression was eating my guts worse than any illness. I couldnt talk to anyone and for once didnt try. I was struggling with exhaustion both physical and mental. I just wanted to be home, with friends, eating Mac & Cheese or some other comfort food. Instead, I ate a few Ritz crackers (which resulted in some vile farts, but thankfully no shits. Sorry, innocent woman next to me) and passed out for an hour.

I woke up right before sunset, seeing the vivid colors silloueting sharp Andean peaks. The bus was barreling down steep mountain switchbacks at terrifying speed. It seemed to me that I was getting a more thrilling ride, with a better backdrop, and protection from the wind, all for much cheaper than the Devil's Nose Train. There's a theme going on here, that just when I feel like I'm bottoming out, I find something to remind me why my seemingly masochistic travels are truly blessed, vile farts and all.

Post Script: I was actually able to catch the Devil's Nose train in Alausi. A bit overpriced for a glorified bus on tracks down a hill, but not a bad way to spend an hour either. Also, I'm beginning to suspect my momentary happiness is almost entirely depending on my blood sugar level (this will not shock my boss or her mother).