Arrived in Quito!!!

I´m here!!! Just a couple of hours ago my plane touched down at the airport in Quito after what can only be described as a long 36 hours..

The chaos started on Monday morning when I started to finalize the things I was going to take with me. After a couple of last minute errands and a final dinner with some friends the night had only begun (it was actually almost 11pm by that point, but my night had hardly begun). What followed has almost become a routine for me before long trips... Long, very long nights of last minute packing and cleaing up my stuff around the house (if you´ve seen our house in DC you knowa that I have a lot of stuff around the house!). But, by Tuesday morning I was finally ready to go and piled my stuff in the car for the drive to the airport.

I´m not sure that I can say that it has entirely hit me yet. I still tried to speak to the immigration officers at the arrivals terminal in English. But, as we drove down the streets to the hostel my Spanish started to kick in... Not soon enough to stop me from probably paying the taxi driver too much (we negotiated the price right at the beginning of the trip), but in enough time to start having a real conversation with the driver (I actually think he felt a little bad about the price he was charging me by the time we arrived at the hotel).

My home for the night is La Casa Bambu, a small hostel with a great view overlooking the city. But tomorrow I head to Cuenca, a city 9 hours south of here by bus (but the trip only costs $8) where I will start the process of finding an apartment and living a normal life.. We´ll, normal in a loose sense of the word that I will define and shape during the days, weeks and months to come.