Do you play racketball?

I'll be honest. Making Ecuadorian friends here, real friends and not the type you talk to only when you randomly bump into them, can be a challenge. Some people wonder why... Here I am; tall, white and blond. Shouldn't that make it easy? Well, there's a big difference between getting attention and making friends.

Getting attention:
- I was walking along the edge of a park the other day and I head someone shout, "Gringo!". I knew it was intended for me.. There were no other foreigners in this part of town. Seriously. I looked around. Spotted. A teenage kind was sticking his head out of the second floor window of a nearby house. "Gringo!". I guess the show he had been watching had just gone to commercial break. Was he going to become a lifelong friend? Doubtful.

- Last week I was walking by another park (maybe this is a pattern...) and two kids shouted, "hello!". This always puts a smile on my face and I responded with, "hello". Two steps later and I heard, "you want to be my romantic friend?" Again, these were two young teenage boys. My smile turned into a laugh. I shook my head and kept walking. Should I have offered to teach them English? Why bother!! It sounds like they're already learning plenty from tv and music.

- Last week I meet up with some other foreigners that live in Quito but that were passing through Cuenca. We decided it would be nice to go hang out by the river. I was sitting with my back to the road when one of my friends started staring at a tree about 20 feet behind us. "Guys check this out...", he said and nodded in the direction of the tree. Not being subtle at all, we all turned around to look. A guy had was just standing next to the tree staring at us. Not pretending to be doing anything, not pretending to be staring at something else. Just staring at us. When we all turned around he stepped behind the tree. Seconds later his head popped out and he continued staring at us. Should we have gotten his number? Sadly, he left before we were able to even say hello.

So, when someone who actually seems nice and interesting (if the above tales are any indication, the bar might not actually be that high) asks you if you want to do something, you stop saying "no". Even if (1) it doesn't sound that interesting or (2) it's something that you are clueless about. So, when one of my classes ended recently one of my students came up to me:

"Mike, do you play racketball?"

"Of course I do!"
I've only played it once before, but I know how to play squash and tennis

"Mike, can you teach me to play racketball?"

"Definitely!"
I remember most of the rules from the one time I played...