First thing this morning, we ate breakfast and headed north to a Jesuit school outside of the city. When we arrived, the kids just stared at all of us like we were aliens or something. They knew that we aren't from around here. We met with the director and then observed a few classrooms. The rooms themselves are very basic, and the kids were crazy! In our class, they were taking a test, but couldn't stop looking at us and wanting to ask us questions. One kid's jaw dropped when we affirmed that we were from "America." It was an interesting experience.
After the school visit, we went to the actual Equator. First, we took a tour of an outdoor indigenous history museum. We learned about guinea pigs, houses, families, animals, shrunken heads, how to cut off a head in order to create a war trophy, how to shoot a blow gun, and many weird things about the Equator itself. About 12 years ago, when GPS became available, the decided to check to see if they had placed the monument in the right place. They had not! It was about 100 meters south of the monument! The actual line was within the "Inti Ñan," which mean
sun museum. On the line, we learned about the equinox, telling time way back when, equatorial forces that I never knew about, and the Coriolis effect (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coriolis_effect). I got a video of that, but it will take a million years to upload. You'll have to wait for that one. Basically, think about how toilets flush in the northern hemisphere and that they are the opposite in the southern. Another illustration would be hurricanes (which rotate clockwise) and typhoons (which rotate counter clockwise). The weather at the equator tends to be relatively nice because the forces cancel each other out. It's hard to balance on the equator because the poles are pulling you in different directions, and somehow you lose strengh when you stand right on the equator. We couldn't figure out if it was real or if we just made ourselves believe it was actually happening. We then visited the monument and had lunch.
Afterwards, we returned to the hotel for a meeting, went to some cable cars and traveled to an altitude of 12,000 ft. The view was gorgeous. The city is huge. The snow-capped mountains are amazing. I wish everyone could see it in person. The photos do not do it justice.
(I am posting this on the 21st because the internet stopped working last night. It is the summer equinox which is one of the most important days of the year in Ecuador. It is the beginning of a week long festival called Inti Raymi, which has to do with the Incas worshiping the sun. However, they have mixed it with Catholicism and it is very unique. The sun will be DIRECTLY over us today (which never happens anywhere but on the equator on this day), and there will be about 10 extra minutes of sunlight. I'll be sure to slather on the sunscreen while I'm sitting in the hot springs of Papallacta. More about that later).
