Above the Clouds and Terrorists

NOTE: Mom, you might not want to read this one...

Yesterday we woke up early and hopped on a 2 hour bus ride out of Quito into the Andes. For those of you who don't don't know, the Andes form a ladder of mountain ranges, two long, north-south spines and several rungs of mountains in between, Quito lays in between two of these rungs and is therefore surrounded on all sides by the mountains. Our bus drove up hill along a road that had little room for error- 500 foot drop off on one side and the Andes on the other. We we arrived, we hiked up another 500 feet or so, leaving us at about 11000 feet. We explored Yanacocha, a natural preserve for rare plants and birds. We had an incredible view of Quito and its neighboring volcanos. As we ascended the clouds from the West blew in and before long visiblity was down to less than fifty feet. We meet our spanish professors and our spanish classes. 1 prof, 5 students. We all slept on the way home and had a low key, homework night.

Today however, and this is where mother should stop reading, we met several of the people we will be working with in the coming weeks. First, we learned that we will be working with an ecoterrorist. Her name is Mary Ellen and the president of Ecuador -Rafael Correa- has referred to her and her group as terrorists. This requires a bit of explaination. Primero, the politics of Ecuador is in terrible disarray. There have been 3 civilian coups in the last 15 years. The current president is a nationalist and a populist, neither of which aren't bad, in fact, he has built hosiptals and homes and hopes to erase foreign debt. All good things right? Wrong, Correa is attempting to centralize and control all media, trying to remove autonomy from all universities and is undermining the country's newest constitution (this is their 20th). Ecuador recently passed a new constitution which is the first in the world to have an article which states that the environment and natural resources have rights that must be respected. Anyway, Correa has recently allowed more companies to open new strip mining projects. Mining in Ecuador has is the single greatest cause of deforestation(Ecuador has the highest percentage of deforestation out of any country in the world), loss in biodiversity, pollution to the air, water and soil, and displacement and exploitation of indigenous peoples. Recently Texco-Cheveron left 280 toxic waste pits, uncontained and unregulated in the Intag cloud forest. The people of the intag have one of the highest rates of cancer anywhere in South America. Anyways back to my terrorist friend, Mary Ellen, she lives in the Intag and recently has been very vocal and lead several demonstrations against Correa's regime. Correa, who addresses Ecuador every Saturday morning, has called those who oppose his regime in the Intag are terrorist and shouldn't be negogiated with. The corruption and exploitation under Correa is disgusting. And this type of treatment towards both indigenous people and environmentalists exists all over Quito, especially in the rose industry (the U.S. should boycott roses from Ecuador). But there is hope, all of my professors and advisors and many people who guest lecture are fighting and fighting hard. These people continue to impress me with there optimism and heart. Ecuador can look doomed politically, environmentally, economically and socially, but these people will stop at nothing to correct what is wrong about this great country.

In the days of Spanish colonialism, Quito was know as la ciudad de la luz- the city of light- because it fostered the leaders of a country wide revolution in on december 6, 1809. As we approach the bicentenial of one revolution, these people believe it is time for another.

On a less inspiring note: real classes start tomorrow and our Excursion to the Intag Cloud Forest begins Saturday morning. If anyone would like to contact me, my email is geldermt@carleton.edu