Día 111 | Lunes, 20 de Abril | 2009

Servicio Voluntario...

Todays has been another rainy one.  Turns out the climate down here is considerably cold and wet.  In the last week it has been sunny maybe once or twice.  My family said that this is pretty typical of April although it is usually a little less wet.  May will not be as wet but it will still be chilly.  Usually I wear a jacket or a couple layers of shirts walking to school -- just to dispel any assumptions that it is always sunny down here.  Today we had classes -- one exam in Andean Literature and then a pretty long Grammar class that was not very fun at all.  After classes we went to this elementary school here in Cuenca for some volunteer work.  Today we sanded down some of the walls and prepped them with primer so we can paint them the rest of the week.  If I wasn't feeling a little ill, I would be more excited about this project.

I have been feeling sick recently (feeling tired and having a sore throat) and it's just really bad timing right now.  This week I have a lot of work to do -- two exams and about four papers.  Good news is that we have next week off.   We'll just be traveling down to the coast to basically sight-see and relax.  That will be nice...

Today was a little disappointing because I found out that I wasn't awarded the Student Enhancement Award that I had applied for back in February.  I had applied for a considerable amount of money in order to conduct a research project about ambient noise and indigenous music of Ecuador.  I am not sure what the specific committee comments were (I'm waiting on an e-mail to find out why my proposal was not funded) but I think that I'm okay with the result in general.  Given the fact that I had found out about the grant a week before its due date, I am impressed and proud that I was even able to finish an acceptable application in that short amount of time.  I had stayed up working on the proposal for about 32 hours straight the day and night before it was due -- resulting in me being able to produce about 20 pages of proposal-worthy material.  

Even though I didn't get any funding, that still doesn't mean anything really in terms of my ability to still carry on my research.  All that it means now is that I will have to eat the money that I have already spent for my recorder and accessories.  Oh well...  the research has been going a little slow lately on account of being so busy with Spanish classes but maybe this is a good thing for me to kick in gear and get more work done.  I still intend to do what I had set out to do, regardless of being financially sponsored by the University.

In other news, it is my big brother Dustin's birthday today.  He is 27.  I wish I could be around to give him a hug.  I miss you brother.

Día 95 | Sábado, el 4 de Abril | 2009

Sala de Sigsig...

Friday night Billy and I went out to canvas the town.  We started out at this place called Wonder Bar.  It's a really quaint little café that serves a variety of drinks, appetizers, and deserts.  It has a really calm ambience -- soft lights, warm drinks, and their walls are adorned with those artsy and old-style posters that used to be French advertisements for vermouth, french cinema, and movie posters that have beautiful women like Marlene Dietrech smiling while smoking cigarettes.  Billy and I met up with Ryan at the bar.  Ryan is a really cool and nice guy who seems to always laugh at my jokes -- even the bad ones.  Ryan is a man of few words -- I haven't heard him talk a whole lot on our trip but that doesn't mean anything bad (no value judgments here) nor does it mean anything good...it just means what it means.  It was a good time to sit back and relax at the Wonder Bar after a somewhat disorienting week.  It seemed like we had made it out, survived the week, and it was a nice release to sit down at a bar and sip orange juice for a couple hours (Billy and Ryan on the other hand were handily tasting some samples of Ecuador's fine breweries).  Later on, some more members of our program coincidentally met up with us -- Emily, Nick, Megan and Jake -- and we sat at the Wonder Bar for some more time.  

Later on we went to this liquor store called Taxi and it was all so strange.  I felt like we were in the middle of a theater set.  People were all gathered around the store drinking and listening to reggaeton -- it all actually reminded me a lot of when I was in Spain back in 2005.  People just sitting outside in their cars, drinking, smoking,....conversing.  After Taxi, we went to this dance club called Zo.  That place was really surreal -- pretty dark place like a cavern with a bunch of flashing neon lights, hordes of dancers, and the heat from everyone dancing made us all sweat.  This was the kind of place that, without all of the people in it, could be pretty functional for brainwashing someone.  Just strap them down in a chair in the middle of the room, pump up the music, turn all the whirring lights on, and just let them go crazy.  After about an hour there, I felt a little crazy myself and I wanted to go.  I didn't want to leave Billy there alone though, so I made sure we left together.  

The night was okay but it wasn't my thing.  Some people just like to lose themselves in a dark dance club full of drunk strangers.  Alcohol, lights, and music pumping through their veins, they abandon consciousness to chase a surreal fantasy.  It is places and times like those that remind me how absurd existence really is -- "can't believe the things we ask for; can't believe the things we need."

Today was really fun.  I got a chance to break away from my program mates and do my own thing.  This week, I met a really cool and nice guy named Judd.  Judd is doing a independent study in South America over Andean music.  In the fall, he'll be attending the University of Illinois to get a master's degree in Ethnomusicology.  When we met, we hit it off and decided to become recording partners.  So Saturday, we both travelled with this band called Cañara (I think that is their name).  Cañara is a seven-person group that plays Andean folk music.  Today, they performed in a little town called Sigsig as a part of a local music festival.  Judd, Lauren (another student at CEDEI), and I all went to hear some music, have some local food, and relax.  The music was very fine and Judd and I both recorded it from the audience.  The picture above is of the auditorium after the show and it shows the room in which the audience sat.  The room itself was pretty problematic in terms of getting good sound.  There was a echo of about 500 ms built into the room -- this caused a good bit of low-end feed back, confusion, and just a general unpleasant 'boxy' sound.  When the band first started out, I felt pretty insecure setting up my sound equipment.  Maybe not insecure as much as conspicuous -- the room was filled with about 200-250 people and they all glared at me as if I was some kind of alien.  I suppose it was a pretty strange sight to see -- some gringo setting up a boom stand and microphone -- and I sat smack dab in the middle of the room with my boom stand raised about 15 feet in the air.  

The recording turned out pretty good though and it was nice to make friends with people from Cuenca.  This Thursday, I am going to go to Cañara's practice.  I'll probably be able to get a better recording of them there -- they won't have an annoying echo in their practice space.

Day 63 | Tuesday, March 3 | 2009

Pierogi...

Alas, I am caught up on my sleep and I am back at it.  I did not get some of my papers in on time to my professors on Monday so I am trying to finish the rest right now.  I probably should have turned them in already today but by this point I am just trying to aim for quality completion.

I realized today that I leave in three weeks for Ecuador.  This seems really unreal.  What's going to seem even more unreal with be the actual day -- March 24 -- that I actually do leave to Ecuador.  I still have a various list of items that I need to realize still but it's getting closer.  I still need to find out about malaria pills, complete some formalized membership canceling (cancel my cable service, clean out my locker at the gym, etc.), get my belongings together, read a book and write a report for my field study, read two books (or at least get started) and plan my independent study, purchase an external hard drive, and get well acquainted with my portable digital recorder.

Because I have been so busy, I have forgotten to mention that my Nagra ARES-MII came in the mail this past Friday!  I am really excited about it all.  It came well equipped with a USB 2.0 input cord, a shock-resistant stereo (cardioid) condenser microphone, a mono (omni) condenser cap, two wind guards, a XLR adaptable input cord, a protective case, and a cool wrist sling.  I have used it already just minimally but it sounds great.  Also, my 10' mono hydrophone came in the mail on Friday too.  This is basically a microphone that can record SPL movements underwater.  This will be especially useful when I am collecting data from some of the Ecuadorian water sheds -- rivers, streams, waterfalls, etc.  I am so excited!

Today has been a pretty good day, all in all.  Caitlin and I went to vegan cooking and it was delicious.  It was great to hang out with Larry and Annie too.  I feel like the setup for vegan cooking is not fair sometimes, because I feel like sitting down and talking with a lot of people.  I really wanted to hang out and talk to Leslie, Jamie, Ellen, and Clare but the seating was all cramped and space is just limited in that room.  The food, though, was great.  It was all Ukrainian style food -- pierogi (mashed potatoes inside a noodle-like shell), salad, rice-stuffed cabbage wraps, this really great beet-based soup, a delicious dessert (I don't remember what it was), and a neat lavender-tasting drink.  I got a picture of the cooks making the pierogies in the kitchen (above) before they were done.

Great day!