left over and so I thought it might be a good idea to just give it to one of the many beggars that kept coming up to us, but Jorge wanted to keep it. I said it would melt and all, but he insisted we didn’t give it away and instead that we would eat it after the beach. We spent the next 4 hours hanging out, playing cards, and taking a nap on the beach…and it was perfect for me as the sun wasn’t out so we didn’t get sunburned. I was the only gringa at this beach (or at least within sight) so a tv anchor came up to talk to us and tape us. I refused to be interviewed, so Cinthya did the talking and then just zoomed in on me afterwards to encourage tourisms! Oh Ecuador, how I will miss being so special. Around 5pm we decided to head back to the city, but before doing so we bought some water at the store and finished our semi-melted cheesecake J Jorge was in heaven! Friday night we went to Jackie’s house, the friend we met in Cuenca, and spent some time at her aunt’s house and then had some delicious beef (made on a grill with a hairdryer!) and rice at her cousin’s little restaurant. Then we went out to Las Peñas, which are these steps that are lined with bars and restaurants. It was so cool and beautiful. I was absolutely exhausted though, so we walked around for a while and then went dancing for about an hour before calling it a day around 12:30am.
Saturday was spent with Jackie’s family and preparing for her nine year old cousin’s birthday party. We got up and made patacones, AMAZING ‘fried’ plantains! Besides batidos (fresh fruit smoothies), patacones are the best thing about the coast! Then we walked to the supermarket and on the way stopped by the guys’ house of who went with Ja
ckie to Cuenca. One of the guys, Paul, ended up coming with us to the store, but we separated as we shopped. Then he came back to find us and gave me flowers! Oh wow, I was so shocked that I think I had a pretty bad reaction, but the girls at least thought I was pretty funny. These Ecua boys aren’t afraid to take risks. Thank goodness we didn’t meet up with him anymore during the weekend. Well after the store, we went home and cooked in the deadly hot little kitchen all afternoon for the party - little appetizers. Then we went to the party for a while and came ho
me to change to go out for the night. We went to a place called “La Terraza,” the terrace where there were bands playing live music, like oldies (but in Spanish, so I didn’t know them). It reminded in a lot of ways of the terrace at the Union in Madison…oh I miss it! I am sure it is gorgeous and so fun now at this time of year! We stayed out until 3:30am and again I was exhausted, which definitely helped in sleeping the 3 of us girls in a double bed in a room without windows and just one fan trying to create some airflow!
Sunday was Game Day! The main purpose of the trip was to go to the ‘dangerous,’ high energy and emotional Liga (Quito) versus Barcelona (Guayaquil) game. We went around noon to the stadium to see if we could get tickets from scalpers. We saw some guys a little ways away, so we asked our taxi driver to stop to talk to them. There were actually two guys so that helped us in bartering them down. We got the tickets to this huge game for only one dollar more than ticket price – thanks to Jackie! $11 for the game…what a steal. We were planning on spending about $20 or so to go. It was so easy that we just stuck with the same taxi driver, that Jackie even made friends with and was changing his radio! He took us to the mall, the pride and joy of Guayaquil, where we got ice cream sundaes and walked around for a bit. Then we went home and took a nap and waited for Jorge to come over to go to the stadium. 
He finally game around 4pm and we went about 1.5 hours early to the stadium, which was already pretty packed by the time we got there. Jackie really wanted to sit so we kept walking to look for space and we ended in the Liga fans area. Jackie and Jorge couldn’t believe they were actually going to sit with Liga fans, but we did. Now let me explain, people are pretty brutal when it comes to these soccer games and they will even fight, so to sit in the little area designated for Liga fans definitely put us even more at risk, but it was so worth it! There was so much energy from all the people who came, even without any goals; the game ended in a 0-0 tie. The only part that was really dangerous was during half time and after the game, Barcelona fans threw plastic bottles down into the Liga area. 
We had some guys help protect us though! Cinthya did get hit in the shoulder though and Jorge got a bit wet on his legs, but nothing big. Then we had to wait about an hour after the game was over to leave the stadium, so that people would disperse outside the stadium and not cause riots. Thank God we were safe and it was just a really fun event. Also funny thing was just outside the stadium is not a very good area so it is not safe to walk too far, but also there were no taxis. We decided to just try to flag down any truck to see if we could get in the trailer and get out of the area to get a taxi. We weren’t having very good luck, but eventually two recently off duty cops let us get in the back of their truck and we got to an area where we could get a taxi! We didn’t get home until about 10:30pm, but it was so much fun and definitely a crazy adventure.
Monday morning we just got up, packed, and went to a local restaurant where we ate a HUGE breakfast. Then we got on our flight and we were back in Quito by about noon. Guayaquil was a bit risky, a bit crazy, very humid, and I only understood about half of what was being said, but it was also was amazing and fun! Muchas Gracias Jackie y la familia Barrios para toda su muy buena hospitalidad!
