Tattoo Me

So, I am really trying to keep up with this blog thing, but geez, it´s so hard with hardly any time to spare...ok, that´s just my excuse. Anyway, as you can probably tell from the title, I just got a new tattoo here in Quito. I´m telling you, there is something in the air here. I came here such a good boy(yeah, right), and now I have fallin´into the world of tattoos and piercings. I am leaving for Lima, Peru in 5 days and in just enough time for my tats to heal, so I can properly show them off..lol. There is a tremendous artist here, the one who did my new one, who has agreed to do some add-on work to enhance one of my other tattoos from earlier on. So, maybe when I return from Bolivia, I will take him up on it. I sure will miss Quito, when I have to come back to the U.S., but if everything goes well with my visa, I will be returning to Ecuador for work in September 2009. So, that´s about it. See ya again soon :)

Music Nights

There isn´t a whole to update since the last blog entry, just finishing up three more weeks here in Quito, then it´s off to Peru and Bolivia for a month before returning back to Ecuador to tour the country for a month. As of now, the current plan is to head back to the U.S. around the first of April, where I have to wait until my permanent work visa is approved around September, then it´s back to Ecuador where I will be working here for a year to two years on the coast in a city called Canoa. In some ways I hate to even have to leave here to head back to the U.S. because the restaurant is doing well, and it´s a lot of fun here. We just started having music nights up on the terrace here at the hotel, and every night is a different theme. Sundays are 80´s night, and everyone hadf a great time eating , drinking, and listening to music from the past. But, after I leave in April, they have to close the restaurant, until I return in September, because they don´t have anyone to take it over. Anyway, it will still be nice to visit family and friends back home for a bit, but Ecuador and the people and culture here sure grow on you. Caio´for now!

Happy New Years!

I realize this post is a little late, but celebrating New Years in Quito will do that to you. This was my first New Years away from home, but everyone had a great time. The traditions here are so much different, and it was great to experience all the new things that New Years here had to offer. The party usually starts off around 6pm New Years Eve, and it's filled with everyone telling stories from the past year. Of the interesting customs here is to make paper stuffed, life sized dummies that are displayed around the city, and then set on fire at midnight creating small fires around the city. The idea is that it represents all the bad from the previous year, and setting them on fire destroys that, and prepares the new year ahead. We played music through the night, and danced, danced, danced! Just after midnight, everyone sits down for a huge home cooked meal. This year I cooked, and I made chicken parm, mashed potatoes, grilled green beans with tomatoes, rice and corn, and brandy apples. Everyone enjoyed the gringo style food, and some never even had chicken parm before...imagine..lol. Finally, most of us went to bed around 3:00 am, and when we woke up the next day, there were still people singing and dancing around all the small fires burning in the streets of Quito...what a NEW YEAR!!