Day 4-Mosquitos, Mosquitos, oh my!

I slept well last night and felt back to 85% this morning. Breakfast was quimboletos (pic to follow)which is maize with raisins steamed in banana leaves- it was quite good with jam on top. We also had fruit salad, but here they put sugar on the fruit salad so it is quite sweet.
Post breakfast it was off to the orchid garden for me and I had the tedious task of dipping the plants in water then scrubbing each leaf with a toothbrush. Most of you are probably imagining the orchids that you purchase at Trader Joes, not the same orchids here! Here they have leaves as big as my face to small leaves, like 50 per plant. My Ipod was helping matters and then the mosquito’s descended. They are quite annoying and by lunch I had accumulated 6 bites even though I was constantly applying repellant. They are sneaky buggers. One of the employees here who is a very nice man named Carlos approached me and asked to use my repellant; we chatted while he applied. He asked if Michael was my novio- I said no, amigo! I then explained how old we are and that we are new friends. Everyone here asks how old you are and if you have children. When I told him my age and that I didn’t have kids he kept saying a word and gesturing to my cheeks. Not sure what that meant.
Carlos only has one arm, but man he can kick major behind with the machete. It is so interesting that all the local employees here know their way around machetes. During orchid cleaning (video to be uploaded soon) a female employee approached with a machete in one hand and bananas in the other. Mid morning banana snack time. (: Interesting facts about bananas: they are Ecuador’s primary export and each tree only produces one fruiting. And then it dies.
Lunch was more gluten- which is actually soy, with mashed potatoes and a cabbage salad. The others had chicken instead of gluten. Apparently the chicken that is served here is quite bony- um pass on that!
After lunch it was back to the orchid garden where Michael joined me. We had an entertaining time comparing American English vs. British English, a few laughs were definitely to be had. It was raining all afternoon but I sat on a bench that was covered while I cleaned the orchids. Carlos approached me and exclaimed that it will take me a year to clean them all and that it is a lot of work. (:
Despite the rain the damn mosquito’s were out IN FORCE, so much so that I had to rock my new head mosquito net. I informed Michael it is the latest fashion rage, he replied “One step Ecuador, next step Milan.”
Post cleaning it was off to the shower again and time to pack for this weekend. I am headed to Otavalo as it is the largest market in Ecuador and something that all the tourists see. Who am I to say no to being a tourist? I am quite excited about free wifi at the hotel as I will be able to upload pictures. The hotel also has live music which should be quite entertaining.
Off to dinner now, pizzas are on the menu! There are no tourists here at the moment so we have to cook for ourselves, which I must admit I am looking forward to.
Ciao!
(Note: everyone says ciao here instead of adios… interesting isn’t it?)