Reflecting my deep respect for the mulleted beauty of the backpacking Argentinians in Montañita and their vehement early-morning support of their footballing countrymen, I am currently rooting for them over Germany in today's match. And so commence 30 more minutes of reading lines such as, "Miroslav Klose sends the home nation into raptures," on the BBC's live updater. Raptures, I say!

The three go hand in hand and hip to hip when intestinal duress is involved. Pisser.

In response to two weeks ago's punctured tire debacle, I've now got myself a newly-sealed, tightly lug-nutted left front. The experience set me back $10 but was well worth it; while one of the shop's minions searched for and repaired my puncture, the proprietor sat me down in his office and performed amazing feats of numerology using my birthday, name, social security number, and checking account PIN. Orrr, just the first of those two. Anyway, he derived that I am a "9" and therefore it *must* be true that I . . .

1) have a large mole/birth mark on the left side of my body
2) am one of three children
3) am Jewish

I felt bad hating on his mad skillz, but none of thems are true. Or maybe I AM Jewish?

The experience set off some domino¹-effect spiritual questioning that led me directly, and for the first time, to the doors of Bikram Chicago. And Bikram I did. Afterward my body was happy but while the rest of me tried to embrace the new setting, yogi, etc, I found myself wistful for the loving embrace of Bikram Traverse City.

Three more things:

1) Check out my latest wiki wiki contribution here!
2) Reading The Beej's LJ is a little bit natsukashii ne? Sigh.
3) Enjoying the World Cup thorugh BBC Sport's live game commentary is a recommended practice indeed. Oh, Brits. They love their futbol.

¹In Montañita Lauren (our host) and I were schooled by four freshly-graduated Princeton lads in D.R.-rules dominoes. So I know what I'm talking about.

Click below for some delicious Flizzzzzckr flizzzaction . . .

Happy Father's Day to my papa. I called home from Newark to announce my Stateside arrival, but failed to send along such blessings.

Travel photos coming sooooon! Also, I revamped my only redeeming Ecua-post, and I'll do it again when I have pictures. Enjoy!

Mmm, this will probably be my only blog of interest from Ecua. So it goes. Here´s a rundown of the past few days in the sweet sweet village o' Baños:

6.14.04: I woke up groggily after four hours of a sleep frustratingly punctuated by the sounds of a rooster crowing faithfully every five minutes. Despite the cacophony, it was a pleasant morning: our hostal Plantas y Blanco (Plants and White), was fantastic: clean, cheap, conveniently located and with a glassed-in rooftop terrace allowing access to views of foggy mornings and crystal clear midnights.

The reason for my choice to cut short sleep this particular a.m. was to beat the alleged crowds of screaming children and PDA lovers to a Japanese-style outdoor bath, one of the few from which Baños gets its name, and one that had been specifically recommended to my because of its early morning access (4:30 a.m. go-time). My trip to this bath was solitary (three hungover roommates doth a solo venture make) yet great, characterized by a mix of the following: rain, fog, a rented towel, a $1 taxi ride, enduring many stares and questions, putting on Reina Elizabeth (as dubbed by my gold-toothed chauffer) airs, enjoying four hot-spring-fed pools of differing temperatures and varied cleanliness, and ending up super rejuvinated, despite my lack of sleep. The refreshing experience made me wish I'd spent more time at onsen in Japan. If only they'd been $1.60, too. Alas.

Once awoken, my roommates and I rented bikes/helmets/maps ($5 for the day) and ventured about 20 kilometers to see the waterfalls near the village. The mini-tour was awesome, fantastic, frustrating, redeeming, terrifying, and awesome again, in that order. Awesome: enjyoing the weather and the exercise (the former: erratic but pleasant, the latter: infrequent on this trip, partially due to the lovably booze-centric lifestyles of my travel buddies), Fantastic: taking a tipsy cablecar ride across a ravine with a waterfall view, Frustrating: experiencing the demise of my "brand new" rental bike, Redeeming: Our host Lauren's selfless act of returning my bike via bus as Jonah, Vin and I sallied forth without her, Terrifying: me leading our helpless pack of three through a pitch black, 1/4 mile long no-bikes-allowed tunnel, Awesome again: the rocky mile-ish long hike to see el pailon del diablo (the devil's cauldron, I'm told), an amazingly powerful waterfall located on the edge of the Amazon.

After well-earned showers, our evening included multiple failed nighttime bus rides and, finally, a successful one, and naturally I'm measuring success by its showing of the feature film The Karate Dog . . .

6.15.06: and at 7 a.m. we awoke in Guayaquil to embrace our FIFA viewing companions (a 1,000-strong emotion-packed crowd) for the 8 a.m. Ecua vs. Costa Rica world cup match (Ecuador, 3-0). Awesome. We actually watched this sucker at the Guayaquil Hilton (arguably the nicest hotel in the country), something I hadn't wanted to do but which ended up being pretty fun.

From there it was another four hours to Montañita, where we are now, for some hippie/rasta observation, humbling (in the sense of being completely overwhelmed by huge swells and a powerful undertow) ocean swims, intense viewing of more World Cup games (lots of Holland fans observing today´s match, though I was wearing Ivory Coast colors and secretly rooting for them), interesting interactions with the locals, and the six or seven power-outages. Wee.

I am NOT ready to come home. More Ecuador, please.

Heart,
Eliz

Greeting from Quito. Unlike in China, I can both blog and read here, but it's possible that I don't want to. Alas All I can really say is that, mmm, the weather is here, and I wish you were beautiful, and Ecuador plays Costa Rica in the world cup on Thursday, which is going to be OFF THE HOOK.

Soooo, though my feelings about my job tend to oscillate, I sure as hell like my coworkers. Recent email communication with "the gatekeeper" (aka the White Sox fan who I have to call so he can blitz down from the 22nd floor at 7:00 tomorrow morning to let me in) yielded much joviality and a bonus link re: Ecuador. I don't think I ever told this fella that I was going to Ecuador, but apparently word travels FAST. It'll travel even quicker once I've posted my MSOutlook auto-response, "I can't be bothered to respond properly as I'm out of the office on holiday in Ecuador, possibly at a discoteca somewhere in El Mariscal. If you need to contact me, please leave a message on my mobile and press hash when you're through. Cheers."

In other news, I got a flat but my roommate helped me changed the tire on my car to a spare, and until I get the real guy fixed (or buy a new one . . . GOSH), it's been concluded that I've entered a whole new demographic of drivership-- the demo that cruises around on their spare(s), possibly missing hubcaps, dodging in and out of traffic, possibly clipping mailboxes . . . don't worry mom. It's only a theoretical demographic, I promise.

Aspects of Note Re: Past Weekend and/or Coming Week

1) I laughed ridiculously hard multiple times today. Maybe my spleen exploded.
2) I got in a verbal (but HEATED) fight with the downstairs neighbor last night at 2:00 a.m. It was dirty.
3) Jake's college buddy came to vist unexpectedly and we got to do it up host style. Enjoyable!
4) Ecuador happens in five days. I am a lucky lass.
5) Today's Japanese dinner was delicious.
6) I walked to the beach from my apartment both today and yesterday, went swimming and threw the frisbee. Awesome.
7) A month's worth of diligently collected recyclables finally made its way to the Lincolnwood Civic Recycling Center in the back of my Toyota (PBS blaring the whole way) on Saturday.
8) On my run yesterday, the various and sundry racial demographics that populate Edgewater yielded an environment in which I understood less from their conversations than I would have in Japan. Crazy!
9) I finally hemmed some awesome Salvo pants I've been meaning to hem for weeks.
10) I will start playing rec. ultimate frisbee this Thursday. Team sports like woah I can't handle it!

I purchased a copy of Tom Wolfe's The Bonfire of The Vanities, and every time I pick it up to read I always think, "The Vanfire of the Bonnities," a clearly meaningless phrase that I nevertheless haven't failed once to try to analyze, yielding nothing but slight, repetitive frustration.

I got into a little conversation with Jake yesterday about gracefully strong-arming someone after claiming to have done so to one of my coworkers. Is it possible to gracefully strong-arm? We need answers.

Oh, and Vnak and Katie's babies are here, and they are fabulous. Woot.