CELEBRATING OUR FIRST YEAR IN ECUADOR

We celebrated our one year anniversary in our new adopted country, by having  our "sponsors" Chuck and Nancy Watson, over for a dinner celebration. Randy thought I was a bit silly with the candle, but it really means alot to me that we are here, and even more that we are HAPPY, living here. So the candle; as every one who knows me knows, I love birthdays (mine is Oct. 7th), so this anniversary was cause for celebrating with a candle!

Do you see that dark dark chocolate ice cream in those bowls... that was Chucks contribution.. we were having Randys wonderful homemade burritos, so Chuck decided we needed Mexican Chocolate Ice cream from the new ice cream store (MIXX). Oh my, they use jalapenos in the ice cream..talk about screaming hot. It was even a bit warm for Randy, but delicious! I am going to go back and see if I can just get the Chocolate..

After our dinner, Chuck, Randy and I (Nancy was not feeling well..) went to a local concert at the University. Normally the concerts here are free, this one was $10 per person. As we stood outside in line, there were ladies selling tickets with a bit of a scalping fee added on. Chuck was able to exclaim and throw up his arms to the amount asked, the lady very sheepishly sold his ticket to him for $10. We on the other hand were not so lucky.. out lady held out, watched us from a few feet away, and finally when Randy said, "dos para $21" she relented and agreed. I consoled Randy, by saying I thought that Chuck only got the better deal because he got the "Anciano" discount..that seemed to perk him up.

The concert was good, and we enjoyed the fact that the ladies singing were doing tribute songs to famous women singers in their culture, then they changed bands and began with American women singers! In English. It was quite fun to hear Madonna's music, Gloria Estefan and others being sung with such vigor and in excellent English. The audience  knew each song, and would ooh and ahh when the music began, as they knew what the song would be, and sing along. Their families were in the audience, so alot of love and appreciation was spoken to them, and the audience ate it up. Family is very important here, and it was so nice to see the love shown.

We are looking forward to our new adventures this coming year. We appreciate our family and friends for the love they have shown to us with their support as we stepped off the path and headed out on our adventure.