Let Them Eat Yucca

Pan de yucca (yucca bread) has become one of my favorite foods here in Ecuador. It is a dense, kind of sticky on the inside, almost sweet bread. It is normally served with yogurt. This week, we have discovered something even better than pan de yucca....DEEP FRIED pan de yucca!

There is a festival going on all this week in Portoviejo, something about a virgin...and mercy...and neon lights. There is a small carnival set up on the end of town that brings me back to my younger days in good old Bellbrook, back to the days of the Lion's Club Festival. There are quite a few kids' rides, games, and (of course) fried foods! We've been in town four days and we are 3 for 4 on nights ending with fried pan de yucca. I still haven't tried the fried cheesecake or Twinkies at home, but I can't imangine they could be better than these!

A fun little Ecuadorian flare added to the celebrations is the chiva. Chivas are kind of street trains, very colorfully decorated with neon lights and bright paint. Each section seats 4 people and they zoom around the town playing loud music, occasionally stopping in an intersection to spin around in a circle. While they´re usually considered kids rides, I find them quite fun.

A decidedly not fun flare is the lovley church making sure we all know how horrible we all are for not being devout Catholics. Every morning this week, we've been woken up with a set of HUGE sounding explosions at 4:30 and 4:45. We can't figure how it could possily be, but it sure does sound like a cannon shooting off rounds in the middle of town. This is followed by a procession of a loud (and off key) group of a few hundred people singing while processing down the streets. Of course, this is all topped off with a church service blasted over loud speakers around 6am. We just happen to be staying in the hotel across from the sponsoring church. What luck.