Well, almost. As we passed the "Casa del Cuy" (or "House of the guinea pig") I realised too late that it wasn`t a pet shop. I got off the bus in the next town, a funny place called Cañar, and looked around. No Cuys there.
I`m in Ecuador in a nice little city called Cuenca. According to an Ecuadorian that I met near Quito, the guinea pig is sacred here and many people in more traditional areas still keep guinea pigs in their front rooms to ward off evil spirits. So why do you eat them?! "Er... because they`re sacred... it`s better that we eat them... " Logic that doesn`t work in India. Tomorrow I`m going to head for a few Sunday markets and see if I can`t pick up my own Cuy and perhaps an Ecuadorian cookbook. It`ll keep me lucky for months.
Ecuador is pretty amazing. Travelling north to south along the Andes, the bits that I`ve seen have been all mountains, volcanoes, colonial cities and highland villages. But venture a few hours west and you hit the beach and a few hours east and you`re in the jungle. It`s mental - in less than the space from Brighton to London, the land goes from 0 to 6,000 metres, and from deep equatorial jungle to surreal equatorial glaciers.
And I`m now in the southern hemisphere. I confirmed this by pouring a bucket of water down a sink at the equator. There was no vortex. Incredible. But strangely my compass still works.
Anyway not much else to report. I do requests...
PS. Loads more photos online now, at the photobucket place. I`ve got a bit trigger-happy so not sure where to start - from Mexico there`s some cool ones of Guanajuato and Zacatecas, as well as the ruins at La Quemada, Palenque, Monte Alban and Chichen Itza. Some nices ones of Habana in Cuba too - they manage to make it look better than it is. Unfortunately I think I`ve lost most of my photos of Central America after mislaying a memory stick, but there`s a few from there too.
And also I`ve got some more videos on youtube. The best ones are this guy tearing up "My Way" on the flute in Habana, and me nearly getting hit by fireworks in a street party in Nicaragua. Enjoy.
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Where did this respect for guinea pigs come from? Rewind a bit. Who was left to clean the buggers out in the shed? And why didn't you express such appreciation of my special casseroles? Oh, have I gone too far? Is this psychologically damaging? So many questions!
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