After an opening round of perfunctories, Nick, Julio and I entered my room and sat in the furniture. I told Nick the Peace Corps was misinformed about the situation in El Tambo. I explained the reality of the situation and we wrote up some “plan of action” crap formality for him to cart back with him to Quito.

     Yesterday, when Julio asked me if Nick would be staying for lunch when he came, I told him I didn’t know, but if he does, expect that he will try to pay for the meal. Julio said he didn’t want money. I told Julio that the Peace Corps gives Nick money to cover food expenses and everything else and not to worry about it. Julio said it is not right to accept money if you invite someone to eat. Then just refuse the money, I told him. So today when Nick stepped out to use the baño, Julio snuck into my room and asked “You guys aren’t fighting are you?” I told him we weren’t.

      “Is he staying for lunch?” Julio asked.

      “I don’t know. I’ll ask him when he comes back.”

      “No! Don’t ask him! When the food is ready, I’ll just tell you guys to come.” Julio smiled at the sheer genius of his plan and then snuck away. He was determined not to accept cash.

     When Nick returned, I told him that Julio was sneaking around preparing meals so he wouldn’t have to accept payment and that I hoped he hadn’t been looking forward to non-EcuaFood somewhere in town. Nick said EcuaFood was fine. We ate and then headed for Debi’s house, as she had a load of stuff she wanted Nick to haul to Quito for her to lighten her load for when she takes the rest of her stuff there. Then Nick dropped me off and left up the coast.

     I walked into the house and the family crowded around to hear how things had gone. I handed them a small shrink-wrapped styrofoam plate of cookies that Nick had bought at a gas station from a woman raising money for some women’s group. He had told me just to give them to Julio’s family. The cookies were what y’all Yankee types might call cheap and nearly tasteless, but Julio and co were sold. They went bananas on them.

     I went into my room and cracked into a bag of mail nick had brought me. Inside were a bunch of papers and memos from the Peace Corps, a month old letter from my parents, and 6 Newsweeks. Then I wrote from 3:00 to 9:00 PM."

     Later that night, I fed Julio and co. their very first Snickers bars from a 10 pack I had bought earlier at the mall. They nearly crapped in their pants. They were a little weirded out because the candy was way expensive in their estimation and I was just throwing the candy bars around the table like people in movies throw armloads of money into the air when they “strike it rich” (Am I the only one whose very last nerve is grated by people in movies throwing armloads of money into the air? I want to smack them upside the head and tell them that this would not be acceptable behavior even if the dollars were worthless and that no amount of wealth can exempt you from being a complete idiot if a 100 dollar bill slips behind a bed or under a refrigerator because you were heedlessly making dozens of such bills airborne).

     Later still, Julio came into my room to rewrite and practice the phonetic English phrases I had given him to relay to English speakers who call by phone when I am not home. His son, Ivan, a green card hopeful, came in when he heard Julio practicing English words. Then Ivan, too, began practicing his pronunciation. I had told him a few days back that his English literacy was up to snuff and his grasp of English lacked only the practice. Alex, who is 15 years old and to whom everything is weird, wandered over and stood in my doorway for a moment before asking what was going on. Julio, who was writing intensely on his notepad, droned, “A-pren-di-en-do (learning)” at length, as though in hypnotic trance. Alex looked around the room, which was silent as both Julio and Ivan were pouring over their respective materials. Then he looked at me to see if he was crazy or was Julio’s answer and this whole setting, not the weirdest thing he had ever seen. Alex found me sitting in a chair in the middle of the room, perfectly at ease, deific I might say, looking completely out of place and smiling my confirmation back at him. Alex and I politely muffled our cracking up and then he withdrew.

     English short vowel sounds can’t be written using phonetic Spanish. Most people here have great difficulty making short vowel sounds, even when mimicking them immediately me. Repetition is the only way I know how to teach them.

     “Kiss my black ass”, I slowly enunciated to Julio and Ivan.

     “Kiss my black ass”, they repeated (more or less).

     “Kiss my black ass”, I repeated to contrast their vowels with mine.

     “Kiss my black ass”, they repeated a little less sure of themselves.

     A lot of people here get nervous when they know I am evaluating their pronunciation. Julio is particularly neurotic. His voice slides up an octave and quivers. His torso stiffens. “Julio, just relax and read what’s on your sheet”, I always tell him.

     To lighten the mood, I told Julio and Ivan what I was they were saying. We all laughed like idiots for a minute and took turns ordering each other to kiss our respective black asses. Then, Ivan’s command of his speech grew introspective and his smile faded. Julio froze and listened to Ivan’s pronunciation. Then his voice slid up an octave and he tentatively joined in. The 2 stared vacantly at each other and slowly repeated, “Kiss my black ass… Kiss my black ass… Kiss my black ass”. It was eerie. It sounded like a mantra. It even seemed to be functioning as one. “Kiss my black ass… Kiss my black ass… Kiss my black ass… Bah, where’s Alex when you need him?

     When I came to breakfast, I found all 3 males of the family enraptured by a snake documentary on TV. This was unusual behavior for them at 7 in the morning. Susanna heated up a tea kettle of boiling water so I could mix it with a bucket of shower water and take a warm bucket bath.

     Teaching English at the school today was a blast because I had made thorough lesson plans and didn’t have to interrupt my shenanigans to check with the text to see if I was still on track. Yet another class turned up today. Now I’m teaching 6 levels. However, 3 of those levels failed to come to school today, so I was done before noon.

     At home, from about noon to 5:00 PM, I messed around with writing and amended a number of things in my extensive secret files, which I keep because I am an undiagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. At around 2:00 PM, Debi and Francisco called to they want to go out tonight in Salinas. I said I was in. I got ready and left around 6:00 PM.

     On the way to catch the bus, I returned an empty 5-gallon water jug to the tienda of Susanna’s sister (Merci), which left me to catch the bus from a location I would not normally use. There, the president of El Tambo rushed up to me. He had been drinking, but didn’t yet seem very incapacitated. I definitely prefer the drunk president to the normal one because he is not at all intimidated by me and is fun and very friendly. He told me about a bunch of upcoming meetings and then we boarded the same bus and continued our boisterous conversation. He asked to borrow 2 bucks. I don’t put it past anyone here to go delinquent on any amount of borrowed cash, but I figured it was an inexpensive test of the president’s character. If he defaults, he looses all leeway in every respect I might normally have afforded him. He said he has a load of wood furniture that is almost ready for sale and he would have the money to give to Julio in 4 days. He got off the bus in Santa Elena and I continued to the mall in Libertad.

     At the mall, I withdrew money from the ATM, ate in the food court and then went shopping in Hipermarket to pick up a formidable assortment of candy and junk food. I had allotted time to shop for pants, but no longer felt like it as the mall was so packed.

     I bussed to Debi’s neighborhood and got off at a place called “7 corners”, a high traffic landmark through which all the busses pass. I crossed the street in the direction of Debi’s house and ran directly into Lorena and her sister. I cursed my luck, but had been feeling bad about how coldly Julio had dispatched her last week and so stood there talking with them until their bus came.

     At Debi’s house, I relayed my night’s adventures and solicited commentary. She said I was a fool to have reopened the Lorena can-of-worms. I tried to debate the validity of her critique but quickly concluded, with a smack to the forehead, that she was right. However, she agreed that 2 dollars was a cheap way to identify the president’s character. Pleased with my partial vindication, I broke out the assortment of candy I was hiding in my backpack. Then we walked back to 7 corners and cabbed to Salinas.

     We arrived at the “Barcelo Hotel” lobby around. By EcuaStandards, it was an amazing place (rooms will run you over $100). Its was posh, spacious and teeming with activity. Francisco was waiting for us there in the lobby. We left the Barcelo to head down the boardwalk and find out where the action was. We selected an open air dive with a view of the beach and opened up the Pilsener floodgates. An Austrian man I had been seeing round Libertad introduced himself. He is something of a wanderer. He had lived in the States in the past, and knew a lot of people here in the peninsula, a few of which Debi also knew. He had sailed down to Ecuador in his sailboat and was waiting for the annual migration of whales to come down the coast before setting his course for the Galapagos.

     The Salinas boardwalk began filling up and was a full-blown “scene” by the time we were ready to leave. I take back everything bad I’ve ever said about Salinas in the past. It even has a Dunkin’ Donuts right there on the boardwalk. It’s a happening place. After midnight, we cabbed to Debi’s place, where I stayed.

     “Estabas borracho?” Julio asked, hopefully.

     “Casi sí” I responded, at which point they again highjacked my story and exchanged humorous fictional summaries of my night. Julio asked me if I had had fun. I told him yes.

     ”Well, good. You need to have SOME fun,” he asserted in a vague air of challenge (the family thinks I work too much). “Did you dance?” (Remember that the only quantifiable measure of fun in the campo is how much dancing went down)

      “No”

     “Why not?”

     “Because it wasn't a dance place.” Then, because I know they love any story in which I am dodging women and/or dancing, I told them a story from last night wherein a girl sent word down the bar to me that she wanted to dance. I illustrated my response using a dismissive shrug and a quick, irritated shake of my head. The family went bananas. Being a weird ass foreigner has automatic comic value especially when the perception is that you are somewhat helpless and cursed with an unearthly mojo. To them, I am reliable incomprehensibility.

     I showered and went straight into writing until lunch. At lunch Susanna made me a shrimp omelet. I don't know what the world's fascination is with shrimp. It must be more a texture thing than a taste thing. In any event, y'all can make my omelets shrimp free in the future.

     After lunch, I started writing my first pig lecture. Julio naturally interrupted this and we ended up discussing the farming of chickens for 2 hours. Then we went to the main drag to see about a fundraiser bingo game the school I English teach at was putting on. When we got there, some of the girls from the school were standing in the 2 lane road that connects El Tambo to the rest of the world, flagging down cars and imploring them to come win fabulous prizes at the big 'Don Bosco Colegio al Distancia' bingo fundraiser. The town president and a few others continuously blasted the town with news of the event from a giant loudspeaker. Several times, as part of his pitch, he thundered about the English teacher “Treyn Beenklei from the United States, working here in El Tambo with El Cuerpo de Paz- a gringo!” who would be attending the event so the town could come out and meet me. It reminded me of an auto show in the U.S. where some wash up like Daryl Hall would be on hand to sign autographs in hopes of boosting attendance. I had to prepare myself for the possibility that they might demand I make an impromptu speech or something.

     Bingo once again proved itself to be a cant-miss diversion. Bingo is beautiful. It is so supremely ludicrous to have people of all makes complying with a droning voice that tells them to put chips on a card until they make a line and have to yell into the air. How can you not love that? Bingo and line dancing are the only 2 redeeming things to have come out of the rise of man. I told Julio not to say anything if I made a line because I didn't want to win any of the EcuaCrap they were offering as prizes. However, Julio's niece was watching my card and caught me winning the last round. She yelled bingo for me before I could stuff her mouth full of dry leaves and I became the proud new owner of a plastic electronic music box that played a very tinny Fur Elise when one lifted its lid.

     Julio encouraged me to hang on to the music box and re-gift it to someone else later. I told him I could not stand behind this hideous creation as a gift and needed to put it out of its misery ASAP. I gave it instead to my 7-year-old neighbor. I later overheard the family in the next room laughing about my loathing of the music box, saying it had not been 'expensive enough' for me. I would have sauntered into the room and told them that “expense” and “taste” are not interchangeable concepts, but aesthetic sensitivity is a meaningless abstraction in the campo.

     I played frisbee with kids until dinner. On the heels of dinner, I received a call from someone identifying himself as a 'professor' living somewhere here in El Tambo. He said his daughter need help on an English class homework assignment she had received in her school and wanted to know if they could come over. I said yes. Then he wanted to know if I could give his daughter private lessons in the future for money. I could not understand what he was asking because he was being indirect, but Julio explained to me what the guy was getting at while the duo were en route to the house. I told Julio that I am in broke ass El Tambo ostensibly to raise the quality of life, not to provide the people who have extra money with favored status. If I had wanted money, I would have stayed in the States and besides, there are already too many people here wanting too many different things for me to begin working with individuals- ESPECIALLY in teaching English.

     Julio explained to the guy what my inadequate Spanish apparently couldn't about declining his tutoring offer. The guy bought us a 3-liter of cola while I worked with his daughter on her homework. I don't think she really even needed my help because 100% of what she had done to that point was correct. When Julio stepped out, the man continued to make offers for private tutoring and I continued to decline. I told him that if his daughter ever gets stuck again in her homework I can get her unstuck, but I am otherwise unavailable.

     When they left, I broke rank and gave an account of the meeting directly to Susanna. Then I fed her and Julio full of junk food and wrote for the rest of the night.