(Another) Slice of Expat Life…
O.k., o.k. it’s been a (goodly long) while. Quite the (nearly 3 month, gasp!) hiatus since I managed to pop in here w/ a bit of TL blather. Agreed. I am nothing but a wretchedly unreliable Blatherer these days.
And it isn’t as if I have nothing to say. I do have a boatload of pics and commentary on my skip to Bogotá and Cartagena, Colombia last winter. Will get to that (eventually), but what I thought might be more fun to write about…
I haven’t shared a “Slice of Expat Life” post in awhile, so I thought y’all might enjoy a few of the happenings here on this 8,400+ ft. mountain-top in South America. Given the – OMG 12 years now! – I’ve been cozily calling Cuenca “home”, clearly my day-to-day life here isn’t much different than yours (e.g. grocery shopping, paying bills, dental appointments, puttering with the plants in my balcony “jardin”, and – in my particular case – confounding innocent private English students with a boatload of English homophones and bewildering idioms.
And while even the most mundane chores can still prove a bit challenging (which in my book is a GOOD thing that I actually THRIVE on) when you’ve chosen to live outside your native land for years on end, nonetheless, just as in your life – happily, a smattering of somewhat unique affairs do pop up occasionally as especially memorable. So let’s take a peek at a handful of such highlights I’ve recently enjoyed here in Cuenca, Ecuador, shall we?
Another (Dodderin’) Trip Around the Sun
The birthday girl is in PHO HEAVEN!
Generally I try to jet off to some wholly new corner of the globe around the time of my birthday (March is the perfect “shoulder season” in Europe and many other corners of the globe). But since returning from Colombia in December, I wasn’t in any particular hurry to decamp again from my comfy home here on this mountain-top. So I opted instead for a simple (yet arguably EPIC!) bowl of a rarity in this part of the world: a great big ol’ steaming-hot bowl of Vietnamese PHO (FYI: pronounced “fuh” as in “fun” – w/o the n) soup at my favorite restaurant in El Centro (Sunday Brunch Cuenca).
(Dear Vietnam: Oh how I so miss your amazing eats!)
New Chinese Expat Friends
As is my characteristic M.O. when it comes to befriending strangers at every turn, I first met Minny by barging into her sweet pink and white sushi/dumpling shop (Koi Sushi) at the neighborhood mall on the chance that she might know where I could get my hands on a bamboo steamer. I wanted to make a batch of “bao” (FYI: pronounced “bow” as in “how”) buns, and I’d looked high and low all over Cuenca for a steamer. But not even the specialty kitchen shops seem to know whattheheck a “vaporera de bambu” was (sigh).
Minny agreed that such a contraption might be hard to find here in Cuenca but pointed me to a couple of shops I’d not tried before. Meanwhile, she said she’d keep an eye out for a steamer, and we exchanged contact deets.
No dice at the new shop options, but a few weeks later dear Minny sends me a FB message with a pic of my long sought-after quarry (see right: rather shabby pic of said lusted-after bamboo steamer nestled in what looks like a disused corner of somebody’s garage). Apparently (bless-her-heart) Minny checked with the Chinese import supplier for her sushi shop that’s located in Guayaquil on the coast, and…
YIPPEEE – he had two and would sell one to ME!
Which led to…
An “American” Lunch
As Minny spoke little English (while both of us continue to learn Spanish here in our adopted Ecuadorian home), I started helping her devise online ads for her family sushi shop business (um, often Google translate doesn’t get things quiiiite right). 😉 And in early December I invited her and her family (hubby Tomoi and 13 yr. old daughter Lily) to join me in my (cleverly reserved for a 1 nt. “staycation” for a mere $24) hotel room in El Centro – the balcony, directly above Santo Domingo Plaza, with a perfect view of my favorite annual fiesta here in Cuenca, the Festival de Las Luces (the Festival of Lights).
After Christmas, my new Chinese expat friends invited me to their home for a delicious authentic Chinese homecooked dinner (Tomoi previously was a chef in some of the best hotels in Shanghai and Tokyo). Not only were the many different dishes delicious, but I finally learned how to prep fresh shrimp into the quintessential stretched “straight” shape for proper shrimp tempura.
My take on an “American” lunch…
Naturally, I wanted to reciprocate their hospitality so a few weeks later I invited them to lunch at Casa Dyannita. My “plan” was to likewise cook them a truly “American” lunch (short of the standard fast-food associated w/ U.S. of A. cuisine: pizza and hot-dogs).
But I must say – choosing a menu representative of the wide variety of cuisines spread across my native land proved quite a challenge. I even polled my friends and family on Facebook and received a diverse array of suggestions including fried chicken, potato salad, ranch dressing, buffalo wings, nachos, and sloppy joes. All good suggestions, but I finally went with a potpourri of comfort foods from my own childhood in the U.S. Midwest: meat loaf, “loaded” baked potatoes, and good ol’ (albeit “copycat”) homemade KFC coleslaw.
Happily my Chinese friends seemed to enjoy my humble “American” eats. Even better, Tomoi brought a a small batch of dehydrated Chinese seaweed, and made us all a starter of seaweed soup.
In short, a 7,000+ mile wide cultural exchange of national eats, curiously led to…
A Quilting Teacher is Born!
“Crazy About Cuenca” quilt at Casa Dyannita.
While the four of us chatted (mostly via Google Translate and mime) around the table after lunch, young Lily (the only member of the family that spoke a good bit of English – not to mention is swiftly becoming fluent in a 3rd language at school here in Ecuador) admired my several quilts scattered about the walls and draped across the couch.
Casually I replied “Thanks Lily – would you like me to teach you how to make a quilt?” The gleaming smile on her face needed no language (neither English, nor Spanish nor Chinese) – oh my “YESSS!” was her emphatic answer. And we arranged then and there, for quilting lessons every Sunday since that day.
Suddenly I’d become a (very happy) quilting Teach to a most delightful teen born in now far-away Shanghai, China!
It’s honestly been great fun to share with her my own renewed passion for fiddling with all manner of colorful fabric scraps and creating ever new fiber art to hang on the walls and liven-up my apartment.
Clearly not everyone gets a high from snipping fabric scraps and struggling to match unruly patchwork corners. But Lily swiftly befriended my sewing machine (albeit pressing that uber-speedy foot pedal ever so gently to slow stitch her seams). And even happily claimed the title of “Seam Ripper Queen” when she has to un-stitch a wonky seam.
We’ve been working on small projects to start, and Lily is an especially quick learner. The first project was a fun “snap purse” (using a metal strip from a carpenter’s measure for the “snap” closure), and now we’re working on a series of quilt blocks using various piecing techniques that she’ll eventually stitch into a runner for her family’s kitchen table (Shhh! – don’t tell her parents – it’s a surprise!)
lol – note the bamboo steamer tucked in the cart behind Lily – that started it all! 😉
The Best of All Worlds
So there you have it – just a peek into a handful of what the TravelnLass has been up to lately.
Fond reminders that – while g-knows we wanderlusts love to travel – even (recently trendy) “slow travel” has its downside. For me, having a permanent base in a foreign country is the best of all worlds. A place that still offers cultural/language surprises daily even after a dozen years. A place where I can set up a sewing machine (which is otherwise a bit heavy to drag around from country to country every month or two) and invest in a proper bamboo steamer for my kitchen. A place where I can still hop on a plane to a new land for a month or more whenever I get the itch, yet… A place that I can truly call “home” and nurture genuine friendships (not just endless “meet-ups”) with both local Cuencano neighbors as well as fellow intrepids from far-away lands (who feed me well!) 😉
In short, after a lifetime of whizzing hither and yon round the globe, I’m ever grateful to have found such a lovely corner of the globe to settle down.
Thanks ever so much Ecuador, for allowing me to permanently live in your beautiful country!
P. S. New here and curious who I am? Check my bio to learn more! Better yet, subscribe to my email list (so you never miss a single post) and get a pdf of my 30+ Best Travel Tips (trust me, at least one is sure to be a revelation).
About the Author
Dyanne Off-the-beaten-path travel is my passion,and I’ve always lived life “like-a-kid-in-a-candy-store” – eager to sample as many flavors as I can. Indeed, my life motto has long been: This ain’t a dress rehearsal, folks!
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Off-the-beaten-path travel is my passion, and I’ve always lived life “like a kid in a candy store” – eager to sample as many flavors as I can. Indeed, my life motto has long been:
Loved it especially since a. Lived in China for 3 years and miss it and b. My granddaughter is called Lily
Glad you enjoyed the post Ruth, meeting such wonderful folks from different cultures is the primary reason I travel and choose to live in foreign lands.
Thanks for dropping by – btw, I recently learned that “Lirio” is the Spanish word for “Lily”.