Galapagos

I’ve been feeling low lately. Passionately purposeless on the border of desperation.

Even the nice moments don’t seem to relieve this heavy feeling of nothing.

Perhaps recounting recent pleasant moments might lift my mood polluted by the dark ones.

The other day I was taking pictures with the sea lion pup that lives by the little fisherman’s market here in Puerto Ayora (Santa Cruz). The pup just dragged herself up onto my feet, turned on her back and begged to be loved. She was as irresistible as a Labrador puppy. Huge black eyes full of need. So I couldn’t resist. Wiped a bit of the ever-present alcohol gel on my palms and stroked her wet, furry belly. She gratefully closed her eyes and enjoyed the few moments of love her mother denied her. I could relate. A couple of large pelicans looked on with some curiosity but quickly got disrupted by the enormous headless tuna one of the fisherman was degutting.

Turtle bay has the most incredibly fine, powdery white sand I’ve ever seen. Absolutely perfect for making sand sculpture. Have seen one little turtle with her head out of the water hoping for a bit of respite on a people free beach, alas was not to be. Although there are never more than ten of us spread out on this 200 odd meter long, curved stretch of mangrove cradled beach, it seemed still too many. I built a big sand turtle behind a mangrove bush.

A Dutch couple came to take some shots of my sculpture and kept me company for a little while recounting their recent misadventure on an Ecuadorian bus. It turned over on it’s side and slid downhill till it was stopped by some shrubs a few meters from the mountains edge. Lucky, unlucky. Nobody got injured but their bags got trapped. A couple of hours later an other bus turned up from the same company which was convenient for the bus driver and two other employees. They just got on it and abandoned the bus full of passengers in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night.  Around 5 am a truck turned up to pull the bus back upright but alas it was not to be. Upon seeing the company’s logo on the side of the bus, the truck driver said they haven’t paid him for the last time he pulled them out and proceeded to leave. One of the passengers bribed him with some cash though so he did the job. Few more hours passed by till the other bus came by. The story ended well. the Dutch couple managed to get to Quito and tell their tale (many times over I suspect.)

So I’m still on the positives, that’s good. Just ordered a vegetable soup, an avocado salad and a potion of garlic bread for a bargain price of about $12US. yep Ecuador uses US$ and it’s very expensive here. But the little house I’m renting is reasonable, got hot water, cable TV and a huge fridge that occasionally sounds like an aircraft landing. Fantastic. OK so so I could do with fewer ants but I stopped killing the spiders now and have a new found respect for them and their hard work eliminating the little pesky buggers that don’t stop crawling through the ceiling from a struggling, infested tree.

I had some fried plantains for breakfast that I cooked myself on a little three burner stove. Going all native. Then biked downtown to wish Karin this German woman who owns a travel agency here a very happy Birthday. Didn’t make it to her party because I was rather feeling depressed last night. Shame because it was held in a quaint restaurant across the bay on a little peninsula that can only be approached by water taxi (small boat with an outboard.) The ambiance must be fantastic at night as the place has a balcony overlooking the bay with some nice yachts and sailing boats. One day.

I met two other German chicks who are married to natives. Despite living in this lovely island they do complain a lot. Neither of their man works, one of the woman is raising a baby and working full time at a gift shop. The other woman does some tour guiding and works at an art gallery that sells tourist art on Prozac by English gone native Sarah Darling. Apparently she studied at Chelsea School which I cannot detect in her work. She paints fucking unicorns and sea life with gaudy colours using oils but look acrylic. Never met her but not too exciting about the prospect of it either. Both Germans whine a lot about the locals, the conditions and their men so I stopped visiting them.

I Need some positive energy. Just finished my nice meal drinking a cold beer and not thinking of the futility of it all.