Three-Day Weekend Voyages

Even though Guayquil is over 160 miles from here, we were fortunate enough to celebrate its independence day with a day off from work. We spent the weekend rather scattered throughout the country; Sonia was off in Tena with Ricky (we miss you Ricky!). Haley and Sarah ventured north to the infamous Rose Cottage for a quiet weekend in the mountains of Otovalo. And the rest of us braved the Estadio Olimpico Atahualpa for the Ecuador vs. Uruguay game.

The hammocks they barely left for 24 hours

Future save-the-date announcement?

We had been looking forward to this game for about two months, ever since Serena sent an e-mail informing us that the first five people to write her back would claim tickets owned by last year's PDs. Chet, Erik, Krysta, Mike and I were lucky to have read our e-mails first and after a couple of weeks trying to find the receipt, plus two days trying to pick up the actual tickets in Quito, we we're geared up and ready to go Saturday morning. You would probably think that a 5p.m. game wouldn't require us to get there much more than an hour or so ahead of time. However, as we made our way into the stadium around noon, we barely found enough open seats and the crowd was already extremely rowdy.

Me and Krysta (hour one of waiting for the game to start)

The flag that covered our whole section (hours 1 - 5, multiple times)

Erik rocks out, fully-dressed in Ecuador gear

Mike and Chet just before the opening kick off!

Unfortunately, as you probably already know, Ecuador lost 2 - 1 to Uruguay. Before we had enough time to marvel in the glory of scoring the first goal towards the end of the second half, Uruguay retaliated and somehow got themselves a penalty shot within mere seconds of the game ending. Though we were all disappointed, it was an amazing experience and tons of fun, even the five hours of basking in the sun playing cards.

Thanks to some advice from Seth, we'll be attempting to watch Wednesday's game against Chile in the teen center. Although our chances are slim since being pushed down into 6th place with 23 points (we need to be in at least 4th place to qualify for South Africa 2010), we're still hopeful!

Si Se Puede!

- Jackie