AMAZONIA :D

More on Friday: Sebastian came over, and I still really don't know him or talk to him so I feel kind of weird around him. Pepe and Carie came over, and they're both super polite. I went to dinner with their family, which was absolutely delicious because we went to a really nice restaurant. They've told me Carie cries a lot, but since she's always been super nice and friendly to me, I haven't really believed it. At dinner she randomly started crying, which was weird, but then I remembered that that happened in Banos a while ago to me. Dang it. A story about today: the part seperating the toilet and the sink in the bathroom isn't completely finished, so whenever anyone is going to the bathroom just no one goes to wash their hands. Well I was just finishing up, and the grandpa goes to wash his hands! What?! I was in the bathroom! It was really weird and I don't think he ment anything by it, but still. Saturday: Here begins the Amazon. A fun, very fun, but interesting, very interesting, trip. We didn't go to the "typical Amazon," aka the giant river with trees everywhere. Apparently there are cities in the Amazon, which makes me kind of sad, but we went to one. I thought it was gonna be just our family and Molde (Molde: another name for Kmilo, my cousin who is at the house so often he's like my brother). Anyways, it was our whole extended family and two other families; crazy! We stopped at a place of some really nice people we didn't know, and I got to pet their MONKEY! It was so awesome, I absolutely adore monkies. I had my, I-feel-most-like-an-Ecuadorian moment: I was sitting in the bed of a truck, riding on a dirt road through the Amazon, next to eight large canas (a food dessert type thing everyone eats), washing my hands with a wipe because I just petted a monkey, washing butterflies chase eachother, and waving hello to a friendly Ecuadorian. It was awesome. We arrived and took this scary cart across the river which was awesome, and then we started walking. We didn't know how far it would be, so good thing someone came to get us because it was like 30km (and no, I don't know how much that is in miles, but it took a while to get to in the car). We got there, had lunch, and chilled. The adults were boring, so I went to the kids who were more boring, so I went back to the adults. I kind of hate that about being a teenager, you never really know who you're supposed to be hanging out with. Gaby, another cousin-type person, might just be my favorite person. She's twenty-one years old, and an absolute sweetheart. I think she could tell I felt kind of out of place because she would always come and talk to me. Chichi (my aunt) is also really nice to me now, which is awesome and she kind of acts like another mom to me. We went to a beauty pageant type thing, which meant more food. Favorite food here: a batido de araza, which is a shake made of an Amazonian fruit; delicious. SUPER loud pageant, a dog that I felt super bad for, I possibly had a crush on a cousin who I barely know (but maybe I just liked flirting with him and that he's super nice to me), more food, and a freezing shower. Sunday: We drove to a mirador (view) or three, I don't remember, and took so many pictures of the family. It was so pretty! I tried the petahuya (?) fruit, which was completely delicious. We ate more, then I took the TeraVeta (the cable car back across the river). After that, Chichi's car had people that needed a ride in it, and one of the guys invited us to his house. He offered a thing made of yuca, which was completely awful! Everyone was joking about it afterwards because, first of all, it did taste really bizarre, and second of all, there were hairs in it. When we went to eat more, they found a hair (from the plant that was holding the food, hopefully) in the food, and they joked again. Anytime they see anything light, like a blonde hair or a blonde child, they always say it's me, because they barely know anyone else with light hair. We went to Puyo, in a hosteleria called El Pigual, which was so pretty. We went into the pool, then into the steam room for an absurdly long time. It was so much fun! We went to dinner (pizza and batidos, my favorite!) and then watched Enchanted in Spanish. Monday: Oh dear. This is gonna be a tough day to write about. I would say probably the worst day here. My brother, Mateo, drives me completely insane! We always do this thing where he has something purposely to offend me, and I hit him. We both know what will happen, and both laugh about it. Well, he said something, and I hit him, and he freaked out. It was this huge thing with his mom, and he said it'd been bothering that I hit him but he would just "let it go"! What?! He would laugh and say more things so I would hit him more! That bothered me so much! Anyways, that went on for SO long that I just started apologizing, even though he wouldn't!, and to top it off he wouldn't forgive me. So, of course, I broke down. My third time! How embarassing! At least this time it was for a reason. I went out to the car after a while, and the second I got there my dad hugged me for a super long time, and I broke down again. He said we need to go up from the situation, aka transcend, aka IB coming into my life. After, we went to this super awesome zoo. There was a (probably) wild monkey, that wanted to go into the cage while the others wanted to leave it. It was so cute! And, I found an onion that we had fun using to play with, and we could get right up to the cage of all the animals; it was crazy. We ate at a really nice place, then started to climb to this waterfall, Pailon del Diablo. It was huge, and water was everywhere. After that, I got to hold a snake (put it around my neck of course!) which was super cool. I was super tired when we got back, but we were invited over to Molde's house because it was someone's birthday (speaking of which, my mom's was the 29th so happy birthday mom!). It was super fun, and I had a huge pillow fight with Molde and Pepe, they love bothering me and they don't get upset when I hit them, which is awesome. That lasted for like an hour, and then I danced with Mayte, who is also in the running for my favorite person ever. So last night. I really hate when I have to shower, because it takes forever to heat up, and the bathroom isn't finished. Well, I'm in the shower and I look down and see that there's water all over the bathroom! I ran and told the parents, then finished my shower in the other bathroom. When I came back, I felt really weird. The mom told me that when I see that it's flooding, I should turn off the water immediately and not wait, implying that I waited; why would I wait?! The dad told me I needed to make sure to shut the shower door, and that I should turn off that shower periodically. Needless to say, I won't be showering there any more! Well, this is my longest blog, and if you made it through to here, congrats!