Friday was a long day and we got stuff done. The campground remained weird and I found myself sliding a ten dollar bill through the door jamb of the house as we’d seen no one while we’d parked. I tip-toed past the bicycle tourist probably sleeping.
The plan was to get to the museum du jour and check out some Cuenca culture. We left the weird disheveled camping space quite possibly for the last time.
The Ministry of Culture and Heritage working with the Central Bank of Ecuador built this astonishing space and they let the public in for free. Amazing.
“Imagine that in this tiny space we can do something really interesting; we can reflect the world.” Indeed.
I zoomed in on the ground floor photography exhibition of work by Christoph Hirtz. He was born in Quito in 1959 and took up photography like his father Gottfried. For some reason he studied photography in Munich, possibly because his family could have been German immigrants with names like that…
I really enjoyed his work, shots of decaying buildings in Ecuador, geometric shapes and lots of varied textures.
So I made a picture of the interior courtyard in the Hirtz style, or what I hoped was that style.
Layne and I got to wander around in separate spaces pretty much by ourselves until the school field trips showed up.
There was a whole bunch of pre Inca pieces. The museum has received gifts and bought collections totaling 750 various donations comprising 10,000 pieces in the museums archives.
There was a weird similarity between the pottery pieces and similar stuff we saw here and across Latin America and even the US southwest.
And look at this, a pre Inca knife that looks just like the knives used by Inuit in the Arctic. We humans are alike even when we don’t know it.
I speak several languages but Quechua or Cañar is beyond me. The museum lobby:
Part of the exhibit area was devoted to contemporary young artists working in ancient style in Cuenca. Check out these pieces that reminded me of symbols I’ve seen in the desert southwest at home.
This piece tickled me.
My favorite room was another photography exhibit in honor of a street photographer who pictured life in Cuenca chronicling the city, officially for his paper, but in his own time noticing the forgotten citizens, the poor and the marginalized. My Lumix GX85 sitting atop the equipment used by Vicente Tello famous in his city as Don Vichi an institution.
He died in February of this year at the age of 92 and he left behind a record of thousands of his pictures of his city.
A camera in the street was the title of the exhibit and that was what he did. He left behind a vast collection of thousands of pictures with a fraction on show here.
I spent a fair bit of time there and had to drag myself away to take a walk through the corridors of beautifully laid out examples of life in southern Ecuador before everyone started invading.
A diorama of a life lived in a prehistoric hut included a figure threading a necklace. These ancients spent a lot of time keeping busy apparently.
And they shrank the heads of their enemies. According to the signs it wasn’t personal but it was some sort of sacrifice to propitiate the gods. I’d take it personally but that’s how I am.
Personally I thought they were gross and I was quite happy they were locked behind glass.
I am well aware modern humans can be awful but I don’t think our ancestors lacked for grotesque behaviors.
And then just like that we drive from the sublime to the necessary. Which in this case was a new windshield. A tiny nick in our glass was producing a long crack that refused to stop growing. So I found an auto glass shop in town.
At first he wanted to try to fix the crack which he said might not work perfectly but I wanted a whole new windshield. He recoiled as he’d never seen a Promaster before but I explained it was an American version of a Peugeot Jumper and he got on the computer. Meanwhile the neighbors wanted a tour of the mobile home parked on the street.
Look at this tiny hole causing all this damage. I’d put tape on the crack to see if the damage was growing and sure enough every day I had to add a piece of tape which was when I decided we needed to do something.
The shop owner’s brother was hanging out chatting as we waited for the Peugeot windshield to arrive. He has four children with four women he said as I explained how we traveled with no obligations and no children. An eleven year old in Tokyo he never sees, another in Germany who cones in faction every year, one in Medellin Colombia he goes to visit in summer and a final child (he hopes) here in Cuenca.
I’d rather have a dog a van and one wife and travel.
The new windshield arrived and they sawed out the old one.
Then when the windshield came out in one piece they cleaved the grand and stuck glue around the edge.
No windshield and we also found time to get haircuts yesterday.
The Peugeot windshield in place.
Four hours and $260 and we are good to go till our next crack appears. I was removed it’s such an easy fix but that’s why I like the Promaster. Many parts can be found that fit the bodywork from the Fiat/Renault/Peugeot/Citroen vans that have the sane chassis and the gasoline engine is that fitted to modern Jeeps whose dealers have been helpful along the way to us as well. My Promaster has an assortment of European parts now including brakes and wheel bearings.
It’s been a great exercise for me in patience and learning coming down here and GANNET2 is a great teacher: to we the problem there is a solution. And to the problem of constant rain and crappy campgrounds in Cuenca we had a solution: an apartment.
We also got Rusty to the vet this busy day, and the vet checked him out and is preparing his papers to cross into Peru next week. Meanwhile we needed somewhere to stay out of the rain, as daily rain makes the van grow small, and at $50 a night all in, this place seemed very reasonable with safe parking outside for GANNET2.
And with an attached garden and grass to sunbathe on Rusty will be happy.
