Last 48 Hours at Rio Guajalito

Last 48 hours at La Reserva Rio “Guaja” Guajalito

Prefaced by Vlastimil deciding to leave for the Oriente earlier than previously planned so he wants a rough draft of our papers (10 days earlier than it is actually due) when he picks us up from the reserve on Friday morning. (Note that papers are to be written completely in Spanish so that they can be used by Vlasti and others in the future)

Wednesday:

12:00 Its raining a lot. Elsita finishes the last of the soup, Christa eats more oatmeal.
4:00 afternoon data collection, Christa’s last in anticipation of working all Thursday in the day to complete paper – Elsita plans all-nighter
6:15 dinner time, spaghetti!
6:45 inspired by Vlasti’s talent, Elsita and Christa make awesome warm fire, burning all accumulated toilet paper in the process
10:00 Elsita goes to bed
11:30 Christa goes to bed after dowsing fire

Thursday:

6:00 Elsita realizes that wristwatch is in the kitchen. Elsita enters to find smoke filled room and huge hole in floor. Cursing and laughing hysterically, Elsita attempts to put out fire with potfuls of water. When last of visible embers wetted, Elsita warns Christa (still in bed) and goes to collect data.
6:15 Christa starts fighting fire, douses entire room with water, removes remaints of two floorboards plus third for good measure, shovels ashes into bucket, ignores kitty begging for food, douses entire room with water again. Elsita finds 3 Phoebes, 2 Dippers, 2 Tyrannulets, and 1 Sandpiper (highest population totals ever). Christa finds missing ruler under floor, runs out excited to tell Elsita.
8:00 Breakfast of bread piece for Elsita, Christa eating more oatmeal, starts working on paper using laptop computer
9:30 Elsita leaves to run up the mountain to call Betty, to confirm place to stay
9:40 Power goes out while Christa on toilet.
9:50 Elsita blatantly breaks SIT rules and hitchhikes – nice truck driver gives her a lift
11:00 Elsita returns from mountain having run all the way down, finds Christa sitting in darkness. Still raining.
11:00:30 Elsita blames guardian angel for the whole thing, Christa blames peanut butter goddess
11:05 Elsita helps Christa put some new floorboards back in the floor, Christa found them in the shed behind the house.
11:10 Elsita takes first shower in a week
11:30 early huge lunch cause there’s nothing else to do. Christa and Elsita attempt to finish all remaining vegetables, beans, crackers and tuna
1:00 Elsita decides to take nap, Christa decides to start writing paper by hand
2:30 power back, Elsita still asleep
3:30 Elsita gets up, packs most of her things, heads out for more data collection, Christa attempts to focus
6:00 dinner time, spaghetti!!
7:00 veto making another fire. Christa tries to get back to work, Elsita mopes around and catnaps, then outlines her discussion and intro sections on paper
9:50 Christa takes break, Elsita begins Microsoft Excel data analysis of her results. Christa takes first shower in a week
11:30 Elsita playing with Excel graphs, Christa decides to sleep for “a couple hours”
11:50 Elsita has downed two glasses of coke, is extremely wired and has trance music blasting in earphones. Continues results section of paper

Friday:

2:00 Christa walks back into kitchen building, scares the crap out of already jittery Elsita. Elsita has completed half of discussion section, all results and stats, and another glass of coke
3:30 Christa takes a turn on laptop, Elsita drinks a cup of coffee and then sits and stares at a piece of paper for a while
4:30 Christa takes another break, having consumed roughly 5 cups of coffee and two glasses of coke, decides to wash dishes
6:30 Elsita finishes the paper including intro, abstract in english and spanish, figure insertion and other little touchups. Decides against editing bad spanish grammar. Christa sits back down.
6:38 Elsita decides to go for a run, hopes for spectacular sunrise, gets rain, chugs last cup of chocolate milk before heading out
7:30 Elsita returns, Christa still working
8:00 Elsita has left-over vegetables and coke for breakfast, Christa polishes off second bowl of oatmeal for the night, 7th cup of coffee. Elsita washes more dishes
9:10 Christa finishes her paper, including maps, figures and text
9:15 Christa pees for 53rd time in the past 24 hours, starts packing
10:00 Elsita plays on computer, Christa finishes “Cold Mountain”, quoted as saying “why would you write 400 awesome pages and then have such a shitty ending?” Discussion ensues as to whether Inman actually died, eventually reach consensus that he did (Elsita was wrong and she is sad, she thought he was cool, not to mention sexy)
11:00 neighbors’ dog knocks over bucket full of ashes, Elsita and Christa find it extremely hard to clean up in their tired and giggly state of mind. Both agree that they feel tipsy.
12:30 still no sign of Vlastimil
12:45 Vlasti shows up
12:50 Elsita explains the fire damage, Vlasti says “oh no”. Elsita shows Vlasti the fire damage, Vlasti says “ok, vamos a arreglarse” (we´ll fix it), then changes subject.
12:55 Settle up business, Vlasti signs some forms, Elsita and Christa save papers on his USB flash drive, goodbyes to Cesar and family, and Rigoberto
1:30 head back to Quito. Drive is long and extremely bumpy, punctuated by Vlastimil stopping to a) collect plant samples for his students´ upcoming biology exam and b) open the hood of the car, allow smoke to diffuse, pour water on engine, keep driving
1:48 Nevertheless, Elsita manages to fall asleep on Vlasti´s shoulder for the better part of two hours, doesn’t regain full consciousness until close to Quito. Christa still giggly.
4:00 10-minute stop at Vlasti´s “casa de soltero” (bachelor´s house), Vlasti smokes 20th cigarette since arrival at Guaja, second cup of instant coffee. Elsita and Christa gaze in awe at plant collection on table, pictures of his children (multiple ex-wives), girly ornaments in bathroom and table covered in booze (Vlasti on previous visit had made claim of quitting alcoholism)
4:35 arrival at Quito bus station, where Elsita and Christa make final goodbyes, remember to pay for accommodations (give Vlasti the cash), catch taxis to respective residences