This week I present the proud people of Ecuador.  They are students and workers.  There are no cardboard signs asking for money, instead there are jugglers and street performers at intersections.  (We read that one got hit by a car!)  Entrepreneurs push wheelbarrows of fruit, or hawk anything and everything from spray bottles to potato chips, from doggie sweaters to pillows and blankets for the long bus ride.  They step onto the buses selling baggies of coconut water, baskets of homemade bread, tamales, cut fruit and candies.  Some bravely sing along to music blaring from their boombox to sell their CDs.  Babies are carried on their mother’s back and children play alongside their working mothers and fathers as they sell toilet paper at the bus station toilets or their wares along the sidewalks.

This past week we’ve been traveling and enjoying the magnificent scenery of this beautiful country.  I’ll catch up with you next week!

A father with 2 little girls pays for one seat on the bus!

Steve showed 5-year-old Cristina how to play Pac-Man.

This entrepreneur is BBQing skewers in a wheeled stand. She placed plastic chairs on the sidewalk and we came for Sunday dinner.

There are street sweepers and park sweepers in Cuenca.

Workers of all types

Nancy, my favorite fruit vender at the Cuenca mercado.

Bride and a Groom in a 1955 Ford.

Everyone wears an uniform.  These are bank employees.

So many different school uniforms!  At a glance one knows which school they attend.

The parks are busy on the weekends as families play together.  Here is a bicycle built for 3.