Books of Life
In the past couple of weeks I have found the time to actually talk to two of my good friends about life growing up here in Ecuador. And though a picture may be worth a thousand words, a person is probably worth 10,000 to the 10,000th power words. When I was a kid I used to always marvel at the following scenario: Imagine if every person in the world had a book about their lives that recorded every single event that ever happened to them. Thus as you are passing random people in the street your name ends up on page 6 billion of their book for one small line, never to be seen again. Or, more interestingly, your name has appeared in their book countless times, where each mentioning occurs for only six seconds as you pass each endless times in the same city, bar, or wherever. I am sure the Kane Russell Book is filled with innumerable names and faces, but its nice when a random mentioning of a name actually gets their own chapter.
My first friend was born in Esmeraldas, a fairly large and almost entirely black city on the north Ecuadorian coast. He is currently in his early twenties and lives with his sister in Ibarra. Picture Kwame Brown, though slightly darker. He came to Ibarra in search of work, as Esmeraldas was not brimming with job opportunities, and a better life. Probably the equivalent of a young person from Bolinas decides that La Costa Canyon might offer a more hard working less laid back working environment. However, as is the case with much of Ecuador, his job in Ibarra proved to be frustrating as time and time again his pay days are late, or his boss fails to show up to take care of his employees. Nonetheless he is a hard worker, who comes from an honest family, and is trying his best to make a living in the big city. He tried to sign up for English classes, to better his chances of earning more money, but ultimately couldn´t afford the fee (50 dollars for 10 weeks), because of the insecurity of his pay schedule.
Probably sounds pretty pedestrian for life in the third world, but last night I had one of the most endearing conversations since arriving in Ecuador. My friend told me, seemingly on the point of shedding one of those single movie type tears, that I was one of the nicest people he had ever met in his life. Why? Because a white person had treated him as an equal. He explained that he had never talked to a gringo ever, but in the past two days had actually had an extended conversation with me (we walked home from my Supermaxi scavenger hunt because he did not have any money to afford the bus), had another white person (Ally) say hello to him on three separate occations, and had the opprtunity to chat with two other people from the United States that I had introduced him to on the way home from the Supermarket.
The racism in this country is sick. Obviously the United States has a long way to go, but I do not know one person in San Francisco who will refuse to talk to a person of color on principle. For my friend´s whole life he had always wanted to have a Gringo chapter in his book, and now had four different entries thanks to me. I cannot even begin to explain how nice it is when someone makes you feel like you are doing some good down here, and my conversation last night did just that.
My second friend grew up in San Antonio, the wood-sculptor capital of Ecuador. Its located just outside Ibarra, and the artwork that comes out of the small city is beautifully done. He himself is a wood sculptor, so on the way home from Quito I got to pick his brain about life as a craftsmen.
The most feel good part of his story starts with a pair of pants. Hanging out with his Dad one day in a department store, my friend saw a pair of jeans that he really wanted. His own pants were tattered and stretched, so he respectfully asked his father for a new pair of jeans. His father´s reply mildly stung. ¨Son you are 17, it´s time you start making money to buy your own pants.¨
Thus my friend grabbed his best buddy and headed off to visit every wood carving shop in all of San Antonio. They walked in to every master craftsmen and asked if he could benefit from anything-sanding, sculpting, cleaning, aiding, learning-in his shop. After being turned down countless times, my friend finally found a job sanding wood in a shop at the far end of San Antonio. He would be payed money to show up to the shop for ten hours a day. My friend didn´t remember the actual sum, because in those days everything was in sucres.
Thus he explained to me the joy and elation he felt as he picked up his first pay check. While he was describing the story his face literally lit up like the quintissential christmas tree at the memory. And you know what? Mine did too. Who could forget my first pay check written on to the Minnesota Mowers after a week´s worth of serious lawn mowing. In fact, I feel like the first pay check story is one in almost everybody´s life book that provides at least one chapter filled with genuine happiness. In fact, if you ever find yourself depressed or unhappy, just think of the moment you received your first pay check-the first time you held money in your hands that you earned-and I almost guarantee you can provide yourself with a slight smile.
My friend went on to explain how he later went on to begin his own wood carving business, and his first commission were wooden skulls for a local market. He started off being able to make one skull a week, but when the owner of the story told him that she wanted as many of the skulls as he could turn out, he slowly improved his craft to allow him to make one skull a day, later two a day, and finally one an hour.
He also explained his conception of wood working, which I found to be very interesting. He explained that every craftsman starts with something easy, maybe something that his or her father has taught him or her, and slowly works up to the tour de force project. For many sculptors this is the human form, but for my friend he spent the first half of his career preparing to build a horse. We all have had tasks that we put off time and time again, saying that we are not ready, only to finally garner the courage to dive in head on one day.
He later explained his perception of modern art, which I found to be very interesting. He stated that he cannot respect an artist who dives headlong into abstract creations from the beginning. For him, an artist has to first be able to recreate reality, exactly as it appears to the human eye. Once they have succeeded in this endeavor, then they have proof that they are talented enough to not only recreate life objectively, but to recreate life subjectively, which is in essence the point of modern art.
We later discussed one of the biggest perils of Ecuador´s work culture. Basically nobody can get a patent for anything. Thus my friend has created many cool original ideas, but the atmosphere in San Antonio is so tight knit, that people instantly copy good ideas to make them main stream copies and fakes almost immediately. Thus if you are in Ecuador ever, or anywhere for that matter, always look around to see if you can find copies of what seems to be a cool idea. Only then can you be sure to reward the artist who originally conceived the novel project.
Gotta run. Look for a blog about the beach sometime this week.
My first friend was born in Esmeraldas, a fairly large and almost entirely black city on the north Ecuadorian coast. He is currently in his early twenties and lives with his sister in Ibarra. Picture Kwame Brown, though slightly darker. He came to Ibarra in search of work, as Esmeraldas was not brimming with job opportunities, and a better life. Probably the equivalent of a young person from Bolinas decides that La Costa Canyon might offer a more hard working less laid back working environment. However, as is the case with much of Ecuador, his job in Ibarra proved to be frustrating as time and time again his pay days are late, or his boss fails to show up to take care of his employees. Nonetheless he is a hard worker, who comes from an honest family, and is trying his best to make a living in the big city. He tried to sign up for English classes, to better his chances of earning more money, but ultimately couldn´t afford the fee (50 dollars for 10 weeks), because of the insecurity of his pay schedule.
Probably sounds pretty pedestrian for life in the third world, but last night I had one of the most endearing conversations since arriving in Ecuador. My friend told me, seemingly on the point of shedding one of those single movie type tears, that I was one of the nicest people he had ever met in his life. Why? Because a white person had treated him as an equal. He explained that he had never talked to a gringo ever, but in the past two days had actually had an extended conversation with me (we walked home from my Supermaxi scavenger hunt because he did not have any money to afford the bus), had another white person (Ally) say hello to him on three separate occations, and had the opprtunity to chat with two other people from the United States that I had introduced him to on the way home from the Supermarket.
The racism in this country is sick. Obviously the United States has a long way to go, but I do not know one person in San Francisco who will refuse to talk to a person of color on principle. For my friend´s whole life he had always wanted to have a Gringo chapter in his book, and now had four different entries thanks to me. I cannot even begin to explain how nice it is when someone makes you feel like you are doing some good down here, and my conversation last night did just that.
My second friend grew up in San Antonio, the wood-sculptor capital of Ecuador. Its located just outside Ibarra, and the artwork that comes out of the small city is beautifully done. He himself is a wood sculptor, so on the way home from Quito I got to pick his brain about life as a craftsmen.
The most feel good part of his story starts with a pair of pants. Hanging out with his Dad one day in a department store, my friend saw a pair of jeans that he really wanted. His own pants were tattered and stretched, so he respectfully asked his father for a new pair of jeans. His father´s reply mildly stung. ¨Son you are 17, it´s time you start making money to buy your own pants.¨
Thus my friend grabbed his best buddy and headed off to visit every wood carving shop in all of San Antonio. They walked in to every master craftsmen and asked if he could benefit from anything-sanding, sculpting, cleaning, aiding, learning-in his shop. After being turned down countless times, my friend finally found a job sanding wood in a shop at the far end of San Antonio. He would be payed money to show up to the shop for ten hours a day. My friend didn´t remember the actual sum, because in those days everything was in sucres.
Thus he explained to me the joy and elation he felt as he picked up his first pay check. While he was describing the story his face literally lit up like the quintissential christmas tree at the memory. And you know what? Mine did too. Who could forget my first pay check written on to the Minnesota Mowers after a week´s worth of serious lawn mowing. In fact, I feel like the first pay check story is one in almost everybody´s life book that provides at least one chapter filled with genuine happiness. In fact, if you ever find yourself depressed or unhappy, just think of the moment you received your first pay check-the first time you held money in your hands that you earned-and I almost guarantee you can provide yourself with a slight smile.
My friend went on to explain how he later went on to begin his own wood carving business, and his first commission were wooden skulls for a local market. He started off being able to make one skull a week, but when the owner of the story told him that she wanted as many of the skulls as he could turn out, he slowly improved his craft to allow him to make one skull a day, later two a day, and finally one an hour.
He also explained his conception of wood working, which I found to be very interesting. He explained that every craftsman starts with something easy, maybe something that his or her father has taught him or her, and slowly works up to the tour de force project. For many sculptors this is the human form, but for my friend he spent the first half of his career preparing to build a horse. We all have had tasks that we put off time and time again, saying that we are not ready, only to finally garner the courage to dive in head on one day.
He later explained his perception of modern art, which I found to be very interesting. He stated that he cannot respect an artist who dives headlong into abstract creations from the beginning. For him, an artist has to first be able to recreate reality, exactly as it appears to the human eye. Once they have succeeded in this endeavor, then they have proof that they are talented enough to not only recreate life objectively, but to recreate life subjectively, which is in essence the point of modern art.
We later discussed one of the biggest perils of Ecuador´s work culture. Basically nobody can get a patent for anything. Thus my friend has created many cool original ideas, but the atmosphere in San Antonio is so tight knit, that people instantly copy good ideas to make them main stream copies and fakes almost immediately. Thus if you are in Ecuador ever, or anywhere for that matter, always look around to see if you can find copies of what seems to be a cool idea. Only then can you be sure to reward the artist who originally conceived the novel project.
Gotta run. Look for a blog about the beach sometime this week.
posted by ecuadortraveler at 9:57 AM
1 Comments:
Your friend's description of Modern Art is really fascinating! It must be interesting to hear such in-depth conversations in Spanish, reflect on them to yourself, and then transcribe them in English for all of us.
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