This post is a lot of text to picture ratio because I have a lot to say about my 2 weeks in Montañita doing a Spanish and surf school and living with a host family. This truly was one of the most incredible and unique experiences of my whole trip. Not only was it an amazing way to improve my Spanish, but I got to learn so much about the culture by being a part of an Ecuadorian family. There’s so much I could say about these 2 weeks and it was hard to figure out the best way to present it, but here goes nothing. I start out by summarizing the experience into categories like I normally do and then I give a daily breakdown. It’s super long but there’s a lot to say.
Getting In
It was hard to find much info on bus times in Ecuador. I took the bus in the morning from Cuenca to Guayaquil which took about 4 hours. When I got to Guayaquil, which is a major bus hub, I found the bus that goes to Montañita and was fortunate enough to only have about a 30 minute wait until it left at 3:30. The bus wasn’t very crowded and it took about 3 hours of driving up the coast before we got to Montanita. The bus just drops you off on the main “highway” that runs through town and I walked 10 minutes to get to my hostel.
The City
Montañita is a beach and surfing party town that is widely known in the backpacker community for having a good Spanish school where you can also do surf lessons. I heard about this school earlier in my trip and had it on my radar ever since.
The city lived up to its reputation as a party town as it was always loud in the streets and the parties on Wednesday night and during the weekend lasted until 5 in the morning or later. Not only do a lot of backpackers come here to party, it’s also popular amongst Ecuadorians from Guayaquil and Quito. The town was small with dirt roads when you weren’t on the main highway. It was easy to navigate with most of the action in the center area by the main beach with tiendas selling beach ware, restaurants with people trying to come get you to eat their seafood and other meals, and stands with guys selling fruits or ceviche. There were different streets dedicated to a selling a particular service with rows of little stands: cocktail alley, breakfast row, and ceviche stands.
One really annoying thing that stands out about life here is that every morning at 7am the garbage truck goes around town playing the same song on repeat. I don’t know how the garbage men don’t go crazy; it drove me mad.
While it was a fun beach town, if it weren’t for Spanish school then I think 2-3 nights would be a sufficient stay here. That being said, I’m glad that I spent 2 weeks here as I really got a feel for the little town. After just a few days, I could walk around town and already have a memory from each street. In this world where I’m traveling every few days, Montañita felt like home. I think living with a family made it feel even more like home.
The Lodging
After doing my 2 weeks of Spanish school in Medellin, I travelled for another 8 weeks improving on what I learned and talking with locals. Now was a good time to go back for more lessons and continue to improve my Spanish abilities. My plan was to sign up for 1 week of school and see if I liked it, in which case I would do a 2nd (which I ultimately did). The school also offered home stays, rather than staying at their hostel, for a slightly higher price and I figured this would be a great opportunity to both practice my Spanish and see how a local Ecuadorian family lives. While it was a bit nerve racking beforehand, I’m so glad that I made this decision.
After spending my first 2 nights at a hostel by the beach, it was the Sunday before school started and time to meet my Ecuadorian family. There are no addresses in Montañita so the school just gave me a map with a photo where the house will be. They also provided a photo of the family and some info about them. It was a huge family with my host mom, Yolanda (the grandma) at the center of it all, her husband Alejandro, four kids, and countless grandkids. I wasn’t sure if they all lived at the house but was about to find out.
Of course it was not straight forward to find the house based on a static map with a building starred, so I was walking around the area where I thought it would be looking like a lost tourist with my bag. I sent Yolanda a message and she came out in the streets to find me. Phew nice to get past that uncertainty. She immediately gave off a warm and loving energy which took away some of my anxiety. She showed me my room then we chatted for a bit which helped shake off the remaining nerves. She was good at talking slowly (well slowish) and made having a conversation easy.
The house was above their family run swimwear shop which I later found out that Alejandro stitched together all the clothing and Saul came up with the designs. It was really cool to see they handmade everything in the process and I ultimately bought a bathing suit and a tee shirt to help support their business.
There was a staircase next to the entrance of the swimwear shop that led to an open air living room that overlooked a busy street in town. The living room was cozy with 2 hammocks, a rocking chair, a couch, and a small TV. It was an open space that connected to the dining room and kitchen. I had a room to myself on this same floor with 2 beds and my own bathroom. It was a very nice space and I was glad to have my own room that I could escape to when I needed privacy or was tired after a long day.
Yolanda didn’t speak any English and no one else in the family knew much either so it truly was an opportunity to surround myself entirely with Spanish. I had a lot of amazing conversations about things I had never talked about before in Spanish. It really tested my abilities to think on the fly and respond to new questions. At times it was hard to go into a lot of detail for my responses, especially in the moment (later I would think of more things I could have said). But it was such a strong learning experience to be put in these situations and it really helped grow my confidence by the end. Some conversations were better than others, but in the end I’m so proud of myself for my ability to interact with the family. And luckily they were used to having students from the school stay at their house so they were good at speaking more slowly to me. Whenever they spoke amongst themselves as a family, it was always much harder to understand.
My home stay included breakfast and dinner every day, which was always wonderfully cooked by Yolanda. She was an incredible chef and made some great dishes (more on that in the food section). I never left the table hungry. It was interesting because most the kids and grandkids don’t live at the house, but when Yolanda was cooking and it was meal time then everyone would slowly trickle into the house over the next hour. She usually served me first at the table and then it would be a rotating cast of family members that would sit down and eat. The table only sat 4 people so it was never everyone eating together at the same time. I always offered to wash my dishes after but my offer was always declined.
The People
I’m going to give a quick rundown of my host family:
Yolanda – the grandma and my host mom. She was my rock in the family making me breakfast and dinner every night and being a great source of conversation. Every time I came into the house, Yolanda would smile and chuckle “hola mi niño, todo bien?” She is such a sweet and loving lady. She spent a lot of time in the kitchen cooking for the family and keeping the house clean. Then at the end of the nights she loved watching her telenovelas, which are Latin American soap operas. If I didn’t go out to meet up with other students or wasn’t holed up in my room too tired from a long day, then I would sit in the living room and watch telenovelas with her. I think she really appreciated this and she liked to explain the story lines to me. She would always fade in and out of falling asleep on her rocking chair.
Alejandro – the grandfather. He was a really hard working guy who was always down in the swim ware shop until 10 or 11 at night. Sometimes he would come up for dinner and chat and other times he would just eat in the shop. Occasionally he gave off the intimidating Dad energy, but overall I had some nice conversations with him and we had a good relationship.
Saúl – one of their son’s. Him, his wife whose name I can’t remember, and his 2 year old son Jesse were the only other family members that lived in the house full time. Saúl and I got along really well and had some really great conversations. He even tried to convince me to buy a house in Montanita. His wife was typically tending to their son but she was really kind and we had a few nice chats, especially further into my stay.
Frixon – grandson that I communicated the most with. Whenever he was home, he would always ask me lots of questions about a variety of topics which I’ll talk about more later. I didn’t always understand him 100% the first time but he was good about repeating himself and keeping the conversation going. He had just graduated college and was getting ready to figure out the next stage of his life. Hamilton – oldest son that lived in a different house with his wife and 2 kids. Big surfer. He had lived and worked in California for a short time period so he spoke pretty good English. I only interacted with him a few times but he was very down to earth.
Grace – daughter who came over for dinner a few times. We had a solid conversation one night but otherwise not many interactions.
Other grandkids I talked to but only briefly was Alejandra who seemed a bit shy around me and Belfor who headed to college in Riobamba a few days after I arrived. The younger grandkids Liam, Leilani, and Caio were running around the house sometimes but I never truly interacted with any of them.
Sometimes just being in my room reading my book and listening to the family was a good experience. The whole family went to bed late and most school nights I went to bed before them. Even the 2 year old Jesse went to bed so late. I would hear more noise in the house around midnight than any other time of the day. I can’t imagine my nieces and nephews staying up that late.
I also loved spending time with them and getting to know the family better, more about Ecuadorian culture, the life of a big family in a small town in Ecuador, and of course the delicious home cooked meals. Interesting to think about the things they don’t have around – movie theaters, big super markets, etc. They really only leave their little city a few times a year, if at all, besides when going to college in Guayaquil, Riobamba, Quito, etc. It’s a big change for the family when one member leaves the city.
Apart from the amazing interactions I had with my host family, just like Blink school in Medellin, I met so many people it’d be too much to list them all: Lena (Austria), Sophia (Netherlands), Tessa (Netherlands), Maga (Chile/Netherlands), Dave (Switzerland), Lulu (Netherlands), Stephen (Belgium), Laura (Poland/Jersey), Laura (Germany), Lara (France), Sarah (Germany), Herman (Netherlands), Amber (Netherlands), and countless others. It’s super easy to meet people and make friends at hostels but it’s even easier at the schools because your all sharing this experience of going to classes and learning Spanish. Also at the Montañita school there was a lot of extracurriculares with surfing, yoga, salsa, welcome dinners, almost nightly activities, and weekend trips. I spent a lot of time with my host family trying to soak in that experience, but I would also go over to the cabanas where the other students stayed and get socialization in there. It was also a nice outlet to speak English.
The Food
Yolanda was a great chef and fed me very well. One night she told me that she had learned how to cook from her mother who passed away at a young age. Yolanda spent most of the day in the kitchen whipping up large portions of delicious dishes for the whole family to eat. For breakfast she would always make me a jugo and a cup of coffee along with a fruit cup and a main dish: empanada, omelet, meat and rice, bolon de verde (traditional breakfast dish on coast of Ecuador made of fried plantain fritters and cheese). I started out every day of class on a very full stomach.
Then for dinner it would be a protein: fish, seco de pollo, meat, chicken, breaded shrimp that was always served with rice and typically another side like beans, salad, fried plantains, etc. Saul’s favorite dish was seco de pollo and I tend to agree with him. Seco de pollo is a traditional Ecuadorian dish which is a chicken stew cooked slowly in a sauce of beer, naranjilla, onions, peppers, tomatoes, and herbs. I ate a lot of it throughout my 7 weeks in Ecuador but none compared to how delicious Yolanda made it. I was spoiled with my meals. It was so nice to have 2 home cooked meals per day.
Lunch was not included and usually I would just grab something easy from breakfast alley, but I had a few other meals around town: encebollado, breaded shrimp with mango sauce, and chuleta (pork chops). I think the best value meal I got was a $1 plate of chuleta with rice, lentils, and a salad where the guy was grilling pork chops in front of the restaurant. It was one of those hole in the walls where you don’t know the price beforehand and I tried handing the guy a $5 bill and he asked if I had anything smaller. So I asked what the price was and he said $1. It was too good to be true.
I also went out to the weekly Monday night welcome dinner with the school. The first one was at an Italian restaurant where the pasta was average but nothing great. The northern countries in South America aren’t exactly pasta experts. The next week the dinner was at a Thai restaurant and the curry was actually pretty tasty although still not as authentic as we have in Denver. It was a little strange that the welcome dinners were never just at regular Ecuadorian restaurants. Oh well I had my private chef at home.
The Beach
The main beach in Montañita had a boardwalk running along it and the sand was pretty nice. Not Sarasota status but acceptable. Unfortunately it was pretty gray a lot of my days in Montañita but I still went to the beach quite a few times to sit out and listen to the waves.
The day before I started the home stay, I was getting nervous if my Spanish would be sufficient enough to live with a family. But then I met a Colombian woman on the beach who struck up a convo with me. She ended up sitting next to me and we spoke for a over an hour about a variety of different things. This convo gave me more confidence in my general speaking and listening abilities. I didn’t always understand everything she said and I eventually ran out of things to say myself, but it was good practice before my home stay. It proved to me that I could hold a longer conversation. At one point she started teaching me how to salsa on the beach.
Every few minutes someone comes up trying to sell something: bracelets, ice creams, random souvenirs. At least they aren’t pushy. One guy came up and made up a rap about me and the Colombian woman. Not that I understood too much of it.I also spent a lot of time on the Olan beach as that’s where are surf lessons were but more on that below.
Nightlife
As I’ve mentioned, Montañita is a party town and there are plenty of late night places. Our go to bar was Caña Grill which I went to Wednesday and Friday night both weeks. Wednesday nights had a beer pong tournament and Friday was Friday. There would always be a band playing until 11pm (the same band and they were actually pretty good) and then a DJ after that until the wee hours. We also went to Poco Loco Beach Club one night afterwards but I wasn’t a huge fan of that one. Another popular move was to pregame at to this little bonfire on the beach; either there or at the cabanas.
The School
I was a really big fan of the Montañita Spanish school and think that it was awesome that you can also do surfing lessons. It made for some really long and tiring days but added to the overall experience. There was also yoga classes (which I did twice), salsa lessons (which I did once), and other activities almost every night to bring people together. The cost of classes was higher than when I went to Blink school in Medellin, but I think it was a better overall experience. Plus doing the home stay was worth every extra penny.
I really liked all 3 of the teachers that I had over the course of the 2 weeks. I learned even more about Ecuadorian culture and lifestyle based on conversations we would have in class. It was really interesting to get their perspective on daily life in Ecuador. While they were certainly interested in getting us to talk about ourselves, we also had lots of open conversations that gave me insight into their lives.
I picked it up pretty quickly and was standing pretty consistently by my 2nd and 3rd days. I was mostly riding the whitewash rather than the green waves but I had some nice long rides. And the Pacific Ocean Ecuadorian waves put anything I’ve ever seen in Florida to shame. It’s crazy how strong the current is when surfing and you don’t even realize how far it pushes you. It’s a very tiring sport when you paddle out and always having waves crashing into you and swallowing so much water.
The surf lessons were a great addition to the experience and I ended up enjoying surfing a lot more than I thought I would. I originally signed up to spread out my 5 days of surf lessons across the two weeks (once I had decided to do 2 weeks of classes) but I ended up going a few extra times. After my second week of classes I even went on the bi-weekly Saturday surf trip to Las Tunas. It was a great day that I’ll explain more down below in the daily breakdown.
The surf instructor Jorge was such a ball of energy and delight to listen/be around. He needs his own podcast. Everything he says is hilarious – in both Spanish and English. He was a jack of all trades: super good at surfing, dancing salsa, juggling, you name it. Seems like one of those people that picks something up and is immediately good. Overall positive energy and vibe.
For the surf lessons we would all meet in the garage below the school and get on our wet suits before a nice pep talk by Jorge. Then we would hop in the mini van and drive to the beach in the neighboring town of Olán which was about 10 minutes away. Jorge would lead us through some stretches before finally hitting the waves. So in reality we were only surfing for about 1 hour but it was nonstop once we were in the water so that was plenty of time to be surfing.
My life in Montañita was jam packed between school, surf, and home stay. The first week I had Spanish class 8-10, surf lessons 10-12 (the days I went), Spanish class 1-3 then back to my host family surrounded by more Spanish. Every day I did surf lessons that week I got home at 3 and immediately took a nap. The second week I had Spanish class 8-10, surf lessons 1-3 (when I went), and Spanish class 3-5. It was a crazy routine of life.
Daily Life
I know I’ve already said a lot in the summary of my life in Montañita but if nothing else but for my own reading pleasure later in life I’m going to give a “brief” daily breakdown. There was just so much that happened in these 2 weeks and I want to have it documented while I still have good notes about it. Experiencing this different lifestyle and way of travel really slowed down my trip in a lot of ways.
Sunday
I arrived at my new host family home around noon after struggling to find it (which I explained above). Yolanda immediately made me feel at home after our brief opening convo. During lunch I had my first experience of a delicious home cooked meal by Yolanda and family members coming in and out to eat. I chatted with grandson Frixon for 20-30 minutes. It was a nice experience and gave me more confidence in being here. I felt more at home. Sometimes I didn’t fully understand his questions but mostly did. Overall good conversation and took mental notes on types of things he was curious about: where my favorite place is to visit in the world, how much things cost in America like a new iPhone or cost to buy a home, etc. While a lot of my answers were shorter and less detailed than I would have liked, I was still able to hold down the basic conversation. Plus these questions are really challenging because certain things have such variable answers. Cost of buying home. Where? How many bedrooms? How big? Of course I just had to give a general answer, which regardless what it was going to be was incredibly high for them.
Afterwards I went to the beach and hung out for a little bit to get some fresh air. That evening during dinner, I got the chance to chat with Alejandro a bit at dinner. He asked me some questions about myself and we talked a bit about fútbol. Then it was just Yolanda and I and we had a very nice conversation (although she did most the talking).
She speaks slow and proper so I understood almost everything she said. She loves hosting students and has been doing it for nearly 10 years now. First we talked for a bit about Venezuelan immigrants. Then she told a long story about a Swiss girl that she had to take to the hospital for her appendix. Yolanda is just such a sweet motherly figure and my first day made me feel so much better about my decision to do a home stay. It was a big day of Spanish speaking so my brain was fried when I went to my room. This would become the norm for every night during these 2 weeks.
Monday
Yolanda made me an incredible breakfast to start the day, and this would be the running theme throughout the next 2 weeks. As I mentioned above the breakfast would usually consist of a main plate, this particular morning it was a big empanada, then a small side of fruit, a blended fruit juice, and a coffee. It was such a great way to start the morning; especially given how long my days were ahead.
I had to get to school at 7:30 to take my Spanish placement exam. Most of it was a breeze but the last few sections dealt with topics that I hadn’t learned yet like imperative and subjunctive. I was placed in a fairly high, but appropriate, level and it was just me and one other girl named Lulu. She was an 18 year old Dutch girl who just arrived in South America and would be traveling for 3 months. She was probably stronger than me at grammar since she was just learning Spanish in high school, and grammar has never been my strong suit even in English. But my speaking was way ahead of hers since I had been practicing for 3 months now in real world situations, and I had a way better arsenal of vocabulary. I have really learned a lot of words because throughout the day when I’m thinking in English, if a word pops up in my brain that I use frequently and don’t know in Spanish, then I look it up and write it down in my notes. I also occasionally read articles in Spanish in which case I’m constantly learning new vocabulary.
Our morning Spanish class from 8-10 was mostly focused on grammar and writing in el pasado pretérito y imperfecto. The professor, Stalin, spoke kind of quickly but my ear was decently trained at this point so I understood him pretty well; however Lulu was struggling.
Then from 10-12 was my first surf lesson. It was a group of about 8 of us and we met up in the garage below the school and get on our wet suits before driving in a van about 10 minutes to the beach in Olan. I already talked about him a lot above but the main surf instructor Jorge was an incredible energy and really helped shed any anxiety about the upcoming surf day. On days with more students there was another instructor David that also helped out.
After doing some warm up stretching led by Jorge, those of us surfing for the first time were given instructions on how to paddle with the wave and stand up on the board. There’s really just a few things to know to get started. Then we were split out into groups based on skill and the beginners were given a lot of help on which waves to ride. I did the surf lessons because I’m here and why not do it as part of the experience with the school, but it turned out to be more fun than I expected. I wasn’t great but I did get up a few times. For being my first time ever surfing, I was proud of how I did and excited to go back again the next day. After about an hour in the water, we headed back in the van to school where we showered off our wetsuits and ourselves. Then me and some friends from surf class went and got lunch at breakfast alley. It was only an hour between lunch and my next class so didn’t have a lot of time.
Then afternoon classes from 1-3 began with a different professor, named Elizabeth. She turned out to be both an amazing teacher and person. I really loved her energy and she had a great way of bringing out the best Spanish in me. She was very easy to chat with and good at getting us to communicate. At the same time, she was also extremely chatty and told us lots of stories which really gave me better insight into the life of an Ecuadorian mother in her 30s. I felt very comfortable chatting with her which made my Spanish better and more confident. While she knew how to translate some words into English, she really didn’t know much English, so the class was all in Spanish. As a matter of fact all my classes were. It’s really the best way to learn.
The running theme for this week was the morning classes were more focused on writing and grammar, and the afternoon classes were focused on speaking and grammar. The first 15-20 minutes (if not longer) of every class with Elizabeth was just shooting the shit and getting us to talk about various things. Since today was the first class, we mostly talked about ourselves and our travels. Elizabeth was really good about continually asking questions to get us to explain ourselves in more details. It was great practice. At the end of class we told a made up story in the past where Lulu and I would trade back and forth sentences. It was very difficult because usually I’m talking about myself or things I know about, but this exercise required making stuff up in Spanish. It was a good brain teaser. At the end of class Elizabeth gave us some homework to do for the next day.
I was absolutely exhausted after 4 hours of Spanish lessons and 2 hours of surfing and after saying hello to Yolanda and briefly telling her about my day, I took a 2 hour nap. Then I went out that night for the weekly Monday welcome dinner at an Italian restaurant with a big group of fellow students. I wasn’t staying at the Cabanas so I hadn’t gotten a chance to meet as many people, but the welcome dinner was a great opportunity for that. I met a lot of people and had some good convos. After spending the last 2 days absorbed in Spanish, it was nice to just speak in English the whole time. Afterwards I went back and drank a beer at the Cabanas with some of the people I just met.
Tuesday
I went into a lot of detail about my first day and that pretty much sets the scene for how my days went in the first week of school: big breakfast > morning class with Stalin focused on writing and grammar > surf lessons (3 of the 5 days in the first week) > afternoon class with Elizabeth focused on speaking and grammar.
My day 2 surfing arms were a bit sore but I did even better on this second day. I stood up more and rode a few waves for a longer period of time. I was really happy with how well I did and was starting to see the appeal of why people go surfing on a consistent basis. Plus like any of these types of sports, the more often you go then the better you get. The process of standing up becomes more muscles memory and you can do it way faster without having to think so much.
I was super tired for afternoon classes after this day’s surf lessons. It’s a shame that the class with more talking is in the afternoon because I was always really exhausted on the days that I surfed. Luckily Elizabeth was still good at extracting it out of me and it was another solid lesson. Once again I was dead by the time the day was done and I took another 2 hour nap after class.
After another delicious dinner, I hung out in the living room area with Yolanda and we watched the news and then novelas (Spanish soap operas). The local news was showing videos of people in Guayaquil that go to restaurants and hold them up with guns so they can steal everyone’s cell phone. Sheesh glad I didn’t go there. I knew it had a reputation of being sketchy but it hits home more when you see it on TV.
Yolanda loves novelas and she was explaining some back stories to the plot lines for me. The first one was called Luz de luna from Perú and I was actually following the different story lines pretty well and getting into it. It was very dramatic and would constantly have this cheesy music in the background. There was a few different stories developing: a pair of male coworkers hanging out where one of them was falling for the other; a man with his daughter whose wife had just left them; a woman whose father just got injured in a car accident; a grandpa whose granddaughter’s friend had seen him almost try to kill himself. And all the stories were intertwined by them being family or friends. It was quite juicy. I really enjoyed the two episodes we watched, and it was a good bonding experience with Yolanda. Then the next telenovela on was from Turkey with dubbed over voices in Spanish. I couldn’t quite get as into this one and went to bed after about 20 minutes of watching.
Wednesday
I was really enjoying my home stay, the Spanish classes, and the surf lessons; so I decided to go ahead and pay for a 2nd week of Spanish classes and to do the home stay again. And since I had already paid for a week of surf lessons, I decided that I would split the 5 lessons out over the course of 2 weeks. While going every single day is the best way to improve, I thought it was going to be too much. Surfing is super exhausting on the body. Plus the afternoon classes were always much more of a struggle after surfing, and after all, I did come here mainly for the Spanish learning. So I figured it’d be best to spread out the surf lessons and take some days off. I decided to take Wednesday and Thursday off from surfing so I used my extra 2 hours to just go back to my home stay and either chill or do some additional Spanish practice. I was sitting on the couch in the living room reading some Spanish when Saul walked in so we struck up a conversation. He was telling me about his work as a designer and the adult fútbol league he was in. We talked a bit about the work I had done and sports in general.
It was a really nice convo and got the speaking juices flowing for my afternoon class with Elizabeth. I was much higher energy that day since I hadn’t surfed and it showed in class. Elizabeth told us a funny story about how she was in some town (I don’t remember which) and she was trying to find this store she used to go to. So she just kept walking in circles looking for it and couldn’t find it. And apparently that street had changed over time and was an area where lots of prostitutes worked. So some guys cat called her thinking she was walking around looking for work.
I finally didn’t need to take a nap after class since I didn’t have surf lessons so I just lied on my bed in my room reading my book, Of Songbirds and Snakes. I needed a little reprieve from Spanish so it was nice to read in English. Plus I was starting to get really absorbed into the story.
There was another school dinner that night at Rose’s Burgers, but I decided I would eat the free meal at home with my host family then head over there after to meet people from school. I would way rather have Yolanda’s authentic Ecuadorian meals than a burger. Plus I liked to take the dinner time opportunities to chat with the family. It was all part of the experience of doing a home stay: eating local food and talking. The whole family was coming in and out on this night and I met Hamilton (the oldest son) and Grace (the daughter) for the first time. I can’t recall the specific conversations we had but there was a lot of activity at the table on this night. After dinner I met up with the others at Rose’s Burgers and had a meal while they finished their food. Then we went to cocktail alley and sat around the table chatting and drinking. There was a big diversity of backpackers from Belgium to Germany to France to Australia to Netherlands and more. Plus as I’ve mentioned before, there seems to be this even stronger bond you create with your fellow Spanish school backpackers. Afterwards we headed to Caña Grill (the go to party spot) where a live band was playing. They were doing some covers of a wide range of genres and were actually quite talented musicians. The drummer was crushing it!!
It was $6 for all you can drink Mojitos but I was trying to keep it contained on a school night so I didn’t go for the deal and stuck to just a few beers. Some other classmates were getting litty though. On Wednesday’s they have a beer pong tournament so I teamed with Tessa but we lost in the first round. The band ended just after 11 and a DJ started playing classic dance music songs which really lifted the energy of the place. At one point the bartenders were walking around with a limbo stick and people were boogieing underneath. I ended up staying out until about 12:30 so it was late for a school night but not too terribly crazy. All the teachers know that Wednesday is a big party night and they almost expect students to be hungover the next day.
Thursday
Once again I took the day off from surfing lessons but otherwise it was a pretty standard day of school. We learned how to use the future tense, not just the easy ir + verb which is “I am going to + verb,” but the actual future tense that corresponds to “I will + verb” in English and requires different conjugations. We also learned the conditional tense corresponding to “I would + verb”.
After class I had decided to sign up for a Salsa lesson. I neglected to do so during my time at school in Medellin and I kind of regretted it. While I didn’t plan to be a salsa master, I at least wanted to learn the basics. There was 7 of us in the class which made for an odd number (we had 4 guys and 3 girls) so the instructor rotated around acting as the girl to be the eighth. The basic steps of salsa are fairly simple, it’s when you start adding in more complexity to how you do them that makes it difficult. We ended up learning 4 different “movements” throughout the class. At first I was a bit stiff but I started to get the hang of it and it was actually quite fun. Salsa is very interesting because the guy is the one that leads everything. Whenever you want to spin a girl or do some sort of figure eight motion, it’s on the guy to give the signal for the next step. It was a fun hour and I really did learn a lot just from that one class. If nothing else I learned some of the intricacies involved beyond just doing the stepping motions. Good salsa dancing is very entertaining to watch.
That night at the dinner table I had some really interesting conversations with Frixon. At one point he asked me if I believe in God. That already makes for an interesting dinner table conversation and even more so when trying to answer in Spanish. Especially when your speaking with people that live in a highly religious country. I sort of danced around the question and was explaining how I grew up in a family with a Jewish mother and a Christian father, which they found quite interesting. It was a powerful exercise in using my brain. And the hard part is that I can’t go into as many details with my answers in Spanish. Some of the questions he asked already required me to think hard in English about my answer let alone to respond in Spanish.
After dinner Yolanda and I sat around the dining table having some good discussions. She told me that she learned to cook from her grandma because her mom passed away at a young age. Then she told me about how they have hosted many students for over 10 years now. That’s why they have 2 beds in my room and 1 more upstairs. I didn’t even realize there was another room upstairs to host people. During the peak business of the school before Covid they were typically hosting 3 people at a time. Then we went into the living room and watched the same Peruvian novella, Luz de Luna, from the night before. It was a nice bonding evening with Yolanda. I went to bed around 10:30 and that night I could hear the conversations of the family from the living room and that was entertaining in itself. The 2 year old, Jesse, would normally stay up way too late and be screaming until about midnight.
Friday
Woohoo it’s Friday!! After a long week of Spanish courses, surf lessons, and my home stay; I was so ready to be in the weekend mode. But still had one more day of class to go. And I was actually a bit sore in my legs from salsa dancing the night before. Who knew it was such a strenuous activity? But I was using muscles to dance that don’t normally get usually.
Stalin suggested that I asked to be bumped up a level for next week because otherwise it would be a whole week of learning the imperative. While it is an important tense, it could be learned in way less time. And if I went up a level then I could start learning the subjunctive. So I took his advice and talked to the main coordinator of class schedules who said it was fine.
Lulu was sick this day so both my classes were private lessons which was cool. After a few exercises, Stalin and I just spent the last 30 minutes chatting about whatever. I decided to return to surf lessons again this day to do my 3rd of the week. While it was a decent day on the water, taking those 2 days off definitely set me back a little bit in my progress. I think that Tuesday was actually my best surfing day that week. Then in the afternoon I told Elizabeth about how I was going straight to subjunctive the following week, and since it was a private class without Lulu, she went ahead and fast tracked through the rules of the imperative in one day. It was super nice of her to do that and I feel like I got enough of an overview to get the gist of it.
I took another long nap after class that day since I had also surfed and I wanted to have energy for the Friday night party. There was a BBQ that night at the cabanas for a small price. It was a good opportunity to socialize with my fellow backpackers/students. Some of the teachers from the school were also there to hang with the students; as was the surf instructor Jorge who brought his ever contagious energy. The grill master was crushing it cooking a lot of meat for the big crowd.
After dinner, the party really ramped up as people started dancing salsa (with Jorge leading the charge) and getting looser. We played a massive game of flip cup that was really fun because we did 4 different rounds down the table: starting with normal flip cup, then using your mouth to suck the cup and turn it, then using your tongue to flip the cup, then kicking the cup. The energy was high as we headed to Caña Grill in time to catch the end of the band. Then the DJ got behind the decks and turned the dance party up. At one point a few of us hopped over to Poco Loco club which was more of a traditional club environment. I didn’t actually like it as much and headed back to Caña Grill. Before I knew it, I was out until just after 4 in the morning. It was a fun party night out on Montañita after a week of classes.
Saturday
This day was a struggle after the previous evening’s partying. I ended up sleeping in until about 1pm and continued to struggle to get out of bed. I felt a little guilty for not leaving my room and wanting to hang out with my host family but I also just felt so crappy. At some point in the afternoon, I left to go to the beach with my friend Dave from school, just to get out of the house for a bit. Otherwise after dinner I went back to my room to read and fell asleep around 9 that night.
Sunday
It was a different type of fútbol Sunday as Saul invited me to watch his adult league game in Sinchal, a neighboring town. Hamilton and his wife picked us me, Saul, his wife, Jesse, and Alejandro and drove us the 25 minutes to Sinchal. On car ride over we were listening to the Doors and they were singing along to Light My Fire. Jim Morrison transcends all cultures. While soccer isn’t my favorite sport, it was cool to attend an adult Intramural league game in Ecuador since it was once again a new and interesting cultural experience.
The first half was pretty boring but Saul’s team scored a goal toward the end. Jesse was on the sideline crying and calling out his Dad’s name the whole half; and the mom just sat there doing nothing. It’s certainly a different style of raising kids in Ecuador compared to watching my brothers. At half time Alejandro and I walked onto the field and chatted with the team. He was good friends with the coach and seemed to have lots of connections on the field. The second half was a bit more exciting as they put up 3 more goals including 1 by Saul. In the end, they ended up winning 4 to 1. Overall it was a cool experience and I feel like it helped me connect more with Saul and Alejandro to be a part of it. I think they really appreciated that I showed interest in going. Although I was pretty quiet throughout the day because I was still slightly recovering from Friday and I really don’t have a lot of insight to add when it comes to soccer, even in English.
Monday
My schedule on the second week was a little more spread out. I had morning classes from 8-10, once again with my favorite teacher Elizabeth. Then I had a break for awhile as surf lessons this week were from 1-3; followed by my afternoon classes from 3-5 with Curly. I was no longer in classes with Lulu and had a new classmate this, Laura, a Polish girl who lives in Jersey. I didn’t even know an “old Jersey” existed but it’s a small island between England and France that is apparently a big tax haven. Laura was much better at Spanish than Lulu and was better than me at speaking. She had been doing a 4 week traveling Spanish program across 4 different cities in Ecuador. I didn’t know that was a possibility but sounds like a cool experience to mix travel with education. She spoke Polish and English perfectly, some French, some Japanese, and some Norwegian; so she was clearly a language enthusiast. All while being a doctor and marathon runner. I’m not sure how she has time for it all, but she seems like one of those people that is constantly doing things.
Once again Elizabeth was very chatty and good at getting us to talk. We spent nearly an hour just talking about random things as she pried into Laura’s background. We also got started a bit on learning the basic rules behind the subjunctive. When I got back from class I had another good lunch talk with Frixon as he continued to be a great source of conversation in the house. I took the day off from surfing as I only had 2 more lessons left that I had paid for. I decided to rent one of the Spanish grammar books from the school (just had to pay a deposit that I got back upon return) so that I could practice further. I figured why not since it was available and it was my last week of classes I’d be taking during my travels.
My afternoon teacher was Curly who was a 26 year old chatter box. I liked her a lot and while she did do a good job getting Laura and I to talk, she also chatted a bit too much herself. I’m fine with the teacher talking a lot because it’s still listening practice but Curly started droning on about ex-boyfriends and sometimes it was just a bit much. I’m hear to learn the subjunctive, not about your love life! Anyways it was still a cultural perspective hearing her stories and about her upbringing. At one point Laura had to get her back on track when she was about to go on about another story and said “soooo subjunctive.” We got a little bit of subjunctive practice in, although not too much.
That night I went to the welcome dinner again to meet the newest students and chat with others I’d already met. We went to a Thai place in Olan, which actually turned out be pretty good. Maybe not super authentic but it was tasty. It was the first time I had Thai food since America and I miss it a lot. I had some great convos at dinner and met my first Slovenian who was very well spoken and interesting to talk to. Then I went back to the Cabanas and hung out for awhile.
Tuesday
This was a very busy day as I had my morning class then a short break then surf lessons then afternoon class then yoga. I had a really good surf lesson that day and felt like I was starting to get the hang of it more. I didn’t need to think as much about the actions involved with standing up and just did them naturally. This allowed me to go through the motions much quicker.
Laura had convinced me to sign up for yoga and I’m glad that I did as it had been a long time. I forgot how nice it makes you feel to get in a good stretch and work on your balance, as well as just the general sense of inner peace it creates. It was just Laura and I that signed up so the instructor asked if we wanted it in Spanish or English, and we decided on Spanish. Why not? We were both at a high enough level. It was actually quite soothing to have the instructor lead us in Spanish although sometimes I had to think a little harder to figure out what she was requesting us to do with the poses. She would occasionally switch to English to help us out. Laura is super flexible and well balanced, but I was struggling on a few of the poses that required a lot of balance. They were difficult and it had been awhile! Luckily with yoga there’s usually an alternative pose you can do that’s easier for those of us who don’t do it as much. Overall it was a great class that left me feeling better than I started and it was cool to add yoga to my list of Spanish activities.
That night during dinner Yolanda and I had a good convo talking about the history of Montañita. She was telling me how 20 years ago they didn’t have this level of tourism and it was basically just a small farm town with cows and chickens running across the streets. But now it has become a lot more commercialized (well relatively speaking) with more restaurants lining the beach and hotels for accommodation. It was interesting to hear her perspective because I think a part of her is happy to see the local economy thriving more but another part misses when things were calmer and more peaceful. The pandemic was very difficult for the town since it now relies so heavily on tourism. They had to close their swimwear shop for an extended period of time and weren’t getting any additional revenue from hosting students at the school.
Wednesday
That morning in class we had an interesting conversation with Elizabeth about how Ecuadorian woman don’t keep their diet and fitness after having kids and tend to let go. She works really hard to not let that happen. It was interesting to hear her take on the dietary habits of other Ecuadorians and her concerns over the amount of sugar people it.
This was my best day of surfing to date. My ability to stand up was good at this point and I was able do it almost every time without thinking and just doing. Plus I was getting better at balancing once I’m actually up. I rode a few waves all the way to shore. It was a really nice feeling seeing the progress I made as a surfer. I was still just riding the white wash rather than the green waves but it was a really good day on the water. I felt like it was a turning point in my young surfing career.
That night was another pregame at the cabanas before heading to the classic Caña Grill. The band was really crushing it this night and even did a La Bamba > Twist and Shout > La Bamba sandwich jam. I ended up staying out until about 1am before calling it a night.
Thursday
Nothing too much of note happened at school on this day. I had used up all my surf lessons and while I could buy individual days I decided to take the day off. I did go to another yoga class that night and since there were 4 of us this time, it was taught in English. This class wasn’t quite as strenuous as the one on Tuesday. The teacher worked us through a lot of different poses over the course of the hour. That night at home was the last of which I watched novelas with Yolanda. That’s certainly something I will miss as it was a fun way to wind down at the end of the night and passively practice my Spanish listening while spending some quality time with Yolanda.
Friday
Graduation day from classes! I started out the morning by going to the bakery and buying Elizabeth a pastry to thank her for 2 great weeks of classes. I thought she was an incredible teacher and great person to talk to. I really appreciated her style of teaching and all that I learned about Ecuadorian culture from her. Laura was also “graduating” after her 4 weeks of classes so spirits were high. It was hard to try and learn anything new but as usual we mostly just talked. Then at the end, Elizabeth had a little cap and gown that we took graduation photos in.
During lunch I talked with Saul and Frixon about housing prices in Montañita and how it’d be a good investment. Saul is in the industry and really had me thinking about the opportunity. He said it only cost about $40,000 to buy some land and build a property. And that the price in a few years will already be so much higher as Montañita continues to grow as a tourist destination. He wants to start buying up properties and making some cash from rentals and future real estate sales. During the conversation he really had me convinced how good of an idea it’d be, but looking at it now my sentiment has changed a bit. While I had a great experience in Montañita, I don’t think I would actually want to own property there. It’s a very noisy town and a few days there is a sufficient amount of time so why would I want to permanently own something. Oh well it was still a good conversation and I feel like Saul and I had a stronger relationship afterwards.
I decided to do another surf lesson with the gang to get it all in. I had to be extra careful today because my rib was kind of hurting. The board hit me in the rib on Wednesday when a wave had come crashing in. It was inevitable that I would have some injuries after 2 weeks of surfing lessons. I rode a few nice waves but overall it wasn’t as good as Wednesday. I decided to also go ahead and sign up for the surf trip to Las Tunas the following day so I could get one more good surf day in.
That afternoon was our last class with Curly, and my last hours of school on the trip! She was super chatty as usual and we didn’t get too much further along on the subjunctive but at this point I didn’t really care about much further education. I was ready to go back to the carefree backpacker life and use some of my new Spanish skills in real life situations. Now every time I use the subjunctive I give myself a pat on the back even though the person I’m talking to doesn’t even think twice about it since it’s just the natural way you’re supposed to talk.
After class I got a chocolate cake for my family to thank them for the hospitality and amazing experience. It was the perfect timing because everyone happened to be home, almost all the kids and grandkids were there. They didn’t expect to receive the gift and were super thrilled by it. It didn’t take long before the giant cake was eaten entirely as we sat around chatting and enjoying its chocolatey goodness. The cake cemented my stay being memorable for the family. At this point I had a strong sense of comfort and homeliness with everyone in the family. I had much more confidence in my speaking abilities after 2 weeks with the family and doing classes, so I was much better at answering their questions in the moment. I was able to correctly conjugate more quickly and speak in more details. We even took a nice family photo together after eating the cake.
That night after dinner I went over to the cabanas and met up with the crew. We took a taxi to Olan for a party but once we got inside, there was absolutely no one there. The DJs were actually really good but I guess we were way too early. After hanging around for about 30 minutes we decided to go back to Montañita rather than waiting for the party to fill in. First we went to a bonfire on the beach before going back to our normal stomping grounds at Caña Grill. It felt like I knew so many people going in there after 2 weeks of Montañita. I even ran into my Russian friend, Talia, that I had met in Cuenca. While I wanted to party late, the surf trip started at 8am the next day, and I wisely called it a night around 1am.
Saturday
I had to be at school by 8am for the surf trip to Las Tunas. It was a group of 8 of us going plus Jorge and it was a nice opportunity to explore a new beach area about 45 minutes north of Montañita. Just like when skiing new resort, surfing a new beach had totally different vibes and type of waves. They were stronger and shorter here. You really had to be patient to catch the right wave at this beach. I got my most speed so far but also got swallowed whole by multiple waves. I had to paddle out pretty far to get better waves so it was an exhausting morning. My rib was also hurting from earlier in the week so I didn’t end up riding for too long. Overall not my best day but still fun.
It was a good last day with the group of school friends. Finally had some sun so even when I wasn’t surfing, I just lied on a towel and soaked in the sun. We also played a few card games and chatted the afternoon away. Jorge setup a nice fruit platter of watermelon, pineapple, strawberry before lunch. Then I ordered a delicious pescado asado. We didn’t end up getting back to Montañita until around 7:00. Originally I was going to head to Ayampe on this evening (in hindsight I should have just brought my stuff with on the surf trip since Las Tunas was just past Ayampe), but it was already late in the evening and Yolanda said I should just stay another night. Okay why not? I’ll take one last round of her cooking.
The family was also hosting 2 new people starting that day. Around 8pm an older German guy showed up that spoke pretty much no Spanish. Yolanda had me act as the translator between them. I give the guy respect for going in for the home stay to surround himself by Spanish but he knew so little that it was going to be an interesting experience for both him and the family. Yolanda told me that they get guests like this sometimes where they don’t know any Spanish but they improve quickly. Best of luck to everyone involved in that situation. I was so glad that I had the house to myself with the family so that I could really spend time talking and getting to know them rather than dealing with another student in the house. Plus it prevented me from speaking English while at home. Once the German guy was there then we talked on the side in English. I gave him a bit of a rundown of the family and lifestyle.
Then the other new student at the house, Tanja, showed up. Except she actually wasn’t new, we had met before, she just didn’t like her first host family. Her Spanish also wasn’t super strong so it was going to be an interesting week for Yolanda and family. I was glad to see it would provide some extra income for the family. She was Swiss German so it would be good for the German guy and her to have an outlet to speak to each other. After dinner, the 3 of us went out for a couple of drinks before calling it a night.
Sunday
During my final breakfast with the fam, Saul told me about their New Years celebration in Montañita and convinced me that I have to come back for it some day. There are parties everywhere throughout town. At 11:45 all the surfers go in the water to catch one last wave for the year and then to do their first one for the new year. Then they put on masks and costumes and run through the streets yelling. Weather is sunny and perfect. The city is decorated with Christmas lights. Overall sounds like a great time and place to be in Montañita.
After breakfast I said my goodbyes to everyone before walking to the bus. It was actually a bit of an emotional moment as they had been my family the last 2 weeks and really treated me as such. I could tell Yolanda was sad to see me go. We had created a nice connection during my stay at their home. This whole experience was something I will never forget and was one of the highlights of my whole trip. Not only did it improve my Spanish, but it gave me the opportunity to dive deeper into the Ecuadorian culture and lifestyle. Plus I learned how to surf and made a lot of great friends at school. A+ experience.