Man - this is hard! The past two days have been a succession of blank stares, 'no entiendo', and frantic but stealthy flipping of phrasebooks. We had a few days of listen and repeat lessons in the car in NZ, and some basic 'hello, thankyous' worked out, but we got here, and confronted with a rapid fire torrent of sounds ending in 'ó' and my mind just goes to mush. I tried to explain the game of Punch Buggy to our cab driver (to explain why his passengers were constantly punching each other), but he just looked at me like I was an idiot. I can't blame him!

Anyway, we made it here to Quito, and found some supplies to keep us going till we can get to the proper markets, so everything's sweet. The only room left at Casa bambu is 'habitacion doble con baÑo' (double room with bathroom) which turns out to be an apartment downstairs in the building - we've got a sweet setup for now! it's $9 each a night, so it's pretty extravagant! As soon as I can work out how to explain what we need to the manager, I suppose we'll have to downgrade. sigh.

More pics coming soon! Buenos noches!