Southamerikate Update 1.

For around about 6 weeks now I´ve been travelling around Ecuador and Peru. South America is not somewhere I imagined myself getting to before I was 20 but well, here I am.

My trip began with a month in Quito, Ecuador making a documentary through the organisation Actuality Media. They work with local NGO´s in developing countries and along with some trained media proffessionals strive to create changemaking documentaries with students from around the world. The other places I could´ve travelled were Siem Reap, Cambodia or Kisumu, Kenya. I had visited Siem Reap before in 2011 and I didn´t feel quite ready for Kenya, plus I´d heard amazing things about South America from my friends.

And so it was chosen. I applied had an interview and got in. I had a very limited idea of what Ecuador would be like mostly fueled by a yr 4 countries of the world assignment.

When i got there it was a shock. Quito and Ecuador on a whole is so diverse. In Quito there is Old Town which is straight from Colonial Spain, all the architecture and squares scream Europe. You contrast that with Southern Quito which is poorer and rougher and not really safe for gringos. Then you have Guapolo which is the Fitzroy of Quito with cute cafes and shops. Once we visited a cinema hosting a documentary festival and found ourselves in front of gated off mansions and the theatre itself was straight out of Melbourne and choc block full of hipsters. On a country scale it changes from desert like scrub, to full blown amazon, to mountains, to a beautiful coast line.

It´s a country of suprises