Today we woke up at an early 6:20 in the morning. It was still dim outside and we were all feeling really sleepy. We met down in the lobby at 6:50 and we were on the bus by 7:00 with our breakfasts. Today we went to the wonderful town of Salinas. While it was an hour long drive, we filled the time with putting breakfast in our bellies and with Emily reading riddles to some of us. We arrived at the cheese factory and played an energizer called pterodactyl. We had to say the word “pterodactyl” with our mouths closed and us trying to get other people to laugh. While Skyler and Marco are the reining champs, Laurel successfully got the most people out. After playing the game for a while, we made our way into the cheese factory to start our tour. Our tour guide, Don Victor, explained to us the cheese factory’s process of making the cheese. They first pasteurize the milk and then put the milk into molds… I was trying to write down the whole process but the translations went by so fast. But once the process was described, we went upstairs to where they sold most of their cheeses, which Josue called, “His Heaven.” Don Victor explained that Salinas has 10,000 inhabitants and has areas ranging from 800 to 4,000 meters above sea level. The center of Salinas is at 3,500 meters – I found it really interesting to know that we were so high up. They sold all ranges of cheese, from fresh cheese to aged parmesan and we were able to try mozzarella with oregano, Tilsit, and gouda. They were all delicious. Once we tried and bought some cheeses, we went back on the bus to go to the Chocolate Factory.
The Chocolate Factory was one of the most delicious visits of the day. Inside we were introduced to so much variety of chocolate. It is safe to say that many of us spent half of our money at the chocolate factory, with people buying bucket loads of chocolate. Half of us went to see the process of the chocolate making and half of us went to visit the salt mine. We then switched so we got a full tour of both. For the chocolate tour, we went inside this tiny lab room where we put on our hair nets, looking so stylish of course. Jorge, the chocolate master and creator himself, cooked up two batches of chocolate for us: dark and milk chocolate. They were beyond delicious. Jorge explained the chocolate making process. To begin, the cacao is cut in half with a knife and the chocolate makers check the color to make sure it is good enough for chocolate. The color variation includes two; which are dark brown and a slight hue of purple. Obviously, the dark brown cacao is the most preferred and allows for the chocolate to be much more fine in taste and aroma. After checking for the best cacao, they manually remove any strange substances in the cacao such as rocks, dirt, and any other substance. After cleaning up the cacao they put it into a small container that fits into a small oven. The oven bakes the cacao to the temperature and time that the cooks need the cacao to be at. Once it has been toasted in the small oven, Jorge takes the cacao and put it into a special vacuum machine that separates the cacao and the shell from each other. Once separated, Jorge makes sure that there aren’t any extra shells in the cacao. The second to final part of the process is taking the extracted cacao and grinding it up into a cacao paste. With the cacao paste, Jorge added the final ingredients to make the chocolate: milk, sugar, butter (or lard), and the signature ingredient for the type of chocolate that Jorge was making. In this case, it was simply milk chocolate. We tried four different types of chocolates: milk chocolate, chocolate fondant, chocolate infused with coffee, and chocolate covered banana pieces. Jorge also explained to us that about fifteen percent of the income that the companies make in Salinas goes directly to neighboring communities. A lot of the people that the companies help are elderly and young people – they typically assist with education, eating, and housing. A lot of these young people go on and create their own small businesses. Jorge said a really profound quote that represents the role that Salinas plays with the neighboring communities. “Salinas produces not only products, but people as well.”
Meanwhile, half of us learned about the salt mining process, where they separated the salt and water from the other minerals in the salt mine. As seen from the photos, Tyler, Skyler’s child (inflatable penguin), is seen floating around on top of the salty water. We had prepared a whole photo shoot for Tyler. The salt mine was extremely cool to look at, although it was hard to take in most of the scenery, with the strong gusts of wind throwing off our balance. The wind was so strong that it blew my leader of the day hat near the stream, but Marco was able to fetch it for me. I thanked him immensely. The hike back up from the salt mines were rough, but we all made it with the help from Kate and other glimpsers cheering us on.
From the salt mine, we went to the Textile Factory, where we saw how they turned alpaca and sheep wool into yarn. But on the way to the Textile Factory, we made a fury friend. While we couldn’t pet him, we did name him “Mad Dog” or “Galleta”. He followed us around everywhere in Salinas, even waiting for us outside of the pizzeria once we were done eating. After the textile factory, we made our way to “Andean Artisans” store, where they sold a variety of goods made out of the sheep and llama wool. Many of us bought scarves, ponchos, jackets, beanies, and llama keychains. During our time there, we were approached by one of the employees who asked us if we wanted to model some of their new wool products. Asha, Ellery, Arianna, and Crystal were the models for the wool products. They seemed like naturals as the employees took pictures of them for the store’s advertising. There also was a llama and sheep portrait where one could put their head through for a photo. Emily, one of our GGLs, took a picture of Joshua and Asha. It was hilarious. Joshua was the llama and Asha was the sheep.
After everyone bought their souvenirs and clothes, we made our way to the pizzeria called, La Vak. We had over six pizzas; which included Hawaiian, vegetarian, and anther covered in different meats. Many of us had over four slices of pizza, such as Ellery and Skyler – while Josue only ate two. After eating our fill of pizza and soda, we made our way back to the bus. It was about an hour from Salinas to Guaranda. Once we arrived back at our hotel, we changed into our “business casual” clothes and prepared for our first English tutoring classes. While we were nervous for our first day teaching, we arrived at Verbo Divino, walking past all of the kids we were about to teach. We were given our student attendance list and we walked to the rooms we were about to teach in.
Ellery taught the Intermediate B group with Lucinda D. while Josue taught the Beginning C group with Simone. Ellery’s class was eager to learn, as were many! Once we were done tutoring English we headed back to the hotel, where we got ready for dinner. For dinner, we had fried chicken and french fries with a salad on the side. Many of us were excited to eat this. After eating the main course, we were served a type of crepe, or pancake, with whipped cream and some fruits. Everyone ate it with forks and knives, but Marco and Josue didn’t have the necessary utensils. In the end, we decided to eat the crepes as a sort of taco. After dinner, we made our way back to the hotel to have our nightly meeting and call it a night.
Thanks for reading – we’re signing off and handing the torch over to Simone to lead us in our second free day tomorrow!
– Ellery & Josue
Hi Ellery & Josue,
Thanks for making our day with the daily blog. What a wonderful summary of what looks like a very packed day! Is it me or are all your days punctuated by culinary delights. We keep thinking that Global Glimpse is helping to shape you all as leaders and global citizens.
So very, very proud of you all. Enjoy your well deserved free day tomorrow. Maybe you can sleep in a bit.
EP – Miss you and can’t wait to see you. XOXO
Congratulations Glimpsers. It’s great the places they visited and I can not imagine how much cheese they bought? How much cheese will they have eaten? especially Josue, I imagine how he felt to be in that place and see live the process to make cheese, and the factory of chocolates wow! incredible another sweetie, I also imagine how much they bought, and the place of salt that was interesting, that well seeing those photos are great. Congratulations for their classes they gave, they all look like teachers! keep giving all of you and enjoying every moment in every place, greetings and hugs, thanks for all the photos are great. Josue we love you and we miss you.
Dearest Asha, great to learn that you and friends had a chance to enjoy the city of Salinas, , visit the cheese & chocolate factories, learn the process, and then taste some of the delicious mouth watering cheese and chocolates. We hope you enjoyed the day as we enjoyed reading about it.
Have a wonderful time. Best wishes
Woof Woof!
Hello glimpsers. This is Sparky Jotwani. It was wonderful to read about the cheese factory, chocolate factory, textile factory and the salt mines. All that pizza, chocolate and cheese makes me drool 🤤
Asha, I am sure you would have enjoyed the llamas. You seem to have a llama connection. Hey, can you teach me English too. I know it already, but would pretend to learn 😋
At home, I enjoyed sleeping in your room when mom and dad were at the gym. I hate those neighborhood kids – they wake me up and I end up barking at them. I love to just eat, sleep and repeat.
So long now. Woof woof – Sparky.
By the way, mom dad and Ravi send their love ❤️❤️❤️
Ellery and Josue thank you for the detailed summary of yet another amazing day for you guys. Sounds like the group is making the most of each day in Ecuador without one wasted minute! The chocolate factory must have been a hit, right Ariana? You certainly hit the jackpot on that part of the trip. Bijan and I envisioned a Willy Wonka type of situation for a moment while reading that part of the blog. Anyhow, can’t wait to hear how the teaching went and what kind of students you all have in your classes. Love You Ariana!! Mom and Bijan
Kieran! what an amazing day! all the things you love; cheese and chocolate and knitting and arts! We hope you got us some treats. we miss you! Tin tin ate strawberries for dinner.
Dadda took out the Lupine Rocket for the first time yesterday – it works great, and he loves seeing your art on the board 🙂
<3 a a n t p
Hi Kalei – cheese, chocolate and pizza yum:)) sounds like a fun filled day xoxo Mama
Hello Lindsey & all glimpsers,
Your touring in Salinas included some of our favorite things- cheese, CHOCOLATE, salt & wooly things to wear! I can’t believe you did all that and had time to teach English! What a trip you’ll never forget-can’t wait to hear more…..
Love, grandparents C& H
It was great talking to you Lindsey! You know I am envious of your visit to the textile and chocolate factories! Stay hydrated and don’t forget to use the meds you packed if needed! We are on BART headed to Hamilton right now! So glad you’ll be able to go with your cousins in July! Love you so much ❤️
hey glimpsers! i hope you guys are having a good time learning about about guaranda’s culture and adapting to a new environment! thank you for the blogs! they are really interesting 🙂
hey emily (nguyen)! i think you think that today is my birthday and you’re right!…. you’re just a month off HAHAHAH. anyway, i appreciate you and hope that you’re having a good time in guaranda (i didn’t know you were going on a global glimpse trip so i didn’t question it when you gave me a gift). come back soon 🥺
Thank you Josue and Ellery for your blog about Salinas de Guaranda! I read about this unique solidarity-based economy and collection of cooperative companies before Ellery left for Ecuador and I’m so impressed by what they’re doing there. https://ecuadorfulbrightguaranda.wordpress.com/2013/05/20/salinas-de-guaranda-a-wonderful-community-in-the-andes/
I can’t wait to see what Ellery bought, and Ellery: I think your Advanced Cooking teacher will be so interested to learn about the chocolate and cheese details you learned and shared too. I love the photo shoot with the penguin (hope that wasn’t a problem with the mine managers – hope they too saw it as very creative and fun!). I wonder if you got a copy of the photo they took for the merchant advertisement you did (your first commercial modeling gig, albeit a freebie!). Joshua and Asha’s photo is awesome too! Glad to hear the English-language classes are going well – I hope they like the bilingual books we sent. I can’t wait to see the mural your group paints.
I have another piece of Ecuador news that I saw on the BBC website: Their government is allowing the U.S. to put military planes on Galapagos Island! It’s apparently a cooperation to fight drug trafficking, but many are concerned it will lead to environmental damage on that special Ecuadorian island (and there are even some Ecuadorian leaders who think it’s an affront to Ecuador’s sovereignty as a “territory of peace”). It’s pretty controversial. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-48663283
It was nice chatting with you by phone today – thank you for calling and making me laugh (and reassuring me that you’re doing better with your health and diet). Love, Mom
Sounds like such a wonderful adventure! Something you will remember for the rest of your lives! Enjoy!
Hi Maddie!
Hope you’re having a phenomenal time in Guaranda! It looks like you are all enjoying the rich culture and the delicious food. Soak it all in, take lots of pictures and have the time of your life! I hope your French is coming in handy!
Willow Glen misses you 🙂
Lots of love,
Claire
Wow! What awesome trips for all you Glimpsers! I’m sure for all the chocolate lovers out there, it was chocolate heaven!
The llama wool clothing looks pretty amazing!
I’m sure the cheeses were delicious too.
Ariana, from one chocolate lover to another I bet you enjoyed the chocolate!! Yes, I know, you like milk chocolate and I like dark, but really what would the world look like without any chocolate?!!!
PS Bijan is going hiking with Kian to Yosemite today and will start UCLA Monday.
Love Dad