Hello Quito

Well, It's been a little over two weeks since I arrived in Quito and it's already been a fun adventure.

A couple of days before I arrived I got a message from my roommate in Ecuador saying that the house had been broken into and that all of his things had been stolen. I wasn't sure what to make of it as I had left most of my belongings here in the house while I roamed the USA raising support. Fortunately, when Joey was here earlier this summer he had packed all of my things in suitcases and bags and boxes and put them in the back closet...

When I arrived I was greeted by a mangled front gate and a broken latch on my front door as well as a roommate who was in the midst of packing his bags to move out of the house and back with his parents. This seemed to be the last straw as Chris has been robbed multiple times in the last couple of years. His business was robbed two times at gun point, he has been mugged, his car was stolen and then our house was broken into. Please keep Chris in your prayers.

Now, Quito is a relatively small city. At about 25 miles in length and 3 miles in width, there is relatively little road space to accomodate the cars, busses, motorcycles, and taxis that transport the almost three million people that live here. Because of this the city has adopted a system called "Pico y Placa". The last number on a car's license plate determines the day of the week that the rule or system applies to that car. For example, if your plates end in a 1 or a 2 you may not drive your car during rush hour or 7:00am to 9:30am and 4:00pm to 7:30pm on Monday. If your plates en in 3 or 4 the same applies for Tuesday - etc all the way to Friday which limits plates 9 and 0.

If you happen to be driving illegally during your PICO Y PLACA (PYP) time, you will be fined $80 for the first offense, $120 for the second, etc. All this to say, you do not want to get caught driving during that time.

So, the other day Joel and Kim Delp (New Missionaries with me here in Quito) had a pediatrician's appointment for their son Simeon but were also on their PYP day so I offered to trade cars with them. I wasn't planning on going anywhere so they could take the car that I use and I would park their's at my house and we could trade at bible study in the morning. Later that evening I received a panicked call from Joel who had come out of the doctor's office to a parking space void of the pre-present automobile.

As I have never really owned a car in Ecuador before I wasn't sure what the protocol was but we figured out that he had probably been illegally parked and the car had been towed. After confirming our suspicions, Joel caught a ride with another one of our missionaries out to the impound lot and was able to into the car and remove some of his things but the office to pay for it's release was closed so the story jumps to the following morning.

Void of a car, the Delps asked me if I would be willing to pick them up on the way to Bible study (Tuesday morn). I reluctantly said I would but before arriving at the church offices we decided that perhaps I should run Joel to pay for the release of the car and go get the car...apparently it's not a good idea to leave the car in the impound lot for very long as things might turn up missing.

After dropping Kim and Simeon off at the offices, Joel and I drove to one side of the city where we stood in line, paid the fine and were back on our way to the other side of the city where the impound lot is located. Now if you are ever in Quito and have a car towed this piece is key. You need to have a copy of your registration as well as your passport as well as the proof that the impound fee has been paid and you need this all in duplicate or you will be sent to the nearest version of Kinkos to make those copies. (there are none nearby). Joel wisely had already made his copies beforehand and besides having to run from one side of town to the other, the experience proved to be relatively painless, aside from the $120 fee that had to be paid for the indiscretion.

Upon receiving the car I determined two things, 1. I don't have any desire to pay $120 to get my car out of the impound. 2. Leaving the car for a longer period of time is really not a problem. I determined the second after noticing the security measures that are used to ensure that my automobile is not entered after the tow truck has determined that it's resting location is inappropriate and it must be removed. Please take note of the image at the left hand side of the page. What you see there is a picture of the car door with a "security" sticker placed over the edge of where the door opens. The sticker clearly states that it is a seal of security. Please not that if the seal is broken the product is no longer under warranty. I was pleased to see that only the driver door "SEAL" was broken and that indeed my city map and seat belt clip had not been taken from the car.

The silver lining to this relatively dark cloud is this, It's been a week since I got the car back and some of my most enthusiastic efforts have fallen short of cleanly removing any of the stickers from the car which means that the "Seal of Security" system perhaps isn't as "funny" or "ludicrous" as it might seem at first glance.