My journey home

Continuing on from the last two posts, here's a look in photos at a typical journey home from the JUCONI office after a day of cmap art workshops. 

If I headed in by bike, I go home by pedalling straight up 9 de Octubre, but if I came in by the metro bus I head home on foot, passing back over the Malecón Salado with its 'singing' fountain (after dark it is lit up with colours and songs pump out of large hidden loudspeakers), under the Ferroviaria flyover with its colourful murals, passing by the park by the metro bus stop where it's not uncommon to spot iguanas shuffling in the foilage or climbing a tree.  This is where my bike route goes straight whilst if I'm on foot I veer into the Parque Lineal, with its outdoor gym, trees, fountians, smooching couples and more iguanas.  

At the Universidad Católica and its unicyclist statue I turn left and cross the Zig-Zag bridge that takes me across the estuary into Urdesa.  Here there is a long stretch of private housing with interesting colours, textures and ornate metal bars covering doorways and windows.  

Finally I turn left onto Avenida Monjas, passing Bella's bikeshop Cikla and the giant statue of an iguana (one of three giant mosaic statues in Guayaquil, the others being a parrot and a monkey) and rejoining 9 de Octubre to pass the huge shopping centres of Mi Comiseriato and Albanborja, (where I am often tempted in to buy a $1 coconut ice cream, totally delicious and always reminds me of Mr. Whippy's from the beach ice cream vans of childhood!)  

And the final stop… our house in Ciudadela El Paraíso where Emily and I live with other JUCONI volunteers from América Solidaria on the third floor of this yellow building with our baclony that looks out over the hill Cerro El Paraíso.

This has been a really fascinating exercise, documenting our daily routes in and around Guayaquil.  Funnily enough in all the time I have been here in Guayaquil (a year tomorrow) this is the first time that I have taken photos of my day-to-day surroundings.  In a way all the photos that I have taken over the year have been very 'biased', in the sense that I'll tend to take photos of artwork, murals, animals and plants, with the occasional turistic spot, but up until last week hadn't taken any general shots of the city.  Perhaps because the streets here tend to be large, multi-lane, traffic and billboard loaded, and perhaps because, in being my daily backdrop, they somehow fall out of the 'new things' photographic radar.  Either way it was surprising to realise this, and then really enjoyable taking the photos, I have felt like I'm looking afresh at the city that's currently my home and it has made me really happy and has inspired ideas for drawings and painting.  

Brilliant idea Katie at ICYE, thanks for the inspiration!

p.s. these are not on my walk home but should really be included here to be kept near their iguana friend: 

The monkey by Las Peñas and the Parrot by City Mall in the south.

 

And finally, one of the under-the-bridge mosaics that initiated this flurry of photographs of the streets.  Ever since arriving into Guayaquil these splashes of colour underneath the flyovers havemade me smile, and I've often thought about photographing them in series.  Inspired to collect reference imagery for our new Art Club project was perfect timing to finally do it, and I owe a big thanks to Tyrone for making it possible by driving me around between many of them a couple of Sundays ago.