Be Afraid (Of Ghosts, Not Barack) !!

Voting in a foreign country turned out to be a bit more complicated than I had hoped. Unfortunately, the State of Missouri is not the most technically advanced State in the Union (Surprising, I know!) A bunch of my friends were able to order their absentee ballots on line, receive them as a PDF, vote, sign the ballot, and then just mail it in. I had to print out a form and then mail it to the Board of Elections. I had hoped that they would only require a signature, so I had the ballot mailed to my parent´s house for them to complete. So much for planning, Missouri requires all absentee ballots to be co-signed by a Notary Public or other official authorized to administer oaths. Therefore, my Parent´s had to mail the ballot to me to get the appropriate signature. I thought that someone in the Peace Corps office would be able to do this, but nobody is so authorized. I looked for an American Notary in Quito, but without luck. I had to have one of my friends scribble a crazy signature where the co-signer was supposed to sign, hopefully this will work.

While I was in the office committing voter fraud, I turned in a ballot from one of my friends who I knew who had voted for Obama. I have to admit that I was tempted to tell him that I turned his ballot in and then throw it away. While I was thinking, I had a moment like in a cartoon. Karl Rove dressed like a devil appeared on one of my shoulders. He whispered in my ear, “Pitch it! He´ll never know”. Then Dick Cheney popped on the other shoulder dressed like an angel. “That would be a disservice to Democracy, Jay. You know better than that”, he said. I turned the ballot in…thank you Mr. Vice President.

With Halloween approaching, I thought I´d retell a story I recently heard. It is about the Hacienda where I had lunch with the new Ambassador (Post: Make Cotton Soff – In Word) you can also see the website at http://www.yourghoststories.com/real-ghost-story.php?story=3692

"La Cienega" is a Spaniard hacienda built on the province of Cotopaxi-Ecuador. Two hundred years ago this hacienda served as home of Spaniard conquerors, they had thousands of indigenous people working on huge fields.

These haciendas were the heart of the economics in that time. Now, this hacienda is a touristic site, because is a building which has history. This hacienda has not been remodeled or modified it has been kept the same way as it was two hundred years ago. The hacienda works as an inn, and has the name of "la cienega".

It was late October; I went to the cienega to spend a weekend outside the city. My younger sister and brother were scared because they knew this place was supposed to be haunted.
There is a legend which says, that the Africans and indigenous people who worked on this hacienda suffered everyday, they were slaves, and working schedules were so harsh, most of the slaves died in the middle of the task. And their bodies were buried in the fields.
It was Saturday in the night, after we at dinner in the hacienda restaurant, my parents went ahead to their room with my sister. Five minutes later, I went with my brother. As we were walking through a hallway, my brother just fell to the ground, he said he felt something grasping his foot.

There was no one, and there were no doors on that hallway, from which, a prankster could play a joke. I felt cold, and seen. I continued to walk very fast to our room. That midnight my brother woke up screaming because he said that he felt that someone was pulling his feet. I calmed him for a couple of minutes, and took him to my parent's room. I returned to my room.

I went to the bathroom to pick up a bottle of water because I was thirsty, when I stared at the mirror. At my side I saw a face, the face was ugly and seemed to be rotting, and I simply fainted. I woke up at nine o clock. I checked my arms and they had scratches, as like those of a cat, but instead, these were only two lines in each arm. I was freaked out.

That next day I talked to a staff member and told him of what happened the other night. For my surprise, he simply told me that these kinds of experiences are weird. Although, that hacienda has a certain reputation of haunted.

A week later, I learned that this place gets its name "la cienega" from the translation from the Spanish, what means is "the swamp" because the Spaniards not only buried corpses on the ground, but mainly on a nearby swamp, which is about a five miles from the main house (where the inn works). And local people say that the spirits which inhabit the hacienda are enraged spirits who seek vengeance from their cruel masters.

I have to admit that I don´t believe in ghosts and didn´t feel anything crawling up my neck while we were walking around the Hacienda´s grounds, but it is still pretty interesting.
Speaking of Halloween, I hope you all have a good one. I´ll be leaving La Libertad this Friday and heading out to my friend´s site, El Chaco. I´ve been there twice before, and it is nice and the weather is hot. About 70 volunteers from all over the country are heading there for a big Halloween bash and the next day we are going to have a rafting contest down the Quijos River. It should be fun, and after the last couple of weeks, it will be a nice break from planting gardens every other day.

Speaking of gardens, John and I planted our 12th one this week. That was our target number when we started the project so I´m pretty happy. We have two more lined up next month and then hopefully we will start transplanting. The next big hurdle will be getting the parents to plant gardens in the own yards. We´ve taught them the techniques, now it is up to them (with a little prodding from us).