Tuesday

Last night I left El Capitan's favorite barro, Shooters, after just the second drink of the day. Felt weird, hazy and weak but not sleepy tired and my digestion will not stop bubbling away all this took me home early. Fearing the worst i took the roundabout way to the hostel so i could both avoid the dangerous night streets and get myself some Bismutol.

The store clerk said something too fast thru the iron gate the transaction was taking place between. "Two dolares somethingsomething" So I held out my hand full of change and she took five 50 centavo pieces and gave me the pink bottle and a few pennies.

The currency here is the US$ all bills are the exact same as the stateside, but you can only break $20's in American-catering or very large establishments, wish I had known that before I came down! Oh and casinos are glad to take your 20's. The coinage is a mix of the US and Ecuadorian, though they are the same size and weight and would work in either country's vending machines.

So I got back to the room and am feeling much better the Bismutol remains unopened and I am asleep by 1am. I sleep thru 11am thanks to the Mindfold and earplugs. I hopped out of bed with a mind full of "Super Trooper" by ABBA, and a body moving nowhere that speed. I play the song on my ipod as I fall into my Qi Gung routine. El Capitan is hunched over his swarm of cables, drives and computerations. My routine consists of slow, intentional movements accompanied by a deep breathing. As I was moving through the postures I found the breath lacking as if i was breathing empty air. I had to tone it down and finished off the set with a refreshed body and woozy head.

I pack my day bag for a trek around the New Town section of Quito but that additional moving around completely took my body by surprise and I started getting the spotty, flashy light flickering seen in the eyes and felt in the head like a mix of brain cotton and unexpected levitation.

So I lay down. I let El Capitan go towards internetting and I take to breathing. Breathing. Deep and long and counting from Zero to One hundred and back down in Espanol. This took a long time so that I caught my breath. The nausea faded and my head settled back into my neck.

I must have trundled along the edge of conscious passing out for a good 20 minutes but came out in the end. Fascinating feeling if not for the slight suffocation I had to breathe past. So it looks like I'm going to need to be aware to breathe more over the next few days.

All this is so very weird because I have walked miles around Quito and never felt out of breath.

The best news of the day (beyond Super Trooper in my mente) is that I am still hungry and everythings coming out alright. I have a water filter (REI) that is actually a ceramic filter with holes smaller than parasites (I hope). I have filtered a few batches of tap water with it and that's been fine. But I do shower and brush teeth with it straight which i feel is a good first step into assimilating whatever organisms might be foreign to me in the water, because once we venture out of the city the water quality will only get worse.