Globalization

In my travels, I have seen many provocative examples of globalization. In Barbados, I ate fried chicken with my feet in white sand under a red canvas umbrella emblazoned with Coronel Sanders face. In Valle de Bravos, Mexico, I was astonished to learn Doritos manufactured their familiar tortilla chips in bold mexican flavors. In the small town of Tujankir Uno, Costa Rica, I participated in meetings under a Coca-Cola tent. While all of these experiences have led me to reflect on the interactions between the developed and developing world, none of my previous contacts with globalization have done so as deeply as living in Ecuador, integrated into a place that balances precariously between authentic and manufactured.

Colimbuela consists of approximately 500 people in 75 families. They are all indigenous Ecuadorians whose families have lived there for many generations. Every family produces their livelihood, to some extent, through integrated farming. The women still wear their traditional hand-sown blouses and the kids speak in Kichwa. As ideally untouched by globalization this village may sound, its not all roasted guinea pigs and purple corn kernels.

The men do not wear their traditional outfits, but American-style clothing with pirated NY Yankees emblems and Armani labels. While many people eat what they grow or raise, many others sell the products of their land to be shipped away. Others yet work construction or in the dreadful flower plantations, producing their living in the western fashion.

The town center consists of a dirt road flanked on one side by an elementary school and on the other by a line of three houses that double as tiny general stores. One of these three stores recently installed a satellite dish and two computers that connect to the internet. Living in such a simple place, I may have lost perspective on how obsolete human innovation has made fixed distance, but I was shocked by this new urban development.

Mid-afternoon a few days after the system was installed, the father of this family visited my house to ask for help on a problem with the printer. The problem was out of my technical expertise (especially in Windows Espanol), but they asked me if I could instant message with Shelley, the volunteer here before me. This demonstration would really shrink the distance between Colimbuela and the rest of the world. So, I signed into Facebook to check if she was online.

No dice.

However, when I showed them some profile pictures and asked if they had heard of Facebook, they said no. Libro de caras? No?

That one really got me. With such a juxtaposition of cultures old and new, I still find exceptions to the globalization trend. Here we have a young couple: they run a store with internet and work construction in the city, they own no farmland. That is about of as western as they come here these days, yet these two have no concept of the most ubiquitous and permeating symbol of globalization of our generation.

This town is in a critical phase of development. One generation ago, no one had a TV. Two generations ago, kids (now grandparents) were brought up with no exposure to the Spanish language and still don't speak it. Now we see families staring at TV over dinner and kids playing GTA San Diego on the internet.

To leave you with a question to ponder, I will present the lives of two young women.

Maria and Sayra grew up in Colimbuela and are in the same class at the elementary school. After 7th grade, Maria, who has good grades and gets a scholarship for high school, leaves town for the city. She begins wearing western clothing and makeup. She marries a boy from Quito, moves away and forgets how to speak Kichwa. She and her family occasionally take trips to the beach and back to Colimbuela.

Sayra does fine in school, but finishes 7th grade and stays at home. She works in the fields, helps raise her younger siblings, and plays in the open country. She marries a man from the same town and never travels farther than one hour from home. She never forgets Kichwa or her culture, but can hardly write a sentence in any language and lacks an understanding of her own country in the world. She eventually receives a portion of her parents land.

Whose better off?

Chimborazo

11 PM, January 17, 2011 (5000 meters, 16, 400 feet): Dressed in so many layers, I feel warm in the frozen weather. 5 companions, 3 mountain guides, and I leave the Mt. Chimborazo refuge at 16,000 feet to attempt a summit of the largest mountain I have ever seen.

You may remember my recent successful summit of Mt. Cotopaxi. The cold pierced my bones, the fatigue caused my legs to almost crumble like a ragdoll, and the 19,344 ft altitude gave me a hacking cough. Whatever unneccesary pain that experience brought, a harder challenge lay ahead.

12 AM, January 18, 2011 (5,200 meters, 17,000 feet): Our consistent line of 9 climbers reaches the glacier. We stop for a short rest to fasten crampons on our boots, unstrap our ice axes, and form groups of three connected by a rope. Augmenting that of our headlamps, the full moon casts a bright light over the whole mountain. When we look up, we get visual confirmation that our next few hours will be very painful.

At 20,702 feet above sea level, Chimborazo is the highest mountain in Ecuador. Regardless of the more than 8,000 feet of altitude it lays below Mt. Everest, Chimborazo sits so close to the equator (and therefore the equatorial bulge), that its summit is the farthest point from the center of the Earth.

2 AM, January 18, 2011 (5,700 meters, 18,700 feet): The ridge has been gained and dangerous ridge scrambling has been surmounted. At points, the ridge is wide enough for only one foot placement, so lucidity and concentration are gravely needed. A steep snow field now looms above us, and we begin making switchbacks as we climb higher and higher toward the summit.

After multiple high-altitude camping trips, feeling acclimated and in shape, we (my companions and I) found ourselves in the refuge, tucked in our sleeping bags at 5,000 meters. The mountain looked appetizing, conditions were good (not much snow), and successful summitting stories were abound from recent days.

4:30 AM, January 18, 2011 (6,000 meters, 19,700 feet): After 2 1/2 hours of continuous climbing up a snowy slope with a much greater angle of repose than your normal sand dune or type-example stratovolcano, the snow begins to give way. What had been a nice slick ice sheet topped with packed snow 24 hours before, is now a two foot-deep layer of loose snow flakes. Every two or three steps means a defeated fall into the soft-packed snow and at least 30 seconds of stasis so I can catch my breath.

Thought to be the tallest mountain in the world until the early 19th century, early summit attempts ended in bittersweet failure. Two famous attempts, in 1802 and 1831, marked the highest elevation attained by a European in recorded history (19,280 ft and 19, 704 ft, respectively). Legendary English explorer Edward Whymper successfully reached the summit in 1880 on his first attempt.

The afternoon and evening spent in the refuge was tranquil inside yet volatile outside. As we sat playing cards, relaxing, and passing time, snow and sleet battered the roof and came fluttering in through whatever holes existed.

5 AM, January 18, 2011 (6,100 meters, 20,000 feet): My legs are failing, the snow won´t hold my weight, my head begins to throb, my stomach threatens to expunge the apple I ate a few minutes back, and I begin to exhibit a dry cough. As I look up the slope to check what lays ahead, I see the distant headlamps of other climbers hundreds of feet above. The cautionary words of my mother echo through my head ¨If you feel the altitude, its OK to turn back.¨ As much as it hurts my inner self to admit it, I have reached my physical limit. I decide to descend. Since my climbing companion is fresh and ready to continue, our guide contacts another group via walkie-talkie and arranges for me to descend with them. As I sit alone in the snow waiting to descend, I turn my headlamp off to appreciate the stars. The co-existent beauty and sadness of this moment overcome me and I begin to cry. I really wanted to reach the summit. Yet I sit here at 20,000 feet above sea level, farther on top of the world than I have ever been, and I cannot help but appreciate all that I have around me. Both my immediate world and the abstract concept of life itself.

The decision to turn back was both easy and difficult. I recognize how rare and precious it is to find oneself in a position like that, and I wanted to absorb it for all it was worth. But when I realized my physical abilities were overcome by the mountain, I really had no choice.

5:15 AM, January 18, 2011: I rope up with my companions and we begin our long descent. Of the two friends I am now connected with, I am clearly the most lucid. The one placed in the front of the rope suddenly drops to his knees for 2 minutes of uncontrollable vomiting. While most of the horrid sounds do not expel any material from his mouth, I notice a small green pool of melted snow as I pass. Our descent lasts another 2 1/2 hours. My desire for pictures has been eradicated under these extreme conditions, so I will not have many to show. The sunrises as we descend, and the clouds below look like layers of a cake. My altitude issues subside and my fatigue materializes as the most grave of my current ailments.

In the end, I pushed my limit, challenged the mountain, and reached an altitude at which I may never again stand. While I really wanted to make the summit, it was out of my reach. And you know what? That´s OK. Instead of making the top and possibly losing my life, I would rather live to tell the tale to the rest of you.