Otavalo, Peleas de Gallos and More...

Wilson and I have been in Quito, Ecuador, for approximately 3 or so weeks now. And last weekend, we went to a little city North of Quito, Otavalo, which is known for its mercado (market) with tons of artesanías, animals (and typically not for pets) and crap. We had a great $2.50 lunch with pig and corn at the market, and of course, I bought some crap. After the mercado, we went to Cotacachi, known for their leather, and we both bought some stuff (not crap) for ourselves. More exciting, though, on Saturday evening, we went to our first “peleas de gallos” (cock fights).
As we all know, Wilson is fascinated with chickens (see entry on killing a chicken).

As the taxi cab was taking us up to this random, quiet, crooked street outside of Otavalo, I began to feel a little nervous. I knew this street wasn't frequented by tourists like us. When we arrived at this random, dark house on top of the hill, I was even more nervous. We kindly asked the taxi driver if it was easy to get a taxi back. He assured us that we should not have a problem finding a cab back.

We walked through this little man-made-cut-hole in a fence and was not sure what to expect. We saw something that resembled an arena and walked in. As soon as we walked in, everyone (all locals) turned and stared at us (now I know how the animals feel in the zoo). I, being my paranoid self, felt very uncomfortable. We had a beer at dinner so my nerves, although not completely calm, were a bit in check. We stared into the arena, not sure what was going on. There was no fight but merely 15 to 20 men in groups in the center with their gallos (chickens). I finally got the nerve to ask two locals “que paso?” The two kind locals, Pablo and not sure what the other guy's name was, told us that they were determining which chickens would fight each other. They where weighing the chickens by holding them by their legs. I guess it's kind of the same as wrestling, the UFC and boxing...the two with the same weight would fight each other.

After the decisions were made on who would fight who, a sharp razor was tied and burned with wax onto the chickens' patas (feet). I don't think this hurt the chickens since they didn't make any noise.

At last, a whistle was blown. The referee (assuming he was the ref although he wasn't in uniform like in the States), would set a large white clock to 8:46 or 8:47. If I understood correctly, the fights lasts for 12 minutes and a winner was determined when one of the chickens couldn't fight anymore.

The first fight began and I was afraid there would be a lot sangre (blood) everywhere but to my surprise, there was not much blood nor much noise (the chickens made more noise before the fight than during). I think there was a lot of blood but we couldn't tell because of the chicken's plumas (feathers). Although the fights weren't as violent or vicious as I thought, I was still sad when one of the chickens couldn't fight anymore (he'd merely put his head down on the ground), and the other won. How sad. The owner would take the chicken that lost and make make sure the chicken spat out the blood. Yuck.

We watched about 3 to 4 fights, and although interesting, weren't as excited as we thought it would be. We decided to try to call a cab from the store next door. When we arrived at the store, to our dismay, one of the guys at the store told us that they didn't have a phone (are you serious???). Anyway, don't remember exactly what happened next but what I do remember is that one of his aunts started giving Wilson and I shots of this local liquor made of sugar cane, through their metal door that separated them and us. It was good, sweet and not very strong, I think. The guy (see photo) said that unfortunately they didn't have a phone so they couldn't call a cab. Instead, he said one of the ladies in the arena had a car and worked nearby where we were staying, so she would give us a ride. Good ole locals! After some commotion, he said she wasn't ready to give us a ride, or something like that.

Anyway, after about 20 minutes or so they let us into their store, through the metal gate. We drank with them, talked, laughed and tried to understand everything that was said. The guy (nephew of the aunt) even proposed that Wilson become his son's padrino (God Father). Although he might have been joking, I think there was some truth to he wanting Wilson to be his God Father. Unfortunately, I had to break the news that he was not Catholic.

After about 2 hours, although the aunt kept saying it was dangerous for us to leave, we insisted that we had to leave. The guy walked (actually we ran because he said the street was dangerous) us to his house and he called us a cab.



What a great experience. Although I have to say I was scared s***less when we got there and alittle after the fights, it was all well worth it.