Posts:
The drive from the high valley of Paute to the sprawling beaches of Ecuador’s central coast takes all day. We left a little after dawn and arrived just in time to order a celebratory cocktail as our fatigue and the blinding heat of the afternoon faded into the...
By Tamara Gane Paper boarding passes get a bad rap. They’ve become shorthand for being not only out of touch but unfamiliar with basic technology. Airlines, for their part, are doing everything they can to push them into the past. Last spring, American Airlines...
Thursday’s power blackouts in nine provinces, including Azuay, are a reminder of technical and erosion problems at the Coca Codo Sinclair hydroelectric plant on the Rio Coca east of Quito. A representative for the national electric company, Celec, said the outages...
By Jerome Long His men were exhausted, cold and wet. They had slogged over a muddy mountain trail and were suffering from altitude sickness. Many of them were raw, untested recruits. The enemy could see what he was doing and was moving to gain the higher ground....
By Andrew Freedman The coming “Super” El Niño is poised to affect the lives of hundreds of millions of people worldwide as it strengthens through the year into the winter season. It may also alter ecosystems for decades to come, judging from the repercussions of past...
By Rich Lowry We’ve been having a debate about “book bans” in recent years, but given the steep decline in student literacy, the deeper question is how anyone would notice whether a book is available in a school library or not. The New York Times published an...
One of the more interesting discoveries about life in Cuenca is that almost nothing is ever called what you think it ought to be called. Take garbage collection. A few days ago my landlady telephoned to announce, with the accusatory tone usually reserved for tax fraud...
By Michael J. Coren There’s protein water, protein beer, protein marshmallows. Millions follow “meatfluencers” on TikTok. If you’re hungry for dessert, God bless you, a protein Pop-Tart will sustain you with 10 grams of protein alongside red No. 40. Behind this...
The Constitutional Court has rejected an appeal by the Energy and Mining Ministry and mining companies to overturn a 2021 ruling shutting down the Rio Tino gold mine in Molleturo. In its previous decision the court said that residents of the affected area were denied...
By Carlos Calderón A couple of years ago, a recently arrived expat who I had only met a few days earlier asked if I could arrange a meeting for him with then-President Guillermo Lasso. He knew that I had been a consultant to the government on an archaeological project...
By Meggan Harris For decades, the American Dream was built around the assumption that hard work, homeownership, career advancement and long-term financial stability would steadily improve quality of life over time. For a growing number of Americans, however, that...
By Mitra Taj and Genevieve Glatsky Keiko Fujimori and Roberto Sánchez officially advanced to a presidential runoff in Peru, more than four weeks after voters went to the ballot box, setting up a runoff next month between two candidates with starkly different...
Undated reports on the El Niño forming in the Pacific Ocean indicate its effects will be felt as soon as June and July. Previous predictions were that it would develop late this year with its full force coming early next year. “All the data indicates a rapid rise in...
A curious thing happens after you have lived in Ecuador for a few years. You gradually stop lusting after the latest digital technology and begin evaluating it the way Ecuadorians often evaluate refrigerators, rice cookers, and umbrellas: Does it work, will it...
By Hira Humayun In the hyper-masculine world of Latin-American drug cartels, it is sometimes the women you need to watch. That’s how the Mexican military hunted down one of the world’s most-wanted traffickers – Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes – in a...
By Carolina Mella In two and a half years, Ecuador has spent 846 days under a state of emergency, almost the same amount of time that Daniel Noboa has been in power. During this period, the president has restricted people’s free movement for 272 days, decreeing seven...
There was a time when many people described moving abroad in simple terms. Cuenca was beautiful. The cost of living was lower. The climate was comfortable. The pace felt easier. For many retirees and expats, that was enough to explain the move. But expat life in...
By Ana Cristina Alvarado Just as many westerners have turned to alternative remedies to seek cures for whatever ails them, Ecuadorians, too, have begun to reconsider ancestral medicine in light of changing attitudes. Indigenous caregivers and midwifes are coming out...
The high school dropout rate has risen sharply in the last decade, and educators claim it is a key factor in Ecuador’s epidemic of violence. According to presenters at the 2026 Adolescence Summit, held in Quito May 14 and 15, 21.5% of the country’s high school...
In Cuenca, most expats have figured out one way or another of watching English-language TV or videos, usually via fiber optic cable and a reasonably reliable internet connection. One quickly discovers, however, that the modern world rests on a fragile assumption: that...
