Posts:
They used to say Bermuda is another world. That was the slogan. It sounded idyllic, and for a time, it wasn’t wrong. Bermuda is a small archipelago out in the north Atlantic which became immensely popular with wealthy Americans in the 1920s and 1930s — not just for...
By Jim Smith If you’ve relocated to another country later in life -- whether to escape political stress, stretch a retirement budget, or start fresh -- you’ve probably discovered something no one talks about enough. It’s not just the paperwork, visas, or new languages...
I walked into an cell phone store with an impressive window display in Cuenca a few weeks ago and asked if they had any phones that supported eSIM. The man behind the counter blinked slowly, as if I’d just asked whether they had unicorns in stock. After a moment, he...
By Deke Castleman and Sylvan Hardy “Los precios gringos” or gringo pricing, also known as the “gringo gouge” and “gringo tax,” is a hot topic in virtually all Latin American expat communities. Even in the times of the coronavirus, the subject can raise a stir. The...
By Karla Freeman I wrote Creating Magic in Midlife:101 questions and answers to navigate the terrain of finding and exploring new directions. Scary? Of course. But why not try? Dream, examine patterns, be open to magic. Using the easy to read two-page chapters in my...
Every so often, I stumble across a headline proclaiming that the self-driving car revolution is just around the corner. The latest promises usually involve fleets of autonomous taxis, seamlessly gliding through city streets while humans sit in the back praying...
By Mario Navas I’m Mario Navas, a data scientist currently working at Kriptos, a startup that uses artificial intelligence to classify and protect sensitive documents. I’ve been with the company for two years, focusing on research and development — designing and...
By Jeremiah Reardon IdiomART opened its doors at Mariscal Lamar 14-25 and Estevez de Toral three years ago. Conveniently located next to Tres de Noviembre Tranvia stop, the intercultural creative hub and event space is operated by Sarah Hanen Bauer. Many people from...
Dos días de tragicomedia - The tragic-comedy "Munay," interpreted by artists Jenny Ochoa and Sandra Llivisaca will be presented on July 16 & 17 at 20:00 in the Sala "Alfonso Carrasco" in the Casa de la Cultura (Luis Cordero 7-22, 2nd floor). The work combines...
By Stephen Vargha With a deeply divided country that is full of hostility and indifference, Paul Wilches has seen an uptick in his business from U.S. customers. “It seems that Trump has increased my business,” said Paul Wilches. “I have been getting a lot of calls...
By Don Moore It seems like every book, article, or website about visiting Peru focuses on the same handful of places – Lima, Cuzco, Machu Picchu, and Lake Titicaca with maybe a few paragraphs about the beaches. They would have you believe that everything worth seeing...
By Jonathan Mason If you believed the glossy brochures, retirement in the Caribbean is a sun-drenched idyll of eternal leisure, cheap rum, and the sound of distant waves lulling you to sleep. The truth, as ever, is less postcard and more ledger book. Paradise, it...
They say you can’t take it with you. But some things come along anyway. Like memories. Like mid-century plumbing. And, in my case, like cheese sauce. It started innocently enough: a lump of butter, a spoon of flour, a jug of milk, and a block of Cheddar that was, in...
They came upon me slowly, despacito, like a foreign language, pacito a pacito, one millimeter at a time. Although at first these centimeters and millimeters sounded more like the names of poisonous insects than construction dimensions. When I went to buy building...
By Emily Stewart There's a certain level of zen that comes with boarding an airplane. The free-for-all may be stressful, but the chaos is also predictable. If you fly often enough, you can see from a mile away how the process is going to go — especially when it comes...
By Miriam Drake, M.Ed., N.C.C., C.H.t. When my husband and I moved to Cuenca, Ecuador in 2011, our plan was to create a new, fun, life adventure together. Medical emergencies, incapacitation, and end of life never even entered our minds. In other words, we were...
There are moments in every expat’s life when you find yourself squinting at the screen of some Ecuadorian TV channel, wondering if the dubbed episode of NCIS: Buenos Aires is really the cultural enrichment you hoped for. Perhaps you just want to hear the shipping...
By Jonathan Mason It is a curious thing, and not without irony, that in the great republic which so proudly proclaims the rights of man, the right to belong has become something contingent, paper-thin, and bureaucratically brittle. Citizenship in the United States is,...
By Noah Sheidlower Most 24-year-olds aren't thinking too deeply about retirement. With decades of work ahead of them, most are focused on getting their footing in the workplace — not on the financial needs and life goals of their 65-year-old selves. The same was true...
There’s a certain satisfaction in turning on the tap in Cuenca and watching clear water pour out, clean enough to drink straight without boiling, filtering, or crossing yourself. People from many parts of the world find this remarkable, and rightly so. Much of Latin...
Week of August 23
Ecuador’s economy grew 2% during the first half of 2026 compared with the same period a year earlier, according to new Banco Central del Ecuador data.
Cuenca gets a prime view of next week’s deep partial lunar eclipse.
Ecuador’s economy grows 2% in the first half of 2026.
