Beware the Bearded One

Update: 5

After spending some time here, we've really settled in. Quito is actually a fantastic city and we both feel pretty safe. On Wednesday night there was a Jazz festival in the Plaza outside the the Teatro Sucre. Fantastic tunes for free. You don't find that often in the West!

On Wednesday night, Tam befriended our neighbour (well actually he interrupted her Spanish homework time) a forty-something bearded Californian archaeologist called Bruce travelling on his own. On Thursday night, I learnt never to trust a forty-something bearded Californian archaeologist called Bruce travelling on his own... especially if he brings out a bottle of vodka at 5.30pm. Let me just say that nursing a hangover during a Spanish class in a smog-ridden, noise-polluted manic city at 3,000m is about as much fun as having your teeth cleaned with an angle-grinder. I've been trying to avoid Bruce all day, but I think he sees me coming because I can't get back to our room without passing him sitting outside our adjacent doors, fag in hand and an evil spark in his eye. We've just been out for supper and as we left, he tried to force a beer down my throat for "medicinal purposes". We've talked him into joining us in the Galapagos Islands at the end of next week which he readily accepted. I might have to call in sick.

Anyway, tomorrow Tam and I are going cycling Leesie-style. Tam likes the exercise you get while peddling around. I try and live by the mantra "Minimum effort, maximum output", so you can imagine my enthusiasm for this weekend's activities: they put the bikes on the roof of the Land Rover and drive us to the top of Cotopaxi (a live volcano) and then let us loose for the downhill. I'll let you know how it goes.

Some things I've observed here:

• There is an unbelievable police presence - I've noted four different uniforms: khaki camo, blue camo, a brown and a navy blue uniform.

• Our phrase book has:  English: Sellotape - Espanol: Durex. Bear that in mind for any sticky situations in Latin America.

• You can get three 2-course dinners, with three cups of juice for $4.50. Bruce picked up the tab for that. Cheers Bruce.

• My Spanish teacher, Fanny's surname is Mercedes. I'll let you mull that over....

• There are more dentists here than any other type of shop and every second advertisement on TeleAmazonas is for dental products or toothpaste. It's the strangest thing.

• Every morning on the way to school we walk past the president's office and usually bump into his motorcade on the corner of Espejo and Garcia Morena. Two or three bikes, two big Chevy 4x4s with blacked out windows and a lot of noise. God help anyone who doesn't get out of the way!