So you arrive in Quito, Ecuador, are greeted by cheerful children who put leis around your neck, take the modern subway from the airport to downtown, and have your bags carried by friendly locals past the impossibly blue fountain to your hotel.

Then you wake up with a cramped neck…and your flight attendant tells you to put your seat in its upright position.

While Quito isn’t the roughest introduction to South America (Caracas, Venezuela or Recife, Brazil wins that prize), you may still wonder if you made the right choice when you step outside the airport. Within a few seconds once inside your cab, a woman with an almost lifeless one-year-old strapped on her back will ask you to buy a pack of Trident gum for 25 cents and vendors will come to your window at red traffic signals, in between the dilapidated storefronts and buses that blow noxious black smoke into the heavily polluted air. But all this is character waiting for your appreciation, nearly 3,000 meters up in the sky. Continue Reading…