My friend Travis works for Remote Year – the company that first facilitated my escape from office life two years ago; he invited me to a weekend retreat in Quito, Ecuador with the purpose of getting “One Layer Deeper” with other creative, curious and inspired people currently travelling with Remote Year. The theme of the weekend was to gather people together and go beyond standard operating norms to cut through that top level boundary which we all usually put up around strangers. Each of us hosted knowledge sessions where we shared experiences, expertise and perspectives to this end. Topics included “Is there free will?”, separate one-on-one, hard-ball interrogations of one another, yoga, goal and action calibrations, a series of improvisational social games and a high-intensity breathing exercise course (which was way more challenging than I thought it would be). While I spent a couple of weeks in Quito last year, this time around it was a completely different experience centered around creating social connections, knowledge and experience sharing. We stayed in a giant mansion built by a former professional Ecuadorian basketball player (also our Airbnb host) replete with a basketball court, a fire pit to host late-night theoretical discussions and a giant parilla […]
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I had originally planned to stay in Quito for 5 weeks to decompress and re-orient focus that had been dispersed to more social and adventurous enterprises, back into creative endeavors. I figured such a small, nondescript location that I had chosen via a map instead of more organic recommendation would afford ample space and few distractions. Half-way into my stay into Bogota last month though I cut my Quito time short in order to remain longer in Colombia. Once I arrived into Ecuador, though, I was glad I did. On paper, Quito is a mid-size city of around 2 million people; but a view from above makes it seem much larger. I found Quito to be a comfortable place to live — even relaxed. There are large parks full of people enjoying the ample sunshine and ideal temperatures. Quito is at altitude so that even though it’s on the equator the temperatures hover around 22 degrees C (72) in July. There’s a mix of sunshine and clouds and it doesn’t seem to rain much. I stayed in an AirBnb in the financial district of the city convenient to a myriad of restaurants, a large super market and within walking distance of a few gyms. Perfecto. Beyond this it afforded a perfect […]
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