I'm pretty sure nobody missed that there was an earthquake in Ecuador on the 16th April. It was the biggest one Ecuador had in 50 years with its 7.8 on Richter scale. A lot of people died, more were injured and homes were destroyed. A real tragedy. The center of the earthquake was in the ocean outside of Esmeralda, the city that got completely destroyed. This is about 400 km from where I was at the time, Otavalo.

Me and Simona went to Otavalo because there is a huge market and it gets even bigger during Saturday. I heard someone say that it is one of South Americas biggest markets, but I'm not sure if that's true or not. We arrived Friday night and on Saturday morning we woke up pretty early to have the whole day to stroll around. We started off with the animal market. It was terrible, they do not treat their animals well here. I felt sick and we left after just 5 minutes.

The big market on the other hand was nicer, even though a lot of the things were the same souvenirs as you could find almost anywhere. After strolling around for a few hours, we went for lunch and skyped for a bit.

Two girls that we had met in Quito were at the same hostel and we decided to have dinner together. I didn't really feel like having dinner though, I think I just needed some alone time. Simona went to meet the girls and a few minutes after she left the world started to shake. I sat on my bed and I didn't realize what happened at first. I ran out of the room, to the others and asked "do you also feel this?". Stupid question, it would have been impossible to not feel it.

Everyone in the hostel got out on the street, because I guess it's at least a bit safer than staying in a building if anything would collapse. The ground felt like jelly and it continued for a long time. It must have been at least 3 minutes. When the ground stopped moving and we went back into the hostel, a girl asked wether this was common or not. The owner of the hostel answered that it was not, but with a smile on his face, so we started laughing and saying that it was quite cool, "a thing to check off the bucket list".

It was cool for us, yes, but when we woke up the next day and found out that it had been way worse along the coast and that people died, it didn't feel cool anymore. I felt really bad the whole day.

The most recent numbers I've read say that over 600 people died, over 50 missing and over 16.000 people are injured. I feel happy to have been where I was at the time, but I'm also sad and my thoughts go to all the people who lost their lives, their relatives or friends and to everyone who lost everything they owned.

This event will forever be in my memory.