Food fair and Turi festival

Sunday, February 8th, 2015 Cuenca
This morning, we were looking at a brochure we got regarding Carnaval events around Cuenca over the next 2 weeks. There was a festival event going on in Turi, which is a neighbourhood on a hilltop at the south side of town. It didn't look that far so we decided to walk. From the old town, we crossed the little Tomebamba River to the newer part of Cuenca. We walked for about 30 or 40 minutes south on a nice big boulevard. Cuenca is very clean and pretty. The tallest buildings in the new town are only about 6 or 8 stories high.
Eventually we crossed the Yanuncay River south of town and then weren't sure exactly which direction to take up the hill to Turi. Anita asked 2 older men who looked like they spoke English and, sure enough, they were American expats. They told us the direction to take but said there were over 400 steps up the hill so we'd be better to take a cab. They and their wives were going to a food fair and invited us to tag along. It turned out that the food fair was a cancer fundraiser in a convention center attached to the biggest shopping mall in Cuenca. It wouldn't look out of place in Toronto or Ottawa - KFC & Burger King were in the food court and Payless Shoes was one of the stores. Those 3 franchises seem to be everywhere in the world.
For $1 each, we got access to the convention centre. There were about a dozen booths with food from different countries so you could order a big plate for about $5. We chose to share a plate of Columbian food since we were still full from breakfast.
There were probably 100 or so gringo expats in the crowd. Our new friends told us a lot about expat life in Cuenca.  They live in nice, new, secure apartment buildings, have gym memberships and generally live like they would in a small city in the US, only much cheaper. One of the attractions here for Americans is cheap health care. One of the couples told us they pay $81 per month for comprehensive health care, including prescription drugs. They were very critical of the way that the US looks after older people. Ecuador has many benefits for older people so that they can live with dignity. This seems very strange to us that one of the richest countries in the world can be surpassed in this regard by such a small developing country. However, that's the way it is. American expats can expect a better quality of life here as they age.

Finally, we left our new friends and took a cab for $2 up to Turi. There's a good view of the city from there. There were lots of locals at the festival but few gringos. It was a lot like the CO Blitz, with a bit of speechifying, music and food booths. However, at home, it would be rare to see guinea pigs (cuy) roasting on a pole over hot coals. Plus, there's always a big, whole pig roasting at any event here.
One element of every Ecuadorian party seems to be throwing water or spraying foam out of spray cans at each other. We haven't figured out the fun in this yet but it seems quite popular. We often see vendors selling big spray cans of some kind of foam so that both children and adults can spray each other. Different.
The festival wasn't that interesting so we soon grabbed a cab for $3 back to our hotel. A lot of restaurants are closed on Sundays so we went a few blocks to Chicago Pizza for dinner. Not remarkable but it was fine.