To me culture is who I am, where I come from and who I will always be. I talk about my culture with a lot of pride, becuase it's me, plain and simple. I come from a Cuban, Puerto Rican, Ecuadorian family and I love all three parts of it equally. My mother is 100% Ecuadorian and my father is half Cuban, half Puerto Rican. So I would say I have 3 different cultures, but they all melt down to being hispanic for me. I think that culture is what make you, YOU. It's where you come from and what represents you. One of the biggest values that comes from my culture is family, no matter what happens in your life, no matter what's going on, family will always be there. Friends are another big value for us, family will always be there through everything, but what better way to share your life and accomplishments than friends?
The traditions we value are small, but a big one my family strongly values is eating meals together, we all have busy lives and when we get older, they just get busier and busier. That's why eating meals is one way we get to all sit down together and talk and spend some quality time together while eating too :) One other tradition is church, we make it our priority to go every Sunday morning to attend mass and take the time to talk with God and communicate with him. We have strong values in our faith and love for God and each other.
I'm not sure that I really have any assumptions because of the background I have. I don't really have any assumptions about the Ecuadorian culture to be honest, i live in this culture and experience it everyday, granted I don't live in Ecuador so I can't say I know how every Ecuadorian acts and behaves but I don't think it's at all, any different than what I experience in my on home.
Ecuadorian food varies depending on where you reside, either the highlands or the costal region, you'll get a couple diffrent types of dishes. In the highland ares, you usually get traditional foods that are revolved potatoes, sweetcorn, cheese and avacadoes. Typical dishes include llapingachos, which is a small fried patties of mashed potato and cheese, often served with a fried egg. It seems to be a dish with a lot of sodium but I know from experience it's a really good meal :) They also have Guinea pig "cuy", which is a pretty famous, traditional dish, usually for special occasions. The costal foods are make dishes with ingredients such as plantains, yuca, coconut and rice. They also have a very wide range of tropical fruits like papaya, pineapple and starfruits. Plaintains are a staple in the costa and are used in a lot of different ways, like platanoes (which are smashed), chifles (sliced very thin and deep-fried; like chips). One of my favorite types is Bolones de verde, which are balls of unripe plantain mashed with cheese.
The typical seafood dishes of Ecuador are Encocados, they are fish or prawns in a rich coconut sauce, usually served with with rice and patacones. Ceviche is raw seafood marinated in lime or lemon juice with chili and onions, so it's pretty spicy, in my opinion. But one of the most famous dishes, which I do not favor at all. Encebollados are also a great local food, but very well known outside of Ecuador. It consists of seafood in a tangy, tomatoey soup with mashed yuca, onion and coriander. My mother told me that they are said to cure a hangover and make a pretty darn good breakfast.
For me, i've personally tried a handful of these dishes, I can't say that I love them all, but I've tried new things haha. In my family we typically eat hispanic dishes, but we do live in America and eat American foods too, but we like to stick to what we know how to make the best! So for me the Ecuadorian dishes are pretty similary to what I would say I eat at home.
