Kuiqui's liberation

First of all, happy mother's day to all of the lovely mothers out there, with a special shout out to my own mom- I couldn't ask for a better one.  Sorry I couldn't be around today Mom, but I'm glad we got to Skype earlier and I hope you enjoy your breakfast, courtesy of Your Favorite (and only) Offspring (because "offsprings" isn't a word, I'll clarify that I meant that as plural because it would be quite erroneous to refer to myself as the Only Offspring). 

I spent mother's day following chilean tradition: releasing a domesticated duck (that had previously lived as a pet) into the wild. OK, so maybe that's not exactly chilean tradition, but it's what we ended up doing today because Alvaro's mom is in Ecuador, so we couldn't exactly spend the day with her.

The duck (christened "Kuiqui"- pronounced "Quickie") originally arrived at the Rodriguez Residence when Maia went to the south to visit her grandma who lives on a farm. Kuiqui was three months old when it (when we released him (?) today we decided with some confidence that he is, indeed, a he and not a she) came north to Viña del Mar to reside in the front yard. When I first heard that Maia had brought a baby duck home, I thought awwww how cute!  I want to see the duck!  And even when Alvaro went back home and told me that the duck wasn't everything it was "quacked up" to be (hahahaha- Mom, that was my second mother's day gift for you), I didn't believe him and forced him to take the computer outside so that I could see the duck via Skype. It took a costly plane ticket and nine hours of travel for me to arrive in the front patio and realize that it was full of duck poop and a rather sad, lonely looking duck for me to realize that maybe not all city ducks can be as happy as Ferdinand (and I guess he wasn't a city duck really).

So it was decided that Kuiqui should (and really, must) go. Today we took a trip to the Jardín Botánico (botanical gardens) where they have a big lake with other ducks to release him into his natural habitat.

Kuiqui had to leave his front yard home

First he had to get into a box and travel in the trunk to get there

 Maia and I travelled with Chicky in the backseat, with Kuiqui in the box in the trunk. Chicky spent the car ride trying to get at the duck, which she could smell in the trunk through a small hole near the seatbelt that she kept digging at

 

 We arrived at the Jardín Botánico and Alvaro's dad carried Kuiqui in his box to the lake

 "Chau, Kuiqui!"

 Kuiqui's first time in water!  He swam naturally, although he was kind of desubicado- out of place, splashing all over the place and making a general, jovial scene

 

 Swimming!

 Chicky has wanted to attack the duck since his arrival, and when he swam off with some other ducks she made a tremendous dive into the water and dog paddled after him for a bit before whimpering and returning to the shore, shivering

Joining the rest of the ducks!  Although they never really accepted him, the park rangers said it could take several weeks, but that he'd probably be just fine

We ended with a nice picnic in the park

So now I can add "liberating a pet duck" to Things I Have Done Since Being In Chile.  Also on that list? Eating an empanada every day, attending two despedidas- good bye parties- in one day, visiting Alvaro's family in Santiago, seeing some of my friends and some of Alvaro's friends, running into my former boss's husband, and making "fajitas" with "mexican-ized" lentils.