General Cemetery of Guayaquil

I went to the General Cemetery of Guayaquil today for a look around. I'd been keen to visit it for months, because I pass by it every time I get the bus into town and it looks very different to any other cemetery I've ever seen. It's huge, spreading around the base of the hill next to Cerro Santa Ana.

There are some gravestones, but the majority aren't gravestones at all but big white blocks, split into smaller compartments with the deceased's name and other information on the front of each. These blocks of grave compartments go up to about 20 feet high. All are white, stone I think, gleaming in the sun like the whitewashed houses in the Portuguese town of Lagos. The painted writing on the front of each compartment is nearly always black; some of them have carvings; a lot of them have a black outlined stencil painting of Jesus; many have bunches of colourful flowers hanging up next to them.

I wandered around for quite a long time.

Twice I came across what looked like the end of internment ceremonies going on in the outdoor 'corridors' between blocks, one of which had a two-man band of fiddle and classical guitar playing, but I didn't stop because I knew I'd stand out as a stranger and I didn't want to intrude.

In some places there were two floors of walkways next to the compartment blocks. As well as the blocks, and some gravestones going up the steep side of the hill, there were separate family memorials or mausoleums. There are several famous Ecuadorians buried in this cemetery, including some ex-presidents, but I'm ashamed to say I didn't recognise any of their names on the list that was by one of the main entrances...

I stopped at a supermarket on my way home and since I had my camera with me, I took a picture of some of the different fruit and veg on offer: