Guayaquil - History
Guayaquil
was first founded in 1534 by Moyano de Benalcázar, and then it was moved
with the name of "Santiago" the 25th of July, 1535.
Then came the Huancavilca Indians (PC people would say "Native
Guayaquileños", but they weren't native Guayaquileños, 
Guayaquil isn't a place, it's a state of mind) and gave the first Guayacos
"chicharrón" (they killed everyone and burned down the
city). After that, the city was rebuilt and burned again 2 times in 1536,
and finally on July 25th 1537 (Santiago's day), when Francisco de Orellana
(also called one-eyed Orellana) founded for the last time the "Muy
Noble y Muy Leal Ciudad de Santiago de Guayaquil" (Very noble and
very loyal city of Santiago of Guayaquil) at the site called El Cerrito
Verde (today "Las Peñas") beside the Guayas river. Part
of the Indians where killed, but
the other part got tired of fighting these stubborn newcomers and decided
to go along with them. This was no "güebada" (joke),
since this Huancavilca guys (and other Indians from the neighbourhood like
the Punaes), had resisted invaders like the Incas for years and never
surrendered to them.
During
her colonial history, Guayaquil had to fight every day with a lot of
problems. There was little drinking water (the Guayas river is salty most
of the year), Pirates came every couple of years to attack (did you know
Robinson Crusoe became a Pirate after he was rescued from Chile's Juan
Fernandez Island and attacked Guayaquil?), Plagues, Heavy rains, floods,
bugs, and the worst: FIRE (since there was little stone around Guayaquil,
all 
of
the houses where made of wood). Except Las Peñas, Guayaquil was
lowlands, and is between the River and the "Estero Salado", and
since there is little stone around here, they couldn't make the land any
higher, right?, WRONG. People started eating a lot of black clam (concha
prieta) and mangrove oyster, and used the shells to fill the land.
Since both mollusks are highly aphrodisiac, the population grew rapidly.
In 1537 there where 150 people, in 1600: 2,000; in 1693 : 5,000; in 1734:
11,000; in 1765: 13,000; in 1805:14,000; in 1814: 15,000; in 1820: 20,000;
1842: 23,000; 1857: 25,000; 1880: 36,000; 1890: 44,792; 1899: 80,000,
1920: 100,000,1930: 150,000; 1944: 200,000 and so on... Today, Guayaquil
has about 3.5 million people.
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