Mi Conejito!

Just another pic of my Conejito or "Little Bunny". Coco's ears are so big, when they're both sticking up he looks like a little bunny rabbit, and he likes to hop around, so it's just all too cute!

Bogota Graffiti

Feliz Cumpleaños Colombia!

Today is Colombia's Independence Day and this year is the 200th Anniversary. So it's a really big day here with lots of celebrations going on around the country - including a concert with Juanes tonight in Medellin!

But this morning in Bogota, Uribe and some other government officials opened a 100 year old time capsule that had been filled and locked back in 1910! Included in the vault were -

Lots of pictures - of the governers, plans of Bogota, monuments and other notable areas of the city and a panoramic of Bogota. The lyrics and music from the 'Himno Nacional', and the "Acta de Independencia Nacional", along with 32 other documents.

Happy Birthday Colombia!

Is there something wrong with this picture?

In Bogota, the answer is NO. People "drive" their horse and buggy around all the time.

The government is in the process of outlawing it because of animal cruelty (the horses all look very old - it's really sad :( and because the horses go much slower than cars, obviously, and it REALLY backs up traffic.

Trabalenguas

Here are some spanish tongue-twisters if you need help with pronunciation :)

Tres tristes tigres tomaban
trago en tres tristes tazas.


R con R cigarro
R con R barril
Rapido ruedan los carros en el ferrocarril


El cielo esta encapotado
Quien lo desencapotará?
Quien lo desencapotare
Buen desencapotador será.

Rock al Parque

Rock al Parque has been a Bogota tradition for the past 18 years. It is a FREE 3-day music festival that takes place every year during the 4th of July weekend (which is also a 3-day weekend here).

Saturday is Metal
Sunday is Reggae and Rock and
Monday is Rock

Most of the bands are Colombian, but they do bring in a few international acts like Ky-Mani Marley (the son of Bob), and from the United States MuteMath, Shadows Fall, Biohazard, Stick To Your Guns and A Place To Bury Strangers. I've only heard of Mute Math and sadly, they were not incentive enough to put myself in the center of this...


However, I did get to meet the band 'No Te Va A Gustar' from Uruguay. They were staying at the Hotel Tequendama and Oscar drove them around for a couple of days. Nice guys with a strange but cool Spanish accent.

Chiva Party Bus

This is a picture of a typical Chiva party bus. I often see these buses downtown on the weekends. A group can rent the bus, and basically there are drinks and music and it's a party! The bus just drives around for hours.

I just found an article in the NYTimes about a company that started this in New York. It was from 2008, so I don't know if they're around anymore, but the link is here if you want to read more.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/02/nyregion/02chiva.html

p.s. Considering how car sick I get from regular driving around here, I've decided to pass on the Chiva...

A Colombian Wedding

A few weeks ago Oscar's cousin Costanza got married. The wedding took place at Oscar's grandmother's house a few hours north of Bogota (it's a LOT hotter there). I found that it was basically the same at most of the weddings I have been to in the U.S. with a few slight differences.


The first difference, the guests were instructed to wear all white - P.Diddy Style. This isn't a Colombian tradition actually, just the bride's preference.


The wedding took place at 5pm in the afternoon at this church in the center of town. It was a beautiful day.


Another difference, in Colombian Catholic weddings it is customary for the bride and groom to have a Godmother and Godfather (Madrina and Padrino) soley for the wedding. They are pictured above next to the bride and groom at the altar. They take the place of bridesmaids and groomsmen and I think their only function is to sign the wedding paper.

The ceremonly was also a lot less formal than what I am used to. Lots of gathering in the front and picture taking.

Also, after the ceremony as the bride and groom leave the church, rose petals are thrown instead of rice or birdseed.


This is a picture of the reception area, in the backyard of the house. This picture was taken before the wedding, the sun had already set by the time we returned after the ceremony. The only difference in the reception is that the introduction of the bride/groom/parents and the toasts were all done as soon as the bride and groom made there way in. After that was dinner, drinks and lots of dancing. Oh, they also had salsa performers who came to dance in the midst of the rest of us - was really cool.

This city is huge.

This is probably coming a little late in the game...I tried in vain to find a map of Bogota on the Internet that I could post, but eventually had to wait until I found someone selling them on the street. Please excuse Coco's paw in the upper right hand corner.

So here is a little orientation. As you can see, Bogota is HUGE, MASSIVE, GIGANTIC, and home to over 7 million people! But my life is pretty much encapsulated in the circumference of these various objects. Bogota's streets are numbered - Calles go North/South and Carerras go East/West. On the map N/S is horizontal and E/W is Vertical. The top part of the map, or east side of the city is guarded by a beautiful mountain range, which is also very helpful in orienting lost pedestrians in the streets (kind of like the Empire State Building in NYC...)

Silver dot - is our apartment, located at Calle 133, Carerra 58.

Two blue dots - are my jobs. Top one is the doctor's office at Calle 134, Cr. 7. The bottom one is the house of the girl I tutor at Calle 111, Cr. 51

White dot - is my school, located at Calle 100, Cr. 19. With traffic it can, and does, take me one hour every morning to get from the silver dot to the white dot.

Pink dot - is where Oscar works - The Hotel Tequendama, located at Calle 27, Cr. 7. If it takes me an hour to go a very little distance, imagine how long it can take him to get to work. That's why he leaves every morning at 5am to beat the traffic!

I hope this gives you a feel for the immense size of Bogota. I know my area pretty well, but ask me to divert slightly off the beaten path and I would be lost in a heartbeat.

Bless You!

Here there is a custom for "blessing sneezes" that brings good luck...

When one sneezes for the first time, you say

1. Salud!

When one sneezes for the second time, you say

2. Dinero!

and IF one sneezes for the third time, you say

3. Amor!

Street Light Salespeople

In Bogota at any given stoplight you can find people selling EVERYTHING. This woman happens to be selling peanuts, cigarettes, gum, chips and candy. Other people cell cell phone chargers and covers, aprons, children games, dish towels, trash bags - literally anything you could want.

Sometimes if it's a long light, they will even leave whatever they're selling on your window. If you want it, you can pay for it, otherwise they will come snatch it back up before the light turns green. They have impecable timing.

Another thing that is very common is for salespeople to come onto the bus to sell their wares. I've seen people selling super glue, batteries, pencils, hand lotion, bracelets, food, etc. It can actually come in handy if you are in need of one of those things, and they're usually a lot cheaper than you would find in the stores. The hand creme I bought was 50 cents!

36 Hours in Bogotá

The New York Times ran this article about Bogotá today in their '36 Hours in...' series. (Link is in the title)

Some of the things are must-see's like Monseratte, the Gold Museum and Andres Carne de Res. I'll have to check the rest of the things out for myself.

Really, really cheap movies

Illegally copied movies are all the rage in Colombia. They are sold in various markets around the city for like $1.00 each. You can even find first run movies, like those that are in the theater at the same time! And these aren't "guy filming while in the theater" type movies, no, these are DVDs that have all of the functions of regular DVDs, scene selection, special features, language options...

I didn't buy the movies above, because that would be illegal...but I did watch them ALL IN SPANISH!

Backup Plan, The Hurt Locker, Law Abiding Citizen, Book of Eli, etc.