Going Back to Cali

We came back to Cali from Salento and spent New Years here. We stayed in that night, but we may as well have gone out since the fireworks and loud music literally lasted ALL night long. It's not like you can just close your windows here either (too hot) so we just stood on the balcony in awe. Much to my dismay, there was NO college football to be found on New Year's Day here. A couple days later, we did make a trip to the famous Cali Zoo. It's supposedly the best zoo in all of South America. Cesar and I would both have to agree. It was amazing. You felt like you were just walking through a savanna or a jungle.Would you ever see this in Lincoln Park Zoo?

There is this amazing butterfly house there. Colombia has something like over 10,000 kinds of butterflies, so it was very cool to see so many different kinds in such an enclosed space.

What we both noticed was that the animals were so lively and active. They weren't just all sleeping in the shade looking depressed. This little guy actually was performing for the camera, he loved the attention. In fact, he put his hand on the glass and was tapping it loudly at Cesar, which I took to mean that we should move on. He looked upset. Cesar thought it was hilarious.

We did a lot more in Cali, but I'll post those pictures another time.

And, we're back...

Well, I've been without the precious internet for over a month now, so that's my excuse for not continuing to blog. It's been super frustrating. We don't really know what the problem was, but let me just say that the internet/phone company called Telmex has a recording when you call that asks you to "hang up, then choose one of the following menu items." That's strange, because when I hang up, there is obviously no menu of options!! So frustrating. Anyway, I need to continue with my Christmas break adventure.

From beautiful Medellin, Cesar and I got on another bus and headed to Armenia. This was about a 6 hour ride, and we took it during the day mostly, so the scenery was absolutely gorgeous. I kept trying to take pictures out the bus window, but none of them really show what it looks like in person of course. We spent the night in Armenia and then the next morning headed to Salento. I'd heard a lot about Salento, I think I was the only new teacher this year to have not visited there yet. It's only about 3 hours from Cali, but I wanted to go with Cesar, which is why I waited. Armenia and Salento are in the Cafeteria, or the coffee region, of Colombia. You definitely feel like you're in the mountains, but you're also still near the Equator, so it's just the most beautiful scenery I've witnessed so far here. The town is so adorable, it has a big town square, where you can find all kinds of artisans selling jewelry, purses, wooden things, and t-shirts. After dark, all these tents are set up in the square, kind of like beer tents everywhere. Oh, and the fish they are famous for serving is the best fish I've ever tasted! During the day, there is a lot to do. There are hiking trails, waterfalls, and lots of horseback riding tours. Across the street from the place we stayed, there were horses. So, we asked if we could come back after lunch and rent two to go see a waterfall. When we got there, the horses were ready, and so was our guide...a 12 year old boy. There were absolutely no instructions given, we just were plopped on there and expected to know what to do. This was a bit of a problem for me, first of all because of the language barrier, and secondly because I'd only been on a horse one other time...and that was a ridiculously scary adventure in the Rocky Mountains in which Johnny's horse kicked mine and my horse was mad and we were on a trail about 3 inches wide on the side of a mountain. Not a good memory. This one seemed to be starting out on the wrong foot as well. No directions. Riding through the streets with cars. A 12 year old guide who doesn't understand me. And, a very adventurous boyfriend who loves horses and wants to go really fast through the mountains. Overall, a very nervewracking experience for me. Basically, our 12 year old guide had to stay right behind my horse because I was too inept to tell it what to do or where to go. I basically turned into this whiny little princess who was about to cry the entire time. I was so glad when it was over! But, as you see in the pictures, it was beautiful up there.

More of Medellin

There he is, kissing butt again. This was taken inside the Botero museum.

These next ones are all the sculptures that were outside in the plaza.

I have to explain this picture. We were walking around the neighborhood on Christmas morning, making a last stop at the grocery store I think, and we saw a guy dressed up as a clown just moseying down the street. I guess clowns have to work on Christmas in Colombia or something. Or maybe this was his costume to scare all the kids in his family get together? Who knows. It was odd, to say the least.

Just another view of the mountains in Medellin.

This one was taken in the neighborhood close to our hotel, in the plaza of course.

One of the many beautiful churches that Colombia is known for, they seem to be everywhere.

At this point, we're only one-third of the way through our trip, so there's a lot more to come...

Medellin

Cesar, being holy for Christmas.

On the balcony in Medellin. Notice I'm wearing a light sweater, my favorite kind of weather!

Our Christmas tree, located just outside of the hotel.

A view from the balcony.

Cesar, enjoying the view as well.

What can I write about Medellin? Nothing but good things. Cesar put it best when he said he "fell in love with it." The Lonely Planet guidebook, our not so accurate bible throughout the trip, said something about how Medellin may have formerly been known as the infamous home of Pablo Escobar and his regime, but is now one of Colombia's most organized and safe cities. It also said something about how you can look in any direction in Medellin and see a gorgeous view. This was definitely true, both statements. The pictures do not give it justice, it really was just gorgeous. The constant Spring-like, minus the rain, perfect weather didn't hurt either. It was so great to spend Christmas in Medellin with my boyfriend. I'd recommend it as a romantic getaway to anyone.

We stayed in a very affordable hotel suite. We wanted to have access to a refrigerator and kitchen since we knew we'd be there for Christmas and would probably want to cook a meal or two. Cesar is an awesome cook (and I have no interest or knowledge in that arena) so it works out quite well. We stayed in a really nice neighborhood called El Poblado, where there are tons of restaurants and boutiques, and a grocery store down the street that supplied many of our snacks and meals. The best part, though, was our balcony, overlooking the city. We took a million pictures of the view from up there, but none of them are as satisfying as it actually looked.

The other thing that Medellin is famous for is their hometown famous artist, Botero. There is a whole plaza dedicated to his voluptuous sculptures (I'll post pictures of that next time) and there is a museum housing many of his paintings. To get there, we got to hop on a metro train, which was fun. I believe it cost about $0.75 each way. I don't know why, but I get a real thrill out of taking another cities' public transportation, so that was a highlight for me. The people were overall some of the warmest and friendliest people I'd ever encountered in my life. There was a group of ladies standing behind Cesar and I on the metro, listening to us speak in English. They told Cesar (in Spanish) that they wanted to practice, but I think that was our stop, so it didn't actually happen.

We loved Medellin so much that we stayed an extra night, four nights in all. Much to the delight of my lazier side, we spent all of Christmas day watching a marathon of Rock of Love 2. Cesar had never seen the show, so who was I to deny him of such a treat on Christmas?

My Christmas Vacation by Carrie Regan

Just like that classic back to school essay after the holidays (which I did also assign to my students just today in fact), I thought I would share my travel adventures with my guy Cesar over the holidays. I have to do it in parts because we literally traveled for the whole three weeks that he was here. It was quite the adventure!

We started out in Bogota, Colombia's capital. I couldn't wait to get there, not only because it'd been 5 months since I'd seen Cesar, but also because I love big cities and I'd been missing Chicago a lot. We luckily were able to find each other at the airport, I'd told him to meet me at the El Corral, which is Colombia's equivalent of McDonald's.

We stayed in a neighborhood called Usaquen, which is in the North of the city. We didn't venture too far, as I hadn't researched much to do in Bogota at that point and our neighborhood seemed to have everything we needed, good food and shopping. We were only there for two nights and I knew we'd end the trip back there. The plan was to leave on day two and head to the bus terminal to catch a ride to a town halfway to Medellin, find a place to stay, and then head to Medellin the following day. What I never anticipated was that the bus terminal would be so packed with holiday travelers, that we would have to spend almost an entire day there waiting.

Let me just backtrack a bit and say that in my experience so far in Colombia, you don't have to plan ANYTHING in advance, including travel by bus. You basically just show up to the terminal and there's a bus leaving within the hour to your desired destination. In fact, I'd been told that the ticket sellers will laugh in your face if you even try to book anything as far in advance as a day before. So, with this prior knowledge, I thought it would be perfectly fine to show up mid-morning to catch a bus halfway to Medellin. I was wrong. With lines that rival O'Hare Airport at Thanksgiving, it was a mad rush to try to find even one bus company that wasn't sold out for the day and night headed to Medellin. We quickly realized that we weren't going to be able to stop halfway, as originally planned, and we had to decide if we were going to stick around so that MAYBE we could get on a night bus, or if we should just leave and go find a hotel in Bogota for another night and then get on a bus super early the next morning. The problem was, we had all our luggage with us, we had no place in Bogota to stay, and we didn't necessarily want to spend 9 hours the whole next day on a bus.

So, one guy that worked for one company, told us that he could most likely get us 2 seats on a night bus, but that we'd have to give him a little "tip" and that it wasn't a definite thing. We decided to risk it, which meant spending the next 5 hours or so waiting in a crowded, uncomfortable, metal chair. I think for Cesar this was his first experience with culture shock. You had to pay to go to the bathroom, and the bathrooms were not worth paying for, trust me. You had to bribe people to get on a bus. You had to sit across from huge families of people with their 9 kids and watch them share one meal of chicken and rice. You had to move your wheeled luggage out of the way for the gigantic carts wheeling around giant potato sacks filled with people's belongings. Maybe it was culture shock for me, now that I think about it.

Well, we did get on the night bus to Medellin as sort of promised by the guy. It was supposed to be about an 8 hour trip, give or take. What I didn't exactly expect was that the bus would be going the whole way through the mountains on VERY windy roads. I also didn't know that our driver would be passing cars the entire time, or that when you looked out the window that you would see the abyss of pitch black over the side of the mountain. I also didn't know that the switchbacks would be so severe that it would be next to impossible to sleep. The one good thing was that the seats were very comfortable and there was plenty of leg room. Needless to say, we arrived in Medellin a bit worn out from our day and night of travel. To be continued...

My apartment

Oh, the pink kitchen. It was almost the reason I refused to sign the lease, until I told myself that I don't spend that much time in there anyway, so I guess I could live with it.

This is our living room. Our apartment is two levels with the kitchen, living room, two bedrooms (both Tina's right now, but soon to be mine when we swap after Christmas break) and a bathroom. Oh, and there's a maid's room and another bathroom with just a toilet and sink. These last two rooms aren't really used, we don't have a live-in maid, but most of the apartments here have these rooms in case you do have one.

This is at the top of the stairs. Our little TV room.

These pictures are not in the greatest order, but I have no clue how to change them around. So, we're back downstairs now, this is our kitchen table which is right next to the living room.

This is a view from my balcony. It's just showing the neighborhood I guess. Behind the trees on the bottom, left corner is a corner store where I can buy a beer, a coke, chips, mayo, a banana, bread, ice cream, etc. Comes in handy when you just need a little snack.

Here's a view of the other side from my balcony. You can see where my balcony and my roommate, Tara's connect. This is also a picture of the house that reminds me of Scarface. My neighborhood is famous for having mafiosos live here, so they have to spend their dirty money somehow and so they do it by building these lavish houses with marble driveways and other unnecessary things. Fun to look at for sure.

This is the view straight down from my balcony. There is a park right there beyond those trees.

A few updated pictures of my classroom

Here's the view to the outside. I do love it that it's an open classroom. The fresh air all day makes me feel like I spend a lot of time outdoors. Amazingly, I haven't gotten a sunburn since moving here. So, I guess I'm not spending all that much time outside after all.

There's not much to say about these pictures, just a normal, messy second grade classroom. I thought at the beginning of the year, I'd never learn to get my kids to listen, but they do now. I realized that they didn't really understand anything that I was saying to them the first few weeks of school, their English was that limited. That's all gotten so much better now though. I keep these little charts at their table groups in which there are 20 boxes. I put stars inside the boxes when their whole group is listening and following directions. It's a pretty good motivator that's been working for a few months now. It's pretty funny to see them try to get into their seats with the right notebook open and pencil in hand in a rush, all of them yelling to each other, "Stars! Stars!" Oh, I forgot to mention the bribery part. When they earn all 20 stars, they get to choose a reward such as having a group picnic, computer time, play a game, or bring in a stuffed animal to put on their desk for the day. It's amazing what will motivate a second grader.