ONE!!!!!!!

My final week in Colombia:

It started with a little fiesta at a finca on Saturday. I went with all my coworkers and we had about as many bottles of alcohol as we did people. We had hired some staff to come make breakfast and lunch for us, and we stayed all day by the pool.

Saturday evening I rushed to Salento for the rest of the three day weekend. I went and did all of my favorite things, for the last time. I also did a lot of shopping for my family. I walked to the top of the mirador in Salento, one of my favorite views.





I ate trucha, and had a coffee at Jesus Martin. I went the plaza and danced with the local friends I've made. I received a poem from one friend there, to Andres' surprise! It was a three day weekend, so on Monday I was still there. I went Monday to say goodbye to my old neighbor. She is a woman in her 70s (at least)! I would always saw her walking around and she would always say hello and comment on how early she heard me get up every morning, and what a good person I must be. As I walked away from her, I could hear her repeating the story to whoever she was walking with everytime. One day she had convinced me to go inside her home to read the label on some prescription lotion her cousin had brought form the States. She wanted to know what it really said. Monday when I said goodbye to her, she started to cry, a lot. She kept hugging me and didn't want me to go. It was so sweet. I teared up a little myself.

At school the last week we had a team building day, which was a nice last day of bonding with all the co-workers. We played trust games, where a co-worker had to catch you as you fell. We played team strategy games, and talked a lot about how we could improve as a team and apply what we learned to our work. I got a little sun burnt but had a great day. The day came to say goodbye to my co-workers and it was filled with tears, starting with my goodbye to the women in the tienda, where I would get breakfast every morning. Lorena, Teresa, Marta, Diana, and all the other women who helped in there sometimes really lightened my day and life there. I will definitely miss all the people I worked with in Colombia. It was such a beautiful experience.

My second to last night, we threw a party at Dave's house. Drank Jar Rum till 3 in the morning over open fire and acoustic guitar. We graffitied the front wall of his future restaurant/bar/hostal. Behind this gentleman you will see my contribution. It says, "Pongo Aki: Buena Energia"

Two...

Another busy, but wonderful, weekend. (June 17-19, 2011)

Friday: My roommate, Rebecca and I hosted a going away party for all the foreign teachers leaving the school. This included myself, and 5 other teachers. Katie and Ann, from "Four...", my trip to Manizales. Ann´s husband John, my favorite person to argue politics with, and the Carpenters (see Blog from 2009 -July -Buena Gente). All of these people I have worked with for the last two years, and all are moving on to the next project in their lives also. Everyone except the Carpenters are going back to the States, ready to spend time closer to their families. The Carps are going to Guatemala, where they both already have teaching jobs lined up for next year.











We had a nice set up of delicious food for the party. I made quesadillas and re-fried bean dip, while Maricela, or Mexico as we call her, made salsa and guacamole. My roommate Rebecca made a cheese, meat, and cracker plate and some ranch dip to eat with veggies. Lisa and Dan made a delicious cake with the Colombian and American flags both flying proudly. Pam and Amanda made bite-size wraps and sweet and sour pork. And Cathy Carpenter brought her famous cookies. Ann, John, and Katie brought enough beer to fill up our fridge, and Dave brought my favorite liquor, Jar Rum. Pam also brought some Glinfiddich and Maricela brought some Tequila. We were ready to party.
















The turn out was great too. Rebecca and I have a pretty large apartment, and it was full of people from about 9pm until 1am. Everyone came, ate, drank, and had a good time. I have to say it went pretty much perfectly. At around 2am I put my P.J.s on, but we still had a few people who didnt wan´t the party to be over. Amanda and Ann went to the store and bought 40 beers for the remaining 15 of us at our place. At about 3am the portero (door watchman) called and said we needed to shut it down. All in all, great party!!!




Saturday:

Saturday night Andres came down to visit from Salento and we went to a Maelo Ruiz concert. (Regalame una noche) We got there early to get a table with a good view, and proceeded to wait until 2:30 am before the headliner came out! This is in typical Colombian fashion. By this point Andres and I had drank a bottle and a half of aguardiente and after about one song, I secretly wanted to go home and go to bed already! But it was a great show, it is some of my favorite salsa. And, really, we had a good time waiting, making friends with the people at the table next to us. I got a little feisty with the waitress. It was a memorable night!

Three...

MUST WATCH THIS VIDEO!!!
Oiga, Mira, Vea (popular salsa song about Cali)

Cali is one of my most favorite cities in Colombia (along with Medellin, Bogota, and Cartagena....I guess I kinda like it all....) My first year I went to visit about 10 times. The first time with my first friend from GI, Stephanie. (See previous post from 2009.) The second time with my friends Desiree and Sharon, who came to visit me. We had an amazing time, and I also had two very important firsts. One: I stayed at Hostal Tostaky (http://www.cafetostaky.blogspot.com/) The place where I have stayed every single time I went to Cali, even when someone offers me their couch. And two: I met Ed. I´LL MISS YOU ED!!!!


This trip was with one of my closest friends, Maricela. She was a new arrival this year, and we have a lot in common: music, comida picante, Spanglish, sometimes a little gossip, and more...I knew this would be my last trip to Cali, and we had never gone together, so she came with to do all my favorite things! First and foremost, to stay at Tostaky and get comfortable there.


About an hour after arriving, we were in our dresses, and looking good. We were ready for the number one thing to do in Cali, Colombia: SALSA!!!!! My favorite club is TinTinDeo. (http://www.tintindeo.com/ If you watch the video for a while, it will show people dancing, give you an idea of what it is like.) I went to lots of different salsa clubs before TinTinDeo, and none after. It is the best place for one main reason: you get asked to dance by lots of different people, and all they want to do is dance. We were there about 10 minutes before we both got asked to dance. Since we were two girls alone, we barely stopped dancing the whole time. Unfortunately neither of us had a camera, so no pics from that night. My favorite group of dance partners for the evening was a group of men older than my dad, but, wow, did they know how to dance! The owner of Tostaky came by for a while, so we sat down with her and her friends at the end of the night. I think that 4 hours of salsa dancing balances out the small bottle of rum Maricela and I drank between the two of us. Although, the next morning I found out that was not the case.

At about noon I finally crawled out of bed and Maricela and I went to my breakfast place of choice. (As you can see, I have a pretty specific routine that I follow when in Cali.) The italian bakery, Pan Dolci, is close enough to Tostaky to walk there. It was too late for breakfast, so we had lunch, but it was as delicious as always. After that we went by the ATM, where we had another encounter with Colombia kindness. After stopping at the ATM, we crossed the street and began walking to see El Gato del Rio. (See previous Cali post from 2009 for pics last time I was there.) Suddenly, a man is running to catch up with us. It is the police officer (or soldier, Im not sure which) that we saw standing guard by the ATM. He handed over Maricela´s wallet, full of cash from our recent stop. Apparently when we ran across the street to avoid crazy Colombian traffic (See post "Four...") her wallet had bounced out of her open purse. It looked like it may have been run over. He had dashed into the street to return her wallet safely to her, credit cards, identification card, cash, everything. I guess he is a police officer (or soldier) so he is supposed to be honest and do wonderful things like that, but obviously a life saver for Maricela. That would have put a serious damper on the great time we had been having so far.

After El Gato del Rio, and all of his girlfriends, we went to El Parque Artesanal, another place that I think I have gone EVERY time I`ve been to Cali. It´s where I always go to get gifts for friends, family, and myself. It has a lot of handmade jewelry, musical instruments, wall hangings, hammocks, scarves, etc... I got a lot of my final stash of gifts for the final trip home this time. Not to mention, I got an oversized ring for myself too.

Later that evening, a friend of mine, Rita (who taught with me in Armenia last year), was throwing a party at her apartment. They had rented the event room of their building, which was actually a large patio with open air. Did I mention that the weather in Cali is wonderfully hot year round? Worst case scenario, it is too hot, and very rarely, it rains. We ordered pizza while we helped them set up for the party. They rented a DJ and had piñata. (Piñatas, by the way, are one thing that Mexicans do much better than Colombians. Here, piñatas are really just decorated boxed with strings at the bottom to pull the thing open if you want to get real lazy about it.) Rita always throws great parties, and this was no exception. Actually I have to say, it may be the best show I´ve seen from her yet. At some point in the middle of the night we got shut down by the neighbors, who called security. Lasted a lot longer than it would have in the States, but we were all still disappointed. (Stay tuned for the upcoming video of Rita and Sam´s Blasian Invasion, I Want to Date a Billionare video.)

As this was NOT a three day weekend, the next day we had to bus it back to Armenia. Sunday night I graded my final exams (No more grading for me!!!!) and went to bed early for work on Monday. Monday was closing ceremonies at school, where I gave away the official awards for Math and Science. It is always so nice to give those awards, so I decided this year to give everyone in my class (those who weren´t exempt from any exams for good grades, so the students who don´t usually get awarded) some kind of certificate from Most Improved to Best Laugh to Most Dramatic. Some of them had to be repeated, I mean, come on, I couldn´t possibly come up with 40 unique adjectives! It was a goodbye to many of my students. I will see a few around town before I leave, but that was the last time I will see some of the faces that have been such a big part of my life for the last year. It is a funny relationship between teacher and student, I am quite sure I am more attached to them than they are to me. I didn´t cry, but a couple of hugs did tear me up. Both years here have been challenging, but I really feel like I ended on a good note, and a big part of me wants to stay another year or two until I can really perfect the improvements I´ve made. Teaching is a profession I will do again someday, but maybe not for a while.

Four...

My three day weekend: June 3rd-6th, 2011.

Friday: School is out at 3:05 pm. Usually I have to stay after and finish some things, but this was the last regular Friday of the year and I was out of there as soon as the bell rang. Me and two coworkers, Katie and Ann, decided to take a trip to Manizales. This is a town about 3 hours from where I live in Armenia. We hopped off the school bus to wait at the bus stop. We weren´t there 30 minutes when a minivan stopped and asked if we wanted to go to Manizales. Normally, people take big buses to Manizales, but the price was the same and we thought we might get there even faster in a minivan, so we got inside. Shortly after getting on the bus we passed by something I have never seen in Colombia, traffic police.

This might be a good moment to comment on the driving of the average Colombian. I have always understood road signs in the country to be a suggestion, not really a rule. Nobody makes a complete stop at stop signs and everyone goes as fast as they want, sometimes right through red lights. This is why I was so surprised when we drove by police with radar guns!!! I have seen some of the craziest driving here, and we get pulled over for going a little over the speed limit. Well, luckily, it is South America and a little $$ in the hands of the police officer and we were on our way again. I was told by another passenger that the 50.000 pesos ($25) we spent on our tickets is the money he used to bribe the cops!

Im only 20 minutes into the first evening of my weekend and already on the third paragraph....this could be a long one....

After the incident with the police, the man did not slow down, and definitely did not stop passing other vehicles, not even on dangerous curves. One of my coworkers was about the stick her head out of the window a couple of times on the trip. FYI, most roads in Colombia are very windy. The countryside is full of mountains. The Andes mountain range branches into three smaller ranges here, so the entire country is separated by mountains. Anyone with a weak stomach would have trouble traveling around in buses here. Luckily, years of bouncing around in tractors and swathers over prairie dog ridden fields, I am not one of the those people.

Anyway, we did finally get to Manizales after 2.5 hours and took a cable car right up to our hostal, Base Camp (http://www.basecampcolombia.com/). We immediately went upstairs on the balcony for beers and made friends with the new manager, Rose. Rose is from Denver, but had been living in Guatamala working at the Base Camp there for the last 2 years. We invited her to come with us to the hot springs later that evening.

Around 7 or 8pm the four of us (Rose in tow) got in a cab to go to the Tierra Viva hot springs. There are actually quite a few locations around Manizales with natural hot springs, ranging from trashy to day spas with massages and facials and everything else. Tierra Viva is a nice hot spring, not too expensive, and (most importantly) has a good bar with mojitos, margaritas, and caipirinhas. It was a hilarious time, with many different characters in the pool with us. A couple drunken older men, who wanted to come speak broken English with us (even though we could have understood their Spanish better). A young man was falling asleep in the warm water, and a few minutes later using the tube of sulfurous water to spray his friends, and also a little on us. (After a few caipirinhas, I was not going to let that slide and told him and his friends that it needed to stop.) Shortly after that we saw a young woman crying in the corner. First we speculated about why she might be crying, but then decided we needed to know. I went and asked her. It turns out that her boyfriend was the one who had fallen asleep earlier and then sprayed sulfurous water in our eyes. She wanted to go home and he wouldnt´take her. I gave her the rest of my drink and invited her to join us. At first she was hesitant, but definitely glad she did later. He was jealous that she was having so much fun with us, and wanted to leave only a few minutes after we started chatting.

Besides the crazy characters in the pool, it was also great to spend quality time with two of my friends who I have worked with for two years and wonder when I might see again. The hot springs were supposed to close at midnight, and we were the last ones in the pool. The owner had to come ask us to leave. We asked if it was already midnight, and were told it was almost 1am. We had to get out of the warm water and into the cool mountain air to get dressed and go back to the hostel to sleep.

Saturday: The next day we explored the city of Manizales a little on foot, and then took a bus back to Armenia. I quickly went home, switched the clothes in my bag for some fresh ones, and got a bus to Salento.

Salento is where I was living for 8 months this year. It is only a 40 minute trip from the north part of Armenia, where I live and work. I had to take the bus every day both ways, but it was worth it to live in this little Colombian town, frozen in time. Salento is a little cold, and almost always rainy. It might not sound like paradise, but it is set on top of mountains that have more shades of green than my own imagination could create. If you walk in any direction you face a gorgeous view, usually of the valley below and the rocky river that runs through it. It is a place I visited frequently my first year, and after making some friends decided to move there for my second year. I ended up moving back to Armenia for the last 3 months of my stay in Colombia, but still visit a lot.

This weekend I had planned to visit my friend Dave, who has recently bought a house in Salento and is turning the place into a hostal/bar with the help of the two Dans, his brother and his friend. The hostal is still not quite up and running, but they are getting close. We had a very successful fundraiser the weekend before. I was the bartender of the party, which I enjoyed immensely. All my friends from work came for burgers, drinks, and a sunset bonfire.

This weekend, it was Dan´s (the friend) last weekend, so I came up to celebrate. On Saturday night we had a few "Jar Rums" as we watched an electrical storm light up the night sky. It wasn´t raining at all, just making a display of white light across a cloudy sky. After we had thrown back a few, we headed to the plaza. Salento was packed full of tourists, Colombian and foreign. The soldiers were putting on a musical performance on a stage, and we even found a tent giving away free beers. A pretty lucky night! We walked up to the mirador, met up with Andres and some local friends, and danced in the plaza until the bars closed.

One of my favorite parts about Salento is drinking in the plaza. Salento is a small town, about 3000 people. I am from a town about the same size, but the night life doesnt even compare. In Salento, the whole town goes out on the weekends. From 18 (or a little younger if they can get away with it) to 75 years old, everyone goes to the plaza. There are about 4 bars and people can jump from bar to bar, or stay on the benches in the park. The people are very generous with their drinks too. In the states we get very upset at anyone who comes out and doesn´t bring enough money to buy their own drinks. In Colombia, you buy a bottle to share it. If you go out in Salento and don´t get offered a shot of Aguardiente by someone, I would be shocked.

After the bars close, as per usual, we grab some street food and head for bed. Night´s over, and a total success. :)

Sunday: The next day I awoke to the boys telling my that breakfast was ready. Probably the company I keep is the number one reason to love Salento. After a nice breakfast I was feeling pretty good. Hot springs, a night on the town, and I still had two days left of my weekend :) I started helping Dave transplant some vegetables from the green house to the garden, and did a little weeding. Then we decided to finish painting what will soon be the kitchen. I was pretty impressed with myself for having partied until the bars closed and still having the energy to garden and paint the next day. Our friend Hemmo stopped by to visit us in the late afternoon. He owns a hostal in Salento, TraLaLa, a place I have helped him watch a couple of weekends. http://www.hosteltralalasalento.com/ Turns out, Rose, from Manizales, is coming to visit us in Salento for a couple of days!! She decided to stay at TraLaLa, as per my recommendation.

That evening the boys cooked a delicious pasta and the neighbors brought over a nice "picada", grilled beef, tomatoes, sweet plantains, etc... The Colombian neighbors had come to let Dave know that they really care about them, and if Dave or Dan ever need anything they would love to help. Another example of Colombian hospitality. After the feast and a couple "Jar Rums", I went out to meet Rose. I had to get up early for a hike the next day, so I went home after only a beer or two.

Monday: When I went to get Rose the next morning, she had stayed out dancing until the bars closed the night before, and had taken advantage of the Salento hospitality with multiple shots of Aguardiente. But the brave girl got up and went on the 5 hour hike with us anyways! A few friends from school came up to Salento and we took a "Willies" jeep to Cocora Valley!

Cocora Valley is a national park in Colombia that I have been to multiple times now. My favorite hike (and the one we did Monday) is to Acaime. Acaime is little house on the top of a mountain that has a lot of hummingbird feeders, and thus, a lot of hummingbirds. In the last 2 years I have seen a massive growth in tourism in Cocora and Salento both. When I first came to Acaime the only thing they served was agua panela or hot chocolate. (Agua panela is like a tea made of panela, which is kind of like brown sugar.) They were building a hostel there. Now it has a complete hostel, and even serves chorizos and arepas! It is a 5 hr hike, if you go at an easy pace. The funnest/most dangerous part of the hike is crossing the river...on a log. I´ve gotten comfortable with it now, but I have crawled it before.

FINAL WEEKS: The countdown begins....

I know. It´s been awhile.

In the last two years I have fallen in love with Colombia. A big part of me wants to stay, but I´ve decided to go home at the end of this year. I don´t know if it´s the long time so far away from home, or the influence of the Colombian culture and how close their families are, but I miss my family like I never have before. While I am very sad to be leaving this beautiful country, amazing people, and wonderful life, I am very happy at the idea of being at home. I am moving back to my hometown, Lakin, KS, population: 2300. I plan on living at home with my parents and working on the farm for a while. It´s funny, 10 years ago I graduated high school and couldn´t wait to experience something totally different. After two semesters abroad in Argentina and Brazil, 3 years in Chicago, and 2 years in Colombia, I think I have acheived just that: the farthest thing from life in Lakin. Now, I can´t wait to get back home. I guess what they say is true, the grass is always greener...

I haven´t blogged for a few reasons, highest on the list being work. As mentioned in previous blogs, teaching is a time consuming profession, that never really ends. The more "great ideas" you have, the more hours and hours of work you have.....Another reason is that it is fun to start a blog in a new place because everything is so strange and you want to share it with your family and friends. But after a while things become normal, and the people you spend time with everyday are the ones you begin to share more of your life with. I have made such amazing friends here, and since I haven´t been blogging, they have been the ones to tolerate my endless stories about myself and hours of venting about work. Lucky them ;)

So, I´ve decided that I will do a final series of blogs about my last 4 weeks in Colombia. Hoping to get details about my life here written in history, so that long, long after the brain cells holding this information have been spent (which, who are we kidding, can´t be more than a couple of years from now) I can remember this wonderful time in my life, this gorgeous country, these incredible people....everything.

BOGOTA : The Things You Can Learn on a 4-hr Bike Tour!!! BOGOTABIKETOURS.COM

I wanted to write this down before I forgot any names or details....So, its really for me, not necessarily for anyone else, but if you read it, I hope you enjoy/learn something from it! Learned all of this in 4 hours biking through Bogota, mostly La Candelaria. BOGOTABIKETOURS.COM <----HIGHLY RECOMMENDED BY ME!!!

Before the Spanish came here, the area was a swamp region inhabited by a people called the Muiscas. They built their homes out of wood and leaves, so there aren´t really any ruins to see. The highest Chief lived in the area of Bogota now called La Candelaria. His home had the best view of the swampy plains that spread out to the west, and was protected by the high hills to the east. His home was, of course, chosen as the site for the first Spanish town square. It is called El Chorro de Quevedo after the Spanish priest Quevedo who worked in the church there. Chorro means a strong stream and this is where many rivers came down from the hills (these "hills" would be mountains in Kansas) and was a well for the early colonial people.





The Muiscas worshipped the hills because the sun would rise every morning behind them and also the water came from the hills. So the Spanish, in their attempt to place their ideas right on top of the indigenous ones, placed a large church on top of one of the mountains, and a statue of the Virgin Mary on the other. The hill with the church is called Montserrat and you can take a cable car ride to the top, which I plan on doing tomorrow. The alcohol of the Muiscas is chicha, made from fermented corn. It was outlawed by the Spanish colonists because they couldnt tax it since the Muiscas could make it at home. Even after it was outlawed many people would still drink it so the Spanish also created a campaign saying that it made you stupid, crazy, etc... Clearly the campaign failed as you can still drink chicha in Bogota today. Also, have not tried that yet, but will probably do so tonight. There are still Muiscas people alive today, but they live in the cities and maintain very few of their original traditions.


I learned all of that at the first stop on the bike tour....which was at El Chorro de Quevedo.

The second stop was the second, and what ended up being the main, square of the city. As with most Southamerican towns and cities, the square is the political and religious center of the town. It is created first and the town is built out from there. This square has a HUGE church that takes up one side of the square. It is not the original church that was there, actually I understand that none of the building are the originals. The next building looking around clockwise is the Congress. Apparently this building began construction in the 1800s and took over 80 years to complete because a liberal had started its construction but everytime there was a political change to conservativism the construction stopped. The going back and forth delayed its completion. Today the building was decorated by some artist, who my tour guide did not give me the name. It was covered in giant ant sculptures...Im not sure what it meant, but it made me feel like there was a plague, or that I was in a science fiction film...cool, but kinda creepy.


The next building is the mayor´s offices, which was huge also and had a very large Frech influence in its architecture. There wasn´t much to tell about that building, but the judicial building has a very interesting and recent history to tell.








The judicial building is the newest construction on the square. In 1985 some guerrillas took the old judicial building hostage with hostages in tow, and began making demands. The president at the time, Betancourt would not negotiate with them because it was terrorism. The guerrillas did let a few hostages go, but eventually the government bombed the whole building, hostages, guerrillas, and all. The hostages that were let go were assumed to actually be guerrillas themselves, and tortured for information. The most interesting part to me was that Betancourt, a few years later, got two of the biggest guerrilla groups to lay down their weapons through peace talks, and promising not to prosecute them for the crimes they committed. It may seem extreme to not prosecute murderers, but to have thousands of citizens put down the weapons they were using to terrorize their country is a pretty big deal. I asked my tour guide if he thought that a president could do that with the FARC and he said no, because the FARC is just a drug-dealing business with a political statement as a mask.


Caddy-corner to the square is a house that carries a very interesting history as well. During colonial times some young men who were sons of the Spanish men with indigenous mothers. They felt like they should be treated as well as a Spanish man, but were discriminated against. So one Saturday when the square was crowded with people they went to the house of a high ranking Spanish man to ask if they could borrow a flower pot. (I dont know if lending flower pots was a common practice at the time, but I have to assume it was.) The man said no and said something to the affect of, "And I will poop on you all" So the young men started a riot which eventually led (after 9 years of fighting) to the Colombians independence from Spain in 1810. That means this will be the 200 yr anniversary of Colombians independence, July 20th.

Bolivar is the man given much of the credit for freeing Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela from the Spanish. He wanted it to all be one big country, but some people did not agree. I saw his house and where he escaped when he was attacked and they attempted to murder him. He escaped out the window and down the street to his mistress house. Bolivar was apparently a very short man. The main square is named Plaza Bolivar. I think a man who had such a large affect on the world sounds like a biography I should read.

The second most popular square is affectionately called the Park of the Unemployed because many unemployed people spend their day on the benches just hanging out. There are a few interesting things about this square. First of all, the founder of the city used to live here. His name was Gonzalo Jimenez de Quesada. He founded this city because he had heard that the Muisca people had built an entire city of gold. This was not true, but ironically enough, right next to where his house used to be is the famous Museo de Oro, or Gold Museum.



The other interesting thing that happened near the square is the assasination of Jorge Eliecer Gaitan in 1948. He was a revolutionary politician that was thought to be as good as elected in the coming election. He was for the liberal party and inspirational to the middle and lower classes. He was also of a stronger indigenous bloodline, so one of the few politicians who was as brown as the people he was going to represent. He was shot on a public corner and his death created riots in the streets of Bogota. Much of La Septima had to be rebuilt becuase so much was burned to the ground by the riots. Many people believed he was shot by someone hired by the conservative party who didnt want a liberal candidate, and much less a person of color. The official report was that he was shot by an individual, but most don´t believe that story. His death created a new fire behind the fight between the two parties which continued for decades. He is now the face on the $1000 peso (approx value, $0.50). Another biography Id like to buy.

Other interesting figures:



Salmona - An architect who built three really cool things that I saw. He built the newest building in La Candelaria, which is a historically protected neighborhood and generally wont let any new constructions be built. It was a really cool construction with about three stories and a lot of walkways and open areas. It was inspired by the idea of having places that anyone could go into and not discriminating against anyone. The stores inside still have doors, but there is a lot of public space that is just open. He also constructed a memorial for the river down Jimenez Avenue (named after the founder of Bogota). Jimenez Avenue used to be a river, but once it dried up they built a road on top. Salmona built something, I don´t know how to describe it. Its kinda like a river, or fountain, or waterway that goes all the way down the side of the road. Its the thickness of a sidewalk and filled with water. He also built these beautiful tall apartment buildings that were right behind the bullfighting arena.








Pola - A woman who worked as a house keeper for the rich colonial settlers and was a spy for the freedom fighters. There was a beer brand named Pola and apparently the young people will refer to going to get a beer by saying lets go get a Pola. When I googled her I couldnt find any information, but I only remember her nickname, her real name was something like Polinsida or something I dont even remember. I suppose a biography of her might be hard to find, but I sure would like to.





Last but not least:


Antonio Narino - a freedom fighter for Colombia who also used to live in Bogota. He translated the Bill of Rights of the French Revolution into Spanish. He then made fliers and was passing them out to the people of Bogota. The Spanish made it illegal and arrested him. From jail he wrote many things against the Spanish and when ... When he got out he again fought for independence for the country and its people. He was eventually shot by the government with other freedom fighters in what is now the Park of the Unemployed as an example to other rebels.




Editors note: Since writing this the day I got back from the tour, I did go to the top of Monserrate. It is an amazing view and a fun ride. If I had more time, I would like to hike it. I did NOT, however, have a chance to drink Chicha. Definitely my only regret of the trip. I went to Salmona's library/bookstore in La Candelaria and could not find a single book on Policarpa Salavarrieta (I found out La Pola's actually name.) They had a few books on Gaitan, but they were all long, dry, historical accounts of his life. Since I was getting it in Spanish, those looked like hard-reads to me. There was a large and diverse selection of Simon Bolivar's books, so I decided to start with him. I found one called "The Bolivar of Marx: Critical studies of Inex Quintero and Vladimir Acosta." It's in Spanish of course, but it's short. What I liked most about it is that Marx didn't like Bolivar, so I think I am getting a very well rounded book. Only about 10 pages in so far, but so far, so good.

Flat Freddy the Fourth Grade Fish

My friend's fiancee's sister's son, Shane, is in the 4th grade. (I've been really wanting to say that.) Some of you may have heard of Flat Stanley, if not, google it (that's what I did). Well, at River View Elementary they're making Flat Freddy to send to the people they know all over the world. I not sure if its a contest to see who sends Flat Freddy the furthest, but if so, I think we've got a shot at winning!!!

Here's a little information about Colombia for Shane's fourth grade class:



Colombia is in the Northwest part of South America, the second most populous country in South America, and the only country in South America with both Pacific and Atlantic Coasts. The climate around the country is very diverse. The beaches in the Caribbean are unforgettably beautiful, and the Pacific coast has whales, surfing, and lots of wildlife to see. The equator runs through the Colombia, but there are mountains so tall here that they are covered in snow. The weather here is what you call PERFECT where I live, in Armenia. It is 60-85 degrees Fahrenheit year-round. Nearby Armenia is the National Park, Valle de Cocora, or Cocora Valley. It gets a little chillier there because of the altitude, but while hiking I usually stay warm enough to walk in a T-shirt.

Colombia has had a lot of bad press over the last few years, some of it legitimate, but most of it exaggerated. Things have changed a lot since Uribe was elected president in 2002. Its safe to travel, for Colombians, foreigners, and Flat Freddys.



I've been teaching 6th grade here for a few months, and I am really enjoying myself. The kids are fun, and we took a few pictures together with Freddy. I think Freddy learned a lot in my class!!! Quiz him on the Periodic Table of Elements when he gets home!

We had a great time, and hope you like the pics.