The South
Last week I went to visit Cally (the other Rotary scholar here) in the southern part of Bogotá. For all of you Bogotanos, she lives south of el Portal de las Americas. When I tell all of my Colombian friends where she lives, they're all like, "she's living where???!!!" You see, the south is supposed to be the "dangerous" part of town. Everybody warns me about the south, but after going there, I didn't see any reason to fear. Of course, along the way there were many places that looked pretty sketchy, but the neighborhood where Cally lives is amazing. I mean, it's definitely not New York, but rather a very simple, quiet neighborhood. There aren't many cars, the buildings are much smaller than they are in the north, and there are children of all ages playing in the streets.
I didn't feel that my life was in danger while I was in the south. I'm not saying it's not dangerous; the Colombians know better than I do in regard to safe places and dangerous places. But there's a part of me that feels like there is a certain fear between the different social classes in this country. Maybe not a fear, but more like a mutual understanding that they each have their "places" in society, and that it is not common for them to mix amongst each other, unless one side is working for the other. But I guess this can be found in all societies. However, when I was in the south, I felt really comfortable, and I felt like this little neighborhood reflected how most Latin Americans live.
The East
On Saturday I went with Cally, Vane, my professor, and another gringa on a short roadtrip to the east of Bogota, to a small city called Choachi. To get to Choachi, we had to drive the winding streets that go through the eastern portion of the Andes Mountains. The night before, we had gone out dancing and drinking, and that, along with the horrendous road conditions, did not make for a very pleasant drive. The sites we saw along the way were amazing, but my stomach was not too happy to be thrown from side to side for the hour and a half it took to get there.
Upon arrival, we walked around a bit and eventually went to have lunch at a Swiss restaurant. I had no idea what Swiss food was like (except for maybe cheesy), so when I saw "conejo en salsa de vino" I thought to myself, "Bugs Bunny! What are the Swiss thinking?!" You see, "conejo en salsa de vino" means "rabbit in wine sauce". I mean, kudos to the Swiss for being all passive and neutral with pretty much everything, but come on...rabbits?! But, since eating rabbit is evidently a Swiss custom (I'll need my european friends to verify that), I figured that I would order it. Would you believe it tastes like chicken?
On the way back, it was no longer the aguardiente sloshing around in my stomach that bothered me while we made the twists and turns of the road, but rather it was little Peter Cottontail that I was trying to keep down. And then when we were halfway home my professor decided that now would be a good time to tell us that this particular area of Colombia used to have a heavy FARC influence. And when I say "used to", I mean like 3 years ago. At this point only two things went through my mind, "please don't vomit, please don't vomit, please don't vomit," and "my parents would freak if they knew where I was right now."
First days of class
I have now finished my first two days of class. Surprisingly, I was able to drag myself out of bed at 5am both days in order to arrive on time at 7. Even more surprising, I wasn't tired during class, and I was able to pay attention the whole time. However, after these two classes I'm beginning to see just how much of a rough road it will be to keep up with everything, given my strictly-conversational Spanish language abilities. But this is exactly what I signed up for. I knew it would be hard, and that it would take me 3 times longer than the other students to finish my homework, and I'm totally up for this challenge.
Last week I went to visit Cally (the other Rotary scholar here) in the southern part of Bogotá. For all of you Bogotanos, she lives south of el Portal de las Americas. When I tell all of my Colombian friends where she lives, they're all like, "she's living where???!!!" You see, the south is supposed to be the "dangerous" part of town. Everybody warns me about the south, but after going there, I didn't see any reason to fear. Of course, along the way there were many places that looked pretty sketchy, but the neighborhood where Cally lives is amazing. I mean, it's definitely not New York, but rather a very simple, quiet neighborhood. There aren't many cars, the buildings are much smaller than they are in the north, and there are children of all ages playing in the streets.
I didn't feel that my life was in danger while I was in the south. I'm not saying it's not dangerous; the Colombians know better than I do in regard to safe places and dangerous places. But there's a part of me that feels like there is a certain fear between the different social classes in this country. Maybe not a fear, but more like a mutual understanding that they each have their "places" in society, and that it is not common for them to mix amongst each other, unless one side is working for the other. But I guess this can be found in all societies. However, when I was in the south, I felt really comfortable, and I felt like this little neighborhood reflected how most Latin Americans live.
The East
On Saturday I went with Cally, Vane, my professor, and another gringa on a short roadtrip to the east of Bogota, to a small city called Choachi. To get to Choachi, we had to drive the winding streets that go through the eastern portion of the Andes Mountains. The night before, we had gone out dancing and drinking, and that, along with the horrendous road conditions, did not make for a very pleasant drive. The sites we saw along the way were amazing, but my stomach was not too happy to be thrown from side to side for the hour and a half it took to get there.
Upon arrival, we walked around a bit and eventually went to have lunch at a Swiss restaurant. I had no idea what Swiss food was like (except for maybe cheesy), so when I saw "conejo en salsa de vino" I thought to myself, "Bugs Bunny! What are the Swiss thinking?!" You see, "conejo en salsa de vino" means "rabbit in wine sauce". I mean, kudos to the Swiss for being all passive and neutral with pretty much everything, but come on...rabbits?! But, since eating rabbit is evidently a Swiss custom (I'll need my european friends to verify that), I figured that I would order it. Would you believe it tastes like chicken?
On the way back, it was no longer the aguardiente sloshing around in my stomach that bothered me while we made the twists and turns of the road, but rather it was little Peter Cottontail that I was trying to keep down. And then when we were halfway home my professor decided that now would be a good time to tell us that this particular area of Colombia used to have a heavy FARC influence. And when I say "used to", I mean like 3 years ago. At this point only two things went through my mind, "please don't vomit, please don't vomit, please don't vomit," and "my parents would freak if they knew where I was right now."
First days of class
I have now finished my first two days of class. Surprisingly, I was able to drag myself out of bed at 5am both days in order to arrive on time at 7. Even more surprising, I wasn't tired during class, and I was able to pay attention the whole time. However, after these two classes I'm beginning to see just how much of a rough road it will be to keep up with everything, given my strictly-conversational Spanish language abilities. But this is exactly what I signed up for. I knew it would be hard, and that it would take me 3 times longer than the other students to finish my homework, and I'm totally up for this challenge.
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