End of the Beginning

Clear skies!


A somewhat rare occurrence in Bogota, seemed to be foreshadowing my future here. This week marked my last week in La Macarena, and the impending launch of my gym and my moving into a new apartment. Finally, I can begin to have some semblence of a normal life!

I hate Roosters!


As I've mentioned, I've been living in La Macarena, on the cheap, as I get all the pieces in place to launch my business and find an apartment. One item that I've forgotten to mention is that I do not need to set my alarm thanks to a rooster somewhere in the surrounding vicinity. Unfortunately, this rooster likes to sound off at around 3:00am every day! The sun is not up, sometimes the moon is not even out, but this damn rooster is hellbent on letting everyone in the neighborhood know when it's 3:00am. At this point, I'm convinced that there is more than one rooster at work. And today, I think I've finally figured out where this rooster, or gang of roosters, is hiding out.


After sitting at the window for about a half hour, I am almost certain that the sounds originated from that area to the northwest of my location. Too bad I couldn't get a visual, otherwise I would have bought a BB gun yesterday to teach that cock a lesson!

And who sells BB guns you ask? Why, this human hedgehog fellow to the right. I went to another Canal Street-like part of Bogota today with my friend Jurgen and his son. His son needed to buy some toy weaponry for his Halloween costume, so we stumbled upon this little shop where Sonic was selling very real looking BB guns. They had sniper rifles, automatics and pistols. One of these bad boys would have come in real handy had I actually seen the rooster.

Crossing the Street.

While I desperately hope the rooster follows the chicken's lead, and attempts to cross the street only to be plowed under by a busetta, I do want to retouch on the whole crossing the street thing. I've mentioned applying frogger-like tactics to cross the highway, but I haven't mentioned normal streets. Most streets don't have "walk/don't walk" type signals. Some do. Some don't. Which begs the question, why? Well, I've stopped asking because no one knows. Instead, pedestrians and drivers disregard all known traffic customs and apply an anarchic approach to negotiating the roadways.

Moving on up...

My time in La Macarena has finally come to an end. No more Transmilenio. No more busettas. No more cold showers or long, sleepless nights at the sounds of stray dogs or those damn roosters! While at nearly $350 for the month La Macarena sure was living on the cheap, it was too inconvenient for me to last any longer. This coming week I expect to move into my, my very own, apartment in the north centrally located between all of my friends, the location of my gym and all the places we hang out.

All in all I think the experience was a very good one. I have a much more profound appreciation for the comforts and conveniences I've been afforded in my life, and will no longer take them for granted.

Who Cares if There's No Free Lunch?

As I rode the Transmilenio the other day, I looked out the window to my right and was presented the following proposition in no uncertain terms:

I mean, if that picture isn't worth a thousand words, I'm not sure what is. I haven't a clue as to validity of the sign's claim, but it definitely has shock value. It is clear, concise and doesn't bullshit around.

Double Takes.

Now, I've seen some pretty funny stuff since coming here, but this week I've seen a few things that made me stop, shake my head, and take a second look.


Example 1: Addidas?
At first, my friend and I couldn't believe an athletic Addidas shirt was only $7. But upon closer inspection, we discovered that the brand was not quite what it had appeared to be.





Example 2: Ferrari?
This one is my personal favorite. How can you go wrong, it's a Ferrari, right? Wrong. It's a Forrari!





And this one speaks for itself. A priceless original...

Colombian Time.

I've already bashed the quality of the service industry in Colombia, but I haven't touched on another aspect of Colombian culture, a complete lack of punctuality. Being on time is something that only a handful of Colombians I've met actually ever do. When someone says 8pm, they really mean closer to 9pm. And scheduling a meeting at 2pm means that by 2:20pm you can actually expect everyone to be there. And in some cases, like as with my students on some occassions, they just outright fail to show up at all.

Heaven.

But there is one place that bucks the trends of bad service, punctuality and exceeding expectations no matter how high you set them. A place that I've mentioned before, but for which no words, pictures or videos can do justice. This place is Andres Carnes de Res, and if you visit here I'll be sure we hit this adult Disneyland on a Saturday night for an aguardiente-induced night of amazement. This past Saturday was spectacular as I finally met the girl that I've been trying to meet since my birthday back on August 23rd. Known only as "the hot chick" until last night, I've seen her at Andres every Saturday I've gone, every Saturday in the park when we do our outside CrossFit WOD and even once on the street. And now I not only know her name, but also know her digits!

But first things first -- apartment, company and then girls!