I went into Barranquilla city properly for the first time, 20 mins away on a local bus. It was like entering into a different world, suddenly chain stores and comida rapido (fast food). I bought cereal from a supermarket. To counteract the offence this might cause at home I bought Miladys a present.
My family seem to have accepted that I have strange eating habits and things have improved. Vegetables do exist. I’ve seen them; lurking away in shop corners saying, “choose me”, choose me”. Usually for lunch Alex and I have rice and meat. Yesterday I had rice and a fish head. One advantage however is the animal population within houses. Every house has at least one hungry cat or dog. Laura had complained about carbs to me before I arrived and the lack of vegetables. Yesterday for lunch I had oily pasta, with rice.
The people here are friendly. One day I was walking along the street and one of my students shouted to me to come over and she invited me into her house for lunch. Her mother told me all about how much she fancies Hugh Grant and Gordon Ramsay.
Then I got an eye infection. Something flew into my eye through the window on a bus. The mother of Laura’s house suggested putting breast milk in my eye. Why milk, and why specifically breast milk I wasn’t able to fathom.
One day last week as I was leaving the school a rather dodge looking hombre started speaking to me. I softened as I noticed that he too appeared to be suffering from some sort of eye irritation. Anyway, it turned out that he is from a newspaper and wanted to interview me for the television. It seems our foreign presence here makes newsworthy material and I am on TV at 5pm three days this week. It is quite embarrassing largely because I am having difficulty communicating with the interviewer throughout much of the interview. Apparently some other news channel heard of it so I am on National TV and not just a local channel.
I have made some Colombian friends. They work at the Café in the school. This forces me to try harder at my Spanish. We have a week off school for Easter soon and they have invited us camping by the beach. I am very happy to be living somewhere where people go camping by beaches when they have a couple of days off.
The best news to recount is our weekend adventuring. We went to the famous colonial old city of Cartegena, which is two hours away by bus. It was very strange to see other gringos at the hostel and hear people speaking English. I felt somewhat sorry for the lone Argentinian guy who couldn’t speak in his own language.
My family seem to have accepted that I have strange eating habits and things have improved. Vegetables do exist. I’ve seen them; lurking away in shop corners saying, “choose me”, choose me”. Usually for lunch Alex and I have rice and meat. Yesterday I had rice and a fish head. One advantage however is the animal population within houses. Every house has at least one hungry cat or dog. Laura had complained about carbs to me before I arrived and the lack of vegetables. Yesterday for lunch I had oily pasta, with rice.
The people here are friendly. One day I was walking along the street and one of my students shouted to me to come over and she invited me into her house for lunch. Her mother told me all about how much she fancies Hugh Grant and Gordon Ramsay.
Then I got an eye infection. Something flew into my eye through the window on a bus. The mother of Laura’s house suggested putting breast milk in my eye. Why milk, and why specifically breast milk I wasn’t able to fathom.
One day last week as I was leaving the school a rather dodge looking hombre started speaking to me. I softened as I noticed that he too appeared to be suffering from some sort of eye irritation. Anyway, it turned out that he is from a newspaper and wanted to interview me for the television. It seems our foreign presence here makes newsworthy material and I am on TV at 5pm three days this week. It is quite embarrassing largely because I am having difficulty communicating with the interviewer throughout much of the interview. Apparently some other news channel heard of it so I am on National TV and not just a local channel.
I have made some Colombian friends. They work at the Café in the school. This forces me to try harder at my Spanish. We have a week off school for Easter soon and they have invited us camping by the beach. I am very happy to be living somewhere where people go camping by beaches when they have a couple of days off.
The best news to recount is our weekend adventuring. We went to the famous colonial old city of Cartegena, which is two hours away by bus. It was very strange to see other gringos at the hostel and hear people speaking English. I felt somewhat sorry for the lone Argentinian guy who couldn’t speak in his own language.
We went to a mud volcano. I think that and the pictures reveal all. It was fun. You can’t sink. You just slide around in a state of immobile buoyancy. It has enriching properties for the skin and afterwards we swam in a conveniently placed natural lake.
The next day we journeyed to Playa Blanca, which, after a local bus, boat and a half-hour moped ride, proved itself enormously. Palm trees, hammocks and moonlight swimming in the Caribbean Sea. Need I say any more?
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