Life as we know it:
-We've moved from Moth Month to Dragonfly Days (alliteration courtesy of James). But seriously, we rarely have moths now and we have 1 or 2 dragonflies a day, which I think is a lot. And Ant Año continues to plague us with no end in sight.
-We have been on a quest for good pizza because, for some reason, that seems to be the food we miss most. The pizza in Cartagena is actually alright...but not anywhere near the level of pizza in the states. But our salvation has come...Dominos opened up around the corner! Ok, really, it's like a mile away, but to us that's around the corner. We've already been twice. James thinks it's amazing, I think it still has a Colombianness about it, but I'm grateful nonetheless.
-We found a park with a freaking trampoline in it. Why doesn't every park in the states have a tramp?! Oh, liability? Right...but these are the reasons we love Colombia.
This is a terrible picture, but trust me, that's a tramp.
-We baptized the oldest gringa girl last Sunday. They were filling up the font when we came to church at 9:00, and by the time church was over at 12:00, the font had like 6 inches of water in it. They decided to start the program and see if it filled up anymore. By the time they baptized her, it had maybe a foot of water. So that was fun. But this little girl had the coolest baptism ever: 1) it was on her actual birthday, 2) it was in COLOMBIA, 3) she was baptized and confirmed in Spanish 4) both of her grandmas had recorded video talks which they played on the church TV 5) she got to be baptized in her white dress instead of one of those jumpsuits 6) she was baptized in a foot of water. Coolest baptism ever.
-We went to the aviary, which is one of the coolest things we've done in Colombia (pictures on Facebook). It was exactly how I wanted it to be...no people, cageless animals, and no supervision. Actually, it was even better, because it was surprisingly clean, well maintained and HUGE. And I could never have imagined that many different types of interesting birds if I tried. It was so cool! We went with the other gringos from our ward who have 3 girls under the age of 8. Things are always more hilarious with kids. We were the first ones in the park, and saw maybe 2 or 3 other families in the 2 1/2 hours that we were there. Right when we walked in there were 2 peacocks just chilling 5 feet away from us. Then we walked a few feet to an artificial tree full of colorful parrots. And then before we even started on the path, we saw two more peacocks, one of which had his tail spread out. These freaking birds were just right out there for us to get as close as we wanted! I loved it. I mean, we didn't really get that close, because birds are kind of gross...but still pretty exciting. Some of the birds were cute and others were super evil looking.
Also, there were giant iguanas everywhere! And, in 2 or 3 areas, they had a hammock. You know, just in case you come to the aviary to relax in the shadow of bird trees. Towards the end, we came to an ampitheatre where we assume they usually have bird shows? The stands were empty except for 3 middle-aged Colombian women and the trainers were just feeding birds on the stage. The trainers let the girls get on the stage with the birds and let everyone feed them. The birds climbed on the James' shoulder and then the girls' heads and no one was alarmed. Those trainers for sure would have let us walk around the park with those birds if we'd asked, I'm pretty sure. Things are just so chill in Colombia.
After we went to the aviary, we decided to go find the road to the fabled Playa Blanca. This is the main tourist attraction of Cartagena, even though it's an hour plus from Cartagena. But this is the thing that all of the gringos and most of the Colombian tourists do while staying in Cartagena. It's a white sand beach and i
t's usually a day trip by boat, but as we found out, you can drive there as well. James and I have contemplated going to Playa Blanca for many an occassion but it has never really worked out. I'm glad we went and scoped things out, because it is very different than I thought it would be. Playa Blanca is known for its beach vendors. We had heard that they were bad, but we think the vendors in the beaches in Cartagena are bad, so we thought it probably wouldn't be that different. Before we even turned off the main road, we had 8 guys surround the car, trying to sell us a parking spot. We didn't even stop the car to listen to them, and so 3 of them hopped on the car. Seriously. It's was so funny. The family we were with has an SUV, so the 3 Colombians just hopped on and held on, all the while shouting things at us. Now if I had been a 4, 6, or 8 year old in the backseat while this happened, I would have freaked. But I think because all of us were laughing and joking about it, the girls had a momentary scare and then were fine. Kudos to them. So we drive with 3 Colombians on our car for about 1/2 mile, and then he stopped the car and yelled at them to get off. We decided to park for a few minutes and just walk down and check it out, since we weren't in beach clothes and the poor kids had just walked around a hot aviary for 2 1/2 hours. My first impression: Man does the sun radiate off of that white sand! At this point, we still can't see the water, even though it's 50 feet from us, because there are HUNDREDS of huts looming in front of us with everything from food to hammocks for rent to beach gear, etc. It was crazy. We get down to where we can see the water and it's beautiful. But even the water was hot! And there were crazy amounts of people. And the beach vendors did seem to be extra crazy. So our overall impression was...hmmm, maybe it's worth the money to go pay for a resort with a private beach and healthy cooking conditions. I'm glad we went, because I think if we had stuck with our original plan, I would have been ultra hot, annoyed, and disappointed. Now we know!-Our neighbor gets up every morning at 6:00 AM and blows his nose for like 15 minutes. It's hilarious. Our building is actually pretty quiet...we never hear our neighbors except for through the open windows. But the power behind this guys' incessant nose blowing echos through our house a few times a day. Anyone want to send us some Benadryll so we can change this poor guy's life?
The lady at the immigration office was named Yuranis. Get it?
Differences between Colombia and the states:
-In Latin America, people from the United States are not considered "Americans"...we're either from the states or North American. People get offended if you tell them you're American. They say "I'm American too" because they live in South America. Luckily, James warned me of this before we got here, so I haven't made that faux pas. But I hear tourists say that all the time. I just think it's confusing though...my boss told one of the kids' dads that I was a North American and he asked if I was from Mexico. Yeah, because there are 3 countries in North America. But, I get it. Technically we are all Americans. But the rest of the world refers to people from the United States as Americans, so they're kind of the weird ones.
-When a building is abandoned, they block the doorway and windows with bricks and cement to prevent squatters. Not a bad idea, except I would think the property damage isn't worth it. But they also tear down the building 90% of the time, so I guess it's worth it.
-They have a "walk of Miss Colombias" (as I like to refer to it). Every beauty queen for like the last century. These Colombian teenage girls were discussing the merits of each. Why aren't American girls this excited about beauty queens anymore?
Until next time...
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