During Monday, we had another adventure in Bogota. In order to try to convert my new cell-phone to work here, we walked quite a distance, across the city, to go to the place that many other cell phone places told us could crack the code of my new Razr. Of course after walking there with her brother, his girlfriend, and her dad, they couldn´t convert the damn thing. We ended up just walking around for no reason, but it is always exciting to do that here. I didnt take many pictures since many of the parts we were walking through seemed a little sketchy to me, but I did take a picture of this one very old mall-balcony. It was pretty interesting, because it was so old. A long time back, Colombia made it not legal to build houses out of wood, but since this entire mall was built of wood, it instantly told me it was real old.
After this mall, her dad showed us this interesting row of artisan shops. I was looking to buy a hammock, but Ana convince me not to. Hammocks that are made here are very very cheap. The nicest one, decked out with special fabric, and all these decorative things, was $45. The cheaper ones, that were still large and nice, were around $15. In this artisan row it was packed with hand-made wood furniture, and every Colombian-esque product I could imagine. I didnt buy anything, but it would be an ideal place to get people gifts since it was very cheap unlike most souvenir shops in Colombia.
Monday night, me and Ana caught the last bus from Bogota to Colombia. Other than pulling around my terribly heavy suitcases, the bus ride was great. It takes around 8 hours to get to Bucaramanga, but the whole time I was either looking out the window at the interesting scenery, or was sleeping. I took one Bonnine pill (help with motion sickness) since the bus goes up and down the Andes for hours, but lucky me, the pill made me feel exhausted for the next 48 hours.
Not to be slowed down at all, I still managed to do stuff while being terribly tired. We went to this one huge mall where I bought a fan (here it is about 75 degrees ever day, but it rains off and on all the time because it's SO humid), and then I bought a coffee pot so I can have some real non-instant coffee. One thing that amazes me about here is how no one wears shorts. In the entire 4 floor mall, that was quite warm, without air conditioning (it is very rare here), I probably saw at most 5 people with shorts on, and the mall was quite crowded everywhere we went. I'm not sure if it is because it is the cold/rainy season now, and the people feel that it is cold outside, or if they just dont where shorts here. I have a feeling its because they dont where shorts, but I wear them. Even with the shorts, I always feel extremely hot here. I cant wait until I finally get used to the climate here.
One adventure I have been partaking on a lot is driving. Ana is driving her moms new early-80s Renault 4, and driving in Colombia is something that is never dull. From the countless taxis that avoid stopping...ever...to how no one cares about lines on the road, driving here is always exciting. Ana is quite good at driving here, and with the practice she has driving here, I doubt there is any road in the US that she would have a problem with.
I haven´t been taking many pictures in Bucarmanga, other than the pictures I have taken from the balcony at Ana's moms apartment. I took some nice night shots that really show-off the lights of the city, and some other interesting day shots.
Well it seems I will be here for a while, but when something interesting happens, I will be sure to make an update.
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