Fun Facts

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Here are some fun facts I’ve learned so far about Colombia:


• Your home doubles as a garage.
I still can’t get over this one. I was sitting out front with the kids when all of the sudden, my neighbor across the street opened his front wall of his house up! Apparently, it turns into a big swinging garage door, which was also surprising. He then proceeded to take his car out of his kitchen. KIT-CHEN. You could see everything; his kitchen, his living room, and his car taking up the entire kitchen, while making the living room much smaller. My mouth must have hit the floor. Naturally, I had to share this spectacle, so I got Dave’s attention. But he already knew about this one and informed me that almost everyone keeps their car or motorcycle in their kitchen or living room. Homework: go to your kitchen and imagine your car parked there. I hope you don’t drive an Escalade.


• Ordering wine will get you hated, while ordering beer may cost nothing.
We went out for drinks one night, and Chelsea and Alexis left early to go across the street to say bye to this guy they knew that owns a posh bar there. I stayed with the boys until the bar closed, (it closed early since it was a weekday). As we were getting ready to go, the lady let us know that she really, really disliked our two female friends. She asked where they went, and we had told her they went across the street for wine and it set her off. She kept telling us over and over while motioning her fingers slitting her throat. Crazy! She then didn’t make us pay a cent for our beers! Holla! Better still, we then went across the street and Lexi’s friend hooked it up with more free beverages! One was a Maracuya Mojito (which if you know me, it is my absolute favorite fruit that I go crazy for! Major score!).


• Ordering a bottle of alcohol comes with a pitcher of water.

The cheapest kind of alcohol to order is a bottle of dark rum (vodka is not so cheap). It’s also more expensive to order juice or soda along with it. Hey, we’re all on a budget here! But if you only order a bottle of alcohol, they serve it

with a pitcher of water (ahem, your mixer), a bowl of really random fruit, and a few carrots thrown in. I suppose all of this to help with the after taste. Now I’m not a fan of watering down alcohol, but I’m also not a fan of shooting rum without a chaser and sipping on it sounds far from fantastic. Guess I’m just not that hardcore.

• Holidays come often.

The Monday of the week I arrived was a holiday. The following Monday was also a holiday. Kids are getting out of school for vacation this week, most won’t go back until February.

• You can easily hitch hike here, but I wouldn’t recommend it –even if it’s with a preist.
Jhoanna was so nice and invited me to a little coffee town of Libano. It’s located up in the mountains and about two hours away. She wanted to visit and say goodbye to one of her best friends, since she’s moving to England soon. (Jhoanna's Colombian, was my contact before I came here, and is high on the totem pole at the org. However, she's moving to England to go live with her fiance). We took a bus there without a hitch. However, returning was an adventure.

We tried to leave Libano at 5pm, so I could be back for volunteer Dave’s asado at 7pm (Dave is a chef at the Paris Casino in Vegas btw, so you better believe some good food was about to happen! Plus he made me a tasty steak dinner the night before which definitely ensured my spot at the table! Yum!). But little did we know, since it was a holiday, there were no buses going back. So we had to take a jeep which then dropped us off, and then had to switch to a semi-functioning taxi, (her brother and 14 month daughter, the two of us, plus a priest, and some woman were the other random passengers aboard).

The priest had told us he had a ride picking him up about halfway, and he would take us since we were both going to Ibague. So we got dropped off at this triangle in the jungle with a few bars/shops lining it and lots of cars going past. We waited with the Father for about 45 mins for his ride to come. But when his pimpin’ ride finally arrived, it was full of sketchy people –one was for sure a crack addict. Regardless, he still wanted to take the four of us to the next town, so we could have a better chance of finding a ride, (it’s pitch black mind you). But Jhoanna and I decided against it, there wasn’t even enough room for all of us to pile in the car, never mind the crack addicts he rolled with! So we waited a while longer, and the Father finally gave up and left. Immediately after, some random car pulled over and asked if we wanted a ride to Ibague, we declined. Jhoanna then told me how she didn’t even feel comfortable going with the priest! A while later, we managed to flag down a bus en route to Ibague. The two hour trip took 4.5 hours! But the best part, I thought I had completely missed Dave’s last asado (he’s leaving in one week), but there were cooking issues, which delayed him right up until my arrival! The dinner was ready within minutes of my return (woohoo!). Talkin’ about timing!

Side note: I got scolded by my 29-year-old male Spanish teacher…again (the first was for the hike –even he’s too scared to do the hike at the time of day we went!). He told me that Jhoanna, being Colombian, should have known that getting a bus from Libano on a holiday, and so late in the day is near impossible. In fact, the Guerillas have an order on the town of Libano that no public transportation is allowed after 6pm. They will not be held responsible for whatever happens to those traveling on the bus or taxi. Therefore, even trying to leave at 5pm is gearing towards danger. I was lectured for not questioning every little detail about the trip, making sure she was aware of any and every detail about it. He says that this is a well known fact, but it turns out he’s from Libano. So I’m thinking it’s a well known fact for the people of Libano, not of Ibague.


• Out in the country, public transportation is a jeep -which is pretty rad!

Furthermore, they most definitely pile people in and on and all around. So much so, they even have a competition of how many people and things they can stuff in a jeep, and it must drive on it’s back two wheels in order to win! Whomever can go the furthest wins. How it doesn’t topple over or how people actually survive this, the world may never know. But I definitely will be adding this competition to the list of things I need to see while I’m here! I also can’t wait to catch a ride in one!


• You can’t trust the water here.
It has pretty much been out for most of the long weekend. When I returned from my Libano excursion, the water was out and it hadn’t even rained! I’ve been told that the reason why the water goes out is because the water reserve isn’t that big, but more so because of the rain. They don’t trust the filters when it rains a lot, so they shut off all the water in the city to not take any chances. The first ones to gain water back are the rich -did I mention I live in a poor neighborhood? This means I’ll finally get water back hours, if not a whole day later. I also live on the second floor, so it takes even more time for the water pressure to build up and reach me after it has been off.



• There are a ton of stray dogs.

All of them bark. They bark at ANYTHING, and not just one simple bark. No, no, it lasts quite a while. They especially like to bark late at night and very early in the morning. All of them basically need to get shot -this coming from an animal/dog lover. Even the dogs that have owners aren’t told to shut up by them. I don’t get it! Why aren’t they annoyed too? I hope I can magically tune that sound out quickly, like I did with the early morning call to prayers each day I spent in Turkey!

• Colombians get cold easily, which is understandable considering the climate.

But their clothes for when it gets a bit cooler, at first glance, makes you think snow is coming. They make Southern Californians look like they can handle the cold! Boots, jackets with fur, tuques, scarves, etc. It’s like 75F with humidity, and they’re frozen!

• Remember that famous Colombian coffee dude with the ‘stache, poncho over his shoulder, hat, donkey, and mountains behind him? Yeah, he actually exists!!

In fact, many of them! Ever since I was little, I thought it was an inaccurate depiction of a coffee farmer. But after going to Libano, I’ve seen many look-a-likes of this dude, 'stache, poncho and all. Incredible!


• Each home has a backup water supply.

I don’t think I've explained it well enough in a past post, so I’ll explain it here. Colombian houses have this extra water supply. It’s not clean water, but it’s used for when the water goes out. For dish washing, toilet flushing, clothes washing, etc. So that dumping a bucket of water in the toilet trick comes from this supply in my kitchen. Genius. Who knew how crucial that would become.

• Minutos.

Everyone here has a cell phone, but why put credit on your phone when you can use someone else’s? You can find men on the street with this "Mintuos" sign, use their phone, and pay him a cheap rate dependent on the amount of time you’ve talked. And if you actually don’t have a phone, this works as a genius new age pay phone.

• The average age of a woman getting pregnant is 15…er, not so woman I suppose.

Unless she’s educated, which would put her at about 27. The fathers? What fathers? Most of them scram. The majority of the kids don’t even know their fathers. The mothers try to get back at their baby’s daddy by suing them for not paying child support. These fathers then get their choice of either paying child support until the child is 18 or going to jail for a year. The result? More often than not, they choose jail.

• The pride and joy for males is their car (surprise), no matter the condition (achoo-crappy-taxi-cars).

Absolutely under no circumstances may you slam a car door, as you normally would, to ensure that it’s closed and you do not go flying out. I mean this is precious material you’re dealing with here, never mind your safety. Actually, they close it so weakly here, that many don’t even wind up closing the door all of the way!

• Book drugged.

Apparently there’s a powdery drug (no not cocaine, Smarty Pants!), that some people sprinkle on your food or in your drink to drug you on a long distance bus. It has progressed even further in that they put this in an open book, slam the book shut in your face, forcing you to unknowingly inhale it without even noticing it. This drug doesn’t make you unconscious, but you lose all control and will do anything these people say; like give them your bags.

• Colombians don’t look their age, especially the females.

One guy is 11 and he looks 8. Another is 14, and he looks 18. One girl I thought for sure was 15, is only 11. One teacher is 25, and I thought she was at least 33! Another is 27 and she looks 30-32. The little ones look 3, but are really 6 or 8. It’s absolutely impossible to even estimate their age, because you wind up being so off! So be careful all of you foreign men, she'll most likely not be legal!

• Juices.

They are absolutely nuts about having their freshly blended juices here. There are so many tasty exotic fruits, and they're so cheap too! Everyone has a blender in order to make juice each day. Jhoanna even brought one over for me as she insists that I must make juices for myself. Now I’m not big into juice unless it’s mixed with hard-A, so we’ll see about that. Plus I can get fresh juice next door for “free.” To further make my point, Jhoanna's moving to England in a few weeks and is really, really upset about not being able to have her homemade, exotic fruit juices anymore!


• If you hear a store alarm go off in the city center, tighten a hold on your belongings.

This means that there's a thief (or thieves) near by! The store workers are there everyday, so they know and see all of the pick-pocketers. If they see one of them come around, they sound their store alarm to make the other stores and people aware that there’s one (or some) in the area. Genius.

• They love their skylights here.

It’s really great, I must admit. I always think my kitchen light is on and try to turn it off. However, they also put them in apartments that are located on the bottom. Say what?! Yes. They use those sort of clear bricks you would in a bathroom, and put them in a small rectangular shape. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not a giant window to the person-above-you’s floor or anything. No, it's like the same size as four large floor tiles placed next to each other. There’s some on my kitchen floor for the guy below, and I’ve seen it in other apartments as well. It’s weird at night when you can tell when someone’s home or in that room. I even caught myself trying to spy on my neighbor the other night! About a minute in, I suddenly realized that they might be able to see me looking at them, so I ran away! Creepy Neighbor Katie! Jeez!

• Food: it’s ridiculously cheap.

A steak meal and a beer is 16,000 pesos at a nicer restaurant. To you that means 8 bucks, USD! A big, juicy steak, lots of French fries, a “salad,” and a beer for 8 bucks! Nice!

• “Wait, why did she put quotes around salad?” you may ask.

Well they don’t care much for veggies here. The "salad" that was served with that fine cheap meal was literally one leaf of iceberg lettuce, a sliver of tomato, complete with some sort of oily dressing. Sorry vegetarians!

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Photos

Libano
We went out for lunch in Libano and they took me to the tiny kitchen to see the view. You almost don't see the stairs and it looks like the door is just wide open and you could just step off the edge and fall to your death.

Jeep transportation.
How many people can you pile in/on?