Devil Went Down to Bucaramanga

26 de agosto 2016
Bucaramanga, Santander, Colombia

Two posts today!  It's been a busy week of adventuring for me.

The other day we all received an invitation to an event in the arts festival.  One of the board members had brought a bunch of these flyers to distribute to the teachers.

Blues musicians from the USA?  Here?

Sounded like a fun and interesting evening, not to mention out of place here in Colombia, land of salsa, bachata, and rumba.  We had to go.

Colleen and I decided to take the Metrolinea (the public bus system here in Bucaramanga).  This turned out to be a bigger adventure than we had planned for.  First off, the maps aren't the clearest.  They don't show every stop; only the major ones.  There isn't a map posted with the lines compared to the streets.  Despite Bucaramanga's streets being numbered rather than named, the stops are named rather than numbered.  We asked a Metrolinea worker, but she was not entirely sure which route we should take (she said P1 or P2 probably).  Then, a man saw us looking at the map and came up to us and (in English!) whipped out his Waze app to try to help us figure out which line to take (he said T1 or T3).  Armed with his knowledge, we walked onto the bus platform and found where the T1 picks up.  We waited for a while, looking at the maps on the wall some more, until a bus came.  This bus was PACKED.  There was no way we were getting on.  

We decided to stake out a better spot in line for the next bus.  As we stood at our improved vantage point, a small woman decided to take us under her wing.  She looked at our invitación, and we told her that the Centro Cultural del Oriente was near the Parque Centenario (people tend to know where the big parks are, if nothing else).  She confirmed that we would get on the T1, then get off at San Mateo.  This would get us close, but it would still be a walk or a taxi ride from there.  We thanked her for her help, and squeezed onto the bus as it finally arrived.  I'm sure most of you have seen those crazy videos of subways in Tokyo where people are packed so tightly the workers need to shove people in so they can shut the doors.  This was very near to that in terms of packing density.  Luckily, by the time our mama-duck friend reminded us that our stop was next, many of the people had gotten off, so we could disembark with relative ease.  

Mama-duck came off the bus with us, and told us that we were at the corner of 15th and 30, and we wanted to get to 19th and 31.  It would not be a long walk, but at that time of evening it would not be safe.  She flagged down a cab for us and told him where to take us.  We confirmed the address and gave the taxi driver the address on the invitación.  

The taxi driver had the Union Jack pinned to his ceiling.

At long last we arrived at the cultural center!  The place was beautiful, but we didn't look around much as we hurried over to the chapel (it was 6:45 already, and our invitación had said the concert began at 6:30).  Luckily, they did not look to be in any danger of starting soon.  Colleen and I had not eaten dinner, so we decided to spend our newfound time eating snacks from the cultural center's cafe.  

As we sat and ate our snacks, Kate, Ryan, Dan, and Rosa all trickled in and joined us.  Around 7:00pm, we heard the Colombian anthem start playing from the Capilla, so we found our seats (and stood).  Once the Colombian anthem was over, we remained standing for the Santander anthem.  (They really like their anthems here.  At assemblies at school, we get a THIRD anthem after these - the school hymn.)  After the anthems, someone spoke about the Cali Blues & Folk Festival, then a representative of the mayor discussed a bunch of political things that were not relevant to the concert, and then FINALLY, at 7:15pm, they welcomed Sherman Lee Dillon on stage.

He started off with some folk music on his banjo, including "Oh Susanna," which he invited everyone to sing along to.

Sherman Lee Dillon tried really hard to get some audience participation through the language barrier (he did not speak Spanish) - he spoke very slowly and with lots of gestures.  It's gotta be tough performing in a different country like this, but he was great and really wanted everyone to enjoy themselves as much as he was enjoying himself.

After a few songs on his banjo and his cool metal guitar (apparently it's called a slide resonator guitar!), he called up his son, Andrew Dillon, to join him.  Andrew Dillon had a hell of a voice and played a mean fiddle.

An amazing father-son duo

They were fantastic performers, and they ROCKED "Devil Went Down to Georgia."  They are 100% from Mississippi (which in Spanish is Misisipi...I feel so lost looking at that word now) as they kept mentioning several times throughout the concert.  Almost every song they played was written and first performed in Mississippi, and most in their hometown of Jackson.

For the last few songs, they brought up two more people to complete their band, Carlos on the bass guitar and Sebastian on the drums.

We're gettin' the band back together!

With the full blues band, they were able to get into some of the deep, soul-wrenching blues that makes you want a beer or makes you want to dance your troubles away (or both!).  When they were done with their last song, a lady behind us started shouting OTRA OTRA OTRA (ANOTHER ANOTHER ANOTHER) and everyone else started chanting with her, so we got an encore!

After the encore, we were all invited to the courtyard for a fiesta con vino, which was pretty amazing.  How many free concerts have you been to where you got free wine and got to hang out with the artists afterwards?  We talked to Sherman Lee and Andrew and found out that Andrew is actually an elementary school music teacher, he's just joining his dad for a few concerts on the tour route before he goes back to school.  It was a great event, thanks mystery board member for the invitación!

After the concert, we went to go find a beer and chat a bit.  The tienda on the corner was already closed, so we went to the Hotel Floridablanca (interestingly not in Floridablanca, but in Bucaramanga) and bought a round.  The weirdest part of this place was that they did not have bachata music blasting so loud you can't hear yourself think - a staple in any place you can grab a beer around here.  Dan asked about it, and the hotel man said they didn't have speakers.  This place was pretty rough around the edges; it looked like the kind of place you buy prostitutes or drugs.  Luckily, we were in a huge group of 9 of us, so strength in numbers.  We didn't want to walk any farther away in that neighborhood.  After our beers, we all grabbed taxis and made it home safe and sound.

Colleen and I stopped to grab a slice a pizza at the place on the corner by our house, and when we walked upstairs, our neighbor's cat was waiting for us to open the door, scratching at the door as we put our keys in.  As soon as we opened the door a crack, she ran in.  She begged, so we gave her little pieces of meat from our pizzas, and we decided to name her (if she's going to keep coming over, she's got to have a name).  We debated on a few names, but decided it had to be something Colombian, so we settled on Pía. Pía hung out for a while, but we wanted to go to bed (it was late and we still had work in the morning!) so we had to put her outside.  It was POURING rain, so she was not pleased.  We left her with a little bit of meat and quickly shut the door so she couldn't come back in.  I felt so bad.  She was waiting for us when we woke up this morning and tried to come in as we were leaving for work.  She's adopted us. 

Art and History

26 de agosto 2016

Bucaramanga, Santander, Colombia

A few days ago on Tuesday, I went with a couple of my teacher-friends to Bucaramanga.  We had heard about an art exhibition and wanted to see what there was to see. 

It appeared to be a class exhibition; all the pieces were furniture found in a bedroom with pen ink drawings.

All the drawings were a bit surreal, and some were a bit creepy.  Perhaps they were dreamscapes?  This cat came from a dresser with very Tim Burton-esque drawings on it.

The exhibition was cool, but with 9 pieces it was smaller than we had expected (well, smaller than Dan and Rosa had expected; all I knew prior to our adventure was what Colleen had told me: "We're going to an art exhibit.  I think it's by a park."  For those of you unaware, Bucaramanga is called "The City of Parks," so you can imagine how helpful that statement was.)

After the art exhibition, we decided to caminando (walk around) the city a bit.  We walked around the shopping center area, where the streets are pedestrian-only and are full of people selling their wares - everything from fresh juice and fruits to books to a multi-purpose kitchen tool that rolls and cuts your empanadas just right.  We almost got run down by 4-5 people running with giant styrofoam boards full of knock-off sunglasses (the cops had found them).  Between the carts and tables of peddlers were more of the painted hormigas culonas statues.

These were among the few that still had all their pieces - most were missing their heads and/or wings.  Thanks vandals, this is why we can't have nice things.

We bopped around some more, and then Nestor realized that we were near the Santander History Museum (located in an old house of Bolivar's), so we headed over there.  At the door, a little old man was taking down the flags bordering the entrance; closing up shop.  He did let us in though, at the low price of $2.000 (FYI, 3 mil [thousand] Colombian pesos is approximately 1 USD).  

El Liberatador, Simón Bolivar

As we walked through the museum, the little grumpy man turning lights on as we entered (or 5 minutes after we entered) each successive room, it became clear that this was not a sustainable way to preserve these artifacts. Like many buildings here in Colombia, the boundary between outside and inside was blurred; many of the rooms did not have doors, or had large open-air windows to the courtyard.  There was no attempt at climate control, and many of the artifacts (including a few prints) were in direct sunlight for at least part of every day.  The cases they were in did not prevent the sun or air from entering either.  In a few generations, many of these artifacts will be lost to history.

Creepy mummies in plexiglass cases... the guane must have prserved them well, because this museum doesn't seem to be doing much in the way of preservation.

Guane textile, much of which has already disintegrated.

Museum cats!  Adorable in their homes in the eaves, until you realize they live there because there is game for them to catch...within the museum...

All in all though, we got to see some cool stuff (while it lasts) - Bolivar's possessions, Guane artifacts, and a bunch of other things from revolutionary times.

Took another selfie with this lady (same one I took a selfie with at Panachi) - there's statues of her ALL OVER the city, always holding that tax edict and a gas burner.

If you happen to be in Bucaramanga, I recommend visiting this museum. It's pretty cool if you look past the probable asbestos and rats, and it definitely makes you think about the longevity and preservation of history.

"The liberty of the new world is the hope of the universe."

Parque Nacional del Chicamocha

21 de agosto 2016

Parque Nacional del Chicamocha, Bucaramanga, Santander, Colombia

This is a bit of a late post, but I finally have internet in my apartment so I can write more!

A few weeks ago on August 6th, Colleen's host father Hugo took us and his two kids to Panachi, or Parque Nacional del Chicamocha, a national park nearby.  After driving up the switchback road to the top of one mountain, we took the teleférico (cable car) down into the Chicamocha valley and back up to the park.

Hugo and his kids admiring the view from the teléferico

Hey, another teléferico goin' the other way!

The Chicamocha Canyon, with the Rio Chicamocha running through it

If you look hard enough, you can find some mountain goats havin' a great time

The sand from the Chicamocha is used a lot in construction in this area

So after a ride full of nice views and conversation, we got off and felt like we had arrived in Colombian Disney World.  The park was structured like a little missionary town, but it felt very constructed and fake.  The Claro sign acting like a Hollywood sign didn't help the image either (Claro is an internet/phone company).  However, we soon got over that as we sipped our coffee.

The beautiful parking lot, framed by the Claro sign

Most Colombians work at least a half day on Saturdays, so we were almost the only people in the park.

¡Hola de Santander!

The kids saw this, thought they were peanuts, and started eating them... coffee beans are not the best to feed your kids.

Real or decoration?  Who knows?

According to Hugo, the coffee from this area (this mountain specifically I believe) recently won "Best Coffee in the World," beating out Indonesian coffee that was harvested from the poop of animals that ate the coffee berries.  Congrats Santander on beating the poop coffee!

As we drank our coffee and the kids drank their Milo (kind of like Nesquik; you can drink it cold or hot), we learned about panela, which is a type of sugar that tastes kind of like molasses; it's essentially unrefined cane sugar.  They had some on the table; it was pretty tasty and it was hard to keep the kids from eating the whole bowl.  The next shop over had virtual reality glasses, so we watched a few people pay for the privilege to have a Colombian man spin you around and make noises at you to further enhance the VR gear experience while your friends looked on and laughed at you.  Not necessarily what I expected from a national park, but hey, whatever floats your boat.  Speaking of boats, we then strolled down to the water park.

Just a little aquaparque hidden in the mountains...

The water park was little, but had a great view.  We didn't spend long there; we went around the lazy river once and went down each of the two slides once and then the kids got cold so we left.  However, like every pool here in Colombia, you have to wear a swim cap.  Don't have one?  You must buy one.

So fashionable

Colleen and her host sister rockin' the Chicamocha rosa caps

After drying off and changing back out of our swimsuits, we walked back up the mountain to the petting zoo, where we saw a llama (pronounced jyama here), a horse, a cow, a bunch of guinea pigs (which are eaten as a delicacy in Peru; just the whole animal roasted on a stick over a fire), a bunch of bunnies, couple of piggies, and some capybara (which I had never seen in real life; only on the internet!).  Most importantly though, we got to feed baby goats out of milk bottles.

Cabras (goats) are Colleen's favorite baby animal.  Just be careful not to say "cabron," which is a curse word.

Straight chillin'

After checkin' out all the animals, we walked further up the mountain to wash up and have some lunch.  On the way, we noticed some birds of prey circling around; I hope they weren't there to snatch up the bunnies.  

The restaurant had tons of cats wandering around looking for scraps.  Hugo's daughter was terrified of them, poor thing.

At lunch we shared a pitcher of limonada con panela (lemonade with that panela I talked about earlier), and I had what was essentially a chicken schnitzel, breaded and with fries.  I also stole a breaded-and-fried yuca off Colleen's plate.  Very tasty.  

We then wandered over to a museum that talked about the native people that used to live here before the Spaniards took it over.  It was they who called the area Chicamocha.  Legend has it that the Guane were so brave that rather than surrender to the Spaniards, they just jumped off a cliff.  Now, suicide doesn't sound as brave as standing up to your conquerors, but that's just my opinion...

They bound their heads from birth for aesthetic reasons...their heads became elongated in the back and shorter from the front.  A bit over-zealous for a mullet?

Since we had the kids with limited amounts of patience, we couldn't spend as much time in the museum as I would have liked, so we continued on up the mountain, admiring the view and the foliage.

No tree trunk to carve your name in? No worries! We've got you covered with succulents!

Panachi has a wonderful monument of the Colombian revolution.  It has a bunch of famous revolutionary figures on a tobacco leaf (the original big export of the country).  The Colombian revolution had its start in Santander, so it's a pretty big deal here.

This woman tore up the tax edict, effectively starting the revolution.  She was later killed by firing squad.

The bishop put on a nice face (mask) to get into power, but then he was enslaving the Colombian people (as you can see behind him)

The say if you touch the bull's balls, you will be very fertile.  Guess Colleen and I will both be bearing many children.

After exploring all the different people and their very expressive statues, we ventured over to the very top of the park, where you can see a 360° panoramic view of the whole park.  However, we were getting a bit tired of walking around in the hot sun, so we hitched a ride.

Chivas used to be used as public transportation, like this one.  Now they are usually used as drunk trolleys through the mountains. 

We got to the top, admired the view, then stopped at the little cafe up there to quench our thirst for a bit.

There's a lot of "adventure" things we didn't do here, like the Extreme Swings that swing you over the edge of the mountain, or the ziplines that are several hundred feet above the ground.

You can trace our whole path through the park from here!

The road to Bogotá; no wonder a 1-hour flight turns into a 9-hour drive...

Colleen admiring the view

We headed back down to the teleférico, but this late in the day it was a lot windier, so the car went slower and stopped a few times, rocking in the wind...just a little bit terrifying.  But we made it back alive and spent a little bit of time looking in the shops.  We didn't buy anything, though the snack shops were selling the Bucaramanga special - Hormigas Culonas (large-bottomed-ants).  Hugo advised us to try them first while drunk, not while hungry, so we didn't try them yet.  We then piled back into the car and Hugo drove us home to the sounds of the kids' favorite CD - Justin Bieber.