Colombia - Weeks 6 and 7

It's hard to think in order what happened over the past two weeks, so I'll just hit the highlights.

Some places we've visited:  

Simon Bolivar Park.  It's one of the largest parks in Bogota.  While there we had our first taste of mango biche.  No picture but it is green mango with salt, lime juice and some other unidentified substance.  It was good!  Sweet, salty and refreshing.  The park had quite the number of playgrounds which the kids loved.  All of them under the backdrop of the beautiful mountains

Zipaquira is a town about 1 hour north of Bogota.  It's known for it's salt mine and the underground cathedral inside of the salt mine, Catedral de Sal.  We hopped on a bus and took a scenic ride to get there.  It was an amazing experience just to go down into the mines, but the artistry of the miners was pretty incredible.  There are specific ways in which they mine the salt to make sure the mountain remains stable.  It results in underground corridor after corridor.  After the salt was mined then the miner were commissioned to carve structures into the salt.  We walked through the stations of the cross and then experienced the beautiful and humongous underground cathedral.  And it's all salt!  We licked the walls just to check!  The kids may have licked more than just the walls!

Today we went to an area of town called Usaquen.  There is an artisan market there every weekend and it's just a lovely part of town.  We explored the shops, played at a park and ate lunch there.  We tried Colombian tamales.  Yum!

On the way to Usaquen the kids and I took the bus while Dane rode his bike and enjoyed Ciclovia.  Ciclovia is an event each Sunday and on holidays where the city closes off about 80 miles of city streets to vehicles and lets pedestrians and bikes take over.  Dane has known about Ciclovia for quite some time and is very happy to be in Bogota and getting to experience it first hand.

Some new fruits and juices!

Guanabana (soursop).  We bought a 6 1/2 pound fruit and that was a small one!  We just at it straight from the fruit minus the toxic seeds, but I froze 6 cups of pulp to use in smoothies later on.  We couldn't handle all of it in one day!

Borojo.  This was given to us by the lady at the fruit store.  We were told to make a juice with milk out of it.  I didn't take a picture before I'm including a picture from the internet.  You buy it when it is VERY ripe.  It's wrapped up in plastic and then put in that yellow mesh.  It feels pretty squishy.  Then I opened it...see the 2nd picture.  You can imagine what the kids thought it looked like.  I mixed it up in the blender with milk and a little sugar.  I was the only one who liked it.  I think after seeing it the kids just mentally couldn't handle it.  I wonder if they would have liked it if I just gave them the drink?

Lulo.  A tart tropical fruit that I blended up with water and a little sugar to make a juice.  Everyone liked it.

Mora berry.  I've never seen this berry in the states but it's similar to a blackberry.  A bit more tart.  I made a juice with milk and a little sugar.  Thumbs up from the kids.

Guava.  I made a guava ginger juice.  The kids all love guava juice.  They serve it frequently at school.  The ginger gave it a zing.  They drank it but prefer it without the ginger.  Just a little boost to their health!

The transportation.  

Dane should probably be writing this section!  He believes that Bogota transportation is pretty amazing.  They use buses, but the Transmilenio system acts in a similar way to a subway system.  You enter the station through a turnstile and then wait on a raised platform for the bus to come.  The bus has a dedicated lane so it doesn't get stuck in traffic. To put it in perspective the Transmilenio system typically moves about 2 million people per day.  We use the Transmilenio when we're heading downtown.  To get to the school we ride a regular city bus.  As I'm sure if you ask Elise about our ride to school, she will tell you...it's a bumpy ride!

Did we mention the bakery that is right outside out apartment?!  So good, so inexpensive.  So we're enjoying it while we're here.

School Life.  Spirit week was last week and one day was crazy hair day.  Naomi didn't want to participate and Justus did until he actually got to school.  We didn't have any hair products so I used egg whites to get his hair to stand up.  

After school we often go up to to Dane's classroom which is the science lab.  Justus told a group of teachers that he was going up to his Dad's classroom to explode some things the other day.  No explosions happened but Dane and the kids enjoy doing experiments and looking at things under the microscope.

We did celebrate Thanksgiving.  We went on a hike and enjoyed an improvised Thanksgiving meal with friends.  We also got to play a game of Settlers of Catan while the kids watched a movie!  I didn't pull out the camera, but a friend got some pictures of our hike.  

Until next week...

Colombia - Week 5

Hmmm...what happened this week?

Rain, Rain, and more Rain!  It's rained daily.  Typically it's been dry but cloudy in the mornings and then rain in the afternoons.  Twice this week Dane arrived home quite wet.  One evening we went out grocery shopping a couple of blocks away and arrived back home dripping wet.  My goal this weekend was to buy umbrellas.  I've met my goal and have already been thankful for the purchase on two separate occasions.  We read that October was one of the wettest months in Colombia, but in our Colombian experience it has been November.

Monday and Tuesday were the typical in person school days and Wednesday-Friday was virtual school at home.  Afternoons saw lots more indoor playtime due to the rain.  Remember the lack of toys I mentioned in the last post?  Well, a very lovely family, that had just arrived back in Bogota and was sorting through their toys offered us their collection of big Legos.  Hallelujah!  When the kids saw them for the first time they all really truly squealed with delight.  It has given the kids hours of fun this week.  They may have caused a few fights too, but well worth it!

Friday:  Despite the very wet week, we didn't have water on Friday.  The water to the entire building was shut off to do some maintenance.  It was scheduled from 8am to 4pm, but when we woke up at 6 it was already off.  I wasn't quite prepared for that.  But our amazing neighbors let us borrow a couple of large jugs of water and saved the day.

Then, the kids had their first (and probably last) sleepover while here.  They (meaning Elise) had a very detailed schedule made out that had the kids staying awake until 2am.  Thankfully, everything on the agenda didn't happen or else happened faster than the allotted time she gave it and the kids were all in bed by 10:30pm!  But with a movie, s'mores and storytime they had a fun evening and were up again raring to go at 6:15am.

Saturday:  We took the gang of 5 kids to hike the mountain near our house.  because of the excessive rain during the week it was a very different hike than the first time.  Slippery and muddy, but still fun.  I left Dane on the top of the mountain with all five kids because I had to go meet someone to run an errand.  On my way home I prayed that no one would get injured as they played on the mountain and climbed back down.  Well, God answered.  I learned later that Naomi was climbing the big tree and fell out.  She fell about 8 feet and landed in such a way that only resulted in a couple of bruises.  If she had fallen on the other side of the tree it would have been a 15 foot drop.  Thank you, God.

Dane got out to explore some on his own.  He went downtown and explored the Candelaria district and Bolivar Plaza.  Pictures not currently available!

Saturday evening we had some friends over to play games after the kids went to bed.  

Sunday: We all slept in a bit!  We woke up to beautiful bright blue skies with white clouds.  It seemed so wonderful after the gray, cloudy, rainy week.  That weather lasted about half the day and then the clouds rolled in.  We found a new grocery store near our house that was described to us as kind of like Aldi.  In the states we love Aldi, so we were happy to find it.  We stocked up on some pantry items.  Church at home again.  Please pray that we can find an in-person, Spanish-speaking church that allows children.

Two new foods this week.  

Curuba.  Translates into banana passionfruit.  

The inside was slimy with lots of seeds and an interesting looking shell after everything was eaten out.  We just scooped it out and ate it.  It was a bit sour.  I learned later that it is good to make a sort of smoothie with it by adding some milk and sugar and straining out the seeds.  We'll try that next time.  We all liked it, but I definitely prefer the pitaya.

We had heard about this delicious chocolate bread at a nearby bakery.  I saw it but thought it looked more like a Christmas breakfast sort of treat.  I couldn't resist it any longer and bought a loaf for the sleepover breakfast.  All I can say is yum and probably lots of calories!  Here's a peek into the bag!

An addendum to the post.  Dane and Justus went on a walk.  They found a pirate ship tree (per Justus) and a merry go round that works!

Colombia - Week 4

Monday - After two busy days, we took advantage of the day off for All Saints Day and rested. 

Tuesday and Wednesday we had in person school.  On Wednesday we went to the science lab that Dane teaches from (virtually).   He was entertaining the kids with a taxidermied alligator and slides of various things under the microscope, etc.  Meanwhile, a big storm whipped up.  Thunder, lightning, strong winds.  The video doesn't do it justice, but the school started leaking in several areas!

Thursday and Friday we did school at home.  I came across Naomi "reading" in Spanish and took a video.  She's really saying some Spanish words, but most of it is just Spanish sounding jibberish.  I love that she's trying!

Our new food this week was a fruit called pitaya.  I just now translated that and it is dragon fruit (the yellow variety).  Now I know what dragon fruit is!  We cut it open and scooped out the flesh and seeds straight into our mouths!  Everyone gave it a thumbs up.  We also tried a fruit salad that is sold as street food.  I think watermelon juice is the base and then a bunch of ripe fruit is chopped up and added.  Naomi and I especially liked it.

On Saturday we went with a group from the school to a site about 1 1/2 hours from Bogota.  Guatavita Lake.  We didn't stop in the town of Guatavita itself, but the original town of Guatavita is underwater.  A reservoir was built in the 60s and the town was rebuilt on higher ground and the old town flooded.  

Guativita Lake has it's own history.  It's an interesting circular lake up in the mountains.  After we hiked up we could look down into the lake.  There are several theories about how the lake formed but no one knows for sure except God!  There are stories of an indigenous tribe in the area that would bury their chiefs by decking them out in gold and then setting them afloat in a raft in the lake.  The lake was their burial ground.  There are also stories know as The Legend of El Dorado.  There have been many attempts to find gold in the lake and the lake has suffered.  There is a deep crevice in one side of the "crater" where earth and stone were removed in an attempt to drain the lake.  It did drain out lots of the lake's water but was an unsuccessful attempt to find gold.  Now the lake is considerably smaller than it used to be.

It started raining at the end of our adventure.  When we got home we were cold and so had our first fire using wood we had collected from the compost area in our conjunta.  Apparently the addition of the compost area is new.  The gardeners use it to put clippings and cuttings in but residents don't use it.  I went out after dark one evening to try to start discreetly using it.  My under cover compost mission failed due to a large group of neighbors that had gathered outside holding a vigil for a neighbor who had died.  I don't worry about being discreet anymore!  

On Sunday we were planning on going to our first in person Spanish church, but were disappointed to find out they don't permit kids under 13 yet.  So we had church at home, relaxed and then went on a walk in the neighborhood in search of the hike that we had tried to find previously but ended up on the urban hike instead.  We found it!  It was a pretty steep climb.  Elise found a big tree to climb.  We came across a sink hole that the kids explored.  We'll be back...maybe next weekend!

Sunday also marked out first bout with GI issues.  I think we got some bad salsa with our empanadas.  The kids were fine and Dane and I are the only ones who ate the salsa.  I won't say anymore about that except that it was relatively mild and we have been so very thankful for God's protection over our health thus far.  

We didn't bring any toys with us except what Gran had packed in the kids' goody bags for the trip.  The kids have had to make their own!  Paper boats. Toilet paper rolls taped together with a plastic spoon taped on.  Justus called that a bayonet.  We have books, a playground and their imaginations.  They don't get bored!