Japanese tourists, get ready!

Sunday, August 27th

So far we have gotten a pretty good feeling for what Bogota is like as far as night life and food is concerned. Now it was time to discover the real Bogota, the center of town, the colonial areas, the plazas where people go on a weekend with the family, etcetera.

This morning, Alexey and I had breakfast at the HJ and checked out. After a quick 3 block walk with our bags we were checking in at out new hotel, La Casona del Patio Amarillo. This was a pleasant little hotel with all the amenities you could need and actually quite cozy. We were pretty happy here with the hotel and the price. Tried to call Mauricio on the phone to tell him about the change of place but could only leave a message. We still did not know the number at the hotel so we will call him later to meet up. After this, we walked in the direcion of Avenida Caracas to take advantage of the great public transportation system of Bogota. Here they have what is called ¨TransMilenio¨ which basically consists of a bus system that ressembles a subway system but it goes above ground. The buses have dedicated lanes on the road which makes it for much faster service.

It took about 20 minutes to get to the center of town and there we were in the middle of the Solidarity Walk which basically consists of a yearly event where local soap opera stars ride on beautified trucks and wave hi to the masses. This walk is for a good cause however, the people affected by guerrillas and natural disasters. So we walked around and had some meat buns that frankly looked like had been in the shelf for quite sometime. After I discover some mold spots on mine, we bailed out.

Reaching the Plaza de Bolivar was awesome! The architecture of the official buildings around it reminded us of Berlin, Germany. We took picture after picture after which we decided to walk around the colonial town. Today is also the last Sunday of the month which spells free entrance to museums so we took advantage of this and visited Manuelita Saenz house. She was basically Simon Bolivar´s love affair aside from also helping out with the revolution that in the end freed 5 countries from Spanish rule.

Walking a little further took us through very beautiful houses and parks. However, it was time to eat and we did this at a hole in the wall spot. The beauty of being in South America is that set-menu restaurants are more prevalent. Basically, you order ¨Almuerzo¨ and they will bring you the soup, the second plate (consiting of rice with some other accompanyment), juice, and sometimes even dessert. We had a wonderful lunch for about a dollar each. The food has definitely changed radically ever since we crossed from Central to South America and we find more potatoes and corn (not in tortillas).

The city of Bogota is located between mountains and the local tourism board has taken advantage of this geographical attribute by setting up funicular and cable car service both leaving near the center of the city and taking you up into the clouds for an impressive view of the city. Believe me, the views were breathtaking! It was pretty high up too and up there, there is a church and a few other tourist places which combine pine trees with chalets giving you a feeling of being in the Alps. We went up there by funicular and came back by cable car, both cost the same and tickets are interchangeable.

On the way down we took a taxi cab and requested to be taken to the Museo de Arte Moderno de Bogota (MAMBO). Unfortunately, this was closed due to repairs and Alexey was utterly dissapointed since he wanted to buy a MAMBO t-shirt as a souvenir. However, there was a great way to curb that dissapointment: let´s go to the stadium!! At 5:30PM at the El Campin stadium, Junior from Barranquilla plays Millonarios from Bogota! We take another taxi ride and are at the stadium in no time. Purchasing the tickets was easy. Us, being the high rollers that we are, purchased the most expensive (and safer) tickets at 40K pesos each. This is a big match in the local league so we want to make sure we are not in the middle of the mosh pit when things go downhill.

We were a bit early and waited around before the cheerleaders made their magestic appearance. Truthfully, the stadium did not fill up completely but there were two spots where rowdy fans were going nuts. The match ended 3-1 in favor of the local ¨Millos¨ to the delight of the people in the mosh pit that had been wreaking havoc on the north side of the stadium. The highlight of the game: the cheerleaders. Not that they were incredibly hot or that they did wonderful pirouettes. Their beauty lies in the effort they put to be so perfectly NOT synchronized and scaring the heck out of the expectators by letting their partners fall from high altitutes and barely being able to catch them before reaching the ground. All in all, it was really amusing.

Now it was time to call Mauricio and see if we are able to hook up. Unfortunately, in some South American countries, the way that cell phone service works is that the person calling a cell phone has to pay a higher rate than if calling a land line. The problem with that is that most people disable the ability to call to cell phones from land line, especially in hotels, to avoide incredibly high charges. So Alexey had to go and procure a phone card from a nearby supermarket following the front desk´s advice. He comes back with the card and it does not work. This is a $10K pesos investment so we need to make sure what´s going on. After half an hour of playing around and talking with the 1-8000 line (this is the Colombian version of a 1-800 number) I find that the card that Alexey bought works only to make calls froma landline or cellphone, and only to a COMCEL customer. Mauricio´s cell phone is with another company, Movistar. Therefore, there is no way of reaching him at all with the card. What is worse, is that once we tried to use the card on this particular phone at the hotel, we could never try to use the card, if we wanted to call someone with COMCEL, ever again at another phone line! What kind of service is this?

So we head down to the local supermarket where Alexey bought the card and the lady there argues that she asked him if what he wanted was a COMCEL card to which Alexey had responded: Yes. I would have done the same if I had only 3 days worth of Spanish classes. In the end, they refused to give us our money back. We made a big deal in front of their managers and others but afterall we are not in the US where customer centric management is the norm. Carullo is the supermarket, never buy anything there; and COMCEL the company, crooks.

Our time to call Mauricio is running out and we are not able to make a single phone call to his cell. We even tried Skyping from Bogota to Bogota :) We are not able to get good reception. After all, we decided to grab something to eat and try calling him tomorrow at least to say good bye. Tonight for dinner we have a mexican burrito at this posh gas station. This place really seemed happening for a Sunday evening. Tons of dressed up young girls and guys hanging out by the flat screen TV projecting non-stop videos of Madonna. Pretty cool! So having satiated our appetite but still mad about the cell phone incident, we went back to the hotel. Tomorrow we will head out to Cali. Tough ride with tons of new adventures in store.