i'm in colombia because you are boring

Welcome back to the good ol' US of A

2011-01-27T02:38:00.005-05:00

I finally did it. After 2.5 years I packed up my bags and I'm back in the United States of America. As soon as I touch down at the George Bush airport in Houston I'm awkwardly approached by a perfect stranger who won't seem to leave me alone. He asks me about cocaine in Colombia. I say I never tried it. He says, "Not tryin' cocaine in Colombia is like going to the North pole and not playin' with Santa's toys!" I bite my lip. Welcome back...

we'll see how long this lasts.

Haciendo Bobadas

2010-05-03T00:23:00.003-05:00

Haciendo Bobadas "Doing stupid things"

Thank you to the graffiti artist who profoundly managed to capture the essence of my existence.

Street Work

2010-04-20T13:04:00.002-05:00

La Mariposa (Plaza San Victorino)

This is one of Bogota's busy commercial center. Here you can buy cheap kitchen supplies, clothing, and sex from underage girls.

Rain in Santa Fe

It's rainy season and everyone is looking for shelter. The sex workers wander into doorways and the horses cover up with plastic capes.

Condoms in my room.

Sometimes I'm embarrassed by the amount of condoms and lubricant I have on me at all times. My landlady was over at the house looking at a leak in the roof. Now she thinks I'm a slut.

Fénix headquarters

Antique carpets, cozy cushions and Timothy provide a soothing environment for vulnerable populations

Public Space

2010-04-18T22:59:00.002-05:00

Walking on calle 19 at night I stumbled upon a box covered with spikes. I was immediately fascinated. It's not that I am so completely starved for entertainment that I seek out rusty objects in the streets for fun, nor was I on hallucinogenic drugs. I'm just really getting into public spaces. Why would someone take the time to mold metal triangles on the surface of this locked box? Why are there jagged cement blocks mixed with rocks under a highway overpass? Why was one of Bogota's most beautiful parks built in the heart of its drug and prostitution zone? Does any of this mean anything? Or am I just crazy?

Well I think we can all agree that I am indeed crazy. But I maintain that I am sane when I claim that spiky triangles and rocks and pretty parks in poor neighborhoods are all designed for a specific purpose: to the keep shoeless, non-cologne wearing vagrants away. I guess I do the same thing when I lock the door to my apartment at night and chain my dragon outside (although I am mostly trying to avoid the heavily cologned fanny-pack wearing population), but my home is private space, not public space. And when it downpours, I don't set up burning coals under my doorways shelter to discourage bums, I bring them tea. Obviously a little hot tea in a small green plastic cup isn't going to help anyone (except cancer), but I'm not pretending that this man outside my house doesn't exist.

Earlier this week as I was making my usual street-work rounds, I encountered a change. An underage brothel, where a lot of my contacts work, has been closed down by the city. Upon first inspection, this type of city involvement seems positive. Underage prostitutes equals bad, shutting down the brothel that enables and exploits them equals good. But what happens to these girls after the brothel is no more? Unfortunately, their lives don't automatically become better. They aren't magically transported into homes with lima beans and Gray's Anatomy. No, they move somewhere else. When a grassy park with a playground is constructed on top of Colombia's most famous drug market, the market doesn't disappear, it moves somewhere else. If you can't sleep under an overpass, you sleep somewhere else. Cleaning up public spaces can be great fun, but not being able to sit on a spiky box won't make poverty go away.

Hiking in Colombia

2010-04-05T03:12:00.001-05:00

Sometimes life brings you a happy little surprise and you find yourself climbing, meeting your goals, and achieving success. Hooray! Sometimes you find yourself ascending only to discover more vertical looking trails lie ahead. Your ass aches, you're thirsty, and you wonder why you choose to go hiking on your day off. You try to remind yourself that you love trees, dirt and non-third-world-bus-contaminated air, but you're fundamentally lazy and those lost 4-hours of sleep seem as if they can never be recovered.

Thanks to my new friends and fellow Fénix volunteers, I have discovered a new local trail and camping ground. Chicaque is only 15 minutes west of Soacha (a municipal of Bogotá) and a whole world away from the city. When Celine and Rosie invited me on a hike, I immediately became nostalgic for my old life in Barranquilla. With Valar, my ex-frisbee team, I would often spend weekends romping around the jungle in el Morro. These early morning adventures typically began with me waiting at the bus stop for the team to arrive. One of my rookie Colombian mistakes was believing my captain when he set a 6.30am departure time. Like the gringa I was, I arrived on time and waited for 2 hours. I finally left only to receive a call from Jhon wondering where the hell I was. Luckily, when adventuring with fellow foreigners and their cute, bohemian friends, everyone arrives on time. Unfortunately, I don't. I've picked up some bad Colombian habits.

Chicaque is very different from el Morro. First, Chicaque begins on a beautiful, misty, and heavily vegetated bluff at about 8600 feet. As you descend, you can feel your knees banging out of their sockets and you tremble at the thought of your return. The weather is cool and random domestic animal sightings are entertaining. El Morro is humid and buggy, and the trail is difficult to discern from the surrounding greenery. You spend most of your hike hopping from rock to rock along a river bed and thrusting yourself off of waterfalls into murky pools. Speaking from experience, on both of these treks you should give yourself seven to nine hours as you will probably get a little lost.

Hiking in Colombia doesn't tend to be a popular activity among the locals. Upon mention of walking up steep slopes on dirt paths many of my Barranquillero and Bogotano acquaintances ask me, "why?" As a native Seattleite and a former Maine resident, this question is absolutely absurd. I grew up next to seductive giant peaks and thick forests. Colombia's wilderness is even more alluring, why wouldn't you want to explore?

Well, one pretty good reason not to explore has to do with danger. I'm not talking about snakes or hippopotamus. (Although there were some incidents with Pablo Escobar's Hippopotamus getting loose and attacking people in Antioquia). But, do you really want to wander off into a mountain range swarming with guerrillas and/or paramilitaries? Although these groups are mostly isolated to specific regions in Colombia, petty theft is not. For the most part, it is not a good idea to go on a drive (or bus ride), find a nice looking hill, park your car, and randomly wander through the great outdoors. Although this was my favorite college activity, it doesn't really translate in a country where you'll be strolling around someone's tin shack.

This type of danger, however, can easily be eliminated with some careful planing. Despite everything I wrote in the previous paragraph, there are a plethora of wonderful and safe adventures to be had in Colombia. The Colombian national parks, my favorite being Tayrona, are perhaps some of the more enchanting places I have ever been, and Chicaque and El Morro are certainly well protected and safe. Like the boy scouts say, "always be prepared," and you'll be fine. Just don't dar papaya.*

*Don't be stupid. Dar papaya literally means to "give papaya," which means to ask for it.

Chicaque

From the top

(this picture doesn't do justice to the steepness of this bluff)

Horses!

The bottom of a very tall waterfall

Llamas at a campsite

An ugly female peacock

El Morro

(I've bogged about it before)

El morro is an ancient and sacred meeting ground for some natives

How are you getting down?

Pondering the descent

Rock hopping

The Bouncer

2010-04-04T01:30:00.006-05:00

A few Thursdays ago I went out to grab a beer with five male friends. My friend Phil from Colby and his friend from Vermont are in town visiting me. Somehow Phil was not very surprised to find that the majority of my close friends, once again, are male. We walked a few calles away to familiar bar on a street flowing with beer. I live in the center of several universities and how many Colombian university student don't like to drink after class? Seven? Thus, the whole block was swarming with little students. I say little students because Colombian freshman are usually between the ages of 15 and 17.

As we headed into the bar Rafa and Willie walked right in without any problems. I however, immediately got carded. This has become routine for me. Although the legal drinking age is 18, and most people start drinking around 14, I always get carded. To be fair, I do look somewhat younger than 24, but I refuse to believe that I look like I'm 16-years-old.

Anyways, getting carded has never really ignited my inner rage until Alyssa came to visit. My friends and I had taken her out to the same street to grab a beer and move our booties. Naturally, they asked for Alyssa and my IDs. Unfortunately, Alyssa didn't have any due to the fact that I wasn't going to let her bring her passport out drinking.* Although I arrived prepared to argue, the dude would not let us inside. Since we were the only girls, we were his only problems. So, I told him his bar sucked. Then we tried next door and just Alyssa and I were IDed and rejected.

When they weren't gonna let us in the third bar, I tried to play up the she's a foreigner with nothing more than a passport and we are way over the age limit card. He still wasn't going to let us in until he asked Alyssa about her age and she responded with a blank stare. "She doesn't speak spanish you dumb ass!" I told him (perhaps I exaggerate on the name calling). Luckily, Alyssa's total ignorance convinced the bouncer and he let us in.

My friends claim that I am the only one to get carded (when I go out with all males) because I look like I'm five. But these bars are full of 15-year-old looking boys and their hairless asses never get carded.

Thus, with the lasting memory of fighting with the bouncer a few weeks earlier, on Thursday I mentally prepared myself for battle. When the bouncer asked for my ID and let all 5 guys I was with pass through, I barked at him: "Why do you always card women and never men?" He answered, confirming my allegations, that the police only care about underage women in the bar. I find it rather ludicrous that police care so much about underage women in bars and so little about underage prostitution. I then gave him the Hannah glare of death as I said, "That is really Machista." I continued to rant while the bouncer was pretending to look at my ID. I was pissed and he didn't seem to care or understand why. In an effort to make him understand, I promised to talk to his manager. He handed me my ID back and gave me a "get a life" look. As I sat down at the table, I was fuming. I wouldn't stop rambling until Rafa reminded me that I have bigger problems to battle. I guess he's right, I do, after all, work with underage prostitutes.

*It is illegal not to have your ID on you at all times in Colombia. I recommend that foreigners carry a photocopy of the first page of their passport.

The Police

2010-03-31T16:37:00.003-05:00

A few weeks ago Amy, Toppo and I were sitting down for dinner when Amy's phone rang. We had all had busy days so we encouraged Amy to ignore the call while we ate. After all, isn't it rude to talk on the phone at the supper table? But after realizing that Timothy, the director of Fénix (the foundation where we work), was calling at 8pm after we had seen him that very same day, she answered. Immediately Amy started to panic. When she hung up the phone she yelled, "They've hit Vivi we have to go, now!" I didn't really understand what Amy was talking about, but I knew that Vivi was 8 months pregnant. Amy threw some clothes at Toppo and yelled at me to put my shoes on faster. Forty seconds later we were on the street waving down a cab.

We headed to the Mariposa. Timothy, accompanied by two members of the foundation Procrear, had told us to hurry and help deal with a situation. Who would hit an 18 year old pregnant girl? The adrenalin in the cab was palpable. We finally arrived to a very dark and empty plaza. During the day la plaza San Victorino (known by local dwellers as la Mariposa) is a bustling commercial center and underage prostitution zone. At night it's silent and creepy.

There were two separate assemblies of people in the plaza. One was predominately police officers huddled between a police RV-type van and a large scary looking truck, the other was gathered around a bench. As we neared the bench, we immediately identified Timothy as he was the only 60-year-old British man in the vicinity. I then quickly distinguished the figure on the bench as Vivi. She looked pale and traumatized. Timothy explained that Vivi was hit twice by two police officers' batons and once in her pregnant belly. As an epileptic, she quickly went into epileptic shock and was now experiencing premature labor contractions. Things were looking rather ugly.

I turned my attention to the other grouping of people about 50 feet away. I walked over with Toppo into a conversation between Procrear people and a police officer. The officer was telling us that the girls had been very aggressive with the five police people and that they had no choice but to use physical force to subdue them. I find it impressive that five professional keepers of the peace could not contain six street girls under 5 foot 1 without resorting to extreme physical violence. The officer paused in his story and Toppo began to ask some questions, something along the lines of, "you guys never thought that you had any other options but to hit a pregnant girl in the stomach?"

A woman police officer then entered the conversation. She had her hair gelled back into a lunch-lady like bun. It turned out that she was the one who had hit Vivi in the stomach. She didn't seem very sorry about it. She told us that being pregnant doesn't give someone the right to do whatever they wanted to do. I, of course, agree. She then said that she didn't understand what a tiny pregnant girl was doing hanging around la Mariposa at night. When she was pregnant, she stayed at home.

Well, when the police officer was pregnant, she wasn't a street girl.

As we continued to hang around the scene collecting all the scraps we could and comforting the non-beaten or incarcerated girls, the police were becoming more and more annoyed with us. Three of them refused to provide us with badge numbers (although it is illegal to do so).

After an hour or so, I managed to piece together a good part of the story. Apparently the girls were all drinking beers in a tiny, grimy hole in the wall next to la Mariposa. I'd like to believe that Vivi was drinking a coke. A man from the plaza came up to Wendy (Vivi's girlfriend) and told here that she was a whore and that she had to sleep with him for 10,000 pesos ($5). Wendy, who is currently selling t-shirts, got really pissed (these girls are scary when pissed). The guy continued to fuck with her and she started to fuck with him back. The next few parts get blurry, but the police arrived and tried to break up the fight. In doing so, one of the officers hit Wendy in the face with a baton leaving a nasty mark. Vivi tried to get involved, as her girlfriend was getting beat. A male officer told her her to go away and when she didn't, he smacked her in the forehead. Vivi is currently the spoiled member of her group, due to her large belly, and immediately all the girls sought retaliation. The story gets a little fuzzy until Vivi, again, tries to stop the brawl and gets whacked in the stomach and goes into epileptic shock. Vivi insists that she was not the least bit antagonistic.

The girls immediately panicked and called Timo (on top of his pile of qualifications, Timo is also a nurse). The police officers locked a few of them in the back of the dark truck and shortly after we arrived, an ambulance was on the scene for Vivi. Liliana quickly became distraught and the sight of her pregnant and sickly looking friend being loaded at in the ambulance and walked over to the female police officer in a fit of rage. The police officer looked very satisfied. In situations like these, I find myself more than frustrated by the lack of professionalism on the part of the police officers. They are working in an extremely hot zone of the city and instead of attempting to calm the tension, they exacerbate problems. The policewoman's response to Liliana's fit of rage was to yell vulgarities and come at her with her baton. Luckily, Toppo contained Liliana from making a very stupid decision. But he was tempted to let her go when the policewoman yelled that she didn't want her children to grow up in a world with people like Liliana.

As the ambulance and the truck containing the imprisoned girls drove away, Juani ran after them screaming some hijuputas, malparidos..ect. Then, she decided to mount the back of the police truck. Apparently she didn't want to leave her girlfriend alone. Now, six human rights workers, a pile of police, and some random street people were all that remained in the plaza. Very overwhelmed, I turned to Timothy and said, "I am so totally going to blog about this."

Our purpose for attending these types of events is to level the playing field. The street girls are not totally innocent, but they are repeatedly abused by those in positions of power. And who is going to believe a street girl over a police officer? The police can do whatever they want. Although we started a legal case against the policewoman, most likely it will be ignored. Still, at the very least the locals and the authorities are aware that we are watching. And we should. This population is already vulnerable enough without being hit in the pregnant belly.

Important People

2010-03-30T20:39:00.002-05:00

Contrary to popular belief, most Colombians don't run around the jungle with traditional indigenous garb nor does the entire country have a cocaine problem. Instead, most Colombians talk on msn messenger, wear clean shoes, and eat a lot of slightly salty rice. They also tend to be nice. The following are some of my all time favorites:

Andrea

I met Andrea on my first day in Barranquilla. She then moved back to Bogotá and I moved into the apartment upstairs. There is something very magical about Andrea. I think people are drawn to her because of her huge smile and her heart. I call her my tia because she has fed me and found me shelter for almost two years.

Alexa

Last year Alex and I arrived to her house at 6am and started making sandwiches. Apparently we were fumbling around and making noise. We woke her mom up. She swung open the door to the kitchen and glared at us like we were naughty little puppies. She then called us mala horas and told us to go to bed. Alexa and I met during my first ultimate practice in Barranquilla. She immediately adopted me. For all intensive purposes, Alexa is Barranquilla. Alexa knows everyone and she is everywhere. We now work together in Bogotá teaching English and art to 45 little girls. Even though she lives in Bogotá, she is still the most costeña person I have ever known.

Rafa

Rafa is too serious for me. He has life goals and morals. I think I talk way too much for his liking. However, Rafa has gone completely out of his way to do me more favors than any friend I have ever had. Seriously, how many of you would pick me up at the airport at 5am? Rafa will soon be a New York City resident married to a very good gringa friend of mine. I just hope his English gets better.

Jose Ramon

Moncho is the Kurt Cobain of Puerto Colombia. His local rockstarness makes him a very interesting friend to have. I may or may not be a Leon Bruno groupie. We've been very tight friends ever since last year when he threw corn starch in my eye. He's my favorite person to talk about politics, philosophy, and life with. He also used to sleep in my living room.

Willie

This shorty and sexy Leo enjoys long walks on the septima and watching American football on Direct TV. His hobbies include soccer and making fun of me. He's also really good at English. Willie is fun to be around and always makes me smile, especially when he's carrying his super cool 2nd grade girl notebook. He is currently single so girls don't hesitate to snatch up this hot item up!

Mario

Mario is also an intellectual musician and we used to stay up until dawn drinking beer and talking about really important shit. He has recently given up drinking. Unfortunately that makes him a lot less fun to laugh at as I doubt he will be serenading my friends anytime soon. I also really like his voice.

Alvaro

I'm pretty sure that Alvaro is my favorite Colombian. He's also one of my favorite people of all time.

The Gay Bar

2010-03-28T21:07:00.010-05:00

Since last August I have been making new contacts and allies in the Mariposa and the streets of Santa Fe. Technically speaking these young women and I have very little in common. I have a university degree, my own apartment and tahini in my cupboard. They have syphilis, a bag of clothes, abusive relatives, three children, and a glue sniffing problem. Still, after spending the past several months getting to know these girls they have become much more than deviant street people, they have become my friends.

I am especially fond of a small gang of petite bad ass lesbians.* After accompanying some of them through various insufferable bureaucratic processes, I have gotten to know the whole gang and all their gossip on a fairly personal level. After last night, however, that fairly personal level became a lot more cozy.

The girls and Amy have been talking about bringing me out dancing since I first started doing street work, after seven months of discussion I didn't think it would ever actually happen, but last night I found myself in a gay bar in the middle of the ghetto watching a girl in an American flag thong shake her ass in my face. Awesome.

At 11pm Amy and I left our apartment all dolled up in heavy makeup and polyester. Our gang of friends were playing pool and we were on our way to pick them up and head to the Primero de Mayo (a pretty ghetto neighborhood). When we arrived, we piled the four of them on top of us in the cab and headed towards some neon lights. Shala is a predominately lesbian bar filled with salsa dancing, cigarette butts on the floor, and flashing lights. We arrived, plopped ourselves down at the table and started the rumba. As previously mentioned, I have become a satisfactory-level dancer so when Ginna asked me to dance I was all in. Somehow Merengue feels different when you are dancing with a 4 foot 11 small framed girl, especially the part when she's grabbing your ass.

After a few hours of reggeaton, vallenato, and that awful black eyed peas song that has infiltrated Colombia, I had been hit on several times by random chicks, tried some rum that tasted like melted plastic, and watched a girl in an American flag bikini remove her bikini and prance around the bar. In the process, Ginna flagged her over to our table so she would specifically wiggle her thong covered ass in our faces.

Like any legal club in Colombia, Shala closes at 3pm. At 2:55 we stumbled out onto the street and headed half a block away to a dark building with a large unlit sign. My ears were still ringing from Shala and the taste of foul plastic cup lingered on my tongue. We knocked on the metal door of the seemly closed club and a Wizard of Oz like character peeped through the eye hole to insure that the coast was clear. He then allowed us to enter into a big warehouse-style empty room filled with smoke and Dr. Dre.

We were practically the first group to arrive and we promptly sat ourselves down at a prime-location booth next to the dance floor. Within a half hour the place was hopping and some extremely sketchy looking men had begun to hit on us. I efficiently waved away the first guy who tried to get me to dance, but after his third attempt Mari got in his face and told him to back the hell off. He didn't try again. Mari's glare is enough to make any man shrivel in fear. Although she's a tiny little thing with a pretty face, she emits a toughness equal to a large bouncer with a gun in his pants. As men continued to hit on Amy and I, our little gang of rough little lesbians continued to scare them away for us. There is something very comforting about having Ginna, Mari, Anita, and Angelica as friends. No one is going to fuck with me.

Dawn began to approach and all of us were visibly fading. We all got up to dance to one last song and then we headed for the door. The same gatekeeper dude peeped through his little eye hole then quickly shoved us out and slammed the door behind us.

Amy and I headed home in a cab leaving the girls standing on the street munching on a bag of potato chips and laughing at us. In the cab I immediately felt woozy from lack of sleep and stale cigarette smoke. I wanted to cry. An intense love for these girls bubbled inside my stomach alongside a strange tasting empanada that I had eaten. After a really fun evening I was heading off to sleep in my castle. I didn't know where they were heading off to, but I wished that I could protect them as well as they protect me. I wished that I was a fairy princess who could magically spread peace and justice throughout the world.

Unfortunately my warm feelings quickly subsided when I noticed that the taxi meter was running at an alarmingly tampered rate. Without hesitation I started arguing with the driver. He denied my accusations so I sat back and practiced my best Mari glare as I prepared myself to fight upon arrival. When we landed at my house, he immediately confirmed his guilt by only charging us half-price. I told him he was an asshole and went to directly to bed. I think these girls are rubbing off on me.

*Lesbianism is a frequent trend among sex workers as many of these little ladies were violated as young children and continue to be exploited by men on a daily basis. My guess is that repeated sexual abuse kind of steers you away from the penis.

Mandatory Service

2010-02-16T00:51:00.005-05:00

It's a typical Thursday and Amy and I are rushing to the Mariposa do begin our afternoon of street work. Per usual we're running a little late. As we approach the Décima with Jimenez, our path is congested with about 15 men dressed in army uniforms. I've been in Colombia so long that I've become very accustomed to a military presence wherever I go - in front of la Universidad de Los Andes, in line to buy an arepa con queso, and always in the Mariposa. Initially, Amy and I don't even slow our pace as we push our way across the crowded street until we notice a truck full of boys. Amy and I exchange a puzzled and disturbed look as we come to a holt in front of the truck. After a short discussion we decide to ask what the hell is going on. Amy approaches on of the dudes in uniform and discovers that they are collecting men who are obligated to serve in the military. Literally, they are asking for papers and if you don't have them you are immediately loaded into a truck.

Huh. What a coincidence that forced recruitment is occurring in one of the most vulnerable parts of the city, and how strange that everyone being shoveled into the army lacks a college (and in most cases high school) education. No one is asking for ID in la zona T (a very posh part of town), nor is anyone trucking McDonald's customers of to training. No, if you can afford to pay your way out of mandatory military service, you do it.*

Amy and I linger in front of the truck for awhile discussing the extreme classism of military service. We conclude that we consider picking lower class looking young men off the streetsof poor neighborhoods and carting them off to join the military forces is unjust. Without any other ideas, I pull out my cell phone to take a picture. The kids in the truck begin to cheer, the men in uniform look extremely uncomfortable, Amy and I rush off towards the Mariposa, now we're really late for our lubricant lessons and condom distribution.

La Décima con Jiménez

Loading more young adults into a truck

(notice the lack of windows and seatbelts...not to mention seats)

Smile! Gringos are taking your picture :)

*I've been informed that fake papers cost 80,000 pesos Colombianos ($40).

Dancing

2010-02-14T15:25:00.002-05:00

One of my best friends from college, Alyssa, is coming to visit me. yay! Alyssa would probably make the best wife ever. She cleans, she crafts, and she cooks. A lot. I was lucky enough to benefit from Alyssa's supreme homemaking skills during my final year of college while we both occupied rooms in the lovely Vivian. Still, her cleany, crafty, cookieness only pales in comparison to her giggly-danciness.

I think Alyssa is only coming to visit me because I told her there was lots of dancing in Colombia. As a woman who spent the majority of her college career training or bribing men to dance, the idea that Colombian men dance and actually do it well has excited Alyssa into several pre-arrival fits of giggliness. As much as men who like to dance initially thrilled me, it has become somewhat of a problem. I may wiggle and groove around the dance floor, but I'm in a relationship with a Colombian who dances like he's the frickin Latin Micheal Flatetly. Alvaro's interpretation of good dancing exceeds my abilities by several hundred incomprehensible steps. I can't follow the Lord of the Dance! Whenever we go out I feel like someone has pinned a big A on my shirt. Not dancing in Colombia is virtually sinful.

Last weekend I was invited to a party in Patio Bonito. Patio Bonito can be characterized by crooked wobbly concrete-block houses, lots of vegetable carts, sock vendors, polyester, and dormant busses lining the streets. It's not a very fancy neighborhood. Martha, one of my private pupils from the foundation, has become very attached to me and thus invited me to her birthday celebration. I felt honored and gladly accepted her kind invitation, the arroz con pollo (rice with chicken), sugary cake, and bottle of aguardiente was not easy for her family to afford. They live in a simple cement structure with concrete floors and ceilings that reminds me of living with Carla and Juan (two teachers from Jinotepe, Nicaragua). It's a pretty rural house for a city of 9 million people.

Anyways, shortly after I arrived I was asked if I knew how to dance. Due to the fact that dancing was taking place in a 4x4 space in the center of a circle of chairs, and that all the party guests were either 6 years younger or 20 years older than myself, I responded with a no - No, I do not know how to dance. I was determined to remain steadfast in my boycott of dancing, but it didn't really work. Unfortunately for me, I was immediately forced onto my feet by a 5 foot grinning minor. The thing is that I don't even dance that poorly. A few Merengue and Vallenato numbers don't intimidate me, I've been in Colombia for 19 months and know what I'm supposed to be doing. Even so, there is something slightly humiliating about dancing with a 17-year-old boy in front of your student and her family. Luckily for me, I have been in embarrassing situation training for several years now -- perhaps my entire life. Thus, invoking a little laughter in a private home among mostly strangers isn't really that big of a deal.

Due to the fact that there seemed to be some severe miscommunication with the word no, I ended up dancing with just shy of a dozen minors. However, exactly a year ago today I was drinking aguardiente and dancing Cumbia on a stage in the middle of the street in front of way too many people. Way too many people. This weekend marks the festivities of Carnaval in Barranquilla and I refuse to recount the details of the disastrous reputation damage that I incurred last year. Although I know how to dance Cumbia thanks to my dear friend and costeña partner in crime, Alexa, I have not been doing it since the age of three, nor did I learn any of the Colombian dances (with the exception of the super booty shaking Champeta) without horrible missteps and some serious blows to my pride.

Alyssa's arrival with provide me with a practical dancing test. She's a graceful, well trained dancer, and I'm a klutzy poorly trained ultimate frisbee player (kind of sounds like I'm describing a dog). Still, Alyssa has never a costeña best friend to drag her to la troja every Friday, nor has she been trapped dancing Meregue in Patio Bonito for 6 hours straight, nor does she have a happy-footed boyfriend who shames her into dancing "correctly" during uncomfortably small dinner parties. Alyssa is certainly the better dancer of the two, but my butt is a lot bigger and I'm not afraid to shake it.

Condoms and Lubricant

2010-02-12T09:10:00.001-05:00

I have been working in the streets with my new roommate Amy. Amy's a generous, lovable, and emotional Ph.D student studying international relations/urban geography. She also likes to dance. On Thursdays and Fridays we walk around passing out condoms and lubricant in el barrio Santa Fe and la plaza San Victorino (known as the Mariposa because the city built a giant metal statue of a butterfly in hopes that it would take up space and detract from the naturally unpleasant mood in one of the most notorious prostitution zones in Bogotá). My sexual integrity is forever tarnished due to the fact that individually packed condoms and lubricants are scattered around our apartment like beer cans in a frat house. Even when I leave the house I find myself pulling condoms out of my pockets and purses instead of bus fare or chapstick. At least everyone can be assured that, although it may seem like I'm having some serious rabbit sex, it's safe.

Condoms and lubricants are the key to unlocking casual conversations with sex workers. When we meet a new girl, usually through another girl that we already know, we try to land on the topics of STDs, babies, and safety. My repertoire has recently been updated to include a lubricant application demonstration. I use two fingers and some KY jelly for props, then pass out stickers that lead off with "muchos ratos = cuca seca" (lots of tricks = a dry vagina). As I'm getting to know more and more girls, I'm finding that making them laugh helps lighten the mood and make the girls feel comfortable. Since people tend to enjoy laughing at me, I frequently end up recounting my dozens of almost falling off the bus and getting lost stories.

I've gotten to know quite a few of the girls which makes aimlessly wandering and handing out protection a lot less awkward. Unfortunately, as I've gotten to know them I've learned that prostitution tends to be only one of natural disasters-like complications that each of these girls has to resolve. Amidst all the sexual abuse, displacement, violence, drugs, and diseases, perhaps the most difficult part of most of these girl's lives is hacking through bureaucratic bullshit.

Thus, I (the 15-year-old-looking gringa with 7 jeans) frequently am the only one available to help them yell at state social workers, underpaid hospital staff, and uppity government cubical workers who deny them service. I say yelling, but usually my accompaniment consists of standing in eternal lines only to be sent to a short queue where we take another goddamn paper number and wait.

Last week, I we found out that Angie* was pregnant, then we learned that she hadn't changed her address in 7 years and that she was technically living on the Pacific coast. The hospital recommended that we get her checked out 800 miles away. So, on Wednesday I managed to locate Angie and take her to the hospital to change her information, pick up some medicine and schedule a sonogram. We arrived at 1pm, hoping that the social worker would be back from lunch only to find that she had just left for lunch and that she was expected in one Colombian hour (approximately 1.35 digital watch hours). We reconciled that we were the first ones in line and that the woman could deal with us first. As we waited Angie and I played jewelquest on my phone, talked about baby names, and picked out which male nurse would become her next baby daddy. Several random people came by looking for the social worker and wandered away impatiently. As forty five minutes passed the same woman had come and gone and returned and left twice. A man came by and asked us to hold his place, an almost toothless 35 year old banged on the door for 4 minutes.

As we passed our hour and fifteen minute mark standing outside the social worker's office, I began to contemplate suicide until a fight broke out. A young girl arrived with a small posse of 5, three children and two women. They were standing in line behind us and then the aforementioned woman returned to reclaim her space. Instead of trying to reclaim her space vocally, she simply wiggled her way into the 5cm space between Angie and the posse. The young girl posse leader was not having it and shouted at her to move the fuck away. The woman shouted back that she had claimed her place in line 40 minutes ago and continued to swear at the young girl. The young girl increased her volume and swore back. The conflict continued to escalate until the young girl slapped the woman. Wow, I thought, instead of showing Maury Povich on TV, this hospital is reenacting it live!

As I was shocked, embarrassed and totally entertained by both of these women, Angie just looked sad. I see Angie in la Marisposa every week. She is usually smiling, huffing glue and joking around with her friends. As sad as this scenario is, it's her reality, and it's what she knows. Everyone there automatically know who she is and what she does. In the hospital, she has to face another reality. The social worker will ask her where she lives, the social worker will ask for a telephone number, and the social worker will continue to ask her piles of questions she doesn't know how to answer. Angie assumes that she is probably going to be rejected service and that she is constantly being judged for what she does. Angie has no control.

These girls handle daily situations that I can't even fathom. I don't know what it's like to sleep on a street lined with empty coke and glue bottles. I've never been repeatedly raped by a relative. I've never been in a knife fight. Amy and I may be silly gringas running around Colombia with funny accents, but we know a language that girls simply do not. We know how to challenge authority and we're not afraid to wait in a hospital all day. I may not have learned anything practical during my formal education and upbringing, but I sure as hell know how to threaten lawsuits. And even though there are condoms spilling out of my bag as I pull out my yellow legal pad, everyone takes you a lot more seriously when they are afraid of being sued.

* Amy's blog http://eyesonyouth4sale.blogspot.com/

*the street workers all receive pseudonyms

The Point of no Return

2010-02-09T11:09:00.005-05:00

It's been 8 months since my Fulbright grant ended and I just can't bring myself to leave Colombia. I'm sort of trapped. My best friend Mike has resorted to threatening the life of my dog if I do not return by June. Nemo might be doomed. There is just something daunting about returning to the states. Some nights I dream that I'm suffocating in a cubicle shouting at a computer screen, others I'm waiting tables in a Hawaiian shirt and mini skirt. As long as I stay abroad I don't really have to think about what the hell I'm going to do with my life. I can continue wandering the streets eating pastries full of meat, buying my avocados on street corners, and drinking aguardiente. Everything Colombian has become almost too normal. Standing in two hour lines at the bank, smashing my body into the Transmilenio bus, and buying minutes on the street corner don't phase me at all. I think I've reached the point of no return.

A few commonplace scenarios in Bogotá:

Buy some cell phone minutes, a single cigarette, or a lollypop.

I can read and understand this bus sign.

It will pass by my house on the septima heading north.

Sometimes it rains really hard and the stairs outside my apartment turn into a waterfall.

These dudes are enjoying a lunchtime nap in the middle of the city.

This man is selling delicious ants.

The woman is selling delicious ant butts.

Asado food...yum.

A gringo on a blackberry: weird.

To Market

2009-11-12T11:29:00.002-05:00

I need vegetables in my diet, not simply a shredded lettuce and carrot salad, but something substantial like a meaty chunk of broccoli. My veggie addiction is owing to my upbringing in the health conscious Mecca that is Seattle, Washington. Thus, when I moved to Barranquilla, I found it difficult to consume the traditional arepa con huevo on a daily basis. Restaurants in Quilla lack greenery because Costeños tend to demand foods that are highly saturated and deep-fried in oil. If you eat out, practically everything comes with fries. I'm sure you can imagine just how healthy the abundance of grease is for the skin. Add some humidity and dust, and you've got yourself a whole zit family.

In Seattle, highly processed and fried foods are usually not associated with the cuisine of the wealthy. Rich people don't go to McDonalds for special events, and Bill Gates isn't waiting in the Walmart checkout line. Instead, people with six-digit incomes seem to prefer the highly venerated and very trendy farmer's market. At the farmer's market, usually located in some fenced-in parking lot, Coach purse-carrying and flowy-dress clad mom, Prius-driving and Ray Ban wearing dad, ex-hippy-ex-yuppie grandma, and baby stuffed inside 300 dollar stroller can all enjoy a leisurely Sunday knowing that they are doing their part to make the world a better place. They are, after all, purchasing organic and locally grown produce. Dad samples some goat cheese, and mom buys a peach priced over triple the amount of the chemical-covered relative stacked in the nearby mega-ultra-supermarket.

At the farmer's market, we don't see an abundance of single-mothers on welfare or minorities. No, the farmer's market is a safe and happy environment where the scent of fresh-baked bread, homemade candles, and sweet flowers waft through the air in perfect harmony.

Now, if we travel south to the very large region commonly referred to as Latin America, the farmer's market simply becomes el mercado. Contrary to the tasty smells of the farmer's market, el mercado is overpowered by the stench of raw meat soaking in the sun. Here, instead of the rich flaunting their PC-fabulousness, we find the poor clutching their purses close to their bodies as they squeeze their way through crowds of polyester pants. Yes, the food is locally grown, and, yes, that cow was very freshly slaughtered, but any Costeña with a Coach purse is certainly not taking their baby to el mercado for a Sunday family outing.

The Coach purse-carrying and flowy-dress wearing Costeña mom is, instead, at the Exito (think Colombia’s Walmart). She's stocking up on potato chips, bags of Bimbo bread, and pre-packaged sliced ham. Mom is probably sipping some coffee while the empleada (live in maid) attends to the hyperactive children. Mom buys the kids a soft serve ice cream at 10:30 am and the empleada trains for a marathon as she races after the un-medicated, sticky-faced youngsters. After they purchase a cart full of highly processed goodies, the family makes their way to the food court. Fried chicken is ordered and it’s delivered on a tray with a pair of plastic gloves (so you don't have to grease up your hands, just your arteries).

After my first visit to an open-air mercado in Colombia, I was in love. Despite the overwhelming smells and heated pricing battles (due to my accent), fruit and veggies have never looked so beautiful or cost so little. Even when the vender charges me the going Gringo rate, a sack of red peppers, a whole pineapple, three ears of fresh corn, and bundle of broccoli equals one large farmers market artichoke. Needless to say, I’ve been buying a lot of food.

After my most recent purchase I invited some Colombian and Gringo friends over for veggie stir-fry and carrot soup. When my Colombian friends arrived they were confused. They asked me where the meat was and why there were so many vegetables. My Gringo friends, however, asked me for my recipe. As we three Gringas shoveled carrot soup down our throats, the Colombians present were looking for a polite way to shovel it into the trash. Initially I was saddened by my friends’ disapproval of my food, but an hour later my sadness turned to red hot rage when I found my Colombian born friends ordering hot dogs a block away. Upon further reflection I can’t really piece together why veggie rejection infuriated me to the point of screaming and swearing on the street corner. The truth is that I love hot dogs, ribs and steak just as much as the next carnivore, however, when you live in a city were vegetables hide in the form of creamy soups, a big bite of broccoli tastes like a double bacon cheeseburger. And when you slave over a double bacon cheeseburger all afternoon, you’re probably willing to defend its deliciousness in front of a lengthy hog dog cart line, in a foreign language on a street corner in Barranquilla.

The story of my life in under one page

2009-11-10T15:43:00.004-05:00

I was recently challenged to write a the story of my life in under one page for a job application, here are the results:

As legend holds, I was born in a blizzard. At least that is what my parents have told me. However, seeing as I was born in Seattle, Washington, this story is most likely false; in my hometown it never snows, it rains. My parents’ epic tale of battling the elements to bring me home probably consisted of some very cold rain mixed with bad driving. As much as I enjoy the dramatic account of my birth, which also includes a fireplace and a golden retriever, I am certain that I was born in the rain. It is the only explanation for my complete adoration for dreary days. In my 23 years of life, I’ve been rained on a lot, but each hot, hard, slow or fake rainy day has cultivated one of my crazy ideas. Ultimately, I thank the rain for helping me to land where I am today: soaking wet in Bogotá, Colombia.

When I think of the rain from my childhood, I remember wet soccer games followed by my mother’s ginger, lemon and honey tea. My mother, who was born and raised in Hong Kong, swears that ginger can cure everything, even a broken heart. For years after my parents’ divorce, a pot of roaring hot water with fresh slices of ginger was a permanent stovetop fixture in my home. During a series of drizzly winter months in high school, I drank my mother’s tea while I devoured my AP U.S. history textbook. When I was finished, my teacher, the all-inspiring Mr. Brink, encouraged me to push on to Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States and Richard Hofstadter’s The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It. In 11^th grade I fell in love with history only to experience my first broken heart four years later when I returned to Roosevelt High School hoping to do my teaching practicum with my original mentor, and learning that he had been forced into retirement due to district-wide budget cuts.

In 2004 I moved to Waterville, Maine and began brewing my own tea. I was mystified by Waterville’s fall foliage and I passed my days frolicking in the nearby mountains, playing ultimate Frisbee on the green, and watching the early arrival of winter from the library windows. During my junior year I rediscovered the joy of wearing oversized yellow plastic boots and stomping in puddles with my second grade students. After spending five years of my life as a life guard and swim instructor, I never imagined that I would actually volunteer to chase kids around a playground. But the plethora of hugs, stories and subtraction problems changed my mind.

My students in Nicaragua welcomed the rain with an amplified passion. After spending 18 years of life hating the Spanish language I somehow had a change of heart and decided to study abroad in Nicaragua. During my last month and a half in Nicaragua I conducted a research project on the public school system, I volunteered in several English classrooms, and experienced my most terrifying moment. One day I arrived to the school and Profesora Kenya handed me a tattered English textbook with a white board marker and sent me off alone to teach 50 Nicaraguan teenagers. At this point, I had seconds to prepare for class. Unfortunately, I had never taught on my own, I was not very confidant speaking in Spanish, and I had never met any of the 50 students. As I entered the classroom I was harassed with catcalls and made fun of for my accent. I wanted to die. I finally managed to settle the students down by asking individual questions to individuals. When all 50 children recognized that they could be singled out next the concentration level increased while the volume decreased. Although the experience didn’t end with every student speaking perfect English, or even speaking any comprehendible English, I learned that most of my students were intrinsically motivated to learn. I ultimately discovered that nearly each one had sacrificed working, helping around the house and other daily necessities for the opportunity to pursue the most basic education.

When I moved to Barranquilla in 2008 to work at the Universidad del Norte as an English Teaching Assistant, I was saddened by the level of cheating and apathy towards learning. Downpours in Barranquilla quickly turn into grungy class three rapids that whisk cabbies and bus drivers downstream and obviously deter travel. However, if it began to rain 30 seconds before the start of my class, all of my students would skip. I tried to motivate them with interactive lessons and English games, but my most of my level two students refused to put in any out of classroom effort. Frustrated by the limited enthusiasm from my regular classes, I designed my own creative writing class that was open to the public. I finally received complete job satisfaction when it rained and each of my 11 students was present.

The rain in Bogotá is much more familiar than the downpours of the tropics or the snowstorms of New England. I moved here in June to try to understand the complexities of the Colombian conflict. Some days I walk the misty streets of Santa Fe, passing out condoms and lubricant to sex workers. Others, I watch the gentle rain from the library window of Los Andes. Today I returned to my apartment soaking wet. This morning’s sunshine turned into storm clouds and cold rain with little warning. My Barranquillero roommate is depressed. He has been daydreaming about humid weather and sandy beaches all afternoon. I, however, prefer the rain.

Maybe I forgot a few friends and/or relatives, maybe I forgot several years of worth of sports games and sibling fights, but I'm trying to impress some peeps in under a page so this is my life's story and I'm sticking to it.

The Castle

2009-10-12T17:13:00.000-05:00

Once upon a time there lived a princess in the tower of a beautiful castle. Princess Espider was known throughout his neighborhood for his rockin' guitar skills, megaphone, smelly little sausage dog, and his two beautiful gringa roommates.

Beautiful gringa Anna

Gringa #2

Princess Espider waiting for the prince

The mighty steed Don Ramon

The kingdom (aka neighborhood Chapinero Alto)

The grand castle.

The two gringas met Espider during carnaval in Barranquilla and enjoyed his expansive collection of bad jokes. A few months later they all moved into the grand castle together. The castle, however, provided shelter and sustenance for more than just the three rent payers. Frequent crashers like Prince Carolina (girlfriend of Espider), señor Rafa (boyfriend of Anna), rockstar Moncho (friend and couch-sleeper-oner), and a random assortment of people too lazy to return to their homes at 2am/out of town guests enjoyed the spectacular natural light of the castle during the day and its intolerable cold at night.

One day as the three castle-mates set out to explore Bogota, they couldn't open the door. They shoved and they tugged, but the front door was jammed shut. Then, they realized that they lived in a crooked castle. They soon noticed that the ceilings, the wall, even the grand tower seemed lay at odd angles.

As they uncovered more secrets to the castle they discovered a coffin in the garage, a man sleeping in a helmet in the park outside, three vicious beagles and a little mutt downstairs, and loud shrieks coming from the apartment below.

Needless to say this wacky arrangement left the three a bit puzzled about the inner-workings of their castle. Thus, they sought out the wise lady Andrea who lived on the first floor. As they finally kicked open their front door, they were greeted by a symphony of barking along with a cheerful hello from Andrea. The wise woman invited them into her home and fed them treats and juice, then she popped out her crystal ball and divulged all the information she knew. Alas, the fog began to clear, the coffin and loud shrieks belonged to the actor neighbor, the four dogs all lived with her, and the dude in the trash bag and helmet is a friendly homeless man who scares of others from camping out in the castle's personal park.

The three returned home satisfied that they had finally uncovered the mysteries of their home. All of the castle's little quarks were sort of endearing and separated it from its homogenous, fancy-panty neighbors. Even the uneven walls added some character. They were feeling quite pleased and proud until the princess entered the kitchen to drink some water and found the faucet was dry. No matter how charming imperfections are, frequent water outages are a pain in the ass.

Academic Spanish

2009-10-11T03:01:00.006-05:00

After spending over 14 months in Colombia my Spanish is fine. I can understand what the crazy man on the street corner is mumbling about and I am a professional jet chocolate bar orderer at the tienda below my castle. Even when I swear at the little sausage dog that lives me, the anger automatically comes out in Spanish.

Academic Spanish, however, is still somewhat problematic. Arguing with the dude who is jackhammering the sidewalk in front of my house at 7am on a Saturday morning is much easier than explaining corporate social responsibility trends in Colombia to a room full of graduate students/native speakers/people who obviously notice when I conjugate the past participle subjunctive conditional like a six-year-old. Since my last blog entry (which may or may not have been 6 months ago), I finished my grant, stopped teaching English, moved to Bogotá, stopped the excessive sweating, and somehow decided it was a marvelous idea to start a masters program in Political Science. yay. Little did I know that my greatest academic skill, the ability to bullshit, would not translate very well into a foreign language.

In high school and college I was on the dream team of class discussion jerks. You, the student trying to avoid eye contact with the clock, are enthusiastically thrusting your notebook and pens into your messenger bag as you anticipate the ringing of the bell. I, however, am preparing to enhance my ego with my 17th "intelligent" question of the day posed 45 seconds before the end of second period. Needless to say, I never had any problems with my participation grade. Now that class is in Spanish, I'm rolling my eyes as that girl with the nasally voice in the front row when she raises her hand for the 30th time.

Although I am reading at a snail's pace, I understand the material and I am able to form coherent opinions. When Fran Drescher in the front row starts barking about the fallacy of machismo in Colombia, I understand her well enough to want to smack her in the face. Still, there is something about bitching her out in front of the class that makes me nervous. Last friday I think everyone in my class heard my heart thump out of my chest as I presented on democratic consolidation theory to a room buzzing with a painful silence. I don't understand why it's so difficult for me to pronounce autoritarismo (authoritarianism) when I'm speaking in front of people. As I bumbled my way through mispronunciation after grammatical error, I could feel the judgement of my peers piercing my skin. Man I feel stupid.

My intellectual self-worth hit an all time low after receiving the results of my pop quizzes. They're so low that I'm even embarrassed to share them in my blog. I was pretty sure I was about to be kicked out of the University until I received my mid-term grades. Apart from my pop quiz class (seriously, who gives pop quizzes in a masters program?!), my grades are decent. It appears as if I shamed myself into actually learning. My ability to fake knowledge seems to have disappeared, but luckily it has been replaced by desperate and real studying. Now that I'm rethinking my level of dumb, perhaps I'm ready to return to my overly-talkative classroom self. On second thought, that girl was kind of an asshole.

The three little pigs

2009-04-08T09:20:00.002-05:00

Some days teaching a 17-year-old how to respond to the question “where are you from?” isn’t really that satisfying, nor is teaching a level 7 English speaker how to write a thesis statement. The aforementioned 17-year-old and level 7 English speaker are as certainly just as bored by the assignment as I am. My students and I are slaves to the “Top Notch” book series and I want to slit my wrists every time I have to plug in a listening CD. I feel like the classic North American imperialist forcing my “superior” language into the brains of reluctant Colombians.

It’s not that I don’t like my students. It’s not that I don’t like teaching. It’s not even that I don’t like speaking English. I just don’t like teaching English to my students.

In January, out of shear desperation, I came up with an alternative plan. I wrote a Creative Writing syllabus and emailed it to my boss. Just the prospect of getting out of one English class was enough to cure my chronic laziness. Like the fat nerd that I am, I gleefully reviewed an old College writing book, countless essays, and creative writing internet tips. My boss, very puzzled by my initiative and enthusiasm, agreed to sponsor the class. I now teach Creative Writing two hours a week to whoever is interested.

I have about eleven students. Three of them are adults, one is a mathematics professor, and one is a local musician. The others are simply enigmas. I was very shocked when eight, self-motivated, intelligent, and proficient English speaking uninorte students arrived in my class a few weeks ago. I thought this type of uninorte student only existed in university brochures.

Anyways, on Tuesday, I read my students three different versions of the Three Little Pigs and then had them write their own. No one writes and very few Barranquilleros read for fun, so I thought that this very first-grade style exercise was relatively appropriate. Judging by their stories, my class seemed to enjoy the exercise. And their end results far exceeded my expectations. I was especially amused by a level 5 student who managed to leap over the limits of good taste. I have included his story below:

“One time it was a wolf who loved to smoke weed all the fucking day and one day he was so but so hungry and there wasn’t any food and he decided to go out for some food (he was fucking high). But that day was called “the oil day” and that’s all you could buy, then the wolf buy a bottle of oil and went back home. But before he came home he saw his neighbor house and he remembered he was a pig and decided to kill him and fry him in the oil to kill his unsatiable (I cannot believe this guy knew this word) munchies. Then the good wolf took a knife of his kitchen and ring the bell of the first pig and when the pig came out PRA!!! He cut his head and ate him after he fried him. Then he decided to do the same with the other neighbor (was a pig too), and the wolf did, he ate the other pig and this one was so so delicious and for that reason the wolf went to the third pig's house but when the wolf was going to kill the last pig he saw that the pig was blazed and the wolf asked him: "why are your eyes so read?" and the little pig say can't you see asshole, I'm fucking high leave me alone" and the wolf said, "hey do you have weed?" and the pig said jajaja fool wolf I'll give you some pure and excellent weed, and they smoked like friends forever."

My dear little student is certainly producing A+ material. Luckily, my Creative Writing class is not graded. I wouldn't even know how to begin. Do I mark him down for talking about weed? or do I give him extra-credit for using "blazed" correctly?

I am also trying to participate in my own class. I told the students that I was totally into Freire and abandoning the traditional teacher/student relationship type of B.S. But the truth I only preach that crap so I can justify writing instead of watching people write. If you think class is boring when you're a student, you should try being a teacher. Time ticks backwards when you proctor a test. So, as my students wrote about dying piggies and stoned wolves I produced the following:

“In early February three little gringas journeyed Barranquilla, Colombia. Tales of parties and debauchery in a far away land had travelled north and sweet songs of drink and dance had softly tempted and caressed their youthful desires. So the three little country bumpkins gathered their belongings and set out for the world’s greatest party.

The gringas landed on Thursday afternoon and were immediately greeted by a charming and mysterious young man who introduced himself as Mr. Ron. Mr. Ron spoke in a deep, melodic voice and invited the young ladies to a suave party the following evening. Elated by the prospect of fun, the girls accepted without hesitation.

The next night they dressed in their evening’s best and painted their faces with sparkles and gold dust. As they eagerly awaited the arrival of Mr. Ron, gringa #1 declared that she would not eat anything. Mr. Ron was to fall in love with her slim and delicate figure, thus she refused even the tiniest morsel of arepa. Gringa #2 and #3 scoffed at her foolishness as they munched away on healthy portions of sancocho con límon.

Mr. Ron took them to a fabulous party filled with rum, wine, and music of every flavor. Gringa #1, desperate for Mr. Ron’s approval, swooned over his contentless jokes and slurped every ounce of aguardiente that passed by her periphery. Unfortunately, her hungry belly could not stand the copious amounts of alcohol she ingested and by 11:30 she had resigned herself to a rancid bathroom stale for the evening.

The next day Mr. Ron offered to show the girls around again. Gringa #1, however, was still incapacitated from the night before, so gringa #2 and #3 left the house without her. Gringa #2 was a very fashionable young lady. She spent most of her time and money perusing online designer boutiques. In her many years of excessive spending, she had managed to find only one pair of shoes that satisfied her. Her perfect pair of black stilettos was her only true love.

When Mr. Ron came to collect the girls, gringa #2 boasted and bragged about her magical dancing powers in her black stilettos. Mr. Ron raised his eyebrows and nodded his head in agreement. As he held the door open for the girls, gringa #3 could feel the power of his mischievous smirk pounding on the back of her head. She quickly pulled her friend aside to warn about her about Mr. Ron’s bad intentions, but gringa #2 only laughed, claiming that gringa #3 was just jealous of her superior fashion sense.

An hour and a half later, gringa #2 had fallen a great fall while dancing with Mr. Ron. Her ankle was twisted and her shoe had snapped. It was only midnight and her she was back in the hotel sitting in a puddle of her own tears as she soaked her swollen body and wallowed in her fashion depression.

The final night, gringa #3 was the only one left standing. Mr. Ron had invited her out, and she had accepted. Gringa #3 was a loyal friend and she had watched the destruction of her two best friends with an angry eye. So that night she ate a good meal, put on a sensible pair of shoes, and went to the store around the corner.

With her purchase in hand, Gringa #3 hid behind the corner of her hotel patiently awaiting Mr. Ron's arrival. His foot steps were distinct, and as she heard the slow, rhythmic clicking of his paten leather shoes, she readied herself. Mr. Ron turned the corner and PRAH!!! Gringa #3 threw an entire box of maizena directly into his eyes. Mr. Ron screamed and fell to the ground. Giant buñuelos immediately began to pour down his face in place of tears. He was blinded and writhing in pain.

Gringa #3 dusted the corn starch from her palms and headed off to party the night away."

Although my story was an extremely mild version of carnaval, I decided it was better was not to share my version of the three little pigs with my class so that they could continue to perceive me a responsible professor type figure. Unfortunately, throughout the week several students from each of my classes had been reminding me that we had seen each other drunk, dancing, and covered in maizena. Feigning professionalism continues to be a fruitless task. Maybe I should just stick to the book...

An ode to Aaron

2009-02-11T22:10:00.001-05:00

My little brother recently turned 19-years old. However, when I look at him I still see the same little 9-year-old twit who flashed his entire naked body to every member at each and every one of my pre-adolescence sleepovers. Any of my hometown friends can probably vividly remember several incidences of hockey sticks rammed against my bedroom door, bloody battles over the remote control, and the incessant pestering of an ADHD child. It's now been over five years since we've lived in the same house, but seeing as he's had the same haircut for over 17 years, I'm still struggling to distinguish the Aaron of 2009 from my annoying little brother.

As Aaron keeps getting older, the gap between us keeps getting smaller. It wasn't really until the summer after Aaron's 14th birthday that I began to realize he was actually a real live human being. Before, I had been under the impression that little brothers were a species entirely of their own. I was suddenly very intrigued and I wanted to get to know this new person who, without my knowledge, had been sharing a wall with me for the past 14 years. So, before I headed off to College, Aaron and I took our first trip alone. We drove to Eugene, Oregon and I introduced him to unmentionable illicit activities. We watched some stupid movies, listened to gangster rap, and wandered about in some scenic landscapes.

As expected, we bickered. I played the dictator, and Aaron played the less-useful and inferior member, Kamo if you will, of our little party. But, somehow my Stalinistic demeanor didn't totally spoil the fun. Ultimately, we had a nice time. Several weeks later, we acted in some D-rated movie as we cried on the airport sidewalk. We promised each other that we'd phone and internet often and then, I left. Yes it was pathetic, but heading over 3000 miles away from your most sincere love-hate relationship is quite tragic.

Perhaps it was our physical separation alone that improved our relationship, I mean it is challenging to inflict physical pain from Maine to Seattle, but between the infrequent smoke-signals (neither of us are very good at maintaining correspondences and both of us are usually avoiding several acquaintances..including our parents..) I began to actually like Aaron.

At the end of college I made a few moves and landed myself in Colombia. (I assume this part is self-explanatory). I wasn't really into the whole idea of spending a famililess Christmas so I invited the easiest relative to boss around. Colombia, as you may imagine, is a slightly different type of adventure than Eugene. In Colombia you should probably know how to speak Spanish, whereas I think they speak some ancient form of hippy within a three-mile radius of the U of O.

Naturally, Aaron did absolutely no planing for our trip. (I'm still unsure if he can even locate Colombia on a map). To prepare, he asked me how many pairs of shorts he should bring, stuffed some meds in a bag and hoped on a plane. He should have packed a couple extra capsules of drugs because upon arrival he was immediately sick and injured.

As Christmas rolled around, the two of us gorged ourselves on an overly portioned meal at Andrea's sister's house in a very non-touristy locale in the middle of the coffee zone. Then, Andrea's 70 some year old father forced us into consuming post-Christmas dinner shots of aguardiente. Although the extent of Aaron's spanish begins and ends with "hola" and "gracias," he didn't need words to communicate how shitty he was feeling. Half-hour long visits to the bathroom are pretty much a universal language.

Unfortunately for Aaron, rejecting liquor from old men in Sevilla is a losing battle, and with the taste of aguardiente burning his lips, we hit the town. December 24th in a Colombian pueblo is a unique experience to say the least. Us gringos tend to associate Christmas eve with carols and a low-key familiar evening next to a fire. We, however, found ourselves packed on a sidewalk full of tottering drunkies and meringue. I think Sevilla has a town ordinance which requires that every resident must party their way through Christmas morning. And although Christmas eve was a fiesta and a half, Christmas day was headachingly painful.

Several large plates full of meat, beans, rice, eggs, chorizos, dulces, and chicharrones later, we fled the food party and headed for the jungle on the Caribbean coast. I don't know about you, but even during my fiercest battle with illness, I have never gone four days without brushing my teeth. Thus, Aaron's stank breath became a point of contention. Seeing as we were sharing a tent, it became very difficult for me to take pity on his chainsaw-like stomach-spasms when I had to sleep next to his garlic dragon B.O.

I think our bickerings may have frightened my friends because they seemed to frolic several yards away whenever I raised my voice in English. Clary, David, and tt, who accompanied us on our beach/jungle adventure, guided Aaron and I on more than three five-hour long beach hikes. While us members of Valar were giggling and splashing around in the waterslide-like river that flowed into the Atlanic, Aaron laid in a sand pile like a sick puppy. On the third beach/jungle day, a combination of Aaron lameness and Hannah selfishness had me contemplating homicide. Why did I bring him to Colombia again?

I guess daydreaming about killing my sick brother kind of makes me a huge bitch, but I was seriously trying to get my paradise on. I mean, I'm sitting on a white sandy beach sandwiched between some jungly greenery and the Caribbean. I've got sacks full of mangos, some good friends, and I can't even remember what day it is. Aaron, on the other hand, is hungry (we'd been living off of fruit and tuna), exhausted (he hardly slept due to our neighbor's classic costeño all-night vallenato dance party), decorated with mosquito bites, and excluded from most conversations. For him, Colombia certainly lived up to its reputation as a third-world country.

But the thing about third world countries is that sometimes you find a special spot in the sand a few meters away from the roaring sea where the only light is shinning down on you from the moon and the stars. Usually, the coast is gently shaded by some wispy clouds, but Aaron and I discovered a few hours of comfortable solitude where dozens of shooting stars zoomed across the black sky. Even though our underwear was filled with sand, we were paralyzed by the evening's magic. It's moments like these where all is forgiven between a nasty big sister and a punk-ass little brother. In this universe, hearts are mended, broken families reunite, and everyone lives happily ever after. Instead of watching the clock tick into 2009, you forget that time ever existed and take pleasure in the fact that you are next to the most important person in the world. Maybe you sort of hate him, but you know that you have to love him because he accepts you, even at your ugliest.

...

Then, he farts, ruins the moment, and you wonder why you didn't dispose of that twit 10 years ago when you had the chance.

Hannah and Aaron

Happy 2009

Merry Christmas (perhaps a little late)

Juice

2009-01-30T16:17:00.007-05:00

My favorite juice is made and sold at the bus stop across the highway from the uninorte. It's freshly squeezed with some dangerous medieval-looking device then poured into a large bucket filled to the brim with blocks of ice. There's a spigot at the bottom and after I hand the plump juice attendant one mil pesos, she cranks the nob and the mandarin-goodness comes flowing out into a large plastic cup.

After several weeks of adventure, I have finally returned to my routine at the university. It had been a while since I'd actually worked and I almost forgot to stop and taste the juice. On most school days I scurry across the bridge that straddles the highway and politely request to be "gifted" a glass of jugo. That's what Colombians usually say, "regalame un vasito de jugo porfa." Please gift me some juice.

On Monday, as I approached the umbrella-covered cart, I felt particularly deserving of an after school refreshment. This semester, I have been gifted, by the powers that be, level seven and level one classes. I'm sure everyone who doesn't speak Korean would expect that during the first day of Korean class your teacher would probably spend the majority of the lesson blubbering on in your native language. If not, you would be pondering over the difference between the absence policy and your professor's hometown. Thus, as the majority of my level one students responded to my "where are you from?" question with "I am Barranquilla," I realized that pretending I didn't understand Spanish was not going to fly.

I actually came to conclusion that Hannah's Basic English level one class would probably be more like Hannah's own personal advanced Spanish vulgarities class on Friday before the semester began. Like everyone in Barranquilla between the ages of seven and seventy, I was certain that my students would be at the very least mildly foulmouthed, and since I'm the professor I suppose that it's my responsibility to identify and curb the use of cursing. But ultimately, I assumed that my level ones would probably be more qualified to teach me costeño than I am to teach them English. The idea of me, a teaching ASSISTANT, babysitting twenty-five non-English speaking 16 to 20 year-olds still doesn't seem to logically equate to a university-level course.

Since it doesn't seem to bother my boss, coordinator, or anyone who's actually paying for my class that I am the one and only in-class authority, I figure I can do whatever the hell I want. So, on the first day of class, I decided to assemble a getting to know you, getting off your ass "fun!" activity. I may be teaching at the best university in the northern Colombia, but I figured that your average middle school language introduction game would be sufficient. Still, as much as I tried to take the focus away form my Spanish lecturing abilities (or severe lack there of), I found myself preforming a lengthy song and dance number filled with an orchestra grammatical imperfections in front of fifty judging eyes.

If you would like to speak to me after class, you came to my office.... uff.

Still, despite my tempromental Spanish, I think my students actually bought into the whole Hannah as a teacher thing. As we parted ways for the day, their "I love teacher" comments and fist pounds even led me to believe that maybe I didn't bore them to the brink of suicide. Wow, I'm getting good. One student even stayed after class to ask me the correct spelling and pronunciations of several words including, as he wrote on the whiteboard "mudafuker." I laughed and promised a lesson in Seattle slang at the end of the semester. I mean who else is going to teach them the correct usage of inappropriate phrases?

On my way to my juice I felt proud that my little ducklings appeared to be following me in line and I kind of had this "I'm the shit" glossy film glazed over my eyes as I stuck a straw in my cup and waved down my bus. I then cooly jumped into the bus and handed the driver exact change like I'd done it my whole life. But before I could sit down, the bus jerked away. I guess somethings should never become too routine and clumsy people should never act too cool, because even after months of practice and preparation, you'll still ended up flat on your ass covered in juice.

Free stuff

2009-01-22T18:39:00.003-05:00

If your sibling gave you an ugly, starchy-fabric t-shirt for your birthday, you’d probably put on a fake-ass grin and tell him or her that you love it. At the same time you’d be contemplating the least offensive excuse for tossing the poo-brown, neon logoed waste of closet space at the nearest Goodwill. However, if you went to a baseball game and a 45-year-old costumed man shot the exact same piece of crap out of a rocket-launching-like tube right into your lap, you would be siked. Presents are cool, but free stuff is way better.

Grant money is a lot like free stuff. Well, maybe it’s not exactly accurate to equate a Fulbright with a sports game-scented shirt (seeing as I had to fill out messy paperwork, feign cultural sensitivity, and put on an A+ diplomat’s grin before receiving my monthly stipend), but somewhere along this process someone decided to throw in a free trip to Mexico.

Currently I’m stuffed with expensive free Mexican food, spooning a free giant body pillow, watching free TV with seven friends in a free posh hotel room in the center of the zona rosa in Mexico City. I can’t believe out of the tens of thousands of people in the stadium the Mariner moose actually launched the t-shirt at me!

Supposedly, the Colombian, Mexican, and Venezuelan Fulbrighters are here for a conference. But my fifteen-minute presentation on Shakira, I mean my experience as a Fulbrighter in Barranquilla, isn’t really the equal value of a week-long, all-expenses paid trip. Maybe my internal exchange rate is off again.

It’s not that I’m not elated that piles of gold coins keep falling into my lap, I just wanted to point out how incredibly awesome I am. Lately, I’ve been feeling awfully self-important. Hanging out in Mexico is cool, but so was the last month and a half. Basically since my last blog entry, I’ve been on a paid vacation. More specifically, I failed a few students, packed up some bags, flew to Bogotá for an ultimate tourney, celebrated my birthday in Seattle, drank some aguardiente with my brother in the coffee zone on Christmas eve, watched the stars on the beach in the middle of the jungle for the new years, flew back to Bogotá just because, and now I’m kicking it in Mexico.

My life is pretty sweet.

There’s only one dark cloud on the horizon and it seems to be moving closer and closer to my employment (vacation) paradise. What the hell am I going to do next year? I’ve come to realize that my life has pretty much peaked. Upon further inspection, I didn’t win a free shirt at the baseball game, I won that sweet silver A4 at the mall! And once you win the free car at the mall, the afterlife tends to suck. As for the future, I’m preparing myself for a life of paper-filing, coffee-stained jcpenny-polyester power suits, carpal tunnel syndrome, and Cathy comics. I guess I should collect as many schmoozing with diplomats and Aztec ruins stories as I can. After all, I’m gonna need enough ammunition to one-up my co-workers for the next 42-years.

Thanksgiving

2008-11-30T22:20:00.007-05:00

When I'm sad, lonely, or just flat out depressed I turn to food. For me, the best way to deal with any overly exacerbating emotion is to smile on the outside and stuff fried, sugary, lardy-goodness covered in frosting into my insides. Thus, in the midst my 10-day spell of homesickness I skipped the traditional exercising, reading, socializing bullshit and cured my problems with a good old dose of gorging myself.

I've been thinking about home. Nothing serious, I just miss not sweating, bug bite free legs, punctuality, service in restaurants, driving (or just being in a car without the panic attack), Seattle, waiting in an actual line, and maybe (but only as an after thought) my friends and family. I'm trying not to dwell on how unattainable all of these things are in Barranquilla.

.......

Dammit. I need to eat, Immediately.

Luckily, it's November and the perfect opportunity is quickly approaching. Yes, the most delicious holiday of the year: Thanksgiving. Somehow, in spite of the horrifically tacky decorations, the delusionally idiotic notion that Indians and Pilgrims were really friends, and the melodramatic family incidences, Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday. I am craving, like truly salivating over the mental image, taste, and smell of cranberry, turkey, stuffing happiness.

So how does this work exactly? I'm homesick, I've decided that Thanksgiving will heal me, but I'm in Colombia. No turkey, no canned cranberry sauce, no pumpkin pie, no football.

We make plans to attempt Thanksgiving at Monica and Andrea's, but I'm in Colombia and the drains in the kitchen are clogged. We go to plan B: invade the Irish. So, with enough Exito bags in hand to feed the impoverished South side of Barranquila, we enter Grace's apartment. Together an Irish Thanksgiving virgin, a Texan who can't cook, a sophisticated palleted Colombian, and I team up to Thanksgiving.

Andrea is in a frenzy cooking seven or eight pots filled with savory-smelling ingredients, I'm pouring butter, salt, cheese, cream, and fatness into several bowls at once, Grace is smoking a cigarette, and Monica is perched on a chair in the kitchen doorway sipping on a glass full of 7up and wine. As Andrea's and my hair gets frizzier and frizzier, the garlic cheesy mashed potatoes, buttered brown sugar squash, grilled fat Colombian carrots, cream of mushroom soup rice casserole, perfect turkey day stuffing, garlic and ginger green beans, tamarind gravy, milo chocolate-chunk cookies, and two whole roasted chickens are coming to fruition.

The food is practically perfect, but before we eat Monica and Andrea run home to freshen up and I jump in Grace's shower. I'm quickly washing the cooking sweat off my body with a ravenous anticipation of the calories I'm about to ingest. The thick pitter patter noise of Grace's shower's water pressure is far superior to the drizzling spray or my own shower. Unfortunately, when I turn the water off, the rich noise only grows louder. I'm in Colombia and its storming.

Monica and Andrea are trapped a few streets over, our other Thanksgiving guests, the ladies from my ultimate team, are trapped on the other side of calle 84 (currently white water rapids), and I'm trapped in an apartment hot boxed with food smells. I'm ready with my napkin bib, my kung-fu fork and knife grip, and my unbuttoned pants. I don't care whose absent from the table I'm not thinking about my family, Monica, or Andrea, Ima eat my food and Ima eat my food now. Only my fun is spoiled as the feisty Irish lass drags me feet first and screaming into the other room. She's making me wait.

We wait, and we wait, and we wait, and we wait, and then we wait, and we wait, and we wait.

Crap. As we're waiting, the mental image of my family Thanksgiving(s) begins to haunt me. My mother is surrounded by fifteen people including my brother and best friends. Christine is laughing at some stupid joke and embarrassing Aaron whose on the brink of vomiting, Mike is whispering sweet nothings into the crust of one of the five slices of pie overflowing on his plate, Nicole is serving something chocolate in a cute little dress and sweater, and collectively the room has gained somewhere in the area of 200 pounds. A mile and a half away, my grandfather is overly praising Howard and Linda's Thanksgiving creations, Linda's kitchen is spotless despite the twelve classic dishes mounted on the table, Howard is making some obnoxious eating noises, and my grandmother is scanning the situation for an excuse to help with some cooking or cleaning aspect. I need to hurry up and suppress these thoughts with massive amounts of food.

After some more waiting two wet rats resembling Andrea and Monica finally come dripping through the doorway. The table is set for seven, but the Colombians on the other side of the 84 are screwed. The rain might not let up until daybreak. There are only four of us at the table, but there's absolutely zero room for our plates, we have gone way overboard.

Within a matter of seconds I've inhaled three plates worth of Thanksgiving. Andrea's Tamarind gravy tastes so good I'm licking it off my plate even though belly has reached its 9-month pregnant form. I'm groaning the sweet moans of success. My plan worked. Any of my prior longing for first-world comforts have been pushed down, way down, by tens of thousands of calories worth of Thanksgiving. I'm no longer homesick, now I'm just sick. I swear to myself I shall never eat again. Unfortunately, every dish looks completely virginal. At least we're in Colombia and I know plenty of hungry people to scarf these leftovers.

Sorry, you fail

2008-11-14T13:50:00.001-05:00

Less than six months ago I was slaving over school work. Senior spring is supposed to be a serious non-stop party, but I think that only applies if don't write a thesis. Or maybe if you do write a thesis, frequent the pub, hang out with the committee, and never sleep. Anyways, less than six months ago I was seething in Miller as I tried to impress my professors. The crappy feeling of rejected school work remains vivid in my memory and red ink correction marks are forever burned into my soul. Still, less than six-months after graduating from the torture chamber, I have become the sadist.

I'm sitting in my office grading papers. No Mr. Student, the answer to "what problems did you have on your trip to El Rodadero?" is not "I was vacation a mechanical problem." HAHAHA! Minus four points. "I was the flight to Bogotá in the last year," nope, I really don’t think you were an airplane last year. Wrong! This is very enjoyable. Absolute power may corrupt absolutely, but I'm thinking that just the slightest flavor of power can corrupt completely. I may be an inexperienced 22-year-old English teacher in a foreign country, but you'd think I was Stalin with this Grinch-like grin on my face. I've turned a complete 180 from that watery-eyed little undergraduate cowering in the conference room of the history department.

I'm going to fail four of them. I already know it. If you still can't tell me what you did last weekend you're done. Period. So now I'm like a lion preying on the weak. The scared little doe-eyed students are subject to my questioning and ridicule. The fast ones can answer correctly and relax, but I sink my teeth into the slow-minded. I interrogate their every move and threaten them with failure.

Everything was going so great. I was eagerly awaiting my slaughter. I wanted to get my revenge on the little bastards who made my semester so difficult. I was going to fail them and make them cry. Yes, it was perfect. I bought some oreos so I could give Student 1, Student 2, Student 3, and Student 4 a taste of the sweet life as I handed them their failing grade. I had even practiced my condescending smile in the mirror. And yes, it was perfect until Student 1 arrived to my office today. I smugly showed her my excel sheet to prove that her 56% grade was legitimate, but as I handed her a consolation pack of oreos, I was suddenly far from elated. Her big, brown, glassy eyes were fixated on my computer screen for a few everlasting moments. She then politely refused my oreos, handed me back her test, thanked me for a good semester, and walked out.

Dammit. I'm a bad person.

My bicycle

2008-11-12T15:09:00.001-05:00

Peddling and cruising, I love bikes. As a nine-year-old aspiring dictator of the universe, my purple bike with its classic silver bell and sparkly squawking horn (I'm sure you can smell the annoying factor) was my most prized possession. My bicycle introduced me to a new type of independence. I didn't have to walk to Mike and Nicole's, my mom didn't have to drive me to the park, I had a bike.

Rain or shine (mostly rain) I loved speeding down the steep Seattle hills on my bicycle, but as I entered high school my former love started to seem pretty lame when compared to the passenger seat of a senior boy's SUV. My bike collected dust, and I supported the oil industry. Why bike to the park? Isn't easier to drive the four blocks to Mike and Nicole's? Since then I've been driving. A lot. Including three Waterville-Seattle treks and a few journeys up and down the left coast. Life is so easy and lazy with a car.

Now I'm in the 3rd world. Apparently traffic rules don't really exist. Stop signs are decorative pieces, and as long as you honk while you're driving through a red light you're golden. So, I don't drive (not that I could find/afford a car if I wanted to). I have become dependent on others to transport me. Thus, I get stuck. One of my classic study abroad stories is about my 13 hour brunch/dinner adventure. Juan and Carla, my Nicaraguan family, announced that we were going to visit a friend. We arrived just after 9am. Initially, the visit was advertised as a 2 hour, 3 at the most, excursion, but by 2pm every board bone in my body was aching to leave. By 10pm I was convinced that I had died and gone to purgatory. All in all it was a very painful and awkward experience that was only exacerbated by a language moat.

Now, I have more of a language puddle, and I have learned to embrace the unexpected. Two Saturdays ago I went to the beach with the team to play some frisbee and chill. Taty and I then journeyed a few waves over to a friend's bar. We hung out, watched the sun set over the Atlantic, and drank some rum. I was thinking we'd leave in an hour, 2 at the most. I didn't get home until 2:30. As enjoyable as the afternoon/evening was, I was unavoidably stuck. With a car I could come and go as I please, but as it is, I'm like a 15-year-old forbidden to drive.

I'm really not the type of person who likes to be dependent on others. I'd rather roam free like the scraggly dogs on the street than be locked away like the curly-furred rat that live in the apartment next door. So, I bought a bike. My yellow, 18-speed beauty is my ticket to independence. I feel like a nine-year-old again, I don't have to beg for a ride to practice, I can just cruise over to Tivolli on my own.

We’ve only been united for a few weeks, but if near death experiences really do bring the survivors closer, we should be welded together. If you locate my previous Barrquilla traffic descriptions, you will note that the streets don't really seem, well, safe. The crazy bus/taxi/driver factor is seriously cramping my biking style. Usually, I like to bike without the fear that a taxi containing two of my students is going to run me off the road. I’ve learned to avoid rush hour.

Very surprisingly, my favorite time to ride my bike is at 4:45am. Yes, that’s 4:45 IN THE MORNING. You may be asking what the hell am I, Hannah, hater of all things earlier than 10:30, doing on a bicycle at 4:45? No, I was not particularly pleased when “we” decided to have 5am Tuesday practices. (5am is for sleeping, and that’s about it.) And I wasn’t exactly chipper when I arrived at Tivolli last month and discovered that this “practice,” wasn’t even practice, just running. Wait, aren’t I on a frisbee team? What frisbee team practices in the morning? Additionally, what frisbee team does two hours of wind sprints? Apparently, I am unavoidably committed to a frisbee team that engages in both of these practices. The thing about 5am is that everyone knows that you don't have ANY prior commitments. The only upside is that at 4:45 in the a.m. the roads are empty, the sky is just ever so slightly light, and the temperature is perfect. I turn the wheels a couple dozen times and just cruise.

I think I’m the only female in Barranquilla who bikes. Thus, I receive plenty of piropos and puzzled stares. I’m really feeding my already thriving reputation as a psycho. (Too bad I don’t still have that bell and horn.) At home I park my bike next to Elvis' car. Sometimes we leave the house together. He's dressed in loafers that click like high heels when he walks and some pastel collared shirt. I'm dressed in oversized Aaron shorts and a mud-stained t-shirt. He jumps in his air conditioned car, and I hop on my bike. As we pull out of the apartment complex, I can’t help but feel sorry for him. His life may be easy and lazy with that car of his, but I have a bike. No insurance payments, no gas, no killing people, just a 9-year-old’s vision of independence.

November 4th

2008-11-05T11:38:00.006-05:00

I’m either watching the same seven minutes of footage on repeat, or two beers get me really drunk. This is CNN. I’m sitting at this gringo-wannabe bar listening to a very sexual version of “love to love you baby.” The English street signs and movie poster décor isn’t interesting enough to hold my attention, so I’m tapping my foot and scribbling on a napkin. I’m beyond anxious. This isn’t really where I pictured myself on election night.

For the past three months Colombians have been asking me the same question: “Obama or McCain?” Apparently, tis’ the season to talk politics; US politics to be precise. I thought I could avoid the political 3rd degree that surrounds November 4th by leaving the country, but au contraire bonjour, I get to see Obama and McCain's faces on television, t-shirts and the front page of the newspaper. Honestly, as most of you surely assume, I love it. Even in a foreign country where it's acceptable to talk about politics, I've managed to overstep the bounds of appropriate behavior. At dinner the other night Monica had to literally moved accross the room to escape my political babblings.

I think that Palin, I mean Tina Fey, has single handedly soothed my homesickness. I am obsessed with all the SNL political skits. The NBC.com versions are actually better than live Saturday night rendition because I don't have to watch that dude who used to be on Nickelodeon. I usually escape to the computor lab between classes and giggle. I try not to disrupt the students working around me, but it's difficult to suppress laughter when a politician equates proximity to Russia with foreign experience. Sometimes I look up from the computer to find the entire room staring at me. Everyone here is starting to understand how truly strange I really am. I should probably watch these clips at home.

My students, however, seem to like my quirkiness. In fact, Jose, my very cute 17-year-old student, likes me so much the he officially proposed marriage. I may have to accept his offer now that my level 2 class has voted him president of the United States. On Monday my students would not stop asking me who I voted for. Since we are learning would, should, could, I decided to add some political flavor. I wrote on the board, "Who should I vote for?" A few students were passionate about their Mccain/Obama selections, but the apathetic majority elected Jose. This is the same student who always answers my "what did you do this weekend?" question with "I smoked yerba." Sounds like presidential material to me.

Outside of my classroom McCain is overwhelmingly popular. It seems I have landed myself in the conservative beacon of South America. Here, eight years of Bush wasn't all that bad. Bush supported Uribe and Uribe is beyond popular. Imagine a president in the United States with an approval rating upwards of 90%. No way. The US is way too partisan and ideological. However, in the last eight years Colombia has transformed into a safer, richer, and happier country. Uribe is the only president who's been able to make any difference in over half a century. In turn, he's got fans from all walks of life.

An Obama/Uribe relationship has yet to be determined and many are worried that US military funding will be cut significantly. I don't think the "yes we can" movement is very inspiring in Costeño.

So, here I am in this bar. The flat screen TV doesn't have any sound because the village people are playing. I'm just waiting. The map in front of me keeps getting bluer and bluer. It looks like Obama's going to win. I want to go home. Not to my apartment, but home home to my country. After Obama is declared the winner of Pennsylvania by some hottie CNN español newscaster, I get in a cab and go back to the casa of Elvis and Macgyver. I go online to steam the acceptance speech and run into Laime mid cyberspace. We video chat, watch the speech, and I cry.

I am still youthful and idealistic. As I proudly watch the first black president address my country over the interwebs, I'm sentimental as hell. I mean I'm a history major for God's sake. I've spent years scanning diaries, oral histories, pictures, and big fat books that have taught me the extent of my countries extremely racist past. A few weeks ago, I gave a presentation on the history of slavery and Jim Crow. (which, by the way, went over really well with the text messaging, intellectually uncurious crowd of students that attended) A few weeks ago, I ended my presentation on a rather cynical note. Yes, we've come a long way but racism still exist...blah, blah, blah, you know the drill. But, after watching Obama on Tuesday night maybe I'll change my tone. Even if Mr. Obama is a failure of a president, at least when my second grade child is sitting in her classroom learning about her country's former leaders there will be an exception to the dozens of white faces decorating the walls.

5 mil pesos for free live porn!

2008-10-19T18:29:00.004-05:00

Have you ever accidentally witnessed someone's super private moment? I'm sure you have. We've all overheard parent-child screaming matches that would make Billy Bob Thorton cringe and turned the corner at the exact moment some security guard is adjusting himself, but have you ever inadvertently bought front row seats for a screening of Sex on the Beach: Puerto Colombia? If either of my first two references have ever made you feel uncomfortable, imagine my sentiments as my Saturday night out was abruptly interrupted by two underwear-clad couples getting it on.

Last night I went out with some professors from the Uninorte to a very chill bar on a beach in Puerto Colombia. Andrea 2 picked Monica, Andrea 1 and I up and the drive was a pretty terrifying experience. I think I have permanent whiplash due to a severe mishandling of the stick shift. Anyways, we arrive, pay the 5 mil cover and start drinking rum and coke. Other than the mosquitos, it's pretty pleasant. The waves are crashing 15 feet from my toes and behind us some couples are rumba-ing the night away.

Then some teenagers arrive in a chiva*. These kids are between the ages of 15 and 20 and totally blacked out. For the most part they're stumbling around and taking pictures that will later be posted on facebook. I feel like I'm at a high school homecoming after-party. However, this quickly changes when an over-weight couple and their equally unattractive friends get up from their seats and head for the beach. They lose most of their clothes and enter the water. The entire bar is watching. I will spare you the details, but this experience certainly topped the evening when Vivian and the heights girls watched the basketball quad make friendly with some freshmen girls.

Just for future reference, if a bar is on the beach and you enter the knee-deep water, it doesn't make you invisible, even if it's dark outside. When they finally finished and headed back to their other friends, we clapped. Really, there was no other option. But before the couples could dry off, one of the girls grabbed her very gay friend (who happened to be wearing nothing but a thong) and headed back for the water. My lifeguard instincts were telling me to alert the coast guard or at least blow my whistle, but in doing so I'd be admitting what I had seen. Still, as the very gay man in nothing but a thong continually dropped the now porn-star status girl in mid salsa move, I couldn't help thinking that this girl was probably going to drown. Her dance moves resembled the swimming-level of my infant-age swim classes.

I'd like to say that the night came to a close with some even greater over-the-top incident, but a live porno on the beach pretty much takes the cake. Honestly, we really did try not to look, but you know the obvious cliché, you just can't help but look at a car accident. Even if the car's on fire, the passenger has a severed head, and the man on the stretcher has that glazed-over dead look in his eyes, you still look at the accident when you drive by.

We finally paid the bill and exited. On our way to the car Jair thanked the bouncer, "I didn't know that the 5 mil included two live shows."

*a party bus. everyone drinks, dances, and yells as the bus drives around Barranquilla.

Swearing in Spanglish

2008-10-18T12:02:00.004-05:00

Colombians swear. A lot. You are marica, I am marica, and the old man selling you avocado on the street is marica. Culo this, la verga that, hijueputa, no joda, mierda, or malparida could all be used in a conversation in front of your mother. Even English slang is a part of every day vocabulary. The average Barranquillero under the age of 29 swears in English more frequently than the average Colby student.

I’m still trying to figure out the location of the secret porthole to Times Square. I’m sure it exists, it’s the only explanation for my students’ prompt and through knowledge of everything estadosudense. Without a doubt, they watch more US primetime shows than I do. Really, this isn’t too great a feat seeing as I haven’t had a TV for the past three years, and if I did, I’d probably be watching Bravo on repeat. Grey’s Anatomy may take place in Seattle, but that doesn’t mean I’ve kicked it with the main characters, or for that matter, know who they are. This is such a common Seattle reference I probably should learn the basics of the plot line, but that would detract from my Sarah Palin learnin’. I find immense pleasure in studying her weekly antics over the World Wide Web. Other than Palin politics and the occasional economic nightmare review, I am not doing a good job of living up to the Colombian gringa standards. Sorry, I have no idea who won the past 14 seasons of American Idol and I have never seen the Hills.

I have, however, gone to see a handful of Hollywood movies at the Buena Vista. It’s a low budget, lazy and brainless way to escape the heat. Plus, it’s right next to the Crepes and Waffles so I get to eat very large quantities of the best ice cream in Barranquilla. Generally the options a) suck ass and b) are almost predominately in English. They are the same movies that were showing at your local Cineplex two, maybe three or four months ago. You probably already watched Definetly, Maybe on ondemand (is it on ondemand or just ondemand or am I completely off?). It’s good that the movies are so inexpensive because I would probably be contemplating suicide if I had spent more than three dollars on Eagle Eye (we only went because Monica and I were desperate to drain our brains after an obnoxious day at work. I hate department meetings).

I don’t care how many episodes of Friends you’ve seen, if you’ve never been to the US this movie couldn’t possibly make any sense. Monica and I are weeping with laughter as we watched the dude from some Disney channel show and a single overprotective mother take on the US government’s latest super computer. But, the subtitles don’t translate and neither does the context. Do Colombians really know about magnet schools, the inner structure of the US government, or the serious sigma against Muslims and people who suspected of being Muslim?

My friend Arturo came over to my apartment the other day to drink some wine and shoot the shit. Even though he can speak English pretty well, we usually communicate in Spanish (unless he’s intoxicated or swearing). Turo loves the Simpsons and we’ve pretty much seen all the same episodes (all the episodes), except that my Simpsons are English speakers and his are Mexican. Personally, I don’t understand how Apu is supposed to be Mexican nor do I believe that señor Burns really works, but Arturo’s been watching this his whole life. Our references, jokes, and choice phrases may differ, but Springfield is as familiar and specific to him as it is to me. Maybe it’s kind of like la bamba? Everyone in the US knows la bamba, can sing la bamba, and probably even play la bamba on the guitar. Last night it came on the car radio. When I told Elkin and Diana that every gringo Spanish student is forced to learn this song they cracked up. It’s a pretty absurd Latin reference point.

When Arturo does something sick on the ultimate field he yells “fucking shit.” To me, “fucking shit” means something a little more negative than a d-block, but direct translations never really work. Like every good costeño, I’m starting to say “la verga”, but this doesn’t mean I’m going to return stateside and use penis as a qualifier.

Cali

2008-10-16T18:11:00.004-05:00

Cali, October 2008

Guerreros del Viento

2008-10-16T14:44:00.003-05:00

There is something in my pants. I just woke up, changed, and stepped out of my tent. To my extreme discomfort, something sharp is attacking my butt. I race, stiff-legged, over to the bathroom and tear my clothes off. Inside my pants I find a bee-like insect. The small red circles my new friend has gifted me are unique additions to my already significant collection of bites/stings that are currently covering my legs.

I have recently skipped town and landed in Cali. I’m actually ten minutes outside of Cali in Confandi-Pance camping alongside some grassy fields with nearly 1000 Colombians. I’m here to play ultimate. Cali is a serious trek from Barranquilla. You get to choose between an expensive pain-in-the-ass plane ride and a 24-hour-plus bus ride. In order to supplement part of the travel costs, some of my friends created personal businesses. For example, Nene took on the classic lemonade and brownie trade placing him in competition with the seven-year-olds who live up the street from me in Seattle. Jose’s entrepreneurial approach was particularly successful. Between classes he sold cigarettes to his peers at the University. This, as you may imagine, is kind of looked down upon by the Uninorte faculty and staff. I keep forgetting that I am a university faculty member and I probably shouldn’t spend my lunchtime loitering with the cigarette-selling students.

Anyways, here I am playing frisbee in Colombia. From a far this tournament closely mimics the dozens and dozens of others I’ve been to throughout my ultimate career in the United States. Upon close inspection, however, there are a few key differences. For one, not everyone is white. (See http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/09/23/110-frisbee-sports/). Contrary to popular belief, ethnically diverse frisbee actually exists, but you probably do have to leave the US to find it. Secondly, the Cali tournament, Guerreros del Viento (literally “Warriors of the Wind”), is taken very seriously. Yes, the neo-hippy frisbee movement in the US has its extreme competitive moments where you can find dreadlocked and hemp clad dudes in a rage over cone placement, but someone’s probably wearing a frilly skirt or playing naked. In Colombia there are no ultimate teams named the Dazzling Asses. Still, in the true spirit of the game, there are plenty of cold beers, bongo drums, and red eyes to be found on the sidelines. And even though the heavy evening rains have seriously watered everyone’s tents and possessions, no one is upset about the day’s 80-some-degree sun that is slowly and gently burning our necks and noses.

The four girls from Barranquilla left Valar (my team) and Arena Roja (our nemesis/friends) behind to join a woman’s team, Valkirias, from Cali. Although my boys promised to let me play, I have learned to never underestimate the machismo attitude in sporting events. I didn’t finagle my way out of work and across the country to sit and cheer; I came to play.

Unfortunately, Valkirias sucks. On Friday we got our asses brutally and embarrassingly kicked by the standing women’s champions of Colombia. During the game I kept looking longingly three fields over at Valar’s game. I missed my friends as well as the company of actual competent players. Although a few of the Valkies were tough ultimate-playing athletes, the majority were green, mascara-wearing ladies.

The next day, I decided to assert myself in a semi-coaching position. More specifically, I started yelling in Spanish. During a timeout I tried to explain the basics of a zone offense, a difficult enough task in my native language. I ended up drawing in the grass with my fingers and running around in circles while my fellow Valkies found immense comic relief in my gringa Spanish. Lali actually dropped the disc in hysterics as I mispronounced a series of directions from the sidelines.

After another exhausting day of losing, it rained. Not just a short downpour, but serious rain, the kind that doesn’t stop until daybreak and laughs in your face as it knocked over your tent and ruins any chance of a good nights sleep. In the middle of the night a drumming, singing, dancing circle formed under the gazebo near our tents. We tried to party the rain away, but it only mocked us by piddling along to the music.

I woke up on Sunday with wet clothing and bags under my eyes. Valkirias didn’t play until the afternoon so I was planning on napping and drying myself in the grass until Capi Jhon told me to move my ass if I wanted to play with Valar. The boys are actually going to let me play? Screw sleeping. I scrambled to find my musty belongings. Two games later everyone was dancing in the end zone, drumming, singing, and smiling from our wins. Not only did they let me play, I scored numerous times. I was happy as a fat kid with twinkies until I remembered that I probably should have saved some energy for my afternoon games. No sleep plus “socializing” plus three days of athletic activity is usually a rough combination. Good thing I trained for this in college. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever played in a frisbee tournament in which I received a full night’s sleep, certainly not at Dartmouth.

The only real rest I received all weekend was thanks to my fellow Fulbrighter, Elizabeth. Elizabeth is working in Cali and she came by to check out this peculiar phenomenon I stumbled upon. Ultimate frisbee in Colombia? I jumped at her generous offer to sleep at her apartment and check out Cali. We had a nice dinner, walked along la sixta and drank some beer. Cali has a very different feel from Barranquilla. Here, salsa is king and I think we were seated next to some drug lords while we dined. Instead of just hailing a cab on the street corner, Elizabeth calls the company to insure that nothing sketchy is about to go down. Although I’m glad that she’s playing it safe, I am still convinced that the most dangerous part about any Colombian city is crossing the street.

I probably didn’t receive the real Cali experience as I was trapped in some alternate frisbee universe for five days. Due to Colombia’s mountainous terrain and varying climate, each region has a unique culture. The Cachacas, Paisas, Caleños, and Costeños all eat different food, listen to different music, and speak different Spanish. Generally, us Costeños are perceived as lazy and tacky. Although my gringaness is still overwhelming, I have begun to pick up some distinctly Costeño traits. I preface all of my adjectives with “full” and I actually got cold during in 75 degree night. Also, I take personal offense when someone’s talking shit about Barranquilla.

The level of ultimate in Colombia is surprisingly good. No Maine team can compare to the Worlds quality players in Colombia’s elite division. For the most part, the players from Medellín and Bogotá are far superior. However, Barranquilla’s own Arena Roja managed to win the open division and on Sunday Valkirias cross-country Costeños-Caleño chemistry clicked and we won our games.

Now that we’re done playing, in true Barranquillero fashion, I want to celebrate by doing nothing. I have a new love and respect for my fellow Valkies who managed to muddy themselves up and layout all day long, but I’m done with Cali for now. My legs are covered in chickenpox-spotted bites, I’m sunburned, stinky, dehydrated, and indescribably weary. Barranquilla’s humidity may be insufferable, but it’s home. Plus, there aren’t any bugs climbing inside my pants.

English Song Contest

2008-09-30T12:56:00.002-05:00

Hello, my name is Hannah. Hannah like Hannah Montana or even better, Hannah Bacana (cool). Sometimes I am simply the cosita (little thing). As the cosita, no one ever feels uncomfortable asking me for favors. I am the resident bitch of the Instituto de Idiomas I have to replace sick teachers without notice, spend my mornings conducting oral English exams at the electric company, and most recently, judge the local high school's English Song Contest (aka Latin American Idol).

On Thursday afternoon I was hiding out in Monica's office trying to make my stealth escape from the university. I had just finished my last class of the week and I desperately wanted to keep it that way. I have to hide because I don't know how to say no. I've never really understood the word. As a six-year-old girl I came running into my grandparents' kitchen on Thanksgiving crying. My cousin Sarah had said a bad word. When asked what that word was, I replied, "she said NO!" (on a side note, if you ever come to any Coleman family gathering this is one of the five or six stories you are guaranteed to hear). Anyways, somehow they found me. And now here I am at 7:45 on Friday morning about redefine my previous definition of music hell.

I'm just not that into bad singing, especially at a loud volume. As some may know, I spent many of my formative years as a musical theater geek. During that tap dancing, wig-wearing, set designing time of my life, I became a huge snob. Regardless of my personal talent, I learned how to judge other people's singing, acting, and dancing abilities. It's best to judge during the performance, that way the target of your shit-talking is blinded by the stage lights and deafened by her own voice so she can't hear or see your uncontrollable laughter. Usually it's more fun to judge people who suck. Isn't that why we all like American Idol? But we get to watch American Idol in the privacy of our own home in the comfort of our own country. I, personally, am not prepared to judge anyone when 1) my facial expressions are in plain view of the performer and her friends and family 2) I'm expected to be culturally sensitive and 3) it's before noon.

As the only gringo on the judges’ panel, I clearly suffered the most when Danny Zucko, played by a pimply, heavy gutted teenager, flipped a poodle skirt wearing fake blond with braces over his back. In truth, this painful rendition of "tell me more" was actually a fairly accurate depiction of a high school musical in the U.S. (Roosevelt drama excluded of course). However, when the 7-year-old babies were grinding to Calle 13 for the opening ceremony, I was deer-in-the-headlights horrified. Imagine your 2nd grade aged daughter being groped by some snot nosed kid. Her leg was literally wrapped around his waist. I'm guessing that this would probably not fly in any Seattle elementary school.

But, I am only guessing. If nothing else, the English Song Contest (I just love the name) has taught me how out of touch I am. I kept referencing Grace, an Irish girl, about U.S. pop culture. "Where the hell is this song from?" I would ask. "Oh, don't you remember? This is from Mariah's Honey years." I didn't remember.

The performances were pretty lousy. Off key was the norm and I think I heard four attempts at "if I were a movie" from High School Musical. However, my Colombian counterparts at the judges' table seemed to be enjoying themselves. When we finally awarded prizes, everyone was in agreement. Everyone, except me. I actually genuinely liked the School of Rock style performance from the boy who won (he sang some alternative rock song from 2002), but I cringed at the thought of validating a cat-like moaning of “reflection” with second prize. Damn, I really liked Mulan.

I’m probably too critical. After all, they were just children singing in a foreign language. I can’t even imagine how I sound bouncing around to Shakira in Spanish. The truth is that I just plain don't like pop music (note that I acknowledge how ironic this statement is as I constantly reference pop culture in my posts) and I’m probably just complaining because someone forced me to wake my ass up at 6:45 on my day off. Then, I had to roast in the humidity and listen attentively to Latin American versions of U.S. pop songs. Of course I was bitter at 1:15 as I stood on stage in front of hundreds of people kissing the cheeks of the winners. If only I knew how to say no, then I would be sleeping.

Productivity

2008-09-24T10:31:00.007-05:00

When it rains, it pours. When it pours, you’re wet. Very wet. Like you better not be wearing a white t-shirt wet. The streets turn into grungy class three rapids that whisk cabbies and bus drivers downstream and plastic outerwear is instantly the fashion. During a torrential downpour the world slows for a few moments and my students don't come to class. This secretly excites the laziness in me, but seriously slows the learning process. Lately I've been laying down the law. Dear student, if I, your inept gringo teacher, can make it to class in the midst of a rainstorm, so can you.

Like most third-world cities in the tropics, Barranquilla's productivity is brought to a standstill by any change in the weather. 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, people are used to one temperature: hot. In general, no one wants to be productive when it’s hot. Texas born Monica, who claims that throughout her entire life her two favorite past times have been 1) sleeping and 2) doing nothing, seems well acclimated to the costeño lifestyle. Doing nothing is contagious and I am catching the fever. As I write, I’m daydreaming about sleeping and eating sandwiches on the beach.

I love the absence of time and stress.

My new way of life is an extreme contrast to my homework and activity-filled university existence. Okay, I still meet with professors, teach some class, go to frisbee practice, read, eat, and kick it with friends, but there’s never any urgency. In the United States, we equate stress with productivity and success. If you are stress free, you are probably a waste of space. Responsible people are always rushing. My dear investment banker friends (or I guess ex-investment banker) would probably scoff at a world where fifteen minutes late is early, shooting the shit is expected, and the world stops when it rains. But here on the Caribbean coast, it’s hard to get worked up about anything.

After the rain, placid dark puddles of death emerge in the streets and sidewalks. I believe that these lagoons are full of three-eyed fish and sharp-toothed water rats. I don't know where these mystery animals come from, but after witnessing a few bubbles (and I swear a tail) rise to the surface of one of these skanky bodies of water I am certain they exist. Imagine if you saw a puddle monster in the United States. You’d freak out, call the police, all the neighbors would crowd around and block the road, and your ensuing lawsuit would cost the city thousands of dollars in legal fees. Perhaps puddle monsters exist here, but no one’s suing the McDonalds over a hot cup of coffee.

Maybe Barranquilla’s not really much less productive than your Denver, D.C., or Waterville. At Colby, the highly stressed future lawyers and investment bankers of the greater Boston area can be found on the first floor of Miller library on any Sunday night. They wear designer sweats and fiddle with facebook and aim while scamming on waspy co-eds and talking about how much work they have to do. They are trapped in a vortex of procrastination. Luckily, Miller, the social capital of mid-Maine, doesn't exist here. No one is pretending to be busy. Costeños just sit at home drinking mango juice waiting for the rain to stop. What’s unproductive about that?

El día de amor y amistad

2008-09-21T12:15:00.005-05:00

During the week leading up to September 20th, it is customary for Colombians to buy the crap out of anything covered in chocolate or hearts. I was in the Exito on thursday night and the only items left in the candy isle were a few lonely melted chocolates and overly priced imports. As I approached the front of the store to buy my maracuyás, mandarinas, and socks, I dropped my basket to the floor and quickly found the exit. There's nothing like fifteen lines of fifteen people plus with baskets full of red and pink to suppress a consumer's urge to buy.

Love and friendship day is a hyper-cherished holiday. Think Valentine's day with more presents, hot weather, music, and drunk people. I had the privilege of celebrating in full. On three separate occasions I reached into a hat and pulled out a random name. First, in my English class; second, with my ultimate team; and lastly, with my dearly beloved roommates. My three sweet friends each received some poorly packaged Colombian sweets. I didn't realize I was supposed to give my secret friend a well-wrapped, cinco mil worth of candy. I also didn't realize that I was going to be karaoking to Britney Spears for my students.

A few weeks ago my level seven class begged for a gift-exchange and English-speaking karaoke party. I'm a pushover. The students organized everything and on tuesday at 8:30 in the morning I listen to Spanglish renditions of hips don't lie, the backstreet boys, Madonna and more. I couldn't decide if I was in music hell or comedic paradise. I soon settled on music hell as I stood in front of the class singing hit me baby one more time into a marker. I may be the teacher, but as Mikey always says, when a room full of people chant your name, you are obligated to comply. After my talented performance, I lost some of my scary teacher edge and gained a very humiliating memory.

I guess true expressions of love and friendship are always pretty humiliating.

The Buena Vista (Social Club)

2008-09-18T16:35:00.004-05:00

Less than two months ago I arrived in Colombia, a third world country where U.S. embassy employees receive danger pay, without a single acquaintance in over a 2000 mile radius. You probably think I'm adventurous or just crazy. If you've spent any significant amount of time with me, you might describe my personality as that of a panda bear on hallucinogenic mushrooms. (I’m just going to let that description be without further comment). Anyways, I don’t really seem like the type to kick it in the mall. However, I love the Buena Vista.

My apartment is walking distance from Monica, Andrea, Grace, and the Buena Vista. I tried asking around for artsy Barranquillan hangouts, but the vallenata and auguila-loving locals are all clueless. After dozens of blank stares from strangers and I told you sos from Monic and Andrea, I finally stopped asking. Instead, I adopted the Juan Valdez coffee shop on the third floor of the Buena Vista as my writing and printmaking refuge. Now I’m in love. The mall has high speed internet, humus, ice cream, air conditioning, and free people watching. The only downfall is that some of the people are my students. Barranquilla may be home to 1.5 million, but it already feels like Waterville, Maine.

Thus, when I first saw an advertisement for the Buena Vista Social Club I thought it was some ice cream and pizza eating youth group in the mall. I’ve been listening to the Buena Vista Social Club for years and their music helped me groove through some torturous late-night Miller third-floor study sessions. Yet, in the context of Barranquillan life, the mall makes much more sense than the band. I didn't actually realize that they were playing in town until I encountered tickets to the Buena Vista Social Club concert in the Buena Vista.

The concert was in the jumbo room of the country club. Classy looking Colombians settled into the frigid air conditioned concert hall with their beer and rum. We arrived and found seats near the back. After the opening Brazilian band began we realized that the people around us were never going to shut up. Lady, if you are going to get your hair done, buy some shinny stilettos, and wear a ball gown shouldn't you at least pretend to enjoy the music? She probably should have stayed at the Buena Vista. I mean this is the Buena Vista Social Club live in Barranquilla. A pimpin' white suit here, some big brass sounds there, and enough energy to fill all four floors of the mall. Monica and I wiggled around to the music and screamed with the crowd for the second and third encores. Yes, I love the Buena Vista, but I'll take the Buena Vista Social Club any day.

The team puppy

2008-09-16T13:04:00.001-05:00

It's Saturday evening and I'm at an outdoor rock festival in the center of town. We have VIP passes courtesy of my new ultimate friend, Clary. She is a local TV celebrity and the host of the event. We are sweating from the heat and passing around beers when a heavy metal band enters the stage. The crowd is wild. This band, featuring a girl with an operatic voice in a pink and black 80s prom dress and some greasy, long-haired dudes, is very popular with Barranquilla's youth. The music starts, smoke fills the stage, and the large lead singer yells "PLAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAA."

Typically, the thought of playas (beaches) don't make me want to rage and I try not to laugh as he continues to scream indecipherable noises into the mic. I look to my left and catch a glimpse of Taty and Alexa's expressions. They're bopping around to the music, but their faces reveal their true feelings. They, like I, understand how truly ridiculous this moment is. They, like I, don't associate pain, misery, and death with beaches.

Despite the few Iron Maden-esq heavy metal moments, the concert is a blast. I especially enjoy swaying to reggae music atop a plastic chair. When the festival is over and Clary dismisses the hard rockin' crowd, we are immediately in search of food. My Spanish comprehension should be sufficient enough to understand what is going on around me. However, I am often completely lost. Someone will say "vamos Hannah" and I'll pile into a car or onto a bus without any knowledge of my destination.

Alexa and I share a chicken sandwich while the eight people around me plan our next move. I'm half-deaf and my Spanish is running out of steam so I just go with it. Valar, my ultimate team, has not only accepted me into their inner circle, but they take care of me. Team foreigner is kind of like team puppy. They feed me, give me water, throw the disc for me, and make sure I get home safely. Come to think of it, if you subtract the disc part, I’m pretty much Monica and Andrea’s puppy too.

Anyways, now that my belly is full, I’m ready to sleep. I am very aware that tomorrow Valar is waking up at 5:30am to go on an 8 hour+ hike. Yet, I’m spending the night with Clary and Alexa (how very 7th grade) and we continue to hop from street corner, to friend's house, to restaurant, to taxi cab. Hours later I can hardly see straight. As we approach Clary’s house I’m not sure I have the energy to pull myself inside. Unfortunately, when we open the door her parents are partying. It's 3am and her father and four friends have killed a couple bottles of rum and are grooving to vallenata music in their living room. We’re so delirious it’s funny.

Two and a half hours later, four different cell phone noises are forcing us out of bed. I can’t tell if I actually slept. After some coffee, some waiting, some travel, and some more waiting, we finally make it to el morro. We're a half an hour from Barranquilla and everything surrounding us is green. The tropic trail leads us up some steep boulders and into a forest. We're following a stream bed, jumping off cliffs into pools of water, climbing trees, sweating, singing, and snacking. I completely forget about my lack of sleep as I merrily skip along.

Throughout the day, my Spanish comes and goes. But we're hiking, who needs language? Somehow I found this group of people who are remarkably similar to the Lessels, Tucker, and Sam I left in New England. We all understand that concerts, late nights, and adventures are well worth sleep deprivation. Out of all of my random interests and hobbies, Frisbee (perhaps the most random of all) has connected me to Colombia more than anything else.

I don't return to my house until 8pm. I am drenched from my pig tails through the soles of my shoes and covered in mud. In fifteen minutes I manage to shower, drink seven glasses of water, avoid Elvis and Macguiver, and pass out. In the morning I have early class. Oh well, I can sleep when I die.

The Celine experience

2008-09-08T16:10:00.005-05:00

According to Monica

www.outintheworld.blogspot.com
Soft would never be a word I use to describe the taxi drivers in Barranquilla. They drive without taximeters and charge whatever they feel like charging. Some pretend to be nice in the beginning, give you their number, ask where you’re from, and then when you give them just cuatro or cinco mil, they get nasty. And most often, as soon as they realize you are an American, that doubles the price. But I suppose the worst part is the arguing. Usually I give them whatever I think is fair and get out of the cab without asking. Last night one taxista yelled at me and Hannah because he wanted quince mil because he made two stops. I originally gave him ocho mil, then threw in dos to get him to shut up. The risk is always that the taxistas might possibly get violent. But its necessary to grab a cab sometimes here because riding the bus is also very dangerous (see my blog about riding Colombian buses). So when riding in a taxi, I expect to be accosted, overcharged, yelled at, asked if I’m married to a Colombian, or where in the US I’m from.

The one thing I never expected to hear in Colombia is the queen of polyster, Celine Dion. I thought she was over, in Vegas, far off the air waves, married to her older than spit husband. Colombia is home to reggaeton, salsa, vallenatos, cumbias, and electronic music. I can even accept the champeta, which is what I usually hear in the buses on the way to school. After leaving the Dulcerna Café, Hannah and I got into a taxi, and the dreaded sound of her torturous its so bad it might as well be Kenny G set of lungs filled the cab. “Near…Far…Wherever you are…” I couldn’t even look at Cosita. Celine Dion was blasting, deafening. And the driver didn’t even care. He was a brown Colombian, and I couldn’t tell whether he was gay or not. Who listens to Celine Dion? It wasn’t even the radio. It was a CD, like a greatest pop songs CD. Again I ask, Who listens to Celine Dion?

We were going to Hannah’s apartment, a good 10 minutes away from where we were. I thought I was on an elevator, or back in the movie theatre suffering through Titanic, or worse still, actually listening to Celine Dion.

I hate Celine Dion. The name makes me shudder. She makes me glad the Titanic sank. I wish that song sank with it.

A six minute song. My Heart will go on. It made me wonder about the taxi driver. Clearly he was in love. I found myself mouthing the words. Then I felt disgusted that I even knew them. It was the ultimate betrayal. To know the lyrics of a Celine Dion song. I was disappointing myself. I had to also wonder about myself. I knew the friggin’ lyrics.

The next song started. It was Donna Summers’ Total Eclipse of the Heart.

So either the driver was in love or he does drag shows at night. After I left the cab, I couldn’t be sure of either. Some things are better left unknown.

I had hoped that when I left the states and stopped watching VH1, I’d never hear or see Celine Dion again. And when the song ended in the cab, I had hoped also that was the end of it. But as Cosita and I walked up the steps to Moys later that night, after running away from a pissed off taxista who wanted his extra 5 mil, I heard Celine again. Same song. Same reaction. It did not look promising.

Where is Travis Bickle when you need him?

According to Hannah

I'm standing on the bow of a large, technologically advanced vessel. My eyes are shut tight. I feel the salty breeze blowing through my curly locks. A handsome blond man stands behind. He gently touches my waist and lifts me up. He sets my feet down on the railing. I feel like I'm flying. I begin to hear some music. At first the song is so soft I can barely make out the lyrics, "Every night in my dreams I see you. I feel you. That is how I know you go on," could it be? By the chorus, "Near, far, wherever you are, I believe that the heart does go on," there is no mistake.

When I open my eyes I am in the back seat of a taxi cab. Instead of fresh ocean air, the stale air conditioning is blowing beads of my own sweat into the corners of my eyes and mouth. Leonardo Dicaprio is no where in sight. It's just me, Monica, and a smelly cabby in Barranquilla, Colombia lip-syncing to Celine. When I look at the angry expression on Monica's face I am reminded of why I came to here to begin with: to escape Celine's evil empire. But no, the saggy-skinned witch is more powerful than I could have predicted. She has cast her spell across the third-world and Colombians are helpless to resist.

A few hours later I am walking through the Buena Vista on my way to Exito. I pass by my favorite store and stop in to have a look. I've been staring at the same leather purse for weeks but I'm too indecisive to buy it. Everyday I wander in, head straight for the purse and admire its design while one, two, or three employees awkwardly tail behind me. While I am contemplating purchasing it for the 14th or 15th time, I close my eyes, stretch my arms out to my sides, and smell the sea. My lips began to move, "Love can touch us one time and last for a lifetime." Could it be? But there are no words, just instrumental Celine. I am speechless, scared, and embarrassed that I am karaoking to Celine in the mall. I drop the purse and sprint out of the store. I'm frightened, Celine is persistent. First the cab, now the mall? What does she want from me?

I try to forget about the event and I don't mention it to Monica when I see her that evening. At nine, Monica picks me up in a cab and we head to Moys for Isaura's birthday celebration. Both of us look tired. When we arrive, we argue with the cab driver about the cost until we slam the door in his face. As we hurry into the swanky club we can hear him swearing behind us. Suddenly, his words are muted by a familiar sound. "You're here, there's nothing to fear, and I know that my heart will go on and on."

I finally break. Tears are pouring down my face and I strike a ballerina pose and begin to dance and sing in full volume. Leo is drawing me naked, we're making love in the backseat of a turn-of-the-century car, I'm letting go of his hand as he sinks into the ocean.

Ten years ago you watched Rose throw the hope diamond into the sea. Then you played Celine in your bedroom on repeat as you lusted over Leo (or Rose). Then you grew up and started listening to Dylan, the talking heads, Janis, and Kanye. You sold your Titanic soundtrack to a used CD store for 30 cents and tried to pretend that you only saw the movie one time. Then you moved to Colombia. The new language tires you, everything confuses you, you grasp for something familiar.

That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

Ultimate frisbee... in Spanish

2008-09-06T11:10:00.002-05:00

I found the cool kids. The good-looking athletic-types who respect vegetarians and roll 10 deep in a van. Unfortunately, they always see me caked in sweat and dust. Fortunately, I can d-block, cut, and flick. Somehow, I managed to find an ultimate frisbee team in Barranquilla, Colombia.

A few weeks ago I asked some co-workers what sports teams the Uninorte had. When I mentioned frisbee they laughed in my face. After observing my roommates and most of my students, it is easy to understand why this thought is so ridiculous. Frisbee players don't wear button-up tops and matching pajama bottoms or listen to Christina Aguilera (unless they are intoxicated and in drag). They also lack man boobs and butt implants (insert former parenthetical phrase here). Nevertheless, thanks to Andres' friend Ernesto, last week I arrived to a dirt field filled with flying discs sporting pig-tails and Aaron's basketball shorts. I now play three times a week.

For the most part, Colombian frisbee is the same. An up-call is an up-call, a stack is a stack, and a layout is a layout. None of these terms may make any sense to you, but I'm completely fluent in the language. After years of running around the Olin green, sleeping in cars filled with the odor of Sam Huntington's two-day tournament socks, and losing an eye brow ring to a flying plastic disc, I speak frisbee better than anything else Barranquillan.

I even understand the brutally honest post-practice lectures. If you sucked, they'll let you know. They accept my broken Spanish and end zone dances, and someone always offers to drive me home. They've proven that the Costeño stereotype is true: the people are as warm as the weather. Once I get used to thirty minutes of plyos and calling my teammates maríca (instead of dude, they call each other homo) I doubt I'll ever return stateside.

I English expert

2008-09-05T00:11:00.001-05:00

I am not an English teacher. I don't know what a gerund is, the word "hella" is a staple in my vocabulary, and, I never-learned how to punctuate, correctly (a fact my thesis advisors are painfully aware of). Nevertheless, here I am in Colombia teaching English. Supposedly, native speaker plus US passport equals English specialist. (Does this still apply if you have an FOB mother?) In reality, after 16+ years of schooling and a B.A. in history, English fluency is my only practical skill.

The Uninorte has decided that I am fit to give private English lessons to the former vice president of Colombia. Imagine your local Hong Kong exchange student (or Sandy Ma) teaching Al Gore Cantonese. I'm in over my head. Doctor vice-prez Gustavo Bell is also the director of el heraldo, the newspaper in my region, and an Oxford educated historian. Luckily, he's a slippers and tee-shirt liberal thinking guy.

I put on my most grown-up and responsible looking teacher outfit (yes Linda I was wearing black) and arrived at his swanky apartment building. My job is to listen, provide an occasional grammatical or word choice correction, and drink pineapple juice while he answers all my questions about Colombian politics. Somehow this is helping him prepare for a presentation he's giving in Finland? I have agreed to hold class three times a week. Private political lectures from ex-vice presidents really gets us history nerds off.

Recently I have found other avenues to exploit my knowledge of the English language for the benefit of my intellectual pursuits. Jair Vega, a communications professor and sociologist/social advocate, has invited me to travel with him and help him with his research. He's really into my man Freire and we are going to go visit and participate in some popular education type groups all over the country. For most 22-year-old gringos, this is probably the equivalent of watching a French film or watching paint dry, but I'm so giddy I could hula-hoop. Jair's also trying to improve his English and obviously I agreed to help him. I hella hope that he buys I'm an English expert too.

I have taken to lying

2008-09-03T21:48:00.011-05:00

Fitting into Barranquillan society isn't too difficult when Chinese plus Jew equals Latina. I've been mistaken for a grocery store employee and a student in my own class. However, any confusion about my Colombianess is always resolved the instant I open my mouth. Spanish words may be coming out, but they are corrupted by my gringo/Nicaraguan accent and frequent mispronunciations. My roommates are in the process of publishing a four volume dictionary of Hannah's misspoken Spanish. They think I'm hilarious. I'm going to kick Macgyver in his laughing face.

Other people, on the other hand, only see dollar signs when they hear me speak, taxi drivers in particular. The taxies here have no meters, thus at the end of every ride I get to practice arguing in Spanish. In addressing this problem, I have taken to lying. I like to tell cab drivers that I'm living with my tios and my father is from Barranquilla. Usually, I say I'm Canadian. No one knows shit about Canadians. In my new favorite lie, I have recently moved to Barranquilla with my husband. We are living with his parents and helping to take care of his dying sister. This seems to boost my credibility.

I've learned that it is important to tell people I'm married to reduce awkward come-ons. Colombian men ask about my relationship status in roundabout way. "What does your husband do for a living?" Juan might say. If I respond that I am not married, he will then ask, "well, your boyfriend? Is he Colombian?" The other day I told Eduardo, the cab driver, that I didn't have a boyfriend. His response, "no boyfriend? A girl as pretty as you? You must be a lesbian."

Roadtrip with Elvis and Macgyver

2008-08-31T16:43:00.001-05:00

It's Saturday morning and I'm driving to Cartagena with Elvis and Macgyver. It's not a joke, I live with Elvis and Macgyver. What's more, they love Madonna. It's 10:15 and we're all smiling and singing along to "Like a Virgin" as we near Barranquilla's city limits. We make a quick stop to fill the tires with air and purchase some cold aguilas to drink on the hour and a half road trip. We listen to "Like a Virgin" two more times.

The road to Cartagena is green with breathtaking views of the Caribbean coast. Occasionally we pass stands selling pointy and oddly shaped colorful fruits. Occasionally we pass a mule resting in the shade. Frequently we pass coke bottles and dirty plastic bags embedded in the soil. Several army road blocks hold up a few cars in the breakdown lane. We speed on by. I guess Madonna doesn't attract the police. I think we look like non-threatening Barranquillian locals traveling to the beach for the day. The king of rock disagrees. He is the only Colombian I know who insists that I look like a gringo. I´m taking it as a complement.

We're driving around Cartagena and we have decide that it's too hot to do anything but go to the beach. When we arrive on the beach, three women accost us. The first one squirts coconut oil on Macgyver and rubs him down. Elvis tries to resist, but the second woman catches him and begins massaging his feet. I'm on my feet and running. I barely escape the trajectory of the third woman's coconut oil. When the women finally leave, Elvis and Macgyver are lubed up, a few thousand pesos poorer, and ready to swim. Then the phone rings and it's Elvis' girlfriend with bad news.

A truck containing 94 tanks of cyanide fell off a ferry into the river Magdelena. The river runs alongside my city and filters into the ocean. Barranquilla's water-supply is shut off. I call my friends to confirm that there are actually 94 tanks of cyanide in the Magdelena. It's true. Additionally, all of Barranquilla is sold out of potable water. No one knows the extent of the damage, but as of now there aren't any dead fish floating on the surface. A good sign.

Several divers are braving the river's murky waters in an attempt to recover the missing tanks. I'm imagining their job briefing: 94 tanks 5 gallon tanks of cyanide are at the bottom of a fast-moving river. They may have leaked, they may be unscathed. We don't know for sure. We want you to swim down, bring them to the surface, and then we'll know if there's any poison in the water. I wonder if this type of work warrants danger pay?

The 94 tanks of chemical death in the river worries me for several reasons. First, I'm not going to be able to shower for three days. Second, there's cyanide in the river. Third, I have now learned that the water from my sink faucet has some sort of relationship with the very dark and grungy looking River Magdelena. This whole incident is really putting a damper on my Saturday. As of now, I'm sitting ocean-side covered in salt and sand. I'm wondering how salt and sand covered skin are going to feel and smell after three days. Elvis and Macgyver seem considerably less concerned.

We leave the beach and journey to the colonial part of Cartagena. A wall surrounds the very European looking colonial (and touristy) area. It's epic. As we walk around the city, Elvis is quick to identify every tourist we pass as a gringo. In doing so, he lacks subtlety. I, however, am convinced that the tourists in Cartagena are predominately Europeans. We eat some reddish-brown flavored snow cones and argue over who's gringo radar reigns superior. To prove that I, an actual gringo, can identify my own kind, I decide to tail some tourists. After Elvis points and yells "gringo," I leave my roommates and stalk two men in tight jeans with nice shoes and man purses. Obviously I'm correct. They're speaking French and they seem uncomfortable due to my extremely close proximity. A few British, Spanish, French, and German accents later, and I'm 6 for 6.

Most gringos are terrified of Colombia. After all, isn't Colombia the capital of kidnappings and cocaine. It's too bad my compatriots tend to believe what they see on TV. Maybe Colombia's got some cyanide in the river and some garbage alongside the roads, but isn't it the same in New Jersey? To me, the Colombian vistas are unparalleled. Each city has its own architecture, food, dance, and atmosphere (unfortunately for me also it's own accent). And as a gringo tourist, I believe all are worth visiting. So far, none feel dangerous.

Me and Macgyver on the wall

Cartagena

Elvis

Epilogue: That night when I returned home I was overjoyed to discover that the running water was turned back on. As of now, none of the recovered tanks have leaked. To learn more, read the article on the sidebar entitled "Cyanide-spill."

Santa Marta

2008-08-24T22:18:00.000-05:00

Taganga

Santa Marta is a launching point for some of the most spectacular, nature-filled adventures in Colombia. It is also a tourist hub. In this coastal city you can find both the outdoorsy gringo type who likes to smoke weed and make hemp jewelry as well as the thong-wearing, shade-renting, aguardiente-drinking Colombian on holiday. Last weekend I vacationed somewhere between the outdoors and the dance floors of Santa Marta.

After only five days of work, I was rewarded with a long weekend. Upon further inspection of the Colombian calendar, I was happy to discover that holidays are more common than full moons. Furthermore, my boss Lourdes has given me specific instructions to travel as much as possible.

So, at 5:45 on Saturday morning, in the midst of one of Barranquilla's epic rainstorms, I set out for Santa Marta with a Brit, and Irish girl, a Texan, and a Colombian. An hour and a half later we arrived in sunny Santa Marta, caught a launcha (a long, slender, wooden rowboat-like vessel) and plopped ourselves down on what can only be described as a party beach.

Here on the coast, there are many derivations of the party beach including the party park and the party street corner. Elvis had shown me the party park on a drive through the neighborhood. We turned off the car, turned up the stereo, and were immediately accosted by men selling cold beer and fried food. At the beach (playa blanca), we were surrounded by tacky bathing suits, thatched roofed restaurants serving fresh fish, and vallenata music. I sat on the white sand sipping coco locos (which are exactly what they sound like) and aguila (my favorite local beer) until my Irish friend Grace was red in the face.

That night we went to a bar a couple streets down from whores' ally. At la puerta, I learned that stereotypes can be very true. Small, smiley Grace can drink. A lot. Colombians love to shake their asses. A lot. The DJ was great and we stayed until closing. But before returning to the Hostel, we were collectively propositioned by a chubby prostitute in powder-blue bike shorts and a matching top that revealed her bulging muffin top.

The next morning (maybe afternoon) we took a bus to Taganga and hiked to party beach number two (playa grande). I wasn't feeling the crowd, so Steve (the Brit) and I journey on along the coast. The farther we traveled, the clearer the water and more remote the beaches. At one point Steve answered his cell phone and I went on alone. I came to a large cliff and sat down next to a cactus. I just sat there for awhile doing nothing. Right before I headed back to join my friends on the party beach, I wrote a reminder to myself in my journal: never get an office job.

Andrea (the Colombian) and Aguila

Me, the Coco Loco, and Monica (the Texan)

Fresh fish on the party beach

Profesora Hannah

2008-08-23T20:29:00.000-05:00

I went to this "yoga" class at the UniNorte. My instructor was dressed in a white skirt, top, and belt. She walked in carrying a rainbow-striped, pleather bag. She looked like an idiot. She had us lie down and close our eyes as she explained that "yoga' is only 'yoga' if you feel it in your heart." Thirty-five minutes later her mouth had not stopped moving. I, on the other hand, had not moved. After lifting my legs a grand total of three times in sixty minutes, I concluded that it was officially the worst class of any kind I had ever attended. However, I am thankful for the experience. I now know that I am not the most under qualified teacher at the Universidad del Norte.

I'm really winging this whole teaching thing. Some days I think I'm more confused than my students. Some days I don't know I'm teaching until five minutes before the class begins. But every Monday through Thursday at 1:30, I have twenty-one level two students of my very own. Due to my lack of creativity, I decided to show them an episode of Friends. I picked one where Monica is fat. Unfortunately, I didn't read the summary very closely because four out of the five plot lines were almost exclusively about sex. I wrote on the board, "what is Ross doing?" To my horror, the correct answer was "Ross is having a three-some with his lesbian wife."

At least my students are in college so they could handle the under the cover action. After all, they are practically my age, a fact which is almost painfully obvious. With the level seven classes (where I'm certain many of the student are my age) I am a strict teacher. If you are fifteen minutes late, I will mark you absent. If your not supposed to be talking, I will yell at you. With my class, however, I smiled too early. Now they laugh at my awkward gestures and over-exaggerated facial expressions. When they figured out that I spoke Spanish, Jose, the kid who announced during the first week of class that "this weekend I am smoking in the park," somehow got me talking about Aguardiente (Colombian liquor). I tried to tell them that I don't understand Spanish in the classroom, but I cracked during a grammar lesson. I couldn't help it, they looked at me like I was speaking Martian.

All in all, they are moderately well behaved, and we seem to like each other. When I see my students out of class, they call out "hi teacher" or "hi profe." Our exchanges are usually followed by giggling. I mean, seriously, what would you think if I was your teacher? Two weeks ago I was tossed into a classroom and expected to know what I was doing. Too bad I wasn't tossed into the yoga classroom. I certainly could have out shined rainbow bright.

Profesorsa Hannah

I bumped into someone's gun today

2008-08-14T12:55:00.001-05:00

I bumped into someone's gun today. I was walking through a gate, I looked to my side for a moment, and boom, into a gun. The gun's owner and I exchanged apologies and went our separate ways. I have come to accept that this type of encounter (a tennis racket-sized machine gun touching my body) is bound to happen from time to time. However, I am still having trouble accepting the Barranquilleros complete disregard for lines.

When waiting for an empanada at the UniNorte's café, I always receive my deliciousness and chicken filled pocket about five minutes after the person who was initially standing behind me. I just can't bring myself to hump the backside of the tightly-clothed student (or faculty) in front of me. If you subtracted clothing, everyday life in Barranquilla would make a great late night cinemax movie. Personal space, especially on the bus, is a foreign concept. Typically, I'm pressed against another sweaty body as the Cooteram-Norte short bus swerves and bounces through the Barranquilla streets.

Despite the lack of breathable air, I actually like my daily bus rides. The school is a quick five minutes from my apartment and I am now proficient at attracting the attention of the bus driver. The trick is to furiously wave your hands in the air. My roommate, Mac the 20-year-old aspiring gynecologist, showed me the tricks of the trade on Monday. I am loving my comfortable living arrangement as well as the company of my co-inhabitants. My other roommate, Elvis' fiance, is showing me how to be a real lady. This 95 pound cutie with a perfect little Asian-looking nose is shopping for an affordable plastic surgeon to "close up her nostrils." From the look of the post-surgery isle in my neighborhood carrefour, the very popular French wall-mart, I can tell that her ideas about femininity are not far from the mainstream. I wonder what other cultural tips she can give me?

Supposedly, I am here to learn what makes Colombians tick while simultaneously spreading American goodwill (by teaching English?). My purpose is frequently described as a cross-cultural exchange. I'm trying to discover exactly what the hell a cross-cultural exchange is. So I asked my students. Unfortunately, I asked them in English so they weren't much help. For now, I am teaching Colombians that my entire country is not composed of Bush loving, McDonald's eating Paris Hilton wannabes. And in order to expand cross-cultural awareness in the United States, I am blogging to my dear friends and family about my experiences waiting in lines and bumping into guns.

My roommates

The view from my room

What the bleepity-bleep is going on?

2008-08-09T21:16:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week I received an email alerting me that the Universidad del Norte was going to pay for my room and food in a beautiful Barranquillan hotel while they helped me find a suitable place to live. Fantastic. Upon my arrival, I was picked up by Melina, an outgoing University employee, and driven directly to an apartment building straight out of the upper-west side. Melina helped me carry my bags inside and into the elevator. When we reached the 9th floor I stepped out to find a 60-some-year-old woman. She introduced herself as Gladys and directed me inside number 9A. I took three steps forward and discovered the apartment where everyday crap transforms into antiques.

How had Melina neglected to mention that instead of a hotel (which I later learned had a pool), I was going to live surrounded by lace, Jesus paraphernalia, and the smell of old lady? Even the remote control and the television are unable to survive in this environment without a protective layer of plastic. I soon learned that Gladys is U.S. educated, overly cautious, and slightly racist. Perhaps I am just fussy, but after my very awkward Nicaraguan home-stay experience (I found my 37-year-old, greasy-haired "brother" in my room late at night because he wanted to "feel what my bed felt like"), I am not interested in living with weirdos. Ever since I was introduced to my surprise living situation, I have been asking myself, "what the hell is going on?"

Yesterday, I arrived at the University at 8am and was immediately sent out on a six-hour mission. Before I can do anything I need a cédula (a Colombian ID card). I was introduced to Andres who saved my life. Andres is a chatty Uni-Norte student who accompanied me while I had blood drawn, documents signed, photos taken, and sweat sweated. Upon our return to school, I was swept into meetings. Unfortunately, I was not informed until after the opportunity to ask questions had passed that (1) I have my own English class (2) My class is level 2 (3) I will have to give instructions in Spanish (4) The new session started a week and a half ago (5) I need to turn in a lesson plan and (6) I am teaching alone on monday.

Fast forward nineteen hours and you would find me on the waterfront eating avocado, fresh fish, and coconut rice. I have an attempt at a lesson plan. I am going to be living with Elvis and a male medical student in a glamorous three-bedroom apartment with a pool, laundry service, furniture, and all my basic utilities for less than $200 monthly. Faaantastic. In between my friday afternoon internalized freakout and my saturday afternoon externalized elated state was a series of unforeseen events. My remaining sanity can be attributed to the help of my new Colombian, Canadian, Texan, Irish, and French friends. Near-death taxi rides, near-death bus rides, wrong addresses, awkward conversations, beer, and humidity have occupied by very new Barranquillan life. Through it all, I am always thinking: "what the hell (or insert a stronger word) is going on?"

Bogotá

2008-08-07T14:29:00.000-05:00

Lunch is the meal of the day. Each portion contains enough calories to sustain the average adult for a week. Colombians pile rice, meat, fried potatoes, fried bananas, "salad", beans, more meat, and large quantities of grease onto a single plate. The plate itself is completely unrecognizable under all the carnage. Needless to say, the other day I ordered carne asada and walked a way with a take-away box filled with enough food for a weekend camping trip (or a light snack for Laime).

On the way back to the hotel I encountered a toothless woman with a child on the street and offered them my leftovers. They were sitting on a corner that smelled distinctly of pee, the type with the approximate PH of 12. Although it is a beautiful city with all the modern amenities of home, pockets of Bogotá stink. The odors lead me to believe that public urination is not uncommon. Anyways, the woman was extremely grateful. Terri, one of my fellow Fulbrighters, told me that her soon-to-be Colombian roommate believes that giving small handouts is important. Then, if someone tries to kidnap or rob you, the bums will savagely attack your attacker. I imagine a toothless woman and a saggy-skinned man throwing urine-drenched pieces of cardboard and bits of broken glass at some cocaine-trafficking Pablo Escabar type. Maybe I should offer my leftovers to some more muscular bums.

After giving away my food, I felt pretty good about myself. I was swelling with pride from my overwhelming generosity until later that evening when I realized, after two margaritas and a beer, that dinner was not going to happen. I should have known that the half of a ham sandwich I was served was actually dinner. At the time I thought of it more as a pre-dinner snack. So I found myself ravenous, tipsy from the high elevation, and stuck in a restaurant where no one was eating. Only in Colombia would an up-scale restaurant turn into a major dance party (without food) at 11:30pm on a wednesday night. There wasn't really a dance floor, instead every patron was dancing in the spaces between the tables. It was amazing. The entire place was packed with dancers, drinkers, and smokers.

The upper-class women in Bogotá are beautiful. They have sleek dark hair, elegantly thin waist lines, and frequently they have boob and ass implants. Apparently plastic surgery is a common 15th birthday present for young girls from their fathers. Boobs and butts aside, the only real downfall of their elegant aura is the common mistake of jean on jean. Ew. This country, rich and poor, loves to wear jean jackets with jean pants. Usually the jeans are too short and way too stretchy and they never quite match the jacket. It's especially revolting when the jean (or Texas) tuxedo is embroidered with a colorful design. Although I may be jealous Colombian beauty, I am confident that my fashion taste will always reign superior because of this major flaw.

I am also reassured of my self-worth by the fact that I learned how to dance. My dancing is not even close to the fabulousness of Colombians', but I am thankful that I have a friend like Alyssa Lee. Without her encouragement (which often borderlined on force), college dance parties and late night Wyclef groove sessions would have been infrequent events. Looking at the other gringos, I am thankful for my rigorous training, including the weekends spent atop bars and furniture.

Hours later, Colombians of all ages were still shakin' it in between dinner tables. All of my salsa, merengue, and reggeton moves had dried up, and I found myself drunk, sweaty, sleepy, and starving. On the cab ride back to the hotel, the driver ran every red light. But all I could think about was the perfect late-night feast I gave away.

Colombia: The only risk is wanting to stay

2008-08-06T13:31:00.000-05:00

Another night, another cocktail party. As far as I can tell, this country is full of swanky intellectuals and U.S. diplomats. But before I have been allowed to wine and dine like a fat American (on fancy finger foods and unlimited alcohol), I have had to show picture ID at the super fortified gate. Actually, last night the entire street was blocked off by armed guards. The dozen or so members of the private security force and semi-hidden camera-filled courtyard certainly reinforced the lecture we received from the U.S. embassy on safety in Colombia. An important tip for all you men: if a beautiful woman approaches you at a bar, laughs at your jokes, and offers to buy you a drink, it's probably too good to be true. You may wake up a few days later with no pants, an empty bank account, a throbbing headache, and perhaps a few missing organs (although, the last part is probably more likely to happen in a movie about Brazil). According to the embassy, 90 percent of the victims of the Colombian date rape drug (known as burandanga) are male. I've been here over 72 hours without a single piropo and now I find out that women aren't even the primary victims of burandanga? Finally, a Latin American scenario where it's shittier to be a man than a woman! Females target you, slip something into your drink, and rob the crap out of you. I picture some dark-eyed, curvy Colombian mujer approaching a spiky-haired gringo with a puka shell necklace and only a handful of Spanish phrases. Dude has no chance.

In reality, Colombia consists of friendly people, inexpensive plastic surgery, and gigantic portions of meat for lunch. Bogotá, Medellín, Barranquilla, Cali, the Amazon, Cartagena, Santa Marta, and the majority of the country are perfectly safe. If Colombia really was as dangerous as the U.S. media portrays it, do you seriously believe the State Department would actually fund my intellectual pursuits?

Bogotá, Colombia

Packing up, shipping out

2008-07-30T10:18:00.000-05:00

Summer 2008 has thus far included a sad goodbye to Vivian, a three week road trip from Waterville to Seattle, some sunny Pacific Northwest days, a little too much beer bread (and perhaps beer), a sorry attempt at teaching an SAT prep course, a quick detour to LA, and a long-overdue visit to the Lough Tide. In sum: I have been sitting on my ass. It's time to go to Colombia.

As the number of my unemployed friends has been reduced to simply Darren Grose, I have become lethargic to the point of no return. I now watch daytime TV. Truly pathetic. I'm hoping that my new obsession with the travel channel's never-ending marathon of Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations is due to my inability to pack.

Friday, July 1st will be my last night at Hoville. Yes, my friends, it's the end of an era and the end of your free unlimited access to Christine's. I am moving out. Which means that I have to put 22 years of stuff into boxes and garbage cans. If you're just now remembering the tank-top you left in my room, tough times, it's gone. Anyways, leaving my house only exacerbates the hassle of packing for my Colombian adventure.

Dammit. I wish I could teleport.