Dear M.I.O. Riders, You Suck.

I like to think that I generally keep things pretty positive on here; true, I may complain here and there, but overall I try to see the bright side of things.  That's not gonna happen in this post.

The M.I.O. is the city sponsored system public buses here, and while I don't really have any qualms with the entity as a whole I certainly do have some issues with the passengers.  Now, if you are one of the M.I.O. riders that is capable of acting civil and like a decent human being, then congratulations, you are in the small minority of people that does not get an eye roll or huff from me at the station.  We have have actually at one time or another shared a frustrated glance, thanks for being awesome.  Unfortunately, such people waiting for the bus are few and far between.  In fact, they sometimes seem nonexistent.  Here's the problem: everyone wants to be the first person to get on the bus they are waiting for which, in turn, causes not only a mad dash for the doors when said bus arrives, but it brings people to clustering around the doors that approximately 2.5 people can fit through at any one time.  That means, even if a person sees that the approaching bus is not the one they desire, they will hold their ground firmly in front of the sliding glass doors so that when their bus does come, they can get on first.  News flash people: THIS DOESN'T WORK.  Really what you are doing is causing mass chaos and more importantly, irritating the hell out of me.  Hi, I'm the one kindly waiting at the back of the crowd until I see the T31 coming from down the block.  And guess what?  I always manage to get on the bus.  Although, sometimes its a close call after I have to push my way through the crowd serving as a blockade for the door.  Sure, I may not always get a seat, but its really not a big deal.  I come from the land of L trains and CTA buses where getting a seat isn't always likely, and sometimes standing is the better choice anyway. 

Then there are those who are fond of the psych out.  The "I have been standing here in front of you and now as a bus that you need comes I am going to move toward the door like this is also the bus I am waiting for, but then stop dead in my tracks so that you have to re-route around me and almost miss the bus you waited 20 minutes for.  I was actually just trying to get closer to the door."  Thanks.  I get it people.  You are worried about getting on the bus and getting a seat, and I understand why.  I sometimes worry too when I see the 4:00pm crowd waiting for the E21 and E31, but you are only making it worse. When you crowd the door, it makes other people nervous too, so they crowd the door and then people have to push through 30 people deep just to get the gosh darn T31!  See?  Its a positive feedback loop, not much different than this one:

So if everyone just waited for their bus to come before stampeding toward the door, then we wouldn't have this ridiculous problem, and everyone could get on the bus peacefully.  But it won't just happen, be the change people.

Oh and don't even get me started on the guy who gets on the bus and stops approximately 8 inches in from the door.  Hi, sir.  Do you realize I can't get passed you and the door is now shutting on me and the 20 others trying to get on the bus?  Thanks for caring.

Delirio: Hecho en Cali!

Delirio is a salsa/circus/orchestra show that, as the title says, is made in Cali.  The performance we saw (which turned out to be the premier of the newest show) was "María, un Delirio de Amor", which Carlos explained to us was a Colombian version of Romeo and Juliet.  It is based on a novel written by Jorge Isaacs in which cousins Maria and Efrain fall in love, but are torn apart when Efrain must move to London to continue his studies.  Returning years later, he finds that Maria has died.  In the show I couldn't quite decipher what happened next, either Efrain married a ghost, Maria came back to life and they married, Efrain died and married Maria or Efrain married someone else all together.  Hard to say. 

Regardless, the performance was amazing and the dancing and gymnastics/aerobatics blew me away.  If you watch the dancers' feet on the video, it would be easy to think it is double time; it's not.  We got an extra treat when we discovered that there was also a Michael Jackson tribute portion of the show "Nadie es Igual".  This made the $120.000 pesos more than worth it for me; all of the free stuff they handed us as we walked down the read carpet helped too.  This is a production that I think is worth seeing again, although I would probably wait for the next show for a little variety.  Next time friends or family visit I would love to take them to see this because even if you don't love salsa I think anyone can appreciate the talent it takes to perform in this show.

Now, I thought about titling this blog "Why Technology Hates Me (But Really It's Usually My Fault)", but then decided people would be more likely to want to read about awesome salsa/circus shows in Colombia than hear me complain more.  That doesn't mean I'm not going to complain, but I'll try to keep it to a minimum.  You see, we went to Delirio a week ago, and it has taken me about that long to finally figure out a way to finalize and upload the video that I made of snippets from the show.  First, Windows Movie Maker would crap out anytime I tried to rewind in the video as I was editing it.  Weird.  Then when it was finally done (several hours and restarts later) it wouldn't upload to Blogger.  As I tried to upload it to YouTube, I discovered that it wasn't actually in a video, but a project file.  Oops.  Save as video file, wait ridiculously long time for save, upload to Blogger.  Wrong. No matter how long I left it to upload I would come back to an un-uploaded video.  Several days of trying and finally decided to upload the video to YouTube and then post THAT to Blogger...after it uploaded to YouTube for more than 230 minutes.  Por fin, I have a video for you, and while I am not requiring you to watch it, I think it is worth the 5 days it took for me to succeed.  Even if I have a shaky video hand and there are people occasionally talking in the background.  Insider tip: if you click "watch on YouTube" you can watch it full screen.  Enjoy.

Also, we're kind of famous as this is on the Delirio Facebook page,
along with a few others.

Celebrating Earth Week

In honor of Earth Day/Week, the Middle School decided to get our kids out and enjoying the world around them for 1 hour everyday.  While this meant shorter class periods and trying to get 11-14 year olds to class on time with no bells. it also meant (hopefully) getting the students to see and understand some things that they might miss on a normal day.  There were several activities planned for the week, such as: a water walk to represent how far some people have to walk for fresh water, garbage and recycled art, yoga and meditation, Frisbee golf and a nature scavenger hunt.  I decided to sign up to help make and chaperon the nature scavenger hunt, and a good decision it was; as it turns out, our students really like to complain about walking and touching garbage, so some activities didn't go over as well as intended.  It took some time to get groups engaged in deciphering the clues and wandering ALL over campus to find the nature objects, but in the end we had two teams get all 21 of the clues and several others come pretty close.  On the second day we had students complete the hunt, I was wandering myself to make sure students weren't slacking off, and I decided to capture the images for the clues too.  Here's what I found:

1. Never say you can't, just find a tree with a hanging plant.

2. Near the place you learn the ABCs, you'll find fern-covered palm trees.

3. Don't give excuses starting with but, do your best to find a giant hut.

4. Look for flowers that appear just like the sun, but don't be fooled it must be a real one.

5. A place you can go to sit and eat too, here you will find trees waiting to greet you.

6. Follow the path to walls made of stone, the green coverings offer a cool natural tone.

7. Finding a palm tree will fulfill this stop, but in order to succeed you must leap, jump or hop.

8. I normally hang high in the trees, but it is possible that I have fallen to the ground.  No matter which way, I am a tasty treat for animals all around.

 9. A natural looking door is what you should look for

10. We’re easy to find, we crawl, we fly, and we can even sting.  Of one of us a small image you should bring .

Do you see what I see?

11. Look for me near the base of a tree.  I am often poisonous, so make sure you don't eat me! 

12. I am the color of t-shirts, shoes, backpacks and sometimes even ink. Combine the red and white and you get the color______. Go find something this color and take a great shot. Just make sure it´s grown and not bought!

13. Look for me, I’m everywhere among the other colors in the ground; Over there in deep violet pigments I am around.

14. You can find me in all those places where the Gods bled;
And stained Mother Nature with this beautiful color instead.
The blood painted pieces in the puzzle of creation;
You will find on the Bolivar Campus and across the nation.

15. Parts and pieces painted with drops of sunlight are found in flowers and TREES where they shine so bright!

16. Near the soccer field, the water tumbles clean and free.  Snap a photo of this and be sure to capture the palm tree.

17. Near a great waterfall you will have a good vantage, take a picture of your team in the middle of this bridge.

18. A scary plant that grows out of the dirt, it is best to not touch it, for you just might get hurt.

19.  Near a place where Bolivar is feared, you will find some trees that wear a long beard.

20. A typical palm tree this is NOT, it is shaped in the form of something we use when we´re hot.

21. Although it has no organs and has no feathers, find this bright bird all grouped together.

OK so I may have had an unfair advantage considering I made the scavenger hunt with Jeff and our principal, but you will notice that technically I didn't fulfill some of them since I couldn't be in the pictures, like the jump shot in front of a palm tree (because I was the photographer).  I also snapped this of a baby chucha, which is kind of like an oppossom, that the had to catch from the boys bathroom.  Super cute as a baby, not so cute as an adult, especially when it runs across the science building balcony (or in some cases into classrooms) while you are trying to teach.

Bonus points?

I think our students got at least something out of the activity and I might dare say that some even enjoyed it.  Hopefully they can appreciate the amazing campus we have with such diverse natural beauty that we can see almost on a daily basis. 

The New Normal

Now that I have been here in Cali for more than 7 months (crazy, right?) I have been looking back on some of those things that really threw me for a loop when I first got here.  I still don't think I ever really had culture shock, but there are definitely some things that caught my attention my first few weeks.  These are now things that I see or experience quite often, and usually don't think twice about, except for maybe a laugh or two.

• Being in a cab with the tank reading E and/or having to stop for gas
• Seeing a family of 4 riding on a moto
• Knowing its OK to cross the street only when the street performers and jugglers entertain waiting traffic
• Ridiculously enhanced breasts and butts
• Not having Internet and/or power at school in the morning.  OK, so the power thing has only happened twice after rainy nights, but I've learned to embrace it and have an energy free alternative just in case.
• Our cab driver watching music videos on a portable player, normal right?
• Motos that drive on the sidewalk to avoid traffic
• A horse or mule drawn wagon on the road with cars, trucks and motos
• Brand representatives at the stores trying to sell me things (e.g., toothpaste, laundry detergent, chicken seasoning, etc.)

There is however, one thing that I would like to add that I don't think I will ever get used to that still makes me awkward/uncomfortable/anxious: that would be the workers in clothing stores that attack me upon entering and continue to follow me around the store.  They are kind of like that servant in Adam Sandler's "Mr. Deeds" who is "very, very sneaky".

I specifically learned to say "solo mirando" to help them understand that I don't want a shopping partner and that I am just browsing; unfortunately, few actually get the message.  This leads me to move swiftly through stores in attempts to avoid and dodge the workers and in some cases not even enter stores where the worker to customer ratio is not in my favor (really anything over 1:1 is dangerous and scary).  Needless to say, I haven't shopped a whole lot here in Cali.


I'm sure there is plenty more to add to the list, and it will likely continue to grow.  I will keep you updated on all of the quirky things I witness on a daily basis here in Cali.

Christmas Time in Cali

This post is coming a little late, as Christmas in Cali sees to actually start mid to late November. I'm not kidding.  By the flirt week on December the holiday decoration section in Exito has turned into a toy and gift section as any Caleño clearly already has their decorations up by then.  But there's good reason for this.  In Cali, as well as the rest of the country, Christmas is a month long celebration, almost.  The season usually kicks off December 8th with celebration of the Immaculate Conception, the conception of Mary, not the conception of Jesus as many people quickly assume; do the math: December 8th to December 24th?  This isn't some creepy vampire-human pregnancy.  I can't believe I just made a Twilight reference (actually, I kinda can); if you don't get it just smile and read on.  Anyway, on the night of the 7th people celebrate the conception of Mary by lighting candles to guide her into their homes, also known as Día de las Velitas, Day of the Little Candles.  Bolivar invites the school community to celebrate the Friday before, which is where I go most of my velitas fix.  It was amazing to see so many families, faculty and staff there celebrating with candles, food, music and of course Santa.  Don't tell the kiddos, but it was actually Allain the physics teacher, not Santa.

Everywhere you go in Cali is decorated for Christmas, and there is an especially huge lights display in the north in the Rio Cali, the Alhumbrada.  The display itself is not specific to Christmas, the theme this year in fact was "Myths & Legends" and on the night of the 7th friends and I went to view the beautiful display after some cookie decorating and ornament making.

La Muneca

A favorite of my red-headed-mohawk-sporting-biology-teaching
 science neighbor friend Stetson.

Cutie Patootie

Although it was rainy and the ground was muddy (poor Lauren was in sandals!) and there were HUGE crowds, it was all together a pretty cool view and experience.  Can't wait to see next year's display!

The Truth About Life in Colombia

I know my life in Colombia is in a lot of ways very different then my life in Chicago: having to use a different language to communicate, traveling another country, not driving a car, teaching rich kids, just to name a few.  But really when it comes down to it, the majority of my life here is, well, just normal.  Last weekend for example, was very uneventful.

Friday night a group of about 10-15 went to Hooters in Granada to watch the seventh game of the World Series.  Now if I'm being honest, I actually had very little interest in the game, but was just looking for something to do.  And yes, Cali has a Hooters, and the food was only OK.  After a disappointing ending for most (I mean who REALLY likes the Cardinals anyway?) we attempted to split up the $400000+ peso bill and failed, and then were off to our various destinations.  For David and I that meant home, because yes, we are kind of like old people and like to get to bed at a reasonable hour, even on Fridays.  Others went to Rain, a dance club up north and I believe Talbot's, a little pub up in the same area.  More than anything I was just tired, plus my White Sox shirt & Sperry's are not meant for late night dancing. 

Saturday morning my body gave me the usually pre 7am wake up call so I went downstairs to read and made myself some breakfast.  Then I cleaned the apartment a little bit, because despite the fact we have a cleaning lady, we can still manage to make a mess in 3 days easily.  Around 10am I went to grab a coffee and read a little more at Crepes and Waffles only to discover they didn't open until 12, so I walked to UniCentro to Juan Valdez.  I ordered a macchiato arequipe, thinking it would be similar to a carmel macchiato.  It was, however, the tiniest thing I have ever seen. 

But I happily sipped it and read my book/people watched at the mall.  After a couple hours and being mistaken for a woman named Maria, I decided to continue my hunt for food coloring in Cali.  At last!  I was successful and found red, blue, green and yellow powdered food coloring at Exito, which then meant I also bought the rest of the ingredients needed to make homemade fondant for what I hope to be a super cool 80s birthday cake for my friend Kelsi and I.  If you're in Cali next week, feel free to stop by for our 11-11-11 birthday party!  Afterward I walked home and got ready to head to school for some volleyball against the girls high school team.  We played on the outside court which resulted in a reddish nose and quite a few bug bites, despite putting bug stuff on twice.  Sheesh.  After losing to the girls team 3 games in a row, Shana, Amy and I caught the Mio back north and I got off and got my nails done before heading home.  I caught the end of the Hawkeye game, enough to see them pitifully lose their lead and the game to MN, jumped in the shower and then Skyped with my parents.  My oh so eventful day ended with a Saturday night trip to the grocery store with David.  Jealous?

Sunday was anther early morning that started with me finishing my only-ok-560-page-way-too-long book and then my two hour attempt at making a practice batch of fondant.  Note to self:  If you are going to make a smaller batch actually measure the ingredients!  Although it took forever, I finally got it to the right consistency, and so my self-assigned challenge of cake making is on.  Wish me luck.  Then I made some hummus and started sauce for the lasagna I was planning for dinner.  Lots of internet, blogging and Facebook in between, then I made the rest of the lasagna, threw it together (despite any real recipe) and put it in the oven.  More internet surfing and then dinner.  The night ended with a declaration that I would not do any work all weekend, since it was 8pm on Sunday and I already hadn't.  By 9:30-10 I was in bed, getting ready for another week of work.

So there you have it: a perfectly normal weekend.  No traveling, no parties or visitors or ridiculous field trips, just life. Now you may notice my weekend was mostly David free, but that is only because is taking a statistics class and spent the majority of the weekend working on it, and maybe hit up the casino on Sunday with some of the guys, maybe.  While I do enjoy, even love the exploring and traveling, it can be exhausting and there is something to appreciate in just enjoying the neighborhood we live in for its everyday-ness. 

Halloween in Colombia

So now that it's actually close to Halloween (as in tomorrow) I feel like I can share my Halloween in Cali, which I have celebrated twice already.  With two costumes.  Yes, I'd hate to admit it, but I was one of those people who was dressed up and at a party on October 22nd, but please, hear me out.  It really wasn't my fault, nor the fault of anyone else, except maybe the Colombian government.  You see, they decided to hold elections today, the day before Halloween, thus making this what we call a "dry" weekend in ALL OF COLOMBIA.  Yep, you got it.  No alcohol was sold this weekend anywhere.  Well, actually I found out Friday it didn't start until 6pm last night, but whatever.  Yes, we could have bought alcohol last week and partied it up much closer to Halloween, but then you run the risk of having someone call the police on your party and apparently you can get in a lot more trouble when it's supposed to be a dry weekend.  Confusing I know, but I don't really ask questions, I just went to the party.  And then there was Halloween at school and having kids dress up on a Friday is a way better idea than dressing up on Monday, can't disagree with that.  So there you have it, there is my semi-explanation of why I had a costume on in my Facebook picture last week.  Judge me.  Go ahead.

Well now that that's out of the way, here's how it went.  If you don't know already, I love Halloween because it means I get to be crafty and try to be creative.  Oh, and I don't do slutty/sexy Halloween.  Tried it freshman year of college (sort of) and hated it.  So stupid.  I can't remember the last time I just bought a costume, put it on and was done.  If you ask me, that's cheating.  C'mon people, use your imagination.  I suppose when your mom makes you a homemade werewolf costume (did I mention I was kind of a tomboy as a kid), it starts to become a tradition.  She started with some of my old sweats and sewed patches of fur from the inside as she would take the train to and from work.  Add some scary teeth, lots of face paint and black hairspary and there you have it.  I requested a picture, but we can't seem to come across it, but trust me when I say: it was awesome.  There was also the year I requested to be a "ghost cat"...yeah I was just a white cat...Even as an adult, I find immense joy in coming up with a costume and piecing it together from scratch.  Last year for "Thanksoween" with David's family, I made him the Operation guy and I was a doctor; my costumes my not always turn out looking the best, but at least I put in the effort.

Normally I like to get crafty with fabrics and dyes etc, but I was worried about finding those things here, and the date kind of snuck up on us, so we decided to go with something that we could sort of piece together.  Nonetheless, I think our costume this year was still a hit.

Anyone who used to watch the Price is Right and thus the awesomely bad commercials in between should get the reference.  In case you missed it, David is from Publisher's Clearing House and is presenting me with a check for $10 million, flowers, and the random assortment of balloons Cali had to offer.  I clearly was caught by surprise and had to jump out from the shower to answer the door.  Clever right?    The only problem was, it wasn't very cross-cultural.  Colombian and Canadian friends just kind of stared confused, or politely gave a forced laugh and complimented me on my "just got out of the shower" costume.  Hrumpf.  Also, if we didn't have our props, then everyone was confused and thought David dressed as the President or a politician.  Finally sick of having to go run and grab props, David kindly told anyone who showed up late that they missed the surprise and didn't deserve to see our costume.  Harsh, but fair.

I also goet in a crafty cooking mood for the party and took some goolish treats to Amanda's too.  Eyeball Oreo balls and monster toes made with chorizo looked gross, but tasted delicious.  I was glad to be able to find almost all the ingredients I needed and made other improvisations as necessary, like cherry juice for red coloring.

There were a lot of other great costumes, and so many creative and homemade!

Mr. President with rocker and pirate

Ninja Girls

Incredible Hulk

All the fellas

Then there was Halloween at school.  Of course I needed a different costume, and I struggled all week with what to do.  At different points I considered a bag of jelly beans, a pencil, a gumball machine among others, but finally decided on a skunk, or in Spanish, zorillo.  With a borrowed black hooded sweatshirt, my black sweatpants, a white towel, a black sock and a clothes hanger a was a homemade skunk.  Oh and tape.  Lots of tape.

Most middle schoolers didn't dress up, or changed right before the Halloween assembly.  Middle schoolers can be pretty lame.  I managed to get a picture of some my students that were dressed up.

My kids all loved my costume and said how cute and creative it was, some didn't even know I had made it myself (OK it wasn't THAT good, but I'll take a compliment).  I meant to take a can of Febreeze to school to "spray" people, but in the rush of the morning I forgot.  I think it could have made a difference.  Unfortunately when it came time for the teacher contest, a certain math teacher dressed as a greaser won for his black T-shirt and jeans and gelled hair.  Yeah, I'm sure his on stage hip thrust had nothing to do with the screaming 12-14 year old girls...I'm a little bitter.  Oh well, I'm just glad my kids liked my costume and lots of them saw me later and said they wanted me to win.  And that science is cooler than math.  Fine, that last parts a lie.  Some of my 7th grade girls below won for the group costume for being candies.  Cute.

Middle school group costume winners

UP! High school group winners

When I saw the UP characters as I was walking back to my class after lunch, I made them stop for a picture.  So good!  I told them how creative I thought it was and wished them luck, and they won! 

Some high school teachers dressed as super heroes.  David was Wolverine from X-Men and had some fellow 10th grade teachers joined him on the theme as Beast and Storm.

All in all it was another successful Halloween and I'm glad I had so many creative friends to share it with!  Happy hauntings everyone!