Day 8: Mexico City - The Last Day and Last Night, But By Far, Certainly Not the Least

Today is our final day on this trip – thankfully. We’re all ready to head home tomorrow. My problem is that, although I arrive home on Saturday afternoon, I have about 18 hours before I once again have to get on a plane and head up to Boston for the week. This is getting a bit crazy.

Our last set of presentations is scheduled for 9:30am. The office is across the street in a tall building on the 39^th floor. Randy and Rich head out a bit early – about 8:15 or so. They get there and IM me that they can’t get into the building until 9:30 because there is some kind of protest going on. Nothing unusual for this building as there are some banks here that the locals don't like. Nothing dangerous and it’s all gone by the time I get there.

We put in a full day at the office, having lunch at about 1pm. The tech manager took us out to a nice Italian place that had really good food and very nice service. Once we finished we decided to go for a walk to see the sights. Don’t forget, we’re on Mexico time, and apparently they still recognize the siesta, even if you don't take one.

We walk down the large avenue, Paseo de la Reforma, towards some statues and a large roundabout. This has got to be the weirdest roundabout intersection I’ve ever seen – and the others agreed. Picture a very wide avenue going north/south with each direction broken up into 3 service lanes plus a bike lane, and another 3 primary lanes. So that’s about 12 lanes of traffic. Add to that a very large median on both sides of the road separating the primary lanes from the service lanes. It takes about 10 minutes just to cross the street. 

Median on the northbound traffic side of the avenue looking south.

Then, picture the cross street as a one-way avenue heading east with 6 lanes. Now stick a huge roundabout and monument in the middle of the intersection, and what do you get? Something I would call a clusterf..k. The north/south traffic is not an issue. Standard stuff. But the eastbound traffic diverts around the roundabout on both the north and south sides!!! Then, when the light changes, there are still cars in the roundabout that want to head north, and the southbound traffic that wants to make a left turn heads directly into oncoming northbound traffic (see picture - the garbage truck wants to head north, and the southbound traffic turning tries to avoid the truck.) I think Randy has a video of this insurance nightmare. They don’t delay the turning traffic, so they all weave in and out trying to avoid one another. You really have to be on your toes to avoid getting demolished here. Unbelievable. Click on the link in the caption to see it from Google maps.

The three cars on the right are heading east coming around from the north side of the roundabout. Those on the left came from the south side. And the truck behind them is going around the roundabout and is now heading north, while the southbound traffic and left turn lanes get the green light. Sheesh.

Here's the roundabout from Google maps.

Eventually, we turn around and head back to the office for some final business meetings. Once done, we leave the office at about 5:30 and head back to the hotel. We meet for drinks, and after about 4 Margaritas, and some appetizers, I’m more sleepy than anything. Hardly buzzed at all. So we call it a night at about 8pm after coordinating tomorrow’s return. However, not all of us are happy to retire for the night.

While writing and posting the previous day’s blog, at about 10:45 pm, I get an IM from Rich claiming to have found something. He didn’t say what initially, but he’s out and about. So I wait for a bit and he wants me to go out with him for a while to go “bar hopping” (um, that’s the nice way to put it. We are a few lonely guys far away from home you know. And “bar hopping” is the thing that we do during those long lonely evenings.)

I call Randy to see if he wants to go out, and after several rings, a very groggy voice answers with a gravely “hello?” Now I know that I just woke him from a deep stupor and asked him the same, but he says “no” and I know he’s lying. I ask if he wants to go “bar hopping” and I get the expected answer, “No.” What a wimp. But with Randy saying no, and I’m in a groove writing my blog, I’m leaning towards wimping out as well. But after a nanosecond, I wake up to my stupidity and reply to Rich “Ok.” Hey, it's our last night in South America, and it's time to blow off some steam. So at about 11pm Rich arrives at the hotel and we head out. The weather is just incredible. Beautiful evening.

As we’re walking in the same direction as earlier today past the roundabout, Rich is all excited about what he found, telling me the story of the “bar” he was in when…never mind. 

As we’re walking, we pass a few couples holding hands, holding each other around the waist, and generally appearing to be enjoying life. Hey, it’s Friday night and the weather is fantastic. Why not? It just so happens that they were gay. Uh huh, I think can see where this is going….

It’s about a 10-minute walk when we take a right turn and IT’S PARTY TIME!!!! All of a sudden the streets are crazy with people, music blaring, trees lit up with electric lights, and a couple of guys are sucking face really passionately to our right. Um, Rich, what did you have in mind? Accordingly, I believe that Rich and I are now a couple, at least that’s from the looks we were getting as we dove headfirst into party town.

The place is pretty wild for several blocks in several directions, and we go here and there trying to get the hang of the place.  There are actually all kinds of people here; Gay, straight, curved, zig zag, shills for the clubs, bouncers, anything and nearly anything you can imagine. This is one crazy neighborhood and I’m loving it. Lot’s of great energy. And the best part is that I feel pretty safe because it’s not sleazy. Just a bunch of people having a really good time without being out of control.

As we walk around checking out the sights, we get accosted numerous times by the locals wanting us to attend their "club" – no cover charge of course. English, Spanish, whatever, it’s all here.

As we cross one intersection, 2 young ladies wanting us to attend their "club" accost us. They’re not taking “no” for an answer, and so they follow us around for a bit, with Rich saying in his finest Boston-accented Spanish, “no gracias,” which is about all the Spanish he knows (except for his girlfriend, Susan, teaching him the phrase just before he left the States, “Tengo una novia” – I have a girlfriend. However, I can attest to the fact that Rich is now also quite fluent in saying “no, gracias” although we do need to work on that Boston accent.  

After about 5 minutes of them following us and pleading (it was kinda cute for the first few minutes or so – I could tell because Rich had a big smile on his face) we shake them off and find a crowded bar, and grab a few beers. The place is rockin’. Bars, dancing, food carts, soccer on the TV in the bar, just a kick-ass neighborhood. Really fun to watch.

We gulped down 3 beers between us for about $10, and went to see what else we could find. Whatever it was, and wherever it was, we found it.

We turn onto one of the streets and here are tons of dance clubs and bars one after another. They are all converted store fronts, so they’re fairly small. It was a sight to see. People hanging around on the street chatting away, the clubs with the bouncers in front, blasting Rihanna’s “My umbrella” and a bunch of other pop music, the gay guys with no shirts showing off their stuff; The women looking at the gay guys showing off their stuff; and then, just the women, no stuff.

One of the things that I did notice here is that the women are covered more than those in Buenos Aires. In BA, there’s a lot more cleavage. On the other hand, a good portion of the men here, at least in this neighborhood, prefer to go shirtless. Something I hadn't noticed in BA.

We pass by a few of the clubs and glance in. Rich was ready for another drink. One was sort of interesting from the outside, but pretty dead inside. Obviously not an attractive place, so we look somewhere else to park and have a beer.

We head into a place that looks kind of cool with lots of people, music and dancing. Once we bypassed the door and the bouncers, it must have been 500 degrees inside. Holy smokes it was hot – heat hot that is. So Rich takes the lead and tries to saunter past everyone up to the bar that was situated at the back. It was elbow-to-elbow, and cheek-to-cheek. We were dancing without dancing. Absolutely packed. We didn’t get close to the bar. Too many people, not enough bar. So we turn left and turn right and squeeze between the people to the other side of the dance floor and head towards the door.

Now Rich is in front of me so he can’t see what’s going on behind him – more specifically, where I’m at. But as we’re slide-stepping towards the door, a hand lovingly grabs my right bicep for a moment, but releases as I continue on. And then again to my other arm. Now I had previously realized, and fully understood where we were, and accepted the fact that if I was going to get groped, this was the place it was going to happen. I was right about the place, but not the, um, place. So I turn around to see who might interested in an old Gringo like me, and see some nice looking young man staring deep into my eyes – bedroom eyes (not mine, his.) I smile back at him, hopefully fulfilling his brief fantasy, and make a quick getaway.

We walk down the block and find another bar/dance joint that looks interesting, so we go in. At least this time we can get to the bar. It’s a small rectangular place with a raised dance floor in the middle with the bar, again, in the rear. People are going in and out and so I'm forced to step up onto the dance floor to get by the people. Once on the far side, I grab a couple of beers for the two of us.

We’re just hanging out watching the show and drinking our beer. Standing very close to us is what I would say is a local man, about 35, thin, not handsome, white shirt, having a somewhat unshaven beard, and obviously moderately drunk. He seems to be alone facing the back towards the bar.

Rich and I are just standing with our backs to the wall, guzzling our beers, looking at the grinding and gyrating going on before us, when this guy (I’ll call him Jose) turns to Rich and eyes him a bit, then leans into him, puts his right arm over Rich’s left shoulder in a sort of hug, and says something into his right ear. I don’t think either one of us could tell what he was saying. I was on the other side of Rich, too far to hear with the music blasting away, and I’m sure that Rich, although he could probably hear, just didn’t understand a word.  I believe Rich responded reflexively with something like,  “No gracias. Tengo una novia.” But Jose was persistent, and when he went to say something to Rich a second time, he really put his arm around him, in an even friendlier way.  This went on for a bit with Rich shaking his head and smiling and laughing nervously (Rich is such a nice guy.) Jose definitely wanted to tell Rich something, but I was laughing too hard while Rich was trying to shake him off to determine what. Finally the guy backed out, possibly realizing Rich didn't understand a word. We never did figure out exactly what he wanted. :-)

After that, it was time to head back. We spent about an hour there and I could have lasted a lot longer, but we did have to grab an early ride to the airport.

So that was our last night on our trip, but certainly not the least.

I hope that you enjoyed coming along for the ride. I enjoyed telling the story.

The End

Day 7 - From Bogota to Mexico

Today we leave Columbia for that beautiful, sensation of a travel destination, Mexico City. Not having been there before, I really don’t know what to expect, although I do expect something interesting to occur at some point.  I just hope that the place nothing like the boarder towns of Juarez and Tijuana. Too many guns for my liking.

I hated to say goodbye to the Radisson because the room was really nice, but we had to go.

The flight was scheduled for 2:30 pm, and so far the flights have been on time. It was suggested that we give ourselves a lot of time for traffic because of construction and just plain old traffic, and getting through security. Good thing we listened. This IS Columbia you know. Not one of the top 10 cities known for it’s open roads and efficient services.

We hire a cab at the hotel at about 10:30am, and zoom right out into a ton of traffic. And for the first several miles, we speed along at the amazing rate of about zero miles per hour, or about not much more than that. Of course you can imagine the beautiful scenery that was presented to us along the way of an old decrepit highway, so I wasn’t too happy. But somewhere along the route, the cab driver veers off to a side road that had no sign, when we actually began making headway, hopefully towards the airport.  But we hadn’t a clue. This reminds me of an old Ronald Reagan saying, “Trust but verify.” We were trusting, but no way to verify. Another 15 minutes and I began seeing places I recalled seeing on the way in from the airport, so we were all right.

We get into the airport and check our bags. At this point I’m beginning to wonder about what has changed since the last time I went through this airport? It’s been about 15 years, and when I was departing, the security (as I recall it was the military back then) searched my bags quite thoroughly, and more than once before I got to the gate, and then another, more personal search as well. But that one I enjoyed. :-)

I really don’t know what everyone is complaining about these days about getting patted down – seems to be happening to me a lot these days - airports, gov't offices, doctors' offices... Back then; Columbia must have had a diversity policy because I was patted down by a very nice looking private of the opposite sex. But that was 15 years ago and we married soon after (I hope my wife can take a joke.)

We arrived quite early even though the traffic was tough, and so we decided to just hang out for a while. We were sitting at a table for 4 surrounded by restaurants, when I asked in jest, “Who brought a deck of cards? Rich pops up with, “I’ve got one.” I was just kidding, but seeing as we had a bunch of time on our hands, why not?

We chatted for a bit about what game to play, mentioning things like hearts or spades, and decided on hearts. Now I haven’t played a game of cards in a coon’s age (I haven’t a clue how long a coon lives, but you get the picture.) So Rich goes through the rules, which of course he adds to over the course of the first three hands, whereby I have had the honor of collecting the queen of spades in each hand, and a very large number of hearts along the way – so I’m way out in the lead – although in the wrong direction.

Now when I was in the army a coon’s age ago (it’s the same coon – apparently they live a long time,) I worked the night shift primarily, and during those long, boring hours of doing nothing after repairing the computers within the first hour, a group of us would play spades. After a few months, we could have entered a spades national championship tournament, and won, because we were so good at it. Of course, that also says something about the amount of work that we had to do. But, that’s the army for you.

So we played cards for about an hour, and of course, although I lost my pants, Randy and I had fun trying to put the squeeze on Rich in the one hand where he actually accumulated one or two points. We checked the hour and it was time to go through security. So we gather our things and head over to the international security line.

When we get there, the line is snaking back and forth about 8 times, and was moving as fast as the cab on the highway I mentioned earlier – near zero. It was taking forever, and time was running out. I was wondering if we cut it too short by playing cards? I guess I could have lost by a smaller margin if we had realized how long it was going to take to check our documents (not that losing by 1 point is any better than losing by about 50 points which I did,) by cutting the game short, and I probably could have kept my pants as well.

We finally crawled up to the counters, got our passports stamped, and headed for the gate. Had just a bit of time to spare before boarding.

As Randy and I were walking down the hall towards the gate, (Rich was tagging behind) we began to chat about what we remembered about the security checks. Randy hadn’t been here for quite a while either, and things seemed to have changed in terms of less security. Not so fast, not so fast! As we turn into the gate area, here is the next layer of security guards who gladly go through our carry on bags, ask a few questions, and let me go. I turn around and walk towards the seating area when I notice a young man and woman in security garb. So here’s the pat down. Ok, who’s going to take me on? They guy does a cursory pat down and I’m free to go – both happy and disappointed at the same time. I really shouldn’t have been too disappointed as only two weeks ago I had my, um, manly exam handled by a very nice looking, but professional, nurse. I must be getting old when things like that get me excited. Does that happen to anyone else reading this? (I don’t expect ANYONE to answer THAT question.)

In short order we board the plane and head off into the wild blue yonder – or brown yonder as the air ain’t so clean here.

Four glorious hours later (Randy might say it was either 2 or 6) we land in Mexico City. Just prior to landing I look out the window and see a very densely populated area that almost looks like Los Angeles. Mountains, hilly areas, very, very, dense areas of houses, tall buildings here and there, etc, and very spread out.

We get off the plane, and as we are walking down the jetway and into the hall, Randy and Rich head over to the window and start taking pictures of the half-dozen or so police cars with lights flashing that are sitting at the tail end of our plane – you know, the one that just came from Columbia! Uh oh. I was sure they were after Rich, seeing as he just got off of probation yesterday. But I guess I was wrong as nothing much was happening and we moved along.

We lied our way through immigration as we didn’t want to say that we were here on business – just tourists here for 3 days for fun and sun in Mexico City. We didn’t have a business visa so it was good that they didn’t question us too closely. Randy mentioned that he had a harder time because he spoke some Spanish, but the agent only asked me how long I was staying and where I lived. Whew. I really didn’t know whether we needed a business visa or not for what we were doing as I hadn’t checked that closely while prepping for the trip, so we were taking a bit of a risk.

After an eternity of waiting for our bags, we head over to customs where you put your bags through a scanner, and where the dogs are sniffing around.

Right after that there’s one more insult, and that’s to press a button. It’s a random security check. The agent/guard says, “Press the button” in Spanglish, and if the button/light turns green, you’re on your way. If it turns red, you win and get another security check. Randy’s in front and is just about to press the button when someone else leans in and presses the button first – green. Randy then presses the button – red. Go figure. They rummage through his stuff again - LOL. Rich and I are both green, so we’re all done.

Our taxi driver is waiting for us, so we start for the hotel. The driver says it takes 20 minutes to get to the hotel, and he says it again 30 minutes later as we’re stuck in Mexico City traffic. What? You expect something else?

But at the end of the day, we land at the Four Seasons Hotel in a really nice part of the city. It’s a 5 star hotel and the room is fantastic. In the inner courtyard are trees and flowers and all kinds of really cool greenery. Very, very nice. Couldn’t ask for a better place to stay for our last few days. 

It’s a workday tomorrow – (or it actually was earlier a few days ago because I’m a bit behind in writing the blog.) It’s 10:45pm, Randy is burned out, and Rich is sending me text messages to go out and play. So we’ll see what we’ll see, and if it’s something I can write about, I will (wink wink).

Day 6 - Bogota Day 2: A Working Day

Today, Wednesday, we actually have to work. We were expecting about 40 people to attend the presentation that was scheduled for 4 hours. Rich’s presentation is about 1.5 hours, mine can go to 1 hour, and Randy is just here for filler and as an interpreter (thought I’d say that to ruffle his feathers a bit.) But he can do about 30-45 minutes with some jokes about empanadas thrown in. And then of course there's the question and answer session.

The presentations are scheduled to begin at 9:30 and are to go until 1:30. But of course that isn’t how things go. One of the local EMC managers picks us up at 9am and drives us to the facility, a trip that takes us all of about 30 seconds. After a brief discussion, we find out that we only have 2 hours – half the time we thought we had. Ok, we’re professionals, deal with it. It’s not as if this doesn’t happen EVERY time, or nearly so. So we come up with a plan and Rich kicks it off, then I get up. The only problem is that this group doesn’t say a word. It’s a mix of EMC people and partners (vendors who sell our products). So I start out asking a series of questions to which the answer is… crickets …..chirp….chirp….chirp. Nada. Ok, so I now realize that we have a problem in that 1) they either don’t understand a word that I’m saying or 2) they don’t want to answer because some of the partners may be competitors. So I just bypass the questions and move on. I do my thing in total silence for about 45 minutes. Painful.  

So we finish doing our business thing, with Randy’s key value in making the audience laugh – something about the empanadas. We say our goodbyes and head out back to the hotel. It’s after 12:00 and I had been anticipating someone from the local EMC office to pony up for lunch. Ah, nope. So we decide to go back to the same neighborhood as yesterday.

We walk around and eventually select a restaurant after one of those husband and wife and wife-style discussions (there are three of us remember) of “I don’t know, do you want to eat here, or do you want to walk around some more? Well, I don’t know, what do you want to do?” What happened to the simplicity and beauty of what Rich and I had in BA? Oh for the good old days.

So we finally decide on a place, mostly because the owner comes out of the shop and convinces us. It was a cute place, multi-story with smallish rooms. We ate upstairs. The problem wasn’t that that the menu was in Spanish, as most of them appear to be around here for some odd reason, the problem was that it only had the names of the dish that didn’t describe what it was or the ingredients – such as Ricardo’s Fish.  So this was going to be a guessing game. Guess wrong and you choke with a good chance of getting Montezuma’s Revenge, and since we were in Montezuma’s house, there was more than an even chance things would go that way. Guess right and you are in heaven. I chose Ricardo’s Fish, and Rich and Randy selected some meat/beef dishes. We were in heaven.

The food was very good. Mine ended up being fish soup, Randy’s was something like shredded beef with a mole sauce, and I haven’t a clue what Rich had. I really enjoyed mine. It was a pretty good choice of places, and the waitress was cute. She spoke Spanish very fast – so fast in fact that even that sandbagger Randy had a hard time understanding her. So we winged it, smiling a lot and nodding.

But then it started to rain pretty hard, and we were about 6 blocks from the hotel. So we kinda hung out a bit and chatted and eventually the rain stopped, so we headed back to the hotel.

Nothing much else of major interest happened the rest of the day, unless you want to hear about us commiserating about work and how hard it is to travel to foreign places on someone else’s dollar. It’s a real shame, isn’t it?

Tomorrow is a travel day. We’re heading over to that fun, fun place, Mexico City. Can’t think of a better place for three Gringos to go to after Columbia than Mexico. It’s not as if that route isn’t the most well-worn route for drug trafficking – especially by Americans. No one will even notice.

Ciao.

Day 5 - Bogota

Traveling for business isn’t necessarily  all it’s cracked up to be. Sometimes there is a lot of wasted time, and sometimes it can be a lot of fun. There are times where the adrenaline is flowing fast and furious such as when giving a presentation, and then not long afterwards there is the big letdown. And then there are those times where the trip just takes a lot out of you from all of the above, and being tired rules the day. And then there are the days where you just want to go home. So far I’ve had a bit of all of those. Today was a travel day, but we were scheduled to meet with some of my old friends for dinner.

Our flight from Buenos Aires to Bogota departed at 7:45 am, and so I was up and about at 4:15am. I think that Rich and Randy were up at about the same time. We grabbed a cab and pointed the driver to the airport.

When we arrived at the airport, we needed something to eat, and so we spied a table in an open cafe and sat down. One or two waitresses would fly by our table every now and again, nary giving us a glance. But after waiting about 10 minutes minutes when no one showed up to take our order, we decided to try another place. So off we went.

At the next café we had to order our own food, which was fine with me. At least we could control the timing. Yeah right. Don't assume anything down here.

We placed our order for a few cups of coffee; I ordered a Media Luna (half moon) Danish (I had this in Buenos Aires and they were absolutely awesome), and the guys had hot ham and cheese sandwiches I believe. It took forever. But at some point, we got our food, ate it, and headed over to the gate. From this time until we reached Bogota, nothing really interesting happened. I don’t know about those Argentines, they just made it too easy to leave the place. It was no fun at all.

After we picked up our bags at the airport in Bogota and headed out, we stopped to look for the taxi service and get our driver. The taxi was scheduled and paid for a few days before, so this made it easy – damn, again nothing really good to write about. It was about 12:30pm.

Rich and I went to convert some cash before we got in the taxi. Randy was outside first, then me, and after a minute or so, Rich comes out, empty handed. Randy calls out “Where’s your bags?” Rich looks up with a scrunched face only a mother  (make that "his mother”) and his kids could love (ok, and maybe his girlfriend – although I don’t know why,) turns around quickly, and hightails it back just before the doors slam closed. Randy tries to yell back at him “YOU AREN'T SUPPOSED TO GO BACK IN THAT WAY!” to no avail. But fortunately, no one noticed.  It sure would have been fun to write about the time Rich got caught at the airport heading in the out door and the police grabbed him and tortured him for at least an hour or so in BOGOTA of all places. They wouldn’t have needed to perform a rendition, primarily because we were ALREADY IN rendition territory. But no, I am afraid that didn’t happen. I am fortunate, however, that my wife did that at the airport in Frankfurt last year and set off the alarms. But once again, no one really noticed and she got off scott-free.

The taxi ride from the airport to the hotel in Bogota was a non-event. The roads and buildings looked like what you would expect in, well, a South American city such as Bogota. Somewhat run down, nothing too shiny, the sidewalks are all either under construction or need to be, and all the cars needed to be washed. But the weather was lovely, and we were looking forward to the empanadas.

After we checked in at the hotel, we caught up on some business (boring emails and the like) and rest, and I contacted my friend who was going to meet us for dinner. We agreed to meet at a restaurant at 8pm. All ok so far.

Los tres amigos decided to head out for lunch, and so Randy asked for some suggestions from the hotel that were within walking distance. Now back in 1996 when I was first here, one didn’t go out of the hotel without an escort. And at night, there would be a security guard in front of the hotel sporting a handy-looking shotgun. That’s pretty much changed, at least in this neighborhood.

We headed out, and crossed several streets where the drivers take sport in trying to knock over the pedestrians. It’s a little like the old computer game Frogger, where you try to cross the road before you become road kill. Now that was fun.

You have to understand something about the roads here. Most primary roads are about 3 cars wide, so I was very impressed in how they get at least 5 cars in the same width. There might be those white stripes painted on the blacktop, but the gov’t might as well try to save a few bucks and toss the paint and machinery and just let the road warriors go, because that’s what they do here anyway.  What’s a lane?

It was hysterical watching women cross the street in high heels. It’s not as if the street is flat across the road – at least in the area we were in. Only the stretches where the cars drive are flat. The rest of the street has its, well, ups and downs, so to speak, and is configured in really strange ways, and the places where concrete exists, I believe some of them are sidewalks, the stuff is severely broken up, so you are constantly stepping into holes, or stepping on piles of broken concrete or bricks. In one direction you might have a single service lane that the locals make into three lanes, then the geography rises at a fairly steep angle in-between the service and main roads, about 10 feet in length.  Some stretches of the rise are made of concrete, and some are grass. Not sure how they decided which needs to be which? So the women wearing high heels have a hard time when they actually reach the angled median, and appear to almost fall over trying to keep their balance. It’s dangerous and I feel bad, but it was pretty funny. I guess it takes experience and guts to not stumble into oncoming traffic.

We found a place for lunch on the wrong street that appeared to be just a tad upscale, and the food was very good. I had a chicken somethingorother, and I don’t recall what Rich and Randy had. But we were all satisfied with our find.

When we got back we rested for a bit and responded to emails and other frustrating business issues before meeting up with Carlos and Vivian for dinner.

Dinner

Carlos and Vivian are a great couple. I first met them during a business trip to Bogota in 1996. Carlos was my contact for some routers I was installing, He and Vivian are both electrical engineers. Not long after my first trip, I needed to return, and this time I scheduled an extra day for some sightseeing. They showed me around the city, and that night took me to their college reunion where we danced and just had a really cool time.  Over time, they had come to work in the US, and happily lived not too far from me, so Diane and I had a chance to visit with them.

At about 7:45 we grabbed a cab and went to the restaurant. When we arrived, Carlos and Vivian hadn’t yet arrived, so the hostess showed us to our table on the 4^th floor. The place is called Andres DC.  I haven’t a clue what the “DC” means, and I guess I’m not so certain about the Andres part either. However, this was a very cool, trendy place. Mood lighting, lots of music, some crazy people running around, etc. Interesting. The menu is posted inside a rectangular metal box with a window on one side so that you can read the menu.  It also contains two handles so that you can scroll down the menu. Really strange. Unfortunately, this was one of those places where you have to be under 30 in order to read the menu because the type was so small and the lighting so low that there was no way that someone of my advanced years could read it. Randy tried to help by breaking out his READING glasses, and even THEY wouldn’t help. So we decided to wait for my friends.

About 30 minutes late, Carlos and Vivian show up and we kiss and hug and introduce everyone and just begin yelling across the table at each other because the music was nice and loud. You know, it ain’t easy being in a foreign country where they speak a foreign language, or at least they try to please the foreigners by speaking the visitor’s foreign language with a really heavy local foreign accent, while one tries to interpret what they are saying while music is blaring so loud that not only can’t you hear what they are trying to say, but it affects the eyes as well so you can’t read their lips either. On the other hand, the benefit of all this is that you get to take out a lifetime of frustration by yelling at everyone, but they don’t realize that this is really a therapy session – something you can’t really do to your spouse at home. Ok, you can, but that’s not the point.

Since those of us over the age of death can’t read the menu, we leave it up to Carlos to order. The appetizers were great, and the conversation thrilling – it must have been because there was lots of smiling and nodding across the table. Rich was in love with the place and couldn’t stop commenting about how he was really excited to be there. At least I think that’s what he was saying. I dunno, maybe I was mistaken and he was saying something about his hair, not about being here? He does rub his shaved head a lot, so maybe I misinterpreted? I could hardly hear a thing.

Carlos and Vivian at the restaurant

In the middle of the floor was some strange entertainment of people dancing in costumes while bits of paper were being tossed into the air. I had no idea what they were doing, or why. One person would be dancing, while the others were surrounding him/her so that no one else could see. Great show - not. At one point, a group of them pulls up to the people at the table next to us, and a guy begins what appears to be magic tricks – really, really, really bad magic tricks. So bad that he messes them up constantly. But maybe that’s the way they do magic here and I’m just asking too much? At the beginning of one of his “tricks,” he asks everyone to hold hands and concentrate really hard. He appeared to ask us too, but since I don’t understand much Spanish, and I wouldn’t have been able to hear him anyway, I can only imagine that he was asking us to pray that at least one trick would work. But Randy wasn’t having any of this hand-holding stuff. And I’m sure that’s why the trick failed so miserably. It’s all Randy’s fault.

Unfortunately, the main dish that Carlos ordered wasn’t at the higher end of the delicious list (pressed plantain in the shape of a pizza topped with cheese,) but we love him anyway for trying, and we were having a decent time. After a few hours we paid the tab and headed back to the hotel. Carlos and Vivian were really nice and drove us back, with me in the middle of the smallish back seat, in between two guys, one reasonably thin, and the other, well, he could have been a bit more reasonable. I was squashed as they will attest. But we made it back safely.  

And that about wraps up our first day in Bogota.

Buenos Aires - Days 3 and 4: Sandbagger

Sunday was a lazy day, but ended up being a long one. The plan was to have breakfast, and then head out to check out the market at San Telmo – not too far from the hotel. What we were going to do after that was anyone’s guess? I was certain it wasn’t going to take all day to see the street performers, musicians and shops (since I had been here back in 1996 and knew what to expect - more or less,) and with Randy coming in, having never met him, I was keeping my options open.

So I met Rich at about 9am for breakfast, and too soon afterwards needed some time alone in the men’s room to, um, flush my system. Bottled water? Cooked eggs? The open pitcher of orange juice? I don’t know what it was that caused this disruption in my innards, but it wasn’t fun for a bit. Fortunately, it didn’t last long and I was up and about in a flash – or a flush as the case may be.

While hanging out in my room waiting for the stampede running around inside my intestines to calm down, Randy calls and has arrived at the hotel. Hey, that’s pretty cool. Good timing. So at about 10:30, roughly the same time the buffalos decided they had had enough of me, we all meet down in the lobby. Randy recognized me pretty easily. When you’re in a foreign country, it’s usually not too hard to locate the American tourist with a camera bag slung over the shoulder, jeans, and sneakers, when everyone else is, well, international. It may have been a good thing that I didn’t wear my green/pink spiky hairdo today, and had forgotten to bring my Stetson, chaps and spurs, but then again, this is meat country, so I may have fit in a little better wearing the spurs than the sneakers. Anyway, we head outside to hail a cab.

Just outside the hotel is a small taxi stand where one just happened to be waiting for a fare. So we head over and Randy asks if he’ll take us to San Telmo – in pretty decent Spanish! Now wait just a minute. Randy’s been telling me how little Spanish he knows, and now he appears to be talking to the cabbie in the native tongue. Hmmm. However, the cab driver won’t take 3 of us, only 2. There aren’t any other cabs around, but this one does have space for 3.  But no, he won’t do it. So we go back into the hotel, and ask them to get us a cab. Now I really don’t remember exactly how it happened, but either the desk clerk called the taxi company or he went outside to check, but at some point the driver relented and waved us all to get in. Apparently when the hotel tells them to take 3 people, they take 3 people. And not for anyone else. Sheesh.

So we head over to San Telmo, about a 5 minute drive. Not bad. We get out of the taxi and across the street see the party going on in full swing. The fair is confined to a long stretch of one street that is closed to traffic. Maybe about 10 blocks or so. Not exactly the way I remember it, but interesting nevertheless. So the three of us plow headlong into the crowd.

It’s pretty much the same kind of arts and crafts we had seen yesterday in Recoleta, but a heck of a lot more of it. And since this was on a regular street, although a narrow side street, there were shops and bars along the way. So after slugging it out in the hot, burning sun of the Argentine summer, we finally decided to stop at a local watering hole to quench the deep thirst we had developed along the way, after a long haul of about 2 blocks.

Now over the past week or two as we’ve been putting this rush job of a trip together, Randy’s been telling me that his Spanish is pretty bad, even though his wife is from Venezuela, and his kids can speak the language. Now I did question that to myself when he first told me that he didn’t speak Spanish all that well, but since I really didn’t know him, I just let it go.

So we find a table and sit down, while Randy begins to order a Jack Daniels Black, speaking to the waiter, again in Spanish. Now this isn’t your regular USA high school stumbling and bumbling Spanish that I speak, or rather blurt from time to time when I have to, but it’s the kind that only one who has been speaking it for years can do. The bastard’s been sandbagging me. Come to think of it, he’ll fit right in with this crowd! And over time, he does. And that's a good thing.

After the waiter returns with our order, Randy downs his tumbler of JD Black, Rich knocks off his bottle of cerveza, and down my gullet, I pour a frozen lemonade with ginger and mint. Now what’s wrong with this picture?

Once we have satisfied our dehydration with our manly drinks (ok, so 2 out of 3 were manly) we head back down the happy trail of sightseeing and shopping goodslooking (I’m thinking that it’s time to come up with a new word for shopping, such as goodslooking, as I’m really getting sick and tired of not only hearing it, but writing it as well.)

So we meander down the street wandering through the thickets of knitted sweaters, leather belts, hand-crafted earrings, really cheap shot glasses, and other touristy goods, or bads, when we hit the end of the road. Huh? Where’s all of the music and tango dancing and face painting and other stuff we were warned about? Oh? Whatta ya mean it’s a holiday week? Yep, it’s the tail end of a holiday week here in Bs As. Go figure.

This reminds me of the time back in ’96 when I was in Rio de Janeiro for 1 day on business. My business associate and I arrived the day before a scheduled customer meeting, and we were staying at Ipanema beach. Yes, this was the most famous and (arguably) sexiest beach in the world. Skimpy bathing suits, volleyball playing, bike riding, girl people watching. My hotel room was on the 16^th floor directly across the street from the beach with the most perfect view you can imagine overlooking the beach. Kids, it doesn’t come any better. Well, maybe it does. At the hottest beach in the word, it was raining and the beach was deserted. Depression and a deep bout with alcoholism with years of therapy followed almost immediately afterwards.

But back to yesterday. I purchased nothing, Rich got a baseball cap to protect his shaved noggin from the sun, as he and I were getting somewhat red from all of the shopp walking we’ve been doing. And I don’t think that Randy got anything except for a strained neck from looking at all of the, um, jiggling things that were happily bouncing around. Oh, I got that too.

After we took inventory, we headed back to the hotel to regroup.

Since I have to head out at 5am tomorrow for Bogota, I’m gonna have to shorten this as it’s now a bit after 9pm. 

Our trip co-ordinator, Elisabeth, met us for dinner at a really nice restaurant that serves Parilla (Argetine Parilla - delicious grilled meats and sides Parilla is every day Argentine food served on virtually every city block of Buenos Aires…), after being about an hour late because she had to “charge her phone.” Yeah, right. But we all had a really good time and did the normal European dinner thing starting to eat at about 9pm and not finishing until about midnight. Great food, great company, and great time had by all. Not a bad day after all. Except for being sandbagged that is. 

And the story for today goes like this: Woke up, had a bite to eat, went to the office, listened to a presentation, gave a presentation, listened to a presentation, listened to a presentation, went to lunch, came back from lunch, had a discussion with the locals on how to compete against our nemesis', walked back to the hotel, went down to the pool where when the wind blew the wrong way it stunk from the plumbing (or lack thereof), and then finally began writing my blog. 

So here it ends for day 4, our last day in Buenos Aires.  Tomorrow, Bogota, and having dinner with old friends. Can't even imagine what might happen.

Ciao.

Buenos Aires - Day 2

One of my newest co-workers used to live in Buenos Aires when in college, and she kindly gave us a list of places to visit while we’re here. Now Becky’s a really nice person, and she loves the Tango (and salsa,) so you can imagine that the vast majority of places she suggested we visit included something about the Tango. There’s even a place that we must visit that has wall paintings of the Tango. Now I enjoy a good Tango every now and then too (having danced it the last time I was here – 15 years ago), but I’m not so sure Rich and I are as into it as much as Becky. But ya gotta love her for it.

One of the areas listed was the Recoleta market where the artisans sell their goods, and another is an area called Palermo for funky shops and restaurants. And surprisingly, neither had anything to do with the Tango. So those were our first choices.

Our other co-worker, Randy, isn’t due to arrive until tomorrow, so it appears that today is going to be a nice bonding day between Rich and myself.

Rich and I got to Recoleta at about 10:30am and walked around looking at all of the jewelry, leather goods, clothing, and all of the stuff you’d expect from a market such as this one.  Nothing much that really caught my eye (of the crafts that is, however, there were other architectural sights that were quite interesting), but nice crafts just the same.

One thing I did learn; shopping with a guy is quite a different experience, as opposed to, let’s say, my wife. Rich was totally agreeable to anything I wanted to do, and I was the same. So when we needed to make a decision on which direction to walk, one of us would say “that way” and the other would just follow along, no complaints, no discussion. Easy. That’s pretty much the way it went the entire morning. One of us would say, “let’s go …” and the other would just agree.  Strange, very strange. Is that the same when two girls go shopping?

Now Diane and I have been married for 31 years, and I don’t remember a day where we had that simple of a discussion about who wants to do what and which way to go and when and how and for how long. It’s usually more of something like - I’ll say, “Let’s do this,” and she’ll say, “Is there shopping there?” And I’ll say, “Dunno, I want to see the sights.” And she’ll say, “But I want to go shopping first.” And on ad nauseum until she wins and we go shopping. So the situation between Rich and myself almost had me stumped and questioning my sanity (can this be true?)

At one end of the market is an old cemetery that is a tourist attraction because of the mausoleums, as well as it’s the cemetery where Eva Duarte Peron is buried. So we go through the gate and get immediately accosted by a British woman with a very thick British accent, pushing the cemetery map for 8 pesos. After listening to her for just a short period pointing out where the more important people were interred, I couldn’t take it any more and gave her the 8 pesos, and we went in. Here I was in Argentina listening to a worker with a British accent. Now believe me, I love the Brits, and wouldn't mind living across the pond for a while, but my mind wasn't prepared for this in a Spanish city.

The cemetery is an interesting place. I visited when I was here in ’96, which is why I wanted Rich to see it as well. He was impressed. All of the crypts are extremely ornate as you can see in the accompanying photo.

Here I am showing that I haven't a clue how to model in front of someone's crypt.

Not sure how much value those interred got for their money, but I sincerely hope they are doing well in the afterlife. These things must have cost a small fortune – and in many cases, it was probably a large one.

After paying our respects to the dead, we did our final tour of the market and decided to go on to the next recommended location – the Palermo section.

The problem with locating the Palermo neighborhood is that there are three areas with the same name; Palermo Soho, Palermo Hollywood, and a Palermo botanical garden area. I had emailed Becky about which one we should go see, and all she could reply was that she didn’t recall exactly, but just ask anyone, including the cab driver. So that’s what we did. We grabbed a cab and asked the driver to take us to Palermo. Unfortunately he didn’t speak a word of English, so we pulled out the map and pointed to the areas of Palermo and said, “shopping y comida” Shopping and food. “Ah!” he said in Spanish, “shopping, si.” So he began to drive.  

We drove for about 5 minutes when the driver pulled over to the curb in an area that initially looked about normal for an urban shopping area. However, when we paid the fare and got out of the cab, we found that the driver had just taken us to the local shopping mall, in Palermo. Ugh! Not exactly what I had in mind, and memories of my Budapest trip going shopping were starting to inflict serious mental disturbances.

Suffice it to say that Rich and I immediately agreed that this is not exactly what we wanted to do or where we wanted to be. So we kicked around some ideas of what to do and where to go, as we had no idea of where the “funky” section was. And of course, I had no idea of how to say “funky” in Spanish to a cab driver or anyone else. However, I am a bit pleased with my 1^st grade Spanish that took me 6 years to perfect – from 7^th thru 12^th grades. Ordering beer and water in Spanish, and Empanadas (in Spanish they call them – empanadas, so that’s an easy one) has been a great help. Trying to tell the cab driver where we want to go, obviously hasn’t.  But I digress.

So we reconsider our options, look at the map once again, take a reading of the sun with my sextant (ok, I didn’t bring a sextant –but I did use my iPhone Google maps app), and decide to check out the botanical gardens. It’s only about 6 blocks away, so not bad. So we begin the hike.

When we arrived, we found that there was virtually nil growing except for some love proffered by some serious kissing between a pair of 20-somethings. It’s the middle of the summer and nothing is really blossoming right now – with the obvious exception for hormones that apparently flower any time of year.

So we head back to the hotel to regroup, and ask the concierge where the real Palermo can be found. But first we have a snack.

We go into a restaurant that Rich had pulled one over on yesterday. The story he tells is that while I was doing my thing back at the hotel, he took a walk and went into this restaurant to have some tea – which he did. When he went to pay for it, all he had was a 100 peso ($25) bill. For some reason they couldn’t change it, or didn’t want to, and told him his drink was free. What a deal.  So Rich felt bad and wanted to repay the favor by going back. Very nice of him. In retrospect, I think he wanted to pull the same stunt, but we ate too much and had the proper amount of cash this time.

At the hotel, the concierge pointed out the area in Palermo where we wanted to go, and after some rest we headed back out.

We grabbed a taxi, whereby I pointed out the center of the boxed-in area on the map where we wanted to go. I was simply making sure that we weren’t going to another shopping mall.

We get to the area…and it’s great! There’s lot’s of people, restaurants, interesting stores, more craftspeople on the street, and just a nice fun atmosphere. Perfect! In the center was a band doing their thing. Very cool. And we didn’t have to go shopping. So we walked around a bit checking out all of the sights, and for two guys walking around the streets in this area, in the summer, there’s lots to see (wink, wink.)

So we hung around and walked around and drank some beer around and saw the sights around and just kidded around for a few hours, and as it got dark, headed back to the hotel. And all without argument. Wow.

So at the end of the day I thought - why can’t a woman… be more like a man? (inspiration: My Fair Lady)

Tomorrow is more street fairs with couples doing the Tango, face painting, and other oddities. Yes Becky, the Tango. See ya then. Ciao.

Trip To South America

When I went to Budapest a few months ago, I wrote a daily blog because there were so many things going on that I found sincerely interesting, and at times, humorous. (http://triptobudapest.blogspot.com/2010/10/getting-ready-to-travel.html). Being with old and new family members, and trying to get around a foreign country where English appears to be a last language, made it really interesting, and at times, very funny and fairly writable.

However, on this trip, it's business, and I'm here at the moment with a guy who doesn't like to shop as much as my wife (hmmm, seems to me that's gotta be a good thing, no?), who is interested in many of the same things as I am (more or less), and another guy will be joining us whose wife is from Venezuela, but he doesn't speak the language, so I'm not quite not sure what value he brings to the trip? And more importantly, there's no strudel (see blog URL above). So what could anyone find interesting enough in that to write about? There's no drama from the tug-of-war between husband and wife, there doesn't seem to be a great central story line (we're just here on business trying to get a few days in of warmth and sightseeing before we have to do a song and dance in front of a few hundred people), and there's certainly no love interest - well, maybe I'll offer an exception for the food - but there's still no strudel. So therefore, I'll just spout off here as necessary to blab anything of Earth-shattering interest that I might come across. Don't expect much.

I'm sure you're thinking "Thanks for wasting my time, Jerry, for those two paragraphs of nothing. That's 5 minutes of my life I'll never get back."  Hey, isn't that what blogging (and Facebook) is all about?