Going towards the end of June I have already been here in Bogota for almost half a year. While battling a bit of a flu this week, I had to get outside today and enjoy the nice weather. This photo is a view of the street I live on since April; up the hill, I will take you there in a moment...
To the left of where I took the first photo is the grocery store I mostly use, one of the many "Garulla" outlets. It has literally everything you could be looking for. I don't go out that much, but when I get together with some people and/or when I want to watch a good soccer game in a fun environment, I go to the "Bogota Beer Factory" pub, also just around the corner of where I live:
Just a block further is the street I mostly walk down on my way to the SENA offices or to the closest shopping mall. On the sign you can maybe read that just down the hill it crosses the "septima", the "Carrrera 7" which runs all the way from the south (the old city center) to the north, where most of the newer suburbs are built.
Turning around from that same point you get a view of the street up towards the hills. That way I do regularly a walk in a small park. Let me take you there:
This little park has a stream coming down from the hills and it really right away takes you out of the big city atmosphere. I like to do this walk during mornings when I work from my apartment and on nice days during the weekend. A few snapshots of the park:
This is a photo at the top of the park when it crosses the Carrera 1 (or "circunvular"). At this road that also runs from north to south they have built apartment buildings which have a very nice view over the city of Bogota. Here a few impressions:
I made this (not so pretty) photo to show you the street signage. It is all a grid and quite easy to find your way in town. All the roads going from north (with the newer parts of the city) to south (where the old town center is and beyond) are called "Carreras" and number 1 is up on the hill (where I am standing while taking this photo) to number 100 something near the airport. All the streets going from the east (up the hill on Carrera 1) to the west (where the airport is) are called "Calles" and they go from number 1 in the old city center to number 200 or so in the newer areas of the city in the north.
After going up, there is always again the going down. A view of the walk down....
This is the last part of my street up the hill. Behind the steep grass hill is my apartment building. I walk this up every day 2 or 3 times, and it is a great daily work-out... :-)
The entrance of the building. It is on Calle 72 close to the Carrera 1. The SENA buildings are at Calle 57 and that is a good 20 minute walk. The Canadian Embassy is at Calle 115 and that would be about an hour walk. The Embassy is right across from Usaquen where they have the Sunday craft markets of which I made a post in January. Here is a look of my apartment:
And my little home office. This is where I spent most of my time plotting & planning the project work. With the help of e-mail and Skype it is really a nice way to communicate across the country and with the colleagues in Ottawa. I do go almost every day to the SENA offices, but more to attend meetings, to catch up with people and to join them for lunches.
The work of project start-up goes slow. Too slow for an impatient person like me. But it takes time to get everybody to agree with a Project Implementation Plan which at the end of five years is the basis on which the project results will be measured against. The coming month will be the final part of that planning and later in August and the months of September, October and November we will see again a lot more concrete action. I will try to keep you updated with ongoing posts.
Being away from home now for almost six months brings me to a few early conclusions. It is a very different experience than when I did this in my early thirties as a single professional. I miss Mary, Hilary and Mark much more than I had expected. For that reason alone, I would not do again a year away like this. The travelling work will hopefully always be part of my life, but ideally that is done from the home-base in Niagara....
The work experience is fantastic and of course one learns so much more from a country and its cultures when you live there for a longer time than the 1, 2 or 3 week visits. I have met already a lot of fascinating and intriguing Colombians through both work and social activities. I will do my best to share as much with you as I can of those people and their realities as I can through this blog.
Right now I have to get rid of this typical "Bogota gripa"(flu) through lots of sleep, vitamins and what they consider here the magic solution: "canella con limon". All the best & be good!
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