Accidental Hippo Blog

Here’s a list of Colombian New Year’s customs published in El Tiempo today (translated and expanded in some cases, for your reading pleasure!). Lots of these are also common in other parts of Latin America.

Eating grapes   You assign a goal you want to reach in the new year to each of 12 grapes. Then you eat them, one  by one, as the clock chimes at midnight, to ensure they come true.

Yellow underwear  Tradition says that wearing yellow underwear on January 1 will attract happiness and prosperity.  (Or you can go for red, to attract love and passion!)

Money  If you ring in the new year with a coin in your shoe or money in your pocket, you can expect financial success to come your way.

Grain  Put a few grains in your pockets – lentils, preferably – so that neither money nor food will be scarce during the next year.

Candles  Depending on the color, they bring good energy to your home and your loved ones. White brings harmony, peace and tranquility. Green: health. Pink: friendship. Red: passionate love. Purple: success. Brown: maturity and stability. Orange: creativity and open communication. Blue: wisdom and loyalty. Yellow: happiness.

Lights on  The lights should be on at midnight to bring prosperity and success the whole year.

Around the block  One of the most common traditions is to go out at midnight and walk around the block with a suitcase, so that the new year will bring you lots of opportunities to travel. (Assuming, of course, that you want to travel!)

Coins  So that you’ll never lack money during the new year, put 13 gold coins in a red coin purse. Or you can use 12 coins of the same denomination, and toss them in the air at midnight.

Climbing. Get up on a chair or climb a ladder at midnight so that the new year will bring you progress in all areas.

Bubbly  Bubbly wine is recommended because the bubbles represent happiness.

Wheat  At this time of year, Colombians buy sprigs of wheat to display in their homes on January 1 to protect the home and attract prosperity and good luck.

New clothes  Colombians try to wear at least one new item of clothing on January 1, to assure that they’ll have sufficient new clothing during the new year.

Potato  You select three potatoes. One you peel. Another you leave half peeled, and the third you don’t peel at all. You put all three under your bed on December 31. On January 1, you reach for one with your eyes closed, and the one you pick will determine what your financial situation will be all year. If you pick the peeled one, you’ll have a pretty bad year. If you choose the one that’s half peeled, your year will be OK. And if you pick the one that’s untouched, you’ll have a FABULOUS year!

Herbal bath  This is done to clear away bad energy.

Wish list  In order for your dreams to become reality, you make a list, fold up the sheet, and open it at midnight.

Unfortunately, I can hardly stay awake past 10 pm, let alone midnight, so I didn’t do anything at the appropriate time last night. I have some yellow undies, but I forgot to put them on today. I bought some bubbly, but will drink it with friends later today. And there’s no way I’d risk that potato-under-the-bed thing – I plan on having a great year and I’m not going to jinx it by touching the wrong potato! In the end, every year is a good year, even though difficult and disappointing moments visit with considerable regularity. Brave hearts, all, in 2014! 

Greetings! It’s been over a year since I posted any news here, which isn’t to say there’s no news. I was just otherwise occupied…

Last November, I had cataract surgery on my right eye. It went horribly wrong. In January, having recovered somewhat, they performed the same surgery on my left eye, successfully, thank heaven. In February, recovering nicely and excited to be seeing beautifully through both eyes for a couple of weeks, I began to lose sight in my right eye again. It took a while to get the tests completed, but by late March a retinologist determined that I had a detached retina, probably caused by one of the little slivers of shattered cataract that had fallen into my eye during that November operation. He immediately repaired the detachment and filled my eye with some kind of gel that acted sort of like a cast, keeping it in the correct shape while I healed.

In October, he operated again, to remove the gel and see if my retina had completely healed. So far, all’s finally well with that eye, she says, knocking on her wooden desk. Where there’s scar tissue from the repair, I have no vision, but the rest of the eye is functioning well, and I’m only aware of the blank spot when I look with my left eye closed, something I rarely do. So for the first time in over a year, I can see reasonably well through both eyes and have depth perception again. And I’m gradually abandoning the cane I’ve been using for over a year to help with balance and remind myself not to get too frisky when I’m outside.

Julian

The high point of the year: In June I spent a couple of weeks in Spokane, Washington visiting my kids and grand-kids. It was a wonderful trip for many reasons. My daughter got married, my son and his wife bought a house in the spring, I got to spend time with their two adorable twin four-year-olds, Jaime and Julian, and I even got to visit with some friends who drove over from Mount Vernon, on the other side of the state. And one of the best parts of the trip was that a number of minor health problems that had been bothering me since the surgeries began, cleared up. Happiness will do that for you!

Jaime

Off and on, during this past year, my friends Consuelo and Nancy bundled me into Consu’s car to take me to visit the house in Cajicá – to make sure it was still standing. It was, and still is! It developed a few problems, which, it turns out, every house around mine also developed. (Nice to know it’s not that I bought the one lemon in the complex!) The houses were all settling, which resulted in little hairline cracks developing in some of the walls. This is to be expected in new Colombian houses, which are essentially made of brick and cement, covered with plaster. In early August, one year from the date they gave me the keys, the contractor visited, did an assessment, and then sent a ‘maestro’ to fix all the cracks. He also corrected a few places on the second floor where the building wasn’t sealed properly, causing paint to peel and fall off in chips onto the floor. With those problems all fixed, the house looks brand new again!

Consuelo lost her job early in the year. The official unemployment rate is 9%, but not even I believe that’s accurate. She searched and searched and in August finally decided to use a tourist visa she’d taken out when times were better, to fly to Florida and stay with friends. When she left I learned where to catch the ‘flota’ interurban bus – to Cajicá. I should have done it long ago. It’s easy, very inexpensive – just over a dollar each way – and often takes less time than it took with Consuelo. (She obeys speed limits – the flota drivers tend to race!) The bus leaves me on the main drag, about five blocks from my house, and if I have too much to carry to make walking appealing, there’s a taxi stand a few yards away. Knowing how to get there on my own, I go more often.

I’ve worked with very few local clients this year. It seemed every time I had a client scheduled for dyslexia correction, the clinic would call to say it was time for another check up or surgery! And by the time I had the fourth operation, my body pretty much rebelled, so it took longer to recover than I expected. I’ve been officially back at work for a couple of weeks. December is almost always a slow month for dyslexia correction – everyone who can, leaves the city as soon as their kids’ winter break starts. So I’m taking things slow. By next week I’ll probably head out of town as well, although I probably won’t go any farther than Cajicá.

My neighbor, Nancy, and her daughter, Yseth, in a parade on our street in July

Now that I can see, I’ve discovered that my apartment is almost as much in need of repairs as the house was! It’s amazing how much I simply couldn’t see when my cataracts were at their worst, and during this last year of diminished sight. One problem is that mildew has broken out on the bathroom ceilings and around some of the windows. I need to have Humberto come to scrape all that damaged paint off, re-plaster those areas, and paint again.

Humberto’s already spent a lot of time here. Shortly after the surgery in early October, the natural gas company called to say it was past time for them to come check my water heater and stove. Normally, they check every two years and do repairs, for which customers must pay, of course. I apparently fell through a crack, because they hadn’t been here since before I moved in, in 2008! A fellow comes in with little hand-held monitors, checking for gas and carbon monoxide leaks, and if he finds any, you have two weeks to get repairs done, before they shut off your gas service! The technician who visited me decided that my water heater only needed adjustment, but that my stove needed major repair.

I wasn’t surprised. The water heater is an antique and my stove is older than dirt. Most of the time I had to light it with a match and I’ve never turned on the oven – I’m afraid it might blow up the kitchen! The gas man quoted a price for both repairs, and I called for an appointment.

Two weeks later, a young man in astoundingly grimy hands and clothes showed up at about 5:00 PM on the appointed date. I decided to assume that he’d spent the entire day cleaning people’s miserable appliances, or that his salary was so low he couldn’t afford to live anywhere with access to water – both things very possibly true – and ignored how he looked and smelled. He worked until after 7 PM, replacing all the valves in the stove, cleaning and and tinkering with every conceivable part of the heater. In the end, he was satisfied that the ’emissions’ were acceptable and completed the paperwork to allow me to pay for all this over three months. Then I had to request that the gas company send another technician to do a final check.

My kids, Sara and David, with me at Sara’s wedding

That fellow showed up several days later, well past the two-week limit, and declared that the stove was OK, but the heater was still out of compliance. I decided that I wasn’t going to have ‘authorized’ repair guys in again, so I called Humberto. I think he spent about two hours tinkering with the heater the next day, before he left and said he’d return the following day with a part. By the time he finished, several days later, and the next technician checked his work, both the heater and the stove passed – but only because the fellow felt sorry for me.

He said he’d give me a pass, but that by the next check, in two years, I need a new stove and a new heater. What I really need is a new kitchen!

Even after the technician gave me a pass, Humberto had to return several times, because within a day or two the heater stopped working entirely. In the end, he managed to get it to heat water to luke warm, but a few minutes into every shower, it shuts off and you have to play with the faucets to get it going again. Eventually, Humberto admitted that he’d done all he could for the old machine, and that I’d have to get a new one, or live with this one’s idiosyncracies. For now, I’m living with its idiosyncracies.

Both the heater and the stove are obsolete. I’m going to have to give up wanting hot showers, because the water pressure in this building is too low for most modern gas heaters to handle – and clearly, my old heater’s efforts to deal are about to send it to water heater heaven. In the past five years I’ve tried twice to replace it, but neither of those purchases worked even as well as my poor old clunker. I may have to buy an electric water heater, although chances are it won’t work much better than what I have. Oh, well, at least I can always run out to Cajicá to shower. Lots of pressure, and lovely hot water there!

Meanwhile, the stove may or may not be giving off carbon monoxide, but it’s certainly giving off something – whenever I light a burner to cook, something smelling very much like what comes out of the tailpipe of a car overwhelms the fragrance of the food. I only have to use a match to light the burner about 60% of the time – that’s a bit of an improvement. But meanwhile, once the burners are on, the knobs are so stiff, it’s nearly impossible to turn them to increase or diminish the flame. It’s definitely time I had someone come in, rip out the entire kitchen and replace everything. Unfortunately, after a year with very little work, there’s no money for that project – yet.

A recent acquisition for the house, to hang on the wall as soon as I can get Humberto to Cajicá with his drill!

Back in September, there was an ‘extraordinary’ meeting of owners here in my apartment complex. The purpose was to discuss renovating the facade of the three buildings. It’s about time, not just because they desperately need painting, but because the original contractors did a very spotty job of sealing them, and many people have a lot more than the relatively minor mildew problems I’ve begun to see.

The meeting – as usual – was supposed to begin at 7:30 PM on a Thursday evening. But of course, no quorum was reached until nearly 8:30. And we had to go through the agenda, the minutes from the previous meeting, and a bunch of other required, but irrelevant stuff, before we could get down to the real issue. A committee had been formed some months earlier to look into the cost of renovating the facades. We all imagined they’d called the meeting to present three options to us. By law and custom, whenever a big project is planned in a place like this, three quotes must be obtained. However, although the committee reported that they’d obtained three quotes, they only shared one with us – the one they felt was best.

One might think that the presentation of just one option would go fairly quickly, but one would be wrong. It took forever, and then the arguing took a further forever. I left at about 10 PM, because I simply refuse to stay any later no matter what the issue is. Nancy left at about midnight – she’s more compliant than I am – but at that point no voting had yet begun. I wondered all through October and November whether they ever got around to voting at all, but heard nothing.

The design the committee recommended is very attractive, and very expensive. It might actually raise the value of the property enough to move us from estrato 4 to 5.  (Residential buildings in Colombia are rated from estrato 1 to 6, according to their location, price and quality. Ours started out as estrato 2, but was raised to 4 a year or so before I bought my place. Raising this complex to a 5 isn’t a very good idea – it would raise our property taxes, without improving the saleability of the apartments, since the insides would remain at estrato 3 or 4 quality.)

Supposedly, the paint that would be used contains a sealant, so owners with mildew problems on their vertical walls were at least happy about that, even if they weren’t happy with the price. Those who live on the top floors have a serious problem with leaks and rampant mildew through the roof, so the question was raised as to whether the roof would be painted as well. Nope. Too expensive. Even though I don’t live on the top floor,  I’d have voted against anything that left that problem unsolved.

Last Friday, we all received a notice stating that, as had been decided in September (oh, really?), the additional condo fees to cover the cost of the renovation would begin to be charged in December, and that this week we’d get our bills – and please pay promptly.  No indication of how much the fees will be or over how many months the fees will be spread. It would have been hard to come up with a worse time of year to ask us for an extra payment!

In the course of this year I’ve thought often about when or whether I should move to Cajicá, retire and apply for Social Security, or keep working. It’s quiet there. The heater and stove work perfectly. I don’t hesitate to use the oven when I feel like it. I can walk more there, and should. And I can bike there too, and should buy a bike asap. Since August, I have great internet service at the house; it even includes cable TV channels, although I don’t own a TV.

But I’ve hesitated, trying to decide when, and to what extent… whether to rent the apartment out, or continue to work in the city, where most of my clients live. I might lose clients if they all had to go to Cajicá for my services. And my insurer has no medical offices in Cajicá – all year I had to run back to Bogotá for clinic appointments, surgeries. But still, with all the eye surgery completed, I was beginning to think about all this more seriously… and then…

I suddenly realized that once workers start hammering and drilling on the outside of these apartment buildings, I’m not going to be able to work here. Quiet and tranquility are needed for dyslexia correction. Both are available at the house. Perhaps it really is time to stop thinking and make the move. It’ll  take months to move my office, sell excess furniture, make repairs so the apartment can be rented, let alone find a renter…. I’d better make up my mind and get started!

Me, in a ruana in August – a lovely gift from one of my clients

September 13, 2012
It’s been a very busy couple of months, and now it’s time for an update.

Amarilo finally figured out how to write up the deed on my house without including my ex in the paperwork: they wrote into the deed that the purpose of the purchase was commercial. Do not ask me why this was the solution. I have no idea. But it made me nervous, since I don’t plan to put a business in the building (which would not be permitted under the rules of the owners association), nor am I planning to flip it, or even rent it out for now. (Now that I’ve had a chance to spend some time there, if I were going to rent out anything, it would be the apartment!)  I discussed this with the notary herself the day I went in to review the deed, sign it, and pay the fees. She insisted it wasn’t going to be a problem, that it didn’t require me to put a store in my house, or rent it. It’s apparently just a category with no specific requirements. So I threw up my hands, took a deep breath and signed. Whatever…. If it’s destined to become a problem it will be one for some other day.

Meanwhile, the Amarilo people announced that after I signed on July 30th, they’d give me keys on the 15th of August. That was 15 days later than we’d agreed to way back when. My response was to threaten to come out and roll a few heads in the sales office. In the end they agreed to turn the house over to me on August 4th, because in the meantime they’d given away all the early dates to other buyers. Ultimately that was a better plan than August 1st, because the 4th was a Saturday. That meant Nancy could go with me. Since my assigned task was to inspect the house, and either require them to fix anything that wasn’t as advertised, or sign that all was in order, I was grateful that someone who can actually SEE details could be with me.

Nancy did find a couple of places where the paint job wasn’t perfect. The ‘maestro’ was with us and immediately waved a hand at an assistant, who in turn waved a hand at someone else, who ran out to get someone else to come groveling in with paint and brush to fix the offending bits. But all in all, the house was exactly as it should be, and I was entirely happy to sign the paper accepting the house as it was. Everything inside is guaranteed for a year. So in early August 2013, they will return to inspect, looking to see if ‘settling’ has cracked any aspect of the interior. If they find anything, they must fix it immediately. The rest of the structure is guaranteed for 10 years. It looks very sturdy to me – like it will last long after I’m dead and gone.

And then they left me with keys and a housewarming gift: one very large, yellow and white umbrella. It’s really a fantastic umbrella, except that it also has Amarilo written all over it!

Living room in Cajicá

A couple of weeks before the planned move I’d bought a brass bed for my bedroom at the house, and some living room furniture for the apartment, to replace the set I was moving to the house. Both were scheduled for delivery by August 7th, a day before the movers would arrive. Surprisingly, everything arrived on time, and the next morning three very efficient guys from Panamericana de Mudanzas showed up early and began to fill their truck with about half of my belongings. Half, because I intend to keep the apartment as a place to work with clients (the ‘real’ commercial property!). I left most of the contents of my bedroom and office, and moved most of the living and dining room furniture.

Master bedroom

I asked Humberto to accompany me to the house to put together various pieces of furniture, and as soon as we arrived, he got started. Nancy sold me a very large ‘biblioteca’ for the den. It’s a combination bookshelf, cupboard and desk, designed to fit in a corner. It took Humberto all day to put that and my bed together.  I slept in my new bed, loving it!, and he came back the next day to put together a bed I bought from Nancy’s daughter, Yerlis.

Yerlis bed with trundle and lots of storage

I say bed, but it’s more than that. It’s a twin bed,  with a trundle (what we call in Spanish a ‘cama nido’ (a nesting bed). Instead of a headboard, the beds are backed up by an entire wall of shelves, cupboards and a space to put a computer. I bought it in part to help Yerlis out – she wanted a new bed and couldn’t afford to buy one unless someone bought the old one. And I bought the ‘biblioteca’ from Nancy because I was going to need something with shelves for the den anyway, and she needed to get rid of hers in order to turn the room it had been occupying into a bedroom she can rent to a boarder. So we all benefited from the deal.  Even Humberto, since rebuilding these two large items earned him a pretty penny.

Den with Nancy’s ‘biblioteca’

A few days later, Humberto and I met at Home Center and bought new locks for the house, which he installed once we got to Cajicá.

I’ve not stayed more than a few days at the house at any one time. It took me about a week or two to figure out how to get a phone and wireless internet service installed. Telmex, my cable company in Bogotá shook its corporate head and said it would take 3 to 4 months to get cable to our complex. So I called ETB, the phone company, while Humberto installed the new locks. They came out a couple of days later. Their service costs about 40% less than Telmex, and their internet speed of 4 megs is just as fast. I have half a mind to check out ETB in Bogotá….

Another bedroom, still empty

However, once the service was installed, nothing worked. As it turned out the phone I’d connected was a dud. Once I bought a new phone, that part of the service was fine. But I simply could not connect to the wireless internet.  I really can’t stay more than a couple of days in a row at the house without an internet connection.  Translations and emails from clients can arrive at any time and need to be dealt with as soon as possible. Frustrated, I headed back to Bogotá, and another week passed before I could get back to the house and call the young saleswoman who’d set me up with the service.

Wooden blinds in the den

She gave me a number to call. The man I first spoke to passed me on to a woman who spent almost two hours on the phone fixing my problem. She had me connect using a cable the installers had left in a box (thank goodness). Had I known they’d left it, I could have gone on-line at any time. The tech on the phone had me download a little program that allowed her to take control of my computer. It turned out there was absolutely nothing wrong with the wireless modem. The young man who had installed it had asked me to name my wireless system and create a password. He then copied the password incorrectly, so there was simply no way for me to log on until the tech discovered what password he’d assigned me.

Rotating blinds in the master bedroom – closed

So now I had wireless internet. However, my laptop was and still is virtually useless. It seems that the screen is dying. It works for about 20 minutes, and then goes all wonky, freezes, and won’t work again until the computer is completely cold. I was amazed it didn’t crash while I was on the phone with the tech from ETB. (It gave up about 15 minutes after she and I finished.) And there’s no telling when it might stop working entirely. I can try to have it fixed, or recognize that it’s lasted longer than most and just buy a new one. But that’s a big purchase either way, and I needed curtains to keep strangers from looking in at all my stuff whenever I wasn’t at home.

Part of the kitchen

I started pricing ‘window treatments.’  The first quote was about 2.7 million pesos for three windows, the second, around 2.4 million for the same, and the third 1.9 million for four windows, including installation and faster delivery. This last quote came from a don José. He’s a fellow about my age who’s been in the curtain and blind business for 25 years and lives in an old style house in Cajicá that I pass on my way to and from the bus stop.

I don’t have many sheets or tablecloths to hang temporarily in my windows, so while I waited for don José to deliver, I cut up several dozen of the plastic grocery bags I’d wrapped breakables in during the move, taped them together to make huge, super-light sheets, and taped them onto my windows. I was advertising Safeway, Éxito, Home Center, Carrefour, and Haggens for a few days there, but at least nobody could see me changing into pj’s at night.

Don José delivered right on time. I pulled down all my plastic bag curtains and he installed Japanese panels in the living room, a wooden venetian blind in the den, a simple mini-blind in the kitchen and a rotating ‘Sheer Elegance’ blind in the master bedroom. I’ve NEVER had such nice window coverings! The two smaller upstairs bedrooms still have no curtains or blinds, but you can’t really see into those windows from the street – and in one of them there’s nothing to see but a rocking chair. When I’m ready to deal with those rooms, I’ll definitely be calling don José.

Japanese panels, open a bit

By the time I’d finished paying the notary fees, Nancy, Yerlis, Humberto and don José, I’d pretty much run through the funds I’d saved for the move. So, no new or even refurbished computer for now. But when I go to the house, there are a number of things I’m really enjoying.

First, it’s warmer than Bogotá. The weather in Cajicá is very much like Bogotá, but it’s at a little lower elevation, and it does seem to me that it’s just a shade less chilly. But I suspect that what really makes the difference is simply that the house is better built than my apartment complex. It’s not just me – everyone who’s stepped inside comments on how ‘calientica’ the house is.

Second, it’s QUIET in Huertas de Cajicá. I’m sure part of it is simply that not very many people have moved in yet, but a town of 25,000 is bound to be less noisy than a city of over 8 million. Occasionally I hear a helicopter or small plane fly over the town; I hear the train whistle when it pulls into town, and again when it announces its departure. That’s about it for noise. The ‘citófono’ system hasn’t been installed in the houses yet. (When visitors arrive the guard at the gate uses the citófono to call and ask if that person should be allowed in.) The system depends on a phone line being installed in the house.  I just gave my new phone number to the guys at the gate, so perhaps they can call me now. But I don’t get many visitors! Until now, when someone has arrived, one of the guards has walked over to my house, rung the doorbell, asked the question and then radioed back to the gate to let the person in, or not.

Likewise, at around 8:30 AM and again at about 3:30 PM, someone comes around to collect garbage. All I have to do is set my bag of garbage out by my front step, and a few minutes later it magically disappears. Sometimes, a worker just rings the bell to ask if I have a bag to put out.  This month those of us who have moved in are being charged an extra 28,000 pesos to purchase a bin, which will look neater on the porch than a plastic bag. The complex will recycle, but the cleaning service employees will separate the recyclables from the garbage.  What a service!

A gradually expanding neighborhood. When I first moved in, there was a barrier just beyond the yellow speed limit sign.

(9/20/12 – Yesterday I was at the house, and left at around 2 PM. As I approached the gate, I realized I’d left a bag of garbage inside,and turned around to go get it and bring it to the main building where ‘residuos’ are stored and prepared for the garbage collection. The portero saw me, asked me about another matter, and I mentioned I was going home for my garbage bag and would deal with the issue when I returned. As soon as I opened my front door to bring out the bag, there was the guy in charge of ‘residuos’ saying he’d take that for me. And the portero behind him, heading back towards the gate. What a service, indeed!)

I’ve met a couple of my neighbors, but there aren’t many yet. Each time I run back to the house, the builders have opened up another section of the complex. All of the structures are built, but not everyone’s interior is ready. As they finish the houses scheduled to be delivered, they move the fence back a little more. At the rate they’re going it won’t be long before I can walk through the entire complex.

My house is number 9. Both 8 and 10 are still empty, parts of the interior still unfinished. But two houses down, in number 7, doña Conchita lives with her aged mother. They moved in a few days after I did, also from Bogotá. Conchita has a pair of parakeets. And until about a week ago, she had a small parrot too, Paulino. She rescued Paulino from abusive owners and had been taking care of him for nine years. She was in the habit in Bogotá of letting Paulino and the parakeets out of their cages during the day to sit on little perches outside in her patio. She tried that in Huertas, and within a few days Paulino spread his clipped wings and flew clumsily off, never to be seen again. Conchita and her mom drove all the way to Zipaquirá searching for him and calling his name. Nothing. So now the keets get their cage moved outside when it’s nice, but the little door stays closed.

Shared front garden – before moving day. The plants have grown in the last month and a half, as has the grass in the back yard and the little bushes that border it.

Like me, Conchita works from home and was delighted to learn that ETB could hook her up to the internet in a couple of days.  I put Conchita in touch with Humberto too; and she put him in touch with another neighbor. Humberto’s fantastic – he can fix absolutely anything, and if he keeps proving it to my neighbors as they move in, he may have to move to Cajicá to handle all the business he’s likely to get! I gave Conchita don José’s phone number as well, but she has lots of sheets and table cloths, so she’s not resorting to cut up plastic bags.

I also like that my house isn’t far from the ideal place to catch a bus back into Bogotá, and buses are plentiful. And reasonably comfortable. (And cheap! It costs 2,700 pesos to ride from Cajicá to the north end of Bogotá. That’s less than $1.50.) It’s about a five block walk to the bus stop, and usually within about 5 minutes several different bus lines pass on their way to Bogotá. Most of the buses are small, holding about 26 passengers.  They all have padded seats that recline (tall ones with head rests), and most of the time everyone gets a seat. The ride is so short that if the bus does fill up and a couple of people have to stand, it’s not for long The buses stop here and there on the way out of Cajicá, in Chía, and at certain points along the highway to Bogotá – but they’re fast. It’s probably about a 20 minute ride, including the various stops. (Although yesterday, I caught the bus at about 3 PM. That’s a BAD time if you’re in a hurry. There are several schools between Bogotá and Chía, and on weekdays their buses leave about that time. As all those buses tried to merge into the traffic on the Autopista, we slowed to a virtual crawl. Once we passed the last turnoff from a school, we were back to our normal jaunty pace.)

In addition to the bus driver, there’s always an assistant. As the bus comes up upon one of its regular stops, he leans out the door and yells, “Bogotá, Bogotá, Portal del Norte!” (North Station, which is the northern most Transmilenio Station.). The assistant helps people onto the bus (particularly women, my age), and often helps you get your bag on as well. Many of the buses have storage for bigger bags underneath. Once everyone’s seated and the bus is in a stretch with no stops, he walks from front to back collecting the fares and making change – and these fellows never seem to forget who paid and who has yet to pay. They also always remember who they owe change to and never forget to come back and give you what you’re owed.  Taxi drivers know the buses come in thick and fast all day, so often when I step off the bus, the assistant asks, “Do you need a taxi?” and when I nod yes, he whistles, and one pulls up. Often, either the bus assistant or the cab driver lifts my bag into the taxi for me. So the whole trip, door to door, is quick and easy.

Nancy and Consuelo exploring my tiny back yard shortly before moving day. (The grass is a lot thicker now!)

9/20/2012

I returned to Cajicá midweek because there was a problem with the electrical system. Some lights and outlets worked; others stopped working over last weekend. I was told I’d have to go to the sales office and request in writing that they send an electrician. I wasn’t too thrilled at the idea of walking there. If all four parts of Huertas de Cajicá were finished and the roads among them in, it would be a fairly short walk. But they’re not. Walking all the way around would take a lot longer, along a street that heavy trucks have been traveling since construction got started a couple of years ago – leaving it a bumpy, often muddy mess. But I remembered that don José had given me the number of a taxi driver ‘de confianza’ – trustworthy. So I called him. Don Alfonso arrived exactly the minute we agreed on, took me to the sales office, waited for me, and returned me home. I’ll be calling him again.

I feared that the paperwork for the electrician would take days, and I couldn’t stay that long this week. But about two hours later there was a knock on the door and a guy asking, “Has my partner been here to fix your power yet? No?, Well, if you’d like I’ll come in and see what the problem is.” So I let him in and he found the problem in no time at all. Yay!

Last Saturday Consuelo and Nancy brought me to Cajicá in Consuelo’s car. She’s renting my parking space at the apartment. Instead of paying me, our deal is that if I need a ride somewhere when she’s not at work, she’ll take me. I took with us the ingredients to make peanut butter, chocolate chip, and oatmeal cookies in my new oven. The first attempt was tasty, but really a failure. Adjustments must be made when you’re baking at over 8,000 feet! The next attempts have turned out much better – less sugar more flour than my recipe calls for at sea level, and converting farenheit to centigrade on an oven that has gradations 20 degrees apart is tricky.

Consuelo out in front of Number 9 shortly before moving day. I have two parking spaces, I’ll never use. Consuelo’s parked illegally – everyone MUST back into the spaces.

Supposedly, I have a client arriving from Puerto Wilches on Saturday. But the mom has not yet confirmed they’re actually coming. I need the income, but I’m rather hoping they don’t show up, so I can go spend a whole week in my house. So far I haven’t had an opportunity to explore much of the town, figure out where the best places are to buy groceries, etc… We’ll see what happens Saturday!