Waking up to the sound of cows mooing
I forgot how much sunnier San Francisco is than Eugene...it is so beautiful here. I had a 90-minute delay on my flight from Portland to San Francisco which in reality is only an hour and a half fight. I landed in San Francisco around 10:30 in the evening and a former sorority sister who read my plea on Facebook for a couch to crash on picked me up. I ended up getting a full room to myself; she was so generous.
Traveling Tip: Always check your arrival and departure times. Even when you think you know, double check to confirm the changes and date and time.
2 days, 4 cities and 3 airlines later, I have finally arrived in Tunja, Colombia. I made it to Bogota around 6 in the morning and took a taxi to the bus terminal to Tunja. The bus ride was a little over 3 hours and I was in a state of deliriousness and being awake. Upon my arrival, Manuel (who works for the Institute that I will be teaching at) picked me up and we went to the school. The Institute has two different locations and the teachers switch locations every other day. After lunch (the restaurant only has a menu of the day) we met up with the host family. The host family is incredibly nice and accommodating. As soon as I laid down on the bed, I passed out for a couple of hours. We exchanged information in my broken Spanish that evening about each other’s lives. The next morning, I woke up at 6:30 to the sound of cows mooing in the distance. I had slept over 9 hours and unable to fall back asleep, I decided to get up and go for a run. The whole house was awake because everyone has work early in the morning (Lilian works at a bank and Edison works in the film industry). I never imagined how hard it would be to run in this altitude. Tunja is located in the mountains- 3000 meters high. Thus, I barely ran 5 minutes before I had to stop to catch my breath. Furthermore, the light pollution amalgamated with the smoke from traffic made it very difficult to breathe. I watched as mothers rushed their children to school and hundreds of people selling anything and everything on the streets, only to make enough to get by for the day. In an attempt to find the English Institute by myself, I took the bus and looked for something similar…anything. Instead, an older gentleman ended up helping me find the school and took me all the way to the floor.
Since Fridays are our days off, I had the entire day to explore the town of over 181 thousand inhabitants. While wondering around in the centro, I met a stranger who asked if I was lost and looking for a particular place (Of course I was completely lost…). There he introduced me to another person named Fabian who ended up showing me around. We went to a small café/bar and afterward to the Plaza Bolivar. I tasted oblea for the first time which is a sweet treat with caramel and other syrupy flavors. It was a burst of a sugar filled waffle. The rain is sporadic here and quite often but not for long periods of time. Fabian helped me look for my house and before long, we were lost again (well I was…) But eventually, we found it and he promised to help me get a phone- I tried to buy a local sim card here but AT&T has restrictions and I couldn’t use it… So, I will probably end up buying a local phone. Although there is a lot of wifi everywhere, none of it is open to the public like in the United States. Communication has been the hardest part of this trip because my host family’s house does not have wifi. On my return back to the centro, I was looking for the other location of the institute which is located in a completely different place...so of course I was lost again. Buuut I asked for directions and some university students helped me, taking me directly to the place. That evening, Jay (my boss) and another professor and I had arepa cuadrada for dinner which is a twist to the traditional Colombian meal.
Traveling Tip: Always check your arrival and departure times. Even when you think you know, double check to confirm the changes and date and time.
2 days, 4 cities and 3 airlines later, I have finally arrived in Tunja, Colombia. I made it to Bogota around 6 in the morning and took a taxi to the bus terminal to Tunja. The bus ride was a little over 3 hours and I was in a state of deliriousness and being awake. Upon my arrival, Manuel (who works for the Institute that I will be teaching at) picked me up and we went to the school. The Institute has two different locations and the teachers switch locations every other day. After lunch (the restaurant only has a menu of the day) we met up with the host family. The host family is incredibly nice and accommodating. As soon as I laid down on the bed, I passed out for a couple of hours. We exchanged information in my broken Spanish that evening about each other’s lives. The next morning, I woke up at 6:30 to the sound of cows mooing in the distance. I had slept over 9 hours and unable to fall back asleep, I decided to get up and go for a run. The whole house was awake because everyone has work early in the morning (Lilian works at a bank and Edison works in the film industry). I never imagined how hard it would be to run in this altitude. Tunja is located in the mountains- 3000 meters high. Thus, I barely ran 5 minutes before I had to stop to catch my breath. Furthermore, the light pollution amalgamated with the smoke from traffic made it very difficult to breathe. I watched as mothers rushed their children to school and hundreds of people selling anything and everything on the streets, only to make enough to get by for the day. In an attempt to find the English Institute by myself, I took the bus and looked for something similar…anything. Instead, an older gentleman ended up helping me find the school and took me all the way to the floor. 
Since Fridays are our days off, I had the entire day to explore the town of over 181 thousand inhabitants. While wondering around in the centro, I met a stranger who asked if I was lost and looking for a particular place (Of course I was completely lost…). There he introduced me to another person named Fabian who ended up showing me around. We went to a small café/bar and afterward to the Plaza Bolivar. I tasted oblea for the first time which is a sweet treat with caramel and other syrupy flavors. It was a burst of a sugar filled waffle. The rain is sporadic here and quite often but not for long periods of time. Fabian helped me look for my house and before long, we were lost again (well I was…) But eventually, we found it and he promised to help me get a phone- I tried to buy a local sim card here but AT&T has restrictions and I couldn’t use it… So, I will probably end up buying a local phone. Although there is a lot of wifi everywhere, none of it is open to the public like in the United States. Communication has been the hardest part of this trip because my host family’s house does not have wifi. On my return back to the centro, I was looking for the other location of the institute which is located in a completely different place...so of course I was lost again. Buuut I asked for directions and some university students helped me, taking me directly to the place. That evening, Jay (my boss) and another professor and I had arepa cuadrada for dinner which is a twist to the traditional Colombian meal.
In the evening, we went to a club called Joaquina. It was filled with sweat, loud/live music, and too many people. We went with people from the institute and the atmosphere reminded me a lot of Mexico: young, loud, fun, and a night filled with dancing.
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