God dammit, this city is so much fun. Yesterday and today have been two of my favorite days of the whole trip. This city is so god damn cool! AHH!! We are having a hard time leaving...
Anyways.
Yesterday we (and by we I mean Anton, though I did toast the bread) made over easy eggs and bacon in the hostel kitchen. It´s like the nicest kitchen ever, which I am pretty sure I already discussed. But seriously, it´s like nicer than my kitchen at home (not parents casa, obviously, but that mystical non existant place that I refer to vaguely as home which implies condo, mesa house, cameron creek, rape cave, wherever I´ve lived or live or whatever I don´t know what I´m even talking about).
It was delicious. We were rocking breakfast beers like it was going out of style and I had like 5 and Anton had like 8 I think and we were nice and tipsy and talked to the hostel owner Natalie for a long time (she is from NY but has lived here for like 15 years so she answers all our confusion) and I played with her mini dauchsun Ramona for awhile. We had grand plans to go ride the cable car and the metro and check out the city center but we were too drunk and ended up passing out around 4 for a couple hours. When we awoke we layed around more and decided to go get sushi and go get wasted so we got pretty and I did Anton´s mohawk (which is getting absurdly big, btw) and we were off! We spent $124,000 on sushi, which is about 60 dollars, and it was SO good. Retardedly good. One of the rolls was a tempura lobster and eel, one had mozzarella cheese on it, which was weird, and we got a bunch of nigiri and other shit. So bomb.
We had a few beers and the bar area here is like Mill on steroids. There is a small park and then just SURROUNDING it is bar upon restaurant upon bar upon bar upon bar. There were just hundreds and hundreds of people, everything was packed. This was more of a posh area though and everything was expensive, so we walked a couple blocks to the bigger park and bought some beer and drank in the park (which was also ridiculously packed with people). It´s so sweet being able to drink wherevr, there are just people all over with liquor bottles and beer and it´s ridiculous. People here are wealthy and hot and wasted. So tight.
We found a little dive that had shots of rum and took like 4 shots each and then staggered around from bar to bar taking shot after shot. Anton almost got his head taken off by a low ceiling fan which caused great amusement amongst one bar. We were wasted and found a guy that spoke english that took us to find blow for SIX FUCKING DOLLARS A GRAM and Anton said it was okay (i didn´t do any because I wanted to be able to move today). We were up till like 5 all wasted and goofy and it was good times.
Today we woke up and decided to cook again, so we walked about half a mile to this MASSIVE store that was like super walmart but it also had a huge food court and when we saw a Mexican food place...well...cooking went out the window. We gorged on mounds of food (quesadilla, curly fry, corn, bbq meat, lemonade) and then wandered around deliriously full attempting to shop. It was very fun. We got some necessities and got food for dinner (mac and cheese, corn on the cob, hot dog, prosciutto and green apples, milk for the mac, etc.) We came back and layed around and showered and now we´re just getting dinner together and I have to go buy anton more beer while he makes food.
I cut my toe pretty bad walking back from the store which was bad but otherwise today was super funny. Anton farted on me so bad that my eyes almost watered and he laughed until he was crying. It was very bad.
We´re going to try and be productive tomorrow so we can leave by Tuesday, this city kicks so much ass but it´s expensive and we like it too much. We need to get to Bogota.
We found a nude beach in Argentina that we´re going to hit up, bahahaha. I´m so excited. It´s going to be all old men and shit and it´s going to be fucking hilarious...unfortunately no photography is allowed.
I´m getting in trouble, must go purchase beer.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Medellin, Colombia
We left the cool little beach town yesterday, it was kinda a shame because it was such a cute little town and everyone was really nice and there were like NO tourists there but we just didn´t have time to lollygag...we saw a GORGEOUS sunset Thursday night though, it was wild. Thursday morning we had breakfast in bed (we´d bought a bunch of hardboiled eggs and salt the night before, it was VERY fancy) and Thursday day we just explored around and read our books and enjoyed our air conditioned room...for dinner we found a place where we both ate soup, rice, potatoes, and meat and had two bottles of water and one iced tea for under 10 dollars! Mad sweet! Then, as per usual, we took my chicken bones and found the skinniest street dog to feed them too. The one this time was so bad, poor little guy.
After the sunset we took Xanax and passed the F out. Our hotel room was so dark and I was delirious so when I got up to pee (in the sweet toilet-seatless toilet) I ran into the wall and had to feel my way around the room. It reminded me of Trevors story from his Grandma´s but the difference is that I found the hole to the bathroom and he gave up and peed under the bed.
Anyways.
Yesterday we got on the 7AM bus to Medellin. It was 70,000 pesos! That´s a little under $40, which is BY FAR the most expensive bus we´ve taken. Plus it was FREEZING, but luckily the bus to the town had been cold too so we were prepared and brought jackets and wore long pants and shoes and such. We´d bought cans of tuna and nutri grain bars (odd find! first time I´d seen those, I was so excited..though they are a little different here, firmer or something) and had those to snack on and I finished another book and we drove through this GORGEOUS area that was huge canyons that were completely green and there were big white clouds laying in the bottom of them...I took like 20 pictures...It was through a window so most of them are ehhh (and none of them do it justice) but there are a few that are actually pretty good.
At one point I fell asleep and the malaria pills were fucking with me again and I dreamed that I was on the bus but the bus was different and it was an open aired top and the seats could fold down and there was this big group of kids tour grouping and we went down a waterfall and then on the bus I could close my eyes and hallucinate whatever I wanted (kinda like the night I took too much ecstasy and thought my eyes were open and Andrews socked feet flew away as doves made out of biscuits) so I was kinda dreaming within a dream and it was all fucked up and way too realistic. Fuckin WILD.
Also at one of our stops I saw these two little dogs that were so wrapped up in eachother they were both half on top of the other one snoozing away. It was very cute. Like cats.
We got to Medellin around 7 (10 hour bus took 12 hours, naturally) and had to walk for frickin MILES and MILES with our bags up and down hilly streets and finally found a hostel. We share a bathroom with one other dude but it´s okay...It´s a dorm room with two sets of bunk beds but we pushed them together and so long as the hostel doesn´t fill up we can have it again tonight as a pseudo private room, since
we don´t really want to share. If it fills up though we might have to switch, which would be annoying. This is probably one of my favorite places we´ve stayed, it has a little Mini Dauschsan (however that´s spelled) running around and free internet and a fully equipped kitchen...hot shower...it´s nice. This morning we´re going to go to the store across the street and buy eggs and bacon and tomato and bread and make breakfast! First time cooking in a looonng time!
I think we´ll be here 2 more nights...seems like a cool city. Nightlife was pumpin last night when we went out, though we were more or less too tired to enjoy it much.
At one point this skinny dude in a suit and tie comes up and starts mumbling to us in Spanish and showing us a binder and we figure out he´s trying to get money for a CHURCH for street kids and we´re chilling eating a pizza and drinking beers and he´s like "Blah blah blah we need 100,000 pesos for landscaping...blah blah the Lord blah blah" or whatever and Anton is like "We don´t have much money, but do you want a beer?"
The guy stops and looks at us and shrugs and asks, "Can I have a piece of pizza too?"
Then he took said beer and said pizza and went across the street and inhaled it. It was so funny. We almost fell out of our chair, this suited up preacher man accepting beer off the street. I´d be tempted to say it was a con but I´m pretty sure it wasn´t.
There is a Pablo Escobar tour that we might do, other then that we don´t have many plans. There are lots of cute stores around here so I want to go shopping, even though I´m probably not allowed to buy anything, haha...maybe if I find a cute dress or something. Last night I had like 3 dreams where I was mad at Anton and they´re so damn realistic with the malaria shit that I woke up this morning and it took a few minutes to remind myself that he wasn´t in trouble. I´m cracked out, man.
Oh, I guess also in interesting news Colombia is considered one of the plastic surgery capitals of the WORLD, just behind Brazil. I believe it too, a lot of people here have that creepyish perfection that only comes from collagen injections and too much botox. I guess even lots of guys get butt implants here. If I was on a date with someone and they told me they had butt implants I would politely excuse myself to go to the bathroom and then climb out that fuckers window and run, run, run, and never look back. WHAT THE FUCK.
Time for breakfast.
After the sunset we took Xanax and passed the F out. Our hotel room was so dark and I was delirious so when I got up to pee (in the sweet toilet-seatless toilet) I ran into the wall and had to feel my way around the room. It reminded me of Trevors story from his Grandma´s but the difference is that I found the hole to the bathroom and he gave up and peed under the bed.
Anyways.
Yesterday we got on the 7AM bus to Medellin. It was 70,000 pesos! That´s a little under $40, which is BY FAR the most expensive bus we´ve taken. Plus it was FREEZING, but luckily the bus to the town had been cold too so we were prepared and brought jackets and wore long pants and shoes and such. We´d bought cans of tuna and nutri grain bars (odd find! first time I´d seen those, I was so excited..though they are a little different here, firmer or something) and had those to snack on and I finished another book and we drove through this GORGEOUS area that was huge canyons that were completely green and there were big white clouds laying in the bottom of them...I took like 20 pictures...It was through a window so most of them are ehhh (and none of them do it justice) but there are a few that are actually pretty good.
At one point I fell asleep and the malaria pills were fucking with me again and I dreamed that I was on the bus but the bus was different and it was an open aired top and the seats could fold down and there was this big group of kids tour grouping and we went down a waterfall and then on the bus I could close my eyes and hallucinate whatever I wanted (kinda like the night I took too much ecstasy and thought my eyes were open and Andrews socked feet flew away as doves made out of biscuits) so I was kinda dreaming within a dream and it was all fucked up and way too realistic. Fuckin WILD.
Also at one of our stops I saw these two little dogs that were so wrapped up in eachother they were both half on top of the other one snoozing away. It was very cute. Like cats.
We got to Medellin around 7 (10 hour bus took 12 hours, naturally) and had to walk for frickin MILES and MILES with our bags up and down hilly streets and finally found a hostel. We share a bathroom with one other dude but it´s okay...It´s a dorm room with two sets of bunk beds but we pushed them together and so long as the hostel doesn´t fill up we can have it again tonight as a pseudo private room, since
we don´t really want to share. If it fills up though we might have to switch, which would be annoying. This is probably one of my favorite places we´ve stayed, it has a little Mini Dauschsan (however that´s spelled) running around and free internet and a fully equipped kitchen...hot shower...it´s nice. This morning we´re going to go to the store across the street and buy eggs and bacon and tomato and bread and make breakfast! First time cooking in a looonng time!
I think we´ll be here 2 more nights...seems like a cool city. Nightlife was pumpin last night when we went out, though we were more or less too tired to enjoy it much.
At one point this skinny dude in a suit and tie comes up and starts mumbling to us in Spanish and showing us a binder and we figure out he´s trying to get money for a CHURCH for street kids and we´re chilling eating a pizza and drinking beers and he´s like "Blah blah blah we need 100,000 pesos for landscaping...blah blah the Lord blah blah" or whatever and Anton is like "We don´t have much money, but do you want a beer?"
The guy stops and looks at us and shrugs and asks, "Can I have a piece of pizza too?"
Then he took said beer and said pizza and went across the street and inhaled it. It was so funny. We almost fell out of our chair, this suited up preacher man accepting beer off the street. I´d be tempted to say it was a con but I´m pretty sure it wasn´t.
There is a Pablo Escobar tour that we might do, other then that we don´t have many plans. There are lots of cute stores around here so I want to go shopping, even though I´m probably not allowed to buy anything, haha...maybe if I find a cute dress or something. Last night I had like 3 dreams where I was mad at Anton and they´re so damn realistic with the malaria shit that I woke up this morning and it took a few minutes to remind myself that he wasn´t in trouble. I´m cracked out, man.
Oh, I guess also in interesting news Colombia is considered one of the plastic surgery capitals of the WORLD, just behind Brazil. I believe it too, a lot of people here have that creepyish perfection that only comes from collagen injections and too much botox. I guess even lots of guys get butt implants here. If I was on a date with someone and they told me they had butt implants I would politely excuse myself to go to the bathroom and then climb out that fuckers window and run, run, run, and never look back. WHAT THE FUCK.
Time for breakfast.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
I forgot a very important part of my hungover Monday morning in Cartagena, that Anton so lovingly reminded me of right now.
Hungover Alecia was in such full effect that the loudness of her vomiting caused the hostel maid to come to our door to make sure everything was alright. AHhhhhhhhhh hahahahahaha. I am god.
Last night we ended up going back to our hotel with a bottle of Agua Dientes ($3.50 for a fifth) but I was too tired and Anton was devouring his sci fi and so we didn´t really drink much of it. The alcohol is only 20%, but for $3.50 it´s hard to complain. It´s not the best for hangovers though, I think we´ve decided to spend a little more in the future. Even Anton feels it´s shitty alcohol inducing effects, which is quite the rarity...
Anyways I slept for almost 12 hours and felt much better. Today we have wandered around a bit, the town is cute and sleepy and beachy, more Caribbean life mon. So far we´ve seen 4 other tourists, 2 groups of 2. There are lots of bars and stuff though, we were talking to one of the food stand guys last night and he said that in December and January it is pretty packed with tourists here. We don´t really care either way, less people to get in our way dammit!
It´s pretty fucking hot here, even though it did rain all morning. Still excited to get to Medellin.
I had pretty wacky dreams last night, two characters from the book I just read (Bless Me Father, some mob coming of age book) (oh, and Killer Angels fucking RULED) were in it and one was a crazy crack head and the other a boxer and they were driving me around smoking crack and doing lines after we´d just escaped a robbery of a furniture store? Or something? Sweet malaria pills, I woke myself up again because I was talking out loud.
Hungover Alecia was in such full effect that the loudness of her vomiting caused the hostel maid to come to our door to make sure everything was alright. AHhhhhhhhhh hahahahahaha. I am god.
Last night we ended up going back to our hotel with a bottle of Agua Dientes ($3.50 for a fifth) but I was too tired and Anton was devouring his sci fi and so we didn´t really drink much of it. The alcohol is only 20%, but for $3.50 it´s hard to complain. It´s not the best for hangovers though, I think we´ve decided to spend a little more in the future. Even Anton feels it´s shitty alcohol inducing effects, which is quite the rarity...
Anyways I slept for almost 12 hours and felt much better. Today we have wandered around a bit, the town is cute and sleepy and beachy, more Caribbean life mon. So far we´ve seen 4 other tourists, 2 groups of 2. There are lots of bars and stuff though, we were talking to one of the food stand guys last night and he said that in December and January it is pretty packed with tourists here. We don´t really care either way, less people to get in our way dammit!
It´s pretty fucking hot here, even though it did rain all morning. Still excited to get to Medellin.
I had pretty wacky dreams last night, two characters from the book I just read (Bless Me Father, some mob coming of age book) (oh, and Killer Angels fucking RULED) were in it and one was a crazy crack head and the other a boxer and they were driving me around smoking crack and doing lines after we´d just escaped a robbery of a furniture store? Or something? Sweet malaria pills, I woke myself up again because I was talking out loud.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
this Tolu keyboard sucks my balls
Well we were planning on flying from Cartagena to Medellin but the 80 fare anton found
ended up being a special, as when we looked next it was 160. So we decided to break up the bus trip so we wouldn´t be on a bus at night (the road between Cartagena and Medellin is supposedly the most dangerous for buses, especially at night), and took a 3.5 hour bus ride today to a small town between Cartagena and Medellin called Tolu. It´s on the Caribbean beach and seems cool, we have been wandering around the center for the last couple hours eating street food and drinking cervezas. We got a hotel with AC here, thank god, but no TV still. Owell, we have lots of books. We booked it for tonight and tomorrow, then the next day we´ll take the 11 hour bus ride to Medellin.
We did some good city walking yesterday, and it was pretty fucking hot. Thank god for the snowcone vedors on the street everywhere, plus they put condensced milk on top which makes it super good. We went to (what i imagine is) the most expensive hotel in the city at $300 per night and had $10 bloody mary´s, which definitely weren´t the price, but the lobby inner garden thing had a fucking TOUCAN flying around in it. WTF!! I was so excited, I took pictures and i took a video because it was making a very amusing noise. It made my day.
We ate at the same restaurant again as the day before (sweet chicken soup) because it was like 4 dollars and everything else was mad tourist trappy and like 10 dollars a plate but that was fine because it was delicious. We wandered around more and eventually ended up at the hotel where we drank with a couple Australians named Dan and Karla and talked about drugs and travelling and they didn´t hate us and think we were offensive like most people so that was cool.
Before the bus today we got a repeat hot dog that was equally delicious and street food ceviche with crackers. We both agree that Colombia has had the best street food so far. The steak on a stick we got here was served with potatoes and was all juicy and it was pretty absurd. We´ve also been digging into a lot of hardboiled eggs, which are popular here as well as in Panama.
Nothing beats meat on a stick though, that´s for sure.
Anton just had to go back to the pharmacy to return the Morphine we bought, which ended up being medicine for type two diabetes. A little girl followed him all the way back trying to sell him lottery tickets, and when he finally refused for final she pulled his hair and left. It´s bizarre how much kids fucking love him. Wherever we go they just STARE. It´s so cute.
Anyways, tiempo para salir.
ended up being a special, as when we looked next it was 160. So we decided to break up the bus trip so we wouldn´t be on a bus at night (the road between Cartagena and Medellin is supposedly the most dangerous for buses, especially at night), and took a 3.5 hour bus ride today to a small town between Cartagena and Medellin called Tolu. It´s on the Caribbean beach and seems cool, we have been wandering around the center for the last couple hours eating street food and drinking cervezas. We got a hotel with AC here, thank god, but no TV still. Owell, we have lots of books. We booked it for tonight and tomorrow, then the next day we´ll take the 11 hour bus ride to Medellin.
We did some good city walking yesterday, and it was pretty fucking hot. Thank god for the snowcone vedors on the street everywhere, plus they put condensced milk on top which makes it super good. We went to (what i imagine is) the most expensive hotel in the city at $300 per night and had $10 bloody mary´s, which definitely weren´t the price, but the lobby inner garden thing had a fucking TOUCAN flying around in it. WTF!! I was so excited, I took pictures and i took a video because it was making a very amusing noise. It made my day.
We ate at the same restaurant again as the day before (sweet chicken soup) because it was like 4 dollars and everything else was mad tourist trappy and like 10 dollars a plate but that was fine because it was delicious. We wandered around more and eventually ended up at the hotel where we drank with a couple Australians named Dan and Karla and talked about drugs and travelling and they didn´t hate us and think we were offensive like most people so that was cool.
Before the bus today we got a repeat hot dog that was equally delicious and street food ceviche with crackers. We both agree that Colombia has had the best street food so far. The steak on a stick we got here was served with potatoes and was all juicy and it was pretty absurd. We´ve also been digging into a lot of hardboiled eggs, which are popular here as well as in Panama.
Nothing beats meat on a stick though, that´s for sure.
Anton just had to go back to the pharmacy to return the Morphine we bought, which ended up being medicine for type two diabetes. A little girl followed him all the way back trying to sell him lottery tickets, and when he finally refused for final she pulled his hair and left. It´s bizarre how much kids fucking love him. Wherever we go they just STARE. It´s so cute.
Anyways, tiempo para salir.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Cartagena kicks my ass.
Saturday night we ended up at a rooftop bar (on like the third story) that was right next to the water playing pounding electronic music and had a wild light show, so we took our pills from home (which ended up being pretty weak, didn´t last long at all) and took it easssy. Afterwards we wandered the street looking for a sketchy fellow, which didn´t take long. We had him fetch us some goods to ski with and THE WEIRDEST SHIT HAPPENED. It happended to the first stuff too..
It dissolved! We poured it out and within 10 minutes it was turning into a liquid! The second stuff we did fast enough because we´d learned better but the first stuff we just left there and after it turned liquid within an hour or two it was like a clear glue...so bizarre. I don´t know what the fuck they put in it here...it´s been decent stuff...but dissolving/melting? wtf?
We were up till like 8 AM and finally managed to sleep for awhile...wandered around a bit during the afternoon and then got way way (well i did anyways) wasted sitting around one of the picnic tables that is in the central outdoor hall thing of the hotel we´re at. We chatted it up with a few of these other dudes that were staying there...one 23 year old australian, a 38 year old from great britain but had lived in india for a lot of his life, and a 55 year old dude from Indiana. The 23 year old girl from Utah and the 28 year old guy from the Ukraine and we were an odd bunch. It was good times though.
This morning was NOT good times, NOT at all. Hungover Alecia was in full effect from the two days of boozing / drugging / not eating or drinking water. The lack of air conditioning made it all the more lovely, but a couple cold showers helped. I finally managed to go to sleep for a few hours and felt a lot better around 3 when I woke up. We then went hunting for the meat on a stick guy (people sell thinly sliced steak and onions and green peppers on long long toothpicks at little stands around) but failed because they´re only at night and Anton ate a really good hot dog that had potato flakes and cheese and stuff (we´ve had a hot dog in every country, hahaha) and then found a restaurant that was pretty busy and ate there, and it was fucking good. I had a huge Chicken/potato/rice soup and Anton had fried liver...we were very happy. Those two big plates and 4 bottles of water for about 12 dollars. Not bad not bad. Although I guess I should be straight and admit that by bottles of water I really mean a glass with a bag of water in it with a hole cut in the bag and a straw sticking through. We really are a fancy pair.
We found a stray dog to feed my chicken bones to, which was happy. So far every town has had stray dogs except maybe San Jose...though I think Guatemala and Honduras probably had the most. By Lake Aitlan in Guatemala there were just PACKS of them. I bought some taco meat for a dog and like 10 more were there instantly. That was just absurd. Here you actually have to wander around and look for one, whereas in Guatemala they were as popular as pregnant teens and cripples.
The pregnant teen amount went down slightly in Panama and Costa Rica (very slightly), and is down again in Colombia, but I expect the ratio to increase as we hit bigger less developed cities. One can hope. The cripple amount was also highest in Guatemala and Honduras...farther south we saw dudes with their hands cut off or missing legs but in Guatemala and Honduras you saw dudes with like no legs at all and one eye and one arm or something terrible and they just kinda scooted along in the dirt and yeah...SWEET LIFE.
I think this is the first country that we haven´t seen a McDonalds in. Here are American Fast Food places ranked by popularity:
1. McDonalds is by far the most popular. It is in most cities, and there´s usually more than one.
2. Subway is not hard to find either, but it´s mainly in big cities and capitals, whereas you can find McDonalds in slightly smaller places (though all of the islands we´ve been to have had no American fast food). There were tons of Subways in Panama City, for whatever reason.
3. Burger King is third, and is in most capitals and huge cities, but there will be like 2 burger kings to 8 McDonalds, and you don´t see it at all in any non capital cities, basically.
4. KFC. This is a weird one because every restaurant in every city in all of Central (and it is beginning to appear) SOUTH America as well sells fried chicken. A lot of the time that´s ALL they sell. It´s everywhere. It´s absurd. So I don´t know how KFC manages to have a market considering you can´t walk five feet without finding 8 different chicken joints, but maybe the mashed potatoes really are that good. Note: The KFC´s here do not have KFC bowls, which Anton was going to make me try. Owell.
5. Dunkin Donuts. This has been around with Burger King alot, but sometimes it is not there and sometimes it stands alone. Anton ate Dunkin Donuts in the bus terminal in Panama City. I don´t really like donuts.
6. Wendy´s has been found a few times...I´ve probably seen like 6 Wendy´s total. We ate at one in La Ceiba, Honduras which was weird because that town was pretty barren of, well, anything.
7. Taco Bell. Only one Taco Bell siting, and I think that´s all we will find. It was in San Jose, Costa Rica which had TONS of American fast food and stuff.
I´m sure that´s all very interesting.
Once we leave equator we are going to be below the equator (woo never been there!) which I´m excited about. The farther below we get the cooler it will be...hopefully Peru will be nice since it´s slightly south and at a higher elevation. I want to have brought long pants for a reason...so far they´ve only been rocked in Guatemala and San Jose. Annoying. Though Argentina at least will be cold for sure, and maybe Northern Chile too. I don´t know about Equator though...I don´t really know squat about that place.
Tomorrow or the next day we´re going to fly to Medellin. We were going to take a bus but it´s like 16 hours and 40-50 dollars and the flight is one hour and 80 dollars. Maybe in another country we´d still suck it up but you´re not really advised to take buses at night here because they get stopped and robbed, which doesn´t found fun. But here we are in the mindset of just waiting to get robbed, so it won´t be too bad if it happens. When I carry my camera I always have my sim card in my small inner pocket so even if they take my camera I still have the pictures, so it wouldn´t really be too bad.
Oh man Anton just told me it´s 59 degrees in Bogota. THANK SCIENCE.
After Medellin is when we´re going to Bogota, then Cali (which is by the border) and maybe one other smallish place in Colombia. There´s supposed to be a cool zoo in Cali. Mad excitement.
Enough rambling.
It dissolved! We poured it out and within 10 minutes it was turning into a liquid! The second stuff we did fast enough because we´d learned better but the first stuff we just left there and after it turned liquid within an hour or two it was like a clear glue...so bizarre. I don´t know what the fuck they put in it here...it´s been decent stuff...but dissolving/melting? wtf?
We were up till like 8 AM and finally managed to sleep for awhile...wandered around a bit during the afternoon and then got way way (well i did anyways) wasted sitting around one of the picnic tables that is in the central outdoor hall thing of the hotel we´re at. We chatted it up with a few of these other dudes that were staying there...one 23 year old australian, a 38 year old from great britain but had lived in india for a lot of his life, and a 55 year old dude from Indiana. The 23 year old girl from Utah and the 28 year old guy from the Ukraine and we were an odd bunch. It was good times though.
This morning was NOT good times, NOT at all. Hungover Alecia was in full effect from the two days of boozing / drugging / not eating or drinking water. The lack of air conditioning made it all the more lovely, but a couple cold showers helped. I finally managed to go to sleep for a few hours and felt a lot better around 3 when I woke up. We then went hunting for the meat on a stick guy (people sell thinly sliced steak and onions and green peppers on long long toothpicks at little stands around) but failed because they´re only at night and Anton ate a really good hot dog that had potato flakes and cheese and stuff (we´ve had a hot dog in every country, hahaha) and then found a restaurant that was pretty busy and ate there, and it was fucking good. I had a huge Chicken/potato/rice soup and Anton had fried liver...we were very happy. Those two big plates and 4 bottles of water for about 12 dollars. Not bad not bad. Although I guess I should be straight and admit that by bottles of water I really mean a glass with a bag of water in it with a hole cut in the bag and a straw sticking through. We really are a fancy pair.
We found a stray dog to feed my chicken bones to, which was happy. So far every town has had stray dogs except maybe San Jose...though I think Guatemala and Honduras probably had the most. By Lake Aitlan in Guatemala there were just PACKS of them. I bought some taco meat for a dog and like 10 more were there instantly. That was just absurd. Here you actually have to wander around and look for one, whereas in Guatemala they were as popular as pregnant teens and cripples.
The pregnant teen amount went down slightly in Panama and Costa Rica (very slightly), and is down again in Colombia, but I expect the ratio to increase as we hit bigger less developed cities. One can hope. The cripple amount was also highest in Guatemala and Honduras...farther south we saw dudes with their hands cut off or missing legs but in Guatemala and Honduras you saw dudes with like no legs at all and one eye and one arm or something terrible and they just kinda scooted along in the dirt and yeah...SWEET LIFE.
I think this is the first country that we haven´t seen a McDonalds in. Here are American Fast Food places ranked by popularity:
1. McDonalds is by far the most popular. It is in most cities, and there´s usually more than one.
2. Subway is not hard to find either, but it´s mainly in big cities and capitals, whereas you can find McDonalds in slightly smaller places (though all of the islands we´ve been to have had no American fast food). There were tons of Subways in Panama City, for whatever reason.
3. Burger King is third, and is in most capitals and huge cities, but there will be like 2 burger kings to 8 McDonalds, and you don´t see it at all in any non capital cities, basically.
4. KFC. This is a weird one because every restaurant in every city in all of Central (and it is beginning to appear) SOUTH America as well sells fried chicken. A lot of the time that´s ALL they sell. It´s everywhere. It´s absurd. So I don´t know how KFC manages to have a market considering you can´t walk five feet without finding 8 different chicken joints, but maybe the mashed potatoes really are that good. Note: The KFC´s here do not have KFC bowls, which Anton was going to make me try. Owell.
5. Dunkin Donuts. This has been around with Burger King alot, but sometimes it is not there and sometimes it stands alone. Anton ate Dunkin Donuts in the bus terminal in Panama City. I don´t really like donuts.
6. Wendy´s has been found a few times...I´ve probably seen like 6 Wendy´s total. We ate at one in La Ceiba, Honduras which was weird because that town was pretty barren of, well, anything.
7. Taco Bell. Only one Taco Bell siting, and I think that´s all we will find. It was in San Jose, Costa Rica which had TONS of American fast food and stuff.
I´m sure that´s all very interesting.
Once we leave equator we are going to be below the equator (woo never been there!) which I´m excited about. The farther below we get the cooler it will be...hopefully Peru will be nice since it´s slightly south and at a higher elevation. I want to have brought long pants for a reason...so far they´ve only been rocked in Guatemala and San Jose. Annoying. Though Argentina at least will be cold for sure, and maybe Northern Chile too. I don´t know about Equator though...I don´t really know squat about that place.
Tomorrow or the next day we´re going to fly to Medellin. We were going to take a bus but it´s like 16 hours and 40-50 dollars and the flight is one hour and 80 dollars. Maybe in another country we´d still suck it up but you´re not really advised to take buses at night here because they get stopped and robbed, which doesn´t found fun. But here we are in the mindset of just waiting to get robbed, so it won´t be too bad if it happens. When I carry my camera I always have my sim card in my small inner pocket so even if they take my camera I still have the pictures, so it wouldn´t really be too bad.
Oh man Anton just told me it´s 59 degrees in Bogota. THANK SCIENCE.
After Medellin is when we´re going to Bogota, then Cali (which is by the border) and maybe one other smallish place in Colombia. There´s supposed to be a cool zoo in Cali. Mad excitement.
Enough rambling.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Cartegena, Colombia
Wooooooooooo!!
We finally made it to Colombia! And without incident, no bribe or onward ticket or anything necessary. Smooth sailing.
The flight was fine, they gave us a little snack box that had cheese and ham and fruit and stuff, it was pretty real.
Cartegena is hot, but not as humid as other places so it´s far more tolerable.
Interesting sites so far:
-Homeless dudes sharing a bottle of liquor and using mini plastic shotglasses to shoot with while laying / stumbling in the street.
-Booths that sell the use of a cell phone, 200 pesos (it´s between 1650 and 2000 pesos per dollar). First time we´ve seen that.
-Purchasing a gram of cocaine and actually have it look like a gram, not the 4-6 line baggies that were claimed as a gram elsewhere.
We are in the older area of Cartagena. It´s pretty cool, lots of bright colored buildings and narrow streets and colonial esqu architecture and such. Flying in was really cool because there is a little tail that sticks out with all these high rise buildings on it...that´s the newer part of the city. Here a couple pictures I found:
You can see the little tail in the bottom one. Our hotel is in the area right before the tail gets really skinny. It´s an alright place, the bathroom is called a water closet and it actually is one. It´s one small rectangle with a shower at the far end, the toilet right next to it, and the sink next to that. No division, just one little box. Pretty amusing.
The beaches here are pretty too, all white sand and such. Not as pretty as some of the other ones we´ve seen, but good.
I guess the nightlife here is crazy and late night. We´re probably going to get wasted tonight since we haven´t been wasted since last friday. And we have to try out our first taste of Colombian cocaine, ahhhhhhhhhhhh!
We finally made it to Colombia! And without incident, no bribe or onward ticket or anything necessary. Smooth sailing.
The flight was fine, they gave us a little snack box that had cheese and ham and fruit and stuff, it was pretty real.
Cartegena is hot, but not as humid as other places so it´s far more tolerable.
Interesting sites so far:
-Homeless dudes sharing a bottle of liquor and using mini plastic shotglasses to shoot with while laying / stumbling in the street.
-Booths that sell the use of a cell phone, 200 pesos (it´s between 1650 and 2000 pesos per dollar). First time we´ve seen that.
-Purchasing a gram of cocaine and actually have it look like a gram, not the 4-6 line baggies that were claimed as a gram elsewhere.
We are in the older area of Cartagena. It´s pretty cool, lots of bright colored buildings and narrow streets and colonial esqu architecture and such. Flying in was really cool because there is a little tail that sticks out with all these high rise buildings on it...that´s the newer part of the city. Here a couple pictures I found:
You can see the little tail in the bottom one. Our hotel is in the area right before the tail gets really skinny. It´s an alright place, the bathroom is called a water closet and it actually is one. It´s one small rectangle with a shower at the far end, the toilet right next to it, and the sink next to that. No division, just one little box. Pretty amusing.
The beaches here are pretty too, all white sand and such. Not as pretty as some of the other ones we´ve seen, but good.
I guess the nightlife here is crazy and late night. We´re probably going to get wasted tonight since we haven´t been wasted since last friday. And we have to try out our first taste of Colombian cocaine, ahhhhhhhhhhhh!
Friday, August 22, 2008
Last night in Panama City...finalmente
I forgot to say that yesterday when we went to mail the tube package the post office was closed.
We have an ongoing joke that whenever something is closed it´s like "Only restaurant in town is closed wednesday, errybody know dat!" because that´s pretty much how people respond when we´re confused about something being closed. And things are always, inexplicably closed, generally when we need them the most.
As in when we went to the Starfish beach in Bocas Del Toro (prettiest beach i´ve ever seen, btw) and the only restaurant was closed on tuesdays. Annnddd it was a tuesday, of course.
ANYWAYS. Why was the post office closed on a Thursday?
Because a Panama dude won the gold medal for long jump. Really. I guess Panama hadn´t won a gold medal in 60 years, so I´ve got to give them props, but close down the whole government because of it (banks were also closed)? I guess any excuse is a good excuse for not working here...damn mexicans...just kidding.
Today we were going to try and go to this cheap zoo that this richard gere-esq american dude told us at a bar last night but when we went to mail the package and catch a bus to said zoo it was fucking POURING again. Even with an umbrella we were taking a pounding from the sideways rain. omg. Sooo needless to say we went back to the hotel and amused ourselves and waited for it to stop raining.
We were afraid it would start raining again so we decided to go to the bus terminal because it had a dunkin donuts and a dairy queen and then we were going to catch another bus to the movie theatre we saw batman in but when we got to the terminal we realized there was a massive mall and movie theatre next door to the terminal! So we went and saw Wanted (new angelina jolie film) and...it was pretty badass. Totally unbelievable but SUPER badass. Very entertaining.
Afterwards we ate sushi and nachos (sweet combo) in the mall food court and headed back. Now we are doing this and figuring out some flight stuff and then going to take a sleeping pill since we have to wake up at god-forsaken o`clock in the morning. By that I mean like 4 or so.
I´m now reading Killer Angels which is about the Civil War. I tried to read this book called `The Scorpio Illusion` that Anton read (and hated) that´s by the same guy that wrote The Bourne Identity and I literally couldn´t get through it. I was making any excuse possible not to read, including and not limited to watching reruns of Made, True Life (love mtv), old 80´s videos on VH1, hours of CNN, reruns of Seinfeld...movies that i didn´t understand because I started watching halfway through...part of a hallmark movie....oh man. Yëah. So for one of the first times in my life, I gave up. I actually intentionally stopped. I´ve certainly failed to finish books before, but it´s out of lazyness and genuine intent to oneday finish them, not pure pure hatred.
It was that bad. Robert Ludlumm should rot in hell. I guess after Matt Damon makes one of your books into a famous movie you can, as Anton says, "Shit on a page and make it a bestseller".
Here is one choice review on Amazon, "somebody already beat me to it", says Anton.
"I've never thought Ludlum was a great writer (I've never bought one of his books new, at full price, either) but I have to agree with Ronin - this one is simply a joke. It's hard to believe this was actually written by Ludlum. Nothing is believable about the plot or the action. No, intelligence and military personnel are far from perfect and very human, but if they were as poorly trained, as witless and unprofessional as they and the allegedly brilliant and sophisticated terrorists in this book are - the world would have been blown to hell and back a couple of hundred times since WWII. The dialogue is absurd, and Ludlum "padded" the book by at least 100 pages with pointless "explanatory" parentheticals and asides that detract from the dialogue and narrative flow.
I've always treated Ludlum books as light, fluffy beach or airplane reading and they've always served that end well; this one is almost like reading the text on the side of a toothpaste tube. I can only assume Ludlum either needed money badly or found himself with a contract obligation to fulfill and turned out this piece of bilge in as short of time as possible with as little attention paid to it as possible. "
Now I´m onto Killer Angels. Thank god.
We also picked up a few other books that look good. One is by the guy that wrote The Beach, another one is a comedy, and some other weird sci fi action book that Anton wanted. Hopefully it won´t be as barf inducing as the Scorpio Illusion.
Anyways, I can´t wait to get to Colombia.
We have an ongoing joke that whenever something is closed it´s like "Only restaurant in town is closed wednesday, errybody know dat!" because that´s pretty much how people respond when we´re confused about something being closed. And things are always, inexplicably closed, generally when we need them the most.
As in when we went to the Starfish beach in Bocas Del Toro (prettiest beach i´ve ever seen, btw) and the only restaurant was closed on tuesdays. Annnddd it was a tuesday, of course.
ANYWAYS. Why was the post office closed on a Thursday?
Because a Panama dude won the gold medal for long jump. Really. I guess Panama hadn´t won a gold medal in 60 years, so I´ve got to give them props, but close down the whole government because of it (banks were also closed)? I guess any excuse is a good excuse for not working here...damn mexicans...just kidding.
Today we were going to try and go to this cheap zoo that this richard gere-esq american dude told us at a bar last night but when we went to mail the package and catch a bus to said zoo it was fucking POURING again. Even with an umbrella we were taking a pounding from the sideways rain. omg. Sooo needless to say we went back to the hotel and amused ourselves and waited for it to stop raining.
We were afraid it would start raining again so we decided to go to the bus terminal because it had a dunkin donuts and a dairy queen and then we were going to catch another bus to the movie theatre we saw batman in but when we got to the terminal we realized there was a massive mall and movie theatre next door to the terminal! So we went and saw Wanted (new angelina jolie film) and...it was pretty badass. Totally unbelievable but SUPER badass. Very entertaining.
Afterwards we ate sushi and nachos (sweet combo) in the mall food court and headed back. Now we are doing this and figuring out some flight stuff and then going to take a sleeping pill since we have to wake up at god-forsaken o`clock in the morning. By that I mean like 4 or so.
I´m now reading Killer Angels which is about the Civil War. I tried to read this book called `The Scorpio Illusion` that Anton read (and hated) that´s by the same guy that wrote The Bourne Identity and I literally couldn´t get through it. I was making any excuse possible not to read, including and not limited to watching reruns of Made, True Life (love mtv), old 80´s videos on VH1, hours of CNN, reruns of Seinfeld...movies that i didn´t understand because I started watching halfway through...part of a hallmark movie....oh man. Yëah. So for one of the first times in my life, I gave up. I actually intentionally stopped. I´ve certainly failed to finish books before, but it´s out of lazyness and genuine intent to oneday finish them, not pure pure hatred.
It was that bad. Robert Ludlumm should rot in hell. I guess after Matt Damon makes one of your books into a famous movie you can, as Anton says, "Shit on a page and make it a bestseller".
Here is one choice review on Amazon, "somebody already beat me to it", says Anton.
"I've never thought Ludlum was a great writer (I've never bought one of his books new, at full price, either) but I have to agree with Ronin - this one is simply a joke. It's hard to believe this was actually written by Ludlum. Nothing is believable about the plot or the action. No, intelligence and military personnel are far from perfect and very human, but if they were as poorly trained, as witless and unprofessional as they and the allegedly brilliant and sophisticated terrorists in this book are - the world would have been blown to hell and back a couple of hundred times since WWII. The dialogue is absurd, and Ludlum "padded" the book by at least 100 pages with pointless "explanatory" parentheticals and asides that detract from the dialogue and narrative flow.
I've always treated Ludlum books as light, fluffy beach or airplane reading and they've always served that end well; this one is almost like reading the text on the side of a toothpaste tube. I can only assume Ludlum either needed money badly or found himself with a contract obligation to fulfill and turned out this piece of bilge in as short of time as possible with as little attention paid to it as possible. "
Now I´m onto Killer Angels. Thank god.
We also picked up a few other books that look good. One is by the guy that wrote The Beach, another one is a comedy, and some other weird sci fi action book that Anton wanted. Hopefully it won´t be as barf inducing as the Scorpio Illusion.
Anyways, I can´t wait to get to Colombia.
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