about

categories

• south america (14)
• colombia (10)
• peru (4)
• cuba (0)
• trip (8)
• trip preparation (5)
• volunteering (7)

archives

Choose a Month      June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007

photos

links

B&M wedding slideshow

subscribe

• Atom
• RSS 2.0

Sacred Valley

After Suaita we returned to Bogota for a couple of days, and then took off for our travels in Peru.
The flight to Lima was OK but I got a bit sick towards the end. I’d already been a bit wobbly in Bogota, so maybe I had a bug that finally surfaced… Thankgod for pukebags in the plane. Afterwards I felt much much better.

We started for a couple of days in Lima, to catch up with our Peruvian “Tokyo-friend” Gina. She left Japan about 2 years ago and needless to say it was fantastic to see her again.

Must say that Lima itself isn’t too impressive though. It’s dusty, grey, and full of traffic and car fumes. Even worse than in Colombia. Honking taxis driving me crazy! The weather didn’t particularly help either I guess, because it was cold and overcast. The city has potential, as there’s some areas with beautiful colonial architecture. But it’s all covered with non-artistic graffity, and people just dump garbage everywhere. Not to forget the fact that most men seem to think that just anywhere is a public toilet. Eeeeeeuw (sorry men, us women are really not to blame here). Such a shame.

Anyway, Cusco was next, again we flew there. One step closer to the almighty Machu Picchu. Cold at night but warm during the day, Cusco is situated at 3400m above sea level, in the Sacred Valley of the Incas (Urubamba Valley). It’s nice and green and mountainous. The people there speak Quechua and Spanish. The city is small and friendly, showing an interesting mix of colonial and Inca streets and buildings. Plenty of tourists to be found here, and throughout our stay in Peru we got bombarded with all kinds of handicrafts, paintings and music. No shortage of ‘omiyage’ here. Just limited space in our bags for this neverending flood of souvenirs, heh.

The first day we took it easy to acclamitize to the altitude. After arriving at the airport we negotiated with a taxi driver to take us to town for 10 soles, and show us some hostels. We found that this is the best way to get orientated. As it turned out, the taxi driver also was a member of the police force, and ownes a travel agency. How practical. Once checked in into the hotel, we did something that I usually try to avoid: we signed up for a couple of organised day tours. You know, with one of those tourist buses where the guide makes you hop from one place to the other. hahaha.
At night we visited the local theatre for a performance of the local folklore, music and dance. Nice to hear and see, lovely colourful customes. It would have been better if the musicians didn’t look so bored. The music is a bit repetitive, maybe that’s why. ...Salsa is more fun.

Next day we had the tour of the city, visiting a museum in town; Sacsayhuaman, temple of the sun; and Tambo Machay, the sacred bathing place for the rulers. Funny that it was on this second day that we felt out of breath by doing nothing. It hit us with delay. Other than wishing we had a bottle of oxigen at our disposal we didn’t suffer from headaches or fainting, so it wasn’t too bad.

The day after was for a tour of the Sacred Valley. We hopped from Cusco to the handicraft market in Pisac (there’s impressive ruins as well but the tour didn’t take us there), to the ruins in Ollantaytambo to lunch in Urubamba, to another market in Chinchero, back to Cusco. Every place has some inca history to offer. Incredible to see and hear about the ways of the Incas. They were the creme de la creme of architects, astrologists, and engineers.
The Spaniards should have stuck around and learn from them, instead of bargin in and stealing and destroying the empire!

The Incas also developed incredible techniques for textile. Originally all made from llama, alpaca or wool. Spinned, died and woven by hand. Died with 100% natural dye, made of insects and plants. These days sometimes mixed with synthetics, and by help of machines.
Especially in Cusco and Pisac you can find the best mantas. Really nice to see that the women still use the manta’s to carry anything on their back, from kids to food, to other goods. It seems such a simple solution: pop the baby on your back an go on about whatever it is that you’re doing. Those kids seem always content and comfy and warm, with mum at hands-reach. Have seen few kids cry.

There’s more to write about the inca empire but will leave that to the next entry (Machu Picchu!).
Taking the day tours turned out OK. It was a good solution to see a lot in few days and get an idea of what’s out there. The tour offered an overview but there’s much more time to spend to really enjoy and appreciate these places to the fullest. The Cusco Visitor Ticket we got, easily covers the entrance fee to all of them. If there’s ever a next time, we’ll plan to have an additional week to spend. Then we’ll hire a car and make our own tour back to most of the towns and ruines we visited.

Childhood Memories

Did I ever mention that it´s pretty neat to have family and friends living all over the world?! The great thing about it is that you get to go to places where otherwise you wouldn´t. Especially in Colombia.

The past weekend we drove 3 hours from Bucaramanga to Suaita, to the farm where Manuel´s grandparents used to live. One of his uncles now lives there. Several years ago it wouldn’t have been safe for us to travel there (chance of kidnapping by FARC or paramilitary groups...), but thanks to president Uribe things have gotten better in this area, and these days it´s safe to go. And so the family took us there.

Absolutely gorgeous there. Super green, very countryside. I’ll let Manuel continue from here...:

The village of Suaita is located some 14 Km from the main road that leads to Bogota. To my surprise this road is now paved and took us only a fraction of the time it used to take to reach the village. Itwas also nice to see that the church ws finally finished after several years of ongoing restorations. All in all the village looks much better now than the last time I visited, 19 years ago.
From suaita is a 15 minute drive to the farm on a dirt road. Not much change here.

Arriving at the farm was an almost surreal experience. Everything look a bit different but the small details I remember from my childhood were still there, such as the general layoutof the house, the patios where my Grandfather used to dry the coffee, the smell of the vegetation and the taste of the home-brewed “guarapo” (Local drink made of corn and honey which depending on how long is fermented can kick your ass after a couple of mouthfulls).

Although the kitchen now has a gas stove as well, they prefer to cook the old way, using wood, on a clay-made stove which believe it or not makes the food taste much better! After a late lunch we went for a tour of the farmland and showed B coffee, casava, plantains, mangoes, lemon and pineapple plantations.
As all things Colombian, no family reunion is complete without music and dancing. We salsa and reggaetoned until the wee hours of the evening.

I would have loved for us to stayed longer but time was against us. Nevertheless, it was great to have part of my family reunited in the farm like old times.

Bucaramanga

We are now guests at tia Marina (aunt of Manuel) who is cooking caldo (soup) for us as we speak. We´ve already been fed frigoles and yesterday, pronto after arriving bright and early, tamales and arepas. All home-made. Needless to say that my man is in heaven. I’m afraid my cooking skills can’t beat this. heh.. Thankfully we have 1 Colombian restaurant in Tokyo!

Tia Marina has worked very hard to now own an apartment in a secured compound. There is a tennis court, outdoor swimming pool, gym, sauna, and basketbal field. With all these luxuries within reach it´s like we´re staying in a fancy resort. Very nice to lounge in and along the pool when we got here after the long bus ride from Cartagena. 12 hours. Though it was tiring and a cold ride because of a blasting airco, we have no complaints about the bus. Super soft seats that reclined almost flat, with lots of leg space. Defenitely more comfortable than an economy seat in the plane. They also showed videos. Pirated from Russia (hilarious!) and they stopped functioning halfway, but that didn’t matter.

Bucaramanga is very green, like Medellin. This afternoon we went to see the ‘Grand Canyon’ of this area, called ‘El Cañon de Chicamocha’. Gorgeous. We saw some coffee plantations on the way, too!

beach!

Oh how I´ve missed the lovely feeling of super fine sand between my toes while walking along the beach shore. We got a chance to do so on the morning of our last day in Cartagena. And the Carribean Ocean water that washed the sand away was warm! We walked from the hotel to the beach area, a good 45 minutes in the hot sun—the first day it didn´t rain, hurray.

What they say is true: a quiet and private walk here doesn´t exist. On the way there were persistent sales people trying to get us on a boat to the little Islands (Islas del Rosario—didn´t have time so will have to come back one day in the future), and once on the beach we got appraoched every 10 meters by a local trying to sell us a spot with shaded beach chairs; fruit; sunglasses; drinks; Tshirts; or jewelry. Or (very original) perhaps we would be interested in some special oisters for Manuels “machetti” for some extra potence for later in the day. How about that!

Anyway, we were mentally prepared and with many ´no gracias´ were able to have our walk. The only thing that we smoothly were seduced into while sunbathing, was the foot massage with aloe vera that got extended into a hand-, -and back massage.    One has to indulge at times.

Cartagena de Indias

We arrived in Cartagena 2 days ago, at the north-west coast of Colombia. Cartagena is one of the top tourist destinations of this country, and a world heritage site. We’re staying in Hotel Casa del Curato in San Diego (some pictures on their website), a residential area full of colourful colonial buildings, 400-year old churches, and long narrow cobbled streets. It’s gorgeous here, very romantic, and thus a pretty good honeymoon destination.
And there is a restaurant further down the street that specializes in vegetarian food ("TorreLuna"). We tried it out yesterday, with great results. Such a welcome change!

The only down side is that (as in every touristic area) the prices are high; every passing taxi honks at us looking for a fare, and it seems like everybody tries to sell us something. We haven’t been to the beach yet but apparently that’s even worse there. No quiet walks… Oh well.

Today and tomorrow we’ll continue exploring, and then we’ll take an overnight bus to Bucaramanga. We’re hoping the weather will be a bit better there. It’s nice and warm here (28 °C), but with more rain than supposed to be.

photos

Hurray, finally we´ve got some photos online! Here you can view them: Colombia photos. Enjoy!

Once our dear friend MJ --the star behind the techie bits if this blog-- has recovered from giving birth to a baby boy (congrats MJ!!) you´ll be able to access the photos via the link of the blog menu on the right as well.

PS: due to privacy matters we cannot place photos of the kids during our volunteer work on the World Wide Web, but we´ll be happy to show these when you visit us at home.

Onto Bogota

Today is our last day in Medellin… tonight we fly onto Bogota where we will stay with Sofia and Alejo, in the house where Manuel used to live as a kid.
We’ve wrapped up the volunteer work, as you’ve probably read in the other postings this has been an amazing experience, and time has just flown by.
I passed my final Spanish test with a 4.6 (out of 5.. not bad eh!) and am now in the phase that my brain is starting to tune to Spanish before Japanese. When the kids ask me how to say something in Japanese I have a black out. haha.

Last weekend was a long weekend with holidays on Thursday and Monday. We joined Andres and Adriana and some of her family to the finca of a friend, in Guarne. Guarne is a small town about a 45-minute drive from Medellin. We had a relaxing stay, and the house and landscape were incredibly beautiful. Photos to follow…
Ah, and I finally got my chance to ride a horse for the very first time! I was a natural talent for the first 10 meters until the horse decided to take off and I almost got launched off his back. Thankfully I managed to stay seated though. Next time I’ll opt for a slow tred-only lesson first. 

Also last week Manuel had his eyes lasered, to fix his myopia (nearsightedness). Not LASIK but a slightly different technique, because his corneas are on the thin end. All went well and Manuel’s eyes are healing as should, and as hoped for. After all: eye laser operation was invented and developed in this country.

Volunteering - Last day at Saciar, and How it Begun

About nine years ago a man died. During his funeral, many people unknown to the grieving family of the deceased began arriving to offer their condolences. When asked how they knew the deceased, they all told similar stories of how this man had helped them overcome adversity by providing their families with food, clothing or helping pay for the education of their children.

The man at the center of this story was the father of Mrs. Silvia Llano Mesa, the current Manager of Fundacion Saciar, a foodbank in Medellin, Colombia.

Mrs. Llano Mesa’s family had no idea that their father had been helping all of these people until the day of his funeral. They decided to continue their father’s legacy by establishing the foundation. Today, Saciar provides 650 organizations in and around Medellin with food, clothes and medicines for distribution among the neediest people. They also established 12 soup kitchens where 2000 kids daily receive a nutritious breakfast and lunch.

Currently Saciar has 25 fulltime employees and 120 volunteers to assist run this wonderful organization with the task of helping the most vulnerable people.

We were fortunate to be able to volunteer here for the past 5 weeks, and get to know the Saciar “family” a little. A very rewarding and gratifying experience. Working with the kids was a lot of fun. Today, our last day, the staff at Saciar showed us a heart-warming letter they received from one of the children, thanking everybody at the organization--including us, ‘working with paper’ (origami)! ...What a great way to wrap up our mission here, and knowing that our visits were well received.