Jeff was able to come down and spend some time with me before he started his Masters program at St. Johns. We had a nice time together and he got to know Caracas even more than he already did before that trip. We went to a barbeque at the head of schools house with a few other teachers, went out dancing with some coworkers, and ate dinner on top of the Avila. It was all absolutely amazing. Once he left it was back to reality and lots of work at school.I have made the decision to head back to the US next year and go to law school! I am really excited about the prospect of going back to school and getting into educational policy because it is such an exciting time in the US. Needless to say I have been working on completing my applications and writing personal statement for the schools. I found it very hard to talk about how great I am and convince the school to accept me. However, I have finally finished it and I super excited to start sending in my applications.
In the meantime, last week we had our October break and I travel to Colombia to meet my Dad. We stayed in Bogota for a few days and then headed off to
Medellin. I absolutely loved Colombia and would recommend it to anyone who has ever thought of going. I think it is actually safer than Venezuela! We visited several museums, churches, and houses in Bogota.
We also went outside of the city to a restaurant called Andres Carne De Res.
It was an
incredible place with excellent food and interesting decor. They seriously had the craziest things on the walls and ceilings (pretty much junk). There were also people dressed up as different characters and stationed all around the place. Needless to say it was an experience.
We also went to a Salt Cathedral about 45 minutes outside
of the city. It was absolutely spectacular to see all of the beautiful statues and crosses carved out of salt.
There was also a reflection pool that reflected the ceiling because the water was so salty.
From there we headed to Medellin which was an incredibly nice city with lots of infrastructure maybe funded by the drug money that used to be so prevelant there. We took a bus tour of the city the first full day we were there and saw several parks, cathedrals, and Botero statues. The next day we went with our new found taxi friend to several of the colonial pueblos to the east of the city. They were absolutely beautiful.
We also went to the Piedra del Penol which is a huge rock in the ground that they have built over 700 stairs into so that you can climb it and see the views.
It was incredible beccause it over looked several lakes. The final say we went to a market to buy local handcrafted goods. Overall it was an amazing trip.
I was however disappointed to come back and find out the due to a drought we have been having here in Caracas they are limiting water consumption in the city for who knows how long. I had a huge pile of laundry that needed to be done so it was not a good situation. Needless to say I went over 48 hours with only thirty minutes of water twice a day because during the third time I was at work. We finally have water back today but it sounds like we are going to be rationed once or twice a week from now until who knows when. Oh the joys of living in a third world country. And to top it off they rely on hydropower for electricity so now we are going to be having brown outs or even blackouts because they cannot support all of the need for electricity.
That is all for now. I have included the links to my photos from Colombia so you can take a look at them if you want. I would love for people to add themselves as followers so I know if anyone is ever reading my blog. Also feel free to leave comments....
