Friday, February 22nd, 2013

I forgot to mention that yesterday morning I sent an email through the USAA website requesting to increase my daily withdrawal limit from $600 a day to $1200 a day.  Later in the evening I received their response; my request was denied because my account had yet to be open for 6 months and I don’t have funds in the account to support the increase.  (My present balance is $4.64.)

This morning I created a response explaining my unique situation.  I hope that helps as I don’t want to waste several days accumulating cash until I have enough for whatever large purchase I might want to make (e.g. a bed).

I also forgot to mention that there is construction work being done upstairs so about 7am every morning the power sawing and hammering begins.

We had some rain (lluvia) overnight as the streets are a little damp.  At 6:30 am the guy was out collecting paper, plastic and cardboard.  I wonder if he could be part of the Medellin recycling program?  If Chicago can have everything put in one bag and later have it reopened (so they say) in a building to separate the recyclables from the true garbage, why can’t that be done here in the street without the overhead of a building?

Garbage pickup was at 8:10 this morning.  8:15am and a paneled truck pulls up and parks next door with a loudspeaker mounted on top blaring something over and over again.  In the US we’d call the police to shut them up. Here I guess they’re used to it.  They finally leave 10 minutes later.

We decided to visit a large shopping center down the street called Centro Comercial Los Molinos or just Los Molinos.  We started walking south down Avenida 80.  After 4 blocks Reina asked a lady on the street if she knew how far Los Molinos was and she said it was a long ways like 25 blocks.  So we took the next bus that came by and the mall was only 10 blocks further.  It is a large mall with a lot of shops and fast food restaurants.  We spent about an hour walking around the mall taking pictures until a guard stopped me and said it was forbidden to take pictures in the mall.

Los Molinos mall

Postres means desserts but they also had burgers.

Entrance to the food court.

Parking on the same level as some of the stores.

I think this is an ice cream store.

Auto dealership in the mall.

My last picture before the guard said it's not allowed!

Dancing for pesos at stoplight.

I hope he's right handed!

We took a bus back to our local Viva! Mall and had ice cream cones in the little store behind the mall.  The same place we had been in 2 days ago.  Then we went into Exito and bought some beef and mayonnaise.  We now have about 8000 pesos left.  I checked my account balances again and I still have about $25 left in my Citibank account so tomorrow we’ll see if we can withdraw the last 40,000 pesos.  We still have about 10 days (March 4^th) before I can be sure my March deposits are available.

This evening I finally got my answer from USAA: “At this time we recommend you contact us once funds are available in your account and we will review for reconsideration.”  So I guess I’ll try again on March 1^st.

Regarding McDonald’s

Prior to today the several small McDonald’s I’ve noticed downtown; all they sell is postres (desserts) like McFlurrys and ice cream cones.  But today at Los Molinos the sign on the McDonald’s also said Postres but I noticed they also sell hamburgers so once again I’m confused.   lol