I went to bed at 11pm, got up at 6:30, only made 1 trip to
the bathroom overnight and I feel good.
Remember back on March 13th when I was with my
brother and I picked up 4 free postcards at the Blue Marlin restaurant? I wrote brief notes on each along with the
address of my blog. They are for my
barber, my auto mechanic, the cook & owner of the Niles Grill where I used
to have breakfast and the salespeople at Panera Bread where I would sometimes
stop for iced tea. While I was at the
hotel yesterday the lady at the desk spoke near perfect English so I asked her
if I could mail my postcards from the hotel.
She said no, but I could mail them from Exito. I asked if I could buy the stamps there also
and she said yes, but they may not need any postage. What?
Now I’m starting to wonder if I can believe her about Exito. I will be checking that out when it isn’t so
busy.
Its obvious today is another holiday as I didn’t see any
kids walking to school this morning and the neighborhood is very quiet. I got to Viva at 8:25 and since the gates
were still down I understood it was closed for the holiday. Where am I going to have breakfast - at the
hotel again? I walked around to the back
and they were just opening the gates and I noticed the Exito hours – they don’t
open until 9am on Sundays - and holidays!
I tried to take money out of the ATM but again was
denied. Maybe they ran out of money but
just in case I wrote down the message in Spanish and later translated it to “It
cannot be read. Turn to our office…” What?
Don’t tell me I’m having troubles with this card again? If I can’t get money today I won’t be able to
see the movie – I’ll have to keep what little I still have on hand for
food. It’s a good thing I have another
account and I had transferred money to it last week as I have it just for this
reason.
11:30 I headed back to Viva with both my debit cards. I tried the USAA account again first and
didn’t have any problem getting money out this time. Maybe they refilled the ATMs since this
morning? For lunch I had a FriSnack at
Frisby’s for 8,900 ($4.94). What’s
interesting is the lady’s pronunciation sounded like Free Snack which sounds
even better. Lol.
Right after lunch I took a taxi to Terminal del Sur for
8,500 ($4.72). I had hoped to be able to
do some shopping for some things I couldn’t find in my local Exito but it
wasn’t that kind of a shopping center.
It’s a terminal near the domestic airport for the metro and for a lot of
buses into and out of the city. The few
stores they had were closed and about all that was open were the fast food and
typical Colombian restaurants.
Walking into the movie theater some short film had already
started. It was dark except for some
small lights in the floor of the aisles and I was happy to have the usher guide
me towards my seat (F-14). The short was
all in Spanish and appeared to be an advertisement for some Colombian
golfer. The sound wasn’t good – I could
even hear the projector in the rear balcony – and the video wasn’t clear. I was hoping this wouldn’t be a problem with
the feature film After Earth but it
turned out not to be a concern when it started 10 minutes later. I didn’t have any trouble hearing most of the
audio and of course the subtitles were in Spanish. The movie was pretty good – mainly featuring
Will Smith’s son Jadan.
The only problem was during the movie I felt like I had
broken off a piece of tooth. I spit it
out and put it in my pocket and verified later it was indeed a piece of one of
my back molars. Now I guess I’ll need to
find a dentist to fix it.
After the movie I took a taxi home for 10,500 ($5.83). So this afternoon’s entertainment cost me a
total of 31,500 ($17.50) counting the movie, popcorn, Pepsi, and taxi each way
– not to mention an upcoming dental visit.
A little pricey because of the taxis but I won’t be doing it very
often. And I think I’d better make
eating popcorn more the exception than the rule from now on!
Coming out of the theater was interesting because as they
were all (about 20) filing out almost everyone was checking his or her cell
phone. Lol.
I stopped at the ATM again on my way to dinner to pick up
cash for what should be the remainder of the week.
Dinner was chili con carne and Mandarin juice at El Comedor de
Chava for 11,600 ($6.44). I stopped at
Exito on the way back and picked up a 30-day supply of my enlarged prostate
medicine (Tamsulosin) for 40,500 ($22.50).
7pm I’m back at the apartment to watch The Bachelorette. 7:15 and some guy buzzes my apartment from
downstairs. Of course I don’t understand
what he’s saying until I hear comeda (food).
I gave him the remainder of my bag of milk and a couple of small
packages of crackers. (I have to admit I
had my pepper spray in my hand just in case.)
I got an email tonight from Eddie; he’s now in Medellin. Hopefully I can meet him sometime in the next
few days.
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