Tuesday, January 2, 2018

Last night I got up once about 1:15, again about 5:30, finally waking/getting up at 7:45.

I left the apt at 8:45 and caught a bus after a 5 minute wait.  At the Poblado station I saw 4 gringos get on and when I looked towards the other doorway I saw about 6 more.  I got up as the train left the station before my San Antonio stop and asked them where they were from.  I heard “San Francisco” just as we arrived at the station, the doors opened and they got off.  I arrived at the chess league at 9:45.  Jose was already waiting there for me.

He won the first game with the Black pieces and I won the second with the Black pieces.  That’s 5 games in a row won by the person playing Black – a bit unusual.

We walked over to El Chapparal where I ordered the pepper steak again with a limonada de coco.  This time it was smothered in sauce, came with rice instead of salad, and French fries instead of baked potato.  I’ll try to remember in the future to ask specifically for the baked potato – I think they call it “papas de vapor” or “papas el horno”.

1st page of their menu - steaks at the top.

My pepper steak with rice already transferred, fries, and arepa.

I mixed the rice with the sauce and I can’t believe I finished the whole thing.  Delicious and the meat was cooked perfectly – slightly pink.

I asked the waiter if they were open Christmas Day and New Years Day and I understand they are open every day.

I talked to Jose about ATM machines and that’s when he told me about World Remit.  He can transfer thousands of dollars from his bank in the US to his Bancolombia account for $1.99.  He said you don’t need a Banclombia account to do that – you just pick it up like you would at Western Union.  Something to keep in mind for future emergencies.  It just takes a little work/time to set up your World Remit account.

As we were finishing our food I was about to say it suddenly got chilly when Jose announced it was raining.

While Jose was in the bathroom the waiter brought me the bill and told me it was 91mil.  I gave him 100mil and he brought me 18,000 pesos in change.  I kept 10mil out to share with Jose when the waiter came over and questioned how much change he gave me.  I gave him 10mil and he gave me 1mil back.  I split the remainder with Jose.

They allowed us to play a couple more games at one of their side tables and I had Black in the first game and I quickly messed up and left myself with a lost game – which I eventually did lose.  Finally, a win for White.  During our games I had a couple of café con leches and he had a couple tintos.  After that, I won a close game with the White pieces.

We said goodbye and plan to meet again next Tuesday.

On the metro to Envigado I got a seat across from a young? Black man and a dark skinned Colombiana.  He appeared to be teaching her a little English – I heard him say in perfect English “I really like this lady”.  “She repeated “I really like this lady” and then changed “lady” to “man”.  I was visibly chuckling when she pointed me out.  I asked where he was from and was told Chicago.  I asked him what part of Chicago and he changed it to Champaign.  I learned he’s been visiting Medellin for about 12 years – on and off – on the 6 month plan.  Lol.

On the bus it started raining lightly.  Back at the park I added 50mil to Teresa’s cell phone and stopped in Citibank.  The screen showed some crossed tools and I asked the guard if it was working.  He said to come back in 20 minutes.  I went next door to Bancolombia where I withdrew 600mil without being charged an ATM fee.  That’s one!

I stopped in Exito where I bought a few things and had to wait about 15 minutes in line.

Back at the apartment, MT was there.  I understand they both visited another gym down the hill.  Teresa said it was less expensive for personal trainers but she also said it was noisy.  Not for me!

Teresa informed me that MT wants to go to Mu for ribs this weekend.  I said how about Friday as I know there will be NFL games on Saturday.  I’m sure she won’t be able to eat very much but I guess she’ll still enjoy it.

On the news we saw there was a large landslide that closed the road between Medellin and Santafe de Antioquia.  You could see them working on clearing the road with backhoes and dump trucks.

I waited until it had stopped raining and Laura went with me to the bank.  On the way we ran into Wilson with bags of groceries.  At Bancolombia there was no line until after I had finished my payments.  My health insurance payment went up from 123mil to 130mil.  I understand the apartment rent doesn’t go up until May 1^st.

It started raining again about 7pm.  I was going to do some work on my laptop and found I couldn’t open it.  The slide “thingy” seemed to have disappeared.  I got a flashlight and found I was trying to open it from the left front instead of the center front; just one more sign that I’m losing it.  After I logged on I found we had no internet.  Unplugging and replugging the power cord had no affect.

T-shirt of the day: No excuses.