COLOMBIA TIP #34 – Keep your weekends busy and your long weekends busier.
Sometimes I don’t know how people with blogs do it – post all the time, or at least regularly. I think I started out this project fairly well three years ago, but I’d like to think I’ve become too busy out there doing things and going places that it’s difficult for me to keep it up!
We successfully finished another school year at COJOWA and here are a few of the events that happened towards the end:
-Mom’s visit
As a quick trip with a good deal on a flight, Mom decided to come down for an extra long weekend few days for Mother’s Day. I wouldn’t say that we did a lot of things (it rained the day we planned to go to the islands, she visited school one day, we wandered around Centro), but it was nice to get to show her this new part of Colombia! She did say that it was very different than Armenia but that it was still neat. We went to an awesome steak dinner at an Argentinian (Argentine?) restaurant and it was fun to get to spend Mother’s Day with her for the first time in a long while!
-The COJOWA Cosmic Run
The second annual COJOWA Cosmic run brought people from school and the community together in Cartagena’s Walled City to run, paint yourself with bright colours, and dance to the mini concert on stage. I did the first two, and the first one was rather difficult! Becky was my buddy for the night and we got painted up (which mostly got washed away from the rain) and then proceeded to run 8K. There was a 4K option, but most of the other teachers that were running were all doing the 8K, so call it peer pressure or a case of “go big or go home”, but 8K it was. To give you some background information, I had been doing essentially zero running (I started to over the summer afterwards, but got lazy again since), and running 8K cold off the bench was extremely difficult/stupid. Becky and I stuck together and encouraged each other, walked a few times, but finished within an hour which I was completely okay with. Good teamwork by the future roommates – did I mention that? This year I’ll have a bit more company, a cooking coach, and as an extra bonus, more money saved up. We got our medals, I was sore the next 5+ days, and remembered that training is your friend.
Pre-race we looked so nice and naive
But we survived in the end! Barely…
-Random Beach Days
Rachael found a cool beach spot up in Morros/La Boquilla which is pretty far from the area we live, but she insisted that the place was cool and the beach was a lot emptier than the Bocagrande ones. A few of us hopped into Kathy’s car and drove up and it was pretty fun! We had a nice relaxing day, floated in the water, watched Rachael do some kite surfing (I want to try that this year!) and took a break from the end of year stress.
Rachael, Ali, Michelle, me, Kathy, and Beverly safe in the shade by the beach.
-Armenia friends visit!
Before the end of their year, Katie (1 or 2? I can’t keep track) and Rachel from GI School came by for a long weekend to go to the islands and explore Cartagena one last time. It was nice to have some people visit! That’s a shout out to all you people back home who haven’t made the trip and maybe want to, this year may be your last opportunity! I do love playing tour guide although there is a sense of stress because I want to make sure I keep it entertaining, but these girls know Colombia and in Katie’s case she had been to Cartagena already, so spending time catching up was pretty nice in itself. Thanks for coming ladies!
Me, Rachel, and Katie at Cafe del Mar for sunset
And then out on the town in Centro.
We went to one of the islands and in the pool there was a built in bar with underwater stools beside it! Awesome.
And the Katies tried their hands at paddle boarding.
-SAN ANDRES
I finally got to check off a trip to San Andres Island on my Colombia Bucket List when Tristen and I went for a long weekend. Even though it is located up by Nicaragua, the small island is a part of Colombia. Tristen got to do some diving which was apparently pretty good, and I got to lie on the beach and chill and get tanned.
Obviously the Caribbean influence is a lot stronger there and at one restaurant, this band was really fun to watch. They even sang the “Shaving Cream” song which I thought was pretty hilarious!
Tristen is also a big swimmer, so she organized with one of the locals to drive a boat along side her as she swam to a tiny island out in the distance. I was pretty impressed! I rode in the boat, you can’t make me swim that far, especially with no training (as I learned from the Cosmic Run…)
Below is the island that she swam to from the beach of our hotel/hostel house and then an action shot of her almost done!
Although I’m not a diver, the snorkelling was pretty awesome! The water was so much clearer than Cartagena and there were lots of cool fish and coral. No sharks thank goodness, or at least that I saw.
Overall a pretty good weekend!
-Some serious blog impact on others!
One day, I got a comment on my blog from someone saying they were interested in talking to me and to email them. I figured, “What the heck, the worst that could happen is that it is fake and I won’t get a response.” So I emailed and I met Natalie who is from Ottawa and was looking into teaching at GI! She wanted to ask me about Colombia, Armenia, and the school, and I even Skyped her and her parents to help answer some questions and ease their concerns. I also got in touch with a friend of a friend named Catherine after she had interviews with GI too. We exchanged emails with tons of questions to be answered. Both girls ended up getting the job and just finished their first week of school there! I hope everything continues to go well for them (remember, there will be some roller coasters and culture shock, but I believe in you!) and maybe we’ll even be able to visit some time this year and actually meet each other in person!
Here are Catherine and Natalie enjoying their first few weeks in Armenia with the nice climate and mountains. Good luck girls!
That about sums up my adventures of the last couple months. Of course there is one more adventure that rarely gets mentioned on my blog and that would be the one of teaching. Sometimes it’s hard and the kids drive me nuts, but I think with time and persistence, it has gotten easier.
One thing that stinks about teaching is that you don’t get recognized or acknowledged as much as you’d like (or at least how much I’d like anyway). The students say thanks almost every day, but it almost feels like a reflex. I know (or hope) that I am doing something positive for them as they’re growing up and learning, but sometimes it’s hard to actually know if it’s true. That’s why when the students take the time to really say thanks, it means so much. I got this little card from one student at the end of the year and it made me almost cry. These are the things that keep me going!
Go tell something thanks today cause you just might make their day/week/month/year/LIFE.
PS. Sorry to get a little too sappy haha
Katie En Kolombia 