humorous translation

i can't help but read the english translations of products that are produced in a spanish -speaking country, to accompany it's own spanish instructions. this is the back of a product called 'Carve' which is a half-assed hamburger helper-like substitute which i decided to try recently. i like the product because it gives me the freedom to select any liquid (literally ANY liquid!) of my choice, including hot. and i like the double-standard at the bottom, telling me that i must consume the product immediately after i add any liquid of my choice. or i could just wait until the next day.

my perception of the u.s.

some students have been asking me lately about what i plan to do in december and next year at the end of my contract. i emphatically inform them that i am done with bogota, colombia, and the whole central and south american culture. i can't speak for brazil, chile, argentina and other neighboring countries and their respective cultures but i feel as if i know the south american way of life pretty well. i also inform them that i'm not planning to leave alone, andrea will be with me, wherever that may be. i also know that i'm not interested in returning to the u.s. any time soon. with the exception of friends, family, and a few selected geographic locations, i've had a negative opinion about the states, the people within it, and the 'culture' that surrounds it for a while now.

i've been reading henry rollins' book 'broken summers' (again) recently and he has some great perceptions about the states that i think i can relate to. to quote him: 'Amerika is playing catch up and it's out of breath. By the time they figured out that all that fast food and other crap was bad for your health, it was too late. Ronald McDonald was already in the home and he would never hurt you and you were already hooked so why stop a good thing? You're allowed to be an ignorant piece of shit in this country and someone will always be there to carry you. I meet fuck ups all the time. Divorced, substance abusers, two kids by two mothers, collecting unemployment and somehow driving and new SUV. They are pigs running wild and they are allowed to live. They are carried. Amerika spits in your face and charges you double and tells you to be proud. I love Amerika but it's hard to be proud of a place run by cowards who are afriad to tell the people the bottom line. They won't tell them to use less gas, they just get more oil. Here it's thousands of idiots driving in cars and trucks they don't need, clogging the lanes, on the phone.'

i like reading rollins. i don't always agree with what he says or the music he likes but he has a way of writing thoughts that i've had for a long time into clear, blunt, and to-the-point prose. the book also describes rollins' integral involvement with the West Memphis Three. three teenagers who were convicted of murder in 1993, even though there was no physical evidence, motive, or connection to the victims. they have been in prison since. rollins details his part by going on tour and making compilation CDs to raise money for DNA testing. HBO also made a documentary on the case called Paradise Lost I and II. if you're interested in knowing about the book, the film, or the case, you can see the information and reviews on amazon.com.

i hope not to end up like charlie

this is charlie. charlie is from madrid but has been living in bogota for over 20 years. he's been an english teacher in the system for about that time and i consider him a veteran. he has turned down jobs that i have tried to get. he was nice enough to take me under his wing when i got to my current school and has helped me a lot with the way things function there. he's one of the nicest guys you could ever meet, plus he a polyglot, knowing three languages fluently. he's a teacher, and i certainly hope not to end up like him after 20 years of teaching.

charlie is a classic case of a teacher who has given up and stopped caring. he's stopped caring about the job, the students, the teaching methods, the school administrators, the curricula, and everything else that comes along with being a teacher except the paycheck at the end of every month. (For you Simpson buffs, charlie's like Rev. Lovejoy and Ned Flanders is education, if you can recall that episode). he doesn't speak unless spoken to (which is a good quality to have in my opinion), he's a 'yes-man' doing whatever is asked of him without complaining or wondering why or whether it is the right thing to do. he keeps his head down and his nose clean. he's passive in every way and his students think he's a boring teacher. but he makes sure that the school pays him every month.

i may eat my words here but i don't think i'll end up like charlie. what i need to do is find a place where students are able to recognize when a teacher cares about his job and are able to respect the teacher for it. but the questions is is it a place? or is it an age group? or is it a culture? or is it a socioeconomic class? i haven't been to enough places or been teaching long enough to know if it exists. i can say this, when students backs are against the wall, that is when they learn. otherwise, from my experience here, a teacher is just another adult telling them what to do and occasionally spewing out information which they think is useless to them.

all systems go

after talking with a classmate from my master's course, the area of colombia called Sierra Nevada del Cocuy is filled with military people and is safe to traverse. so next month, andrea and I will be doing the Guican-El Cocuy trek, as described in the LonelyPlanet Guide to Colombia (1995 edition). it's a difficult trail and the guidebook says it is a minimum of 7 days hiking. to quote the description:

'This is one of the most spectacular treks the Colombian mountains have to offer. On the way, you'll see more than 20 snow-capped peaks, a dozen beautiful mountain lakes, marvellous frailejon-filled valleys, waterfalls, glaciers, and abundant flora. You'll need six to seven days to complete the whole circuit as described below, but of course it's up to you how long you wish to walk and where you want to camp. Keep in mind that the changeable weather may affect your plans considerably." (The article mentions later that the only period of reasonably good weather is from December to February. The rest of the year is rainy and snowy.) the picture is of the trail map from the guidebook. the trail starts in Guican (to the left, middle of the page) and continues in a clockwise fashion until Cocuy (below Guican). the trail is marked on the page by a dotted line.

in case it's too difficult to see details, some stops along the way include: lakes/rivers: Rio Cardenillo, Laguna Grande de los Verdes, Laguna de la Plaza, Laguna de la Isla, Laguna del Avellanal, Valle de los Cojines, La Cascada del Rio Ratoncito, Laguna del Rincon, and the Laguna Hoja Larga. mountains and elevations: Guican (5000m), Boqueron de la Sierra (4850m), Ritacuba Norte (5200m), Ritacuba Negro (5250m), Ritacuba Blanco (5060m), Puntiagudo (5060m), El Picacho (5030m), San Paulin Norte (5180 m), El Castillo (5100m), San Paulin Sur (5180m), Boqueron del Castillo (4800m), Concavito (5100m), Concavo (5200m), Portales (4850m), Toti (4900m), Diamante (4800m), Pan de Azucar (5150m), Pulpito del Diablo (5120m), and Campanillas (4800m).

the plan is to hire a guide in el cocuy (the town) and go from there. from what the brit in my class said, guides are easy to come by and are pretty cheap. but all things considered, if we do the 7 day trail it would be very difficult. i'm certainly not an expert trekker and neither is andrea. i hope not, but what i think will end up happening is we'll do a few days of hiking and camping through some of the more popular trails, toward the end of the trek (bottom right corner of the photo).

some other people have hiked around this part of colombia. you can see some info about their trek here and a travelogue here, which also includes pictures.

Leaving my mark

i just got a knock at the front door (which never happens) and received word that i will officially be part of the 2005 Colombian census. from what people have told me, it's a big deal because the last offical census was in 1993. i'm curious to know two things: one how many people actually live in Bogota, i've been told anywhere between 6 and 10 million people and two, how many foreigners live here, i've been told between 2 and 10 thousand. i don't think i've ever been asked to participate in any census anywhere, so this is a big deal for me too. it's a bigger deal because i get to miss a day of work with pay this coming wednesday.

other recent events: i've started my second master's course class. this one is called Introduction to Gifted Children taught by an older black lady named Willa Bing Harris. Unfortunately, this class is much less interesting than the last class and i'm getting almost nothing out of it. we've finished one week of the course and have one to go. then who knows. in the last course, the professor had us each make a project to be turned in two weeks after the actual class finished. i seriously doubt anything like that will happen with mrs bing. the good news about the class is it was a bit less expensive than the first. and the cost, apparently, goes up or down depending on the number of students.

Andrea will be starting her certification course to teach spanish as a foreign language next week. she's a bit concerned with how much time it's going to take from her day (it's an online course) and how intensive it'll be. she's also in the process of setting up her own blog. we just started it this morning and has nothing on it but check back periodically if you want a quick spanish lesson.