Even more random thoughts on a Wednesday evening

Hallelujah to the first entry of 2010. To appease the peanut gallery, i.e. Chris, I’m throwing up a little posting. However, I don’t have much to write about to be honest. At least nothing terribly exciting. Got back to Bogota on Friday late afternoon and unbeknownst to me it was the start of a three day weekend. The holiday? Three Kings Day/Epiphany which is celebrated every year on the same day, January 6.. Yes, the rest of the world celebrates it on January 6 and in fact that is the principal gift exchange day of the Christmas season in Spain. But the Colombians chose to celebrate January 6 on Monday January 11 because, well, duh, it gives them a three day weekend. Clever.

Prior to Bogota I was in Paris for a little under a week for my company’s annual meeting. Yearly recaps, team building exercises, project updates yada yada. We did organize however a pretty cool scavenger hunt through the Louvre followed the same evening by a gala dinner on a boat on the Seine parked just outside Notre Dame. There was enough champagne going around to overflow the river. Which really isn’t a river as much as a canal in my opinion. I had a full day in Paris and managed to cruise the stores and minimally enjoy the awesomeness of the post-Christmas sales. In some stores they were practically giving stuff away.

I’ve hit a string of luck with sitting next to cool people on my flights, the most recent one being a US Foreign Service officer stationed in Bogota for the past three years. However, that has been somewhat neutralized by an equally bad luck string of sitting near or around crying babies. But the babies on my most recent flight were far enough away from me so it wasn’t too bad of a ride. The French man, they know how to run their airlines. Fly French or fly home is my new motto. I’ve fallen in love with Air France. Great service, practically a four course meal with each serving, ample leg room, and about 45 movies, 6 TV shows, and 10 different games to choose from on your personalized monitor. The fact that they thought they overbooked the flight and paid me 150 euros to wait on stand-by adds to the pleasant experience. Who doesn’t like to get PAID to fly????

Things are picking up with work in sunny Bogota. This week has been perfect. 75 degrees and clear blue skies all day everyday so far. I’ve been doing a lot of interviews in Spanish this week which has been great practice and a tremendous learning experience. But funny at times to say the least. The Colombians probably think I’m retarded. My name alone makes them think I am pure blooded Hispanic. On top of that I have a pretty decent accent and pronunciation but far, far from perfect grammar and vocab. So all in all they probably think I am a weird native Hispanic who is still learning Spanish. I’m going on a day long organized tour of the city on Saturday so will come back with much more real stuff to say rather than this banter.