La vida corriente y moliente I

It is a bit exaggerated to talk about the “daily grind” after only two weeks living here, but there happen to be some remarkable attributes to Bogota that I have already experienced on a daily basis. Now, I know it’s going to sound like I want to small talk to you, but I’d like to tell you some bits about the weather and the traffic here ;)

On some days I think, that Bogota seems to be St.Peter’s fun park as you never really know how the day is going to turn out weather-wise, whether it starts with a stunning blue sky and sunny, grey in grey or raining. The same applies to the temperature, which can easily swing between 10 and 25 degrees Celsius each and every day. As you can guess the weather-forecast here is rubbish (isn’t it everywhere in the world?), and therefore you are basically forced to take half a camping-equipment with you, if you want to be prepared for the Bogota weather-circus. I actually should know better, as I’ve been here before and my parents even told me about the whims of weather, before I came, but somehow I didn’t think about it at all in the first few days and “preferred” to learn it the hard way. I probably thought that with Colombian blood in my veins, I’d be prepared genetically for any meteorological circumstance here... Anyways, the first incident was on my second day when I was on my way to my aunt Margarita’s, which is a 20’-walk from the closest “transmilenio”-station (that’s the public mass transportation service: buses on an extra-lane on some main-streets, really useful and fast, but packed with commuters like sardines in a can at peak times).

When I got on the bus the sun was still shining and the clouds were only a small apparition on the horizon. But as at Bogota’s eastern frontier the “Cerros orientales de Bogota” build a rather high natural wall, things can go quite fast with the accumulating air there and so when I got off the bus it actually started raining. It wasn’t hard at the beginning and although the other people were already waiting under a roof for the rain to stop again, I thought if I’d walk quickly I wouldn’t get too wet and beat St.Peter. Wrong… the minute I left the bridge leading to the bus-station, the downpour began. It was like standing in the shower. The only protection I had was just a sweater and far away from a raincoat or an umbrella, and all it helped was that I had an additional piece of clothes to dry later. The worst thing is that the streets fill with water instantly and the cars driving by splashing get the best part of your still dry parts! At least I managed to get to a slightly protected spot under a small roof and there I was able to take some pictures for you… I was lucky that my little cousin Sean has grown that much over the past few years, so I could gratefully borrow something dry from him.

The second weather incident was on Sunday, when I went for a walk on the “Ciclovia”. The Ciclovia is one of the things I liked most about Bogota so far. Every Sunday the “Carrera 7”, one of the biggest streets in Bogota (6 lanes and leading all the way from south to north), gets closed for all motor-vehicles from 7 AM to 2 PM and becomes probably the largest fitness-event in the world. People walking, jogging, skating and biking flood the street and enjoy the absence of the usual traffic. The participating number must go into the hundred thousands and many side events as well as merchants make it an impressive and worthwhile spectacle.

It also needs a lot of helpers and they have to get up really early to get the streets empty… And this is taking place every single Sunday! At all events, what happened was that I went out of the house without any sun blocker, because it was cloudy and of course during my two-hour walk the brightest sun ever appeared out of nowhere and left me with a nice red tourist-sunburn. The worst part here was that, in spite of all my efforts to come across as Colombian, now some people even started to talk to me in English… not the expected step ahead in my project “Get rid of that Gringo-air of yours” ;).
tbc...

Primeras impresiones

Although coming to Colombia always was combined with very nice feelings (as it meant I was on holidays) this time was a bit different as I was landing in Bogota to live here for a few months and start a different chapter of my professional career, and I still was (still am) not quite sure what would (will) expect me. Therefore I was very happy to see the well known faces of my relatives Margarita, Leonor and Rafael (aunts and uncle) waiting at the “El Dorado” airport and I was also excited about the nice almost 20 degrees Celsius (as opposed to the minus 5 in Zürich and the snow (!) in Madrid) that were welcoming me. As always another “host” waiting in Bogota, was the heavy traffic, but more to that specific topic later. Anyways, after a “short” drive and a first taste of Bogota’s streets at peak-hour, I arrived at my relatives’ place, where a very delicious “Ajiaco” (that’s a regional meal from Bogota, a really tasteful soup with chicken, potatoes, avocado and other stuff!) was served. That and a couple of hours’ sleep got me ready for my first day in corporate Colombia…
Before I tell you what a typical day in Bogota looks like for me and what kind of stuff can happen to a “principiante”, I would like to tell you more about my whereabouts. I live in a neighborhood called “los Rosales”, located at the eastern boarder of Bogota and pretty much in the middle between the northern and southern ends of Colombia’s capital. I’m very grateful to my relatives Magola and Hernan, who let me stay with them in their apartment. It’s a very spacious but yet cozy flat and they are treating me like their son, what makes me feel at home all the way. We live together with our maid Luz, which means ‘light’, and that’s actually a very accurate name, because she cooks delightful. I feel really lucky as she also washes my clothes and cleans my room, which means I’m getting totally spoiled here and I don’t know if I’ll get used again to doing chores when I’m back in Switzerland (sorry Meli ;)). The Rosales-area is a rather quiet place and has everything I need close by (Shopping centre, banks, supermarket, etc.). As central as it is, it only takes me about half an hour, whether walking or driving, to my office, which is situated at the “Parque de la 93”



, one of the city centers, of which Bogota has a couple.
There I work in the offices of the “CCIT: Cámara Colombiana de Informática y Telecomunicaciones” (www.ccit.org.co). They are the Colombian chamber of commerce representing the ITC-industry, like Dell, HP, Nokia, etc. It is the ideal place for my work as I will need their know-how and network to advance with my report. The CCIT kindly provides me with a workplace and its employees with a lot of Bogota-tips and colloquial vocabulary.

My relatives live all in different parts of this huge city and so I guess I’ll learn all the spots step by step by visiting them. As I’ve been here only for a couple of days, I’ve only been to the places of my uncles and aunts who all live in the northern part of Bogota, the office, my home and a few select places (to do sports and to have a few drinks). More to everything in a later post, but believe me, get mobilized in Bogota is a challenge, at least at the beginning! Check this video to see the dimensions of the city I’m talking about:
If you want to know more about Bogota and its almost 8 Mio unique inhabitants, you best check it out here: http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogot%C3%A1 .
Well, so far so good, I could go on and on with the stuff I’ve seen, but first I have to organize my impressions a little and soon there will be more from “lique en Colombia”… take care y un abrazo, Gabriel

Despedida

After 3 weeks of working at EMPA St.Gallen, which was an interesting change compared to working in Zürich, where I had been for 8 years (incl. university) the day had finally arrived that I would take off into my Colombian adventure.
I did want to mention this part of my trip although it didn’t take place in Colombia, because it was just great and I wanted to thank everybody for saying good bye and sending me off with their best wishes! So: many thanks for the time in St.Gallen to the whole EMPA team, where I got the basics in e-Waste management...
thanks to my team-mates from the volley-team (http://www.vc-smash.ch/), who will try to get the NLB-promotion without my shouting and setting (I wish you all the best and hope we can make it!)...
thanks to all my friends spending the whole night at my place helping to empty my mineral-water stock...
thanks to my family for a very nice farewell-party and the never-ending support...
and of course a big thanks to Melanie for letting me do this and for organizing the whole moving-stuff (btw, thanks to everyone who promised to help her with that), before she takes on her own "adventure" in Chicago herself!
THANK YOU

Introducción

At the end of 2009, while looking for a new endeavor after leaving the bank, I was having quite a dilemma: should I keep applying for a new job, hoping it would become my dream job, should I just pack up and go travelling around the world to have a real time-out, or what the hell was my plan anyways, etc… and on top of that I was doing my guesswork knowing that I would have to spend the last month of the year in the Swiss army no matter what direction my decision would turn to, which is an outlook as motivating as a dirty kitchen.
Usually this kind of problems don’t get solved by themselves and we end up putting up with the second best compromise-solutions… but guess what, usually doesn’t mean always and I was about to get really luck this one time ;) While looking into the possibility of working abroad for some time, a friend suggested having a look at the Swiss civil service homepage (www.zivi.admin.ch), because they were sometimes looking for qualified personnel in Swiss projects abroad. He himself had been very happy with his decision to do civil service instead of going to the army (a choice that was facilitated in Switzerland about a year ago) and so I thought a look wouldn’t hurt. And it didn’t! On the contrary: although lots of the openings were about engineers, computer scientists, medics and teachers, there was one organization looking for an economist in a project of theirs in Colombia… long story short: EMPA (Federal Institute for Materials Science and Technology Research, see: www.empa.ch/tsl) contracted me as civil servant for their e-Waste Initiative Colombia (check out: www.ewasteguide.info), which was about to get implemented and needed some backing up on the financial side (meaning help to get some economic questions out of the way).
So suddenly I would travel to Bogota and help building a system for e-Waste-recycling, kinda something I would never have dared imagine even in my most creative dreams… but there it was: no more army (ever again), no more hamster-race in a big multi-national corporation and the chance to explore my Colombian roots! And the best part of it all was, it would be for a purpose that kept fuelling my motivation the more I learned about it. Of course I would have to leave my beloved Winterthur together with my dearest girlfriend, friends and family (and even my volleyball, where I never had went away in mid-season before in all my life!), but I thought in the end it’s a small price to pay for a once in a lifetime-experience, isn’t it?
Anyways, let’s get to the point of this introduction: because I will be away from home for half a year, I decided to create this blog so I can write down some of my experiences somewhere and at the same time share my Colombia-impressions with anyone who’s interested. I hope you have some fun reading these lines and please feel free to write back to me, so I can keep up with what’s going on elsewhere. And of course let me know if you’re close and want to drop by!!
Un abrazo, Gabriel “lique en Colombia”