Ricky-Ticky Halloween...quiero dulce para mi...

That's how the trick-or-treat chant goes here.  I've heard is a hundred times tonight, but now can't remember how the rest goes.  We had our share of halloween here... on Friday we had the school parade and class parties.  Eric was Flash and I was a Rubric's Cube (posing with my student, who is a little nerdy here.)

Linnea walking with her teacher in the parade.  Kindergarden through 5th grade walked through the Primary School, Elementary School and Middle School.  That took a while!

 And today, the actual Halloween was celebrated in our apartment.  To our surprise there are 23 kids living in our apartment and nearly all of them came to play and eat snacks our in our "park".  Unfortunately Linnea's grey bunny costume got washed today and it wasn't dry in time for the party, so she improvised with blue and white stripes.  Kind of a french bunny...

 Felipe, Linnea, Dempsey and Elijah

After the downstairs party, the kids roamed the halls and trick-or-treated, apartment-style.

Sorting and trading.

Our City!

(Update November 7, 2011)

When we first saw this "sculpture" at Hacienda Santa Barbara, a rambling shopping mall, I thought it was some cool art installation.  I learned recently that it's the symbol for a bottled water company and this was an advertisement.  I'm such a sucker.  The subtle things you miss when you're new to a place...

Villa de Leyva

We spent 5 days in Villa de Leyva with Papa Bruce.  We stayed at our friend, Bonnie's, house/bed and breakfast.  She teaches with us and goes to her finca every weekend.  We dug in the clay, hunted for fossils and made pizza and cooked it in her clay oven.

Before you can make things out of clay, you've got to find the clay in the ground.

 Bonnie's place...

After digging in the mud to find the clay, you've got to rinse off in the pond.

Pizza time!

                  

 Fossil hunting on the property.

 Mural in the Fossil Museum

This fossil was discovered in 1977 and the museum was built around it.

Sebastopol seen throughout the eyes of a NY Times journalist...

A friend here in Bogota forwarded this article to me about our home town, Sebastopol.  Fun to see some our favorite places...

http://travel.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/travel/food-and-art-in-sebastopol-california.html?nl=travel&emc=

Fernando Botero

To our surprise, there the admission to the Botero Museum in Bogota was free!  That was the best deal in town for the great entertainment it provided.  Fernando Botero was born in Medellin in 1932 and is alive and painting still today.  The paintings in the museum were donated by the artist himself are valued at over 200 million dollars.  We also saw works of art by Picasso, Dali, Renior, Chagall, Monet, Degas and more.    A condition placed by Botero was that once a piece is hung in the museum, it cannot be moved or loaned to another museum.

chubby fruit

this looks like a chubby cross-dresser 

chubby dancers

this chubby one looks like she's fretting over her shopping list... 

"should I buy more oranges or grapefruit next time?"

chubby kitty

Best Burger You'll Ever Have!

Yesterday after we went up to Montserrate we headed down to a friend's restaurant called Burger Market  to have the best burgers in Bogota or anywhere for that matter.  If you love a good burger then this is the place for you!  Everything about this place is top notch, from the wine list (yes they have an amazing wine list) to the farm where they have their own special herd of Wangus cows who apparently have a great time before they become burgers and other tasty treats for our enjoyment, to the organically grown hydroponic lettuce growing on the walls.

During lunch we were all treated to an awesome rainstorm and nobody seemed to be surprised when the street turned into a river!

Kids love Burgers!

Note the hydroponic lettuce growing behind Linnea.

Owner/Chef Daniel Kaplan

 

This is the view from the Burger Market during a rainstorm.

Cerro de Monserrate

10,341 feet above the city of Bogota is Monserrate, a mountain with a church at the top that was built in the 17th century.  The mountain can be hiked, but we took the easy and fun way up... we rode the teleferico (read: gondola).  Up top, we walked the beautiful gardens, browsed the souvenirs and has coffee and pastries...

Carnivorous ivy

Inside the church

On the way back down... kind of a cloudy day, but beautiful nonetheless.