Simon's Blog and Oliver's Blog

Ok, so we have dropped the ball on blogging for a while,  but we are going to get back to it sometime soon.  So much from our travels in Colombia that was never finished, and so much from our time in Switzerland.

However here in Switzerland, the kids have been homeschooling, and as part of the curriculum they are writing blog posts and posting pictures and videos.

You can check out Simon at:
simonpetervd.blogspot.com

And Oliver is at:
olys-blog.blogspot.com

And there is Youtube channel at:
www.youtube.com/channel/UCWLNN2lZ0w-cC6_2T6q6fhw

more soon!

Simon's first blog

I am in Zurich.

We live on the third floor.

We have a pleather couch.

 

We have a nice view of Zurich.

This is the neighbor's house.

Papas bombas: an unexpected benefit of working from home

Last Thursday turned out to be a particularly good day to work from home.  Just after lunch, following some very loud thunder, we heard what sounded like actual explosions.  After waves of them for almost an hour, Eric found tweets indicating it was campus protests.  Naturally, we headed out to investigate.  We walked 4 blocks to the edge of campus, and found my regular commute blocked off with riot police (Esmad, the "Moblle Anti-Disturbances Squadron") lined up along the street side of the campus fence, and protesters hiding out on the other side of the fence on campus.  The charade consisted of protesters launching "papas bombas" (potato bombs), also described in the newspaper as "artesenal explosive artifacts" at Esmad, and Esmad responding with water cannons and tear gas.  We watched with a group of students (campus had been evacuated) until the air turned sour and our eyes started burning.  It was my first time experiencing tear gas - not pleasant!

Photo from El Pais with smoking Papas bombas

Esmad Tanquete driving by our corner

I had been told to expect "disturbios" this fall, as something like this typically occurs a few times a year.  The national government is in the process of reforming the main law that governs university education (la ley 30) to allow private investment in public universities, for-profit universities, and top-down accreditation procedures that significantly undermine universities' autonomy.  Student activists are mobilizing around these issues via conventional organizing and peaceful protests.  However, noone seems very clear what this particular protest by the radical wing or "los encaupchados" (the hooded) was about.  

All seems back to normal now, and I'm feeling glad this didn't result in my own class getting cancelled, since I'm only teaching once per week.  Last week we had a couple power outages during class, but that all seems minor now!

San Cipriano - jungle mototrains of the Choco

Last Monday the kids had a holiday, and Eric headed off with the kids to a famous place that we had heard a whole lot about - San Cipriano.  It is famous for the locals using the old railroad track with wooden carts and motorcycles, called brujitas.  It turned out to be that and a whole lot more.  

First we had to get over there, and It is a long and curvy road to Buenaventura, that got the best of us last time we tried, but we made it in time. Jumped off the side of the highway and hiked down to the town, where there was some endearing mix of total disorganization and the services being organized into cooperatives, with tickets, etc.  

We got our ticket and jumped on the bruita, a set of crude wooden benches to which a motorcycle is bolted on.  We had a real cool driver, "JP" who was all ready to go.  But then we had to wait a whole long time because there was lots of traffic coming down the track and its all managed by radios at each end to only have traffic moving in one direction at a time, ( its like a 15-20 minute trip)  So we were told that because of a local funeral there was lots of extra traffic on the track and everything was getting disorganized.  

We also got to see what happened when the radio relay system doesn't work.  A brujita coming the other way with a whole load of visitors had to get off the track, lift the cart and the moto off the track, and sit on the sidelines while we went by.

The part that I hadn't quite figured out before we got there, is that they are basically taking you to a remote Afro-Pacific village, in the jungle, where there are a set of trails to different waterfalls and swimming holes along a beautiful and clean river.  There were even tubes to rent for us to go down some small rapids in.  It was a lovely place, and with 2 kids tired and rain coming, we did less exploring than I would have liked, but had a nice time on the river. And we have already learned from other weekends, people here love to go out to the river with their whole family, and while away a warm afternoon wading and sitting in a cool river.  

On the way out we took the train a different direction uphill to a different terminus.  This was the town of Zaragosa.  Along the way there was spectacular jungle scenery, and a creepy tunnel, and views out to the river. In the river  bank I kept seeing huge earth movers behind piles of gravel and I wondered what kind of environmental disaster there was. Later after I got home I figured out that Zaragosa was an epicenter of a recent wave of environmentally harmful gold mining.  Such a contrast from the pristine jungle and swimming holes.  

and here is the video of the journey

The best coffee in the world - in Cali!

The Best Coffee in the World - Gesha Cerro Azul - Cafe Granja La Esperanza

I say that ironically - I am skeptical of rankings, or that something would be considered the best of the world. 

But it turns out that there are a few different highly regarded international competitions, most visibly the Specialty Coffee Association of America.  And there is a coffee that has been winning a lot. Gesha Cerrro Azul.  ( SCAA winner 2012 2013 2014)   Gesha is a varietal from Ethiopia, introduced to Panama, and now grown with incredible care and dedication just outside of Cali.  And it turns out the warehouse and business office is in Cali, so I dropped them an email full of adulation and pleading, and they had me over for a cup of coffee.  So there I was, Tuesday morning, sampling the best cup of coffee in the world.  Muchisimas Gracias al Sr Felipe Paz!!!

One interesting angle to the story is an Oakland connection. I have been following the Instagram of Steven Vick, the green bean buyer world traveler and interesting person extraordinaire, for Blue Bottle Coffee. Much of my education on great coffee had been through Blue Bottle, at least 10 years ago at the Berkeley Farmers Market. Steven Vick had just been in Cali, and that was one thing that led me to contact the growers myself.  So the loop into my story is that right when I got there and met Felipe Paz, he pulled out a sachet of Blue Bottle roasted coffee, that had just won an award, and grinded it and prepared a Chemex.  So there I was sipping a coffee grown 2 hours from my house in Cali, and roasted in Oakland California a couple of weeks ago.   And futhermore, contemplate that the entire supply of this coffee is exported as green beans ( as is the majority of Colombian coffee) ,  so it is not available for purchase within Colombia!  

Thats $10 for 50grams of coffee, if you are lucky enough to find it

I learned a lot in a brief visit, how much extra they do to take care of the plants, ( 95 steps instead of a normal 16 steps)  how much care is taken in processing and post-processing, and a little bit about the super rarified high end trade.  Lots of fascinating parallels to wine in the terroir, the optimal stressing of the plant, the fragility of the sugars and when and how to harvest and select, etc.  

One super interesting thing I learned was about that the coffee in green form ( the way it is exported and the way I buy it at home) it is still a living seed.  A lot of the care of coffee is to dry it and keep it cool and conditioned, but keeping the living organism of the seed alive is a key to how long it will be storable.  

There is also a cool angle about how it is exported, all of the coffee is sold through a single exporter, Sustainable Harvest, but who is very open about connecting the roasters and the growers - an “open relationship model”  One other fascinating thing is that all these different awards at competitions are due to being roasted by all different roasters in the US ( who are competing with each other)  Imagine a wine competition where winemakers started with the same grapes and competed to beat each other with their own wines.  

One thing that is amazing to me is that the famous area for coffee the “Eje Cafetero” is North of Cali and towards Medellin. The new highly sought after places are several hours south, in Huila and Nariño.  But this amazing coffee is grown in nearby Valle de Cauca, only a couple of hours from Cali.  I have asked to visit the farm itself, but if not we will at least go and drive around in the area with some of our next visitors. 

And finally there is a terrible lack of good coffee in Cali, Colombia.  That is another long post, but sadly the gourmet coffee culture has yet to arrive here.  So it made getting to taste the best coffee in the world, in a warehouse in weird neighborhood.  ( the Taxi driver thought I was crazy - leading him around Barrio Industrial with my iphone) 

Deportivo Cali 4-3 over Los Milionarios de Bogota

We finally got to go see the local futbol team, Deportivo Cali, at the big stadium in the middle of town, Pascual Guerrero Stadium.

The drama was that the League plays 18 games and this was Week 15.  The top 8 teams get to classify for the tournament at the end of the year.  Deportivo Cali after a struggling season and a series of losses was in 7th place.  They had to win at least one more game to make it on to the tournament.  They faced perennial rivals the Milionarios de Bogota, who were in 9th place who had to win to make the tournament.  It was a beautiful night and a big game.

We had decided to go but at the last minute texted with our landlord who it turned out was also going, along with our neighbor. They came by to give us a ride and we didn’t know until it happened, but through connections (“palanca”) drove us right through the army, police, riot police, and barriers to park right in the stadium, and we to got to go in through the same door the players use from the bus to the locker rooms.  

And after arriving in stye, the game was awesome.   Tied, then the other team went ahead then tied again, then an amazing goal got called back, then tied from behind again late in the game, and a go-ahead goal with only a few minutes left. The amazing striker Miguel Morillo had 3 goals, and the team captain Andres Perez had the winning goal.  Cali won 4-3.  Amazing, on the front page of the paper and everyone talking about it for days.  ( watch all the goals here ) 

As visitors from another land the thing that impressed us was the singing and dancing of the Hincha, the fans, who take up the whole southern end of the stadium. Singing and dancing for over 2 hours, it was fun to watch from a distance, but is reportedly dangerous be any closer.  There are fences and police that separate the hincha from the “normal public” at all times.  

Ladrilleros, Whale watching, and the Pacific Coast

( the trip and photos are from a month ago - just getting around the adding a bit of writeup) 


The first trip we had was a great trip to the Pacific Coast just west of Cali. I was really curious to see what the coast would be like, as there are hundreds of kilometers of coastline with almost no development or tourist infrastructure.  How could this huge coast be so neglected and untraveled, and seemingly isolated from the rest of Colombia?  Futhermore, by a terrific coincidence, the night before we left we went to a festival of Afro-Pacific music in Cali ( which is worthy of its own post) and we loved it and we were excited by the love for African-Pacific  culture at the festival.  

The first challenge to getting to the coast was the harrowing bus ride over the mountains. It turned out that we had a super crazy driver who drove the bus as if it was a Ferarri, and was trying to beat his personal record from the other hundreds of times he had done the route. Leaving Cali it was straight up over the mountains on a twisty windy road for two hours.  I got sick, Simon got sick, and even Oliver, unable to see over the seats out the window and lured into watching Die Hard, got sick as well.  One interesting part was after we made it over the mountain and rejoined the bigger road, it was an amazing construction site, huge tunnels and bridges and a super impressive four lane divided highway in progress.  Because it turns out the port we were headed to, Buenaventura, handles 70 percent of Colombias trade, and there is a major effort underway to reduce travel times between Buenaventura and Bogota and other major cities.  Once we got to Buenaventura, we didn't really stay to look around, but headed right to the ferry dock to get on to our destination.  I was curious to look around, but the view of a big steamy port city, at low tide on a muddy estuary, was not very compelling.  

The next part of our journey was from Buenaventura to Ladrilleros on a ferry,  basically a huge panga, with a roof, a driver up in a cockpit, and twin 200s.  A nice trip out of the estuary and a few smaller stops before getting to Juanchaco.  Juanchaco had lots of life around the pier, with the watching of ferries and sightseeing coming and going. But the beach was quite polluted and litter strewn and not inviting.  The exciting part was that from there we were to head to the next town over, Ladrilleros on motos, so it was a driver, Kara and Oly on one moto, and another driver, Eric and Simon and the duffel bag on another moto. One dollar from dock to hotel.  Drove  around a huge navy base and through the town of Ladrilleros to our hotel.

The kids favorite transportation

Our hotel (http://www.reservaaguamarina.com/ ) was probably one of the best in town, but seemed pretty simple.  A few acres along the bluff with amazing sunset views, a nice pool with hangout area/ bar/ hammocks next to it, and a nice restaurant on the bluff with great views of the ocean. Whales were spotted from breakfast more than once.  We had a little cabin, with beds for kids upstairs, and bed for us downstairs. Rainwater showers were just outside.  Kara couldn’t believe that the hotel does not supply any drinking water, and we had to go to a store down the street to buy anything bigger than a tiny bottle.  

The town of Ladrilleros was an interesting little town.  In the interior there was one main muddy street, with shops, hotels, and restaurants along, and a mix of Colombian tourists and locals.  On the beach side, apparently there used to be a broad sandy beach with palms, that a tractor transport brought you along to the hotels. However the beach has all moved away, apparently is a few hundred meters offshore in a reef, but along most of the town and most of the town the cliffs go down directly to the waves.  We did go along the the beach in town, and the waves and water were nice, but the water is very murky/ cloudy with sediment, probably from the rivers up stream, and quite covered in garbage at the tideline, probably from Buenaventura.  

Simon and the high tide line

A society full of sandals and water bottles

We really liked walking around in the town, stopping in the shops to chat with people, and seeing the village life.  The town is mostly African-Colombian, with a mix of upland mestizo Colombians, and a few residents of a local Indigenous tribe.  At night we went to a concert at a cultural center in town, with Afro-Colombian kids in a marimba band, and women and girls from the nearby indigenous village doing traditional dance.   

The highlights of the tip were the two boat tours that we signed up for, whale watching, and jungle exploring.  For the whale watching tour we got to start out with the fun of tripling on a motorbike, back to the pier at Juanchaco, where we got some information about the local National Park, from a small Visitor Center there. And then into the panga not very far off shore to see the whales. Basically we mostly followed along a pair of baby and mother who were swimming along.  The baby was a month or two old and already as big as the panga.  The fun was the baby doing lots of breaching and getting its body out of the water. The mom mostly stayed alongside and shepherded the baby.  Another hightlight for me was the Isla de las Palmas, an awesome uninhabited island just behind where we were watching the whales. Plenty of nesting sea birds and sea caves, and looks like an awesome place  to go back and do a sea kayak.

baby humpback breaching

The second trip we didn't quite understand where we were going, but we walked from the hotel through the town, past the indigenous village, and down into a landing in the mangroves behind the town.  We had a small group, with a nice local guide we had met in town at a store near the hotel, and a canoe with a small motor.  We set out and had an entrancing ride through the mangroves, and the surrounding jungle.  First we headed upriver to a beautiful swimming hole, with a great jumping off spot, a nice waterfall to play on, and spectacular jungle all around.  We shared the swimming hole with another large group of Colombian tourists, but it was fun.  Next we headed down river and into the mangroves and out to the sea. We went out through the mouth of a huge sandbar to a small Afro-colombian community eponymously named Barra.  We had lunch of fresh fish on the beach, played soccer and made sandcastles.  We had a fun swim out in the waves, much cleaner this time, and a nice shave ice out in the middle of the beach.  The water temperature was just perfectly perfect.  

Overall on the trip we were just feeling like being travelers again, being out there in the day to day adventures, and how fun and good it felt to be doing it with the kids.  Certainly every day the kids had some low point or tough spot, but in generally it felt great to be out in new places and little villages exploring the world.  We felt pretty lucky, we had good weather and calm seas to see the whales, we had nice weather at the beach.  The next day it was rainy and the seas were  rough and we headed home.  We got Dramamine, good seats, and a nice safe driver on the way back over the mountain and got home fine.