I've just arrived in Bogotá for what I hope will be the next few years. I'm excited to be back in a Spanish speaking country, and hope to perfect my Spanish whilst I'm here. Below are a few of my first impressions.
Altitude:
The plane dropped down to land – but not at zero metres – Bogotá is at 2600 metres! Watch for headaches, breathlessness, light-headedness I was warned. Fortunately I had none of those symptoms, just jetlag!
Weather:
Bogotá has year round weather just like early British summer I was told. It started well, landing with fading golden light as the sun was going down. The sun rises and falls at the same time year round (around 6am/6pm) so it was dark by the time I got to my hotel. When I woke early (jet lag) I watched the sun come up over Bogotá.
This nice weather didn’t last long though. Most days it’s been changeable with both sun and rain, and especially these months (Oct-Nov) there’s mostly rain. A few nights ago we had more than rain though when we were caught in a hail storm! This, apparently, is unusual here.
Traffic:
With a city of 8 million people, there are inevitably many cars! The infrastructure is modern, using a grid system, though unable to cope with so many cars! I am impressed with the number of people who cycle (using helmets!) and the main roads all have bike paths (ciclorutas). On Sundays and public holidays many roads are closed for the ciclovías (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciclov%C3%ADa#Origins_in_Colombia).
Halloween:
I was surprised at how much Halloween was celebrated. At least with people dressing up – I don’t know if there was any trick or treating.
At breakfast I was greeted by devils:
and on the street there were a variety of outfits:
City views:
Though it’s a big city there appear to be numerous parks and ‘zonas verdes’. I note many dog walkers – though often not their own dogs as they walk 6 or 7 dogs at a time!
And of course there are lots of churches, being a Catholic country.
Food:
Colombian food is not spicy. There are lots of street stands selling Tinto (black coffee), fresh juice, buñuelos and more…
In the capital the food seems to be heavy with carbohydrates and platanos, though I’m told as you get to the coast there’s more fish and coconut. I’ve been trying to taste some local food whenever I can. The most common Bogotán dish is Ajiaco which is a soup with potatoes, chicken and coriander. I enjoyed mine with some guayaba juice.
Arepas (corn and cheese patties) are also very popular.
Breakfast could be tamales (potato mixture wrapped in banana leaves)
or empanadas (with tea of course – the English in me!).
Common snacks are buñuelos and pandebono (both filled with cheese).
or obleas (these are wafers filled with caramel – I’ve yet to find these at the street stands).
Drinks include Avena (oat milk)
or aguadepanela (sugar cane paste melted in hot water).
