Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Another Mini City Tour
On Friday we had another mini city tour, this time with our culture teacher. (Last week was with the grammar teacher) First we went to an area of Barranquilla called Las Flores, lots and lots of little fish restaurants since it's right on the river. It was EXTREMELY windy. I had an blended iced lemonade, which I promptly spilled down my front when I tipped the cup towards me while using the straw. I hate that :P But I seem to do it often. Which is why, much as I hate to use the plastic, I generally try to get a top for things whenever possible...
Next we stopped by La Aduana - the old Customs building. It's a beautiful place that now has a big library, a little art gallery (that had an exhibit of abstracted Carnaval themes, I wish now I'd taken some pictures...) and also lots of offices. Next to La Aduana is a the first train station in Colombia, and also an old Train Engine. I'd been there before but this time there was a guide, and it was fun to actually understand a lot of what he was talking about (not just the words but the concepts) because we'd been learning about a lot of them in class already.
Finally we drove through El Centro - the historic central part of Barranquilla. It's busy and bustling but also a very poor area. They call the residential parts "Barrios de invasion" - Neighborhoods of invasion - where poor people come in the night and just quickly build a living structure and then over time as they come across things materials etc, they slowly build up cement walls and such until they have a proper house and the city pretty much has no choice but to give them a paper saying "ok, this is officially your house". Seems like kind of a weird concept, but I guess that's how it used to be really in other countries too...
Click on any of the pictures to go to my flickr site for more photos from the tour day.
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