Travel to Bucaramanga

Hola from Bucaramanga, Colombia!

We decided that with the courts on strike,and we needed a change of scenery, that we would travel to another part of Colombia, where our friend Jose lives. Bucaramanga is a 1 hour flight from Bogota. We arrived here on Sunday.

This was the first flight for both Diego and Jeferson. We bought each one of them a small airplane to carry with them, as we travelled. It allowed us to show them what the plane was doing during the flight. Both of the boys enjoyed the flight, but were a little apprehensive during the flight. They both were scared with some of the turbulance that we encountered. We kept reassuring them that all was fine. Once they encountered the turbulence, and they were assurred we were OK, they had huge smiles on their faces. We are not sure what they said, but boy did they talk and laugh about it.

When we arrrived in Bucaramanga, Jose met us at the airport and took us to his house. His family planned a barbeque for us outdoors. They treated us to some authentic Colombian food.
All of it was delicious. We caught up on old imes and went throught Joses Photoablums of our time together in the states. We learned of the gratitute, relief, and sense of relief that developed inside Jose's house once he came into our family. Mos of the day was spend reminiscing and learning more about the familes. Late in the afternoon, we checked into our hotel. We are staying at a Country Club, where many parents adopting from Bucaramanga stay during the adoption process. It has a lot of room for the children to run around. Our room is a 2 room suite, so it is nice to have the extra space. The name of the place is Compestre Country Club and its web site is www.campestrebucaramanga.com should you want to check it out.

A bit about Bucaramanga. The city itself is surrounded by mountains. Sort of like sitting in the bottom of a bowl, although it is not a flat city by any imagination. It is not quite as "hilly" as San Francisco, CA, but more like a La Crosse, WI - except all you see around you is the INCREDIBLE mountains. They are incredibly steep, and so full of vegetation going up/down the mountain that you could be two metres from the road and not know anyone is there. I would also bet that anyone would be hard pressed to see the road from two meters away. Jose and his Papi say that Bucaramanga lies in a "plateau" in the mountain range, and I guess this is true if you compare the "hills" of Bucaramanga to steepness of the mountains.

Most of the plants/vegetation I can not identify here, but there is a lot of Bamboo, which I can identify, some sort of palm trees, and - believe it or not, a lot of ficus trees. You know the ones, they are so finicky that anytime there is even a mild change in atmosphere, temperature, humidity, (whatever) it will lose all its leaves, go dormant, and may very well give up on life (not that we would have ever killed such a plant in our lives - yah!). The flowers here are the MOST BRILLIANT colors I have ever seen. Deep yellows, purples, reds, blues and all the colors in between. Since we left the camera in the room today, we will need to take photos "manana" and add to this post, so please check back.

As for the kids today, it was not our best day. Each took turns being naughty! Thank God they seemed to do it in order versus at the same time. We are not sure what the deal is with them today. We are sort of perplexed as we really did not do much today. Pretty much a "normal" day - other than the new location. The usual! Wake up, breakfast, showers, a bit of play time with Madre while Papi worked for a few hours. Then "something" happened. Come lunch time, they would not eat, ran around like the wind, pulled Jose's wonderful dogs hair, ran a golf ball over the screen of the TV putting "little" scratches in it, etc, etc. Thought a walk/trip to the grocery store to burn off a little energy would do the trick. Seemed to make things worse. They took turns NOT walking with us, running ahead, walking behind (in the opposite direction), then throwing a tantrum when corrected. The latest for Jeferson is throwing himself on the ground. Not that big of a deal, but when we pick him up to "correct him" he will not put his legs down, keeps them bent at the knees, and will simply allow himself to be placed back onto the ground in a laying position. Diego did this only three times today after Jeferson , but Jeferson much have did this over 15 times today. In fact, Jeferson had a piggy back ride virtually the entire 15 minute walk to the store (guess who is training who here). PAPI NO FELIZE! Once in the store, they were both placed into a "car" grocery cart just to have an opinion on EVERYTHING that went into cart. Both kids were given dinner tonight, then put to bed around 7:00 as Papi and Mami had about had it.

We broke out the Baileys Irish Cream.

Madre called her sister (for two hours) and Papi went to Jose's house to watch the Packer Game (Boo Hoo all you Viking fans - GO PACK!).

Tomorrow, we do it all over again - better days are on their way - we are keeping the faith.

Check Pack! (sorry no typo) for the pics.

Eric, Joyce, Diego, and Jeferson.

By the way - Welcome to Colombia Dolci and Johnny! We await news about Manny and your new familia!