Working

I had my first class this morning; a woman who works in the oil industry and just needs a bit of practice to to build up her confidence. I´ll be teaching her for two hours a day until the Easter break starts on Thursday and then after Semana Santa, as they call it, I should start to get more hours.

Shortly after I got back to the hostel today the most incredible storms began. Thunder was booming overhead, rain was lashing down and the streets were running deep with water. At the height of the storm an American bloke from Montana (who told me yesterday that he was at school with the creators of South Park and that the real-life Kyle was one of his best friends) burst into the hostel in a state of high excitment. He said he´d just been held up at knifepoint down the road and, in true mountain man style, was hoping to drum up a posse. German (pronounced Herman), the owner of the hostel, one of the most mild-mannered people imaginable, agreed to go along with him. Saying this he opened his desk and pulled out one of those truncheons that riot police use. The American bloke, Dave, didn´t have to look long for a weapon; a French girl happened to be in the process of showing off a machete she´d bought on the north coast.

I went with them down the street, armed only with my umbrella and wondering how much protection my tweed jacket would provide if anything kicked off.

It didn´t, of course, the kids who´d tried to rob Dave (he fended them off and ran away) were long gone. But it was funny to watch these two armed blokes strut down the street watched by the Bogotanos sheltering in doorways from the rain. Presumably they must have seen the attack as well. There was also quite a touching moment among all this machismo. About half way down the street German pointed with his cudgel to the side of the pavement, and there was a little bedraggled sparrow waiting for the rain to pass. It was amazing how something so small could so completely distract two men from thoughts of inflicting bodily mischief.

I´m still trying to find out about some bombs that blew up in a couple of buses here on Thursday. I´ve been asking people what happened exactly but none of them seem very interested. "Oh, yes, that. I think a boy died. I´m not sure, I´ve not seen the news," is the sort of response I get. The only reason I found out about it was because a lot of the buses are driving around now with white flags flying out of the windows. It´s hard to imagine a terrorist saying: "Oh, look, that driver has tied a dishcloth to a broom handle, we´d best not blow his bus up."

The weekend, was quite eventful. On Friday night I went with a couple of people from the hostel to see DJ Mina from Argentina. Our tickets told us it was to be held on top of a multi-storey carpark to the west of the city. When we arrived we were told the venue had moved, and the event was now being held in one of Bogota´s busiest clubs, far to the north of the city. We took a taxi there and found that the inevitable had happened; the club had already filled up with regular punters before hoards of wristband-wearing ticket holders arrived demanding entrance. Realising there was no hope of getting in, we went elsewhere. Eventually, at gone three, we went back to the club on the off-chance and this time we were successful. Stubbornly, we stayed until the very end to get our money´s worth.

After a long sleep on Saturday I was woken by a call from Lina, the English teacher I went out with the other night. She asked if I wanted to meet in half an hour to see an Australian circus troop who are in town for the Theatre Festival. This is quite an amazing event, there are productions from all over the world here along with about 80 Colombian groups. What makes it particularly amazing is that all the shows seem to be packed to capacity or sold out well in advance. This particular show was in a park, and free. After waiting for a friend of her´s to arrive (like all Latin people Colombians are habitually late) we got a taxi to the park where an audience of thousands surrounded the stage. The show was underway, and seemed very silly. We saw two ladies dressed in giant lampshades twirling around with umbrellas before a woman in a top hat came on and sang a song about her bottom. Then it ended. We had arrived exactly seven minutes before the end of the show. Thank God. If they were a British company no power on earth would have prevented me from angrily mounting the stage and, as an erstwhile British taxpayer, demanding a refund from their Arts Council subsidy.

After this Lina and I went for a bite to eat, a Colombian favourite called arepas. Horrible stuff. Imagine taking a crust of stale bread, adding rubber, grease and an unpleasant taste of old maize and there you have it. They´re usually eaten with the tasteless white stuff that passes for cheese here. While I was labouring my way through this unleaven purgatory I noticed that Lina had her eyes shut. I asked her why. "I always eat with my eyes shut. It helps me taste better," she said. Then she apologised, and fell asleep in the cafe. I left soon after, telling her I had to go out with some people leaving Bogota in the morning.

This was actually true, and a large group of us went to a cafe bar up the road that was hosting a concert by Colombia´s ´coolest´ new band. The ten members of the group obviously took this tag very seriously, and all wore 1950s sunglasses and ladies´overcoats over 1970 floral shirts. Despite looking like a Dame Edna Everage convention they were actually very good.