Three minute updates...

I've decided that each time I sit down to the computer I will spend three minutes on an uber short update.
But since I've had a fantastic last week. I'll spend a bit more time.


6/07/09 - 6/12/09
Arrived to a Finca owned by CS Felipe (from Cali). Fincas are my favorite. I'm now on a quest to find more. It was outside of the town Rozo. There was absolutely nothing there except an amazing family of six who took care of the grounds, an 80 year old man who worked for the family for years, huge fruit trees (hooray for guayava!!!), a cutie dog, hammocks galore, birds of all sorts singing at every hour, a hornet's nest in my bedroom, amazing cooking, and and and... I loved it. The grounds were more than perfect. The flowers were gorgeous. The grass was like a golf course. I stayed there with CS Cristian for five days. A little too long for my taste, only because there is so much more to see in Colombia, but...

Check out photos of the finca on my travel buddy Cristian's site.
http://fotoscristiannavarro.blogspot.com/


6/12/09
We headed back to Cali to meet with CS Jaime. We attended the birthday party for Farid Mondragon, an extremely famous goalie for a soccer team in Colombia. About every Colombian I meet is extremely envious.
More importantly, the party was for kids with cancer. There were at least 70 happy kids bouncing around, some with no hair, others with large braces, some with deformities, but all laughing at the four clowns running the show. To see all of them meeting their personal hero Farid, a once-in-a-lifetime moment, was amazing.
Cris and I traveled to Armenia to meet CS Camilo and Juanita... And seven other CS members sleeping on the floor! CS Bernardo, Melek, Cielo, Uri, Sebastian, Emily, Cesar, and Marie.

6/13/09
Uri, Cris, and I headed to a Mariposario, a butterfly farm, outside of Armenia. The grounds were SO lovely - We hardly saw any butterflies in the enclosed garden, but we did have a four hour tour walking amongst rare trees, flowers, and shrubs, and learning about both them and native species. I took a substantial amount of photos. I thought of my mum and also missed my own flower gardens. It was an amazing time.
BEST part of the entire trip: Remember Slimy the Worm from Sesame Street? I found him in the gardens. And he even wanted to crawl on my finger!!! I actually believe it was Slimy Jr - Because he was only about 1cm long. I laughed hard.

6/14/09
Mari (France), Cris, and I headed to a coffee plantation. We followed the entire process from harvesting the bean, husking it, drying the green seed, roasting it, and tasting two types of coffee beverages, both Chaqueta and Tinto. By the way - you need 7 grams of finely ground beans per 100cm cup of coffee, and you do need to heat it to precisely 22 degrees C. By the way - Please wait four minutes for the filtration process to complete.
Sleep: Armenia at Camilo's house. He and Juanita are SO wonderful! They play 50's and 60's music from the US all the time. :)

6/15/09
Cris and I wandered downtown Armenia. It was far from impressive. Noteworthy moment: I was wandering in the main square looking at screenprint art exposition and happened by a little cafe. The blaring music? KENNY G!!!! AHHHH! Memories of my mom endlessly playing the music as I was growing up! (Now where are my disks of Enya???)