Life for oldies.
So this is what happens to me when I stay up way past my bedtime three nights in a row, accompanied by party aids such as drinks and Colombian white: I get sick, feverish and feel like hell. Wednesday night we went out for drinks with friends from the hostel, Chris, Mattias, a guy named Jay from NoCal, Natalia and Gabriel. I stuck with my usual brandy and got toasty right after only one shot of the brown heady stuff. Friday we went with a group of French-speaking Colombians and Swiss early to a reopening reception of a French hotel here in Bogota, where Natalia was showing some of her works. We were still feeling quite thirsty afterward so someone suggested heading to the Quebrada de Canto, a famous old salsa bar down the street that`s actually quite reminiscent, aesthetically and structurally, of the House of Blues. I tried to learn to dance, when I got my nerve up, but with two left feet and hips made of unrelenting bamboo, my dance partner could only laugh and suggest we try again another time. We all walked back together at 2 a.m. and bumped into a very drunk and gregarious (more than usual) Jay, who with full of drink seemed a little more sober than he is normally. He hadn`t carried his blunt sword with him that night, so we were worried he`d get mugged. After 20 minutes of straightening and restraightening him out, he left us to find another bar. I miss Jay. You`d miss him too if you met him, heavy Indian accent and all, a guy who talks a mile a minute and even faster once he gets excited about something. I wish I could have seen the sword in person.
But it was Friday night that did me in. We started in the north, to do some errands, and then headed out to Socorro to see Rodrigo, Gabriel`s best friend, also a DJ. Socorro has sort of become my second home already. It`s a two-level bar, chic on the ground floor but very much like a warehouse in the basement. I had just finished a wonderfully impressive meal at Wok -- their pad thai was as authentic as I`ve had it in Thai Town -- so all that energy needed to go somewhere. Unfortunately the music at Socorro that night left a lot to be desired, so we headed to a new bar down the street, a goth place that looked a bit like Sinister in L.A. In fact, the DJ there used to play at Sinister and was happy to share stories with me about his former life living in Brentwood (yea, what self-respecting goth would live in Brentwood and moreover, be happy about sharing the fact?). But the guy played good music, New Order included. Next door upstairs was a punk rock place, so kids with mohawks and army boots would come trampling down every few minutes.
Just when I was on my 50th yawn, we took a cab back to La Candelaria, to a club where Gabriel´s playing on Wednesday. We wanted to check it out and I dare say it`s actually a nice place, with a good sound system. That`s something hard to come by here. I met two guys, one from Venezuela and his friend from here, who were completely enthralled with me because I`m Asian (BIG yawn). I gotta say that I dont nearly get this type of attention in the states so yea, I gotta work it when I can, right? Gotta make up for all those times I`m openly harassed and stared at on the street for being slanty eyed.
After that party, we wanted more drinks so we ended up in this tiny apartment a few blocks away, completely dark and stuffy inside. In the main room was a giant bed --and nothing else -- on the floor with four people piled into it (all clothed, thank god). I was with a group of 6 others and we were all supposed to drink here? One of the guys I`d been introduced to a few times and we said hello. He always struck me as kind of odd, and I was confirmed that night. We stood around awkwardly for a few minutes and slowly left one by one -- we had walked into some a place with really weird vibes and really, it could have been a scene out of Trainspotting, small mirrors on the side of the bed and all.
Yea, so fast forward to the next day, when I woke up at 1 p.m. and felt like a knife was stuck into my head and held there. I went back to bed at 8 p.m. after backing out of a dinner invite too late and didnt wake up till 11 the next morning. I had afternoon plans already though -- after hitting the antique flea market here (a really good one in fact, in which you can find an antique dentist`s chair for only $50 U.S. but no dildos unlike some of the other ones in the city), a guy Gabriel met at the dinner party the night before took us to the notorious south, where he lives. The south of Bogota used to be very dangerous, but now it`s only relegated to the deep south of town. Juan works at a leather tanning factory where he has his own investment interests in the company, so he works a lot. He`s the only person I`ve met who has a car and was glad to take us on a tour around the city, and out of Bogota, to the nearby mountains where we could smell fresh air and be delighted by how even colder it is in the higher elevation. On the way back we stopped by a small roadside food/drink place so I could try canelazo, which is hot sugar water with a shot of aguardiente. Aguardiente is distinctly Colombian, a drink made with anise and sugarcane. It`s strong and doesnt taste so great to a foreign tongue like mine, but I was grateful for the warmth it brought. Inside we were novelties for the locals who stop by the place on their way home -- they wanted me to play rana, a game similar to skeeball in which you throw metal discs from a certain distance away into two frogs` mouths. If one of your disks make it in (and it`s a hard thing to make happen), the disks roll down into a random slot with a number at the end -- those are your points. I need more practice. One of the guys, an older mechanical engineer who was incarcarated for three years because he was accused of being a drug trafficker and now can`t come to the U.S. because of his record, insisted I try some homebrewed aguardiente, straight. Agh. Everyone was looking at me and in these situations, you have to do it or you`re seen as rude. I humbly held my head high and took the shot down as fast as I could. Smooth, ahhh, thank god. 10 minutes later, it was insisted that I take another shot. Really, I couldn`t say no. So down it went, and back up came a little of it. I was happy they didnt insist on making me drink more. That stuff doesnt taste like candy.
So now I`m here, sitting with sensitive teeth making me cringe every 10 minutes. I got my teeth whitened this morning for only the U.S. equivalent of $90. I am hoping my teeth won`t fall out tomorrow morning, but it will be what I deserve for this vanity.
But it was Friday night that did me in. We started in the north, to do some errands, and then headed out to Socorro to see Rodrigo, Gabriel`s best friend, also a DJ. Socorro has sort of become my second home already. It`s a two-level bar, chic on the ground floor but very much like a warehouse in the basement. I had just finished a wonderfully impressive meal at Wok -- their pad thai was as authentic as I`ve had it in Thai Town -- so all that energy needed to go somewhere. Unfortunately the music at Socorro that night left a lot to be desired, so we headed to a new bar down the street, a goth place that looked a bit like Sinister in L.A. In fact, the DJ there used to play at Sinister and was happy to share stories with me about his former life living in Brentwood (yea, what self-respecting goth would live in Brentwood and moreover, be happy about sharing the fact?). But the guy played good music, New Order included. Next door upstairs was a punk rock place, so kids with mohawks and army boots would come trampling down every few minutes.
Just when I was on my 50th yawn, we took a cab back to La Candelaria, to a club where Gabriel´s playing on Wednesday. We wanted to check it out and I dare say it`s actually a nice place, with a good sound system. That`s something hard to come by here. I met two guys, one from Venezuela and his friend from here, who were completely enthralled with me because I`m Asian (BIG yawn). I gotta say that I dont nearly get this type of attention in the states so yea, I gotta work it when I can, right? Gotta make up for all those times I`m openly harassed and stared at on the street for being slanty eyed.
After that party, we wanted more drinks so we ended up in this tiny apartment a few blocks away, completely dark and stuffy inside. In the main room was a giant bed --and nothing else -- on the floor with four people piled into it (all clothed, thank god). I was with a group of 6 others and we were all supposed to drink here? One of the guys I`d been introduced to a few times and we said hello. He always struck me as kind of odd, and I was confirmed that night. We stood around awkwardly for a few minutes and slowly left one by one -- we had walked into some a place with really weird vibes and really, it could have been a scene out of Trainspotting, small mirrors on the side of the bed and all.
Yea, so fast forward to the next day, when I woke up at 1 p.m. and felt like a knife was stuck into my head and held there. I went back to bed at 8 p.m. after backing out of a dinner invite too late and didnt wake up till 11 the next morning. I had afternoon plans already though -- after hitting the antique flea market here (a really good one in fact, in which you can find an antique dentist`s chair for only $50 U.S. but no dildos unlike some of the other ones in the city), a guy Gabriel met at the dinner party the night before took us to the notorious south, where he lives. The south of Bogota used to be very dangerous, but now it`s only relegated to the deep south of town. Juan works at a leather tanning factory where he has his own investment interests in the company, so he works a lot. He`s the only person I`ve met who has a car and was glad to take us on a tour around the city, and out of Bogota, to the nearby mountains where we could smell fresh air and be delighted by how even colder it is in the higher elevation. On the way back we stopped by a small roadside food/drink place so I could try canelazo, which is hot sugar water with a shot of aguardiente. Aguardiente is distinctly Colombian, a drink made with anise and sugarcane. It`s strong and doesnt taste so great to a foreign tongue like mine, but I was grateful for the warmth it brought. Inside we were novelties for the locals who stop by the place on their way home -- they wanted me to play rana, a game similar to skeeball in which you throw metal discs from a certain distance away into two frogs` mouths. If one of your disks make it in (and it`s a hard thing to make happen), the disks roll down into a random slot with a number at the end -- those are your points. I need more practice. One of the guys, an older mechanical engineer who was incarcarated for three years because he was accused of being a drug trafficker and now can`t come to the U.S. because of his record, insisted I try some homebrewed aguardiente, straight. Agh. Everyone was looking at me and in these situations, you have to do it or you`re seen as rude. I humbly held my head high and took the shot down as fast as I could. Smooth, ahhh, thank god. 10 minutes later, it was insisted that I take another shot. Really, I couldn`t say no. So down it went, and back up came a little of it. I was happy they didnt insist on making me drink more. That stuff doesnt taste like candy.
So now I`m here, sitting with sensitive teeth making me cringe every 10 minutes. I got my teeth whitened this morning for only the U.S. equivalent of $90. I am hoping my teeth won`t fall out tomorrow morning, but it will be what I deserve for this vanity.
posted by Chocolat at 12:03 PM
1 Comments:
You can take the girl out of L.A., but you can't take the L.A. out of the girl--you got your teeth whitened? Holy crap.
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