Saturday March 26th 2011:
On Saturday I met up with one of the other AIESEC trainees, Leo from Guatemala to head to the center of the city to Parque Berrío and more specifically Plazoleta de Esculturas, where the famous statues of Fernando Botero are. Botero is a famous Colombian artist (still alive today) that is known for his "voluminous" figures in his works of art. "The figures painted and sculpted by Botero are not really "fat", they are his formal bid for expressing the sensuality of form, to explore the possibilities of volume and to give monumentality to the protagonists of his pictorial world" (From Museo de Antioquia).
"I fatten my characters to give them sensuality. I'm not interested in fat people for the sake of fat people. What I say is that they are not fat, but voluminous. If I make a fruit, a landscape, an animal, a man, anything, it is deformation to exalt volume. So I do not see them as fat but as voluminous." - Fernando Botero.
Plazoleta de Esculturas is a great place to go to get a taste of the kind of artist Botero is, as there are about 20 different statues located within the plaza, ranging from animals to different types of people. Leo and I had a lot of fun taking pictures with the different statues. I definitely recommend checking it out if you decide to come visit Medellín.
Next, Leo and I decided to check out the Museo of Antioquia which is located next to the Plaza with the Botero statues. It was the first Colombian museum I have been to since arriving. This museum was great as it had all kinds of Botero works of art ranging from more sculptures, to paintings and drawings. There was even two paintings by Botero which depicted the death of Pablo Escobar, also really interesting to see.
We met up with Kevin from Australia after checking out the museum. We all got guarapo and then walked through the markets of the downtown core. As it was a very hot day, probably around 30 degrees, I decided to buy a traditional Paisa (paisa is the word for the people of Antioquia) hat. After negotiating down the price in Spanish with the man who sold the hats, I was feeling and looking very Paisa. Next, we stopped at an empanada restaurant for some lunch, and then continued to Parque San Antonio. After walking through the downtown, Leo and I headed to the metro to go on the second MetroCable (different from the one I went on in my first weekend of Medellín). Oddly enough, we ran into other Aiesec trainees, who were also going to the MetroCable, so we all went up together. This MetroCable was a bit more scary than the first one I went on... it's VERY steep, and also stopped half way at one point, which freaked me out, as we were quite high from the ground. But the views were stunning, especially when we reached the top, and walked around for a bit.
At the top there was a man selling guarapo, and since Im obsessed with it, I obviously got more. Guarapo is a drink made from the juices of raw sugar cane, so it's really sweet, but very refreshing and is normally served with lime. This is how is made and then enjoyed :)
At night I had the chance to go to a real salsa club called Cien Fuegos (one hundred fires) with a couple of friends. This salsa club had a live band, and even professional dancers who would come on once every hour and showcase their impressive dancing talents. When we arrived to the club it was still a bit early, so no one was really on the dance floor yet, so within about 5 minutes of sitting down, 3 professional dancers came up to our table and asked us all to dance (they do this to start encouraging people to dance). I looked at my friends, scared, and asking them now??? we just got here! They nodded, and I was pulled onto the dance floor. My dancing partner took my arm and walked me to the dance floor, and as we were making our way there, I apologized to him in advance (in Spanish), saying how I was Canadian and therefore not a very good salsa dancer. He told me not to worry, saying it was easy and he would show me the steps. After getting over my shyness, I quickly got into the swing of things and picked up the dance steps rather quickly. The rest of the night was spent dancing to various salsa songs, and watching everyone dance (which was equally impressive as the professional dancers, for me at least). The music was incredible, even if we weren't dancing, you couldn't help yourself but shimmy your shoulders or tap your feet to the music, it's just so infectious. I love it.
Sunday March 27th 2011
On Sunday the trainees and our Colombian friends Sara and Laura headed to the Botanical Gardens of Medellín, In the botanical gardens you can see a wide variety of exotic plants, and flowers, and there is even a butterfly sanctuary with all different kinds of butterflies inside it. It's also a really good place to have a picnic, and just relax under the sun. We were all pretty tired from the day/night before so at one point we all laid down under a palm tree, listening to Bob Marley play in the distance. It was very relaxing.
After checking out the botanical gardens we grabbed some lunch at a restaurant near by and had a traditional Colombian lunch. This consisted of meat, rice, beans, salad, arepa, and french fries. Delicious and pretty cheap, they go for about $7.000 pesos which is about $4.50/$5. Once we finished our lunch, we walked across the street to Parque de los Deseos (Park of the Wishes), which is a park that is filled with children and families on a sunday. They have water fountains and pumps, as well as sand areas for children to play in. Great place to go if you have a family.
After seeing both parks, we headed to a discoteca that Kevin had been to before. It offered free 3 hour dance lessons on Sundays, all you had to do was buy a beer to take part. The dance instructor was teaching Porro, which is sort of like the Cumbia. We had 3 girls and 3 boys, so it was the perfect amount of people to do dance lessons. I went back and forth between Lucho and Leo, while learning the (at times) complicated dance steps. We all had a lot of fun, and I was able to learn a new latin dance! Below is a video of what Porro looks like, the first minute is pretty much what we learned to do in 3 hours haha.
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