long weekend
Right, since I've been receiving a few complaints that this blog has been full of "moralising and sociological bullshit" (to quote one of the highly sensitive individuals that commented on one of the entries), I've decided to include something that has absolutely nothing to do with the work I've been doing.
This long weekend a few of the other interns from the project came to visit Bucaramanga and to go to San Gil, which is a town that's just over two hours away, famous for whitewater rafting, caving, abseiling, rockclimbing and paragliding. On Saturday morning, Sam (Switwzerland), Ranko (Holland), Amit (India) and Jean-Maxime (the French part of Canada) arrived in Bucaramanga at about 6am, but since I slept in, I went and met up with them a few hours later. During the morning I took them to Girón, which is a small colonial town near Bucaramanga, and then in the afternoon we met up with Carlos Leon (from Bucaramanga, and the virtual dialogue manager for the project we're working on), Christian (another intern who's working in Bogotá), and Andres (the Colombian guy I'm working with) The plan was to head out to a town called Piedecuesta and use it as a jumping-off point for another town, but we ran out of time, so we decided to spend a few hours in Piedecuesta instead. There's not really that much to do in Piedecuasta, so we ended up going to a tejo club to have a few beers. Tejo is a game that's quite popular here in Colombia, and played mostly by men (I didn't see a single woman in the place we were in, so it's clearly not a place to go if you want to pick up - in fact, the only thing you're likely to pick up is a viral infection from the open urinal). It's a pretty simple game that involves lobbing an iron weight at a raised platform made of mud, in the centre of which is a small triangle of phosphorus that's placed on top of a small metal ring. The idea is to get the weight to hit the phosphorus so that it explodes and burns. Some people take it pretty seriously, but I think that for most men it nothing more than an excuse to spend the afternoon on the piss with their mates, away from the watchful eye of their wife or girlfriend. Either way, it was fun to try it, but I can't see myself getting hooked - it's not the most interesting game in the world, and once the initial thrill of making something explode wears of it's even less interesting. It's a lot like lawn bowls, in that the main attraction is that it's a game that even the least fit of us can play - and you can even do it while you get on the piss.
This long weekend a few of the other interns from the project came to visit Bucaramanga and to go to San Gil, which is a town that's just over two hours away, famous for whitewater rafting, caving, abseiling, rockclimbing and paragliding. On Saturday morning, Sam (Switwzerland), Ranko (Holland), Amit (India) and Jean-Maxime (the French part of Canada) arrived in Bucaramanga at about 6am, but since I slept in, I went and met up with them a few hours later. During the morning I took them to Girón, which is a small colonial town near Bucaramanga, and then in the afternoon we met up with Carlos Leon (from Bucaramanga, and the virtual dialogue manager for the project we're working on), Christian (another intern who's working in Bogotá), and Andres (the Colombian guy I'm working with) The plan was to head out to a town called Piedecuesta and use it as a jumping-off point for another town, but we ran out of time, so we decided to spend a few hours in Piedecuesta instead. There's not really that much to do in Piedecuasta, so we ended up going to a tejo club to have a few beers. Tejo is a game that's quite popular here in Colombia, and played mostly by men (I didn't see a single woman in the place we were in, so it's clearly not a place to go if you want to pick up - in fact, the only thing you're likely to pick up is a viral infection from the open urinal). It's a pretty simple game that involves lobbing an iron weight at a raised platform made of mud, in the centre of which is a small triangle of phosphorus that's placed on top of a small metal ring. The idea is to get the weight to hit the phosphorus so that it explodes and burns. Some people take it pretty seriously, but I think that for most men it nothing more than an excuse to spend the afternoon on the piss with their mates, away from the watchful eye of their wife or girlfriend. Either way, it was fun to try it, but I can't see myself getting hooked - it's not the most interesting game in the world, and once the initial thrill of making something explode wears of it's even less interesting. It's a lot like lawn bowls, in that the main attraction is that it's a game that even the least fit of us can play - and you can even do it while you get on the piss.
posted by Steve Phillips at 2:11 pm
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