Random photos -- not Caribbean paradise

Just to catch up a bit with photos, here are a few more photos for you. I have a whole stack of stuff from the vacation but I'm a stickler for chronology.

A shot of the complex we live in, complete with gym, pool, and bullfighting ring. Well ... the bullfighting ring is real, except that I saw a rock concert there. I've never seen a bull there. Our building is barely in the picture on the right.

Another shot of chez nous, but this time from Monserrate, a church on a mountain at the edge of town. It's an hour of absolute misery going up, a brief respite at the top, and knee-killing steps all the way down. Good times. Or chevere (cool), as they say here. See the tall brown buildings in the middle? We live in the short one on the left. Does anyone else remember Sim City?

Here's a photo of Monserrate from outside our building.

Another shot from the top, just in case you don't remember Sim City. It really did look something like this, but with better animations.

For all you économie de développement nerds, here's an example of a so-called 'problème de développement' from the path up Monserrat. My expert translation says this means, 'Watch out, falling stuff!, go around on the right.' Problem is, it says to go to the right on both sides, so going up the mountain you risk getting killed by falling stuff because you stay to the right, which is the side where stuff is falling if you're going up ... nevermind ... it was funny at the time.

Speaking of which, all this fruit and veggies and milk in plastic bags cost about $12. Mmmmmm ...

Totally unrelated: A photo of the gang plus some of Vania's (Mexican girl in my masters) cool friends.

Now for some random photos from our first trip outside Bogota. Note the positive image of the US abroad, sighted in a Bogota shanty town. Yes, that's Colombia and the world dangling from each of the puppetmaster's hands. Following, a random mountain village, just to show you what they're like.

And now a few from my first research trip with Margot. Indigenous village + thatched roof + nice views = nifty.

And here is what the Colombian countryside looks like.

Actually, most of it looks nothing like this, the country is unbelievably diverse, which you'll see in the next week as I finally get around to posting vacation and other trip photos.

And in case any of you are still reading this far down, I apologize for being so damn slow about replying to emails: pure laziness and an excessive taste for tech web sites and other miscellaneous, pointless distractions. That and trying to do research, and learn Spanish, etc, of course. But I will get to it, I really will.