Parque de la 93

Last night I promised you a much less rushed and infinitely more vivid account of Bogota through the eyes of one famously fatigued business traveler who lives for being significantly less bullish on the business of business than on the alacrity of the ad-lib. Espero que estas listos pero el tiempo ha venido!

It was a famously tough day at the office yesterday and the ride home was no cup of tea either, but I think I mentioned that yesterday. No need to re-hash on such a colossal commute, as I know that like you, I too am eager to get to the good part. Today's ride home was much better, but we'll get to that later. After waiting in the rain and lamenting about how I wish I handn't forgotten my scarf and gloves, I was more than ready to let a superb gastric experience take me away. A good meal could surely take me away, away from the sleep deprivation and the annoyances of a fickle product that seems to be one part sadist and two parts prankster as it routinely picks the most public and significantly inopportune times to get performance anxiety.

Indeed the food was good, but my taste buds would not begin to tell even half of the story. The Devil was truly in the details on this evening, and he may have even had a heart. Who knew? But maybe it was a ploy to get me softened up and off my game for the struggles that awaited me at work today. Whatever it was, it was a perfectly placed diversion, timed with the precision of a swiss jeweler. We hadn't been seated for two minutes when the thick, grey blanket of clouds that had been subtley brushing a cool mist across my face burst into an explosion of silver dollar sized rain drops as if the sky was a big slot machine and God decided that it was time for somebody to get paid. What good fortune we had not to get caught in this watery onslaught, especially me in wool P coat and cotton skull cap. I almost completely tuned out of the conversation at the table and got lost in each splattering drop as it hit the pavement like a thousand tiny snare drums. It's not like I was an integral part of the discussion, scarcely understanding most of what was being said. The Chileans (I'm with a Chilean client, helping to set up a trial at a Colombian communications company) chop up the spanish language with a rapid-fire delivery of words that is much more AK-47 than the rhythmic sing-songiness of the spanish spoken by Mexicans and even the colombians that I have encountered thus far. Occasionally, one of them (the one that speaks english) will stop to translate a particularly good story, but much of the time I just get lost for significant parts of their conversations. Not to worry though because the individual raindrops were dotting the canvas, whose background of el Parque de la 93 had already been filled in, like they were controlled by the brush of impressionist artist Georges Seuratt painting his Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte and I was completely under its spell.

I wondered if anyone else noticed how spectacular this park was? It was downright breathtaking, and even more so in this weather. The vertically pointed, inset spotlights on the walkways were shining with such an intensity that steam was dancing off them, but in slow motion. It wasn't the eerie slow motion of a cemetery scene from a horror movie, but rather a surreal and anything but sinister, if not seductive pace. The decorative lamps, placed just far enough apart so that night time still looks like night time worked in concert with the small fountain pools to make a case that the very overstated and decadent hydraulically powered, mega fountain extravaganza at the Bellagio is a sign of the apocalypse. I was even taken by the trees (acacia? eucalyptus? I don't know..i'm no botanist that's for sure) and how they framed the park like a nice crown moulding, with neatly trimmed hedges as base boards. Do we have parks this nice in the United States? Maybe I never notice. But maybe, just maybe, the urban planners here took special care of this detail knowing that the ripple effect of satisfied patrons returning to the surrounding restaurants like Pesquera Jaramillo from whose window I delighted in a hearty paella would stimulate an economy for years to come.

I dined at Cafe Renault this evening, almost directly across the park, but not nearly as close to the window. Whatever the view of the outside may have lacked here, the visuals on the inside did their best to make up for as fabulously prepared, pretty food and pretty people were in no short supply. The subtle Chilean Shiraz (Tabali 2005, from the Limari Valley) very nicely set up the roast beef with tangy mustard sauce that I did my best to get through before my Mortons-esque warm melted chocolate centered, chocolate cake and cafe con leche wrapped the evening.

Our taxi driver, Juan, took the long way home in today's curiously lighter traffic to showcase the very spectacular mountainside residential neighborhoods and accompanying views among other things. I can't wait to spend some more time checking out these locales that easily give San Francisco's hilly streets a run for the money.