Dispatch from Bogotá!

Yes, you read that right, we're finally in Bogotá. We arrived at 3:30, but let's start at the beginning.

Kristin went with Alexander and the lawyer this morning to get his passport. He's still legally a Colombian citizen so we had to get a Colombian passport. The reason for going to Bogotá is that we have to get a Visa for him to travel to the US. The moment we land in the US he automatically becomes a US citizen and the Colombian passport becomes null and void.

Kristin was gone by the time I showered and got to breakfast, usually in the hotel we ate together as a family but it didn't work out this morning. Somebody, I'm not mentioning any names, took over an hour getting ready this morning, and she, whoops, I mean "they" left me to entertain Alexander so I wasn't able to get ready in time to eat breakfast with them.

I went down to breakfast and as I was eating all the staff came to my table to shake my hand and some of the ladies hugged and kissed me to bid me farewell. As much as I wanted to get out of that place I will miss these warm and kind people.

After breakfast I went up to the room to wait for Kristin. I had asked Enrique what time checkout was but he insisted that we stay and relax, let the baby take a nap and so on before going to the aeropuerto. Lunch doesn't begin until 12:30 but he also insisted having the cooks make us lunch at 12:00 so we could eat before we left. When they got back Xander took a short nap and we packed our stuff to go.

We were hanging out on the porch until it was time to leave. I was entertaining Xander and talking to Peter and Cecilia from Sweden. Kristin went inside to settle the bill. When she came out she had tears in her eyes. "What happened Kristin? Did Enrique yell at you?" I said in mock outrage. Everyone laughed. It turns out that all the staff came to bid Kristin farewell as they had with me in the morning which was very touching to her. Enrique came out to say goodbye and got choked up too, which made me get choked up.

Enrique's wife ended up taking us to the airport. We were sitting in the car in the hotel parking lot waiting for the security guard to open the gate and Kristin said she couldn't believe they fit all of our luggage in what seemed like a really small trunk. One of the men who does general work around the hotel packed the car. "Should we check and make sure that it's all there?" "Yeah, probably a good idea." It turns out that three of our huge suitcases were still in the room. He thought we had carried everything down and had only packed the bags on the porch. I can't even imagine what would have happened if we had left our luggage at the hotel and had gone to the airport without it. We almost did.

An interesting transformation occurred when we got to the airport. We became "baby people". You know, the people that everyone at the gate sees and thinks to themselves, "Oh god, I hope that couple with the baby doesn't sit next to me on the plane!" I've said that to myself many times. On the flip side, there also seem to be some perks to being "baby people". When we got to the ticket counter one of the airline representatives pulled us from the back of a twenty person long line and directed us to the empty preferred customer line. The same thing happened when Kristin went to get the passport this morning.

Xander dealt with the flight really well, he actually got more impatient waiting for the flight than when we were on the plane. Let's just say this, by the end of the flight he was VERY relaxed, and I don't mean he was sleeping. You could just sense something in the air.

I've never seen people push and shove to get off a plane like this before in my life! That's my boy!

The scenery from Calí to Bogotá was beautiful. There were miles and miles of wonderful lush green mountain ranges. It was breathtaking.

Manuela, our Bogotá version of Magnolia picked us up at the airport. Bogotá seems like a really great city. What we've seen so far is very modern and clean. It actually reminds me of NYC in a way and it just feels significantly safer than Calí for some reason. I asked Manuela if Bogotá was safe and she said that it was indeed a very safe city, and that Medellín and Calí are the worst cities in Colombia with the most crime and drug activity!

Before we are allowed to go to the US embassy we are required to have the baby checked out by a doctor so that's what we did this afternoon. The doctor was a gentle and sweet man. He said that Alexander was perfect, in great health and growing exactly as he should be at this age. He said something that really touched me, he thanked us and said it made him really happy that we were taking care of a child from Colombia and said that he could tell we were taking good care of him. He then led us into another room so he could show us pictures of his children.

We are waiting for a letter from Chiquitines that basically determines whether we can leave for home by Saturday. If we don't get this letter by 11:00 tomorrow morning we won't be able to go to the US embassy and will have to stay until at least Tuesday because the US embassy is closed Friday and Monday for a holiday. This whole process is really taking so much less time than we thought so what's a couple extra days? It would be nice to do some sight seeing.

Waiting for the baggage in Bogotá.

Some snapshots on the ride to the hotel.