Weekends in Manizales

Hi again everyone.
This will be a short update. A few weekends ago i spent some time with a teacher from the school, emily, and her family. we went to a really nice restruant called ceritos. there i had the traditional meal called bandeja paisa, it includes, sausage, rice, beans, fried plaintains, fried egg, and avocado. after this i went with emily to chipre, the place where many young people hang out. we went to torre del cielo, the tower that reacher the sky. its a really high tower where you can do extreme sports such as bunjy jumping, or walk on the outside of the tower, or simply climb it to see a beautiful view of manizales. there is one picture of emily and i at the top of the tower, a picture of me with emily's family, her husband belmer, and her two sons alejando and santiago. also you can see a picture of the delicous bandeja paisa that i ate at the restruant. After seeing chipre we went to emily`s church where we listened to a bible reading. although i am strongly connected to my judaism, i like to go to services once in a while, de vez en cuando, to meet nice people, and improve my spanish. lastly her son santiago showed me his motercycle, in which he took his mom emily home. Emily is the type of person that is very down to earth and petite, so i would never imagine that she would ride a motorcycle. apprarantly many colombia woman ride motorcycles, who knew!!
I have also been spending a lot of time with a teacher from the school pilar, and her children laura and andres. yesterday we all went out for the day, first to church, since most people here are catholics, then she prepared a delicious lunch, then we went to get our hair cut at a peluqueria. Pilar told the people how to cut my hair and it turned out great, i will post pics soon. on the way home i invited the family for ice-cream to thank them for being so generous with me. the ice-cream here, is amazing, no wonder why i always see colombians eating so much ice-cream. i got arquipe-mani ice-cream covered in chocolate. Arquipe is a really sweet substance sort of like a mix between caramel, brown sugar, and honey, with nuts covered in chocolate, next time i will take a pic. Colombian food is really delicous, and for the most part nutricious. Today is puente, this means a three day weekend, this monday is a vacation, becuase today is dia de los esposos, married peoples`day, any excuse to have vacation is a good one!
Tommorow i go back to school, to teach cute little kids english. yesterday i joined a new gym called enforma, and i will start with my spinning classes on Tuesday!! All is good in Manizales. On tuesday i go to the young people`s meeting that read the bible, on wednesday i might go to chipre, the hangoutspot with a few peeps, on thursday maybe a movie night, and friday i teach english to the parent`s, looking forward to a short week next week, then the weekend again, then semana santa!
Semana santa here is a holy week, where everyone gets vacation. I will be travelling to Bogota to meet up with Leon Kadish`s family from Cali. We will be celebrating passover together and watching the Macabi games, where all the jewish soccer players in Colombia get together for a tournament. I also hope to get to know the jewish community in either Cali or Bogota, so that i can travel there for high holidays. It`s pretty cool that no matter where i travel i can always find a jewish community and family, it makes me feel at home.
Well, this is all for now, everyone stay healthy and take care,
besos from Manizales,
Neta