Medellin, Colombia

Dan is based in Medellin, Colombia, this summer because of his work for Unbound.org, so the kids and I cashed in some of his frequent flier miles and have joined him for a couple of months! A week ago yesterday at 4:45 a.m. my parents were dropping us off at the airport for two days of travel to get here.

We spent six hours in the Philadelphia airport trying to get some sleep on the floor (and FREEZING), then had to stay overnight in Miami before our final flight to Medellin. Dan had already been here for several weeks, so he was able to pick us up with our new best friend, Henry, who works for Unbound here in Medellin. Dan and Sky took a taxi from the airport, and Grace and Joe and I rode with Henry. The airport is outside of town, so we got to see the stunning countryside first, then gradually made our way into the city.

Our apartment building!

While we're here, we're renting a furnished apartment from a couple from the U.S. It feels like being in an episode of House Hunters International. The apartment is on the 11th floor and has views three directions that are overwhelming every single time we look out a window. Medellin sits in a valley, and at night when we look out the window it's like the lights on the mountainsides jump toward us in 3D. Pictures just don't capture it.

View from kitchen window.

Making themselves at home.

Sky's view from the shower. He's the only one who gets this view. Ha!

Evening view from bedroom.

Because the city sits in a valley and can't grow outward, they use their space really well. In our neighborhood we can walk to two large grocery stores (kind of a combo of a grocery store and a department store--food, clothes, appliances, electronics, furniture, etc.) and smaller grocery stores; a Lowe's-like hardware store; the athletic complex with track, stadium, swimming pools, and covered facilities for all kinds of sports activities and practices all going on at once; a subway station; restaurants, coffeeshops, cafes; gyms, etc.

I haven't seen the show "Narcos" (on purpose!), but if you have, yes, Medellin is the city where Pablo Escobar lived. It was one of the most dangerous cities in the world, but now it's known as one of the most innovative, creative, liveable cities in the world. It turned itself around miraculously.

One of the superstores.

When we walked by the athletic complex one evening last week, a national soccer game was about to start, and Dan and Sky got last-minute tickets! :oD

On Friday night we went a couple of blocks in another direction to a pedestrian street lined with little restaurants, shops, a coffeeshop/bookstore, etc. People hang out there in the evening, and it's suuuuuper chill and lovely. And we found pizza!

This weekend was Joe's birthday. (We have three teenagers now!) Sky and I went on a secret mission and managed to find the ingredients (or close enough) to surprise Joe with Dirt & Worms. Then we went to birthday dinner at a restaurant called Crepes & Waffles that was really good!

It's actually really peaceful to live more day-to-day, buying only the amount of groceries we can carry home with us, and washing dishes by hand several times a day because we only have enough for one meal. Thankfully the apartment has a washing machine, but everyone hangs their clothes to dry here. It's about the same altitude as Denver, I think, and on sunny days the clothes dry quickly. I can only wash as many clothes as the sun and wind will dry, and there's a peace in that, being tied to the weather instead of a to-do list.

So, that's basically our first week in Medellin, minus an outing that I'll post about separately. We've had rocky starts before (India, Guatemala), so we've taken it easy this time. It's definitely a city (four million people), and the traffic is constant and a little crazy. I didn't think I'd ever get comfortable with having to cross these streets to get to where we need to go, but it's already much easier than a week ago. And our little perch up here on the 11th floor still feels like a dream.