Patacon, Ajiaco and Borrachas (Medellin part 2)

So the first day in Medellin I was a little apprehensive - not knowing what everyone was on about, I kept to smiling and nodding quite a bit. This is the interesting part: During my entire stay there, people seemed to assume I spoke Spanish. Maybe it was due to my colleague chatting away in Spanish right next to me with our clients, or maybe I blended in (which surprised me somewhat because I could count on 1 hand how many Chinese people I saw in Medellin during my 10 days there). But the Colombians in Medellin were very friendly and inviting. In no time I felt at ease about the whole place.

This city was a mixture of old and new. It had all the same setup as any metropolitan cities with a very efficient metro system (I could only wished the NY subway was half as nice and on time!). Yet it also retained some characteristics of small towns, such as street merchants selling all kinds of goods on their little shopping cart of carry trays. I don't recall seeing anything like this except maybe in Malaysia's hawker markets or hot-dog sellers at football matches, or the choc-top guy inside Cinema back home. During the week, we spent a lot of time hanging out at the cafe at the Museo de Antioquia during lunch which overlooks a busy open park right at an intersection. It was quite entertaining just watching the interactions of the locals with these street merchants.

And now the food - its all about sauces and sides. Unlike some cuisine where herbs and spices are added into the food during cooking, it seems that the Colombian dishes are cooked with basic seasoning. However, as you actually eat the food, you are expected to add all sorts of wondering sides and sauces to the dish to create very unique flavours and textures. Here are some example:

Ajiaco Bogotano

A chicken and potato soup dish - served with capers and cream. I don't think I have actually ever had capers with anything other thing than salmon. It was actually very interesting when combined with the taste of the chicken soup.

Patacon

Patacon is a plantine flattened out paper thin and deep fried. It is then topped with garlic prawns over a layer of guacamole and served with coconut rice. The best stuff ever.

Typical Paisa

This reminded me of the Vietnamese broken rice dish. Rice is served with a variety of meat and vegetable. This usually consists of chicharron (salted fatty pork with crackling skin), a chorizo sausage, a fried egg, fried plantine, pieces of avacado and frijols (kidney beans).

Borrachas

For drinks, there were plenty of exotic tropical fruits to choose from - guanabana, mora, lulo as well as more commonly available ones like mangoes and guava. And then, there was aquardiente.

One night after work, our Colombian colleague took us to Lleras Park which is a hip and trendy area packed with popular bars and eateries. We went to the Basilica Restaurant for a drink (or two) and a light bite. Well they have been bugging me all week about getting drunk on their "firewater" aquardiente. Well I said bring it on. shots came out and down the hatch it went. What my Colombian colleague forgot to tell me was: it was a double shot that she ordered for us and I was only suppose to drink half of it and not drain it down like I did. Well too late!! I've had taquila before. This was similar in taste and strength. I do miss my piece of lemon and the salt...

So a couple of drinks later, there was a table of borrachas (Spanish for drunken ladies). Well ok, maybe we weren't quite drunk. We were however very merry. :)

Buenos Dias, Colombia!

Last week due to work, I had the opportunity to go and visit Medellin in Colombia, South America.

Colombia is one of those countries that have received a lot of press over the years - and they are not necessarily the good kind. For most people (including myself until I went there), the mention of the country alsost always conjure up a certain stereotype of the country - crime, drug, violence, and in one word: a dangerous place to be. Actually Medellin at one point was known for being a base for the most powerful international drug trafficking organisations.

It is true, certain parts of Colombia is still on the high caution list from Travel Advisories, both for Australian and US citizens (and I would imagine for most foreign nationals). Bogota (the captial of Colombia) and Medellin (the 2nd most populated city in Colombia) however, are relatively safe for travel at present. Of course one should exercise the normal precaution when travelling in a foreign country. If you insist of flashing your bling-bling around and act like a mindless tourists well then I think you will be in trouble in any country, even if you were the wrong part of town in NY!

So with that said, my biggest barrier was language. But I was well taken care of. I had my own travel companion/translator/guide - a colleague of mine who is an American-born Colombian. It definitely helped that she was there as I don't think I would have gotten very far with trying to point and "charade" my way around town.

Surprisingly (and to show a complete lack of geographical knowledge here), Medellin was more "east" on the globe than I thought. It was actually in the same time zone as the East Coast of US (ie. NY). I wasn't sure what to expect of this place and for those who know me, you know I am quite adventureous so I was full of anticipation and really wanting to know all about this town (yeah, I knew I had to work, but hey its my first trip to South America!!).

We arrived late into Medellin and it is a ride down the mountain from the airport to the hotel. During the 35 minute ride, my colleague had already briefed me on all the food I must try out (well I was very happy to hear food is high on the priority, hee hee).

As we decended from the hills, Medellin's came into view. My first glimpse of Medellin left me breathless - a milkway of light going for miles into the horizon. I didn't realise how big it was.

Medellin at night
Originally uploaded by xmascarol

We had arranged to stay in a 2 bedroom apartment in the Affinity Hotel and that was a great arrangement for me as I ended up with a 24x7 translator and companion for the trip(Thanks a bunch, IV)!! The hotel was very nice, not to mention having a balcony with am amazing view.

The next impressive thing in Medellin - my room service breakfast. Since we arrived late at night, we figured the best thing to do was to order breakfast to the room. What we didn't realized was what that meant. The doorbell rang in the morning, and voila, there were 2 people standing outside of our door, one taking order and the other manning a fully stocked breakfast cart, complete with its own stove top. We get to pick from a variety of fresh tropical fruits, juices, pastries, cereals and we could also order omlette with whatever topping we wanted, straight from the cart. Then all we had to do was sit back (or in our case, we eventually got so comfortable with this arrangement, we go back to our rooms to get ourselve ready while they cook breakfast outside our door) and wait for the server to set our table on the dining table and bring the spread in. What's even more impressive - they were not expecting any tips. Later on we found out the breakfast was included in our room rates. Try to beat THAT one!!

Room Service anyone?

After breakfast we headed into the centre of Medellin, where the client's office was situated. Medellin is a very modern city, which means it came with normal modern city peak hour morning traffic. The roads were well maintained and dotted with yellow cabs and colourful buses. My colleague told me in an effort to reduce the number of vehicles on the road, the government had imposed rules that limit which cars can travel on the road during certain hours and days of the week. For example, cars with odd number plates can travel on alternate days of the week in comparison to cars with even number plates. This promotes the use of public transportation and carpooling.

Taxi and bus

[To be continued...]