This post will be constantly updated with more funny/interesting things about life in Cali and things that I will easily forget if I don't write them down. Obviously these may not be generalisable to the whole of the country, or even to all Caleños, but they show the side of the culture that I have been in touch with.
- Women's fashion: The most fashionable and commonly used outfit (by that I mean every single woman aged 10-50) is skinny jeans, a strap top/t-shirt and high heels. To me, given the heat over here and the fact that a lot of Colombian women have plastic surgery to show off, or are just very body-proud, it seems illogical to cover up in these 'bluyíns' (blue jeans phonetically). Although they do serve as a second skin that highlight the enhanced curves, especially as there are 'levantacola' (push up bum) jeans made especially for bum implants, but to me, women look so much nicer in pretty dresses or skirts and they would distinguish themselves from the other thousands of women wearing the exact same thing!
- Women's hair: Another repercussion of the race issues here is that hardly anyone embraces their natural curly/wavy hair, especially mixed race people. In addition to the standard outfit I described above, most girls/women's hair is straightened to within an inch of its life and is as long as physically possible, often brushing their 90 degree angle bum. Coming from a country where wavy/curly hair tends to be prettier, I find this fashion of dead straight hair so plain! I would give anything to have the incredible voluminous waves of most people here!
- Serviettes: It is a crime here to serve a drink or food without a paper serviette. At every meal you must have one, and they all get used, even if it is a very clean meal with a knife and fork. Even bottles of beer or fizzy drinks often come wrapped in a serviette! It's not that I am complaining, apart from the environmental side of it, it is more of an observation than anything.
- Busetas: These are the private mini buses that operate an informal network of routes in crazy colours some with fairy lights or disco lights and most never close the door which petrifies me. You see people just hanging out of them. I took a video 3 years ago from inside it, I will try to find it and upload it. The other day, one even had Pablo Escobar's face on the bottom.
- Chivas: These are the famous party buses with insanely loud cheesy music and disco lights all over that can be hired to drive around the city at 30mph holding up traffic. It is quite a sight for all senses and strangely appealing if only for the novelty factor.
- Names: There is a phenomenon here with English-style names which show the massive influence of the USA and western culture. I find these fascinating and my favourite so far are: Madeinusa (literally, Made In USA), Ladi/Leidi (influenced by Lady Diana as they thought Lady was a first name), Leidi Dayana as a double-barrelled first name, these have also been transformed into Deidi, Zeidi, Bleidi and other Lady-sounding names, Jhon/Jhony, Nixon (from the president but used as a first name), Erwin (a variant of Edwin – also common), Estiben (Steven phonetically), Estiwar/Estiguar (combination of Steven and Edward phonetically), Jhon Estiwars (incredible double-barred first name that to me sounds like John Starwars), Hoover (yes, hoover as a first name), Williams/Jackson/Anderson (lots of last names as first names), Neil Armstrong (double barreled first name, so the full name would be something like Neil Armstong Gonzales Ortega).
- Eggs: They never eat their eggs runny, even when fried, and since for me a runny yolk is like liquid gold, this is disastrous! It also means that they have never had egg and soldiers which was the joy of my childhood and secretly still is now!
- Dental hygiene: I noticed this 3 years ago when I was working in a university that people brought their toothbrush and toothpaste to work and after everything they ate they went to the toilet to brush their teeth. This time too, I have noticed that people do that and brush their teeth at least 3 times a day if not more and in shopping centres it is not unusual to see workers or customers in the toilets brushing their teeth. Of course there is nothing wrong with this and maybe if it is due to the expensive dental insurance it is a logical preventative measure.
- Minutos: An amusing/great entrepreneurial invention here are the minutos (minutes) people you find at every street corner or little shop who have a variety of old-school mobile phones tied to a string or chain and tied to themselves or a post from whom you can buy minutes to call people. They tend to have a mobile for each operator, as here operators tend to be very separate and have different rates depending on who you are going to call. So people tend to only use their own phones to call people on the same operator as them. Not very convenient but logical in a country where phone credit does not last long and contracts are incredibly expensive, for example, £10 for 3GB of internet, without a phone, minutes or texts.
- Queuing: Obviously coming from the number 1 country of professional queuers, the UK, to me, Colombia is a country that basically doesn't queue. You get used to it after a while! But one thing I have noticed is that in public toilets, instead of queuing in a line somewhere near the door and waiting for a cubicle to free up so the person at the front of the queue goes in, in Colombia, people queue outside each individual cubicle. This means that if you have been waiting the longest, but the person inside the cubicle you are stood outside is in there for ages, you will be the last to use the toilet!
- Getting ill: Due to the hot climate here, when people get a runny nose or a cough they call it flu (gripa) rather than a cold (resfriado) and complain as if it is really bad. They are clearly not used to having colds and thing it's a proper illness even though they are not bed-ridden, don't ache and don't have headaches. It's quite funny for me to hear my boyfriend so angry that he's got a runny nose when in Europe, that's normal for various months of the year and we continue to function. It's like a national epidemic of man-flu!