Passports and Doctor Visit - and a Date to Come Home

Lucia called this morning during breakfast. She had a busy day scheduled for us. First stop, get the ninos Colombian passports at 11:00 a.m. Next stop, trip to the doctor for the ninos physicals at 3:00 p.m. We were on track for a possible Wednesday departure.

Before we could do any of that, we still had to finish up some business with Maria’s doctor. She explained that Maria might have a parasite in her belly which would be causing some somewhat loose stools. She asked that we collect a stool sample and bring it to their lab for analysis. She gave us a little cup with a lid and a latex glove which I thought was nice. I don’t know if a lot of U.S. doctors would have provided the glove. Well, Traci and I were out for the rest of the afternoon yesterday and it didn’t have a change to "collect" and get back that day. However, Traci “collected the sample” while I was out last night running to the ATM. So, she gets major points for being the good wife last night.

Anyway, after breakfast I set out for the lab with my Spanish-English dictionary in one coat pocket and a sealed vial of “used food” in the other. I kind of wondered what a robber might think if I got mugged and he emptied my pockets. It takes about 15 minutes to get to the doctor's office at a brisk walk and I have become accustomed to wearing a jacket in weather where I don’t need one (trying to blend into the Colombian culture). I only needed the dictionary once today and after some paper work at the doctor’s office, I made it back to the compound just in time to meet Lucia and Andres (her driver, not our Andres). However, I wasn’t able to stay for the lab results.

The passport office was a pretty wild place. I’ve heard and read stories from other people. To be honest, it seemed that Lucia, Andres and my wife were running in several different directions at once for a while. I was kind of watching the kids which was like herding cats. At one point, I was given a piece of paper and told to go pay some money to man behind a window. I don't ask why - I just do as I am told. But pretty soon we turned in some papers to a woman behind another window and were told to go sit down for a while. Maria and I colored while Andres played with his cars. Luke played Nintendo and read his book. Traci snapped pictures and did some people watching.



Finally, after about 30 minutes of waiting, a guy comes to a window with a stack of passports and just starts reading off names. About eveyone in the office crowds around him - and there was about 40 people in the place. We hit him from several different angles with Andres (the driver), Traci and Lucia standing around him in different areas. Maria loved looking at her Colombian passport – to the point where we had to take it away. We wanted to get a picture of the kids with their passports, but Maria was still mad at us. Maybe tomorrow.

The one thing that confused me a little about the passport office was all of the people out front selling touristy garbage. It just didn’t seem to fit. You have mostly Colombian people going in to get Colombian passports so they can, presumably, leave the country for one reason or another. Why would they want a bunch of junky maps, beads and bracelets from their own country?

We returned to the compound in good time for lunch. Today’s soup: cheese (I think – it was really good though). Main course: ham and cheese – no bread, just ham and cheese. Again, it was good. Sides: salad and potatoes. I had to pretty much inhale my meal and get back to Maria’s doctor for the lab results. You get the lab results in one room and then go down to see the doctor in another room. However, this time I didn’t have my normal English speaking doctor. I could tell by looking at the lab results myself that most of the tests came back normal (I'm not a doctor but it said "normal" after just about each test), but the doctor seemed to be indicating that Maria might have some issue that I didn’t fully understand. I did understand enough to know that it wasn't a very big deal and he gave me yet another prescription for something. When I got back to the compound, I went over the lab results with Carmen and showed her the prescription the doctor gave Maria. Apparently, Maria has been drinking some of the local water – from all of the tooth brushing, no doubt – and it isn’t agreeing with her system. So, he gave her something to kind of dry her up. Carmen said it is pretty common for people to come down with whatever this was called (she told me but I forgot) and not to worry.

Again, we had to leave soon after I arrived back at the compound. Previously, Andres drove us to the passport office in his own car but this time showed up in a cab (no Lucia with us this time). I never asked and was never told what happened to his car. Maybe he was sick of driving in downtown Bogota. I can certainly see how that would be the case. Driving down here is just crazy. Just imagine a place where there are no driving laws. While I am sure they have them, I am also pretty sure that in the last 24 hours I have been in a car that has broken every single one of them at one time or another.

The doctor visit went well and was pretty uneventful. He was a very nice man who spoke very good English. Since we got the kids, we have had a couple of folders of medical records that we couldn't really decipher because they were all in Spanish. He went over the ninos medical records with us and that got us to relax about several things. I guess his job is really just to translate the immunizations records for the kids and to give them brief physicals. During the portion of the time where he was explaining their past medical histories to Traci & me, the ninos pretty much wrecked his little collection of kids’ toys. They were all over the office and Andres treated each one like a soccer ball. As for the physical exam itself, Maria was surprisingly cooperative and Andres warmed up to things pretty quickly.



Back at the compound, we decided to go out to eat tonight at someplace very U.S.A. and we chose the Hard Rock Café. I kind of wanted a real cheeseburger, and knew we could find something there for Luke to eat. (Yes, I had a McDonald’s cheeseburger last night but those things are really pretty lousy. I was wondering today why we even eat those things). We also had some good news to celebrate.

After we got home, Traci called Lucia to see if we would be going to the U.S. Embassy for visas on Monday. Lucia said that we would and that we would have them on Tuesday. Right after that call was finished, Traci was on the phone with Delta to change our return flight reservations. We are coming home Wednesday evening. If you want more details on exactly when we will be in town, call my parents at our house or Traci’s folks at their homes. They have all of the info. We didn’t feel like posting it on the internet.

So, we now have a coming home date and our trip is almost over. However, I guess the rest of the journey is just beginning. I worry a little about Maria and Andres in those first few days in the States, but I feel pretty sure they will warm up to all of our family and friends very quickly (Andres probably will in a matter of minutes).

Back to dinner, the Hard Rock Café is in a little mall called the Atlantis Place. We’d never been in this area before and, while it was dark out, it looked very nice. There appeared to be lots of clubs in the area and lots of people out walking the streets. We might have to visit this place in the day (time permitting). I got my bacon cheeseburger, but it left me a little unsatisfied. It was one of those processed, frozen burgers and I was looking forward to a real hamburger. Luke had pizza bread and the ninos had chicken tenders. Traci ate nachos and we got a plate of onion rings for the family. Luke has been whining about getting some onion rings for weeks and ended up only eating one.



That was about it for the day. We have some shopping planned for the next couple of days. If the weather holds up, we’d like to visit Monseratte (the big mountain by the city). The rest of our days will probably be filled with planning what we want to eat and do when we get home.

I'll end with a picture we had taken at the photo shop outside of the passport office. I don't know if I would call it a "professional" portrait, but it turned out pretty good. Personally, I kind of like the saintly glow around my head. I think it is fitting.