8/8/22
We went to my host sister's grandparents house for brunch yesterday – on Sunday morning. Her grandparents live in the same apartment complex as she does, on the first floor instead of the fourth. I've noticed that families here in Bogotá often live very nearby across generations: at my other host family, the parents of my host mom live a few block down the hill in their own house.
When I walked into the apartment, my host grandmother was seated on a chair watching television. I had heard from my host sister that she was beginning to forget things easily, so I expected her to be in a much worse condition. But she talked to me completely coherently, and seemed to be a very kind and interesting person. I asked her what she was watching, and she said she had no idea, she just started playing it. It looked like a dubbed American movie about some kids in the midwest.
For brunch we ate arepas de huevo. This version of an arepa is fried with an egg inside: Janis (I think that's how it's spelled), their maid, showed me how this arepa is prepared:
Frying the arepa (and stirring hot chocolate in the meantime)
Cutting a slit for the egg, before frying (with egg) a second time
Ready to eat!
Over brunch, my host dad talked about how he had studied in the US. He went to university in Lexington, Kentucky in the 1950s to study industrial engineering. He said he wanted to go somewhere where there would be no Spanish speakers, but that he ultimately struggled quite a bit with learning English. At one point he started singing Que Será, Será – and the whole family and I joined in. My host sister later told me that he was the first industrial engineer in Colombia, and he helped to build the system of telephone wires in the country.
Spending time with my host grandmother pulled at my heart a bit, because she made me think of my own grandmother, who just passed away a few days ago. My grandmother was in Chicago, and I considered flying from Bogotá to see her before she passed. I discussed visiting her with my dad, who said it was kind of too late — she was barely able to communicate and she might have passed away on my flight there. I was able to do a video call with her two weeks ago when she was a bit more aware, and she recognized me and said I was so sweet to call. I cried after the call – I think part of me knew that it might be the last time I saw her, even though I was hoping that wasn't the case. When I was studying abroad at Stanford in Washington during Spring quarter, I called her for her birthday and she asked me to come visit her. I said that I would love to and might be able to after going to Colombia. I didn't visit her enough while she was alive, and I feel guilty about it. At the same time, the distance – between California, where my parents live, and Chicago – makes it hard to see each other regularly, especially amidst the pressures and business of school and work. I think I would have seen her much more if she and I had lived nearby, as seems to be customary in Colombia.
Comentários