Fancy dinner

Tuesday night, we went finally went for dinner at the 1621, the restaurant from the Hotel Santa Clara. It was absolutely great. The garden is beautiful and decorated with candles for Christmas:

While waiting for our table to be ready, I was wondering about what sounded like bird noises, but so regular, I thought it was recorded. Nope, it was not, they have small frogs hidden in the garden that make this great background noise, not to loud (not like your frogs, Stella^^). And there are two more creatures living in the garden, may I introduce:

Matteo

and Clarissa, the house toucans. Sweet and fluffy, they were sleeping in trees by our table.
The food was incredible, a few highlights:
Roasted pepper filled with crab mousse and Gruyère cheese. Basil perfume

Blue goat cheese sorbet

The next morning was a bit rough, I had to be up at 5 to deliver a translation *Hi Nelli^^*
Today, reality kicked in: I had to buy some real shoes, after realizing all I own are flip-flops... Not very useful for Vienna in December. I can't believe I am going to be back in a week, time passed by so fast! Sure, I am happy to see everybody, but... Not looking forward to the cold. I really got used to life here, to the slow-motion feel to everything, to the heat, to life stopping when it rains, you just postpone everything to the next day. My work-drive is still the same but I did really good at relaxing when I am not working, at enjoying life again. This workaholic rehab is actually working. :)
All pics by Isa

2 broke girls and a luckily not so broke guy :)

Last Weekend, we decided to make it back to the island, but this time on a budget. The wonderful special offer they had at the Cocoliso expired by December and the normal prices are... well, you don't go there just because you are bored. The Caribbean way of life may have gotten to us a little bit... Planning more then a day in advance is incredibly stressfull, so you give up on that. And anyways, it could rain. And when it rains, life stops. The new way of planning, because we're cool like that:
Friday afternoon, Isa writing her thesis in the hammock, me half-heartily working on the couch.
Me: hey, shall we go to the island tomorrow? Isa: yes, why not Me: here is the number of this cheaper place and my phone, you call (her Spanish is light-years better then mine)
Isa sorted out the reservation and the nice lady on the phone, Ana-Rosa, told her were we would find a boat taking us there.In the evening, Alvaro decided to join the fun, so they picked me up at 9 am the next morning.
We took a taxi to the place were the local boats leave on the back of the market. Let's put it that way. This is NOT a fancy place. When I asked for our boat, the guy thought we got lost.

What you see at the bottom of the pic is not a dump, it is part of the boat. The groceries going to the island. After paying an extra 2€ for looking like a tourist, we got on board. And then, the captain announced that the departure was delayed by an hour. We could not really go walking around, so it was an hour of sitting in the boat, which wouldn't be that bad. If this guy wouldn't have been there:

You see, he was selling bread. And he spent the ENTIRE hour yelling: PAN, PAN, HAY PAN. To the same 30 people sitting in the boat. Who would have bought it the first 10 times he asked. After an hour, we finally took off. For about 5 minutes. Thats' when the motor broke. We made it to the nearest island and spent another 45 minutes getting roasted while it was repaired.

And then, we made it to the open sea. This is the moment I started to think that it was a really really bad idea. See, this boat was made for transportation of goods and people, it was not made to get tourists around. So, the captain just get all the power he can out of this boat and goes full speed straight away. Did I mention the wind season started and that the Atlantic has some pretty waves? I didn't cry, I didn't jump out of the boat but man, did I get sea-sick. Isa was a hero holding me together. ^^
We made it to the island very fast and the ride was immediately forgotten. We walked to Las Palmeras, which was going to be our home for the night. Las Palmeras is a cooperative from the islands native population, an eco lodge with cabanas. Simple but beautiful, one minute walking from a big white sandy beach:

After lunch, we decided to pay a visit to the Cocoliso... that's when the real fun started and we sadly don't have any pics. We first met Santa, our favorite waiter ever, who welcomed us in a way we felt like coming home. After hopping in the pool, we had to have a Cocoloco. That is when we noticed that we had almost no money. We planned for a very chilled all ecological peaceful thing, not for cocktails in the pool. Thanks for Alvaro who is a better planner. :) The rest of the afternoon was pure fun, Isa learning to destroy coconuts with a machete, Isa learning how to make Cocoloco, all of us test-drinking them, going for a swim at night with the moon turning everything silver in a luke-warm sea. *ok, hate me* :) The next morning, I went snorkeling with Mauro, the guide who lives next door to Las Palmeras. An hour of diving in the coral riffs surrounding the coast, just beautiful. We spent the rest of the morning in hammocks.

The sea was pretty rough that day and Mauro told me that open sea would be... interesting. I started dreading the way back to Cartagena (we didn't have enough money to pay for the fancy Cocoliso boat, damned Cocolocos), when our hosts told us that there was no boat from the market on Sunday. They arranged for the boat from the 5 stars resort next door to take us. And that was FUN! The sea was rough, we got soaked but the boat was a beauty, a fancy speedboat... I learned that my seasickness is just a very fancy one, it just kicks in on cheap lanchas^^.
We had a great weekend and the Cocoliso staff got us another discount so, back to the island saturday for the last time before heading back to Europe. We already warned them to line up the coconuts... Disclaimer: ALL pics by Isa, I was way to lazy to take any :)

Aaaand... It's a wrap

As you can all guess, work came back and hence the disappearing act. No more Margaritas, sandy beaches and hammock sessions... But a seriously happy girl *you can't give me enough workaholic rehab to stop loving my job*. :)
I also managed to finally go out, like really go out and dancing and all on Saturday. It turned out to be the best night I had in ages *Alex, Juli, I think,the last crazy night like that was at the BGF last year^^*. We started at... Cafe del Mar *what a surprise*, went out to the place I love but can't spell the name *don't ask* to listen to some live music, and then to Mister Babilla. Well, we means Alvaro and me because Doris, Isa and Gerald all went home. But I was on a mission: 3 months without partying is the longest stint I ever had since I was 16 I guess. I do believe that party animals have some kind of a special energy storage thing for the party energy. And it can't be spent on other activities. What followed was 3 hours of dancing non stop with a constant Mojito supply. Music was mainly Ok, when it wasn't we just made fun of it and kept dancing. I turned into a Duracell bunny with a stupid grin on my face until I was to tired to even move a finger. This was taken when I came home at 3 am:

Happy me :)
I can't believe I am going to Europe in 2 weeks already, my idea of cold being 25 degrees right now... I successfully escaped everything Christmassy until now, easy one when you avoid shopping malls. I am kind of a Grinch, so Holiday season is not my favorite. But this year, Christmas is going to be fun, we are going to be 23... With all my Dads family, I am looking forward to it. A real French Christmas. :)

Crazy days

I finished the last post all chilled out and in a happy post margarita haze... but things can change very quickly. Monday was kind of a textbook Monday from hell. First, the beautiful project was canceled after everybody started working on it. It just disappeared like it never existed. I tried not to feel to disappointed but well, not a very good way to start the day.
I went on trying to get a grip on my bank account. You see, I do have a company account and a private account, both with on-line banking. So I thought at least. When I checked the company account and discovered some funds have been transferred, I decided to transfer some to my private account, to pay the rent and so on. This is when I discover that what my bank means by "on-line banking" is, you can look but you can't touch, pretty much like at a table dance joint. So, I called the guy in charge of my account, waited for 37 min on hold and asked him about this parody of on-line banking. He explained that it was possible to do transfers but that the account wasn't activated *whatever* and that I had to call a hot-line who would do that.
I called. And the lady explained (I had her repeat that 3 times before I started yelling), that they had to FEDEX ME A BLACK BOX to Colombia, in order for me to be able to do a transfer of funds from one account to the other WITHIN THE SAME BANK. And then, I have to connect this device to my lap-top EVERY time I want to do anything with my accounts. I lost it. I tried to breathe deeply, but to no avail. So, FYI, in Panama, they never heard of thing like TAN and such. They have black boxes. *Sight*.
To calm down, I went to cook a very French ratatouille and invited my neighbor for lunch. It helped.
Work is pretty much non-existent this days, so, with the money from the beautiful project not coming round and half of November being gone without any significant income, I had to go fishing. Client fishing. Now, I have a few different small projects, it is ok but.... this wakes up the procrastination monster. This is a freelance translator disease and it was pretty hilarious to see pretty much all of my colleagues affected by it this week. It goes like that:
1) First slow day: you are happy, you breath, you finish and wrap everything up.
2) Second day: you start making lists. Lists of all the things you want to take care of, now that you have time. This includes things like writing invoices, accounting, cleaning up your computer, fixing stuff at your place, ironing and so on. You start having a look at Proz.com, just to see how the market looks like.
3) Day three: You open the Proz page as soon as you turn on your computer and start writing application for everything that can remotely be in your field. You contact fellow translators in your language pair to ask them how things are *is it just you, what did you do wrong, or a general crisis?* when they tell you that work has significantly slowed down over the past few days, you realize what is happening :
THE DROUGHT
This is the dreaded black hole in the translation world. They are no signs of warning, there is no logic in its appearance, it just happens, usually about once or twice a year. Jobs are sucked in a black hole and just disappear. They cease to be.
You look at your list. And start procrastinating, online shopping, overeating, watching Youtube videos, everything that is NOT on your list.
4) Day 4: small jobs do come in, but nothing to keep you really busy. You get lazier by the hour and your daily output shrinks to 2000 words a day. Your list is still untouched and you start to feel depressed about not being productive. You check Proz every 10 min.
The day work resumes to its crazy normal of 12 hours a day, you are the happiest person on earth. You get that feeling again, that feeling you had with your first jobs, so exciting.... and after a few days, you are back to bitching about the impossible hours and clients. Bliss.
This black holes usually last a week, but we are now in week 3. Despair. Lol, not really, I do know it will be back to normal soon, but this reminds me of how crazy this job is.... Too much or not enough and nothing in between. But I would not give it up for anything it the world. ;)
On another note, some very interesting job offers started coming up this days, more permanent stuff... So, I found myself having to send applications, something I am really not good at. Remember, freelancer ? My mails usually sound pretty much like "Yeah, sounds cool, I could do that". Special kudoz today to Juli, who spent until 3 am rewriting my very not sexy cover letter and made me sound like I kick ass (I do, I am just not good at selling it^^). And that was it for today, I need a glass of wine and to prepare mentally for another day of fishing.... :)
I leave you with a random happy island pic. Translation: the girl's toaster^^

Sunday afternoon margarita

Last Thursday, I went back to Cocoliso with Mari, spending the night again. Work had been slow all week and I wanted to break through the vicious cycle of staring at the screen all day, waiting for work to come in and wanted to try to enjoy life instead. Because work ALWAYS comes back and then I curse myself for not doing anything of the down-time.
Isla Grande was great, time flying by, just watching the sea, iguanas passing by, sipping a fresh coconut... Snorkeling was amazing, I could have stayed in the water for hours, so beautiful. Got a bit sunburned, even 50+ protection doesn't cut it, I have to get my skin used to this. And Friday morning, I had a nice wakeup call at 7 am, great project starting now. After sending out so many quotes for gaming projects and not getting the contracts, I didn't expect it to happen so fast (or happen at all). I am pretty happy with my life as a freelance translator these days, but nothing can make me as happy as a juicy game... Smart me had the laptop around this time, so I could start organizing things straight away.
After a 9am to midnight workday yesterday, I had a very quiet Sunday today. Sleeping in, having a late breakfast with my neighbor and meeting Mari for a great late lunch at a very nice Mexican restaurant. I had a margarita, just because I could… Enjoying the rainy afternoon, tomorrow is going to be wicked busy.

I do start to feel the effects of my so called workaholic rehab. After three years feeling I was running behind my life and trying to catch up with it to no avail, being stuck in a giant to do list that was getting longer by the day, everything slowed down and I feel on top of things. I still do enjoy work but I also start to know what to do with myself when I am not working and this is pretty new.
I am setting things up to be able to go back to the island on a regular basis, a cheaper way and more centered about spending time in the water and not sipping cocktails by the pool. ;) I also plan to renew my PADI advanced open water certificate and start diving again. With paradise 45 min from home, it would be silly not to enjoy it more.

Wish you all a nice week!

Best of fridge salad :)

The plan was to go to have lunch somewhere but the heat is just too much today, so after paying the bills at the supermarket (love that, you can pay any electricity, phone, etc. bill at the supermarket here), I just headed home and plan to stay here until sunset. All the vegetables left in my fridge made for a great salad, no need to get out for a healthy fresh lunch:

There was a lot of police in front of the Boutique Hotel next door and they all looked very much stressed out, so I ask what was up. Well, the President of this country has an interesting taste in hotels and my place is going to be even safer then it already is this days. :) Meeting beautiful Patricia for the sunset @ Cafe del Mar, chilling until then. Ah, and, yes, I am going back to work tomorrow. ;)

2 days in heaven

After a week of rain, I was kind of fed up to be at home and since this week wasn't too busy work-wise, It seemed like a great idea to get out of the city and got to the Rosario Islands. 45 min by boat fro Cartagena, this is a national park made of 27 islands. Isa and I started looking for a place to stay there, and the search wasn't easy: many hotels are really expensive and we found a lot of awful comments on the Internet. We finally settled on the Cocoliso Resort (Isa found it), it looked nice and they had a special offer, about 75€ for a night, all meals and transport included. This was the best idea EVER. :) We bought the tickets Wednesday night and started our trip early Thursday morning, going to the marina to catch a boat. There was the first surprise. See, they are different size of boats, capacities going from 20 to 250 people... We had the smallest boat of the marina, which sounded great because it meant not too many people headed there. Actually, 2 people more and they weren't staying the night. We started out of Cartagena and the very nice gentleman sitting next to me informed me that 1) he was the owner of the Cocoliso and 2) we were the ONLY guests staying that night (the resort can host up to 400 people during the day and about 60 over night I think) He told us we would be treated like queens, and maaaaan, he didn't lie :)

When we arrives to the Island, we were greeted with this:

Not to forget this:

And when you take a closer look, you see this:

This, my friends, is a bar IN the pool. *By that point, I couldn't stop shrieking*

You can guess what happened next:

The day was spent between the pool and the beach, I think I spent 8 hours in the water. A bit more about the resort:

Enough for today, more tomorrow, but I am one happy and relaxed girl :))