Getting acclimated

Well, I slept like a dead person last night.  I woke up this morning feeling refreshed.  Here are a few pictures of where we are.....this is our room.  As you can see, Layne has already set up his "station" and is ready to do his schoolwork online (ha...nope...that's Minecraft he's playing...LOL).  We'll be in this room for about a month and then we're moving to a bigger room.

 

No, the walls aren't pink...it's just the reflection off of the sheets. 

 

Here's a pic of the house and two pics of looking left and then right down the street in front of the house....

 



I'm sure you notice that the house is like Fort Knox.  Most of the homes around here are like that...and they're all connected.  There is no space between houses like we have in the suburbs in the US.  And, they all are locked up like fortresses with wooden gates or metal bars like the one on our house.  I asked our landlady about the reasons why and she said it's really just overreaction.  She said that in the 1980s there was an economic downturn here and that a politician proclaimed that all the poor people would start stealing from the rich people, so all the people who could afford to started securing their homes like this.  Then, as drugs began to move through from Colombia toward the US, there were some robberies, but not many.  As a result, people here just got scared and went overboard with protecting themselves.  She said it's really safe, because the people take security very serious.  In fact, here are a couple of pics of some people....I wondered who they were and just thought it was odd.  When I asked my landlady, she said the guys that we see on bikes are guards.  People pay them to ride around the block and protect them. There are also guards on the corners and "lurking about."  In case your wondering, we have guards at this house, too.  They also serve as our drivers so my landlady told me not to be alarmed if I see them around just watching things.  I'll have to post some pics later of the garden area and the kitty cats.  Super friendly cats and Layne is feeling his lonliness for Leo by hanging out with them.

Here's a couple of guards I saw outside our bedroom window....

Oh, and birds are singing EVERYWHERE!  I feel like I'm in the middle of the bird section at the zoo.  For real, they sing beautiful songs.  There are exotic flowers all over (of course I'll take pics!) and it is a beautiful 75 degrees.  It's hot and humid and I feel like I'm in south Louisiana all over again.  I'm thinking ponytail might become my go-to hairstyle.

Heading to explore a little more....will share more later.