Cali day 4 - Monday

Today was a quiet day, taken up primarily with errands for Patricia, Sofia and Mama Leny. I tagged along to look at the sights and sounds around the city and occasionally practice my poor Spanish.

The malls in Cali are open, airy and clean with excellent amenities and we went first to buy earings for Aunt Lia. The Chipichape mall buildings used to be the engine sheds and repair shops for the Colombian railway system in the central plateau, but with the decline of the railways the buildings fell into disuse before a private company took over and converted the disused buildings into a mall with wide corridors, multiple cafes and a large selection of stores on two floors.

While the ladies shopped I checked out several sculptures of partially naked ladies adorning one of the open air food courts. The sculptures are by a Caleno called Emilio Hernandez (http://www.hernandezemilio.com/) Interesting sculptures. I wouldn't mind one of these in my back yard.
Minor fact. None of the malls are air conditioned, the weather is cool enough all year round that as long as there are ample open air courts to allow air to circulate under the canopies that protect from the frequent rain showers, then there is no need for air conditioning.

The ladies were done soon enough and it was time to eat. Patricia had memories of a restaurant - La Cazuela - on Calle 6 that she ate at 10 years ago when she lived in Cali. Her memories were not just of the restaurant but of a particular dish made by that restaurant - Cazuela de Langostinos - so off we went. The branch she used to eat at on the north side of Calle 26 was obviously closed as we drove by, but our driver spotted the second branch of the restaurant 50 yards further down the street on the south side. We pulled up just as the owner was taking the padlock off the front door.

It was a strange and surreal experience. We were the only diners in the restaurant all the time we were there. They had run out of beer and wine - the owner said he had not yet ordered after being closed for Holy Week - and the owner appeared to be the waiter and the chef. With some trepidation we decided to stay and ordered the Langostinos and some lemonade and sat waiting for the ghosts to appear, the doors to mysteriously close and lock, the walls start to close in and the lights to dim.

None of this happened. Cazuela de Langostinos is a thick red soup, piping hot and full of small shrimp and a few onions. The soup was served with fried plantains, white rice and French bread and we were offered, but declined, Colombian hot sauce. It was excellent. The broth was made from fish and the flavor was delicate enough not to overpower the shrimp, and there were shrimp galore and they were very tasty. This was our most expensive meal to date in Cali, a little over 110,000 pesos for four people - around $45 - but it was worth it.

The ladies still had errands to run so I accompanied them on the promise of a good cup of coffee when they were finished.

We had been searching for a Juan Valdez coffee shop for three days and I was beginning to tease that these coffee shops were a figment of their imagination. I was assured they were real so late in the afternoon we headed to another mall where they knew a Juan Valdez existed, and voila, there it was. Juan Valdez coffee shops are Colombia's answer to Starbucks, the only thing that disappointed slightly was the size of the paper cup. The largest of the three sizes was equivalent to a small Starbucks, but even so, the Latte Arequipe (Caramel Latte) was excellent.


Once again it was time for supper, and we decided to repeat the Arepas de Choclo, but this time at a roadside cafe Lucero knew close to Jamundi. It appears that Cali is somewhat like Houston in that nowhere is close to anywhere else. We always drive miles and this was no exception but the drive was worth it to see the open ovens used to cook Arepas. The restaurant was Mazorca Tierna on the side of highway 25 just north of Jamundi.

We (here Manuel Jose and I inspect the Arepas in the oven) were given a demonstration of Arepa cooking from start to finish by the cook and we enjoyed Arepas de Choclo, roasted corn and Agua Panela with cheese (and an Aguila beer for me, no one else in Patricia's extended family drinks alcohol)