This year, La Nacho's School of Engineering is celebrating its 150th anniversary, and several other university anniversaries are coming up over the next years. Congress created it in 1867.
La Nacho is famous for radical political activism and equally radical and colorful graffiti - much of it anti-government and pro-guerrilla. The 'University City' name is appropriate for at least two reasons: the 121-hectare campus is almost as big as a city, and the campus almost looks like a city, with its street vendors, protestors and cultural events.
The graffiti changes steadily as artists add to it, university workers paint over walls and artists add new murals.
Whether despite or thanks to the political fervor, La Nacho is a good university. And it's subsidized, so that the poorer the student, the less he or she pays in tuition. People I know who've taught at both La Nacho and private universities say La Nacho students are more questioning and intellectually inquisitive.
The mural by the Teusaquillo entrance - each American nation is labeled with an image. Venezuela is a gasoline pump and weapons rain down on Colombia. |
Whether despite or thanks to the political fervor, La Nacho is a good university. And it's subsidized, so that the poorer the student, the less he or she pays in tuition. People I know who've taught at both La Nacho and private universities say La Nacho students are more questioning and intellectually inquisitive.
An impromptu game of futbolito near 'Lenin Plaza'. |
The university's central plaza, named Che Plaza by students. (Ignore the smell of ganja) |
The dream of anarchism lives on in La Nacho. |
An unsubtle critique of the police. |
Campus vendors. |
By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours
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