The Bendita Chicha Festival

A few photos from the Bendita bebida festival held yesterday and today on the Plaza del Chorro de Queveda. Chicha and masato are traditional drinks inherited from the Muisca indigenous people, made from fermented corn and rice, respectively.

They're available around the plaza all the time (except during dry law), particularly in the Callejon del Embudo.

Bottles of chicha for sale.

Traditional foods.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

A Facelift for the Plaza del Chorro

The Plaza's newly-unvealed fountain.

After several dry years, the Plaza del Chorro's fountain is flowing again. The city spent 600 million pesos for some five-months work resurfacing the spot where Bogotá was supposedly founded in 1538, repairing the decorations and improving access for disabled people. 

Workers repairing the plaza's fountain.

To lots of us, the plaza seemed just fine already. The facelift is fine, but each of us will have to decide whether the 600 million pesos were well spent. Perhaps were can survey the pot smokers and chicha drinkers who gather in the evenings, and the police who drive them away each night for having too much fun.

The plaza was named after Quevedo, the chapel's priest, who came for water there in the early 1800s. Centuries before that, it was said to be the summer resting place for the leader of the Muisca Indians, called the Zipa - until the Spanish drove them out and founded Bogotá, a distortion of the indigenous name 'Bacatá.'

Until recently, at least, lots more beer and chicha flowed on the plaza than did water. We'll see for how long the fountain operates this time around.

Loading a letter after the inauguration event.

A historic view of the plaza.

Kicking the hacky sack around on the plaza.

A storyteller at work in the chapel doorway.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Sanitizing La Plaza del Chorro

La Plaza del Chorro, the spot where Bogotá was founded and center of Bohemian activity, has a well-earned reputation for small-time vice like smoking pot and drinking in public. The police have evidently decided to put a halt to all that - but not by patrolling and enforcing the law. Instead, they've roped off big parts of the plaza on Friday and Saturday nights to prevent kids from hanging out and consuming illegal vices.

Sadly, the yellow tapes have also cut out a lot of the plaza's life and spirit.

Storytellers used to entertain crowds on the chapel's steps. 

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Armored Horses and Armored Riders

These armored anti-riot police and their armored horses were waiting on La Plaza del Chorro de Quevedo this morning, prepared if trouble broke out in protest marches down the hill on Ave. Septima. (Others would suggest that the police were waiting to make the trouble.) I've seen many armored police, but these were the first armored horses I've spotted.

In fact, the march, of judicial employees and university students, was peaceful, except for some graffiti and paint balls.

 

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

20 de Julio on the Plaza del Chorro

Try some chicha!

They celebrated the 20 de Julio, Colombia's independence day, all over the country, including the Plaza del Chorro in La Candelaria (where Bogotá was founded).

A children's theatre group. 

The crowded Callejon del Embudo, or Funnel Avenue.

Try out cake.

Lots of mural work going on, including this one in the Callejon del Embudo. 

Dressed for the occasion. 

Young stiltwalkers. 

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

La Candelaria Returns to Life!

A storyteller at work in the chapel doorway.

Photographing a mural
in the Callejon del Embudo. 

The La Candelaria neighborhood, Bogotá's historic center and the location of many universities, is coming back to life these days as students return to class.

The neighborhood has more than a dozen universities, all but one of them private. And, when the students are around, La Plaza del Chorro becomes the center of action, with its musicians, street performers, storytellers, chicha bars and crafts and pot sellers.

Playing with fire. 

Juggling. 

A handicraft seller catches some customers.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

The Bathroom's Back in La Plaza del Chorro!

The bathroom is located at the bottom of a stairway.
It is almost dwarfed by the elevator for wheelchair users. 

Finally, La Plaza del Chorro has a bathroom again!

It took only about three years and 50 million pesos, but there it is.

La Plaza del Chorro, always lively. 

For many years, two neighborhood women had operated a bathroom at the bottom of the stairs on the plaza's west side. Their bathroom wasn't always the cleanest, nor did the women observe the strictest hygiene rules - I often saw them preparing their lunch on a hot plate and eating it inside the bathroom.

How long will the complex new
wheelchair elevator last?

But the bathroom served an important function, particularly because the plaza is surrounded by hostels, universities and bars and restaurants. For the ladies who ran it, the bathroom also provided a modest income.

So, when officials from the city government showed up and ordered the bathroom closed in the interests of public hygiene, lots of us shook our heads. Now, instead of less-than-perfect bathroom, the whole neighborhood would turn into an open-air restroom, with no hygiene standards at all.

The shiny new bathroom
(model not always present).

Which was exactly what happened. And the plaza's bars and restaurants got pestered by drunken young people demanding to use their facilities.

But the local City Hall promised that a new public bathroom would be built....soon. Soon turned from months into one year and then three years. Local officials kept promising and promising that remodeling work was just about to start, which it of course did not.And there was a problem, I learned: city regulations required that the new bathrooms include handicapped access. The obvious way to provide such access would be to build a ramp into the steps. But that possible ramp would be a bit too steep to please regulators, and so an expensive and sophisticated elevator was required. But the city didn't have enough money for the elevator - which meant no bathroom for anybody.

Why couldn't the city instead just make an agreement with one of the plaza's restaurants to allow wheelchair users to use their bathroom?

A special stall for wheelchair users.

Besides, in a neighborhood full of drinkers, in which drug addicts rip away and sell every piece of metal they can, how long would a beautiful wheelchair elevator last?

Meanwhile, the neighborhood's alleys and corners continued serving the needs of alchohol-saturated bladders.

The porta-potties didn't
contribute to the plaza's colonial
ambience (or aroma).

The city did place two porta-potties on the plaza, where they looked ugly and quickly became so filthy and revolting that few ventured inside. So much for improving hygiene standards.

Late last year, work finally started on the new bathroom. And this week it was finally inaugurated. After three years' wait and 50 million pesos spent, it does look nice. And it's a plus for the neighborhood's residents and tourists.

Now, let's see how long that elevator lasts. 

Heading to the bathroom. 

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Plaza del Chorro is Flowing Again!

A minor milestone for a major Bogotá landmark

Spanish conquistadores founded Bogotá in 1538 at what's now known as La Plaza del Chorro - the Plaza of the Stream, or Fountain, of Water. (They had first fought and killed the Muisca Indians, who had a settlement in the same spot.)

However, for years, the plaza's fountain has been dry. 

But in recent days city workers fitted the fountain with a hose, setting the water flowing again. 

'Plaza of the dry fountain' - but it made a good bench.

It's wet again!

We'll see how long it lasts. 

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours