Michael Jackson: Fans in Madrid Saying "We´ll Miss You"

I was writing my good bye post when they mentioned on the news that in Madrid the fans will go to the Hard Rock Café to make him a small tribute… so there I went.

It was very spontaneous and simple, nobody organized it, just the fans accorded to go there. Was amazing to see over there people of all ages.



When I arrived, there were already a lot of fans, but it was very quiet, mostly people with sad faces, some crying. Several tv cameras and news photographers. Wasn´t easy to hear the music, due it was being played in a car CD player, that one of the fans had the good luck to find there a parking place and had open all the doors (even the back one) to ad music to the tribute, at first slow music like “I´ll be there”, “We are the World” and “Man in the Mirror”.





Suddenly music started to be livelier and so do the fans. A few, in order, started to dance a bit and from then on it became into a party!









We also had one minute silence.










The one with the music had to go around 23.00 and something magical happened: some fans, again in order, started to sing his songs, with the rest of fans doing the choruses.












I´m afraid I had to go more or less at midnight seems the call is for going there the whole weekend and also in front of the entrance of the Wash Museum, where they had put M. J. statue out there.

The pity: I do think would be nice from Hard Rock Café marketing staff to find the way to place a screen with Michael´s videos out there. Anyway some of us went there to at least drink something…

Bogota Second Part: Doing a Bit of Tourism

We arrived in Bogotá just 2 days before the World Championship, trying to have at least one day for recovering from the jet lag. The other Spanish players were arriving or the same day or the day after, some of them went few days to places like Cartagena de Indias before the Championship (smart people!) ;)

So, actually Topo and I will have just 1 morning for doing tourism due we´ll participate in a Tourney that will start the afternoon before the Championship day.

We went to the Salt Mines in Zipaquirá, in a tour, with more Scrabble people. We went in a micro bus, so it was just our group.


The visit at the mines was really nice. They even have a Cathedral and a theater there.










Going back to Bogotá, as part of the tour, we went to an emeralds factory and then we went back to the hotel, but we can go walking from there, enjoying part of the tourist area of Bogotá, but some of us had the Nations Cup that will start that afternoon.

The day after we had some free hours, so Alvaro, Topo and I went to a mall with 3 objectives: mine: to buy a pin at the Hard Rock Caffe :P (yeap, I collect them), Alvaro´s one: to taste the best Colombian coffee and to find out a toys´ store with the Scrabble travel version :D (but I´m afraid we didn´t found it).

We went by taxi and it was quite interesting to see the things that made Topo and Alvaro to be curious about. It was their first experience in a Latin American Country and things like traffic, old cars, old trucks, black smoke from cars, old and crowded, really crowded buses, the color of the houses, the way people dress; impacted them both.



The special part was about how to know where to find the best Colombian coffee… so, I asked to a shop assistant on one of the visited stores and he tell us the best place was right there at the lobby of the mall, a Juan Valdez coffee shop! I should say it was the first time I heard about Juan Valdez coffee… but was funny due right after coming back to Madrid, I found out a lot of them! :D (Really no idea if they were there before, but if that´s the case, it means I less observant of what I thought I was! :$ ).



(To be continued).