Bogota Final Part: Chiva Rumbera and Parties!

If we take into account that Colombians are known as the “party kings” and combine that with a young team of Argentineans lovers of new technologies, we could start to get the picture about how good organized was the whole Championship.

People of redeletras.com, the official web for playing Spanish Scrabble online, had been responsible of the technical organization, including, of course, retransmissions. FISE´s staff made the organization of the Championship and the different tourneys, meaning while the tourneys where played, but the Colombian Scrabble organization made, as good hosts, a great job during the time we weren´t playing.

The Scrabble Colombia team had take care of every single detail, from sending us mails the days before asking us if we prefer them to arrange taxis to wait us at the airport, made a welcome letter including prevention indications and how to behave at the city in case we go around alone, prepared a quite complete activities program for the different days the tourney lasted, most of the activities ended with party! (When they weren´t the organizators of the party, Rede´s people did!) :D and even they had done a very happy song talking about a couple that found love playing Scrabble! :D



So, every night some of us were at the different parties, some others playing Scrabble at the lobby. Yes, we just can´t get enough! And it´s not usual to have the bests of the world at the same place! So! We finished the championship inebriated of Scrabble and party! :D



With no doubts, the best party was the Chiva Rumbera one. First of all, I should explain what is a “chiva rumbera”. The chiva is a kind of bus, but with some differences from the normal ones we all know. First of all, instead of having 2 lines of sits per row, it´s just 1 line, going from one wall to the other, so, every line has it´s own door. There are no windows at the sides. Some of them have no some of the sits in order to give space to a musicians group. This all make them perfect for having party inside! And that´s exactly the goal! :D When you go into a Chiva Rumbera, it means you´ll have a party at the bus (could be with a real life musicians group, could be with cd´s) while you are giving a ride. The ride includes drinks that usually are rum. Depending on the place, you´ll go to some places or others, but the point is to have a city seeing night tour that includes a visit to a viewpoint where the Chiva stops, usually several at the same time, to make a big party, but this is just one of the stops, not the end… the end usually is at the most fashion discos street. Wherever you go with the Chiva, everybody will now a Chiva is coming due the big noise of the music inside of it… so, usually people will stop a bit for greeting the Chivas. Usually different Chivas met at the streets and it becomes into a fight for being the faster and the one with people having more fun.

In our case, we had 2 Chivas that took us from the hotel and made a tour going first to the party zone of the city, then to the La Calera overview, where we stopped for a while and then we went back to the hotel.





You see, in situations like this one is quite interesting to watch out how the different cultures behave. Since the beginning, all the people from Latin America were laughing, dancing, singing and drinking. The Spanish ones were a bit serious at the beginning, like watching what was going on… even some kept on sited big part of the way to the overview point. .. one liter of Rum latter… hehehehe! Spanish team was unrecognizable! Even Juan Carlos Ayala, that usually is so quiet and serious, was dancing! I was at his side and once he told me “Ho! In this country everybody dance! Even me, that haven´t dance in my whole life… and look at me! Now even I am dancing!”







When we were going back to the hotel, most of the people started to relax a bit, knowing the party will be over soon… but the Spanish team at this point was at the middle of the fun and went out of the Chiva, in front of the hotel, cheering: “we all want more, we all want more… we all want more, much more and much more!” :P But I´m afraid it was so late and all the people were concerned about the matches to play the day after.



The party, in all the versions (dancing or playing Scrabble) ;) had been all the nights of the championship. Topo and I had the flight for coming back home the morning after the last day of the tourney. Again the way back meant to go first from Bogota to Miami, where we stayed some hours (not enough for going out to watch a bit, but enough for doing some shopping at the airport stores and for eat something while playing a Scrabble). Then, from Miami to Madrid… and for Topo some more hours till finally arrive in Barcelona. Before leaving Bogota, Topo had been playing Scrabble… in my case, I had been dancing and dancing and dancing! We were 8 the ones that had been dancing till 5.00 in the morning, I´m afraid I had to leff then, the taxi for going to the airport would be waiting us at the door of the hotel at 5.30 and I haven´t finished to put all inside my bag already! But I even took a shower before leaving the hotel!  Yeap, I had been dancing the whole night without sleeping after finishing the championship and went to the airport quite tired… but… we´ll have a lot of hours at the plane to sleep!

Bogota Third Part: Scrabble Tourneys

There were also other Scrabble tourneys taking place in Bogotá those days:

The Andean Tourney: for people from Venezuela, Perú, Bolivia, Colombia and Ecuador. It had been played 2 days before the World Championship (SSWC from now on). The winner, José Luis Rodriguez from Venezuela, obtained a place at the SSWC.

Other Tourney was the called “Extra” one. This one is for all the people that would like to play it and also gives 4 places for the SSWC.

The afternoon of the day before the World Championship, took place a new Tourney: the First Nations Scrabble in Spanish Cup. It was played by teams of 5 people, but playing at the same time just 4 (so one of each group can relax a bit each match). Days before the SSWC someone of the Spanish group of representatives, asked by mail who would like to play that tourney… and Alvaro, Topo, Juan Carlos and me, as good newbies, answered so soon we would like to, plus Carlos Puente, the only one of us that already had experience in a World Championship… the point is the other countries selected their best players for playing the tourney and we 5 weren´t exactly the best ones of Spain, so… the result was obvious… we were the second last… no wonder! :(

For me the funny experience was at the last match. I usually play quick, but in this case we both had to think a lot and the game took more time, so we were one of the last couples to end… It was a hard game, I had to think a lot, so, when we finally finished it, I was really thick and tired. In this kind of tourneys the public should remind outside the room the players are… so, imagine my big surprise when I opened the door of the room, someone asked me if I had won and when I said yes a lot of people screamed quite excited! Hehehehe! No! it wasn´t exactly my group of fans! ;P The point was that my game was the last one of the Spanish team and depending on it, Colombia would be (or not) the winner of the tourney… so the ones outside were the Colombians celebrating not exactly that I had win but that it meant they had win!!! :D



The World Championship was really exciting. In my case I usually say that my perfect way to lose weight is being in Scrabble tourneys! I usually go to the bathroom before starting the match and immediately after finishing each! But it´s nice to release that even the more expert players are also nervous. But what I liked more, was that even being a quite serious championship, everybody was so friendly, it really feels like a nice big family! The champion was Benjamín Olaizola.



The championship lasted 3 and half days. Most of us stayed in the same hotel. Also the meals were arranged with the hotel, so, most of us even didn´t cruised the hotel door during those days! Basically the restaurant was just for us during those days.



But definitely my favorite part of the Championship was what happened every night AFTER the matches! Just that… it deserves it´s own post! ;)



(To be continued)

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).

Bogota First Part: Going There

In September 2007 took place the XI Scrabble in Spanish World Championship in Bogotá, Colombia.

For representing a country at the World Championship, you should be classified, due there´s a specific number of participants from each country. That year the representatives of Spain should be 8. On a first sight, I shouldn´t have a chance to go as representative, but a lot of people with a better position at the table than me can´t go… so! There I was! :D In the list of representatives of Spain!

By coincidence I was in the same flight than Topo, just that he was coming from Barcelona, I arrived in Madrid, but we were lucky and had the chance to get sited together. It was the first time going to a Scrabble World Championship for both of us, and we were so excited about that.

I think every “professional” Scrabble player that prides oneself on being it, wouldn´t ever miss the chance of playing if is travelling with another one. And that´s exactly what we did as much as we can! We had a scale in Miami and Topo was quite wondered about the arrogance of the authorities at the airport with foreigners. (So sweet!) ;)



We arrived in Bogotá with 1 hour of delay, so, the taxi we had arranged to pick up us at the airport wasn´t anymore there. We had been prevented about not taking taxis out there (that´s a normal prevention in any Latin American country). At the other side of the outside door, a lot of people in a noisy and semi chaotic way were waiting for passengers some, others trying to buy/sell dollars… I mean, a normal Latin American country airport activity… but that could seem frighten for Europeans if it´s the first time. It wasn´t possible to stay inside the airport at that stage and anyway, there wasn´t anything that could help us, so, I told Topo to wait me outside till I try to find a way to take a secure taxi. He should wait me taking care of the bags (1 big bag and 1 trolley each one), but in the moment we went out, a lot of people at the same time came to us offering us whatever. Topo´s face was saying he was scared, Im afraid! :) But he defended the bags quite good! Hehehe ;P



I went to search the taxi again, but no one with our names waiting us, so, there were some people from hotels waiting passengers and I thought they could understand my position as tourist and give me the best recommendation of what to do… and it was so simple! There was an specific taxis office with a fixed price for taking you to the different hotels! :)



So, after several flight hours, finally we were arriving at the hotel… and immediately we felt at home! A lot of Scrabble players from all over the world were already at the lobby with their boards, playing! :D



(To be continued)