Leon (half) day 1

Couldn´t get these computers to recognize my camera, so you´ll have to hold off for pictures a little while longer.

After checking into my sweet hostel (REAL beds, for starters), I decided to see what I could see in Leon. I had mostly one place in mind for the afternoon, La Fundacion Ortiz, which is a large collection of art, much of it from Latin America. I had neither properly studied my map nor pointed myself in the four directions of the compass, so I started off going the opposite way, and kept trying to correct myself and doing a poor job. Luckily, the central part of Leon isn´t big, dangerous, or scary. Just confusing until you realize it´s very simple: all the streets are numbered and directioned (like Washington, DC) and the East-Wests are Calles and the North-Souths are Avenidas. Or is it the other way around. However, getting lost was a good way for me to run into like a million churches. I found the cathedral, according to my guidebook the biggest in Latin America, took over 100 years to build, and not at all hard to find, though I wasn´t looking for it. Unfortunately now it´s pretty dirty on the outside and needs renovation, but it´s still extremely impressive. Today I plan to go inside it, but yesterday my thoughts were on seeing other things. There´s a large central square in front of the cathedral, cool to see guys kicking a ball around, vendors with food and random brightly colored plastic toys and knick-kncacks, and people strolling. Since this town houses a university (or a few, not sure), it´s very young and there´s a lot of teenagers with books and art supplies (I think there´s an art university or something like that). In Santiago there isn´t a central square, so being here I felt that I was really in a Latin American city again. So much going on! Another thing I like about Leon: minimal harrassment. People are generally smiley, friendly, but not imposing, just going about their own business. Must be they´re used to lots of foreign tourists, and have learned how they like to be treated (i.e. left alone!). I bought a large green guava for 7 Cordobas (less than 50 cents), and it was tasty, but I prefer ripe ones, so I guess I´ll buy more and ripen them up. In Panama they also eat them just green, I don´t know why. I´d overdosed on mangoes the day before I left Panama, so I avoided fruit mostly yesterday. But today´s going to be a different story. So many types of mangoes and avocadoes to choose from! Also a brown fruit that looks like a bit like a spherical potato, I must find out what that is and how you eat it.

Finally found the art museum, but by that point I was indeed tired and my legs hurt and so I sort of rushed through the large collection. I was the only one there, maybe because it was later in the afternoon, and the security guys sort of distracted me by turning on lights in front of me and then shutting them off after me. Felt like I was being followed...because I was! Lots of cool stuff, but honestly I don´t know what to look at in art. I prefered the more modern Latin stuff over the European oils (mostly religious art which I definitely need someone to explain to me since it´s so full of symbols). Had a nice big salad for dinner. Nothing I couldn´t make myself, but nice to not have to. That´s what vacation is about right?

Slept very well on a very good mattress, though I´m still getting used to dorm-style hostels. Being a light sleeper is tough when people come in and rustle through their stuff and whisper and flick on and on their flashlights, but I don´t mind it overall (at least here there´s courtesy rules and quiet hours after 11pm). Of course, woke up at 5:30 am with no hope of sleeping again, but thinking about the time change, it´s as if I slept in until 6:30 in Panama, so that´s a good thing. Ahhh all of vacation is a good thing.