bogota day 02 : kirkham ham

VERY early morning today. Breakfast served at 6:20am in my hotel room, off in the van at 7am. We have a FULL day of location scouting ahead of us, so lets get started. First we're picked up to see a potential place for an apartment of a main character, Jason. A stark white, three room space, some potential, but we keep our hopes up in seeing something more feasible. We continue to walk to our next location, along the way, we randomly seeing a building with a cool facade. Turns out its a bar and Bernardo knocks on the door to see if we can take a look inside. We think it might be perfect for the character Valentina's bar that she works at.

We continue to our next scheduled location. We walk past a location that Daniel had already found for a shot of Serafina, we all think it'll be amazing, especially at night. More walking, its amazing how close everything is to each other. We head towards an amazing, historical area called Candelaria. Its a jumble of restaurants, colleges, theaters, residences, bars, hostels, and hotels. There seems to be a great artistic community here, the street walls are littered with some really amazing tags and graffiti. Definitely an area I could see myself living in.

Next up was a hotel to use a potential location. We were excited about the lobby, but once we got upstairs, it didn't really fit what we were looking for. Moving on to our next location, Carlos ends up recognizing an old apartment he used to live in, and we knock on the door. He is friends with the owner and she answers the door to show us some of the empty apartments in her building that are available. It has an amazing courtyard that all the rooms surround. And rent is ridiculously inexpensive here, furthering a notion to live here for a bit... The space she had wasn't exactly looking for the film though. Que lastima.

Our next stop was the highlight of the day because we discovered (well, Bernardo and Carlos discovered) an amazing place for us. Its perfect for the character Jason's apartment. Frankly, its also just an amazing apartment! So spacious, perfect to shoot in, beautiful light, great character and windows throughout the whole place. We're very excited about it, we couldn't have found a better place if we built it ourselves. The funniest part, the man that is currently renting the apartment, will possibly also be our caterer. Two birds one stone, gotta love it.

Walking through more of Candelaria, we passed by several government buildings, historical landmarks, and finally Bogota Town Square where we plan to shoot a scene. Definitely picturesque. We stop for a snack closer towards downtown, walking out of historical Candelaria. We try a soft mozzarella type cheese with a guava compote and syrup snack. Very different, very tasty. Also, yucca bread, salty, almost like a cheese bread, with a small sour aftertaste.

Our next location takes care of two areas in the film. A shady hotel and hotel room, and a dark alley. At first we're hesitant about the hotel building, but we realize that with the right set dressing, we can make it work perfectly.

The Santa Fe district is our next stop, we drive there to scout a playground, an apartment for the Valentina character, a cafe, and a city street Serafina runs down. The city street is half florists and half tombstone carvers, and is, of course, near a giant cemetery, which we also take a walk through.

Lunch is eaten at a popular restaurant called Sopas y Postres (Soups and Desserts), a chain restaurant in Colombia. We get a slew of food, soups, chicharrones, platanos, meats, salads, everything.

We take off from there to see more at Candelaria. We actually walk into a market where they're filming a telenovela. Funny to see how large their team is, and know how small our crew is going to be when making a full feature length film. We looked at an area we're considering for another scene with Valentina, near a college campus. Very artsy, several restaurants and bars. Along our walk we find a great new hostel nearby, only $10 a night! If you don't mind sharing a bunkbed with 10 other people or so, but the facilities are all very nice, clean, and new.

More walking around as the night goes on. We finally head back to the hotel around 9pm, but not before stopping at a nearby restaurant with some amazing burritos and quesadillas. We get back around 10pm, a very long day.

Jamie and Carlos hit the hay, Jason, Daniel and I decide to go out and grab a quick drink somewhere. We head to a safer area that Daniel knows of nearby, called Zona Rosa. Its pretty much like a 3rd Street Promenade in Los Angeles, nothing amazing, but a nice place to chill. We end up at a Irish pub style bar, grab a few beers, meet some very random South African women after their book club, and quickly retreat back to the hotel after our beers are empty.

A very long day...