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This is Santa Magdalena, the street I stayed on. The Tempo Rent is on the right behind the trees. The Sheraton Four Points Hotel is on the left. Providencia (the main shopping street) is right ahead. The river and park is a block behind me. There's an alley just past the Sheraton on the left that is the beginning of the bar and cafe district.

An odd thing happened here one evening. I'd just finished my nightly ice cream cone (Sebastian's has great peach ice cream) and was walking back to the hotel. Out front, I got a cell phone call, so I stopped on the sidewalk. While I was just finishing the call, a car pulled out of the parking garage and I had to step back. I stepped right into the path of a woman who was walking by. Tall, slender, about 30 or 40, wearing heels and a women's slacks/jacket business suit. She didn't bump into me, but she did have to dodge to miss me. She stopped, turned around, looked at me and asked me something in Spanish. I hesitated, and she asked "Do you speak Spanish?". Well, enough to order ice cream cones, but I figured that wasn't what we were talking about. "Not a word", I said. She started to turn away, stopped, looked at me again, and said "Too bad." And she was gone.

Odd.