Colectivo!

Today was mine and my Aunt Mimi's first experience riding in a "colectivo" or group taxi. There are various stations throughout the city where you can share a taxi with other passengers headed in the same direction for very little money. The cars are marked with the destination, so as soon as you see a vehicle headed in the direction you wish to go you flag them down, ask how much, and hop in. Now, this system would never fly back home. In a 4 person vehicle we had the driver, 3 people up front (a mom, small child and grandmother - geegads!!), and in the back me, my aunt, and an elderly gentleman, all crammed in. Well, can I tell you...that is part of the charm! CHARM? Yes, wrong word. That is part of the experience, I meant to say! If we would have hired a taxi it would have probably been at least 150 - 200 pesos for where we wanted to go, however, we managed to go via colectivo for a total of 65 pesos (less than $5 USD for both of us), round trip.

You will notice I got a little flustered at the end of the video and it ended abruptly...the man that passed me had less than stellar manners...I told my aunt about the unwelcome pat I got and she said, "Where is he?!" Lucky for him he disappeared into the crowd, as I can guarantee you he would have gotten an unexpected earful of Aunt Mimi's fluent Spanish!