Development!

The big excitement of the barrio was the recent arrival of pavement! Yes, the Callejón de la Loma, home to a few thousand people and roughly the same number of motorcycles, has been paved. Well... kind of. They did about half of the streets. Maybe a third. And then the giant trucks and workers and piles of gravel just disappeared one day, as suddenly as they had arrived.

One afternoon, I took a class of kids out with my camera to document the event. Here are a few of the photos they took:








(This one isn't really related to the paving, but I think it's a cool photo. Check out the large version! This restaurant has been abandoned and decaying for a while now, but you can still read the menu on the wall.)

Unfortunately, I don't have any photos of my favorite aspect of the newly-paved roads: rollerblades! Literally the day after the streets were paved, kids of all ages started scooting around the neighborhood on rollerblades. Where did all the rollerblades come from? I have never seen them in a store here. Did everyone just have rollerblades saved in their closet, waiting for the day when the asphalt would arrive? Amazing!