This is going to be a quick update (again) because I´m running out of money and I´m dead tired from travelling and losing things (and finding them) again. I´ll get the hang of it soon, I promise. Things lost (and found) today: my sleeping bag.
I just got to my next stop, Manizales, after spending 4 days in Medellin. Today is my first real day of travelling sola. Up until now, my friend Amalia has been with me, and been an amazing travelling partner and friend and supporter of my efforts to communicate in Spanish with just about everyone who will open their mouths.
Medellin was a weird but cool city. Bogota is still my Number 1, but Medellin had its, shall we say, charms. You´ve seen the title of my email, so I´ll tell you why. Because every third Paisa male (what they call the people of Antioquia district, of which Medellin is the capital) has a mullet. I kid you not. I have an entire photo essay about it. Young and old, they all have this pride that´s connected with it. It´s a symbol of their being people of the earth — paisas, a statement of sorts to declare themselves as above the superficiality of the Rollos of Bogota. I actually quite grew to like those mullets, to be honest. There were moments when I`d stop dead in my tracks and think, “What a BEAUTIFUL, luxurious mullet that is!” Curly, straight, blonde, black, grey… When you see so many of them, this sort of obsession tends to happen.
There was a lot more to see in Medellin. The feria de las flores was on in full swing there when we arrived with some mishaps. Let me start at the very beginning: we couldn´t get a bus to Medellin. All sold out because it was a long weekend and everyone was headed to the feria, one of the largest festivals in the dept. of Antioquia and the country. The highlight of this festival is the desfile des silleteros: when the paisas come down from the mountains with their baskets (kind of like a coffee picking basket) filled to the brim with flowers. This parade was on Friday at 2 pm, and we wanted to be there in time.
At 10 pm on Thursday night, we stood in the bus station in Bogota, determined not to return home, and flummoxed as to how we would get to Medellin. So we did the next best thing — took a really crappy night bus to Manizales. We had the last two actual seats, thank god, because after that, three more people got on and had to sit in folding chairs in the aisles. We were told it would be cold; it was boiling hot. We were told it would be comfortable, it was not. The teenage girl next to me decided to use my shoulder as a pillow. At some point, she decided to talk to me, in Spanish. One of the questions she asked me was whether, when I was young, I had ever fallen in love with a boy and experienced heartbreak. It was an 8 hour ride.
At around 2 am, 4 hours in, the bus broke down on the highway. It was a full moon night. I was paranoid with tales of highway robbery in Colombia. Instead, we got off the bus, and sat by the side of the road until it was fixed. Amalia had some food, so we had a midnight moonlight picnic. Fun!
We caught a connection early am from Manizales to Medellin. The drive was spectacular, but the roads were so winding I felt like I was driving down a long instestine. The woman next to me had a really cute two year old girl who could do an imitation of Michael Jackson. Not kidding. We got talking, about morbid things like plastic surgery and serial killers. Don´t ask. In Spanish. Things I have learned: pechugas falsas = fake breasts. Nalgas = butt cheeks. Matar = to kill.
Medellin was hell to find a place to stay but after half an hour of calling around we found a place. If you know Bombay, we were staying in the Falklands Road area of Medellin that is, the red light district. Of course, we didn`t know this. the hotel was clean and serviceable even though the windows were broken. Another thing here — no toilet seats.
(Right now as I write this, I am listening to a bunch of gringoes talking about their worst travel experiences, and getting scared senseless. Note to self: please ignore.)
Made it to the desfile des silleteros! I´ll post photos on my blog tomorrow so you can see how grand it was. People were everywhere, cheering and egging on these exhausted paisas. The rest of the city was pretty empty, excpet for the street near our place, where there were prossies out at 2 pm, who were looking at us, maybe wondering if we were on their territory. NOT.
The next couple of days whirred by. Lots of festivities, lots of walking the city, a classic auto show, a Born Again Christian passion play in the rich, pechuga falsa district of El Poblado to warn youth against the temptation of beer and electronic music (Want protection? *insert image of condom here* Jesus is your only protection), and a really cool post-football game under the sky party in Estadio where the stadium is. Also went to Santa Fe de Antioquia the former capital of Medellin, now a sleepy pueblo stuck in the 18th century, with cobbled streets and a plaza and horses and old paisa men. A youth there offered me a bouquet of flowers. Colombians are apparently fascinated by me because I don’t look like a gringa so they can’t place me and they don´t have many indians travelling though, so they don´t know what to do with my big eyes. True.
I made my way to Manizales this afternoon, which is a mountaintop town in the Eje Cafetero — the coffee district. Fincas (coffee farms) all around, cool weather, a blessing after the heat of Medellin and the sauna of Santa Fe. I got dropped off in the dark in the wrong place. Then I asked around (THANK GOD I can speak some Spanish) and found it. Then I realized I left my sleeping bag behind. Then I hopped on a bus to get it. Then I wrung my hands and made my eyes really big, until one of the drivers, who told me I was bonita, called around and located it for me. Then I caught a bus back. And the stupid driver tried to cheat me. But I got my money back. In Spanish. And got off about twenty minutes away from where I was supposed to be and had to find my way back. And could not. But a few kind people walked me to each corner until I found the hostel.
Now I am done writing and will go to BED.
The Chapati Kid 