Stunning Cartagena

---

I have said it before but it really seems like the whole world is in Colombia! I haven't come across this many travelers, locals or other South Americans in any other country. I know I have been here over Christmas holidays but it doesn't seem to be stopping even now. Some one said that the locals here are only just starting to feel safe enough now to travel again in their own country and I guess they have been waiting a long time.

I am really enjoying Colombia for lots of reasons, the climate, the music, the friendly people. It seems like they have got right in this country in terms of customer service too. In all the other South American countries I have visited, the service is at best, indifferent, at worst, so slack that I have walked out of a number of restaurants now after no one even bought me a menu. Here the most common phrase you'll hear is 'a la orden' - at your service'. They say it when you enter a shop, when you leave or if you just ask a question.
Anything you want you can get here, any little whim. If you are on the bus and a bit peckish some one will come along with some of the tastiest street food I've had so far. If someone wants just two cigarettes they can buy just two, if you fancy a beer while you are shopping look out for a cool box on wheels, they sell little bags of water instead of bottles here which is a great idea, or a big 5 litre one to take home. Generally wherever you are, if you want something you can send some young boy to get it for you. Its great fun. I am also getting quite used to men doing everything for me, if I want something getting or doing I just ask even if its perfectly easy to do myself (I still feel guilty though but I am getting over it).
Its going to be hard to adjust again when I get home and, as annoying as it can be, I think I will miss knowing that everyone thinks I'm gorgeous and tells me so 5 times a day, here even the police tell me they love me!
The other convenient but odd thing is the people who sell mobile phone minutes. Almost everyone here has a phone (including me as I just bought one) but calls are so expensive, especially to other networks, that everyone uses these llamada sites that are everywhere. Sometimes they are literally just a guy on the street with a mobile from each network attached to him by chains, but the annoying thing is you never know who is calling you, as it is not their own number and therefore cant screen your calls. You also have to let the seller dial the number for some reason, so every call I get is some person saying "just a minute" then they pass me over to the person who actually wants to speak to me.

I arrived in Cartagena hoping to see a bit more of Gary before he got a boat to Panama and was gone for good. After Mayra had left Taganga on bad terms with him Gary had also started getting mysterious calls from someone telling him not to call or send any more messages. Initially we suspected they were from Mayra but after 4 or 5 calls he managed to figure out that it was in connection with another Colombian girl he had met before Christmas and was planning to visit again in Cartagena. It turns out that this girl had got back together with her ex boyfriend who may or may not be involved with the guerrilla group F.A.R.C, but either way he was not happy and allegedly was after Gary. Gary was advised to get rid of his phone number so that F.A.R.C couldn´t trace him!
Over beers and dominoes in the apartment it was all faintly worrying but highly amusing. We all concluded that Gary should get a new SIM card (no point in taking any risks here in Colombia even if it was just a jealous boyfriend) and steer clear of crazy Colombian women from now on........and so I was very surprised to find that he was here in Cartagena with......Mayra!
Unfortunately that meant that when he left the next day on the boat I was stuck with Mayra who I know has no money and was wanting to share her double room where she and Gary had stayed and go out on the town with me.
I am slightly ashamed to admit that my chosen course of action was to hide! Basically I went out of my hostel and didn´t come back for the rest of the day. After two days it seems she left without leaving me any kind of note, what a shame.
So I never did get the full story on how he escaped from the guerrillas or how Marya tracked him down again but as far as I know he made it to Panama safe and sound despite reports of horrible weather.
I have really enjoyed being a tourist here again in Cartagena and also getting some culture. It is such a beautiful city as you will see from the pictures, there is the historical walled centre with balconies and Verona like architecture and then a slightly poorer walled section outside this called Getsemani where I am staying. Then there is a long spit with high rises, posh hotels and expensive shops called Bocagrande but a huge portion of the city including a big market sprawls outside this. However, you only get to see it if you take the bus to the bus terminal instead of a taxi so most of the well off tourists (and there are lots of them) never see it. In amongst all of this are a number of defensive forts built to protect Cartagena from the likes of Sir Francis Drake who sacked the city of its gold and only declined to burn it to the ground for a big ransom. Although this wasnt how they told it in the tour of the Castillo de San Felipe, of course the locals came out on top in that one!
I decided to take one of the city tours in a traditional Chiva bus as I though it would be a good way to see the sights without suffering in the heat, but every time I take a tour I realise its not worth it. The best bit was up at the Convento de popa with its lovely flowery courtyard (but not much else) when I realised some ingenious kids had made collecting cups to push up through the barricade meant to keep them out and were shouting at me to put money in. I was so amused I had to give them each a few coins.
I had a arrived in Cartagena just before a literature festival and, although the book discussions didn't interest me there were two concerts, one by African artist Baaba Maal that I knew from my Dads collection and one local artist called Toto La Moposina who I had just discovered and thought was great. So I was really disappointed that the tickets were all sold out for the second concert but as I was walking back to my hostel past the stage which was being erected in the square, having begged and pleaded for a ticket or a way in, a guy started talking to me....
He told me he worked for the organisers and also for Greenpeace and after a few minutes answered his phone and told the caller to put his friend Lisa on the guest list of the concert for which I had managed to get a ticket already. I was suspicious but figured I’d go along with it in the hope that it was genuine and he would get me in to the Toto concert too. So of course this meant going out for a drink with him the following night. The night was surprisingly enjoyable actually and we went to a little bar called La Esquina Santiageña where we danced salsa and there was a lively and friendly crowd including a lovely old grandpa who wanted to dance with all the girls. However when it came to concert night he didn´t show up. To be fair I didn't wait long, already having my suspicions, so when the music started I went in with some other friends - Rubier and Sarah and asked about a guest list but there wasn't one.
I thought I’d try my luck at getting a ticket outside the next concert which was in a theater so me and Rubier (who sells artisania jewellery in the street) went to see if there were any for sale. The street hawkers where selling them at 3 times the face value and so we waited in line at the box office to see if any would become available. A customer of Rubiers came up to him and gave him a spare one but when the crowd went in and the lady in the box office told us there were no spare tickets we decided to sell Rubiers free one and watch the concert on the screen that was set up outside. It was a good back up plan in theory but unfortunately, being south America, the sound cut out as the concert started and they couldn't fix it! So I got to see the fantastic Toto in concert but I just couldn't hear her. Gutted.
Just an hour or so outside of Cartagena are a few villages which I went to visit, the first was San Jacinto from where the famous (here at least) Gaiteros de San Jacinto originate, so Rubier and I caught a bus there principally because he wanted to buy some maracas and I wanted to see some places off the tourist trail. It was a nice enough little town with an ugly square and we wandered around finding people who made maracas and tamboros (drums) and taking in the old fashioned and slow way of life there. The next day in the afternoon after purchasing said maracas we caught a bus back towards Cartagena and got off to take two mototaxis to San Basilio de Palenque. The 5km trip was bumpy and dusty but went through some lovely scenery and arrived in the amazing village which seems to be famous for having lots of black people! In fact they have a dialect which is African in origin and a very strong musical history. We had the name of someone called Manuel Perez who had a house with two rooms where tourists could stay, there are no hotels in the village and only one kind of restaurant opposite the only shop in town. When we arrived and asked for him they took us to where he and his group La Sexteta Tabalá were filming a video in the street for their new CD. It was fantastic to arrive in this other world full of music and kids running around in the street, its the only place I have been where none of the kids asked for money for photos, the kids just thought it was brilliant and performed for us whenever we got the camera out. We later watched the kids in a dance rehearsal like no other I have ever seen. With just three drums and a metal tube filled with seeds the kids reeled through some very energetic and at times suggestive dances as the sun set over the quiet little village. We spent the evening sitting on the veranda of the house chatting to Manuel and some Anthropologists from Bogota who were working on a project there and then returned to Cartagena on the bus at midday the next day.
Now its off to Barranquilla for Carnival and more music and gyrating.

---