30 July 2010, Barranquilla

I write to you from Barranquilla. This is an industrial/residential town, with many neighbourhoods full of one-story houses. I am back to couchsurfing, which has been lovely. I haven´t been on the go, go, go, but have been hanging out talking to G and M. M does not speak English, but we have managed to have some pretty serious girl talk with my limited Spanish and her even more limited English. I think she is very frustrated about this because she tells G that she thinks we would be close friends if we could speak the same language, but I'm just so happy I am communicating and understanding anything at all in Spanish that I am chuffed. Only couchsurfers can speak slow enough for me to understand. No one that I meet in public can slow down their speaking.

I talk in English with G in the mornings and late evenings, when he comes home from work. He is an avid reader, loves Neitzche, considers himself a nihilist and an atheist. He has the exuberance of someone who knows that his ideas are right, though he claims to understand that all is relative to our own egos. We can talk for four hours at a time. And let me tell you, he is doing most of the talking.

Today the three of us went into town and wandered through the streets of street sellers, soaking up the local atmosphere. We went into his favourite used bookshop, a wonderful two-level place of dusty old books in neat piles on the shelves. I bought two more books in Spanish by Eduardo Caballero Calderon. One day I will be able to read them. I began the young adult book by Calderon that I bought and couldn´t get through the first sentence, even with the help of my Spanish/English dictionary. But I will keep trying. How else to learn?

Cartagena is a quaint and romantic place. I preferred the neighbourhood my hostel was in, Getsamani, to the city inside the walls, but both are full of coloured houses with balconies. In Getsamani everything is rustically run-down and the doors to the houses are open so you can see inside to the tile-floored living rooms with couches, porch chairs and television sets. On Tuesday I met an Israeli couchsurfer in the hostel and we went out to an expensive sushi dinner together. We drank mojitos and the chef made me a beautiful gourmet vegetarian sushi, but it was the most expensive day I have had so far in Colombia. The sushi was $515,000 pesos, two drinks (it was happy hour) $13,000.

While we were eating and discussing the politics and economy of Israel, the two New Yorkers I invited myself to sit with in the square in the old town the night before came into the sushi place. I was engrossed in conversation, when I heard a male voice say,`'Is that Rachel?` I had sat with them for an hour and a half or so and talked about the politics and economics of Latin America. They both worked in finance and were much more pro-capitalist than me. I would love to have the Colombians I talk to explain to the Americans I talk to how the West and capitalism have fucked over their country, because I am never able to adequately get across the pillaging nature of capitalism. It is interesting, though, that economic views are so predictable. They are deeply related to one´s country's economic experience. Americans don't really understand the negative impacts of capitalism and South Americans feel exploited not only by the US but mostly by their own corrupt politicians.

The three men and I later met up in the old city to go to a salsa club. But the club was pretty empty and we paid $10,000 (which got us an overpriced drink) to get into a non-salsa discoteque. This was okay. The music was fine, but the boys wanted to stay on the upper level, which was really crowded and I could tell they really wanted to dance with Colombian girls. The Israeli and I didn´t stay that long.

On the Tuesday I took a trip to the Isles de las Roques. I wanted to try to find a little boat to tae me there, as a Swedish guy in the hostel suggested but I wandered around on Monday unable to find the right port for those boats. Instead I went to the modern art museum with a special exhibit on Mexican art and it´s normal South American art exhibit. It was a small and nice gallery. By Monday night I felt I had done Cartagena. I had walked around the old neighbourhoods and some of the ordinary central bits of Cartagena. So, it was good that the trip to Playa Blanca took all day Tuesday. I booked the trip in the hostel and was told to arrive at 7.30am. The large cruising boat didn`t leave until 9.00.

On the boat I talked with a Colombian man and his young son, who both spoke English. They were on a three-month holiday together. The boy was very smart and sweet. Our first stop was at an island with an aquarium. I didn´t want to go to the aquarium, was just desperate to finally get in water - so I hopped into the Caribbean, though there was no beach on this island. Some others were also in the water and one older woman talked to me a lot in rapid-fire Spanish that I barely understood.

The next stop was Playa Blanca, a long beach of white sand, trees, and many people trying to sell you things. We had lunch on the island and I went for a snorkel. It was decent - I saw some nice small phosphorescent fish and one nice coral. Here the Caribbean is very warm and waveless, clear green. So I was a little bit lonely and bored and came back sunburnt.

Now, though Barranquilla doesn't have much to see other than the bar that Marquez and other writers hung out in, and I'm not doing much other than talking, I feel good to be with couchsurfers and in a home. Tonight we are meeting a German couchsurfer and going for drinks at a bar. So next post may be about Barranquilla nightlife.