BOGOTA!

March 8, 2013

Tonight is my last night in Bogota, at least for this part of the trip. Tomorrow I will head up to La Guatavita, the farm that I found through couchsurfing.com.

Some reflections of my past week exploring Bogota...

To start with, Bogota is a fully 100% modern city, comparable to any city in the world. With all of the same issues as any city. There are definitely more 'dangerous' places here than in Seattle and other cities I've been to. Security is a Big Deal here. There are even a staff of three security guards at the community coop art gallery.

Not speaking Spanish is a huge barrier for me in getting to know anyone who lives here. I keep finding people who I'd really like to be friends with, but that's hard when I can't talk to them. I mean, there's lots of people who speak English, but my intention for this trip is to get to know this place, on it's own terms, and that definitely requires speaking the language. So for starters, I'm downloading mp3s of Spanish lessons tonight, so I can put them on my phone and listen to them while I paint, walk, do other work.

A few days ago, still staying at my first hostel, Alegria, I met a dude named Hunter and his friend Ankesh, traveling together on spring break from college in Raleigh North Carolina. Hunter is from Ashville, and he tells me the story of how at 18 or something, he started a non-profit company with his best friend (whose name I did not catch), to send shoes to Dominican Republic. He told me about how in doing this work, he quickly realized that people in the Dominican Republic don't need shoes. In fact, they don't need most of the charity bullshit that people send them... Hunter said in one visit, one old dude told him, “you know we just want you to hang out with us and work on actually trying to understand us. If we wanted shoes we would get shoes.” Whoa. Big realization for a privileged white kid. So now, mostly what Hunter and his friend to with their non-profit is to give presentations to school kids in the US and talk about cooperative problem solving... they go to DR to hang out with peeps and learn, then they go home and tell US schoolkids their story about how kids in the DR didn't need their shoes. Which seems like a pretty good turnaround in the flow of “international aid” to me.

I have gotten to meet some people who live in Bogota, very near my hostel in La Candelaria neighborhood. They are Anres and Carolina. Andres is the brother of Felipe, the dude who's farm I'm going to. Before I even got to Bogota, Felipe sent me their phone numbers and told me to call them when I got to Bogota. After getting out of the hospital, I managed to muster up the inertia to actually call Andres, and he was very happy to meet up and chat. He invited me to their house, a gorgeous old Spanish style home, with linking open courtyards (as most of the houses here are).

Andres is an artist, and Carolina is an anthropologist. Carolina spends nearly a total of six months working with tribes in the Columbian Amazon, and Andres often goes with her. I got to have lots of interesting conversation with them about the state of aboriginal rights in Colombia. Carolina says that aboriginal people of the Colombia regions have perhaps the most rights of any peoples in South America. They often own their land, and have nationally recognized sovereignty(!).

I mention my interest in maybe spending time with some tribes, if possible. They gently give me a whole speech, which seems a mix of practiced “reality check” for privileged city kids, and a general vent about negative experiences with idealistic volunteers. Basically, aboriginal people really don't need jack shit from anyone in the “developed world”. In fact the whole concept of “developed vs undeveloped” is inherently racist and ego-centric on the part of the “developed world”. In fact, the reality is more the difference between the colonial/oppressive/corporate world vs the tribes living in harmony with their cultural history and ecology. Anyone trying to “go in and help” is generally full of bullshit and racism (not bad intentions... just bad programming). And the tribes must first spend a massive amount of energy re-programming the jerk and teaching them how to live. Teaching them how to be a human being within their society. Then, maybe... the person can be useful. And anyways, the tribes don't need any things... everything they need is provided by the forest. What the do need is people to help them communicate with the government. Colombian layers and activists to help them assert their sovereignty rights and their land rights.

So in conversation with Caroline and Anres, I re-state my interest with more accuracy to my intentions... “I am interested in spending time with Amazon tribes in order to learn from them... ways to help heal the oppressive colonial world, which is doing so much hurt and destruction.”

“Ah”, the say, “now you might get somewhere.”

So overall, what have I really accomplished the past 10 days in Bogota... ?

Well, I got a diagnosis for a neurological issue that was fucking with my eyesight and giving me vertigo. That was gonna have to happen anyways. I can't blame my trip, Colombia, or Bogota for that one. In fact, I am proud of myself for not allowing that melodrama to derail my trip. One week out of a three month trip to deal with a medical emergency is ok.

I have wandered around the city A Lot, especially back and forth from my hostel to the hospital, which are on completely opposite ends of the city. And Bogota is HUGE. I haven't done any research, but I think it's waaay bigger than Seattle. Bigger than LA. Maybe... I've begun to understand and navigate an incredibly convoluted and chaotic transit system, which I feel super proud of myself for. It is like learning to decipher a new form of hieroglyphics. I have seen tons of amazing graffiti and street art (see photographic evidence!).

I have not done art in public or sold it to any passerbyers, and I have not gone salsa dancing (not sure if the vertigo is healed well enough yet for dancing...). But you know what, I am a huge homebody... and I'm just as much of a homebody while traveling as I am at home... So I don't really want to fill up all of every day with a zillion little goals and tourist activities. I just want to chill out and cook meals for myself and write blog posts and do some artwork. Unfortunately, when I do that in hostels, it costs $12 a day, which isn't incredibly expensive, but definitely isn't in my budget for the whole trip. Also, hostels are this strange bubble-world of privileged international travelers. Granted, I've met some awesome people staying in hostels this past week, but I've barely met anyone who actually lives in Bogota, aside from Adnres and Carolina.

Now, Andres and Carolina I met, vaguely, through couchsurfing. And I think that's definitely what I'll focus the rest of my trip on for staying in cities. I was excessively picky when looking for CS hosts before my trip, trying really hard to find people to stay with who were as close to me (or some idealized version of who I think I'd like to be...) as possible. Which is kind of bullshit. Reviewing the list of nearly 15 thousand possible couchsurfing hosts in Bogota alone, I found lots and lots of people who I'd love to stay with and get to know. I really think coming back to Bogota and staying with people who live here will drastically improve my experience of this city. Now again, I'm being judgemental of hostels maybe... there's lots and lots of people in hostels who are great! I met a bunch of them! But meeting first world-kids on holiday isn't my intention for this trip, and it's definitely not something I want to blow my trip budget on.

In the first couple of days of this trip, it feels like I got this huge blow that knocked me off center and totally fucked with my sense of self and purpose for being here. I had a couple of dark and stormy days, under the bright and shining Colombian sun. I feel like I'm beginning to get my center back now. I've got a great start getting to know Bogota. I move slowly anyways, and I know this about myself. I should've expect myself to blow into a city in a week, DO ALL THE THINGS, find all of the little out of the way hard to find secret bits of culture that I hope to find. What I did do was figure out how to find all of the things I do want to do, start to get comfortable and familiar with a big huge foreign city, and also deal with a medical crisis. And that's pretty damn ok (I remind myself).

NEXT UPDATE: FARMALICIOUS