Not Black Face, Shots, Andean Culture: Carnaval de Negros y Blancos (Pasto: Aspect 1)

The last of my journeys during the Christmas break was to Pasto. Pasto's in the south of Colombia, close to the border of Ecuado. There's not much there, and there's about only one reason you'd go there: El Carnaval de Negros y Blancos. It lasts about a week, but it culminates in the Día de Negros and ends the next day with the Día de Blancos. The idea of the carnival is to celebrate Colombia's diversity, which in comparison to most of Latin America, is in fact pretty diverse. It has a higher African descendant population than most, and there are some people that until they speak, I'm not sure if they're Colombian or European. Then there's a bunch of other people who fall somewhere in the middle of that, including, I'm told, a small population with Japanese ancestry. Go figure.

The hostel I stayed at was in Genoy, a little town to the north. It's accessible by the city's bus route, but it's a long way out. I wasn't exactly sure where in Genoy to go, so I just got on the bus and rode till I got to the end. When the bus driver asked me what I was still doing there, just sitting on the empty, inert bus like some kind of asshole, I got off. This lead to how I found out that the people of Pasto are maybe some of the nicest in Colombia. 

When I got off, looking confused, ushered by the driver to a small restaurant, the whole family came out to help, and the bus driver told me he'd try to wait a little in case I needed to go back. This is absolutely inconceivable coming from New York. A bus driver. Waiting. For me. A bus driver actually concerned for my well-being and making sure I didn't die on the street, abandoned by hope and God. Culture shocked, but in a good way, I called the hostel. When I couldn't understand the directions because the hostel owner kept using local landmarks I wasn't familiar with at all, they asked me to pass the phone to them, and after the phone call, I was offered a ride to the hostel. Like wow, right?! First what trusting and lovely people, and two, gas is expensive. That's no joke. It turned out not to be very far at all, but I was really impressed with their generosity. It also didn't hurt that the guy driving the car was cute. It never does. And yeah, his wife (holding their baby all the while) was very nice too. Whatever.

When I arrived at the hostel, Markus was out, and I decided to stay in since the buses were ending service. I was tired, and Genoy seemed less entertaining than the Southside of Indianapolis, if such a thing can be imagined. Eventually, he arrived with Andrea, and little did I know that over the next days we would all become fast friends.

The following day we left early to go participate in the Día de Negros, and it ended up being one of the most fun days I've had in Colombia. Now, it's customary on the Día de Negros for people to smear black make up on you, which naturally coming from the US with its history of vaudeville, blackface, and increasing racial tension, made me nervous. I remember trying to explain to them why but that I understood that this was different country with a different history, and so it's not viewed the same way. I was hesitant to really participate in that aspect though and was much more content to just shoot foam at small children and the elderly.

As it turns out, I wouldn't have much of a choice. After Markus exhausted his second bottle of foam, we decided to go sit somewhere and have a beer. That's when we were accosted by this ragtag group.

This video is actually after the incident. 

You can see a guy in the back waving to us to come dance 

because he saw me recording... So we did!

First Markus and then me were seized, had our shoes, socks, and shirts pulled off, and in a matter of about a minute were covered head to toe in black paint. I decided to embrace it... mostly because my only opportunity to shower it off was back in Genoy.

Someone shot me as I was taking the picture

The rest of the day consisted of general merriment. There were concerts, and much shooting of foam at unsuspecting people. Oh, and shots. Everyone is nice, and everyone offers you shots of whiskey. All the time. And you get bonus shots for being foreign.

The next day was the Día de Blancos. I'd write about it, but it was stupid. It paled in comparison. There was a parade, and I feel like parades are just guided tours where you don't get to move. And you know how I feel about guided tours. (WHY ARE YOU TRYING TO CONTROL MY EXPERIENCE?) So I wondered around town. I actually ended up mega sunburnt from the day before, and I had lost all my mirth. After Andrea and Markus were satisfied, we went back to the hotel, took shots of aguardiente and fell asleep. The next day I returned to Cali with a few days to spare before Amy arrived.

Making friends (Cartagena: Aspect 1)

I haven't been able to keep up with this blog as regularly as I would have liked over Christmas break, but it's all for a good reason: I've been traveling a bunch! My itinerary went something like this:

December 18-19: Armenia

December 19-20: Salento and Valle de Cocura

December 20-22: Pereira and Santa Rosa

December 22-24: Manizales

December 24-27: Back in Cali

December 27-January 1: Cartagena

January 1-4: Back in Cali

January 4-7: Pasto

This unfortunately is not what it's like to ride on an Avianca flight.
It's like.... opposite.

I then had a few days rest before my friend Amy came down to visit, which brings us up to now. So as you can see, I've basically been living the dream. My bank account can definitely attest to it. It's looking haggard these days.

I've already written about my trip in the coffee region (all the cities between December 18 and December 24), in which I attempted to live out a Doctor Who inspired fantasy of adventure. I actually still think about that rope bridge, even now, weeks later, and I wonder if I might go back there and try it again. Maybe... If I have time...

This week, however, I'd prefer to write about the magic kismet that happens when you travel alone and why you shouldn't be afraid to do it. Most of the travel I have done, I have done alone. A few times I've attempted to travel with others, and unless I knew them well (several years), it never really worked out. I dislike traveling with others for the same reason I dislike guided tours: I don't like others deciding how my experience should be. When you travel with other people, especially friends or family, it's easy to feel obligated to alter your plans to compromise and really, you should. You should make sure everyone gets to do something they want to do, but like most compromises, it's a bit like spreading the jam on your toast thin. Wonderful for material things like the distribution of wealth, pretty sucky for non-material things like enjoyment.

When you travel alone, you can do exactly what you want to do when you want to do it without feeling pressure from others to divert into plans that you might find useless. We all have different ideas of why we're traveling. For some it's to relax. For others it's to party. And there there are all sorts of ways people like to balance the two. It's rare, I think, for these to match up in perfect sync. I think what keeps people from traveling alone is a fear of loneliness. We're afraid we'll go somewhere unknown and foreign and have no idea what to do, where to go, who to keep company with, and we want the support of another to make us feel safe.

Forget that. You're not safe. You never were. You're going to die.

Eventually.

Or not eventually.

Whatever.

I know, we like to feel safe, and while I recognize how important it is to feel secure from time to time, going to the same places and doing the same things make it hard for new and interesting things to happen. Perhaps one of the most rewarding things that occur is that you meet new people.

You should without a doubt add this to your arsenal
of friend finding techniques while traveling...

In Cartagena, I stayed at a hostel called La Quemada. It was an absolute dump, and it cost about double what I'm used to paying for a hostel. When I arrived late Saturday night, I wasn't sure if I was the only one checked in, but it seemed a pretty fair assumption. It was only on the second day that I met Sandra, a woman from Peru who had come, like me and many others, to spend New Year's Eve in Cartagena. She ended up coming along with me and Jorge, a guy I met on Grindr, to a beach off Cartagena's coast. We spent the day there, and when we got back, two others had arrived: Markus from Austria and Alessandra from Brazil. We all introduced each other, and eventually went out into the night where we met some friends of Sandra's from Holland. In the bars, there was a rotating cast of people from England, Australia, Argentina (though we'll avoid talking about how much of a spoiled brat she acted like...oh wait, oops), Scotland, and various other places. It was a kind of night that I had often had in Spain, where you make friends, even if just for the night, and if you're lucky, like I was, they become friends for much longer.

By the time I had left Cartagena, I had found out that Markus was also planning to go to Pasto and had an extra bed in the hostel he had made reservations at. Since I could only find a hotel that was a bit expensive, I made plans to meet up with him there. But we'll get to that next week.

That Time I Watched Too Much Doctor Who (Coffee Region Trip: Aspect 1)

A few months ago, I decided to finally tackle a show that all my friends seemed to love: Doctor Who. As I watched seven and a half seasons, I can't help but wonder what it would be like to travel with the Doctor, how many milliseconds it would take me to say yes if he asked me, and whether I would end up like this jerk.

His name's Adam too, as it turns out.

But while that asshole caught kicked out for putting a hole in his head (cute), I wondered if I would be more like this girl, who looked out into space and vomited.

Who also was annoying as all fuck...

Because of these deep feelings of inadequacy, I decided to try to make this backpacking trip about showing myself I could maybe, kind of, sort of have what it takes to be a companion.

Challenge #1: The Coffee Amusement Park

So, you know what goes with my fear of heights pretty well? A fear of roller coasters. I've always been pretty chicken shit with roller coasters. After I warmed up riding a cable car (oooh, the horror!), I continued to work my way up by going on the one "high impact" roller coaster that was clustered with all the dinky, children coasters.

Small children ride this?

As you can see, it tilts up in the air. I didn't know that detail before I got on. I figured it was more like a centrifuge and that it was just going to spin around really quick, not really getting far from the ground. So, at first I was fine. No big deal. But then I noticed slowly but surely, the ground inching further and further away, and before I knew it I was the three quarters upside down and reciting the Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear.

These people seem
totally fine with it though.
They're probably some sort of death cult.

I also rode some water rides that were exciting but not a big deal and a roller coaster that I kept thinking would take my head off. (Thanks, Caitlin!) But there was one that I hesitated with. It was a giant needle that lifted you to the top and then dropped you a few times. Since it was already on a mountain, when it raises you up and you look out over the trees and at the setting sun, you're pretty high. When I got up there, I almost shit myself. I mean, I kept it together, but you know, like internal shit. But there was really only a few moments to feel much of anything because it soon released and fell. I almost blacked out. Not exactly out of fear but the change in gravity or something was so sudden, it makes you want to pass out. Surprisingly, I didn't die.

Challenge 2: Hike out to the middle of a nature reserve and survive a grumpy old lady

I should have listened...
"En serio señora muy mala onda!"
("Seriously rude lady!")

Okay, so not too extreme. I took the bus from Armenia to Salento, joined a jeep with other people heading to Valle de Cocora, and from there I set out to Acaime Humming Bird sanctuary. I unsuccessfully dodged pits of mud, crossed rickety bridges, and jumped across rushing streams, all going uphill into the mountains. When I got to Acaime, I was greeted by a nice old man and a megabitch of an old lady. I asked to stay the night there. I dropped my backpack off and visited a cloud forest before I decided to come back. I had forgotten to buy food or water before I left Salento and I was running out of energy.

When I got back, a group of backpackers had arrived and decided to stay. The woman showed us the room. There was no hot water, heat or electricity, and "dos velas, nomas!" ("two candles, that's it!"), which she told me and the leader of the other group like some sort of drill sergeant, much to our amusement. She spoke with a strange accent and seemed to be angry about everything. I really should have paid attention to the sign.

I spent the night there, piled under the heavy blankets, but the mountain cold still got in. I didn't sleep too well, and as soon as there was light, I headed back to Salento to take the bus to Pereira. I had successfully dealt with cold, hunger, nature's elements, and one bad-tempered old lady.

Challenge 3a: Ziplining
Later, in Manizales, I went to Los Yarumos, a strange sort of park that looked like what I imagined No Doubt's Tragic Kingdom to be. There were, however, two things worth noticing: a short zipline and a rope bridge. I didn't look at them too long. I handed over some pesos and was all like "take me to the fun stuff!"

Two guys who worked with the park came with me. While they were getting everything ready, I looked over the ledge of the zipline and peered down at all 230 feet of depth. I promptly lost my shit. After they spent a good deal of time  trying to convince me, I spent another eternity at the ledge. They kept telling me nothing would happen, and I said I believed them. And they told me the hardest part was starting off, and I said I believed them. I tested the cords. I let myself feel that they were indeed there to catch me, and after counting to three five or six times, I finally jumped off.

I was freaked out for a second, but I quickly I started to enjoy it. It wasn't much different than being in a swing. But like some cosmic practical joke, the cords started to twist and I began to rotate around, and I looked back at the ledge and the guy standing there with a look that was equal parts fear and helplessness, trying to send some sort of telepathic message for help and being too scared to even make a sound. But before I knew it, I was nearing the crash pad, and bam, I had hit it. The other guy brought out a stool for me to stand on while he unhooked me, and it was over.

It was absolutely exhilarating.

Challenge 4: Rope Bridge
The same, however, probably could not be said of the rope bridge. I had initially thought this would be easier than the ziplining. Stupid Adam. When we arrived at the the bridge, I started off with no problem and a third of the way across. However, when it started to go over the deeper parts of the valley, I froze. "Put your left foot in front of your right foot," the cute guide behind me said. "Okay," I whimpered back. But it was impossible to do this without looking down. The rope wasn't all that thick. I hesitated longer, standing there, seeing eternity stretched out on the other side of that bridge. "You can do this. I've come across here with an eight year old," he said. I'd like to meet that eight year old. He'd make a better companion than me. After my legs started to shake ("You're starting to shake a lot.") and my knees felt really weak, I had to turn around. A regretful decision because I was too scared to make a full turn and walking backwards, though it felt easier, was not exactly low stress.

I felt disappointed with myself, but I tried to forget about it. Later that night, as I was falling asleep, in that space between our world and nod, I saw myself walking across that bridge again, determined to continue, and as I took my next step, my foot slipped and I felt the rope slide along my bare foot and my heart race up my throat and into my mouth. I convulsed in my bed and woke up. Yeah, probably the right choice about that bridge.