Arma Blanca

April 27th, Monday.

I'm currently staying in Taganga, a quiet fisherman's town.. unless you're being jacked by three savages with a big knife. Which is, of course, exactly what happened yesterday.

Just another quiet day in Taganga. Take a walk, take a nap in the hammock.. Decide to go to Playa Grande by foot, follow a little mountain trail with rocks and cactus trees. Buy an icecream, sit on the windy beach, read a book. Oblomovism. Actually the beach is crap and the wind too strong, so I go back on the same trail. Midway, on top of the hill, I pass some young guys.. "Buenas.." Then I hear footsteps behind me, one guy passes me, turns around and pulls out a Cuchillo (large knife). Suddenly I'm surrounded by three guys with knives, gesturing me to give up my bag.. First reaction: panic. Then I think: NO WAY am I losing my camera again! So I start screaming and RUN for it. Through the branches, losing my slippers, on my bare feet, on a road full of sharp rocks etc. One of the savages gets me with his knife, jab on the right arm! I keep running downhill.. Then they start running away too, and they're gone. My arm is bleeding heavily.. I spot some locals on the same path and one of them chases after the kids. I grip my bag tightly: still got all my shit, bitches.

Some guy shows me the way to the First Aid and a fat singing nurse desinfects my wounds and puts a bandage on my arm. The gap in my arm is large but not wide enough to need stitches. Then the nurse gives me the bill: please pay 43.000 pesos for the first aid, thank you.
Seems like they caught the kids that did it, two out of three. I spend three hours waiting at the local police station, where they bring the two captured hoodlums to. Finally I can go back to Casa Felipe, kick back and breathe a bit. Then the cops come again to take me to Santa Marta, where I have to file an official complaint "Denuncia". This fucking takes untill midnight, Columbian style.. meanwhile I watch the action around the policestation: a woman stabbed in the belly, a two kilos marijuana catch... A slow night, not even a murder, the Chief complains.

Next day at 7AM I have to go back to show my wound to a police doctor and then I wander around Santa Marta a bit, glad the paperwork is all over. Back in Taganga I lick my wounds, chill in a hammock.. the story has gotten around, everybody's surprised because this is a safe town and stuff like this rarely happens..

Like I said.. just another quiet day in Taganga.

Lazy Rebel.

Paradise Lost

April 21st.

Tayrona National Park. I arrive after a 16 hour bustrip from Bogota, walk the backpack heavy path through the jungle to Arrecifes, a beautiful spot near the ocean. I start walking by the beach to Cabo San Juan but actually take the wrong way and end up at Canaveral. It's now night and pitchdark, they tell me it's Muy Peligroso to take the jungleroad back to Arrecifes.. I hitch a motorride and walk the rest with a spotlightlamp, exhausted but excited. I crash in a hamaca in Arrecifes, next day go to Cabo San Juan, Beach Bum Paradise.. which reminds me a bit of my house is not a home: a beautiful setting but half the people are too stoned or too self-absorbed to appreciate it fully. I blend in more with locals then with the obnoxious backpackers. It ain't my vibe. But: beautiful, stunning beaches everywhere, jungle nature, Columbian weed and lots of Israelians.. I go back to Arrecifes and make it my homebase. Reading loads of books, one "Une vie d'enfer" (A. Laurendeau) about a guy and the women in his life. I'm lost in paradise. No phone, no internet, no tourists around. The blue sea, the green palmtrees.. The Lazy Rebel Beach Bum. Military helicopters fly over the coast line, like some Vietnam shit. Reading Oblomov (Ivan Goncharov), the story of an idle dreamer..

Seul parmis beaucoup.
Une copine avec des doutes.

Jacques Prevert, "La pluie et e beau temps" (1955)
Nous avons tout melangé,
c'est un fait.
Nous avons perdu notre temps,
c'est un fait.
Mais c'était un si mauvais temps...

It seems like a lot of young people travel the world, because they can't get a job in their own country anyway. It also seems like I'm not so young anymore.. Fuck it, better to stand out than to blend in.

After 5 blissful days of Sun, Sand and Electric Relaxation in El Parque Tayrona, I take a taxi to Taganga, where I am writing this now: Casa Felipe, a cosy hostel with cosy people, a European vibe and VERY warm.. Think I'll go to the beach today.. Maybe take a diving course, if my money's tight enough.. We'll see, we'll see..

Mañaña..

Mr. Loveday & The Girls' Friendly Society.

Bogota Madness

April 9th.
Where was I? Oh, in Bogota, staying with Lili Couch.. Right off the bus, straight into the city: Museo de Oro, restaurant, couchsurfin' party and very tired. Next evening (days are for sleeping) a discoteca in La Candelaria, downtown Bogota with two Mexicans, four girls and a frenchy. The next day, Lili gives me books to read about new media. Inspire.

Multiciudad Bogota, 7.5 million people enormous city where the streets have no name, only numbers: from Calle 72 to Carrere 95, small taxi's glide through traffic congestion..

I'm reading the meditation books of Lili's brother, The Zen Master.. Those who are really wise become ignorant.

April 10th.
Barro Chico with Lili, Andrea and Aymeric.. Bumping through the streets of Bogota with a female
driver, who's only had her drivers licence for three months, ah and the brakes.. yes I must fix them on wednesday, hihi.. Am I cursed? Running red lights, avoiding pedestrians, shaky rides.. My nerves are killing me.

What day is it? We go to La Calera, a small mountain village where Lili's dad lives. He tells me not to worry about the sky falling upon my head (he likes Asterix & Obelix). At night we visit a love-motel, just to see of course, where they have a different theme for every stage. Typical salsa bars afterwards, they literally pull you off the streets to come inside. More beer.

In big cities all over the world
we are all alike, the same products
the only thing that matters is love
music, and the flesh of our sins
and friendship as a safe harbour
the sky wide open
the sun up high
another civilized lie
human ties

In motel rooms on every floor
the love seeps through the doors
cleaning ladies and what do you want?

April 16th.
What happened to those days inbetween? A night out: we go to the most famous whorehouse in Bogota, La Piscina, with a swimming pool, dancers and strippers and porn films and pushy waiters. Lili wants to watch. Me, Andrea and Aymeric tag along: not your average tourist guide, bizarre Bogota for our eyes only. Yum. Only watch. And then once we get inside, the girls close their eyes in mock disgust, shocked. Well whaddayathink it's a Puteria of course it's vulgar. Smile. Afterwards we play billiards in a very very very kitsch bar.

On another night we distribute bread and arguendela to the homeless people of Bogota, with a party attached afterwards of course. I can't be bothered to care but it's all part of the couchsurfing experience, and the club we go to afterwards plays some funky groovy music (no salsa), almost strictly Nice!

Another day, another wild night. Pasta restaurant with Indy and the usual crowd, rum coke and discoteca with a view on a gas station, afterwards looking for something open on a thursday night so some old geezer drags us to a Puteria (well, private club..) where once again we are amongst half-naked ladies (only looking!), dancing and drinking untill 7AM. Next day I get thrown out of Lili's place by her brother the Zen Master, for reasons that will remain undisclosed. Let's just say the guy needs much more Meditation for his troubled soul.

The last Bogota days.. are spent looking for graffiti, buying books in a cute dusty store, and moving to Dave and Nath's couch. Visit to Paipa, the lago and thermal waters.. The Lost Weekend.

Then it's off in a swift yet crazy ride to the Bus Terminal, where a bus will take me to Tayrona, a national park with beaches and monkeys.

And I'm out like a trout!

Epilogue.
The important thing is the obvious thing no one is saying. -Charles Bukowski

Backpackers, fast trackers, nutcrackers
the price of progress is high
but the exchange rate is fine

the predicament of mankind
human perspectives hard to find
idiots with short-term concerns
driving cars but when will you learn
top gear bottom down, hard to earn

the limits of growth (1972)
we must achieve a state of constant population and capital

half the population are idle
the other half is overworked
too many rats in a supermax cage
what can you buy for a minimum wage..

Maximalize, or stabilize?

Blogóta

Well, here I am, my first night in lovely Bogota, altitude 2000 meters so you know I´m high, and after a cold water shower and a quick tour of the city by my wonderful couchsurfin´host Liliana and her friend Violetta, I get on the web and stumble upon Andrew Loog Oldham´s blog, and a thorough article on the music bizz by a guy named Bob Lefsetz.

Blogs are everywhere..

Anyway I´m happy to be in Columbia at last, feels almost European here, and what a difference with greasy macho Venezuela, where men blow their nose with one finger and no handkerchief, where women never pay for anything except insubordination, where the roads are dusty and the oil is cheap, where real men drink beer and whiskey untill they crash into trees, where negroes are april´s fool any month of the year, where they slay a cow to eat for marriage feastin´, where rules are meant to be broken like the hearts of men..

I could go on.

I have to say, being in the middle of the cowboy chaos, in the heart of a man, man´s world was a blast. Something to be experienced, lived, rather than observed. Eventhough my sensitive soul did not understand or appreciate the roughness of the scene, the non-talkative, non-smiling atmosphere, the mumbling, word-swallowing vocabulary, the drunken howling and brawling culture.. well I´m forcing myself not to use the word "backwards" but what does that make me? A travelling European, believe in what I´m seeing.

Venezuela: don´t believe the guide.

And here comes Columbia...

Acción y emoción

Okay it's about time for some further news from faraway adventures. For those concerned, some of the content of this April 1st post should remain strictly confidential as I don't want my parents to worry for nothing. -Entiendes?

Where was I? In a posada in Chichiviriche, where I met some nice french girls and spent a day at the beach on an island. Then onto Coro with Yannick, a fellowtraveller. Coro: old american cars, humming through deserted streets.. These dreams are made of oil. The reality is hot and humid, a second-hand America. all that could have been but never was.

Sitting in the posada drinking Polar beer, reading Richard Powers The Time of our singing : "All ownership is theft, and melody above all." Drinking Pampelo 15-year old rum with Damien the french owner of the posada. The arrow of growth points one way: forward. Reading L'homme revolte/The Rebel by Camus.. Society based on production is only productive, not Creative. The world today is One in nihilism. Civilization is only possible if we renounce nihilism and rediscover the road to creative synthesis. Imaginery recreation of he real world. The drama of our time : work has ceased to be creative. The worker must re-become a creator, by applying his/her interest+intelligence. Shakespeare cannot be the manager of a McDonalds and write at night. Picasso cannot be a graphic designer for an advertising company.

Every act of creation denies the world of master and servant. To create today, is to create dangerously. Collective passions must be lived. Rebellious art is the work of an entire generation.
The artist can no longer be solitary. We Are. Generation Revolution. Beauty does not make revolutions. But one day, revolutions will need beauty. Rebellion/Beauty : to resist the real while creating Unity out of it. The nature of man and the beauty of the world is being insulted by injustice and destruction.

The rebel can never find peace. He knows what is good, and despite himself, does evil.

The revolution has lost it's illusion of being a public holiday (Camus, 1953).

Que?

Remember, I'm reading all this in Venezuela, Chavezland! A country rich in oil, but nothing happens with the wealth. Chavez has no vision for an economic future. An average wage is 250 euros. Fill up your 60L tank with gasoline for 0,20 eurocent. Electricity and water cost 2+3 euro a month! But food is expensive, and some products so obvious in Europe cannot be found here. The potential of tourism is not stimulated. People can't withdraw more than 2500 dollars per year.. People can't travel without permission. Everything is regulated by the government. Black market makes life expensive.. Welcome to Communism, marico.

From Coro I took the bus to Merida. A misty town, amidst the mountains of Pico this and that. Planning my escape once again. Lingering in the park, strolling through the city. Not much to do after 19PM.

El gran observador de tu vida.

planning my escape
listening to children play
meditate on wasted days
away from kings of pain
turning mist to rain
drifting on high plains
people stay the same
see the weather change
everywhere we reign

(...)

And onwards to San Cristobal! I took the bus to La Fria, changed to go to La Grita and meet with Erickson, a young guy who stayed in belgium with my cousin. A latin girl-chaser, the real deal. Mucho macho and poco loco. He introduces me to the special Michi drink, drunk on the streets near the clandestine liquor store (in Venezuela all liquor stores must close at 9PM). Saturday we go back with the Ford pick-up truck to San Cristobal, at night to a China y Nacho concert.. Reggaeton hermano! After that, more rum at some people's place and a drunken drive home.

Sunday, we change cars, get in the Ford Focus and race to pick up two girls and go to a racing cars competition in La Fria. Music, rum, dancing, swimming in the pool, more drinking... driving back to San Cristobal and then...... a crash, the car spins, BAM.

I don't remember anything of the impact, the accident.. only saying ''what? where is my camera?" looking but not finding, and then zooming off in a taxi.. in shock, very pissed off about not having recuperated my digital camera and too drunk to feel any pain. Next morning, a hell of a blue bump and scratch on my face and a little pain on the side of my body.
I will spend the next three days relaxing, recovering, staying at Autorepuestos Walter in SC, slowly getting my forces back. And, once again -another one of my nine lives up for grabs, miraclously still in one piece and alive apart from some muscle pain and bump on the cranium. Lucky guy.

That's it. Experciencing the real life in Venezuela - no tourist tales hermano.

Rebellion, revolution, action and emotion..

Next up: the wedding of Erickson's sister and moving on to Columbia.

Hasta luego,

Lazy Rebel