El Cemetario y en la parka

a few moments in time

Upon return to Colombia I immediately knew it was going to be different... and yet wonderfully familiar. From the rain on the tarmac to the lost luggage... I was pleased and wildly amused by the irony of the situation. It is as if the harder I try the less likely something is to be. So I could stand in the drizzle in a lonely airport where no friends and family were waiting for me... (when I had thought they would be) after being delayed and nearly missing every flight, wearing nothing but a smile. The twists and turns almost predictable they are so unlikely.
The suffocating heat of last January has not yet arrived and the warm yet occasionally rainy days accompany me on my walks through the city. After only a few hours of walking I needed a new pair of shoes for the ones I had bought were causing me to blister. So I wandered through the markets and the crowded streets, vendors and patrons. fruit stands and fresh made juice from coconuts or mandarins. bustling and yelling, hawking and bartering. horns from the streets and motor bikes who have an over developed sense of entitlement. men with guns (securidad pivadad) guns far to big for them. The city square between the court house and city hall is regularly inhabited by the shoe-shine guys with their small covered thrones protecting their patrons form the sun, the candy girl who will sell you individual cigarettes and tempt passers by with delicious snacks and the occasional ranting beggar heavily tanned by the sun and dragging along a life of tattered hopes. The pigeons fly and swoop between the palms. The sun is strong and if you close your eyes and listen the sounds of life and the revolving traffic will wrap you up and hold you in a breathing embrace.

The green mountains that ring this valley determine where the city will and will not grow and they stand at the back of every image and thought here. Just at the edge where those mountains meet the sky is an airport that can take you anywhere you want to go, but no one goes there...

I wander the streets and hear the life around me. Understanding less Spanish now than Chinese and wondering less and less where I belong, and wishing I still didn't know.
The market is alive in a way the I may never be: fresh, naked, openly soliciting, crowded, honest, rotten and disgusting, decaying and vibrant. You can buy a puppy, a hammock, leather jacket, side of beef, lemons, peppers, a nail gun and fresh cut herbs; all in a days work. Just imagine the life you could have.

And I am reunited with an old lover after the third night (and not the one you might think); AREPAS are the true love in my life... and the provider of this love comes from a small stand on the median at an intersection. Mr. Arepa is heaven on earth and there is no denying. I have tried to capture the moment, but couldn't be torn from the task at hand too long to take a better photo... so this is the closest I can get to sharing with you the bliss that I felt.
There is something more than reality here. maybe it is my extrasensory experience of this place, but there is something more to it... something more out there.
Through photos I have tried to summarize a week out of myself.
1)a street vendor
2)the mountains
3)the market
4)heaven in the form of an Arepa.

En la peluqueria

I think for the rest of my life I may have to get my hair cut at this place with these women... both of the hair cuts i have had in the last 6 years have been here (except for the time where my students in San Francisco got to cut off all my hair.)
So when i figure out how to make it look that cute all by my self we will have set some sort of world record for human transformation.
Having a great time en Colombia needless to say.

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