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PBH / travelers / caritadeangel / forum posts |
My final weekend here in Barranquilla: a leisurely spent eating and packing. A few memories: Friday was the day I received more piropos than any other day. Something in the air, I think. My "admirador" got his "besito" but on his face, not his lips or any other part of his anatomy. For the nth time, I very gently refused him and told him if there wasn't someone else in my life, I would kiss him like a lover, not like a sister, without hesitation. He looked at me with a kind of stupefied incompr ...
Yesterday was my last swim at the municipal pool (leaving on Monday) and all the lads were there, including the guy who walks me home every time he's there, asking me for a little "besito". (I have to say, it broke my heart to turn him down). As a kind of goodbye fiesta, the jefe Hector asked me whether I wanted to eat some coconut. Sure I thought (he's not the sort to use euphemisms,) I looked around for the typical vendors of coconuts that you sometimes see here - no sign.
I w ...
Pope denounces kidnappings
AFP
Published: Sunday June 10, 2007
Pope Benedict XVI made a heartfelt appeal Sunday to kidnappers around the world to release their hostages shortly after an Italian priest was abducted by suspected Islamic militants in the Philippines.
The pontiff roundly condemned kidnappings as "despicable acts" during his weekly Sunday Angelus blessing in St Peter's Square.
"Unfortunately, I am frequently reques ...
I've always been fascinated by names: a name to me is a whole identity. Would I have a different personality if my parents had given me a different first name? What do people think when they hear your name? The kabbalists believed that you could literally destroy someone or something by diminishing its name, or give something life by naming it. Shakespeare, through the words of Romeo, said that names weren't really important "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet?" But they are. I imagin ...
For those gentlemen here who have written to me personally to tell me how much I personify the things they hate about western (or indeed, all women), or just want to have a go, lets take this outside. Here's the deal. Any hate mail you guys send me by PM, or nasty thing that gets posted here, I will publish it with my reply off PBH, and you are welcome to respond, in public. There are only a few rules:
(1) Try to be logical, post arguments, not insults.
(2) Don't trash anyo ...
This weekend I went to see what I could see in Cartagena. This, the town placed on the map by Garcia Marquez. I'll place my impressions here for posterity, though I think that many have been or are planning to go. I could only spare (both in time and in cash), so I saw the old town, and the convent at La Popa. I'm going to put the prices here to facilitated discussion about what the fair prices are in CGT, knowledge, after all is power. It should be noted that at the moment I have stricter secu ...
I would never normally associate myself with people who think developing countries are nothing more than their sexual playground.
This is the attitude of men and women around the world who leverage their relative wealth - or perception of it - to get some sort of sexual dividend. They are sex tourists who share this reasoning with other kinds of sex-tourists that enage in illegal activities. While the two types of sex tourists are not the same, they are nonetheless sharing (in par ...
Every day, I swim at sunset, and fall in love with this glorious country once again.
When I first started going I had to convince the easy-going maintenance guy to let me swim after hours, as it was obvious that the big yellow beauty in the sky was going to turn me into Dona Tomate, and he, being easy going was happy to oblige. I love that pool, and swimming there alone (well with the friendly Doberman guard-dogs for company: I don't know they seem real sweethearts to me).
...
To the world's oldest.
to the world's oldest.
Apparently, I am a feminist. I never knew it until enlightened souls on PBH told me because I objected to sex tourism in Colombia. So thats that.
Rubito, Gringoloid, et al: you have convinced me that (1) sex tourism is ok and (2) I AM a feminist, I must be, cos you say so and (3) I may as well be making money from COMBINED feminism and sex tourism as the next girl.
With my new found stat ...
Well, I finally got to dance, though with hindsight I think I would maybe have enjoyed Elmos sleazy dive below the fifties with a generator than in this over-priced joint (cheep for a Brit who isnt a poor student like me, but about the same price as somewhere in NYC or Glasgow, which is a lot considering how much people earn here) that had delusions of grandeur – laser strobe lighting, flat screen tvs, when all they really needed was good lighting and a live band. The place was really trying t ...
I love Garcia's writing, and especially more so now I've been here and realise how much the Bogatanos look down on the Costenos. A bit like the way the English look down on the Scots and the Irish, in spite of the best writers and poets coming from the Celtic countries. Prior to Gabito, the whole world associated Colombia with corrupt politics and excessive violence, and now... ok, people who read associate Colombia with these things AND a thriving intellectual culture. And what must really g ...
Someone must know the answer to this one.
A fine lass is walking innocently down the steet and hardly wiggling her bum pa'mi pa'ti at all, and yet all the dirty (old or young) men are throwing hisses at her in such a way that she knows the hisses are for HER, not for any other woman.
This is not solely a feature of male behaviour on the Coast – it is pretty much universal all over the Carribbean and West Africa. What I want to know is this. How does a chappie th ...
I've lost the magic power.
Yes, CaritadeAngel, whose beauty was once the talk of...well ... a smallish village in a smallish country on the edge of Europe, can now only delight the eyes of small boys and dirty old me.
The former come to the pool where she likes to get away from it all, (to commune with the chickens and the geese that somehow are allowed to use it too) who stare bug-eyed at the Great White Whale as if she was a sea-world exhibit. They eat things wh ...
So my Colombian friends, the ones who taught me how to dance like a true costenya (sorry, my com cant handle Spanish letters yet) in my frozen north European city say " Wow, youre on the coast, you must be dancing 29 hours a day) forgetting one very important thing. I'm a girl who doesnt know anyone here. Which means that I am kind of reluctant to brave the wilds of the BAQ nightlife.
But I'm starting to get withdrawl symptoms for salsa. WHERE can I go to dance here (needs to be ...
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