Gerbil has left 31 comments

Gerbil comments on Poor But Happy Person Of The Year Nomination

My vote Lauthra,

The hottest, sexiest caleña ever.
Plus she´s clever, speaks fluent english, and is incredibly caring.

If nepotism isn´t allowed though, my vote goes for Desi - not only for her intelligent and reasoned points of view, but for putting up with the femi-nazi comments from men with brains situated just south of the (most likely rather large) waistline.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Bogotanos v/ vallunos

Big bums are in here. In Cali I witnessed first hand for the first time the result of 'bum-enlargement' treatment. It was kinda scary!
I didn't even know it existed, but it seems some people like to take the traditional Latina curves to a whole new level :)

I do like curves on a woman - none of this European stick-insect rubbish (that's what they aspire too, not saying they achieve it!). I'm not quite a renaissance man, but I prefer women who don't look like they'd snap in a strong breeze or fall down drains.

Unfortunately, the girls from Medellin seem to do their best to look like they basically don't come from Colombia.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Taxi anyone?

"I put 20k, as the high limit not as the average."

My apologies for interpreting that wrong.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Taxi anyone?

If you think in terms of US dollars, then feel free to be ripped off left, right and center.

While I agree the actual monetary difference is minimal, it's both the principle of the thing and the fact that all those little attempts to get extra money off the foreigner soon add up if you intend to spend any reasonable amount of time here.

I spent my first few months living here wondering why Nato was always arguing over the small amounts (taxis are the most common example), then finally I 'got it', and now won't tolerate it myself.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

No, we still disagree with that, but there's so many fresh avenues of interest to explore here, why get bogged down on one thing? :)

Out of curiosity though, you stood up for him on the age difference thing. Do you still stand by him now he's admitted to cheating on some of his girlfriends, or make the differentiation that the age difference thing is fine to you (and hence you were defending the overall thing rather than Calipro specifically), but are happy to say cheating on a partner is wrong?

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Bogotanos v/ vallunos

That skirt is great - it's called 'leaving at least something to the imagination' :)

Unfortunately, I have no imagination.
Fortunately, I have Nato as my girlfriend so I don't need it ;)

Definately agree with Nato about the projection of the Medellin girls.
They do appear to be very keen on slim, big breasts, light skin, and bleached hair (how to ruin beautiful dark hair...).

I haven't been though - I base my observations purely on the girls from Medellin I see on TV, but that in itself is representative of what people think is beautiful. I understand why girls would want to stand out from the crowd, eg by changing their hair colour, but why in God's name do they have to do such a bad job about it?

PS I'm not a big fan of really dark skin - Calenas are about right :)

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on A Little Contest Re: Zagarise

By the way, I should point out I don't believe Gator has this 'proof'. The board does not show the IPs of other users, and your cookie (bloody thing times out too quick - nearly lost my epic reply in another thread because I was logged in at start of typing, and logged out automatically when I hit 'post'!) has no need to contain this info (off top of head can't remember if it can't, or can, but possibly encrypted). Either way, your own personal cookie info is not available to other users unless they are admin or have access to some rather nasty software which chances are would be illegal (not to say it doesn't happen of course!).

However, it doesn't make any of our guesses less valid, indeed I'd bet money on the one I and Don Negro said are the boy in question :)

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on A Little Contest Re: Zagarise

"as his other attempts at writting good english are poor."

You see it from the wrong perspective.
His other attempts are of writing poor english, and they are poor - that one was more like his proper english. I am quite sure he has a strong command of the english langauge.
There is a world of difference between the writings of someone who only knows a little of a language, and someone who knows it but wishes to pretend they don't.

Given I'm reasonably competant at English and have years of online fun dealing with kids like this, his efforts stick out immediately.

And that's before you even become suspicious about his extreme lack of knowledge about all things Italian (has he mentioned Mussolini yet in any thread? ;)...

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

Weeeeeee! "All the rants against CP boils down to one main point, "he's and older, rich, gringo, guy taking advantage of young, poor, lower strata, hottie"."

Actually not true in my case. I'm well aware Calipro's moralities (or IMO lack of them) is different to me.
I was also taking issue with the fact that his actions have repurcussions amongst us all, because quite frankly what he is doing will and does piss off a lot of Colombians. And take into account this is before they know he's dating four ;). Colombians not liking foreigners = bad news for me. It's well known that many Colombians rightly or wrongly dislike / hate gringos (hence why if I hear someone referring to me as one, friendly intentions or not I always correct them) - giving them another reason to do so isn't going to make Colombia a friendlier place for foreigners.

As for Calipro - while I have been genuinely interested in your replies, and of course understand partly where you are coming from (young girls are sexy, all men have at some point in their life wanted to just have lots of hot girlfriends etc), I'm afraid I've also been playing a little game.

Are you aware of the phrase 'give a man enough rope and he'll hang himself'?

Your statement regarding the two girls that you like enough to marry either one is pretty sickening - more so than the ones who know about your other girlfriends (although I think the fact that the one you saw out with another guy hasn't mentioned it, probably hasn't done so because she's pissed off but has no grounds to tell you off about it! Given the circumstances, I'd say you two are a great match).

You won't tell them you are cheating on them (for this is what it is, they wouldn't want you to do it and you are) because they'd leave you. Well erm...

You know what you are doing is wrong, but you are being selfish. Understandable, but on the other hand, it seems there's no room for you to marry them if your definition of marriage is 'trust and respect'. You clearly are untrustworthy, and don't respect her (or you'd respect her wishes). Any marriage you enter into with one of these is based on lies from day one (before day one technically).
This was one of the reasons I questioned you regarding your thoughts on marriage, since you obviously didn't have a religious angle on it.

It's also telling that of the four girls you have, the only ones you'd consider marrying are those who are faithful and expect you to be so. I can only hope that you could manage to be faithful in marriage and the girl in question doesn't find out about your past. Given your loose justifications, low moral standards and self confessed desire to sleep with other women; I doubt it.

Basically, the bottom line here is you do what you do because you can and you like it. No laws are being broken, and that's all you need to know (and quite possibly even then, depending on the severity of the 'crime', you come across as the kind of person who might be prepared to stray a little).

I'd be happier if you were open about your reasons. While you may be able to morally justify to yourself, you are clearly aware the majority of people (certainly women - men who disagree with you are clearly not able to get any and are jealous!) disagree with you for very clear (if not always stated clearly) reasons. You cannot justify your actions to us in any moral sense.

What we have here is simply you doing what you want to do, regardless of people's thoughts (I submit your 2 'commited' girlfriends as evidence). Either you marry one and live a lie, or they find out and you hurt them needlessly (and it IS needlessly, as opposed to other more normal reasons for relationships not panning out, IE simple incompatibilities).

Everyone has personal instances of hipocrasy and questionable moralities (eg I want to help animals have better lives, yet I am not vegetarian) which they allow because 'hey, it's me, I'm different, I'm special!'. This is all good and well (or at least normal), but only if prepared to be accepted as that.

I've asked you many questions, which, much to my delight and suprise, you've answered in ways that have only deepened the hole you are in. I feel it only fair that I answer your question, and allow you the opportunity to prove my lack of morality, or whichever attribute you would find reprehensible :)

"If you were married and in a mutually loving committed relationship with a beautiful young woman, and you found out she had cheated on you once, would you leave her even thought she was crying, apologetic and seemed sincerely sorry."

If it was the first time, then no, there's every possibility I would not leave her. I would naturally, need to take everything into consideration - there is no simple black and white to the situation.
To be clear, there is, given the potential circumstances, the chance that I would indeed leave her.

Second time? Not a chance.

Third time? It could never get to that.

Love to me is very powerful, but I am not blind to other factors.
You try to cover them in your possible answers, so I'll run through them as much as I can.

A) You would leave her because you could never believe she loved you.

Of course not. Feelings change, and feelings don't necessarily have to change for someone to cheat. Cheating often isn't about love.
But that doesn't mean you can undertake it and expect love to remain steadfast, because a great deal of love is about trust, which is being broken.

B) You would leave her because you could never trust her again. You know someone that you felt always has your best interests at heart.

This is the tough one for many people to overcome I would imagine. Certianly it's the area that I believe I'd have the most problems with. This of course is where the hipocrasy in your actions regarding the girls you profess to love is most obvious to me.

C) You would leave her because you felt so sorry for yourself thinking back on all the missed opportunities to have sex because you mistakenly thought you were in a mutually exclusive committed relationship.

There is no such thing as a 'missed opportunity' like this. If you honestly leave someone for this reason, then I'd argue you probably never loved your partner truly in the first place.
I also find your option rather interesting because I've always believed that the 'mutually exclusive' part of 'commited relationship' is redundant. For me it would be impossible to be unfaithful in a truly commited relationship. Should you be unfaithful, then clearly it isn't quite as commited as you'd believe. This does cause problems, because how 'commited' is 'commited'? You'll never know until one of you dies or you break up - either way you can only judge after the event.

D) You would dump her because you were so shocked to find out that she actually had sexual fantasies that didn't include you let alone find out she actually did the nasty with someone else.

I'm certain Nato has fantasies about other people, and so do I.
Is this something I should be shocked at? Of course not, it's perfectly natural. Last time I checked though we, as humans, had the power of rational thinking and choice making. It is a choice to be unfaithful, to act on your fantasies in this way, or to take an opportunity to have sex with someone else.

Now, bear in mind I believe what people get up to in the privacy of their own homes is up to them. As far as it goes as long as everyone (no need for it to just be a couple, or of mixed gender) is consenting and no permenant harm is being done, then that's fine by me, but we haven't actually been covering that scenario much here - indeed less so than I thought, since I assumed incorrectly that your multiple girlfriends were aware of and OK with your infidelities.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on bogota saftey bla bla bla strata 3 bla

Indeed, it wasn't my intention to say there shouldn't be those charities. My point was that Don Negro believes kids are the ultimate priority to help, and therefore by implication anyone helping another cause (including animals and women in the above-mentioned circumstances) are 'wasting their efforts' and should be manning the main cause.

Anyway, no point in labouring the point - Don Negro is entitled to his opinions, I was merely pointing out what I see to be the fallacy of his views, which if shared by everyone would lead to the scenario that you are rightly opposed to (although I don't agree with your 'immediate death' penalty :).

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on A Little Contest Re: Zagarise

Don't forget he's also queen of the jail/dance.
And tracking IPs is a lot easier than you think - even on dial-up where it changes each time you connect.

Point is his english is just fine - the most articulate of his various ego-fillers is queen of the dance, and it's highly likely that he speaks fluent english.

No-one speaks THAT bad english - it's how someone who speaks english writes when they want to appear like they have little mastery of the language.

As trolls go, he's not a good one - it's almost like he's found a 'how to troll' list on the internet and is going through it step-by-step.

Ah the joys of faceless means of communicating where you can pretend to be someone else. The odd thing is most people tend to project themselves as someone witty, intelligent and very likable (oh, good-looking too!).

It's a shame the forum software used here is so basic - the ones I run on not only store posters by IP (very amusing to publicly post proof people are one and the same) but also allow blocking by IP masks, which would kill this twat immediately.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Need Visa to stay 5 months in Colombia?

If it's anything like the visa requirements from the UK, then the hopping across the border only works if your timing is correct.

Basically I'm only allowed 6 months on a tourist visa per calender year. Since I arrived in July, I had my 6 months, then in early January hopped over to Quito and back the same day, giving me another 6 months.

Just make sure you are VERY clear about wanting the 90 days stamp in the airport - they are all-too-ready with the 60 days one when your passport is open, and this means you'll have to make an extra trip to the DAS and cough up a bit more money to stay the full 6 months.

The student visa thing isn't too hard, it's just an inconvenience really. It's what I'm using to stay in the country at the moment until next year when I can (should I need it) re-start my tourist visa. Fortunately when that runs out I'll have been in Colombia for long enough to qualify for an 'union-libre' visa which will hopefully keep me going for a looooong long time.

Oh, and I finally get to learn Spanish too, so it's good in both ways :)

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Taxi anyone?

20,000 pesos?

I paid 17,000 and I was ripped off.
Of course, it depends where you wish to end up in the city :)
There's no possible 'fixed' price, and taxi drivers do have the luxury that a nice slow run from the airport may well run off the edge of their pricing sheet so they will try to be cheeky. Not much you can do about that. I'll be getting buses from now on...

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on KEEP ZARAGISE

That's kind of the point.
As more and more people work out he's just trolling and don't fall for it, he has to resort to more and more desperate acts to keep our attention.

Actually, he's running out of ideas a lot quicker than most trolls, so if we keep ignoring him he should be gone in a week or so at the latest. It's not THAT hard to skip his gibberish. Just remember - the key is to ignore him :)

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

Sorry to just pick a few bits from the post, but:

"I would not marry someone who openly or even not so openly had other relationships while with me."
...
"If the behaviour ever existed I would never have married her."

And then you say:

"You are free to have sex with other people until the both of you agree to be commited to one another."

Is this a contradiction or merely I'm not sure on your definition of relationship? I get the feeling that you don't class seeing someone, taking them out, partying, having sex etc as being in a relationship.
While it's hard to pindown the exact nature of a relationship, I'd say it's more to do with time spent together and emotions felt than anything else.

"It's not just a matter of love but respect and trust. I could not trust a woman that had any real interest in bedding other men and as a rule I don't cheat on my wife. Believe it or not."

I wouldn't comment on your previous marriage which (A) I know nothing about and (B) is only relevent inasmuch as it shows your thoughts on marrying itself.

It's just you are, I assume, with the girls for companionship, sex, love etc. Which area of these is it that each girl cannot give you enough of individually to require you to have more than one?

Also this may according to you, lead to marriage.
At what point do you make the transition from 'lots of girls' to 'one girl'? What's the deciding factor? My memory isn't great, but you've been saying you've been with some of these girls for a long time. That, to me, would indicate a relationship.

Given the original area of this thread (age = they are with you for what you give them as opposed to because they genuinely like you):

If you thought that these girls were only with you for your money / lifestyle, yet they continued to act like they do to you, would you stay with them?

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Things not to do!

- Wear a top with the american flag on it to show your patriotism.

- Expect taxi drivers to charge the right amount every time.

- Think that no-one will notice the bulge in your wallet when you've just changed a lot of money into pesos.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on bogota saftey bla bla bla strata 3 bla

:) Actually Nato got her love of animals off of me.
Or, I should probably say, I merely awakened it in her.

And yes, she spoils the cats (and me)!

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on KEEP ZARAGISE

ReinaDeLa Baile For the record zagarise, it's a bit obvious for you to create a second account and sit there conversing with yourself about how great you are. Some of us have been using the internet for long enough for fools like you to stick out like a sore thumb.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on KEEP ZARAGISE

Actually as far as trolls go he's a real amateur.
Best way to deal with him is to ignore him. After all, no replies and his threads soon drop off the front page.

Personally I reckon we should start up a fund for him so he can afford to buy a keyboard with a working CAPS LOCK key.

Have to say if my spanish was as good as his english you can be sure I'd be putting it to better use.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

Lionheart I would guess you see a different side to it because the type of girls using whatever means you had for finding and contacting you are different to the 'sexy' party girls of Cali - hence their fears.

It's quite possible they've already been through the mill a bit, had failed relationships, probably been treated badly by men in the past etc so were looking for something more stable.

The fact you are after something more stable (and 'coincidentally') with older women speaks volumes about the kind of relationship you are after.

This is part of my curiosity about calipro still - does he believe he'll be out partying picking up youngsters for the rest of his life, or does he intend to end up with a Colombian version of Anna Nicole-smith? :)

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on making navigation easier

You don't have to back up page by page, there is a button to the right of the numbered page links that's 'last page'. You do still have to wait for the front page to load (which naturally will be full and hence take a while to load).

And I feel for you - these inconveniences for myself and Nato are bad enough but at least we are on broadband so the pages load quickly!

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on bogota saftey bla bla bla strata 3 bla

Don negro "i did not mean to offend you,"

I'm not offended. I've had far too many years practice online to be worried about a few bits of text :)

"its my belief, that as humans, we should help other humans before animals, i know you are a good person, and maybe one day i will understand your efforts for these animals. but i think not."

It's not a clear-cut thing for me either, and it's something I've often thought about. But, for me - animals have always been my 'calling' so to speak. I grew up wanting to be a vet for many years and only stopped when I realised I couldn't handle the sadness that would accompany the job.
It's only been particularly recently that I realised that the sadness and pain on my part at witnessing such things is minor compared to those who suffer, and instead of hiding from it I should confront it head-on and try to, in my own small way, make the world a better place, however I can achieve that.*

* Following my train of though I've used the singular 'I' - but I know that Nato believes in what we do too with all her lovely heart :)

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on bogota saftey bla bla bla strata 3 bla

Maybe, but 'safe' is relative.

Maybe in Bogota you aren't particularly likely to be kidnapped or murdered (although the risk is still there) but there's always the chance of being robbed, beaten, raped etc.

Now while that's not particularly severe in the overall scheme of things, it's still not a nice experience and if giving people a bit of advice can help them pay attention a bit more, then I'm all for it.

I must admit, I'm not entirely sure what you are referring to by saying they 'spout advice about safety', but I do think there's a lot to be said for ignoring the advice of people who's sum of experience is a few short holidays in the safe parts of the city, or worse - who did something stupid and got away with it.

It reminds me of a girl from colombiaexperts a while ago who claimed she'd back-packed through the jungles of Colombia alone. Her reasoning was 'I did it safely, therefore it must be safe' and proceeded to recommend it to anyone. Clearly this was not a good idea ;)

No place is 100% safe - crime is everywhere. I would definately agree though that Bogota, at least the touristy parts, are as safe as, if not safer than, many other cities around the world though.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on bogota saftey bla bla bla strata 3 bla

Don negro "i find any animal charity obserd, but this takes the biscuit."

What is absurd about wishing to help those who cannot help themselves?

People are more important than animals you say. Well, let's take it further. Kids are more important than adults - they are our future.
By your logic, charities to help beaten / abused / raped women are stupid - those people helping them would be better spent supporting and nurturing the children that will be our future.

I won't even start on the environment ;)

We (those who do actually help in one form or another) make the effort because we care. Your implication is if people didn't help the animals, they'd be making an equal effort for 'insert whichever cause you believe is most important'. This is simply not true.

People help because they want to, and naturally they channel their efforts accordingly. Criticising someone because they help, but not in a way you think is worthwhile, kind of misses the point of why people help.

I have a friend here who does charity work with children. She and I were talking only the other night about the relative merits of both forms of help. The bottom line is, we both think both are important to a better future. We'll continue to help in what ways we can.

I am sorry you can't see a positive effort for what it is.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on bogota saftey bla bla bla strata 3 bla

Do you copy and paste your anti-USA rants zagarise?

I would say that Bogota is safer than I'd been led to believe, but then again, coming here for the first time what would you expect from the misinformation and outright lies that gets spread about Colombia in other countries (assuming they ever deign to mention it at all!).

I don't generally feel unsafe or threatened when out - indeed late night in London can be much, much worse. By the same token though I always do the usual things - be alert, don't wear lots of nice expensive jewellry or watch. Other than that, if something bad happens, there's not a lot else you can do other than roll with it.

Not doing things because of fear will ultimately lead you to not getting out of bed in the morning, and Colombia is too great a place for that.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

Zuma / Calipro "your post seems very noble, but I'm sorry to say, there nothing wrong with a relationship where the age difference is 20 years or more.....IN ANY CULTURE!!!"

I would agree - in principal. In a better society where motives were not shown to be anything less than honourable, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

I've already said I believe a healthy relationship like this IS possible, just it's not very likely, and evidence given by Calipro merely adds to the likelihood of it not being a pure thing ;)

And since everyone seems hell-bent on the year age gap I'd like to point out it's not the actual age gap in years, but relative to each other. EG a 20 year old girl and a 40 year old girl is not 'suspicious' because of the 20 year difference, but because he's twice her age. A 60 year old and an 80 year old together is not questionable.

"since you've seen my picture, you should know I don't need to go to Colombia to find a woman.....have plenty here....women in their 20's also"

I have more sympathy for Calipro's self-assesment than yours. The only people who go around boasting of both their good looks and sexual conquests are usually either immature, lack self-esteem or are lying. Or any combination / permutation thereof :)

As for people having too much time - this is a discussion-board. Where people discuss things. Generally things they care about.
Also, not everyone types at 1 letter per minute. I'm a programmer by trade and I can fair old chuck out the sentences when I want.
The flip side is my posts tend to be long, because I can type pretty much as fast as I want. I promise to try to be more concise in the future though - apparently your time is too valuable to spend reading others' differing opinions ;)

Actually, the part I found most amusing about this thread was that of the two girls calipro posted pictures of, one of them is just plain ugly. I find it amusing because I had a similar problem when I first came to Colombia - I'd see (to me) exotic girls and think they were sexy. Then, in time, I came to realise the difference between exotic-ugly and exotic-pretty.

Given that calipro apparently has a long history (I seem to recall someone mentioning here he'd been visiting for 10 years?) with Colombia, has he lived here for any significant amount of time, or has plans to move here? It's not always practical I admit, but if you love Colombia, why not live here?

PS Anyone else wish this site would both remember your logon and take you to the last page of the thread automatically? :s

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

"It is VERY common for young girls in their late teens & early 20's to date men in their 40's in Colombia, no matter which strata they are from. It's PART OF THE CULTURE!!!!"

From my observations it's part of the 'culture' that women are basically second-class here. I'm not saying England is a model of sexual equality (women still get paid less, entitled to less benefits etc), but here it's much more exagerated.

Again, just because people do something, does that make it right?
And to be sure I'm not misunderstood, I'm not in favour of all countries being identical until we are one homogenous group (which is both impossible and undesirable!), but there are certain things that most people would agree are 'wrong'. EG, women being at a disadvantage simply due to their sex. This is prevelant throughout Colombia as far as I can tell, and it leads to the situation where men not only feel they can do what they want with women, and date lots or go for the young ones (why go for the old ones, young ones are prettier and more fun! ;) ).

Colombia has many wonderful attributes and I wouldn't want to live anywhere else, but it's certainly not perfect. Labelling problems as culture merely misleads.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

"I sorry, but when you start equating dating sexy young girls (or even posting their pictures online) with robbery and murder you really hurt your own credibility."

I had thought it clear that my point was that doing something because others do it does not make it right.

Naturally there is no comparison between the severity of the events, it's merely an example of the mindset taken to the extreme to show it's ludicrousness.

www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

Calipro I don't believe Calipro should stop making his comments because it annoys people - he is after all entirely free to post what he likes as we are free to ignore it and him should we choose to.

Just to clarify a few of my own thoughts. I DO entirely believe it is possible for a young pretty girl to go out with a *cough* not-quite-so-handsome older money and for it to not be anything to do with money. But, this is going to be 0.1% of the time. While Calipro and his harem might be the exception, I find it doubtful given his attitude of reply on here. It's tough because of course we are facing another type of discrimination here - that based on looks. IE most people think pretty with pretty and ugly with ugly - no mixing. Of course this is crap, but like many preconceived ideas, it does tend to stem from something fundamentally obvious.

I appreciate Calipro attempting to answer my question sincerely (notable 'cos in virtually all his other replies after he says 'haha!' at least once ;), but he's still missed the general gist of my question.

While you claim that the girls would marry you if you asked (and I've no reason to doubt they wouldn't, either by your interpretation of the situation or mine), it raises the questions:

Will you ever ask them to marry you?
Why are you with them - to what end, for fun?

I'm curious (still!) about your thoughts on this - it's futile to put thoughts into the girls' heads since they aren't here to speak for themselves. But, from a slightly different angle:

Would you be happy marrying someone who openly has other relationships while with you?
Would you expect this behaviour to carry on if / when you get married?
Would YOU become faithful when married, or would a marriage be on the understand you (or both) are free to have sex with other people?

The whole marriage thing here may be a red-herring. It appears you don't hold enough beliefs in common with most religions to give marriage any discernable meaning for you. This is fine really, but you mentioned marriage (not at length, granted), so now I'm just following that train of thought :)

Possibly of more importance from my point of view though is the fact that while we may not like what Calipro does (and it seems most of us don't), he is entirely free to do as he wishes on a personal level. However, this is beyond 'private' and 'personal' - the posting of those pictures was inappropriate - certainly to the point where it merely backs-up the idea of you simply being after trophy girlfriends. Given you say you'd be happy to show those pictures to your friends and other guys interested to learn more about 'colombia', it would be easy to take your implied meaning that you feel you did nothing wrong. I doubt you'd show those images to female collegues or family members though, because of course they are 'clearly' inappropriate.

Personally I don't think those pictures are in bad taste necessarily, but I don't think they are the kind of things you should release publically. Your other albums were password-protected, because they undoubtedly feature more women in various states of undress or 'engaging in acts of sexual congress' as some old git might say :) You know it's not reasonable to show people these (also they may well contain explicit pics of you too - and people generally think twice about revealing themselves naked, although are often more than willing to show others - hell you won't even show your eyes, as if that's the bit of you that stands out!).

OK finally - what's your definition of a relationship?
Are you after 'love', and do you believe it can come from parallel relationships with girls who are equally 'unfaithful'?

You must remember that there's a reason most of the world believes monogamy both in marriages and relationships is the 'accepted' thing - and saying 'when in rome do as the romans' is quite possibly the weakest defence for any action ever concieved (well, certainly after Rome was built).

Many people rob and kill in Colombia. Does this mean you should do it too?

Because many people have multiple girlfriends, does that mean it's ok to do? Culture differences are one thing, but what is right and what is wrong is pretty much the same all over the world. Caslug cites an 'amusing' story to 'prove' it's ok - all it does is prove that people do it. Those who do should certainly not be married or get married, because it goes against the basic idea of marriage.

Urk, darned post is too long again - one of the 'joys' of being able to type nice and quick.

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

I suppose there's a line between 'sexy' and 'overt', and each of us draws that line somewhere else. For example, Nato's gallery here has a picture of her that some would more than likely consider 'too much'. At least we know for a fact that the picture is posted with her consent though ;)

And while I think caslug makes a valid point, that most don't care, I'd play on the importance of his statement backing it up:

'As long as you are nice & respectful, the local guys/girls could care less who you are with.'

But, I don't see how calipro's actions shows any respect. Hence the difference.

I guess I'm old and cynical ;) It would be lovely to be in a world where I could look at a couple like Calipro and his girlfriend and not immediately jump to the conclusion that it can't be because of his (for example) great personality, but because of money.

But do any of his actions about this show any degree of respect?
So far I make out:
1) Flaunting the girl in public to pose sexy.
2) Posting up pictures of them in their underwear (ok only 1, but definate knickers in the other) most likely without their permission.
3) Stating it's ok to have multiple girlfriends over here.

Regarding point 3, I'd say you are utterly wrong. Unless (!) of course none of them are serious or ever intend to get serious, or the girls have no interest in you as a person anyway.
And at Calipro's age, you are a bit too old to just be playing the field IMO (mind you, I've never seen the point particularly. Anything you can do with a girl is better when you love each other).

I'm proud of Nato - she is not only intelligent and caring, but young and hot! Hence I'm happy to 'flaunt' her. But then, I'm also confident that she's with me because she loves me.

Actually I'm REALLY curious now Calipro - what do you think these girls think about you, and what do you think about them? I'm talking about in a serious, level-headed, honest way.

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

Gerbil comments on Aura y Calipro

Hurrah! I wade in too :) Lauthra's partner here :)
She's been showing me some of the threads on here and I must say I'm disappointed but not exactly suprised.

The thing that's been annoying me particularly about a lot of these threads is simply that they prove that a lot of people that come to Colombia and are interested in Colombia aren't really interested in it at all - they only like it because of what their money can buy here that they otherwise couldn't get (because let's face it - there's no way girls like this (and I don't even find them pretty, but I'm prepared to admit others may) would go with someone like Calipro for any other reason than money.

Now, having said that, I'm with Nato on the 'he has what she wants, she has what he wants' in so far as it goes. However, it's naive to think that this simple 'business transaction' has no repercussions.

Ever wonder why a lot of guys over here hate foreigners? Well, Calipro is the answer. He comes here and picks up women simply because he's got money. What kind of impression does this give Colombians about us? And let's face it, Calipro has, by his posted photos, shown he's not exactly discreet about it.
If I saw someone old, foreign and grim taking sexy photos of a young english girl in England I'd not be ecstatic.

Now Calipro has every right to look for happiness. That he finds it by 'buying' women might not be to my tastes, but it's nothing to do with me. The problem is it has a much larger effect than simply boy-meets-girl, and everytime people see 'couples' like this, it makes it a little bit harder for the rest of us, and ingrains those stereotypes that little bit more on a people who are, generally, amazingly open and friendly.

Basically I'm just getting really sick of people claiming they love Colombia but who in fact just love the fact that the luck of their birth-place allows them to do things that would otherwise be beyond them.

For all of you who claim to love colombia, what exactly do you do to show it? Do you go out with young girls and spend money like it's going out of fashion?
Hell, we all do that (although I have the decency to limit myself to one beautiful calena) ;)
But do you actually give anything back at all, or are you simply reinforcing the image that foreigners are a bad thing?

Barry
www.theburrow.co.uk

PS Forgive the lack of accent on calena - I can't stand typing on a spanish-layout keyboard.