Last Day

We had a very pleasant final day here in Cartagena. We got up with no plans and had a slow morning. One of Bill’s travel books recommended a couple of restaurants so we tried one for lunch and were planning to try a second for supper. The lunch restaurant had a very fun atmosphere and the food was good. While we were there, a couple of guys speaking English came in. We’ve met very few Americans, so I went over to talk to them. One of them was from Kansas City, MO, the other from Colorado. Both were Marines and were doing some sort of training here in Colombia. I didn’t ask many questions because I assumed they wouldn’t be able to tell me much. Both were very nice. The guy from MO spent quite a bit of time in IA doing something for the Marines. He was familiar with with the MO Bootheel and with the Des Moines/Cedar Rapids area in IA.

My last class was good. I asked my 22 year old teacher if she liked to dance. She said everyone here dances, its part of the culture. You grow up seeing your family dance and dancing with them. Music is on most of the time. She said there are rare people who can’t dance, but most people just do it naturally. I told her I didn’t know anyone who knew how to dance and her response was “I don’t know any white people who can dance.” She says even the white people who take lessons are rigid and not very good. It was funny.

For dinner, we went to another restaurant I found in Bill’s book. It was closed when we got there but we assumed it would open at 6pm. As it turned out, it didn’t open until 7:30pm so we had to find another place to eat. We waited for a while in a square next to the city wall. As we were leaving, we heard a crowd of people right outside the wall. There was a protest going on and the protestors poured into the square right as we left. Nabely, my teacher, had told me right as I was leaving class that there was going to be a protest. Apparently, for the last few years, all over Colombia, local community leaders have been being assassinated. These are people demanding better education, land rights and public services for their communities. So many of them are currently being assassinated that people decided to organize a protest. Apparently the government is behind the assassinations and everyone knows this. There has been a lot of police and military presence in the area.

Overall this has been a really good trip. We are ready to come home, but we feel like we have done everything we wanted to do. The only thing I didn’t do that I wish I had found out about earlier is kitesurfing. Cartagena has some great kitesurfing schools and locations. It looks hard but it also looks like a lot of fun. It’s on my list of things to do next. This is an amazing kitesurfing video for anyone who’s interested.https://youtu.be/