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Red Roses White Town

Saturday, September 17th, 2005

16 September 2005 (Friday) – Popayan, Colombia

I woke up and found the guy next to me gone. Uh-oh… have we passed Popayan? It was more than 2 hours after Cali. I peered outside and spotted a sign with the word ‘Popayan’ and quickly put on my boots. Within 5 minutes, the bus stopped at the terminal. Phew! And I was the only one to get off at this lonely spot. Gulp… I quickly grabbed a cab to a hotel and slept the rest of the morning.

Popayan is a town with a huge colonial flavour. Actually, through the decades as Colombia modernised, Popayan was pretty much left alone. Ironically, it was terribly destroyed in an earthquake. Over the next few decades, the authorities slowly restored the town back, meaning to preserve its colonial charm. Popayan is slightly distinct from most of the other colonial towns I had seen in that nearly all of the buildings are painted white.

White colonial town of Popayan

Colombia celebrates ‘Dia de Amor y Amistad’ (Day of Love and Friendship), much like, St. Valentine’s Day, I supposed, on 17 September. That’s tomorrow. So, all over Popayan today, vendors were selling red roses to couples and friends. Really HUGE red roses. Aww… how lovely. NOT that anyone would buy me these roses, sigh…

I meandered and wandered all over the town the whole day. I happened upon a cinema which would be screening ‘Rosario Tijeras‘ tonight. I remembered Felipe talking about this Colombian film. We were in a library in Bogotá and there was a photo exhibition of this film, and I made a mental note to try and catch it if I can. Now, here it was. I bought the ticket. However, unfortunately, this cinema was pretty rotten, the sound system totally stank, even the images were not sharp and at some points, the screen kept turning black as if someone was standing in front of the reels. For me to understand Spanish in a movie, I need crystal-clear enunciation and with this rotten setup, plus the paisa accent and street gang slang, forget it. Anyway, I simply watched the film which is about a woman caught in the life of drugs, sex and murders in 1989 Medellin. It was quite a good movie, depicting a crucial part of Colombia’s drug-war history. Nice to see Medellin again… and recognize the slum-areas and even the San Pedro cemetery!

Posted in 06) Colombia Connection | No Comments »

To Popayan

Friday, September 16th, 2005

15 September 2005 (Thursday) – Bogotá to Popayan, Colombia

Yesterday when I bought the bus ticket to Popayan, the lady at the ticket office had told me that for the bus leaving at 12:30pm, we would arrive at 1pm. Huh??? More than 24 hours??, I asked her incredulously, a few times. And each time, she confirmed it. Wow, Colombia is big, but NOT that big, I was sure. But since she had repeatedly confirmed it, I guess it was best that I bought the ticket for the earliest bus.

But this morning, we had a huge debate at Herman’s house. Everyone disagreed with the journey time. They said it should take about 16 hours. Perhaps, it was 1am, but the lady told me 1pm… If so, I would really prefer to have my ticket changed as I do not fancy arriving in a town at 1am!! Hello, please rob me! Herman calculated the time for me. He concluded that it would arrive at around 5am, so I could just hang out at a cafe for 2 hours or so and then, head to town. Alright, so perhaps there was no need to change the ticket.

Gosh, it was so hard to say goodbye to Herman and his family. When I said ‘goodbye’ to his abuelita, she hugged me tightly and gave me a big kiss, telling me, “Como te quiero… como te quiero…” (How I love you… how I love you…). I had tears welling up in my eyes. Felipe, sweet good-natured Felipe, who had been wonderful company and so terribly helpful that day showing me around… Herman’s mother who was constantly so worried for my safety, a generous woman with a heart of gold… And Herman, as well, who had been great by giving up his room for me to sleep in, who had been funny, interesting, intelligent, and who did not kill me with his motorbike…

As I was getting into the bus for Popayan, I asked the guys from the bus company what time we would arrive. One said 14 hours, one said 12 hours. Argh!! What a mistake that woman made at the ticket office! So, I would be arriving between 1am to 3am. How was I supposed to wake up in time to get off? Well, deed was done. So, I decided to appreciate the view on the ride to Popayan instead.

We passed through many fincas that cultivated lovely flowers. Yes, I had heard that Colombia exported flowers around the world. Lovely views of the gardens and flower plantations. Later, there were more lovely views of the mountains and valleys as we hugged the sides of the mountains and headed up and down.

The police came onboard at one point and announced that all of us ought to get off and surrender our identity cards. One of the police radioed back, giving the names on each of the identity cards. I guess this was to check for known felons or guerillas or whatever. I waved my passport at the police, but they were not interested, they just gestured that I could return to the bus.

At around 8pm, the bus stopped, switching off its engine totally. There seemed a long queue in front of us. The guy sitting next to me got off the bus to investigate. He later returned and announced there had been an accident. So, we could be here waiting for a while. An accident. Gosh, the curvy roads in the mountains are actually well-paved, but still dangerous because it is heavily used by huge, gigantic trucks transporting a lot of cargoes, and travelling very slowly. So, cars always want to overtake these trucks. Even trucks and huge buses want to overtake one another all the time. One blind sharp bend, and you could have a headlong collision easily.

Some police activities arrived finally to manage the situation. And after about 2 hours, those on the down-going lane – that was us – moved off first. The up-going lane had to wait for all of us to be cleared first. From the top, at times, we could see the snaky queue of carlights down to the bottom of the mountains.

I dozed off and woke up at 1am, when we arrived in Cali. The guy next to me who was also going to Popayan, told me Popayan would be in 2 hours’ time. Back to sleep, as I felt assured that he would wake me up.

Posted in 06) Colombia Connection | No Comments »