So I arrived in Miami on a short 2 hour layover on my way to Colombia. A little annoyed at having to leave the airport & re-check in, I headed to the ticket counter where I spent the next 1.5 hours dealing with the fact that I had no flight out of the country. You can't enter a country as a foreigner without an exit flight, and they were not ready to make an exception. After some chatting and charm, a solution was reached. They would make and print a fake itinerary for me to show immigration in all of the countries I passed through over the next month. Of course if I was caught in this deception, the flight agents would disavow all knowledge of my existence, but it seemed like a good idea and so with 15 minutes to get through security and on my flight, I started the international portion of my trip.
I arrived in Cartagena, Colombia - a BEAUTIFUL beach town constructed by the spanish to be a port in 1533. Due to the ports massive success, it began to be raided by pirates, for which they encircled the entire town in a 4 kilometer stone wall, complete with look out towers and cannons. The interior of the city was intended for the elite wealthy, and as such all of the buildings are extravagantly built. The town is a maze, but its so small you can walk the entire thing in about an hour, a feat I accomplished several times. Upon arrival, I had no place to stay so i told the taxista to take me to the heart of town. I jumped out, found a hostal, and asked for a place... but it was full so they sent me down the street. They only had private rooms available, so I was stuck with paying $20,000 pesos a night, or roughly $12 dollars - expensive for Colombias standards. I walked straight down to the heart of the small city and started ambling around until I met a 21 year old local distributing flyers. We started talking in spanish, he warmed up to me and decided I needed a full tour of the city. We spent the next 2 hours wandering the streets as he explained to me what every statue meant, what building was for what, and when and why each was constructed. We finished getting a beer and watching the sunset on the wall before he invited me out that night. I ran home, threw on some pants, and met him in front of the clock tower to begin the festivities. We went out and as the night melted away, I started to notice he knew quite a lot of people. When I asked for a beer and was told it was $4, I said it was too expensive but he said no problem, we could go buy a bottle of rum and take it into the club. When I asked if that was ok, he said it was for him because his cousin owned the club, and was dating one of the most powerful drug dealers in the town. We then proceeded to get the bottle and go in, as he introduced me to every bouncer, and later to the 4 military guards carrying machine guns and the 2 officers accompanying them, who he assured me were for our protection. I started to freak when he stood up, took me into the bathroom and pulled out a bag of coke. When someone else walked in, he said hi, did a line right in front of him, turned to me and said - dont worry, you are home. I decided to run for the hills when he started to introduce me to girl after girl and told me to pick anyone I wanted, he was inviting me. When I said I wasnt quite in the mood, he got offended and I got concerned. Finally, he threw me into a cab and told him to take me wherever I wanted and not charge me. I got home at 1 and locked myself in my room, which is lucky because the next day the porter told me a young man with two much larger men came looking for me at 3 am. The porter told me they had the faces of people who run with drugs and offered him $30 to call me in my room ( a serious sum in Colombia). So much for a tranquil first day!
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