Editor’s Note: This isn’t a family-friendly read. That’s not what Bottle Girl is about. You’ve been warned. Proceed if you like.

I ended up with two transsexuals at a multi-level gay bar at about 4:00 in the morning on Saturday night when common sense broke out and I got the hell out of Dodge. Naturally, however, that’s not exactly how I planned the evening to end. The point was to find either Bottle Girl, mayhem, or both.

I’m back in Bogota for a few days and met up with the previously mentioned Christopher K (pictured right), who has been living here for the last few years and knows some good spots. Chris reminds me a of myself: a relatively normal, relatively geeky, non-drug-using guy who’s up for anything and willing to throw himself in a direction that leads to a good story. He also writes a hell of a blog that is worth your time. Before we left, I told Chris I was up for “absolutely anything.” He delivered.

We left from his hostel around 10:00 in the evening and made our way north to collect Simon (pictured on left with a wolf mask on his head he got from a bartender). Simon is an insane Brit that has been in Colombia for two years. We told another guy at the hostel that we were going out with Simon and his reply was an emphatic, “Oh, God.” Simon has to go back to London for a month and he’s scared about it. He says he doesn’t know how he’s going to answer his parents when they ask, “So, what have you been doing in Colombia?” The honest answer would apparently be, “Drugs.”

Quoth Simon in the cab from the strip club to the transsexual theater club, “I don’t want to go in and just walk around asking for coke. That smacks of amateurism; and if there’s one thing I’m an expert at, it’s getting wasted.” I believe him.

We got to Simon’s apartment and opened the door to the smell of weed. I said hello to Simon’s roommate Ben (pictured right in a position he did not move from for the whole 45 minutes we were there) and only got a moan as a reply, “Uuuhhh.” Simon was already well on his way as we left the apartment.

Next stop: Platinum Oz, hole-in-the-wall strip club / whorehouse where we hoped to find Bottle Girl. Apparently every strip club in Bogota is also a whorehouse. There is stripping, but there are also a lot of girls just sitting around. One has the option of spending quality time with one of the ladies in one of the small rooms inside the club. Of course, I naively asked Chris, “So what are these girls doing here sitting with these guys? Did they bring their girlfriends to the strip club or something?” No, no they did not, Nathan. These girls are working. Riiiight.

But let’s go back for a minute. What is Platinum Oz? Why did we come here? Who is Bottle Girl? I’m not going to try to outdo Chris’ description. Here’s an excerpt from his blog (this entry, specifically) written two years ago:

Back to Sam and me and our friend, heading north to Platinum Oz… it turned out it was the American bouncer’s night off, but the bar itself was fascinating. It was a tiny, closet-sized space. The stage was about five feet wide and fifteen feet long, floor-level, but with a wide, low wall surrounding it. A single bench for spectators ran down one side and two other sides had two rows of benches. Underneath the stage wall ran a narrow shelf where you could rest your drink and put your feet up.

I’d never seen such a cozy strip bar. It was like a miniature House of Commons, but with considerably more nudity.

Only one girl at a time could fit in the tiny stage area, and the first girl was amazing. She had a cute hooker-next-door look about her, and she genuinely looked like she was having fun, which is something else I’d never seen at a strip bar. In fact, she was downright funny.

When she got naked, Sam advised me to make sure my beer was safely hidden on the ledge under the stage wall. Why? You’ll see, he advised.

The girl stalked the stage and snatched a beer off the wall from a guy sitting near us. She took a pull off the beer and let some foam out of her mouth and spill down her body as she sat on the edge of the stage wall, and then massaged some of the beer between her legs.

And then she slipped the neck of the bottle inside and jerked it in and out until beer foamed out of her and all over the stage.

And then she walked back over to the guy and jammed the beer back in his mouth and made him drink.

Yeah. That’s a new one on me, too. Forget about any social or gender issues… the bacteriological implications alone are staggering. I bet you won’t see that nancy-boy David Blaine pull a stunt like that (well, not televised, at least). That’s pure brass crazy balls, people.

The stripper finished her show and came back to sit between me and Sam. See, gringos get all the crazy ones. But I have to say, she was hilarious and sharp. She told me she was studying forensic medicine, and her name was Zharyck. Of course. Another girl came up to Sam, and our friend vanished for the better part of an hour, so I ended up sitting with Zharyck for quite some time. I swear, we had an English class. She never tried to sell me her services, exactly, but I was happy to buy her a few beers just for the completely insane company, and to continue my long-standing tradition of engaging strippers in lengthy conversations. And I ended up genuinely liking her - it’s not many people who are so comfortable in their own wacky skin.

So that’s Platinum Oz and Bottle Girl. She has achieved a moderate level of fame/notoriety amongst anyone Chris tells stories to. Even after reading the story two months ago, I certainly had no trouble figuring out who he was talking about when he mentioned the name “Bottle Girl.” Chris genuinely enjoys spending time with her not just because she’s a stripper; he further explained to me that she’s probably the funniest girl he’s ever met and quite smart to boot. Apparently Chris ran in to her a week or so ago and had completely forgotten who she was, but she remembered him after 2 years and was excited to see him. Being fans of crazy, we figured it’d be a good bet to go find her.

We asked the bouncer about her right away when we got there, but unfortunately, Bottle Girl was not in attendance at Platinum Oz that night. Oh well. Upstairs we went.

We sat down in our little spot around the small stage and the show went on more or less as one would expect. Honestly, Simon was as much of a star as the girls on the small stage. Never have I seen such raw enthusiasm from someone at a strip club — the few times I’ve even been to one. We and the guys seated around us laughed out loud for a good hour as the strippers wandered around and chose various gentlemen to abuse while Simon continued his running commentary and mime act. There were no disappearing beer bottle tricks, but Simon did get hit by some beer overspray in one part of the show. Everyone shook his hand on the way out.

We weren’t there very long. The main reason for the trip was to find Bottle Girl. On the way out, we asked the bouncer again about her. Apparently they don’t know when she’s going to show up for work. Sometimes she just disappears for a week. He described her as “dangerous.” Chris described her as his future wife. Good man.

From Platinum Oz, we moved on to Vinacure and Vinacure is awesome.

Vinacure is a huge club built inside an old theater. I would never have known to go there if I was just walking around. It was described as the best club in Bogota by several long-timers at the hostel. The decorations are elaborate and eclectic. There are weird statues everywhere, lots of colors, people walking around in costumes, and trannies. Yeah, trannies.

The stage of the theater is utilized for choreographed lip-sync shows. The stars of the shows are typically one or two of the trannies. Here’s some video that doesn’t do it justice. At least it’s a Madonna number:

Vinacure in Bogota Colombia from Nathan Shipley on Vimeo.

After milling around, watching the shows, dancing a little bit, and talking with the owner of the club for a while, I started talking to two of the trannies from the show. Really interesting (wo)men who were a lot of fun to talk to. The one with the dark hair is actually pretty convincing. The other, not so much, as you can see below in this classic reaction to whatever the hell Simon has just said:

Around 3:30 in the morning, we decided to move on. Chris and Simon were headed God-knows-where and I decided it was time to turn in my chips. After they left in the first cab, the two trannies came out (of the building). With a too-deep hoot they said, “Hey! You’re still here! Wanna come to another club with us?”

“Well, I’m actually headed home, but thanks for the offer,” I said.

“Oh, come on! Just for one drink.”

Ah, what the hell. No balls, no air medal, right? The phrase seemed to have more meaning at that particular moment. “Okay, well where is it? Where are we going?”

At this point, they grabbed me by the arm and we headed to a cab while saying, “It’s just a cool bar that’s open late.”

Well, we got to the “cool bar” and the first warning sign came when I saw two guys making out in the entryway. Ahah. One of those cool bars. They paid my cover and in we went.

Before my eyes, a packed, multi-level, very gay disco spread out. The two trannies walking in were like Norm walking in to Cheers. They knew damn near everybody. Not too overwhelmed, I followed them upstairs and they ordered a bottle of rum.

The rum was taken back downstairs to another section of the bar across the dance floor. This is when the more manly of the two began explaining to me that the more girly of the two was interested in me. “Ah, well that’s… flattering. She knows I’m straight, right?” S/he didn’t really have a good reply to this but kept pestering me about it. It was turning from being fun to talk to them to annoying.

I finally just approached the more girly of the two and said, “Hey, look, you know, it’s nice what your friend is telling me, but it’s just not gonna happen. Besides, you told me you have a boyfriend, right? What about your boyfriend? Have you thought about him?”

I have no idea why I decided that the “but, you’ve got a boyfriend” argument was the right kind of reasoning at that point. That was obviously not a concern for her. The argument had little effect.

They started pouring rum and cokes and I turned around to survey my situation. It was almost 4:00 in the morning and I was in a giant gay club in Bogota, Colombia. Compared to the gay bar my neighbor took me to in Indianapolis one time, it was actually pretty tame. Aside from the trannies, I wasn’t getting hit on. The random ass-grabbery factor was non-existent. A minor victory. However, I was with two transsexuals who were pouring me a drink. One of them wanted to hook up with me and the other was encouraging it. Nothing good could come from this situation. Abort, Shipley.

“Hey, just a second, ladies — gotta use the bathroom. Be right back!”

And that was that. Home I went. I hope they found another straight gringo in the club to give the rum and coke to. Not likely.

Good night. We didn’t see Bottle Girl, but the strip club was surprisingly fun, Vinacure is my favorite club I’ve been to on my trip, and we met some damn interesting people. Fortunately, no one got laid. Much obliged, Chris.

Here’s a Flickr set from Vinacure.

Flickr set with latest goings-on is here.

What’s our Vector, Victor?

I am ready to move on from Medellin. I’ll be catching a bus back to Bogotá early on Friday morning. From there I’ll have five days in Bogota to spend time with friends, and then it’s back to Lima for a little bit before heading on to Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Why Lima again, you ask? Two reasons. For one, it was inexplicably cheaper to buy a return flight from Lima to Bogotá when I first came to Colombia and will be cheaper to fly to Buenos Aires from Lima rather than Bogotá. Already got the ticket, may as well use it. Secondly, I’m looking forward to seeing Gaby again. She ended up being a better friend than anyone I met in Colombia.

Speaking of Friends

I’ve been gone long enough now (three and a half months) that I have occasions where I miss seeing my friends back home. It’s usually simple things such as drinking a High Life while Andrew does woodworking, going for a car ride to get Jimmy Johns, and then getting home to the evil beagle attacking me for no reason before he ruthlessly devours my napkins. Or perhaps walking to get Mexican food in Chicago with Dan or Amy. Or going with a group of people to the Living Room Lounge. Maybe a ride around Dad’s lake on the Jet-Ski.

Medellin Round Up

The Colombian Flakiness has not subsided. I’m fine with it now because I simply don’t expect anyone to ever actually keep a date they make. It’s a bonus when they do.

This past week has been pretty tranquil, overall. Nothing particularly crazy has happened, but I’ve enjoyed spending time with some new friends here.

Let’s tell the story with pictures:

Colombian Hospitality

Brent and I met a mom and her two daughters and got invited to their apartment for a day of tennis, swimming, and hanging out with the family. They lived with the two younger brothers and grandma. Mom cooked lunch and dinner! I later taught the twelve year old brother how to play guitar and we all went bowling. It was fun.

Dancing on Colombian Valentine’s Day

My friend Amelia, who I met through previously-mentioned Mark, invited me to join her and three friend to go out on the Dia del Amor y la Amistad, which is pretty much Valentine’s Day except it’s celebrated in September here in Colombia. We went to a big bar/dancing spot called Babylon and they gave all the girls light-up devil horns. Also fun.

Some Dude Gives Us a Mouse

I met up with my graphic designer friend Monica (she designed a bunch of shirts on sale in the clothes section of Exito) and a group of friends and we went to a park. I liked the park very much and am disappointed I am only now finding out about it right before I have to leave. Some dude made a little wire rat for me and a roach clip for Monica. Some other dude gave us a mouse, which was arguably the highlight of the evening. Monica named him “Stuart.”

Guitar Case / Probable Bomb or Contraband

Finally, I have constructed a ridiculous box/coffin to carry my guitar in with me to Lima out of six other boxes given to me by the grocery store. It is heavy and will be unwieldy to carry, but should look funny if nothing else as the skinny guy walks through the airport with backpack, duffel bag, and monster box. I will be amazed if this thing doesn’t raise suspicion or get me searched.

Gotta pack now! Here’s the Flickr set.

The Flickr set for this post is here.

In my continuing effort to stay away from the “tourist track” and do things that locals might do, things that locals might not do, or things that I think will be funny, I went to a “deathcore” metal festival, spent time in various parks of varying degrees of sketchiness, and got my life threatened by a crazy man this past weekend in Medellin, Colombia. Here are the details:

Dark Blood Fest: The Air-Curdling Sonic Manifestation of Teen Angst

There was no problem finding the address for the much-anticipated Dark Blood Fest on Saturday night. I put on the best thing I had available to wear before leaving - a my red “Periodic Table of the Elements” t-shirt and cut off jeans. About two blocks away in central Medellin, we could hear the drums, feedback, grinding guitar and the growling vocals of amateur metal. The place just looked like a normal building - not the bar or concert hall I was expecting.

“This is gonna be awful,” I said to my roommate, Brent. Standing outside, we took a couple pictures of the venue when some sweaty Colombian guy leaned out the window and yelled at me in English, “Hey! Nigger! Come here, mother fucker!”

Hm. Right. Knowing I would probably be seeing this racially confused master of English inside, I grinned at him and gave him a thumbs up yelling, “Just a second!”

We went inside and upstairs to find a bunch of teenagers dressed in black milling about. To my undiscerning eye, most of them looked like hair-across-the-eyes MySpace Emo Kids. One half of the place was a small-for-a-concert second floor room that housed Dark Blood Fest and the other was an in-use bowling alley. I’m sure the people that came to bowl loved the aural onslaught from the other side of the building.

Paying the $10,000 Peso entrance fee, we walked in and the screaming hit us. We stood in the back while the air-curdling sonic manifestation of teen angst strained the PA and amps. A circle of about 75 people surrounded the band with a mosh area in the middle. There were no lights in the room and I actually didn’t need the earplugs I brought. I was expecting a little something more, I think. Perhaps a fountain of red food coloring water?

Dancing at the metal show consisted of either doing nothing, nodding ones head while swaying slightly, or wildly kicking and punching the air during more frantic parts of the music. Some chose to kick the air in the mosh pit while others (especially the girls) would furiously punch and kick the air in front of them outside the central mosh pit. This looked kind of like a kooky workout tape. The guys in the middle were more Capoeira-style with their kicking; jumping up while doing continuous round-house kicks.

Here’s a video of your standard cute Colombian Metal Girl doing the Air Punch ‘n Kick dance. Apologies for it turning sideways; Brent shot it:

Girl Does the Air Fight at Dark Blood Fest from Nathan Shipley on Vimeo.

My favorite mosh technique, though, was the crowd-parting “pick your friend up under their shoulders and swing them around at people while they bicycle kick at people’s faces” method. It instantly caused everyone to hurriedly step back and cleared a big swath on the floor. What weenies. If they were true Fans of Death, wouldn’t they allow themselves to get kicked in the face?

Within one minute of being in the room, the guy that yelled at me from the window found me. He came over and gave me a big sweaty hug, slap on the back, and introduced me to his girlfriend. I doubt he expected I was actually going to come inside. I couldn’t understand much of what he said, but seemed to get a good reaction when I would yell, “Rock and roll!” and make the rock and roll sign with my hand. This became my default reply to anything anyone said to me at Darkblood Fest.

Sweaty Guy went in to a diatribe about how he hates Emo Kids (”they are gay”), called one of his friends gay a bunch of times (this friend was, incidentally, an Emocore lover), and espoused the awesomeness of Deathcore and Grindcore metal. “Rock and roll!” came my enthusiastic reply.

We milled about inside and outside the room. Outside, we were the subject of much interest from the high school kids sitting around. They were nice and shared their crappy booze with us. I got asked what kind of music I liked, but had trouble with specifics after telling them I like metal. “Well, you know, I used to work with this guy that likes metal. He played it and it rocked. Umm… Autopilot Off? Baby Killer?” (Autopilot Off is relatively candy-assed punk band that hasn’t played in 3 years. “Baby Killer” is only a song title of some metal song.) It was the best I could come up with. They didn’t say anything. Several of them liked hiphop, though, so that worked much better to talk about.

While we didn’t see a drop of blood, the music wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. By no means did I like it, but there was actually an element of melody to it and wasn’t completely just grunting and grinding. It wasn’t ear-splittingly loud. I’m not saying I’m gonna load my iPod up with metal now, but it was certainly tolerable.

Here’s some video of the event of a typical song:

Dark Blood Fest in Medellin Colombia from Nathan Shipley on Vimeo.

The kids were nice and Dark Blood Fest was fun. Thanks, Colombian Metal Crowd; I’d come back. I’m glad we could hang out for a couple hours and I’ve now got some new Facebook friends to clutter up my friend feed. I’m not sure what it would take for me to actually start moshing (Sweaty Guy did ask me to join them in “The Pit”), but I was glad to watch from a safe distance. A safe distance. Pretty hardcore, eh?

We left Dark Blood Fest after a couple hours and headed towards the middle of Centro.

Suicidal Crazytime Screamer says God will kill me.

After Dark Blood Fest, I wanted to check out a park I’d read about in Centro called either “El Guanabano” or “Parque Periodista.” We had wanted to go there on Thursday night, but it seemed a bit too sketchy to walk to so we decided to save it.

It was hopping and it was on the grimy side. I liked it very much. Parque Periodista was full of the usual evening crowd of drinkers, dealers, and weed smokers sitting around outside. A lot of early to mid-thirties tattooed people, Sex Pistols and Misfits t-shirts, and assorted riffraff with establishment-attacking hair dos. I bet they’d love Roller Derby. Excellent fodder for more interesting interactions than the button-up shirt crowd in Parque Lleras.

We had lots of conversations with lots of different people. Most were just regular people that worked and lived in the area. I met an astrophysics student and his girlfriend. Other groups taught us new and useful vocabulary and shared stories. Good times.

The highlight of Parque Periodista, though, was Suicidal Crazytime Screamer. He said his name was Paul. Initially, I had no idea that Suicidal Crazytime Screamer was suicidal, crazy, a screamer, or a religious nut. However, he would earn his namesake and make these facts abundantly clear after about 45 minutes.

Paul (pictured right) approached me and Brent as we were sitting in the park. We talked to him for about a half an hour during which time he offered us coke (Again, no thanks.), told us how much he loves gringos, how welcoming his country is, and that he used to work for Pablo Escobar. He was doing coke bumps fairly regularly. It seemed perfectly normal except for the fact that he said he wanted to kill himself several times.

Brent and I offered several helpful reasons of why he should not kill himself and keep living and he eventually wandered off. That seemed to be that.

Fifteen minutes later, though, I was sitting and talking to another group while Brent talked to some other people about ten feet away from me. Paul came back and approached me. What happened next was curious. He started talking to me moderately normally, but then something changed in him. The crazy took over.

He started puffing his chest out and speaking dramatically like he was overacting in a Shakespeare play. At first I thought he was trying to be funny, but it quickly became evident that he wasn’t kidding and was attempting to be threatening.

Paul then officially transformed from Paul to Suicidal Crazytime Screamer. He started shaking and talking about God and Jesus and blood. He would make dramatic swoops of his arms and body as his voice got louder and louder. He shook his fist at me and pointed at me. His voice rose and fell in volume and pitch. Sometimes he would talk in a snake-like hissy whisper voice and other times he screamed. People in the crowded park began to stop their conversations and start looking. All of this drama and energy was focused directly at me.

He started yelling and screaming. A lot. It was death talk and Day of Reckoning talk. He told me that God was going to kill me and all the gringos. He made machine gun noises and gestures. He would go “Ratatatatatat! Chichchchchchci!” as he sprayed the bemused crowd with his imaginary gun. He was talking all manner of crazy. Batshit crazy. En Espanol. All sorts of apocalyptic stuff and vocabulary that went beyond my knowledge. I tried to reason with him for a little bit, but you can’t reason with crazy. I stopped talking and assumed my best neutral but pleasant face and let him continue.

His eyes were wide and locked on to mine the entire time. I matched his gaze and tried to look amiable, though I was inwardly slightly alarmed by his shift in tone. I’m not used to being told that God will kill me and all my countrymen from someone who initially told me he loves my kind. In fact, I wasn’t sure if he was going to pull out a knife or do something even more crazy so I kept my eyes on him and tried to be ready to move quickly if necessary.

This went on for about six or seven minutes. For some reason, he eventually wandered off to scream at everybody else for a while. I took a breath and turned to grin at the gaggle of people that were looking at me. “Wow, how ’bout that guy, eh?”

The best part of Suicidal Crazytime Screamer was the way my nonplussed reaction seemed to endear me to the crowd around me. Everyone was apologetic and made sure to tell me — as if it wasn’t really obvious — “That guy is crazy.”

He spent the next two hours we were there walking around and yelling at everyone or walking to the street and yelling at cars. I later learned the best way to deal with him is to ignore him, though I was too wary to look away initially.

I joined several groups after that and we continued talking. The rest of the evening at Parque Periodista was fun and I could have stuck around longer than we did. However, we finally left after Brent got punched in the back by the friend of a drug dealer for what he describes as “no reason.”

We spent the rest of the night wandering around Centro, observing skanky prostitutes (see below), and talking with randoms. Brent got mad at a woman at a bar who wouldn’t sleep with him that night and we had to leave again. We taxied back to Parque Poblado in our neighborhood for a little while and talked to some girls that were celebrating their friends’ engagement.

Fun night. Here are some pictures, starting with a favorite from the night featuring me and a lady I’ve dubbed “Sausage Shorts” and followed up by your standard Medellin centro prostitute.

Eye Popping in Envigado

The other noteworthy thing that happened this past weekend was meeting Abdul Alsaler, the Guinness Record-holding man who pops his eyes out of his head and gives you a postcard for a dollar. I would have just let the guy go by, but I was hanging out with Luisa in Parque Envigado and she had seen a video of him on YouTube and paid him to hang out with us for a bit.

These are the results:

Random Racism of the Week

In my continuing end-note series of observed things in South America that are racist to me, I saw this ad for “Niggaz Jeans” on the side of a building in Central Medellin. It’s very prominent right by the largest Metro train station in the city.

Here’s your Flickr set again. That’s all for now, people. Stay tuned.

While Colombia has a ton of really nice, friendly, and helpful people, they prove to be incredibly flaky when it comes to keeping dates. I wrote this after a date that had been in the works since Sunday fell through without explanation. This is the fourth or fifth time or so that I’ve set aside an evening to meet people and things inexplicably never materialize. Needless to say, I was grumpy. Also, please excuse the four-letter words, family.

Juan Diego and the Air-Suck Girl

It started simply enough. It had promise.

Juan Diego, one of the four doormen that works my building, asked if I’d like to meet a girl he’s friends with. We could go out that night. He would introduce us. “Sure!” I said.

I asked what she was like. He said nothing and immediately scrunched up his face and made this sucking-in noise through his clenched teeth with his lips pulled back, his head nodding, and his hands rubbing up and down an imaginary hourglass in front of him. “Shiiiiiii,” went Juan Diego The Doorman. A ringing endorsement. It was a date. He would call his girlfriend, one of her friends that would by my date, and the four of us would go out.

“What time?” I asked.

“When I’m off work. 9. 9:15. Come down here around 9:15.”

“No problem. I’ll be here.”

“One more thing,” he continued, “I don’t want to take them anywhere expensive. I don’t have much cash. Cool?”

“Absolutely.”

“Good. And we’ll go half and half on everything. Half and half. Cool?”

“Yeah, you bet,” I enthusiastically replied, “Cool.”

“Half and half,” he re-emphasized.

It got to be about 8:45 and the phone rang. I hadn’t put on my jeans yet, but Juan Diego was wondering where I was. Could I come downstairs? “Sure, just gimme a second to put my pants on.”

I went downstairs. That’s when the trouble started.

“Do you have any change?” he asked me.

“Yeah, what for?”

“So I can make a phone call. Call the girls.” He needed a coin to use the coin-op phone at the desk.

“Oh, yeah, here you go. Look, I’ll be right back. Just want to throw a shirt on.”

“Okay,” he said, “Do you have money for their taxi?”

“Uhh… yeah? How much is it?”

“About $10,000 pesos.”

“Oh, yeah, I’ve only got a $20,000 note. I’ll bring it with me.”

He then stated, “Oh, just give it to me now and I can give it to the taxi when they get here.”

Fair enough. I gave him the money and went back upstairs to make final preparations before meeting hourglass air-suck girl. As promised, at 9:15 I returned to the lobby to await the girls’ arrival.

Like any Latin girls worth their salt, they were about a half an hour late. I considered this to be an early success, actually. I’ve quickly grown accustomed to people either being at least an hour late or just not showing up at all to dates here. Give me 30 minutes late any day. It’s a goddamn coup.

This lead to 30 minutes of droll conversation with Juan Diego the Doorman. Upon the taxi’s eventual arrival, I asked Juan Diego, who was still watching the desk, to hand me the $20,000 note I’d given him earlier so I could go pay the cab. He shuffled through his pockets and looked through his wallet for the seemingly lost money as the taxi driver grew increasingly impatient while the girls called out repeatedly, “It’s 10,000! It’s 10,000!”

“Screw it,” I thought, not wanting to lose face or let Juan Diego take credit for paying for their cab by letting them see me take money from him (that was actually mine) to hand to the cabbie. I went out and paid the cabbie from my wallet. We went inside and small talk ensued.

The girls wanted to eat. We went to the fast burger joint by the apartment. $17,000 for dinner. At payment time, Juan Diego was nowhere to be found. I paid, thinking to myself, “Okay. Well, he’s got the rest of the night covered at this point considering I bought everyone’s dinner, the cab, and he has my 20.”

Oh, how naive, gringo.

The girls finished their burgers and slurped down their cokes. Conversation wasn’t that interesting thus far and Juan Diego the Doorman mostly just stood away from the group and said snarky things to his girlfriend. I wasn’t sure on the protocol here. Was I supposed to be stand-offish like Juan Diego and go talk “guy talk” with him? Or should I sit with the girls? What were they expecting? A fence-rider from way back, I did a little of both.

We got in a cab and went somewhere to a bar. I’m not sure where it was. Juan Diego paid for this cab. …Using the $20,000 note I had given him.

We sat down at the table in a little patio area of the bar and order the usual half-bottle of rum and a coke to make drinks with. Juan Diego fought with his girlfriend. He soon pulled out a folded up piece of paper, dramatically unfolded it to reveal the cocaine inside, and asked if I wanted any. “No thanks.” I got a, “Fine, if you wanna be a stick in the mud, go ahead,” look as he headed off to the bathroom.

I continued attempting to make conversation with Monica, who was certainly every bit of the hourglass air-suck attractive I was promised. In addition to being air-suck hot, she was air-suck stupid and air-suck boring. I asked if she was in school. No. Was she working? No. Using my standard friendly line to people I meet that are retired I said, “Oh, ha ha, congratulations! So what do you do then?”

“Nothing.”

Nothing. She doesn’t do anything. She does nothing. Doing nothing also includes having the conversation skills of a brick wall. This has now become a default red-flag for me in Colombia. Don’t do anything? Peace out!

I gave and gave. I asked questions and got brief, uninterested answers. Not a single question in return from her. Just bored replies. She wasn’t touching her rum and coke while I was just searching for another. “Are you gonna drink that?”

Juan Diego was coked up by this point, in a much better mood, dancing with his fat girlfriend, and making out with her. It went on like this for a while.

I lost any and all interest in actually-stupid Monica. We eventually asked for the bill. While we were waiting for the bill, Juan Diego pointed at Monica’s ass with a raised eyebrow and made a thumbs-up sign. Right. Yes, it’s nice. “Did you invite her home?” he asked. No. No, Juan Diego, I did not.

The bill came and Juan Diego did not touch it. A touch over $40,000. In front of the group, I asked, “You got this, right?”

“Oh, I paid for the taxi on the way here, remember? It’s your turn.”

He paid for the taxi. It was about $5,000. With my money. I objected. “No, remember, I gave you that $20,000. Remember?”

Monica leaned in to me and in hushed, empathetic tones whispered, “He doesn’t have much money.” I ignored her as echoes of JD’s “Half and half… half and half…” danced through my head. They were all giving me borderline ugly looks as I attempted to delicately explain to Juan Diego that it was his turn to pay and I’m really trying to keep to my trip budget. Everyone just got up from the table and went to the entrance.

The manager looked concerned that we were going to leave without paying. I pulled Juan Diego aside. “Look. You have $20,000 of mine. I paid for their cab. I paid for dinner. You got this, okay? Half and half?”

He just looked at me blankly and said, “I paid for the cab here,” and walked away.

Now angry and with my daily trip budget thoroughly in the shitter, I paid the manager. Monica asked me for money for a cab home. “Oh no. You talk to Juan Diego. He has it.” She balked but I would hear none of it.

It was raining. We all got in one cab, me in the front and the three of them in the back, and Juan Diego asked me where we were going. “Home.”

Still with a shred of false hope that Juan and I might work things out the next day, I said nothing in the cab ride back as the three of them talked in the back seat. I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was Monica.

“Can you give me $10,000?” she asked.

“What for?”

“Just $10,000. Can you give me that as a gift?”

“What for?” I repeated more intensely.

“Just, you know, for whatever. To have.” Silence in the cab. The three of them watched to see what I would do.

I had had it. My face turned red. “No! No. No you can not. You just sat there all night. I just paid for everyone’s whole night. I am not going to give you any more money. I am not an ATM machine. You are not getting $10,000.”

She seemed genuinely taken aback that I wasn’t going to give her the money.

My angry reply prompted the predictable bitchy, sarcastic remarks from the back seat. I faced forward and fumed. “Fuck these guys,” I thought. How many other saps do they play like this?

Juan Diego told the taxi to stop three blocks too soon and I got out and walked in the rain the rest of the way home.

….

Predictably, Juan Diego claims to never have his half of the money to give me. He even tried to tell me we were even-Steven until I wrote down everything on a piece of paper and showed it to him. About a week has gone by. I’ve just quit asking for it. Once warm and friendly relations in the building entryway have turned frigid. We now say nothing to each other. He pushes the buzzer to open the door, and I walk through it.

Fuck you, Juan Diego. Your do-nothing, air-suck friend is a vapid prepago. You lied to me. I hope you’re happy with your ugly girlfriend and your deceit. You are a bad person.

…

Cut to now.

While I was quite mad at the time, I’m not mad anymore. I laugh about it. Lessons learned. In the scheme of things, it’s just money and provided another window into a new world for me. I do my best to annoy Juan Diego when I see him in the entry way. I like to think it works.

Furthermore, the whole night wasn’t bad. It actually had a happy ending. As I was outside the apartment after my date, I chanced across the group of three telecom students. They had just gotten back from a shoot for a video they’re making. It turned in to a lot of fun talking to them about production classes and I made some new friends out of it. Nice people.

Naturally, however, we were supposed to meet up twice so they could show me their video and their school. I would show them my animation and compositing reel, too. They’ve broken both of the meetings.

That’s Colombia. Be chevere and try not to get riled, whitey.

I was just standing on the porch of my apartment in Medellin and saw the city lights flickering in the distance due to some sort of atmospheric haze. They always do this. The first thing I thought about was how I could recreate that effect on a still image background plate for a composite using a displacement filter in After Effects or Shake.

This lead me to think about the fact that I have had a production-capable computer at my disposal since my senior year of high school and I have consistently used it. To create things, learn new things, express a creative thought or image, and challenge myself. I took this fact for granted and hadn’t even considered it until I currently find myself computer-less.

I don’t mean this in the sense of having a computer to communicate with people. I have that and I appreciate it. It’s what brings you this blog! However, with my tiny ASUS EeePC I cannot do graphics, animation, and compositing. These programs are my creative outlet.

I have now gone more than three months without being able to edit a photo I’ve taken in Photostrator, make a design, or do an animation if I think of something.

I sometimes feel idle without some sort of new production technique to learn. (The projects at my last job that I found the most interesting were the ones where I chose to do something that required I learn a new skill or some crazy expression in After Effects to create an animation.)

I miss not making things. Especially when I’m in an apartment in one place for a month.

Not sure if I’ll make it a year without having to change this up.

Perhaps when I get to India I’ll try to settle in and work on some ridiculous Bollywood film for a while? It actually sounds pretty feasible based on a conversation I had with an Indian visual effects artist at SIGGRAPH a few years ago.

She said that I could get hired pretty easily based solely on the fact that I’m a (very) white guy from the United States.

Interesting thought. As we say en espanol, “A ver…”

The Flickr set for this post is here. It has a bunch of pictures in it and is probably worth your time.

A Month in Colombia

Today is my one month anniversary of being in Colombia. I love Medellin. People are consistently welcoming, nice, and helpful. Going out in the evenings (or anytime, really) inevitably leads to fun interactions with new people. The climate is perfect.

My time here is passed exploring the city, meeting up with people I’ve met, and outings on the town in the evening. It’s really fun.

The one thing I’m missing at this point is something more to do with my time. Pretending to be a doctor in Peru was awesome. I’d like to come up with something along these lines to be doing here as well.

For example, I have an idea that I’d like to pretend to be a reporter for Rolling Stone when I go to Dark Blood Fest and get interviews with Colombian death metal fans. Mark (Beck) would be the perfect person to do this with, but, unfortunately, he leaves to go back to LA on Wednesday. He has a video camera, too, which is also a necessity. We might get together in the next two days to go run around and do interviews with people anyway.

I Could Live Here

I want to live in Colombia. I also want to live in Peru. That makes two countries visited, two places I’d like to live.

Beck (Mark, pictured right) does this. He owns an apartment here with three rooms; two of which he rents out. He comes to Colombia for a few months, then he returns to Los Angeles for a few months to see friends and family as well as work as a radio DJ, substitute teacher, and English teacher to immigrants. With the money he makes working in the States, he doesn’t have to work here.

I could see myself doing this. Or perhaps trying to find work doing compositing and motion graphics here if I could get my Spanish comprehension up to the next level. Based on conversations with people that do it, it also seems fairly easy to work for a school. Something to keep in mind for the future.

What will happen when I can’t talk to the people?

What I’m really interested to see, though, is how my trip experience will change when I don’t speak the local language. For example, right now if I want to ask people questions, directions, how much something costs, or have more complex conversations, I can. I can share the day with someone who speaks no English and have a good time. I am not confined to talking to the English-speakers at the hostels. My experiences traveling thus far have gone beyond surface level and touristy.

As my former boss would say, “It’s communication.”

However, what will happen when I’m in Brazil and don’t speak Portuguese? What about Turkey, Lithuania, or Cambodia?

I get the sense that I might be less inclined to stick around so long in one place. Or perhaps I’ll spend more of my time trying to learn the local language? Will things be more confusing or frustrating? Time will tell. What i do know right now is that the ability to speak Spanish makes this place really fun. It’s obvious that the experience wouldn’t be nearly as cool otherwise.

Tidbits and People from around Town

As an example of how speaking Spanish makes this “cool,” here are some noteworthy things I’ve been up to and people I’ve met. None of this would have gone down as well without the ability to talk to people.

I met the son of Juan Valdez at a party at Mark’s apartment. I only have one blurry picture of him, but he was there. Nice guy. His wife stopped me saying, “Wait a second, I have to translate your story to Spanish for him.” I said, “Oh, no problem,” and just re-told the story in Spanish. Also in attendance at the party were a bunch of English teachers from the AEFIT University here.

After this, Mark and I went to Parque Poblado where I ended up getting welcomed in a to big group sitting around a table. We walked over to another park after this. There are a bunch of pictures of this on the Flickr set for this post. Really fun group - three of the girls are pictured to the right.

I have also gone on a couple of tours around the town with friends I’ve met here. Ana, who works at an employment agency, took me to her hood up the Metrocable. The Metrocable is a cablecar extension of the regular train Metro line that goes up the mountain. There are two of them. It’s quite an easy and beautiful way to see the city.

From there, we continued on to a park in the middle of the city called “El Parque de los Pies Descanzos,” which means, more or less, “Barefoot Park.” There are little pools you can sit around next two with your shoes off and stick your feet in and relax. Good scene. That’s me and Ana in the park.

The next day I got together with my friend Luisa (pictured left), who I met with the group from Parque Poblado to have another walk around. Luisa is a fashion design student. We walked around her part of town, then hopped on the Metro and passed time at a mall and wrote on a wall (wall-writing pictured below). Girls here seem to love going to malls. Then we took the other Metrocable at night up for another spectacular view of the city before she needed to get home.

On the way back down, two little old ladies got in the cablecar with us. A younger woman was scared of the Metrocable (it’s pretty high up) and used a cuss word at some point. This prompted laughter from everyone in the car and confusion from me. The best part, though, was when the little old ladies continued on to teach the gringo a few cuss words in Spanish: “hijueputa” and “malparido.” According to the ladies, “Malparido” is the worst thing you can say to a Colombian. Instant laughter amongst everyone ensued when I repeated the words back. I love a place where grandmas get a kick out of teaching foreigners to swear in the language.

On the next train, I sat next to a little kid that playing some “get the ball on a string to land on the end of the stick” game. I very unsuccessfully tried the game. We continued on with this group on the next train and by the end of it, everyone around was laughing at/with me and the dad gifted me the kid’s game. I tried not to take it but Luisa insisted I should.

Last week, Brent and I went out to a different part of town called Envigado to walk around. We only went to one bar and a pool hall. After leaving the bar to go to the pool hall, a table of girls sent a bum after us to tell us that they wanted to talk to us back at the bar. We went back and shared some rum with them.

Next, over at the pool hall, we were mobbed by drunk old men who all wanted to talk to us at the same time. We stood there for one minute before I asked how to play the weird, pocketless pool game they were playing. This lead to a deluge of people talking to us. All old guys. All at once. All in Spanish, and all drunk. There was only one guy that actually seemed aggressive towards us.

It was surprising because he looked and dressed pretty much like Mr. Rogers. His breath stunk like he’d already puked once that night while he yelled incomprehensibly in my face. “What? What?” I would say after almost everything he yelled to me. I’m not sure what Drunk Mr. Roger’s grievance was specifically, but I think he was mad that another group of men stole us away from him.

Drunk Mr. Rogers aside, it’s hard to believe how kind everyone is here. They’re outgoing, fun, and super-welcoming to me as a foreigner.

Thanks, Colombia. Guarantee I’m coming back some day.

My Apartment in Medellin:

For the curious, here’s a a quick video walk-around of where I’m living in Medellin:

Walk through of Nathan’s Medellin Apartment from Nathan Shipley on Vimeo.

Again, here’s your Flickr set.