Roadside Plastic Chair: thoughts on place

In this hot afternoon, I'm sipping my mug of sloshing brain tea boiled fresh, rather than actually being able to host thoughts and I've been sipping on this: that we've had such gorgeous experiences in pleasing places so far.  Destinations, the things that tourists come to Colombia to see: the architecture in Cartagena, the Oceanside, the mountain coffee towns. But currently we have been away from the classic tourist destinations. We have turned south away from the coast, pedaling along the Sierra Nevadas. We have entered a new chapter, and at first I was missing the cappuccinos and the guidebook writeups and the other back-packers.

But it hit me at a roadside tienda, as we aimed dripping bolsas of water into bottles, loud Caribbean-like music setting the scene, maracas and accordion, that I am deep in the real Colombia. The no-other-tourists Colombia. Taking in the scene of life here and now.

This dorky ballade-like Latin music is playing as sound track to We Are In Colombia Scenes, the style of which I can't name, but which I am going to call Corazon Music (heart music), because its men singing about novias (girlfriends), amore, their hearts. I witness men singing along to this music constantly, while sitting over a beer or stocking mangos in the grocery store.

So we're roadside, 3pm, and I'm letting slip the cappuccinos, and taking in all of this. Men are slouched and relaxed on their motorbikes in the shade, a group of women sitting in a ring of red chairs, all these people just hanging out, shooting the breeze as it were. The tienda man washes a piece of glass. You can buy soap, small white breads, batteries, and beer here. A man wearing a dirty American Eagle shirt jabs at a beeping poker game console. Buses roll up and take on passengers. Dogs amble through the heat.

The heat is invincible. We are sodden sorry heaps of heat. We hold bags of cold water to our foreheads. I can't rest an elbow or an ankle on my leg, as it just slips off from the sweat. Its so hot that after only a little time the water in my bike bottle is the temperature of warm tea.

Elise cracks me up with her ways of commenting on the heat:
"Its hot as FACK"
"I feel like I'm riding my bike in an oven"
"My brain is boiling"

So I eat guanabana icecream, drink little shots of coffee, ride past the banana plantations, and watch the Colombian people. Which ends up being a heart warming and amusing way to spend time. Watching two people on a motorcycle carrying a fan. Two little girls under a purple parasol, holding hands and regarding us. I observe that the Colombians are so affectionate with each other, siblings and friends, all ages touching and standing close and smiling. Also, no one is in a hurry, ever. So we sit, in the heat of the mid-section of the day, on colored plastic chairs (yellow ones today!), just like everyone else, sitting with the world.

Posted via Blogaway