My hotel has apparently only been in operation since last December.
However, miscalculations, design flaws and all kinds of damages are already visible and are characteristic for the lacking skills of architects and craftsmen. Light switches, sockets, shower heads, water taps, door locks are either installed in the wrong place or do not work at all or only work after several futile attempts.
Since there is rarely a proper light next to the bed, you have to get up, flip the light switch that is located next to the door, and then toddle back to bed in the dark. Electrical sockets are placed in all sorts of spots, just not where you'd like them to be. Door locks are a puzzle for clever minds, because only after a lot of thinking and a thousand cursing attempts you finally manage to get in or out of the damn room.
The list can be continued indefinitely ...
Oh, Colombia, how do I love you.
The preparation of breakfast as a logistical task
Breakfast in the courtyard is an excellent place to observe another wonderfully illuminating study of the human, in this case Colombian, way of thinking and working.
A cheerful, very sympathetic dark-skinned lady in a light blue uniform is responsible for providing breakfast. So brewing coffee, cutting fruit, squeezing fruit juice, providing toast and butter and jam, occasionally cooking scrambled eggs.
An everyday task, you might think, but one that massively challenges our cheerful girl. Our logical thinking, trained in processes, knowing priorities, including chronological correlations, is pretty absent in this case. Either the lady is pressing fruit for the juice, in which case the hot coffee is missing; or the juice is not ready until shortly after nine instead of at 7.30, when breakfast officially starts; or there is simply no jam to be found on this day and one has to stuff the dry bread with some margarine down one's throat.
This list, too, can be continued at will. But - and that's the beauty - no one gets upset. No one complains, the lady is permitted her own rhythm, and somehow it works out. You get your hot coffee, sometimes even jam and scrambled eggs every few days. What more can you ask for ...
South America and climate change
Walking through the Centro Historico of Cartagena, as I am doing now, one not only notices the many cars, the permanently jammed streets and alleys, but especially the many cars, motorcycles, buses, trucks standing or parked with their engines running.
For some, it's pure convenience; for others, the motive is clear: to keep the air conditioning running so that the driver finds a pleasant environment after beer or dinner or a conference. Not surprisingly, many of these are SUVs, of which there are many here as well, expensive, black-painted monsters whose drivers usually don't care about traffic rules or pedestrians.
Looks familiar to us, doesn't it?
All of this is just one piece of the puzzle in a much bigger game called "I don't care about Climate Change".
A few thoughts on thoughtlessness
Another piece of the puzzle in this tragedy - the development of the railway system in South America.
Of course they still exist, the famous railroad lines: the 'Tren a las Nubes' in Argentina, the 'Andean Explorer' in Peru, the 'Nariz des Diablo' in Ecuador, the 'Valle Sagrado' to Machu Pichu or the 'Serra Verde Express' in Brazil.
Marvelous trains, unfortunately exclusively for tourists. The original task of transporting people or goods from one place to another is increasingly being redistributed in favor of the road. The result is a slow death of the rail network. How many times my buses have crossed railroad tracks - all abandoned, all leading to nowhere, overgrown with grass and shrubs. Useless.
Therefore, millions of buses are on the road, day and night, winter and summer. Gigantic bus terminals are being built that resemble a modern airport more than a bus station as we know it. Can you imagine the amount of greenhouse gases blown into the air by buses alone? Not to mention the other vehicles on the road.
While elsewhere in the world solutions are seriously being sought (the so-called tipping point is near!), here no one seems to be interested in solving the problem. In China especially, but also in other Asian countries like Laos or Burma, more and more electric vehicles are circulating. Here I have not seen a single one.
We all are the problem
But let's be clear about one thing: not only Uncle Donald Trump, who has absolutely no idea about the whole climate story, is part of the problem, we all are, including me with the 10'000 kilometers on the road and the 20'000 in the air.
It demonstrates how much we preach water and drink wine.
The effects have become visible and tangible in the last two months. Floods in Peru and Ecuador and Bolivia. Mudslides in Colombia. Unnaturally heavy rains throughout South America ... Climate change? ... Nonsense! That's El Nino doing its thing again. It will pass.
It will pass? I hope you're not mistaken, amigo!
There are a few other self-evident things from Argentina to Colombia fitting into the same pattern. For example, the habit of putting every single product (!) in a large (!) plastic bag at the checkout. If you point out that you don't need one because you have a backpack, you get at least astonished if not pitying looks.
Environmental pollution? Waste of fossil fuels? Gigantic piles of plastic in the ocean? ... Never heard. No one is interested.
A few young people with whom I discuss the flooding problem are aware of the situation. However, I sense a lot of resignation. But they are the future. Sometimes signs and wonders still happen. Even here in South America as well.
We will see …
A colored dream
But let's not let these pessimistic thoughts spoil this wonderful day. It is too beautiful and too colorful to be ruined by a dystopian mood.
I let myself drift once again, from street to street, from house to house, from blue to yellow to red to green. You can hardly get enough of all the colors. It's Disneyworld, Alice in Wonderland, a city made of marzipan. Sometimes I stop, read the signs at the entrances, admire the balconies floating in the air, the graffiti (especially the one with Miles Davis), stroll along the streets with slowness and dignity just like the locals, until the sweat flows and the next open air restaurant beckons ...
Ionesco and Frieda Kahlo
The hotel crew consists of young people running the show. A cheerful young gang that doesn't always take organization and tasks too seriously. This evening a particular celebration is announced, all guests are invited.
We accept the invitation, but have no idea what it's all about. After another exploratory tour of the city, I'm back at the hotel at eight o'clock sharp and the first thing I do is meet a young man at the reception, dressed up as Frieda Kahlo, though absolutely perfectly.
This is the real Frieda Kahlo, the famous Mexican painter and muse of Diego Rivera, and blueprint for our gay concierge ...
I ask him if he's waiting for Diego Rivera and earn a grateful, gay giggle. So it might be a costume party, because the rest of the crew is also dressed up. For the next two hours, we wonder if some absurd Ionesco theater is being performed here.
It becomes clear after a while that it's someone's birthday, but the performances in front of the birthday cake and the singing are completely unclear to us, even after long consideration. Bouquets of flowers are distributed, someone frantically cleans the floor with a broom, another climbs into a provided barrel for no reason, another lady is waving with a flat iron ...
Everything is somehow beautifully senseless, we clap along, laugh along, but without a touch of understanding what's going on. But no one is dancing to the perfect salsa music, which frustrates me a bit. Watching some natives dance would have been an enlightening contribution after all. And we might have grasped that ...
