Alive and Weird

My name is Drew Jenson. Mike Sack has asked me to write this blog on behalf of our combined experience over the past 2 weeks or so. Perhaps this will provide another window for you to peer into the goings-on of his present reality in Sudamerica. I was first introduced to Mike Sack a little over one year ago. On or around my 25th birthday, our paths crossed in a small train station in Ibague, Colombia. I had arrived in Colombia only a few days prior. Ive come from New York City for a 15 day expatriation in search of knowledge and a piece of understanding about myself and the world south of our version of America. I was in search of all things alive and weird. Mike Sack, with his own chosen verbiage, path, and time line, was in search of very similar things.



Mutually realizing the inherent benefits of the situation and the possibilities that lay before us, Mike Sack and I quickly became primos ¨cousins¨ and started laying down daily methods to support our symbiotic idealism. The first of which was to realize that being self-less is a positive and active way to be a good citizen. We also decided that while traveling, we were not normal citizens. There is an underlying understanding that a main objective of our experience was to personally embrace and take away for ourselves knowledge, experience, and understanding. THEN...Hopefully we will be good citizens and bring that back...



We were staying with a friend Id met in Chicago whose name is Andrea Giron Molina. We stayed with her at another Colombian Andrea´s apartment, who will be known to us as Dos. Dos was a great host and also an intense addition to the mix. A nice girl, but when the time comes to attack, even playfully, she is well known to go straight for the jugular. For example, I was greeted promptly with a fresh breakfast in the morning. Don't say you can't eat tomatoes... or the subtle thunder becomes, ¨you dont like my cooking? do you know where you are going to sleep tonight?¨ and some pretty constant, although possibly well-intended and in-your-face correction of our Spanish. All in all, all things were great once we got beyond their idiosyncratic nature and Dos has a huge heart.



We were watching some television with both Andreas and something about FARC taking American hostages came on... both Andreas smiled at me and maybe even did some dance to get my attention off the screen. Then, when Mike Sack and I set off to take a run, we were told not 'to talk to strangers or go where we didnt know.





Within five minutes we'd met an Elderly guy named Jose, who we did not know, and who led us on a run on some dodgey path in the pseudo-jungle towards an amazing and slightly hidden botanical garden. As he left us there, potentially for dead, we decided to take advantage of life and get weird. We must have ran for about an hour there before deciding to go back to the Apartment and get whisked away to part 2 of the longest day ever. La Familia.



La Familia was this huge Colombian family that we only knew because Dos taught English to one of their children. Before long Mike Sack and I turned into the central focus of a large group of children who wanted to know everything they could about these mysterious ¨gringos¨. We were this weird electric ball of light that La Familia, maybe 7 children, wanted to put their respective fingers on. As we left that evening, they were throwing us email addresses, phone numbers, and names scratched onto any little piece of paper they could scrounge. Further, they were hanging onto our pant legs all the way out of the gates of the neighborhood. Something like in Raiders of the Lost Ark when Indiana Jones is in India (?) and gets the onslaught of loyal child-fans.



It was apparent, for the sake of keeping things weird, that we take our thoughts on the road. We set off soon for a questionable trip to Cali. Id met this really nice girl on an airplane to Munich who just so happened to have moved back from Europe just days before we were to arrive. She seemed real excited to have us and show us her city. I'm not quite sure how happy her boyfriend and family were who, unbeknown to me, she had to lie to and explain how we didn't just meet on a plane, but rather years ago in the states and RANDOMLY again on a plan in Spain last summer. YEP. Did I mention we accidentally arrived on Valentines Day? Things were yet again about to get weird.



Natalia was her name, and she is a really nice person. We were staying in her huge luxury apartment in Cali. She told me not to worry about her little lie concerning how we knew each other. So I didn't.





At least not until her boyfriend asked me point-blank about 30 minutes later with her parents in the immediate next room ¨How do you know Naty?¨. He first asked in Spanish and I tried to fumble around and sort of smudge the issue. Then both Javier and Mike were getting confused and saying ¨you can answer in English¨, to which of course I replied ¨Que?¨. The interrogation probably lasted a solid four and a half minutes; one continuous cycle of Q & A.





Javier: ¨How do you know Naty?¨





Drew: ¨Que?¨





He finally relented.





I quickly went to the room after the conversation and tried to document the situation. Later at dinner, Javier asked ¨what were you writing in your journal¨. The issue sort of fizzled out, but Mike Sack, up for all things weird, was sporting the smile of champion that things were starting right off the bat. Needless to say, the journal was buried deep in the hiking pack only to be excavated outside of the city limits of Cali.



Like I said, Natalia was cool with everything. Principally because it was her idea to support this plan in the first place. And her weird and contrived lie to begin with. Things got funny when she had to go to class and took Sack and I to the ¨country club¨... Lets try and get some sun, sleep, and start fresh.





Thinking about a funny conversation with the locals about what to avoid in Cali, I remember Mike Sack randomly throwing out ¨Ok. So I see a Tonka Truck, 3 guys on Motorcycles and I do what?¨


Mike Sack and I kick a mean conversation in Spanglish.




Anyway... back to the country club. I woke up from a nap to notice a few bites on my persons. I looked over at mike and saw that there was something of an INFESTATION on his body. Without noticing anything out of the ordinary at the pool... our situation quickly changed form as we realized that we had BED BUGS.



I think we had about 1.5 hours until Natalia was to pick us up. Every single minute of which was spent stressing out about where they might have come from and how we could continue our trip without destroying South America with them. We nearly managed to convince ourselves we were in the midst of spreading a dangerous and possibly deadly epidemic of some sort.





After deliberating over every possible way to break the news, we decided to be honest and tell Naty when she came that we had to wash, burn, or otherwise cleanse all of our belongings of potential nocturnal pests. We were fully prepared to leave that day and not cause any more problems. Natalia came, with her boyfriend, and the awkwardness continued. When we finally started to tell her our situation, she looked at the bites and assured us that they were just some bug that chills by the pool and attacks in mass. From our near-tragic social calamity we were spared and thus born again on our continued weirdness. However weird this sounded, we were down with it. Javier later helped to confirm this reality of the "insectos de la piscina". WE DID NOT HAVE BED BUGS.






The rest of the trip went pretty smooth. We danced Salsa, Mike and I cooked some of my Thai Curry as a gift for the hospitality, and we spoke about renewable energy, bio-fuels, and Brazil with Natalia's father. We walked away appreciating the hospitality, but always realizing that we were not at home there. Its not that they were not nice people. It just seemed that our impact, or the impact we received, was quiet at best. We knew that our lifestyle was not very understood in this ambient... in this environment. And that its hard to penetrate such an established and private reality.

Moving back to Ibague in a rain storm, we were happy yet again to be on the road. We had a fun last night there and a good trip to a farm in the mountains on our way back to Bogotá. Bogotá was the center of life, as far as I am concerned, in Colombia. Che Guevara had documented the tension and air of revolution, but I think it was far from bleak. The people there truly touched my heart. I left before Mike Sack and when we saw each other again we met at my favorite dingy bar in Bogotá. This bacano little spot, operated by Ritchie, where you could pretty much control the music and everyone knew everyone (+ soccer on the TV non-stop, so in those long Spanish tirades i could space out into something great) The whole week, we couldn't pass this spot without walking in, even if not to drink, and giving Ritchie a hug. And nobody ever passed by without walking in.

Bogotá. Huge amounts of love in this city. Maybe it bit more personal for me, and not to waste your time on. We knew, through Andrea, a very special group of people here. We continued to eat amazing, home cooked meals. Fresh juice. Panela and Hot Water. We climbed Mt Serrate. We looked back. We looked forward. We found beauty and understanding. We prepared, yet again, the Thai Curry special... which took me about 10 hours in total to find ingredients around downtown Bogotá (including learning how to make coconut milk)... and somehow, during its consumption, with the family of Bethsabe (the beautiful), there was NWA playing in the dining room (?). AWESOME. WEIRD. And up to the last day... we still got hit in the jugular by the raw and potent talk of "Dos". We left in a blurred whirlwind on February 24th. I'll never forget this amazing journey, Mike Sack, Bethsabe, Andreas (3), Ritchie, Mario, Joanna, Natalias (3?), Jose, La Familia, and the people of Colombia. Pues... Marica. We're Alive. And Weird.

PEACE


(que mas mike sack?)

gracias, drew. pretty accurate recap, friend. addition; bogota gets very, very cold at night when you have no place to sleep.

I am alive, and drew...well, drew is most definitely wierd. also, capilene underwear is the best thing ever invented. stay tuned...

be good,
michael