Viva Californication

P3182469, originally uploaded by stangroomm.

Cali, Colombia, not Cali, California. Dont think I have written anything about Medellin though. I stayed in a super cool hostel called Casa del Sol, a very chilled place, a bit like a chill out party house really, right up my street. Some cool dudes hang out there, had a nice couple of smokes, an Argentinan BBQ or asado as they like to call it, which was delicious and I watched the latest Bond movie on a pirated DVD. I think I must have been slightly under the influence as it was until about half way through that I realised that the language was alternating between English and German, very odd!

Another random thing that happened was this old lady who claimed to be 83 who strode into the hostel, and bear hugged everyone,she claimed that she could squeeze energy out of young people and this was what kept heer so strong, her hand shake would have made Arnie Schwarzanegger wince.

The main reason I was in Medellin was to do the awesome Pablo Escobar tour of Medellin. A 3 and a half hour information packed tour of Pablos Medellin, run by a very cool guy called Nicolas, who basically just comes and picks you up in his little van and drives you round some of the famous Pablo sites of Medellin, like his house, offices, the place where they eventtually tracked him down and killed him and his tomb, all the time talking about what life was actually like in Medellin and Colombia duringg the 90s when Pablo was at war with the Colombian governement. I was really fascinated by it, he was according to Forbes magazine at the time, the 7th richest man on the planet, all of his money totally illegal and a very intelligent businessman, albeit slightly unorthodox in the way he went about doing business. He had a very simple rule, "plata o plomo" , "silver or lead", meaning if you worked for him you got paid, if you didn't you would get a bullet through your skull. Nicolas had first hand experience of Pablos ways, his friend and friends Mum were killed by one of Pablos bombs, planted outside a police station in Medellin.

It is worth noting here, for those of you who havent been to Colombia or Medellin that it is now a beautiful city, very modern with some wonderful architecture and the people went through some very hard times in the 90s which they have put behind them. It seems those times inspired them to rebuild their city and culture, it is a very cool and progressive place, not to mention full of beautiful women.

I have since been in Cali for the last 5 days. Chilling out really, again, found a nice hostel called Iguanas with some good people there, it will be my home until next Saturday when I'm heading to Popayan for the Easter festivities and then San Agustin, an archealogical site of great importance in South America, home to some statues that are pre Colombine. It is in some beautiful countryside and I am going to be camping.

Buena vida indeed but I have just under 4 weeeks to go before I will be home.....so I am starting to think about the future. Will it be London, Ibiza, Barcelona or China?