Spent the last three weeks in Medellin, which is Colombia´s second biggest city.
Again another contrasting city but the one memory that I will leave from Medellin are the beautiful women.......way above Cali and Bogota and in truth way above any other city I have ever visited. There are a lot of fake tits and fake asses and along with the beautiful faces it is enough to keep any man glued! The only downfall is most of the chicas know it and are not so easy to pull for the gringos! Medellin also has a lot of other things going for it including a perfect climate (c 20 to 25 degress all year round), very safe city, pretty clean, good transport links and again above all else........incredibly beautiful women!!!!!!!!
I spent my three weeks in Medellin in an Irish owned hostel, which is without doubt the madest hostel I have ever stayed in. At times it was a bit much but in general it was great fun and there with a ton of mad characters and stories. I can safely say this part of my trip was not very educational or cultural as in truth I was surrounded by absolute mad characters who kept ye constantly entertained!
We had Morecombe and Wise (Bailey and Neilser aka Yougurt Head as Bailey christened him). These two boys gave it some lash and would go on c 4/5 day stints without going to bed (at all....not even for a few secs). Myself a few of the lads used to love just hanging around with the boys as they'd be a barrel of entertainment, constantly abusing each-other but also keeping you informed of the mad stuff that was going on around the hostel............of which there was plenty!
The there was Irish Niall who was a small bald lad (ie no oil painting) from Fundrum (as he called it) aka Dundrum. Nialler would sleep most of the day and then awake each day for Happy Hour in the Hostel bar at 5pm and go on the absolute tear. He was a real character with lots of witty stories and his broken Spanish reminded you of the guy with the dodgy French in Allo Allo (ie I was pissing down the rude). He actually booked out one day and then decided to re-book back in as he'd missed happy hour the day before and he decided he couldn't leave the Hostel having missed Happy Hour! Nialler and a sound Colombian called Pablo entertained us solid one evening knocking back bottles of rum and aquardiente (like sambuca) straight while abusing each-other and telling stories. We had a table of c 10 people not drinking just sitting down to watch the two boys bounce off each-other. Hilarious stuff!
The hostel was like a mini Australia as there must have been on average at least 50% of the hostel from Australia at all times. Most of the guys and girls were sound enough but like when you get any big group of guys from one country in the same place they could really get on your tits at times. Any of the Aussies there were really there for the piss up and these guys really gave it lash. One weekend (Friday, Saturday and Sunday) a group of c 20 Aussie blokes went bananas drinking from 11am all the way through to the early hours. And being the competitve nation they are, it was like a competition to see who could drink the most and the fastest. Very similar to what we would be like after finishing school and heading to Greece, Ibiza etc.....but most of these guys were late twenties and early thirties. One particular character who stood out was Micko, who really put it away. Micko would start the drinking competitions and just get as wasted as quickly as possible. He was entertaining though as in one night he ended up in the pool in the wee hours and kept pushing in another girl, who was also off her head, and when she'd try to get out Micko would try to get her gear off but he was so wasted that he was making a meal of it. One of the guys was also awoken by Micko one morning doing what he called his "Helicopter" impression with his mini Micko (flute) in full view of the entire dorm. Safe to say Micko was not shy!
I was accompanied in Medellin for Christmas by my Swedish buddy Linus but then again I didn't see Linus much as he was busy with a young local lady from outside the hostel. The bauld Linus! Another sound lad who also got a bit tied up, excuse the pun, was Colm from Tipp. We went out with Colm one evening and he didn't head back with us as he got lucky. The next day there was still no sign of Colm and we were starting to get worried, only for him to eventually arrive back two days later having stayed a night with his girl and then spending the following day with her only from them to lose eachother that night. Colm being a resourceful guy that he is just said feck it and proceeded to pull another chica and then head home with her. The bauld Colm had plenty of tales to tell when he returned to the Hostel!
I also had a couple of great nights out and two in particular stand out. One night myself and three other sound Irish lads staying in the hostel (Ger, Gerry and Cathal) headed out to the Christmas lights festival in the centre of Medellin. The average male height in Colombia is c 5ft 7 so the people are fascianted by height. Well two of the boys (from the Banner and Co Chairrai) were over 6ft 4 and the looks they were getting were unreal. We ended up stopping by the side of the street towards the middle of the night and next thing every Tom, Dick and Harry were approaching the guys for photos. The lads knew well how to play it, as just as any photo was about to be taken they would pick up the locals and everybody would start laughing. This caused a real commotion around the area and next thing the two boys were the centre attraction,,,,,,,,,feck those lights!. Dozens of Dozens of locals were screaming with excitement and the boys must have had c 30/40 pics taken with locals. It ended up with a ton of c 20 year old boys and girls and we were all just jumping around chanting local football songs. Mad craic!
That was a great night but nothing can top the day we head in the shanty (Brazilain equivalent to a Favela) town area of Medellin one day. A group of 7 including Pontus (my mad Swedish buddy from Cali) of us took a cable card ride which brings you up to the mountains and gives you a fantastic view of the city. You pass the impoverised areas when on the cable-cars where horses are more prevalent than cars and everybody has a tin shed with rocks on top to ensure they don't get blown away. On the way up we took a further cable car which went over the other side of the mountain and brings you to a National park. On the way back down, Pontus, the great Swede that he is, comes up with the novel idea of getting off half way to have a drink in a local establishment. It was around 2pm and we got off and jumped into the first bar we found.
Little did we know what was to happen next. There were a group of local lads (aged c 20 to 35) skulling bottles of Aquardiente (sambuca equivalent) at the table beside us and they were over the moon that we joined them. The guy who was running the bar kept on asking us what music we wanted played and the lads next to us kept on giving us free shots of aquardiente. The locals on the street were all stopping for a gawk but you never felt initimated as everywhere you looked you saw smiles and serious characters. The only sinister thing was a bunch of rats (young kids c 5 to 8 years old) surrounding us looking to grab cameras etc....but they were harmless and we all got a great laugh out of them. These kids were incredibly streetwise and could sell sand to the arabs. The beer was flowing at an incredible speed and we were all getting well oiled pretty quickly.
With myself and Pontus leading the show, I asked the barman to put Riverdance on his music, which he got off youtube and next thing the street is blaring out Riverdance with head the ball Hanby doing his worst Irish dancing impression on the middle of the street! This was around 3.30, still bright and this was only the start of the madness. We get joined by a crazy local auld fella with a massive bottle of aquardiente, all for himself I might add, and he starts entertaining us with his crazy dancing skills in the middle of the street and grabbing people to get up with him including a few of us at the table. Another crazy local header approaches us with a bottle of aquardients for us and he then proceeds to start dancing with the the mad local auld fella. Everytime we get up we get given a shot of aquardients from the local lads and I reckon I must have drank close to 40 shots. It goes so mad that we have local shoe shining guys passing by and stopping for a dance but not putting down their shoe shining equipment, which are really heavy. We all eventually get up at some stage and between the crazy Swedish dancing, the crazy Irish dancing, the crazy Colombian dancing and even things like impressions of a bull running a matador.........things just go mental for the rest of the evening. Pontus really is kicking things off and in the latter part of the evening keeps taking his shirt off in pure drunkness and the whole place just erupts in laughter!
Eventually we leave there (don´t really remember myself) at a round 11pm and funnily enough they won't let me and Pontus on the cable-car back down as we are too drunk so we have a to get a taxi. We all got home but we all agreed this was a day we would never forget and defo the best afternoon´s fun I've had for a long long time!
I did do some touristy things in Medellin and probably most interesting thing was the Pablo Escobar tour. I am sure all of you have heard of Master Escobar but just in case he was Colombian's biggest drug baron for c 20 years where he pretty much ruled Medellin and some will say all of Colombia. He was considered to be the richest man in the world at his height and had a bit of a Robin Hood character traits as he did do some good things like build a small town for people without homes and some say he payed for the metro system that now exists in Medellin. He ownes a ton of houses including the equivalent of Phoenix Park where he had his own zoo with all the most unique animals from all over the world. He ruled the city through fear and paid anybody who shot a poilceman c $1,000 per hit and he had so many informants that it took the CIA years to finally kill him.
We got to visit his grave, his main prinicpal home (not the zoo but only 7 storeys!) and most interestingly his brother Roberto, who was the accountant for the operation and had just finished a 13 year sentance. Roberto was some character as he showed us around his home. He was pretty much blind and deaf in one side as when he opened a letter bomb when in jail it blew up in his face. Amazingly enough he was also a national champion cyclist before the operations started and he had tone of memorabilia from Tour de France etc....regarding his achievements on a wall in the house. Roberto still had people chasing him as only two months ago his home was attacked by thugs. He obviously still has informats as he was aware they were coming and they hid behind a big tree near the house and when the piolice arrived shots were fired everywhere and some people died. There was proof of the shots all over the house. Mad Nialler, who I described above, had told me he had heard Roberto was buddies with Rene Huigita, who was the famous Colombian goalkeeper who made the scorpian kick save in Wembely v England....see attached link.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCxe4r6SjH0.
I mentioned this to Roberto and next thing he proceeds to call Rene but he gets no answer. Mad Nialler told me he got talking to Rene and it was mad craic!
I also spent the last two days in Cartagena, a beautiful fortrees city on the North West coast of Colombia. It is a really pretty place where a lot of the Colombians come to chill for their holidays. On the way I took a 16 hour bus ride from Medellin and witnessed some of the horrific devestation experienced by the locals from the flooding caused by the heavy rains. I must have seen c 5 villages under water and in most of them you could bearly see the tops of most of the houses. So don´t be complaining at home about a bit of sneachta or frost or burst pipes etc..........coz if you´d seen this it would have really opened your eyes. I was going to take pictures but thought it would be really disrespectful to those on the street who had just lost their homes etc....
As for Cartagena I was only there two nights but was really dissapointed with the nightlife as it is full of prostitutes, expensive and there are only a few places to go. I am now in Taganga, which is another beach resort a few hours from Cartagena where I spent New Years (will leave that story for next blog)! And in a few days I will sadly have to leave Colombia and head to loco and peligroso (crazy and dangerous) Venezuela!
Hasta luego amigos!!
Hanbo.
ps For the horny dogs amongst have a look at this link from an average night club in Medellin (skip the first 20 secs).......
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aCXdFZb-Vw
Medellin City from a height
Medellin Favelas where we had our mad day with the locals
Medellin Favelas
Medellin from a height
Pontus and the mad dancing local doing the bull and Matador impression!
Pontus begins to come around to a free bottle of Aquardiente
Mad Local entertains us with his dancing
Mad local takes an Aussie girl dancing!
The rat pack eye up our valuables............great little characters!
Pablo Escobar´s mother
Roberto Escobar´s biking memorbilla
Me and Roberto and the bike used to smuggle drugs
Another Pablo Escobar car
Nialler (drinking) and Bogota Pablo (next to him) start off the fun knockign back the rum with a crowd watching
Empleo Prepago
ReplyDeletePrepago y es c o rt, Shay, años 24, Nicole Zarate, color de ojos Cafés, color de pelo Castaño, color de piel Triguena, c a l l girl, tamaño de cola Brasileña, acompañante VIP.