La Linea

7/3/11 6:15 Ibangue

It was brilliant of Leon de Los Rios to recommend I not leave mid-afternoon to Ibangue and instead leave very early in the morning the next day. The climb was 3.5 hours and perhaps the toughest climbing of my life, up there with a climb in Spain, a climb in Portugal, a climb in Northern California, and that's about it. Brutal, and add the bags, and more brutal. The scenery was brilliant--coffee fields, platanos, bananas, humans, trucks--strangely, even after the street food and 4 beers the night before, no lung issues, no breathing issues. The scenery was green and fantastic and I cannot describe it well due to exhaustion. Ibangue was slightly difficult to navigate as I had no address. I picked a hotel that is most likely 20.000 a person, but I was given a triple and it is 40.000. Spend 33.000 on groceries I really didn't need--one is hungry and desperate and it occurred to me that, on a Sunday, the French Carrefour might be my only chance. I took many photos, not many of Ibanque because I feared I would call myself out. There are no foreigners here, no one speaks English. If my Spanish were better, if I trusted the hotel desk a little more, I would be out on the streets. Reminds me of downtown Armenia. Still, a great city with great people, but alone and with great Spanish I might conquer this city well, but alone and with poor Spanish, too much effort given my tongue stiffened by fatigue. If Moraline were here, I am sure he and I would hit the city for some grub, and then hit the clubs. As it stands, I did pick up a quarto, which was two large pieces of chicken, an arrepa, two potatoes, and a fried banana. Excellent, and I ate it with a beer in about 5 minutes, taking photos. There are other hotels, perhaps some of them nicer, but it does not matter. Hotel Alferes Ibague, room 305 .

Yesterday I ran into a feria at Alarca, a great city with stupendously beautiful women. The feria involved local dance groups, some fighting with machetes, some beauty queens on floats with soldiers (the beauty queens put ours to shame), and various strange creatures on stilts. Aguardiente, beer, grilled chicken, sausage, and beef, potatoes, stuffed pig, fruits, pastries, all were sold on the streets in vast quantities. The girls were so hot I could not concentrate. I wandered with my blue bag, pretending I belonged, and took some photos. I drank two beers on the street, ate two chicken skewers, then a pastry, then a chorizo. I went to the super market and picked up supplies, and upon exiting I ran into two mormon missionaries. I called after them, "Amigos." I must have frightened them, but I don't know why.

I continued to wander and it began to rain. I absorbed the energy and music and happiness and beauty and foreign strangeness of it all. Yes, I was alone, but I absorbed much. And I had to rise very early the next morning.

When I arrived back at the hotel, I used the internet downstairs, and not the wireless in the lobby (not wanting to reveal my computer, thinking of Moraline's healthy paranoia) I got a strange call from the manager. He didn't think my name or my address was correct on the form, which his employee prepared, and I didn't understand his point. The chorrizo I had eaten from the street made my mind heavy and I was unable to communicate very well.  He finally came to my door. Not wanting to get robbed, I waited, then asked "Quien esta." "Si, Esta aqui." I opened the door, took my prescription sunglasses off (I had removed my contacts), and stood shirtless in my shorts, while we walked through intricate aspects of the form his employee had filled out. I provided a detailed audit, and determined my middle name didn't matter, and that my address on my passport was not, indeed, my address at all, but my birthplace. He was perplexed and troubled, but I was patient and literally blind, and I decided the best thing to do was continue to describe, in groggy broken spanish, the difficulties of these formalities. (I just killed my second beer, ate a can of tuna--this after the potatoes, the arepa, the chicken, the bread with guayaba puree--party buses drive by, blasting music, as in Cali--did you know Ibangue is the music capital of Colombia?). It's nice I think I've figured out a few things in Colombia now--I can go to non-touristed cities, find a hotel, find food, wander around, and learn some spanish as I make mistakes. Like, tonight, it's a "quarto" of pollo, not "quarta."  I won't have much time in Cali to have meet girls in the hostels. This shouldn't be my goal. Europe would  be easier. But the hostels here have a predominance of women, and it seemed like I was in demand and the girls were competing against each other and all of them very horny. I still think about Sara--her brilliance, her decency, how she held me as I made love to her, how she held my penis, how sweet she was in the morning, offering me pineapple. She smiled much at me, and as Chrome would say,the eyes don't lie, and she looked at me with joy and happiness, but my own joy was restrained by the sadness that I felt in her, and her apprehensiveness. We walked to the city center to find a game of tejo, but the place was closed. We were to meet Adriana, the German Colombian.  But when we were turned away we bought cookies and wine and aguardiente and walked back to the eco hostel in the foothills. As we walked, we poured shots of aguardiente into the cap of the bottle and did multiple shots. We arrived at the hostel and sat outside and drank wine and ate wafers. We then put in Up in the Air but towards the middle I fell alseep in Sara's arms. I drank much wine and aguardiente and massaged her neck and shoulders and then at 1:30 we went in the dormitory room and both of us brushed our teeth and as Sara came from the bathroom and I on my top bunk bed I asked Sara if she needed company and she said yes if I could. I laid next to her and we became aroused together and I took off my shorts and her panties and in mutual masturbation it was clear I needed to take my nakedness, erection and everything, across the pitch black dormitory to find a condom. Miraculously, I was able to find my wallet in my camelback and two condoms in my wallet in the pitch black and then walk back over, recover my partially lost erection, place a condom on my penis in the pitch black, and make love for 20 minutes in three positions (her knees to her chest, traditional, and her legs sideways). She groaned like a girl and I ate her pussy and we then slept together until 7 when i made my way back to my top bunk bed above Adriana so I could sleep. The Israeli slept above us during all of this, and his impressions, weren't my concern as I made love to Sara.

Unable to have an early start, I met Leon de Los Rios at 11:30. Do I remember everyone I have ever met during my travels? Perhaps, and it is latent, and I suppose the idea of latency and past is in sharp contradiction to my recent thoughts on identity, personality, and time. He asked of my bike, I told him of my bike tour plans, and he told me I would not make it to Ibangue, that it was the toughest climb in Colombia, and that at night with the trucks it was crazy to try. Go go Calarca, instead, and start at 7 and make it to Ibangue, but it would be a full day of work in the saddle, grueling and arduous. He told me of snow and wind and rain and unheard of steepness and brutality. To even finish, a very early morning and a much closer approach would be required.

My legs were exhausted as it were--on the day before, my run up the hill revealed fatigue and uneasiness as to my fitness. The idea of a short ride to Calarca and an early morning start the next day sounded ideal. It rained as I made my way to Calarca, but the raid subsided quickly and I removed my yellow vest and climbed to Calarca. I saw many military men with their Galil rifles--perhaps my favorite design. A variant of the AK-74, the Galil shoots Nato Standard 5.56 .223. A large handguarde and gas fed piston ensures durability. I ran into a feria, which I described earlier, feeling out of place in my cycling costume. A man approached me and I felt intimidated, but he said he spent 17 years in Houston, parking cars. He told me to head to the Hotel Villa. I ate a roasted corn cob with salt and butter yet before I did this a woman wanted a picture with me next to my bike. She told me to keep and eye on my camera. The route to the Hotel Villa was blocked by the parade, and when I eventually could cross, there were no room at the hotel. Yet a recommendation from the women led me to the next hotel, where I stored my bicycle in the basement and then headed to the cramped but clean and sufficient room for 30.000 pesos.

A flat today 20k outside of Ibangue. Took me 25 min to repair due to bags and tight wire bead and difficult dropouts. Pretty deep glass cut.

The shower spigot at the Hotel Alferez--a simple pvc pipe, no hot water, perfect for my needs. I must say I do not feel I am missing out on anything today by my not hitting the city right now. I am exhausted and am eating constantly. I enjoy lying in this bed and writing.