At a hostel in Prague last August I went through the typical travelers first words: Where have you been? Where are you going? Where are you from? When I answered the reciprocal of the last question with “North Carolina” (“The United States” is too broad an answer, although most foreigners couldn’t figure where North Carolina is and often think I say “North Canada,” and respond “Oh, how cold, you must get lots of snow!” Which was true of North Carolina this January but few other times.) Anyway, one of the hostel dwellers I met in Prague happened to be from the USA (two of them actually, one from Texas and one from Chicago) and (Chicago) responded “The craziest two people I know are from North Carolina.”
“Who?” I asked, not really expecting to know them (I am not even close to knowing one one-hundreth of our nine-million strong state, which I also just learned was the tenth most populous state in the US). But of course, the point of this story is that I did know them. One of them. It was someone I had gone to highschool with and didn’t think was that crazy (until I heard from my new Chi City friend) and who will remain unnamed here so his infamy shall not spread.
But anyway, that was last August. Around the world.
Yesterday an even more astonishing thing happened. Katie Mae and I had hiked out to a little swimming hole and waterfall near San Gil. You could either swim or you could climb down the waterfall. It looked like climbing down from any rockwall, except you had cold water spilling over your head. We thought it was not for us. So we went to the swimming hole and watched the descenders descend. And noticed they were not exactly practicing top-notch safety standards. Five or six people coming down at a time. Two belayers. One guy blowing a whistle at the descenders. No-one who could figure what the whistle meant.
It is Semana Santa here which means processions, histories of Jesus on the TV and everyone on vacation. Which means many more Colombian vacationers than normal. In fact I saw only Colombians and commented, “I think we’re the only gringos here. For once.” And then a few minutes later I looked up and saw the tips of some red, curly, fairly un-Colombian hair. And I leaned back further and saw someone familiar. And I asked Katie Mae, just to confirm, and she did. Another unplanned friend-encounter in South America! Que locura.
Southerners head North 