De regreso

On the 13th of December I hugged Ana Maria tight, kissed her one last time, tightened my pack on my back, and stepped into Medellín's Metro, bound for the bus terminal. It was time to head back to Bogotá, where this two-week trip, my year in Colombia, and my life away from the UK during the preceding two-and-a-half years, were to come to an end.

Five days later, five days filled with frantic last-minute tying up of loose ends and poignant goodbyes, I was barrelling towards the airport in what was likely to be my last life-threatening taxi ride for some time. So many "last"s. Characteristically, I nearly missed the flight, only the second last in line before they closed the check-in. Also characteristically, this meant that I got a free upgrade to Business class. And, the following day, I was back in the UK, back in Coulsdon, back in the bedroom which I grew up in and where I had not lived for 10 years.

2007. It was a year which started with my catching a last-minute flight back to Colombian with a beautiful Colombian girl who had stolen my heart the previous summer in Bogotá, and ended with me leaving, with heavy heart, another beautiful girl in another Colombian city, another delightful Colombiana who had enchanted me and brought me so many happy moments in such a short time. It was a year in two acts, defined by a break-up so wrenching that I cried into my washing-up for weeks after as I slowly came to terms with the fact that I would not be spending my life with the girl whom I had loved so intensely. But Act One has already been amply decribed in this blog. What of Act Two?

The key moment of the year came when, looking for a new flat, I came across a house-share in the Chapinero neighbourhood of Bogotá: a neighbourhood characterised by its many Universities, its gay population, and its high street catering to regular-Jo lower middle class bogotanos, with shabby malls, shops selling chinese imported goods, and dolarazos or dollar-stores. Run by an American named Grant, the house had six rooms, and was a focus for the small foreign population of Bogotá: Brits, Americans, Europeans and Aussies congregated here. Everyone had their own story and without exception all taught me something about the simple act of living. Here I found a group of people who were so far from living in a rut it sometimes seemed absurd to juxtapose us against the highly conservative bogotanos. Some teaching English, some in love with Colombians, some recovering from relationships, some working with NGOs or in other business ventures. I found people who shared a passionate love for Colombia yet a passionate frustration with its difficult aspects: being able to use humour to let off steam was a huge blessing.

Feeling at home among this inspirational bunch of people, I started to really enjoy Bogotá. Through them, I made many amazing friendships with Colombians. Teaching at the local school, going to the local gym with my housemate, sipping coffee at Juan Valdez with a Colombian girl: I started to feel part of a community in Bogotá in a way that I hadn't done before. I met some great girls: I realised that Panda was not the love of my life. I travelled outside Bogotá for weekends away -- the Eje Cafetero, the Caribbean coast, Medellín, Girardot, Cucuta. I saw something of the astonishing beauty of this country. I was happy.

Around August, I bought a flight home for late December, attracted by an inexplicably cheap fare. I wanted to spend some time with my family, renew old friendships that had weathered two dry years of communicating only by infrequent Messenger and Skype conversations, and see how the UK had got on for two years without me. I, and most of my friends, were celebrating their 30th birthdays in the first half of 2008, and my brother was getting married in June. It seemed like an appropriate time to return.

But then in October, I visited Medellín with my wonderfully entertaining housemate Bridget. I met Ana Maria and wished that I had longer to get to know her and that she didn't live a 9-hour bus ride away. In November I spent a long weekend with her and a bus full of rowdy Paisas on the Caribbean coast. Later that month she visited me for a week (what Colombians call "eight days") in Bogotá, visiting the nearby attractions, and enjoying the simple pleasure of each other's company. I began to regret that I was leaving.

In December, Stefan arrived from Holland, for a two-week holiday. You can follow his blog of our trip at http://www.ballofdirt.com/entries/19444/262599.html. Apart from two weekends in Bogotá, we spent most of our time on the Caribbean coast. Although I hadn't seen him for 12 months, it was great to find that conversation flowed as freely and widely as it ever had, as we compared notes on the year. Travelling around Colombia with someone new to the country, I saw things afresh through his eyes: the stunning natural beauty, the regional diversity, the openness and friendliness of the people, quick to smile, concerned for outsiders. I was reminded of the quality of life even with a modest income in European terms. I wondered more about leaving.

But leave I did, and on December 20th, full of bittersweet emotions, I arrived home. But I now looked at "home" through a different lens. I had lived in another culture long enough to really begin to call that home, and my ideas of where "returning" would take me to had blurred. I had good, close friends now on two sides of the Atlantic; friendships in two languages. I had as much reason to live there as here. I missed so much about "there". I missed even things I'd hated. I missed it as you miss an ex-lover: irrationally. Missing everything about her, even the things which you hated.

But I concentrated on the positive aspects of being home. I came back to find my brother a changed man, having both got engaged, and moved out of my parents place and into a first home with his fiancée, since I'd left the UK two and a half years previously. He had become a man, via a well-trodden route. And yet, even as I looked at myself, without a job, without a home, practically without money, with a girlfriend of one month 6000 miles away, I could feel within myself that I too had changed distinctly in those two years. I had gone through some amazing experiences, some really unhappy times, and some great times. But I had also fulfilled two of my greatest dreams, to travel solo, and to live in a foreign country. I feel the spring in my step, the sparkle in my eye, the relaxed attitude to life, all the signs to everyone I meet that say: I am someone. I have lived and seen things most people have no idea about: no way I'm going to get upset about small things like a someone giving me bad vibes or getting agro. I'm confident, I'm happy, I know who I am, I'm in charge, and I'm going somewhere. And in the end, it seems to me that that is what maturity brings you, what growing up is all about you. Getting there could be marrying your childhood sweetheart and making a home together. Or it could be living in Latin America for two and a half years. Take your pick.