Medellin

Medellin was once listed as the most dangerous city in the world, with a recorded homicide rate 11 times higher then Chicago. Escobar, one of the two largest cartels in Colombia and the 7th richest man in the world in 1989, lived there and he was fond of killing anyone who refused to work with him, as well as building shelters for the poor and throwing lavish parties. His house is still there, as well as the plane used to fly drugs to the states. Escobar was killed after a call to his family was traced and they shot him through the ears as he ran, barefoot, over the rooftops.

Anyway, now it's a tourist destination.

The Antioquia Museum is there, with one of the largest collections of Botero (link) paintings and sculptures as he donated most of his work to them recently. Most of his work is of very large rotound people, which appears a lot less original after being to Medellin. They love their food there. At the museum I got told off for taking a photo of an old obscure sketch of a skeleton chasing a guy on stilts with a lasso (I know it's wrong, but I didn't use flash and they don't sell postcards or prints of it. I mean, come on.), then for standing too close to a painting (they put tape on the ground. You weren't supposed to step over the tape. It was grey tape on a grey floor.) and then for putting my hand on the ledge of a large case so I could get closer to the one inch carving that was set at the back of a three foot deep cabinet. We were also two of maybe five people in the museum and every person working there would follow us around, standing maybe 3 feet away and STARING at us. It is not a friendly museum.

Outside they have about 15 large Botero statues, and we found one of Derek's massive head.
There was a large pool at the hotel, and I forgot my swimsuit, so after we drove around looking for one, which you know I love doing, especially in a foreign language. The top photo is taken from the most beautiful mall in the world, which also has one of the best views in the world. You know, for a country that has had so many problems, they're doing alright. I swam laps for 45 minutes after dark. The water was heated (it's cold at night in the mountains) and small bats glided through the mist rising from the water a few feet from me.

The next day we checked out the small zoo. It's mostly full of local animals, which in Canada is boring as hell, but pretty awesome in a country that has rainforest, mountains, deserts, and beaches. There were large iguanas in almost every section, and we're pretty sure they weren't put there, as well as large parrots screeching from the tops of trees, and some large rodent that looked like a cross between a guinea pig and a capybara that stuck it's nose through a fence trying to get at my icecream bar. There was one large pen that had a small island in the middle with pygmy marmosets in the trees, and a zookeeper was trying to chase an iguana off and chased it around and around the island for a good 5 minutes. When he finally got it off, the iguana, a tapir, and a capybara wandered off out of sight together.

Crazy large flower growing near the sidewalk at the zoo.

Look at his silly face!

Afterwards we drove off to Santa Fe de Antioquia, a city founded 50 years after Colombus got here. The country side in Colombia is amazing.

Right before we got there, Dad had his gall bladder attack, so he lay down at a local hostel and I got lunch with the cab driver to see if the painkillers would help any. The cabbie didn't speak any English, and I speak about eight words of Spanish, so we flipped through my phrasebook and pointed at sentences. He was an incredibly good natured guy, and got us to the airport with Dad curled up in agony in the front seat at top speed. Thankfully the flight to Bogota is incredibly short, they gave me a juice box when we got in the air, and I didn't have time to finish it before we landed.