Downtown Medellín is a crowded, gritty place where street vendors abound. With them, you can make a cell phone call, get weighed, and buy anything from mangoes to porn. Shops in the downtown are a series of consecutive purveyors of all things straight off the boat from China: a pleather shoe store, a shop that sells nothing but flip flops, and lots of places to buy spandex outfits (I decided against it) and multi-pair packs of crummy polyester underwear. It wasn't pretty, but my walk through the downtown area gave me a glimpse of a different side of Colombia than I see in my snooty Bogotá neighborhood.
Besides, I shouldn't have started with the low-lights. My morning exploring Medellín reminded me of being in Mexico City because I was on a mission to see every piece of art by
Fernando Botero, just like I was in Mexico City to see evertthing I could by Diego Rivera. I started the Plazoleta de las Esculturas, a plaza full of sculptures by Medellín's iconic native son, artist Fernando Botero. They are just kind of there -- with people bustling all around them, and they are lovely. Then I went into the Museo de Antioquia that's right on the plaza; again, full of Botero sculptures, paintings, and sketches. As if that weren't enough, then I trekked over to another plaza to see the sculptured I most wanted to check out: the dove. Botero made a big bronze sculpture of a peace dove I don't know when, but it was blown up in 1995 in an attack that killed over 20 people. He urged the city to leave the destroyed statue there as a symbol of the violence that continues to affect millions of Colombians everyday. So the warped and gaping sculpture is still in the same spot -- next to a new sculpture of a dove that Botero gave as a gift to the city.
Fernando Botero, just like I was in Mexico City to see evertthing I could by Diego Rivera. I started the Plazoleta de las Esculturas, a plaza full of sculptures by Medellín's iconic native son, artist Fernando Botero. They are just kind of there -- with people bustling all around them, and they are lovely. Then I went into the Museo de Antioquia that's right on the plaza; again, full of Botero sculptures, paintings, and sketches. As if that weren't enough, then I trekked over to another plaza to see the sculptured I most wanted to check out: the dove. Botero made a big bronze sculpture of a peace dove I don't know when, but it was blown up in 1995 in an attack that killed over 20 people. He urged the city to leave the destroyed statue there as a symbol of the violence that continues to affect millions of Colombians everyday. So the warped and gaping sculpture is still in the same spot -- next to a new sculpture of a dove that Botero gave as a gift to the city.
I saw some other sights while I was in Medellín, but I think it would be boring if I just talked all about them here. So I will close with the observation that no blog entry is complete if I don't list a couple of cool or weird or unique things that I have seen in Colombia, in this case, in Medellín.
1. Orchids growing like any other tropical plant on the street near my hotel
2. Many men with mullets, including some pretty severe ones that featured really closely cut hair on top
3. In the botanical garden, a very heavily armed security guard (no big shocker there)... riding a bicycle in circles like he was a 10 year-old showing off to his friends but with a shotgun strapped across his chest.
4. Also in the botanical garden, a guy jogging while wearing a motorcycle helmet on his head
And finally, the best/worst response I've ever gotten upon asking an airline employee about the status of our plane (during a five hour delay): "It should be leaving at 12:30, God willing."
No comments:
Post a Comment