May 14. First day at sea.

We will leave today. Fabien arrives to wake us up and we finally set sail. Before we reach open waters, we buy some large chunks of ice to refrigerate the ham and cheese we have for the sandwiches during the sea crossing. I take a last glance at the town of Cartagena, that looks out proudly over the Caribbean sea. Once we are on open waters, the boat starts bumping a lot, and, well, I get seasick. The highrises are long out of sight when I have to throw up. My stomach as to remain empty for the next 48 hours. I just lay down on my narrow berth and switch sides like I am frying myself. Dreams revolve inevitably around the subject of good food. Steaks, pineapples, grapes, lamb chops, kebabs, fries, smoked salmon, lobster, garlic-shrimps, old cheese and mangos. It's amazing how creative an empty stomach is. What am I? What is this? Am I really looking at the bright sight of seasick starvation? The delirium boosts creativity and it doesn't kill me. What doesn't kill me makes me stronger, to quote Nietzsche at least once in this story. I fry myself in my own sweat, it's boiling hot in the berth, I turn around again and again, there are stones in my stomach. The equilibrium organ plays mad. I need a plastic bag the captain hands it to me relunctantly because it's the only thing next to glass the Ocean does not like to swallow: plastic. Everything else is biodegradable. You can throw in tin cans, paper, cork - no problem. I dream about the Ocean as a giant organism (and it's not too far off a comparison, I am referring here to Lovelock's "Gaia"-hypothesis) and the Ocean knows how to keep her equilibrium in spite of the mess a 10-figure bunch of ignorant bipedal monkeys keeps making of her. I turn around on my bowel's command, fry my other side, dream about good food again, and creativity. Can we artificially put ourselves in such a state that everything just pours out of us? Can we? Should we?

May 13. Waiting in the port.

Fabien sends a taxi to pick us up from the hostel. We have to wait a few hours in the Club Nautico before embarkation. Today, it's going to happen... my excitement has been stirred up like cappuccino foam for the last couple of days, and I do feel really good. It will be six days until we'll arrive in Panama City and I'll be able to update this monologue.

At least, that's what I thought. Fabien brings our passports to the port captain who has to take care of immigration. We can leave only by his mercy. If we don't get the passports back until 6pm, we have to sleep on the boat because sailing out at nighttime will make us marine novices prone to sea-sickness. We hang around, I join Fabien to a big supermarket where he buys the stuff for our trip. Seven people can eat a lot in six days. By the way, the supermarket looks exactly like what I'm used to in Western Europe and the civilized part of Northern America, with two exceptions:
1) There are security guards that check your bags when you leave the shop;
2) There are employees to help you put everything in bags and say "buenos dias" to you, with a friendly smile.
We have everything packed in Fabien's small car and drive back to the boat. The preparations for such a sailing tour are extensive. It's a lot of work to maintain a self-sustaining boat. And this is, in my case, a good opportunity to reflect about autonomy, independence, and the like.

At night, we feast on a huge pizza, provided for by Fabien our ever cooler captain, and then retreat to our boat to spend a beautiful night under the stars. Doing these things for the first time, it makes us all excited about the marine life we are going to experience in the week to come.

May 12. The First Supper.

Fabien the captain takes my passport because he has to go the the immigration on our behalf and then it's time for lunch. Last lunch on this continent, with the last juice, the last soup. Today, I'll have the last bit of streetfood here, the last walk through a park, the last south American newspaper, and so on. It make me think about the appeal of the "last". Why does it fascinate us so much? I like to swim against the stream, so I created a little fantasy about a bunch of people waiting at the Gate of Heaven, smoking their first cigaret nervously, already making their first friends, feeling their attraction to the opposite sex for the first time, until Peter opens the Gate with the yawning of an advanced evening. "Come in", he says and the crowd walks through the gate. "Make yourself comfortable everyone, cloakroam is on your left, you can leave your umbrella's there too since you won't need them. You might want to take a shower. If you're done, come along with me. It's about time for the First Supper."

I go writing in "Juan Valdez" the real caffeine intake boosted my production a fare bit. I will write an unplanned novel, just by following the main character which will be a "he"-character, and see how his mindset develops. That can be interesting. Is he going to be desperate? Will he become a vegetarian? A sex-addict? Will he give up on himself? What kind of people will he meet? I feel like writing it for one single reason: skimming the cream off my fantasy that I reckon is too rich to be healty. I dreamt seven dreams tonight. About a Finnish girl I know, who had transformed into a schoolgirl and at the same time the place I went looking for her was an old Russian submarine; in parallel to that I dreamt about an ex-girlfriend staring at me from a high bridge, about my mother, about Pablo Escobar being hunt down by a hundred tanks on the streets of Medellin, and much more. So I will write that novel in a couple of weeks, and publish it here when it's ready. And I'll ask for donations.

May 11. El gato negro.

In el gato negro you can have an excellent breakfast with real Columbian coffee prepared in a German way. The place is run by a worldwise grey-haired German lady, who manages it on her own. The place is open from 7am till 2pm and you can recognize it by the black cat on the door. As for the exact location, I don't want you to feel you bought your guidebook for nothing, so I'll refer to it at this point.

I walked up a hill today. It was so hot most of the other people in my hostel would hardly come out of the air-conditioned dormitory. I felt like I had to make a decent walk so I went out, passed the fort and went uphill. On the top, I enjoyed the view over Cartagena in an almost hallucinogenic heat. The view of the docks with the big blue cranes handling giant container ships gave me some sense of reality back. The trade that provides this little tourist paradise. I bought a water. I tried the last few types of fried dough-wraps I wasn't yet familiar with. When I had tried them all, it felt like my time in Cartagena should come to an end soon. Fortunately it would. Back in the hostel, I cooked with David, who has traveled to almost every country. He keeps amazing me with his brightness. I (as most people do, I switch to myself at this point) should warm up some of my old sharpness of mind. Used to be a bright kid myself. It's good to travel together and I'm looking forward to the sailing trip.

May 10. Guayaba cubes.

Guayaba cubes are an interesting aliment, and they go well with black coffee. After some writing, I walk to the city beach, which is not so far away. People are already spreading out and enjoying the sun. I just lay down on a rock and pondered. Am I getting old? At my age, normal people have assets; big structures with themselves in the center. Material structures, social structures, structures that clamp tightly onto the earth like big insect ligaments slowly moving as the water comes. I don't want assets. I want humanity. I'm a guest here, a passer-by, just like everybody else. There's no point in gathering all those structures around you. What you need is love.

I swim the Caribbean at sunset. It feels good. I feel connected with the seven seas and everything. Big waves hit my back by surprise when I dream away standing in the water. I can't see them coming and the strap my back like a whip. Mother nature is giving me a little beating. But she's so gentle at it, so moderate. She never exaggerates, not when it comes to a reason to punish you because she doesn't need a reason, and not when it comes to the measure of punishment because she cannnot change that anyway. Hallucinations. Projections of the human struggle with the concept of Justice upon the receptive skin of nature. We need the concept of Justice, it follows from Consciousness which originated in Awareness of Death. We can do a good job with the concept of Justice, but we can fuck it up entirely as well. It comes only in one flavor: intentional. Justice always walks like a crippled punk behind the actual events, and out of frustration she inspires us to do a Clean Sweep every few centuries. To get rid of the frustration is to get rid of the rigid concept of intentionality, to open it up like a giant chestnut, widening our consciousness that we're all maroons down here.

Kamiel's Daily Karma Rule: "Take a swim in the ocean at sunset every once in a while. Try not to hallucinate."
It makes you feel connected with the oceans and everything. You feel like you know the solutions to all the problems human minds have invented to feel they're not redundant. You have to get out before you skin gets too soft though, and you start believing in the artificiality of the problems too much.

May 9. Weary Cartagena.

I slept long, had breakfast with cheese bread, and wrote.
I went to eat something in old town, and wrote.
I went back to the hostel, and wrote.

"Some entries just say that he wrote."
-"Yes, it's boring, I feel like he is giving up."
"What do you mean, giving up?"
-"Like he's not believing in himself anymore."
"O, that's bad. Writers should believe in themselves."
-"That's what I think. Shall we help him?"
"As his characters? He sees us coming and laughs at us."
-"How do you know that?"
"It's common knowledge."
-"Let's just try, come on, it won't hurt."
"But what should I say. 'Hi I am your character, look at me I am very real I even have a birthmark on my belly how could I be so real if you wouldn't have done a good job?'. Should I say something like that then?"
-"For example. It's actually quite good. I think you've got talent. Now, shall we go?"
"Can't we just write him a letter, I'm a bit shy."
-"There's no need in writing him a letter."
"Why not?"
-"Because he will write it himself."
"So?"
-"So we have to talk to him in person, don't you understand?"
"O I see."
-"Let's wake him up tomorrow morning and tell him he should start believing in himself again."
"That sounds like a good plan indeed."

Story:
Enter Kirk and Hank in a dodgy bar in the port-city of Cartagena de Indias, northern Colombia. You can smell the salt and hear the sea. On the table we count two big beers and an empty ashtray. Kirk takes a gulp of his beer and says:
"So, how you're doing mate?"
-"Good, thanks for asking. Doing really well here. The food is tasty and cheap. The climate is a dream" Hank answers and drinks from his beer.
They are what we call old friends, they used to be in the navy together. Now Kirk has a job as a freighter captain and Hank just hangs around making some cash with his band.
"Hank man, shall we go for some women tonight?"
-"Okay."
"Come on, be a little bit more enthousiastic."
-"Sorry man, I'm not in the mood."
"Why not?"
-"It's empty in here". He points at his head. "I'm serious. There's nothing. You are talking to nothing."
"Come on, you are doing well. Said so yourself. Playing every other night with your band. What else do you want?"
Hank shrugs. He hits hard on the table and yells so that everybody can hear it:
-"Let's drink. Let's fucking drink tonight!" and he offers a bottle of rum.
"No wonder why it's empty in that chamber" Kirk murmers.
-"What's that?"
"Nothing."
They sit and drink for some time, and two hookers come in. That stand behind the man and gently caress their cheek bones.
"What's your name?" one hooker says to Kirk.
-"Kirk."
"Nice. We go fuck tonight? Very very good body very very cheap."
Kirk laughs and looks at his mate. They used to do this all the time when they were marines. Then he answers the woman.
"No thanks."
-"But I will!" Hank suddenly shouts. "I will go with both of you!" and he leaves with the two woman. Kirk drinks up the rest of both beers.
The next morning, they see each other on the street.
"Hey mate, how it is going?" Kirk asks.
-"Bad mate, I couldn't do it yesterday and they laughed at me. I feel so bad now."
"Maybe that's because your head is empty?"
-"So you finally believe my head is empty?"
"No. That was a cynical joke. I'll never believe that. Not if you write a whole encyclopedia about it. Your head cannot be empty."
-"I am suffering mate, beyond your imagination."
"Because of that empty head of yours?"
-"Yes!"
Hank will never be understood. Kirk will return to his ship tomorrow, and he will hear about the suicide only months later when he will be in Cartagena again. Empty heads are a bad illness. Kirk decides to take that very seriously from that moment on.

Kamiel's Daily Karma Rule: "If there's no Karma Rule, don't get upset."
This can't go on forever. You should try to deal with life without those daily rules. Just do something you never did before and write a short story about it. The story should not contain the word "I" though.

May 8. Waiting for our boat.

After only a few hours sleep we walk to the Club Nautico and say YES to Fabian and the Panama boattrip. And that was it. The next days we will spend waiting for the boat to leave. And I will write.

Consider this: THE KEYS.
"How did you get in?"
-"I still have the keys."
"You should have left them."
-"I'm sorry, okay. S-o-r-r-y."
"I can hear you. Just give them to me now."
-"Suspicious as always. I could have known. I should have come to get my stuff while you're working."
"You diabolical serpent."
-"Pardon?"
"I mean, ah, you know what I mean. Can you give me the keys now?"
-"No. I'm not ready. I will get my stuff first."
"What stuff?"
-"My cd's and the salad bowl."
"Salad bowl was a present of my uncle."
-"He gave it to me, so it belongs to me and me and me."
"Okay. You can have it. And keep the keys too. I don't care about what you do."
-"You run away again, can't you see that. You always run away."
"I can see it, but I no longer care. Do whatever you like."
-"You make me very, very sick."
He shrugs.
"Maybe you should visit a doctor then."
-"Fuck you. I'm out of here."
She throws the keys at him and rans away. He shouts at her.
"Don't you want the cd's?"
-"No! they're contaminated."
"What do you mean?"
-"Everything you touch gets bad."
"You're hysterical. You should see a doctor."
-"Yes, I AM hysterical. And you know why? Because you touched me."
She rans out of the house. He shrugs again and plays one of her cd's that is actually quite nice. He begins to swing a little bit to the music. It's some old jazz record. If love were like an old jazz record, we see him thinking, this world would be a paradise. Another woman gets in and starts talking to him.
"Tom, how are you doing?"
-"What?"
"How are you.. can you lower the volume a little?"
-"What?"
She sighs and walks to the stereo set to lower the volume.
-"What do you want?"
"I want to talk to you about us. How serious are we?"
-"Why now?"
"Well I... technical reasons."
-"Technical?"
"Tomorrow I should start taking the pill again."
-"And?"
"If we're serious I thought I will not take it. I am thirty-two you know."
He knew. Thirty-two, almost the autumn of her reproductive life. He had thought about having a child with her, but just not now. His wife had just left him. We can see him calculating.
-"And thirty-four? My sister was thirty-four" he says.
"I am not your sister. Women of my age are running a risk. Just tell me are we serious?"
He shrugs.
-"Okay, we're serious" he says absent-mindedly.
"You make me very, very sick."
-"You don't believe me?"
"No of course I don't believe you."
-"Look at the table. You see the keys? They are yours. What do you say? Do you believe me now?"
"O Tom, that was not necessary. And I thought you had not yet made up your mind. I'm sorry, stupid little me. I love you."
She walks to Tom and gives him a kiss on his mouth. They hug and she sighs.
"I am so happy we finally found each other."
-"Will you be careful with the keys?"
"Of course. You can trust me."
-"I trust you, sweetheart."
He stands up to get a bottle of wine. He comes back with two glasses and a bottle.
-"Should I change the music?"
"No, I like it. It's jazz, isn't it?"
He sighs.
-"Do you think our love is like this music?"
"What do you mean?"
-"Swinging, dynamic, smooth, without stress."
"That depends."
-"On what?"
"On our understanding of each other."
-"You mean thiry-two?"
"Do you want a child with me?"
-"It's too early sweetheart. How am I supposed to make that kind of decision. My wife just left."
"She was here?"
-"She came to return the keys."
"O. So that's why they feel warm. They are still warm of her hands."
-"Does it bother you?"
"I don't know. Did she want a child with you?"
-"After the death of Tom we never spoke about having another child."
"But did she want Tom with you?"
-"Yes, very much. Tom has made us very happy the last three years."
"How happy?"
-"I don't want to talk about now, please. Let's go to bed."
She plays with the keys in her hands.
"Can I visit Tom's grave?"
He sighs.
-"Yes, but leave the keys on the table. I will change the lock.
"Why?"
-"Because I say so!" he yells.
She looks at him and thinks for a few seconds. Then she says.
"Who will get Tom's keys?"
He looks at her with tears in his eyes. She sweeps the tears out of his eyes and whispers in his ear.
"Thirty-three."
Then they go to bed.

Kamiel's Daily Karma Rule: "Synthesis of opposite fears".
If you are afraid of something, try to generate fear of the opposite as well. Try to imagine why the exact opposite is fearsome as well. The synthesis of these two fears, if properly generated, will heave you up a higher level of Being (taste of apricots).

May 7. Arrested!

Today, I go to the Club Nautico again, this time with a young Brit called David. He is a Londoner and I have met a lot of nice Londoners along the way. He is gathering random events, which I like a lot.
Doug's boat was already full, so we spoke to some more skippers. Olivier the Frenchman with his thick accent and grey beard, Herman the Hungarian Hun with his boat Atilla and big silver earrings. Fabien the professional experienced Colombian. They explain us how expensive everything is and how much work to operate an open-sea yacht. Our bargaining attempts fail and we give in. Tomorrow we will say YES to Fabien. We will leave for Panama the 13th of May.

We always desire violence more than we would admit. There is a metaphysical need for violence in all of us, and when it doen't come out that means we're suppressing it. Buh! How many writers impress their readers by this kind of talk. They all want to show us the darkest corner of the human soul, exemplifying it with their own soul that spouts deep metaphysical tones in e-minor just like an enormous organ in a gothic church, why not, they want to cut off the breath of their own public, strangulate their readers with their words. And in the end they say it's all meaningless. Well, write about meaningless butterflies and meaningless hummingbirds then, instead of our meaningless lives. I have to elaborate this kind of stuff more, but I'm tired. I need better metaphores to describe the character of that writer so you can follow my imagination better. The long unkempt curly hair with shades of grey, the large plastic frame on his nose, the self-aggrandizing smile on his wet lips, his tailormade ruby suit, his laid-back posture, the wrinkles, the restlessly bouncing feet, that kind of things. I have to eleborate more in order to make you feel and think about it. All that pseudo-intellectual rant - what do I want to say here - that so called deep talk about the great questions: Why do we talk? Why we hold dear the illusion that we are not alone on this path to eventual decay. We always express ourselves in the hope our words echo in the receptive mental chamber of the Other. It doesn't matter how black and nihilistic our words are. And there he sits on his chair, the writer, pressing the nail of his thumb slowly in the cushions and suppressing a long yawn. He is bored by the whole situation. The question remains: Why doesn't he write about meaningless hummingbirds instead of the meaningless timespan between ejaculation and death?

There is a computer problem. On Ivan's memory card is a virus. I discovered it and engaged on the resolving process right away. Like ambulance personel that doesn't want to waste a single second. When I work with computers, which I don't like, I can't do only one thing at the time. So I download a couple of programs and try to restore the data with some tools simultaneously. This takes me a few hours, in the burning midday sun and I was kind of happy about it since now I am secure this is not my life. This was the thing I have escaped from. Like a good prisoner, the memory of my old prison fulfills my heart with joy. From the outside, that prison looks very, very pretty. Now I can see what it is: It's just a laugable episode, an unsignificant interval between juicy organic activities. I resolve every aspect of the problem and that should have raised endorphine levels to induce a feeling of satisfaction and relief, just like it does with normal people. I am just sweaty, hot, and hungry, but happy to have experienced another proof ex negativo of who I am today.

After that I take a shower. Why not write a story about my seven-second fight with gravity and the soap? They have every right to be honored here. The soap is a piece of cheap red perfumed soap I bought in Santa Cruz for my private bump who refused to use it. It's very slippery but it does what it should do: take away the sweat. I keep it in a plastic bag so that it doesn't waste the other contents of my backpack. There are some hairs sticking on it, and its surface is not as fine as it used to be. That's about all I can say about the soap-character, admittedly it's not much. The gravity, my other adversary on this sprinkled venture, has an even simpler character. At least, to us earthlings it reveals only one side of it: "go down" I think maybe the soap could have made it into a modern play, at least it would have a chance to slip through, but the gravity would definitely be denied a role. My seven-second shower fight was, for that reason, not a modern play and would probably miss the Becketty finesse. If it was not a play, so it must have been real life. Seven seconds of real life! That's something. I hold the soap in my right hand and try to rub my left arm, armpits, chest, belly, making a few circles around the bellybutton before the soap slips out of my hand. With my left hand I manage to catch it before it hits the floor and start washing my right arm, armpit, chest, belly, where the soap tries to escape again. A second time I can foil the conspirancy of its slipperyness and the blunt "go down" of gravity once again and catch the soap with both hands. I wash my thighs and bend forward to reach my calves. That was fatal. The soap falls on the floor and I lose the struggle. In only seven seconds, a foamy allegory to the drama of life has taken place. There is no

We go to a dance bar. The girls don't dance with us. Either they're hookers here, or frigid, that's an interesting juxtaposition. This town is full of interesting juxtapositions and we sense that even though we only know the touristic center. When we walk home, some whores offer us massage and fuckifucki.
"Muy rico, muy economico fuckifucki suckisucki. Cinquenta mil pesos."
Conversations with prostitutes usually never surpass a certain level, where only the erectile parts of my being are being taken into consideration. I don't really like that.

I'm a bad boy. With the fake 20.000 peso bill I still carry along with me, I buy some beers on the street. The guy who sold me the beers recognized the counterfeit bill and showed it to some police officers. I have to come with them because it is a crime to have forged bills in your wallet, they tell me.
"How can that me a crime?" I ask. "I'm a tourist, I don't know about this."
-"I know, but Colombian law is very strong on this."
"Look, I probably received this bill in a shop in Manizales."
-"You walk with me."
"Can't you please let me go. I'll be careful with the bills next time."
-"Right now you're arrested."
"Look, it's a twenty thousand peso bill. I can give you a real twenty if this remains between us."
-"What do you say?"
I look around and tap him on his left shoulder.
"I want the best solution for everyone. You know I'm not guilty and I know you don't earn much. You can eat out with your family with this money."
-"I would, but it's not my case."
We walk on to the headquarters. I have to explain the situation a couple of times, in English and in Spanish. In the hostel, I can borrow some money to pay the beer-guy who has followed us all along.
"What happens next?" I ask.
-"You must offer them the same thing you offered me."
"What do you mean?"
-"The twenty thousand."
"No. That would be bribery. And I don't want to do anything illegal. And besides, you know I am a writer and I will write about this. I hope I can write a positive story about Colombia."
-"Tell them what you're offering."
"No. We shouldn't be talking about this. Maybe I should talk to your chef instead."
-"It's your decision. We have to take you."
His colleagues waited on their motorcycle, laughing.
"Now you must go with them."
They kept laughing and when I told them again I wanted to talk to the chief of police, they suddenly announced me I was free to go. On my way back to the hostel I saw an older man in a police uniform standing on a balcony overlooking the scene. What might have prevented me to spend the night in prison was thus a trick. I started mentioning the bribe, and when they were considering it, I suddenly changed my attitude and told them I didn't want to do anything illegal and I'd write exactly what would happen. I guess they were intimidated. Not bad, huh? There might even be a moral of this story:

Kamiel's Daily Karma Rule: "Intimidation can be reversed"
If you're intimidated by a person and a concept (such as the Law, Truth, Guilt), be imaginative and use the same concept against that very person.

May 6. Hot weather provokes dreams.

Yesterday, my old camera stopped working. I learned a lot about equilibrium in the process of buying a new one that occupies me today. The new one is a Samsung. I always wanted a Samsung because my ex-girlfriend is Korean. It's like I have her back, at least the nonfighting part of her.

And that's where the Guyana guy with bad teeth and an untuned guitar enters the scene. He proclaims with great pride that he is a Bitish Guyanese and smiles as he offers us to play Bob Marley and please look at his handicraft. He will follow us all the time to the Club Nautico and back to the center. He will get on my nerves. Maybe I'll dream about him and in my dreams he is the good shepherd that leads me to salvation. But in reality he is just a pain in the ass.

The fort Castilo de San Felipe of Cartagena is the strongest in Latin America. In front of it there is a statue of Blas de Lezo, the one-armed one-legged one-eyed hero of Cartagena’s successful defense against the British Admiral Vernon in 1741. The guy kept defending the fort even though he missed half of his body. Maybe I'll dream about him too. And in my dream he meets the Guyanese who tries to lead me to salvation. In the moment he takes out his wallet to buy the handicraft the Guyanese offers him, the armies of Francis Drake and other pirates storm his fort and cut off his remaining arm and leg. The Guyanese starts playing Bob Marley on his untuned guitar as smoke ascends from the fort in thick spirals. Blas de Lezo dies with a smile on his face, whispering "could it be love". He closes his eyes in salvation. I ask the Guyanese about my salvation and he says I am a few limbs away of it.

May 5. Identity.

A little hangover can be worked off by four cups of coffee and a cold shower. At twelve I'm good to go and walk out to find a boat that will take me to Panama. Enter: Club Nautico. I walk in and ask some people for a boat to Panama. There are plenty of sailors headed that way, that is, to the San Blas islands. All you need is some money. They have some kind of agreement that the passage cost 350$. I try to talk that price down. An older man in a red shirt asks me to play a game of chess with him and I agree. There is this idea in my mind that he'll offer me a free boatride if I win the game. How romantic! He makes some mistakes and I take his queen and the first game is mine. In the return match, I make some mistakes and he takes my Reina, giving him enough advantage to win. In the third game, I concentrate a little bit more and got us into a rather complicated situation. I see him thinking. He attacks a last time with his queen but overlooks something; I get a pawn across and bring the game to a victorious conclusion. "Colombia in big trouble" my opponent says ten minutes before losing the match. "Holanda very strong". In that moment, a real sailor walks to our table, making me feel like I'm in a pirate movie. I stare at his bright blue eyes and his large unkempt beard. We shake hands and he says he is planning to sail to Panama on thursday. I offer him to pay 200 bucks, he will think about it, maybe, if I bring someone else. Sailing is a costly diversion. Tomorrow at 10am I will meet him again. He introduces himself as Doug, and he has a Dutch boat.

I walk on, feeling the hormomes of happiness and exaltation degrading in my blood. The sun is setting. I walk into the historic old town asking for a place where I could get a real espresso. I want to write. This city has a pretty face! It was the prime port of South America, the gate of trade for a whole continent and it still breathes this esprit albeit in that typical touristic way of souvenir vendors and handicraft shops with people shouting at you in English "he man where you from? Holland? Amsterdam!" Just close the ear that hears that and you're fine. I find a stylish café and get at least some writing done.

At night, some police come to the hostel and mention Ivan's name.
"Es tu amigo?"
-"Si."
"Venga."
They take me to the nearby park where the lizard lives, and Ivan sits there on a bench, doing fine and waving at me. The officers have brought him from far far away and might have saved him a lot of trouble. When they asked me to com with them and explained somethings with such a heavy Colombian accent that I couldn't understand them, I was very worried. I might have to identify a body, that's what I thought. But I only had to identify my new buddy.

Tomorrow, I will buy some cheap cigars on the street. Every once in a while, I like to walk around with a cigar butt in the corner of my mouth. It has a lot to do with identity. I should know all about the concept Identity since I studied philosophy. But I don't. I really have no idea. You can tell me anything, anything you like and then just say "look, and that's exactly what identity is" and I would know nothing to disprove it. I'd go "okay" and nod my head dimly. The mere form of a conjecture can be more than enough to paralyze any thought about the substance of identity.

May 4. Aguardiente.

At 5:30am the bus to Cartagena leaves. It will take almost the whole day and I enjoy the Colombian countryside from the comfortable bus chair. Why don't we make up more proverbs ourselves? Let's found some institution for the creation of new proverbs. After so many busrides...

I arrive in Cartagena, the port town and the end of the overland road. I have to rely on boats now. From the terminal I try to take a taxi to the city center, but they say my 20.000 peso bill is a counterfeit. Back in, the toilet lady tells me the same. I am ashamed I tried to get rid of the bill once again. But after all, it's nice how such a piece of paper can generate stories. A couple of days later I'll be arrested for it. Nothing to worry about, though. So, I have a meal in the terminal. A black girl starts talking to me and asks why I'm not married. They marry very young here. She is twenty-one. The woman tells me about her life but I can't remember much. I was more concerned about the change she'll bring me. Bah! Only money on the mind.

A very slow bus took me to the center of the city. That ride was more like a carnival parade. I meet Ivan on it, a countryman of mine with a similar mentality, which we will live out with two bottles of Aguardiente that night. The old town is very touristic. There are security guards everywhere, and people that want to sell juice and fried snacks. We find the Hostal Real and sleep in a dorm. With two bottles of Aguardiente, the local liquor that tastes like Pastis, we have a good conversation about what two grown-up men talk about. Use your imagination.