Cali, Colombia Trip Report: March 2010

[Osa]

Day 5

- lazy day today.  we eat a great, late lunch at the inhouse restaurant, then head back to the hotel room.

- We're getting on our nerves a little bit today, but i think its cause we realize we have spent the last 72 hours or so straight together, so we need some space.  I send her home in a taxi.

- I realize that I also have felt weird all day, because I havent taken my meds since saturday!  Uh oh.  I double up on my meds and hope I will feel better in the morning.

- I fall asleep feeling cranky and bored.  I'm dying for my laptop, where I can making music on software.

- Oh before I finished I checked my stuff at the internet cafe.  A girl I had been "cultivating" popped up on MSN.  She's really hot for me.  She tells me she'll be back in Cali on Saturday, and would love to come to my hotel and sex me up.  I'm really tempted, but I dont think I should cause girl#1 and I are developing something nice and I wouldnt want to botch it up just for a hot piece of ass.

[kontra]

Great report so far...Looking forward to more! Do you have any pics?

[Osa]

Day 6

- This is perhaps the most interesting day yet.  We head to her family's house, and make a list of things to do before I leave (I have a week left at this point).  One of the things on my list is I want to look at plots of land for sale, cause I dream of one day building my own house.  

- We get a taxi and ask us to drive us to Cuidad de Gardin (Garden City), a more affluent and underdeveloped part of the city in the south.  We see both gorgeous houses and great plots of land.  I'm totally stoked for buying land and building in Colombia.

- Oh I should add that, after about 30 minutes of driving around, and the meter getting expensive, the <taxi driver asked me if we wanted to switch to an hourly rate.  He said it would be cheaper, 20,000 pesos per hour (about $11).  We signed on.  In all, we kept him for an hour and a half, which ended up being 30,000 pesos, about 17 bucks.  a good bargain indeed.

- We visit La Hermita, a cathedral here in Cali

- We visit Loma de la Cruz, a hilltop open air market where you can buy great gifts.  It's also a hangout for a strange mix of a crowd, everything from emo kids to marijuana heads.  

- Also, there is an ampitheatre in the middle where, on the weekends, "Conteros" (storytellers/comedians) get in the middle and do comedy routines.   But if you're gonna stay and watch, be prepared for a) to get ripped on by the comedian.  me being an out of towner with a great looking girl, well, we got a mild ribbing from the comedian (but it was in good taste).  b) prepare to give a love-offering at the end.  they pass around the hat and expect you to put something in it.

- Finally, we stopped by a tend where the merchant sold authentic Andean instruments and music.  I wanted to buy the whole store.  We ended up buying a copa de Bamboo (a small clave) and a shaker.  My small collection of percussive instruments is growing.  Oh and I bought a CD of andean music.

[Osa]

Day 7 (Saturday)

- The town is going dead till sundays national elections take place, which means public places, especially bars, will be closed till monday.

- Her mom was sweet enough to take a bus up to the hotel and bring us fresh breakfast: arepas stuffed with eggs.  She checks up on her daughter.  I give cab fare home. 

- A little later my girl and I go the Zooligico de Cali (the Cali Zoo).  I think its Colombias best zoo, and we took tons of pics.  Lunch at the end of the zoo, however, was horrible.  Bees kept interrupting our meals and drove me nuts. 

- To be honest, Im getting a little bored of the food, which seems overpriced sometimes.

[Osa]

Day 8 (Sunday)

- Girlfriend sleeps in to 1:30pm (!)

- We finally mobilize to have lunch and go for a walk, and the city is a ghosttown due to the elections.  we walk around (actually we eat ice cream and buy some drug store products) aimlessly then eventually head back to the room for boredom.

- She spoils me.  She washes about 10 of my garments by hand in the bathroom sink then hangs them to dry.  Then she gives me a pedicure (who knew they hurt so much) getting all kinds of old bits of skin and what not from the crevices of my toes   All while Im reading National Geographic.

- I find a bedbug in my bed and a few bites on my arm.  Im not happy.  My building at home is currently dealing with a bedbug ´problem; I wonder if this one was a stowaway.

[Osa]

Reflections (Part 1)

- Ok so far I have mostly just reported facts.  Not much on my feelings or my interpretations.  Heres a few things I am dealing with:

1) The girl I am with is great.  Shes beautiful, sweet, attentive, smart, and crazy about me.   Am I head over heels in love?  Im not sure.  I have felt rather cool and detached all trip long, almost like one shopping for a car.  Im enjoying myself, to be sure, and love the girl.  But I feel more cool than passionate.  Not sure why.

2) Im having a little trouble in the sexual department.  With this girl, I'd have to evaluate to evaluate the sex in two ways: in terms of passionate hotness, and in terms of beauty.  In terms of beauty, I LOVE doing this girl.  Her naked body is a dream to look at and just makes me happy inside.  So for that I would give the sex a '9'.   In terms of passionate hotness (you know how you can have really hot sex with a girl even though she is like a 7? )  well, here, the hotness is only about a 6 or a 7.  I dont know why.  I'll be doing her, and I'll think, I should be REALLY turned on right now.  But instead I am just turned on.  also...

For the last year or so, my erections havent been as hard and consistent as I would like them to be.  So I will make love to her about 30 minutes then lose my erection before ejaculating.  Kind of frustrating.  Not so bad, considering that #during# that 30 minutes, I am a beast, and almost always make her cum, but me losing my erection after that is a little anticlimactic for both of us.

3) I think the expectation is that I will somehow commit to something before I head for home.  She really wants to be my wife.   But I want to get out of the context and think things through with my head before i committ.  Fools rush in.

[dennislevy]

WELL.....

this is interesting, a guy who will admit that he isn t a stallion all the time on a chat board.

Anyone who writes this has got to be telling the truth. So Im not taking any shots at performace issues.....

Im older then you, 56 and  I believe that there is a huge difference between doing a woman and making love with a woman, in my youth, i did girls when I wa sin my twenties.....now I hope to make love with women.   

If you ve got that detached outside looking at yourself attitude, (and I remember that feeling) maybe some thinking about sex iand your priorities s in order.

and before anyone hollers anything aobut me haivng a superior attitude....

I believe that making love isnt supposed to be red hot 10s al the time. its a way to communicate feelings....and at its best it s about more then a stiff Johnson or ejacualatng.  Hopefully a couple teach other what they like to do and have done to them.....they trust each other and share their body, but also laughs and pillow talk before cleaning up...unless its a rapido, a quickie.

Virtually every lover I ve had in my life has wanted and loved oral sex, for a man to go down on her and drive her crazy.....A tongue and lips should never get tired or droop......

If this is your first trip to Colombia ands you had as a first lover in Colubia, a young beautiful  nubile girl...and you think you can do better.....that s a common thought pattern that happens with first time visitors. Im not saying its right or its wrong, Iv lived in Colombia for two years and although Ive had relationships and lovers, at present Im not committed and I admit to meeting 150 women for at least coffee or more in a bit more then 2 years...of course not 150 lovers!

So I dont judge....But at some point, a man has to say himelf,  I don t want to really make a committment (for wahtever reasons) ,  I m happy making conquistas. Again that s up to each man. But I do think, the not so good aftermath is being alone late rin life...wanting companionship and being burnt out, with performance issues, but also an inabiltiy to excpress genuine emotions that lead to a committment-


Finally i htink when yous ay its possible to have a better time with a 7 then with a 9, you re really tlaking about sexual chemistry...which is how people react to each other from second to second as lovers. Its got very little to do with physical beauty.

its not terrilby hard to get laid in Colombia, especially for anyone who speaks Spanish. What is more diffcult is to be true to oneself and to treat women with respect. Im not pinpointing you, thats a rhetoriical statement meant for any man who visits or has visited Colombia in search of women.

Final thoughts

If you break up with this girl.....no matter how you do it, she will probably be hurt- 

This gorl mnay be too young for you.

What do you really need in a woman, not jsut want, what you need?

Make a list before you go south of the border again. if you found a woman who you physically evaluated as a 7, but you completely got lost when you made love, your head pounded, the room swam, your body was burning hot...and she helped you to be a better man away form the sheets, she gave you good advice, she was a good mother (if thats what you want), and was loyal, i

s that better then a 9 with a great body but no substance.

My dad gave me great advice a lot of eyars ago.....look for a woman  turns on your mind and makes your heart race, because you cant wait to see and talk with her again....and those things are at least equally important then hitting the sheets.     
 

 

 

[utopiacowboy]

"My dad gave me great advice a lot of eyars ago.....look for a woman  turns on your mind and makes your heart race, because you cant wait to see and talk with her again....and those things are at least equally important then hitting the sheets."

Good advice.

[Alabamaboy!]

Congratulations! Sounds like you have found a really good girl. Hot, young, smart, takes care of you, sounds like the family is cool, seems like she is not milking you for cash, thoughtful. Damn man. That is awesome. I have met a lot of women during my trips to Colombia and have not met many that had all that going for them.

I think in your case, you might have a different problem than most. You actually found a good one on your first try, but you still see a lot of other options out there. So maybe you are second guessing it a bit.

In my case, I passed on some really great women to have a serious relationship with one that just blew me away with the "sexual chemistry" that you are referring to. And we were very compatible with other things as well. But if I went down the checklist that I mentioned in the first paragraph above, she did not have all of those things going for her. And I should have seen that it was going to be a bit of a bumpy road. I ended up ending the relationship and canceling the visa process for the "sexual chemistry" girl. And now I have been in a long term relationship with a different girl who has a lot of the things you described above. And things are much better now.

And with the new girl, the "sexual chemistry" is getting better and better each time we are together, so in the end, it turns out that it was not even an issue.

If you are searching for the best looking woman you can land, you are going to drive yourself crazy for sure. Because there are just so many to choose from. You could spend a lifetime dating and looking. And you will never find the best one, because it is like trying to find the best piece of fruit there. There are so many delicious kinds, and they are all over the place.

What kind of girl are you looking for? A career woman? Laid back lifestyle? Do you have any kids you need to be concerned about? How often do you think you will be able to travel to continue your search or to service this relationship?

If you are having any doubts whatsoever, just don't paint yourself into a corner. Leave yourself some "wiggle room" so you can get back to the States and assess the situation when you are removed from the Vitamin P.

Glad to hear you are having fun. I love Cali!

[Osa]

thanks for the comments and support guys.   a little bit more processing:

Pro's this girl has:

- Beautiful, a solid 9, maybe a 9.5

- Affectionate as heaven.  I'm very moved by verbals, and she showers me with all the great names Latinas use on their men: cielo, mi amor, papi, and some that we came up with ourselves: boo-boo, chuchi, etc

- Business smart.  She knows how to crunch numbers really fast, and grasps basic principles like supply and demand, flipping a piece of property, etc

- Good family.  Though its mostly just her mom and brother,they also are business smart, and if I (we) ever decide to do something like buy rental property, they would be great people to serve as our "agents", collecting rents and stuff, while the girl and I receive our share of the dough stateside .  Family appears to be one of the few trustworthy ways to do business in SA

- Domestic.  She loves cleanliness.  She is hygenic out the wazoo and insists I be the same.


Cons:

- She can be a bit of a winer/crybaby when she doesnt get her way

- She isn't crazy about the idea of north american winters.  She thinks the cold in Bogota is intolerable; wait till she gets hit in the face with a cold front in the Mid Atlantic East Coast

- She didn't finish school here in Colombia.  The only thing she is interested in studying/pursuing careerwise is Criminology.  Whch she is near finishing here in Colombia.  I told her that academic degrees in SA are hard to transfer and get recognized in the US. That discourages her.  But we spent alot of time brainstorming about self-employment if/when she comes to the US...like owning websites, helping me with a business idea I have, heck, even driving a taxi part-time....so that we can fund our South American dreams, like owning a house and buying investment property

[kontra]

Osa, This chica sounds like a winner to me......If you don't want her I'll take her off your hands...just kiding...I personally don't think the chick is the problem and neither are you, I just think that you want to look at other options before you settle down with her. Let's be honest, This was girl #1 and she turned out to be pretty good but just think If you dated a few more girls and found something better are you kinda bothered with the fact that you haven't had a chance to explore your options?

[Osa]

Day 9 (Monday)

- we oversleep again...this is becoming the norm. 

- in an attempt to save money, we lunch at a small sidewalk cafe.  I have a bandeja paisa (the Country Platter; like the colombia's official meal) and she has something.  It turns out costing half of what we had been paying for lunch and is at least as yummy.

- We head to her family's home with the intention of going hunting for more plots of land, this time in Yumbo (a suburb).  But it is so hot (its about 92F) and everyone is so lazy that we all end up alternating taking naps.  Darkness falls.  her mom makes me a good dinner.

- Girlie thinks I should help her mom out with some money for groceries, so I contribute 50,000 pesos (about $27) to the cause.

- The family and I head out for Choladas, which is like a wated-based ice cream with fruit.  Think an Icee on steroids.  I pass.  I walk down the street and get me a colombian style banana split and am the envy of all

- Send the family home.  Girlie and I decide it is still early and we hadn't seen anything interesting today.  We catch a cab to the Statue of Sebastian de Belalcazar.  While the taxista waits for us, I pay for us to be serenaded by a singing guitarista.  I request "La Malaguena" and he knows it.  He plays, and in moments like this I can feel us falling in love.

- The taxista then offers to show us an even *better* hilltop view of Cali.  He takes us to a hilltop road called la Calle de la Celda and shows us an absolutely breathtaking view of the city

[Knight11]

Omar-- i just got back to the board -- I havent been coming here much because there was too much arguing and macho crap going around.

It was truly refreshing to see a guy come here.... and go thru a real growth process...ask questions...get advice and take that advice yet stick to his guns for the most part.

Also it was very refreshing to see honesty in telling the facts right down to man type problems with the lady.

I agree with the person who said: A girl should make your heart race and you WANT to see her and be with her everyday.... otherwise your just screwing a hot girls body who may really care about you... and you are being unfair to her if you dont feel the same. How would you feel if she has 3 more guys lined up after you? That she picked up guy #2 the day you leave...

She her mom and brother go to the airport the next day....and JOSE walks off the plane and sees that crayon sigh with OMAR marked out and his name written in? I dont think you would be happy in that knowledge.

You can find a girl and screw her in colombia -- its easy. They are passionate people to start with.

Alot of guys will take advantage of that -- just read this board here its easy to see that.

Obviously you could have lied in 100% of what you posted about your trip but assuming its 100% true and you want to find a wife then I think you need to make a decision wether the lady #1 can make you happy.

I think if you just keep going down to just sex her up... you may hurt her... and shell lose faith in good guys. Now I am assuming shes a nice girl and not a ho. Ill take your word if she is or not.

But you do need to find someone your happy with and makes you drive home everyday to be with her (or fly down all the time).

I found a colombian girl like that once and we didnt have sex one time but dated a year for real and a year as "friends" and i would have married her even at 23 if i wasnt in college then and thinking more clearly...my god after 10 years I am still in love with her its crazy even though she had to return to her country (we met in University in USA and she couldnt stay after 2 years) but i heard she married a guy down there but...thats the kind of girl you need to try to find. You need to be crazy passionate for her for REAL one that you cant get out of your head ... and guaranteed you wont feel empty like most guys do if you find her... your second head will be just as happy as your first.

Hope if turns out great for you!

[Knight11]

My last post was a  "BE CAREFUL DONT HURT HER.... but MAKE SURE YOU ARE REALLY INTO HER BEFORE MARRYING POST"



So Ill post a more informational now

I have been in a really unique and special circumstance and its all by luck (or a curse depends how you see it).

I accidentally became a co-host to foundation group of colombian students that came every year to study for a year or two when I was in university. Since I was on a double major i was in school almost six years so I was able to meet about 15-20 students a year for 6 years. I learned alot about colombia.

Ill say man...most were 20-23 year old chica hotties from colombia wow and I was a young american college guy so my jaw was dropping alot. Alot of their complaints were most americans were "KIND to them as far as classes or official business but unfriendly and cold compared to what they were used to socially" They said I was warm and socilable and i guess thats why i got drafted.

Anyway, I met a lot of girls from different cities in colombia and because they wanted to practice english of course Id get to talk to them alot about their life and country and such. Well those years of talking to lots of colombian girls gave me a pretty good idea of the girls of colombia. Im not a master no one is...but here goes an OVERALL idea of girls from colombia. It isnt ALL inclusive not every girl is that way but  know parts of a country any country have "personalities and overall characteristics":

Rating: With 1=not wife material at all unless your crazy  & 10=couldnt find a better wife.
And this is not saying ALL girls are bad or good in these places its more a general overview for quick review.

Barranquilla: Coast people/girls are wild and crazy party girls. They can tend to be slow going and some would say "lazy" in most things that arent parties or fun NEVER expect people to be on time from barranquilla omg i learned that the hard way . But nice and and loco and friendly girls for sure! The girls are very sexual. They would be easy to date and quickly form a relationship and marriage. I know alot of guys on here have dated them with mixed results. Girls tend to be darker, wear more revealing clothes, and be more free spirited.

Wife Material: 8 expect a more free spirit and all that may entail

Bogota area: Girls there are more educated and reserved overall. They are more bussiness like and focus alot more of serious sides of things. Trust me my best friend embodies this my god shes demanding even tho im her friend! They tend to be more "porper" and the term Bogotana (and bogotano) has an underlying meaning used to distinguish this. Bogota is the commerical center of colombia its kinda like the New York of colombia. if you can make it there in bogota you can make it anywhere and all that jazz. But the girls here will be less wild and partiers. I just mean they focus alot on their careers and education but compared to ameircans girls WOW they party just fine!

Wife Material: 9 but may not fit the "WILD CRAZY PARTY SEX EVERY HOUR" idea most guys have of girls from colombia but girls like that arent wife material usually anyway. overall bogotanas are good all around wife material.

Medellin: Supposedly the most "culturally sophisticated" city so supposedly the most cultured women. But alot of women here tend to be upity and snobbish. This has been varified by a wide range of guys so its pretty true. I think "image" is mostly everything there so the girls like palstic surgery and guys with money. The girls can be kind of cold/materialistic compared to other cities and distant especially to foreigners. I dont think medellin is known as a party city at all. The girls would be more like bogota but more snobbish. They tend to be whiter and thiner.

Wife Material: 7 due to their being pretty distant and harder to get to know especially for foreigners. Im sure once you know one shes probably awesome but good luck.

Cali: Cali is interesting... It has a very night/day reputation. Very crime ridden poorer city compared to other cities. Alot of the "dating agencies" were from there for a reason. Calenas have a reputation of being extremely sweet, sexy, carinosa, pretty, and very sexual...read the forums here for more support of that and from my own experience i would even say not as committal as girls from other cities whne it comes to relationships. Like barranquilla the girls in cali like to party and since cali is the home of salsa it is known for wild parties. It is probably THE party town of colombia.

Wife Material: 7 due to the fact there is alot of evidence that girls from Cali seem to be less willing to be committed and monogamous in relationships which is what Marriage is all about really.


THis is just a general overview and cannot be taken as absolute word on the sibject.

Not sure if you and your girl are at this point heading toward a truly serious committed relationship but if not and you do want to think about other cities this post can be used as a rule olf thumb.

[utopiacowboy]

Ask yourself this: if I let this chick get away will I regret it for the rest of my life?

[Kiltboy1]

I think because most of us took a while to find the right one and played the field a lot , you are feeling like you might be missing out on something better if you comitted to this girl, This is normal and only after you return back home will you know or not if she is the one, Just enjoy the flow and maybe take a sde trip to Dr. Amor just to test your theory out 

KB

[Dan Las Vegas]

Knight11,

I am curious, have you ever been to Colombia?

[robert angel]

Hind sight being 20/20, I think most guys have had one or two women they regret having let 'get away' and who we later on ponder about 'what if' and so on. I'm certainly not fixated on the subject, but when I 'reminisce' I sometimes smile and wonder about what might have been.

All the same, guys being guys, it's hard to avoid this kind of situation and maybe if I had stayed with the ones I have some regrets about letting get away, I'd just wonder about some others instead.

People tend to be interested in the grass on the other side of the fence too much any way...

[Osa]

I'm back home now, but I'll complete my trip report

Day 10 (Tuesday)

- Nothing much to report, except

- My girl cleans some of my underwear in the bathroom sink by by hand.

- At night we go to a bar/grill/club.  I drink more than I have all trip -- a good share of two pitchers of beer.  I'm drunk, and take a walk to a grease pit and eat something like shishkabobs

Day 11 (Wednesday)

- We go back to the family house; this time I am intent on seeing some land outside of Yumbo.  

- My girl gets to scrubbing, by hand, my clothes which she had brought from the hotel.  They actually have one of the wash basins like the one's they have on Little House on the Prairie.  I'd never seen anyone clean clothes by hand before.  They have a washing machine, but claim it doesn't get clothes as clean as hand washing.

- After much procrastinating and vacillating, we finally decide to catch two buses to Yumbo.  Yumbo is a town to the east of Cali, maybe 10 miles out.  

- I don't mind taking the bus.  It wasn't overcrowded or over hot, and its dirt cheap.  Plus, its lightly raining for the first since I've been in Colombia and its pleasantly cool and overcast.  The trip to Yumbo takes about an hour.

- Yumbo is a town build on hills.  The streets are very steep, but not as narrow as in Cali.  It has a small town flavor.  We make out way to my girl's mom's sister-in-law's house, where she operates a store front out of living room. They know I want to go look at property for a while, but the polite thing is to a chill for a while, even though it is rapidly getting dark.  So we order some arepas with melted cheese from a nearby sidewalk barbecue grill and enjoy those with coffee.

- While I'm waiting for the formalities to end, our host's 17 year old son pulls up on a Honda Scooter.  I had been expressing alot that I wanted to try riding a moped or something before I went home, but was afraid of trying to ride something that was manual.  Well, he gave me a quick crash course on how all the pedals/gears/cranks worked, got on the bike behind me, and we pulled off.  It was much easier than I had thought -- I pulled off nice and smooth like a pro right away.   Ahhhhhhhhh......with rain drizzling upon us, no helmet on, and the wind in my face...I felt very much alive.  Viva Colombia!

- After a while, we caught a taxi, and began driving up the face of a mountain that people have been buying property along.  Long story short, we saw everything from little house near the foot of the mountain to villas near the summit.  You really are way out there, far from civilization up there.  The temperature is about 15 degrees cooler, and the views look like something out of the Sound of Music.   Viva Los Andes!

- Eventually we went back home to girl's house.  We recapped our "terrain hunting" and we agreed that the plots of land were too far out there for the place we'd like to build our dream house, we want to be closer to the action like in the southern part of Cali.  They decided it was too late for me to go back to my hotel so they obligated me to spend the night.

[Osa]

Day 12 (Thursday)

- Lazy Day (for me, at least).  I had complained about not having tried my girlfriend's cooking yet (I was getting suspicious that maybe they were trying to sell me a lemon in the cooking department  )  So my girl makes me both breakfast (arepas and eggs) and lunch (soup, with chicken and rice).  Both are pretty good and received the Osa Seal of Approval. 

- Mom and grandma iron my clothes that my girl washed the day before and which is now dry.  They put it all on neat hangers ready for me to pack and take home

- My girl is tangibly nervous about me leaving the next day.  There's tension in the air.  She expressed more than once that she is fearful that I will leave and never look back, that this is all just a tryst for me.  I try to assuage her fears without making compromising commitments. 

- Her and I head back to my hotel for our last night together.  She borrows a dress from her cousin, and dolls herself up, and looks like a million bucks. 

- I explain that my spending money is basically spent, we'll have to keep our last night rather simple.  This adds to the tension, and we have a few curt words with each other over the course of the evening.  It isn't very fun.  At one point she is acting so bratty that I tell her, "do you want to go inside to the hotel room?" she says yes and takes the key and storms back into the hotel.   Our first official fight.

- I hang outside the hotel, strike up a long conversations with one of the natives and drink beer.  An hour or two later, girlie comes out, having changed clothes...I guess she was curious what I had been doing all that time.  I take her back inside.

- She's acting like a spoiled brat for a good while, avoiding me and such.  Finally we talk things over and we get over our silly tiff.  We have really, really hot makeup sex.  During our passionate bout, she confesses that the reason she had been pestering me all day was that she really needed a good [snip].  Oh, and I finally climax from intercourse at the end. She literally clapped her hands over her head when I finally released 

[Osa]

TRIP HOME

- Nothing much to report.  Mom and girlfriend saw me off at the airport in what we all could anticipate would be a bittersweet good-bye.  I go into the terminal asap cause I hate long good byes.

- Have a long ass layover in Bogota: overnight!   Flight leaves 7 in the morn. 

- Short layover in Panama City.

- Home in Newark Airport at about 3:30pm.  I change what remains in Colombian pesos into dollars at a kiosk near the exit where the cabs are at.  I'm kinda broke, so I'll need every penny I can get to get me to the next paycheck. I'm not the type to live paycheck to paycheck, but, truth be said, I couldn't truly *afford* this trip; I took alot of faith risks  because I saw an opportunity to capitalize on.

[Caballero2009]

Sounds like you are a lucky man. I think most guys dream of the total kinda package you seemed to find.

No one is perfect... no woman... so you know seems like you got a girl whose cute smart enough for you but has defects...but thats ok you know we all do.

Gratz

[michaelb]

Well, maybe a little bit more than we needed to know (hint: a gentleman doesn't tell), but on the whole a good trip and she sounds like a keeper. You'll be back...and to see the same lady, I reckon. Either that, or after thinking things over and talking things through with her, you'll file for a K-1 without the delay and expense of another trip. Hope you got some good 'evidence' photos of the two of you together.

Almost ran out of money? Heck, I had to borrow money from my wife's neighbor to have enough for the airport departure tax, ha ha. This same neighbor had a house under construction in Cuidad Jardin (I'm sure it's finished by now) and we went out to look at it, it is indeed a very upscale part of town. 

One place I'm surprised she didn't take you was, .......darn, I can't remember the name of it right now, but there is a book that literally EVERYONE in Colombia has read and seems to love, kind of a romantic historical fiction (or maybe it's supposed to all be true??). Anyway, the house where the book allegedly took place isn't too far from Cali, it has been turned into a museum and is a tourist draw, they actually run buses out to it....somebody help me out with the name of the place and/or the book...

Good trip report

[michaelb]

Hind sight being 20/20, I think most guys have had one or two women they regret having let 'get away' and who we later on ponder about 'what if' and so on. I'm certainly not fixated on the subject, but when I 'reminisce' I sometimes smile and wonder about what might have been.

I agree.

I've got a 'could have, but didn't' (why didn't you tell me you had a kid BEFORE we got involved? answer-If I had told you, you WOULDN'T have gotten involved-that's Latina logic, but she was probably right)

a 'a could have and probably should have but didn't' (a couple of years ago I ran into a news article about her, seems she's quite prominent in her field of work and apparently never married--but you could see in the picture that she is now a wide as her mother used to be, which, if I'm honest, I will have to admit did have something to do with my decision at the time)

and a 'shouldn't have but did' in my past.

And while I don't consider it an obsession, sometimes the first two do cross my mind as 'what might have been?'.....I think most people have similar experiences and memories.

[Osa]

FINAL REFLECTIONS:

- I would consider this trip a success, as I was able to follow through on Plan A (see above) with a really great girl.

But..

- From a financial perspective, the trip was poorly planned.  I just didn't have enough in the bank to do it all right.  So I got hit with fees and NSF's left and right.  I'd estimate I got hit with about $300 in miscellaneous fees, which I don't need.  It'll take me about two or three paychecks to get rebalanced.  Also, it added to the anxiety of the trip.

- Pleasant surprises:

     - My girl's family is great

     - Cali people are, by and large, friendly and classy.

     - I didnt get robbed

- I told my girl I wanted to go home and think things over stateside before committing to anything.  She was saddened but understood.  Well, I was back home just a couple of days, but no heavy meditation needed to be done.  There quite frankly wasn't much to think about.  I'm crazy about the girl, I'd be sad to lose her, she's young, beautiful, smart, caring, sexy, fun, and yummy.

- I called her home yesterday.  I asked her if she was still serious about coming to be with me.   She said yes.  I asked to speak to her mom.   Her mom came on the line, and after small talk, I asked her if she was ok with me beginning the visa process to bring her daughter to the states.  She seemed pleased.  She said girlie is a young lady and is old enough to start making her own life decisions, but she was impressed with me during my visit and thinks I'm a great guy.  That made me happy. 

Well, onward to the visa process!!!!

[this concludes this trip report </report>]