Back to Colombia

We arrive before 7am after another nights sleep on the bus. We are very short on money so take a shared bus. We were assured that no matter how many people turned up we would be leaving within 30 minutes. 3Hrs, 15 people, 10 suitcases, a flat screen TV, and some powdered milk later we were off.

Even saints and mothers patience wear out eventually and ours was in tatters after a week of intense travel and broken sleep. I brought up the fact that we were deceived with regard to the leaving time. This was not well received. After some aggressive dialogue in Spanish in what was a rather unpleasant exchange they talked about us amongst themselves. I could make out a few words; 4am (potential arrival time?), falta con pasaporte (passport problems), gringos (even though we are not American), negrita (referring to Chan 'little black' which acts as a cultural commentary as they just call things as they see them). We were slightly apprehensive as you often need information and directions from the bus workers. It turns out that rocking the boat that your are about to sail in for the next few hours is ill advised no matter how true your point was. The drivers rage was reflected in his erratic and often uncomfortable driving but at least we were on the move.

5 minutes later we stop for petrol. One last look at the pricing meter that defies belief at the price of less than1 Bolivar (12 cents) for 10 litres. After filling up we hit the road again.

20 minutes later at 9:30 we stopped for almuezo (lunch). We were now actually laughing about the absurdity of it all. The empanadas were delicious and it would have hardly been right to leave Venezuela without one last deep fried supper.

We stopped a further 7 times to show our passports. There was a lot of talk about and handing over of money which was used to bribe the police checking our identification. Every time they refused the bribe and then the driver would complain, leave the bus and return 10 minutes later. These bribes must have cost all of them as much as the ticket itself. Although we will never know for sure what illegal things they had we think that it had something to do with powdered milk. There is a shortage at the moment all over Venezuela. We we asked why and they told us that the cows had gone dry much to their and our amusement. The real reasons were then given but sadly lost in translation.

We paid our 65 Bolivars to leave the country, had our passports stamped, spent our last Bolivars on some extortionate cold beverage and finally arrived 6 hours after arriving in what should have been a 2 and a half hour trip. We changed buses for the last four hour trip of the Venezuelan tour and were glad of the air conditioning and to be free of our sweaty and stressful incarceration.

Joseph Davies 30/10/10