In need of some peace and quiet? Sleepy Somondoco is the place to go to

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio/video version of this blog story, click here.]

Bucolic bliss. The rural idyll. Like anything that refers to perfection, the reality is different. Nothing in this world is perfect.

What we strive for is to have as many positives as possible in whatever it is we're doing or wherever we're going (both mentally and physically).

Peaceful: Somondoco is as quiet as they come.

What these positives are depend on the individual. When it comes to a break from the routine, a getaway, what works wonders for one may be a bore for another.

Church-hill views

My needs for any escape from Bogotá are minimal. A lot of the time I simply have a desire to leave; the destination is almost of secondary importance.

As long as there's a fairly cheap hotel room and quiet-ish countryside to wander about, I'm usually content. If it's a warm-weather location, having a clean-ish watercourse of some description nearby in which one can bathe in peace whilst taking in some sun is a nice bonus.

To varying degrees, most towns within a 200-kilometre radius of Bogotá meet these rather undemanding requirements.

Of course, no matter how cosy and quiet your setting may be, at some stage loud music will trump the tranquillity. It's practically a rule that where there's a human settlement in Colombia, there are oversized speakers. And there's almost always a crazy canine or two to contend with when out and about, saying nothing of the crazy human folk.

Such drawbacks were, mercifully, in short supply in the town of Somondoco, in the south-east of Colombia's Boyacá department — my default go-to department over the last few years.

OK, it could be said that it has few pull factors, that it hasn't anything particularly appealing to make it stand out from the many other similar Andean towns. That's not fully true.

'Surely the townsfolk will look to bloom big again in the coming years to win back their flower power?'

For one, it has the impressive Santuario del Santo Cristo del Cerro de Somondoco. This ornate, in-renovation chapel sits at an altitude of 2,300 metres, offering views of the neighbouring towns of Guayatá, Guateque, Sutatenza, La Capilla, Macanal and Almeida.

The landscape somewhat obscures the view of Somondoco itself, some 600 metres below. The trek up from the town to the hilltop chapel takes about two hours, a nice way to sweat out any bodily impurities.

Massive mango town

A swift walk down into the Somondao River valley and back up to the town of Guayatá, 10 kilometres west of Somondoco, also gets the body working, as well as allowing one to take in the scenic Andean countryside in relative serenity.

Record town: Guayatá.

While I only stayed a couple of hours in Guayatá, it seemed a little livelier, in a fun way that is, than Somondoco.

More importantly, it has at least one café that makes decent coffee. Somondoco is unfortunately still stuck in the greca era; the brews available there are ordinary at best.

On a quirkier note, Guayatá has been home to two Guinness World Records: It still holds the title for the world's heaviest mango and in 2014 it was registered as having the longest line of flowers ever recorded, a spectacle that can be seen each year in celebration of Corpus Christi. This latter record has since been beaten. Surely the townsfolk will look to bloom big again in the coming years to win back their flower power?

Back in Somondoco, while it won't win any world record for this, the well-kept, modern Hotel Real Simindoco (no, I'm not writing that wrong, it is Simindoco, not Somondoco) is a winner with me with spacious rooms from 25,000 COP per night.

So for a small town within a few hours' drive of Bogotá, Somondoco and its surrounds have many plus points for me.

Quiet, affordable and with a few tranquil treks to traipse. If someone in the town would only ditch those grecas and learn how to make decent coffee. Nothing, though, is perfect after all.
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Bogged down in Bogotá

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio version of this blog story click here.]

It's been quite eventful on the news front in Colombia of late, even more so than normal.

Is it time for a long-term break from Bogotá?

We've had corruption allegations leading right up to President Petro that have resulted in some high-profile sackings, as well as the suicide of a police colonel mixed up in the scandal; potentially game-changing reforms to health and pensions have been making their way through Congress; and a new ceasefire with the ELN rebels has come into force as peace talks continue between them and the government.

Personal problems

Outside of grubby politics, the finding of four children lost for 40 days in the Amazon jungle after the plane they were in crashed made headlines around the world. We like a good news story after all (the children, though, do have to deal with the turmoil of losing their mother in that tragedy).

At other times during my more-than 11-year stint based in Bogotá, such stories would have piqued my interest quite a bit, particularly in the guise of a reporter-on-the-ground that I have occasionally been for a couple of foreign media.

It is, however, hard to get too worked up about events over there when one's mind is preoccupied with personal issues that, by their very nature, are more pertinent.

'The enfeebling of what I'd thought were robust relationships moves me closer to the exit door.'

It's why I feel that adults who are sports fanatics — in terms of supporting players and teams, not in the actual playing of sports — must be in an overall comfortable life position. Or they are just a little immature, impressionable and can't wean themselves off the opium high such voyeurism offers. I have, for the most part, grown out of that sports fanatic phase.

For example, should the Irish men's rugby team win the World Cup this year, I'll be very happy for them, but it's extremely unlikely to have any real bearing on my life, negative or positive. And, surprising as this may be, the Irish players are most likely not concerned about the fate of yours truly. If I'm wrong on that, I'll happily take any financial support forthcoming.

As for politics, well a crisis in Colombia could have ramifications for me so I should keep myself informed. And I do, to a certain extent.

As much as I live on the fringes here, something I explained in a previous story, I do have a Colombian bank account and some savings, so I want the peso to be as strong as possible (a return to its 2012 price against the euro would be very welcome!).

Pastures new

However, whether the peso is strong or weak has nothing to do with a frenemy's ability, nay willingness, to repay a substantial loan I gave him. See The fiendish frenemy for more on that.

That deflating episode has only served to add to my uncertainty about continuing to live in Bogotá, an uncertainty that I've had for years.

Now, it's an overstatement to say that firm friendships have been the foundation for my being here, but they do certainly play a part. So the enfeebling of what I'd thought were robust relationships moves me closer to the exit door.

I do think that leaving Bogotá, at least for a substantial period of time, would be good for both body and mind. Having said that, the biggest concerns in my life these days are largely independent of place — apart from the desire to have my own place!

Regardless of where I am, there's always the headache of sourcing paid projects to keep in the black. If I was completely desperate, English teaching would be the fallback in these parts, as it has been before. But as I recently explained, I have little desire for that right now. Who knows, that feeling may change at some stage.

All things considered, a considerable Bogotá break, a change of scenery, seems the smarter option. It's unlikely to be a panacea but it should provide a much-needed energy and enthusiasm boost.
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Listen to The Corrigan Cast podcast here.

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The fiendish frenemy

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio version of this blog story click here.]

'Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.'

It's an oft-repeated piece of advice, one that well predates its memorable use by Michael Corleone in the 1974 movie masterpiece, The Godfather Part II. Nonetheless, studies now suggest it's incomplete, in a significant way.

Missing is the deadliest relationship of them all: the frenemy.

'We only give credit to those over 90 who bring a grandparent as guarantor.' Or better yet, f**k off!

A friend in need

As the organisational psychologist Adam Grant, author of Think Again, put it in a recent New York Times opinion piece, 'the most toxic relationships aren’t the purely negative ones. They’re the ones that are a mix of positive and negative.' (Read the article at https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/28/opinion/frenemies-relationships-health.html.)

In that NY Times piece, Dr Grant cited research by the psychologists Bert Uchino and Julianne Holt-Lunstad that showed how 'ambivalent relationships can be damaging to your health'.

The studies found that those interacting with people who evoked mixed feelings had higher blood pressure and increased heart rates than those interacting with people who evoked negative feelings only. Dealing with frenemies also appears to trigger depression.

I can certainly relate.

My current frenemy situation also ties in with an arguably more important maxim: 'Neither a borrower nor a lender be, for loan oft loses both itself and friend, and borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.'

While the message is clear in that proverb from William Shakespeare's Hamlet, some of us still get duped into helping out a hard-up friend in need — a friend indeed, of course. They can be ever so convincing.

Yes, the potential borrower is also warned of hardships should he go ahead with the request but experience tells me that it's the lender who ends up, well, more alone, disillusioned and utterly frustrated.

In working-class Colombia in any case, keeping your financial affairs in order is almost viewed as a negative. My previous piece, Rewarding the reckless, elaborates on my latest loan lament. Here I want to share the emotional torment of what must be a prime example of an ambivalent relationship.

'Has it been this frenemy's plan all along to drive me to a state of disillusionment where I'll just give up?'

The friend-fast-becoming-frenemy to whom I lent money continues to tell me that he's good for it. The original repayment deadline was on 15 February of this year. The money was lent on 12 December 2022.

To his, um, partial credit, he has paid back about a third of the principal.

However, over the last few weeks, it's been a case of 'mañana, mañana', 'tomorrow, tomorrow'. He promises me he'll repay the remainder or a portion of it on a certain day yet, thus far, when the appointed day arrives, nothing. Tomorrow never comes.

This constant failure to meet repayment dates — that he himself sets — both disappoints and infuriates me just as much as the fact that he still owes me money.

Toxic

I lent him this cash because we had similar dealings previously. He always paid back — not always on the date originally specified but never more than a month late. So I trusted him. That trust has now been shattered. When it comes to his promises of paying me back on a particular date, I simply can't believe him.

Of course, he has excuses. Chief amongst them is that he isn't getting paid for work he has done. That may indeed be true; it most likely is in these parts.

However, he still has money to socialise regularly and liberally — Bogotá isn't short of freeloaders should one be so obliging. And he can still fuel his car, a car that is far from essential for his work. If he is in hard times, he's putting the sunny side out; and then some.

All this betrays his constant cries that he's 'embarrassed' that he hasn't paid me back yet and that he truly values our friendship. In addition, I have to do the chasing. If he really did see me as a good buddy, should he not be doing his utmost to reassure me that everything will be fine?

For sure, over the last number of years, we have shared many moments that, at face value, point to genuine friendship.

Yet, colder, deeper analysis suggests it has been nothing more than an ambivalent relationship. It just took this incident — plus my reading of Dr Grant's article — to realise its true toxicity.

That I'm keeping it on a life-support machine is solely for the money owed to me. If it was for a lesser amount, I would write it off as a bad debt, cut ties with the borrower and firmly put him in the non-friend category. Right now, I can't afford to do that. The outstanding sum is equal to more than three months' rent for me.

Nonetheless, considering the mental anguish I'm suffering and, as the Uchino/Holt-Lunstad research has shown, the potential physical health damage, I'd probably be doing my overall well-being a favour by putting this upsetting chapter and "chap" behind me.

On the flip side, the thoughts of just letting it go also anger me. Has it been this frenemy's plan all along to drive me to a state of disillusionment where I'll just give up? In that scenario, while many mules might start to submit, I don't want to admit defeat.

Why bother with friends or enemies when you can have frenemies like these? They get closer to you than anyone.
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Drink-from-home boozers

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio version of this blog story click here.]

OK, I'm probably not the best housemate to have. More precisely, I'm closer to being the worst housemate.

Why drink at home when you can have a cheaper tipple in a tienda?

The biggest reason for this is that I wish I didn't have to share accommodation whatsoever. However, I'm forced into such arrangements for financial reasons.

To get my own place in Bogotá, one that isn't like something from the 19th century, that is, I'd have to pay at least double my current rent. Right now, with few paid projects to sustain me, I just couldn't justify such an increase in my expenditure.

Home alone utopia

So, house-sharing is my lot and most likely will be for quite some time to come. I'm not very good, though, at grinning and bearing it. It's more a case of being grumpy and bewailing it.

I get this sinking feeling upon opening the door and realising I don't have the place to myself.

This adverse reaction would be lessened somewhat if I was living with family or very close friends, people who I know well and vice versa. They would understand that my desire not to talk, to keep myself to myself, isn't a hostile act. It's just my disposition, especially when I want to concentrate on something or simply relax.

Having said that, as shared accommodation goes, my current situation isn't too terrible.

For the most part, when I want to cook, my housemates are mercifully not around. They also keep the common areas fairly clean — there hasn't been a need to wage kitchen wars.

Bottle battles

Although, I will never come to terms with this habit of throwing bottles and cans with liquid in them in the bin. Pour the damned liquid down the sink first! Not doing so smacks of extreme laziness. Or just plain stupidity. Or the arguably worse mixture of both.

Indeed, it's liquid-linked affairs that get my blood up the most in my current abode.

While I enjoy the odd tipple, boozing in the place where I cook and sleep has never appealed to me. Even in my student days, I preferred to drink in a public house than stay at home, even if it cost me a little more. And the idea of parties in my residence has always been repugnant to me — well, since adulthood anyway.

You see, contrary to the impression this blog may give, not every action I take has value for money at its heart. If that were the case, in Ireland I would have drunk at home when wanting to get merry. In most high-income nations, drinking out is more expensive than drinking in.

'Rather than get up and, quite literally, face the music and merrymakers, makeshift chamber pots have been found instead'.

As it so happens, in working-class areas of Colombia the opposite is generally true. This suits me perfectly — when it comes to being in a beer-drinking mood that is. If I was trying to cut beer entirely from my life, making it cheaper to down a few at home would be of greater help. In such a scenario, I'd be far less inclined to imbibe. 

So Colombians who otherwise seem fairly frugal, are eager for the best deal, why they drink from home perplexes me (let's use "from home" rather than "at home", in keeping with the work-from-home zeitgeist).

Not only is the alcohol normally cheaper in a barrio tienda bar compared to the supermarkets but there are utility savings to be made as well. Electricity and water use at home comes at a cost.

This cost concern would irk me somewhat if the sum of the utility bills in my current accommodation was divided equally. It's not. My rent is all-inclusive. And not too exorbitant as it is.

Piss-take

It's simply the act of drinking from home that annoys me. There's the additional rubbish from bottles/cans, the smell, the potential that guests are invited and, with that, the ever-present risk of boisterousness.

There's also the fact that it's inescapable. When I've had my fill in a tienda, I want to go home to sleep in peace.

With housemates who drink at home in shared spaces, it's like having to enter a tienda just to get to one's bed. What's more, if the home boozers are merry, they'll invariably try to drag one down with them, to partake in the "fun". Eh, no thanks.

Even a normally mundane matter of going to the toilet becomes a very uncomfortable high-risk mission. 'If I go now they'll try to get me to drink. Surely they'll be finishing up shortly.'

An hour later and they're still at it. 'Will those plastic bags next to my bed hold my urine? Let's see.'

Yes, rather than get up and, quite literally, face the music and merrymakers, makeshift chamber pots have been known to be found.

Thankfully, this worst-case scenario of resident revellers rarely happens in my apartment. Most of the time, the main culprit drinks quietly in his room with his girlfriend, who also happens to be the normally absentee administrator of the property.

On odd occasions, though — at birthdays for one — a jamboree breaks out. A couple of times a year for this tienda-at-home affair is more than enough for me all the same.

Rather than a boisterous bar pad, what I want these days is a benign bachelor pad. I might have to get out of Bogotá to find such an ideal.
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Making the bell toll for us while we still can

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio version of this blog story click here.]

'You can't unring a bell.'

Of the many quips former Ireland men's rugby coach, Eddie O'Sullivan, has uttered, that one regularly reverberates in my mind.

What's rung is rung!

A different ball game

In more common parlance it's expressed as, 'What's done, is done'. It can't be undone. If it's something that needs fixing, requires a remedy, this may be possible afterwards but we can't go back in time and re-do the original action. The best we can do is try to learn from it and not make the same mistakes again.

Certain events, however, allow one shot only. Yes, similar situations may arise in the future where we can adopt a wiser approach based on experience but no two scenarios play out exactly the same.

Returning briefly to O'Sullivan and the Irish rugby team that he once coached, followers of the game are well aware of Ireland's failure to make it to a World Cup semi-final after nine attempts.

In rugby's professional era, from 1995 onwards, Team Ireland has by now pretty much achieved everything that can be achieved in the sport, except those significant shortcomings at World Cups. 2023 presents another opportunity to address this.

Of course, the personnel involved in each World Cup selection changes, as does the location and the makeup of the other competitors. A new bell is being rung each time, so to put it.

And so it is with every new challenge. None is exactly like another because there are so many variables at play.

'That I have these uncomfortable dreams could be due to my largely stress-free, relaxed-paced life on Bogotá's Mediocre Lane.'

Over the last four years, I've had, if I recall correctly, eight online job interviews. Three of those were for positions that I'm fairly certain I would have said yes to had I been the preferred candidate. Obviously enough, I wasn't.

Naturally, I've done mental post-mortems on each of them. One usually has a sense of where it goes wrong in such things, so this gets played over and over in the mind ahead of the next interview.

As somebody who prefers in-person meetings over online ones, being forced into the latter is a negative before a virtual ball is kicked. My job interview record suggests I have to be seen to be truly believed — or hired, at least!

'It's not us, it's you'

My most recent interview gives a nice illustration of this. I had a technical problem that simply couldn't happen in person: my laptop's camera wouldn't work when it had worked fine just moments before I connected to the "video" call.

As it transpired, I have it on good authority that this glitch had no bearing on the outcome. After all, the interview was for a job where it was much more about my voice, my current affairs/news sense and my ability to write news bulletins. How I looked was not of major importance.

That aside, I did have to write up and record a news bulletin against the clock. When my low-spec laptop has to multitask online, it often throws a tantrum. Its temperament on this occasion made an already stressful task somewhat more taxing than it needed to be.

This might sound like a not-very-skilled workman pointing his finger at the tools at his disposal, but it's not. I'm just stating the facts, these aren't excuses.

In any case, that I wasn't offered the job may have as much to do with my distance from where the gig is based than my interview performance. I say this because I was told that if I happen to be in the city where the work is in the coming months, I should contact the interviewer for potential freelance opportunities.

As rejections go, this was one of the gentler ones I've received. Or could it be that the company in question is just being overly and unnecessarily nice?

Don't dream it's over

Whatever the real reasons are, I am left with the feeling that I didn't give the best account of myself on the day. My performance could have been a few percentage points higher. The bell that I rang on this occasion just didn't sound quite right for its target.

More specifically, the news task did remind me why I prefer interviewing and presenting programmes, i.e. a format that allows for some unscripted dissection of current affairs, to composing bulletins. Alas, such paid gigs are thin on the ground.

I still have the occasional nightmare of rushing from a radio newsroom to the studio for a live bulletin with just seconds remaining to broadcast time. Or, worse again, actually being in the studio with no news to read at all.

I'm fairly sure that second scenario never happened in reality. Well, not to the extent visualised in my nightmares. I did, though, have to make up the weather forecast once or twice. In Ireland, one is rarely wrong in prognosticating wind and rain.

That I have these uncomfortable dreams could be due to my largely stress-free, relaxed-paced life on Bogotá's Mediocre Lane.

Time, perhaps, for some more daring bell ringing while I'm still in a position to do so. Better to have rung and lost than never have rung at all, right? And there's no avoiding the eternal empty silence that awaits us all.
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Not so gaga for physical footy

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio version of this blog story click here.]

If somebody had told me in November 2008, just before I embarked on my first solo bout of world travelling, that I'd become indifferent to being involved in Gaelic football, I would have suggested they see a psychiatrist.

It's been nice to play some "footy". The injuries have been less fun.

At that time, in addition to playing, I'd started training my club's under-21s and I'd served as public relations officer. To say I was gaga about Gaelic football is pretty much, um, on point.

Nipped in the rib

Of the myriad concerns I had about leaving home for a protracted period, abandoning Irish football was chief amongst them.

My absence from the game could hardly grow my fondness for it — my heart was pumped full of it. Thus, it was probably only natural that travelling would begin to weaken the bond, even though I didn't think it at the time.

The love was reignited on my return to Ireland in late 2009, but it was of a different beat. Work took me to Belfast and with it a change in club. While I enjoyed playing for Naomh Bríd, my outlook had changed. Gaelic football was now a pastime, not a vocation.

Leaving Belfast in mid-2011 to base myself, eventually, in Gaelic football-free Bogotá ensured my playing days ended.

The odd game of fútbol (soccer) filled any ball-shaped void but it was with surprising speed that I kicked to touch the "need" to play such sports regularly or join a club.

Merely making ends meet became my Bogotá sport; that and travelling around Colombia when I could. Thus it has largely remained.

Yet, while Gaelic football may have been out of sight in a real-life sense, it has never been out of my mind.

'With no health insurance, I would have to be close to death to see a doctor right now. Anyway, I had a fair idea that the best treatment is ice, rest and time.'

Even so, when the game made a brief appearance in Bogotá recently thanks to the guys at Go Gaelic, I was somewhat surprised at my excitement to be reunited with an O'Neills size five — the ball used in the men's game, that is.

More surprising, if I do say so myself, was that my touch was fairly sharp, all things considered.

Glory days with Belfast's Naomh Bríd in 2010! A slightly bulkier Wrong Way is wearing No. 5.

Playing a compromise rules exhibition game with the well-established Australian (Aussie) Rules football club, Bogotá Bulldogs, my enthusiasm to play some "footy", as our antipodean acquaintances affectionately and boisterously call their game, was reignited. (Aussie Rules and Gaelic football are seen as close cousins.)

This enthusiasm was dampened when, adrenaline abated, I noticed I'd picked up a bruised rib or two. It's really only when you suffer such an injury that you realise how intrinsically involved your rib cage is in every movement of your body.

Nonetheless, invited to train weekly with the footy folk with an eye on playing in an upcoming Colombians versus The Rest internal club game, I was determined to show commitment to my new cause.

Solo fun

While the bruised ribs were still bothering me, I managed to take in a few training sessions before the big game.

Indeed, it took all four weeks between the compromise exhibition match and this internal game for the injury to heal; and not even fully at that.

One heavy, late hit later — if it was rugby, I'm sure the tackler would have been sent off — and it seemed as if my whole rib cage had been shattered.

To give an idea of my suffering in the days that followed, I was compelled to take painkillers. This is something I rarely do. I hadn't taken any for the previous rib injury. I usually take a grin-and-bear-it approach to pain.

Some barrio friends, seeing me in such a state, suggested I seek medical help. With no health insurance, I would have to be close to death to see a doctor right now. What's more, I had a fair idea that the best treatment was (still is!) ice, rest and time.

Health insurance or not, getting these rib injuries within a month of each other has certainly made me less eager to play such a high-contact sport. (Gaelic football is a little less physical.)

I'm not as bulky as I was in my early 20s and I am, naturally enough, a little slower, so both factors make me more vulnerable to getting smashed up.

OK, I did enjoy being back in the heat of battle but I haven't enjoyed the aftermath, injured to the point where I've struggled to do low-intensity activities, meaning I've been less active overall. And I'm not the most patient patient, particularly when my everyday movements are curtailed.

Thus, I won't lament a return to being indifferent to such team sports. I had been more than happy engaging in my own physical fun this past decade.
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The panadería's pudgy pauper

@wwaycorrigan

[For an audio version of this blog story click here.]

A boy, about 12 years old, regularly comes into one of my panadería offices asking for food.

Unfortunately, such a scene is not unusual in these parts.

Rather than helping the bread-begging boy, are we killing him softly?

Pan out

However, what makes this particular pauper stand out from the stream of other mendicants is that he seems well, nay overly, fed and is rather neat in appearance. Also, he doesn't appear — thankfully enough, especially considering his youth — to have a drug problem.

He might, though, have a sweet-bread addiction. This would help to explain both his pudginess and penchant for the panadería.

Now, before I am accused of being both cruel and a hypocrite — I've previously documented my predilection for certain panadería delights — I'm not completely begrudging the boy of this farinaceous favour.

An occasional — occasional that is — bit of bread isn't the worst thing he could consume. And because he's plump doesn't mean he's sufficiently satiated.

One concern, however, is that if his diet consists chiefly of highly processed bread, then he's most likely facing into an adulthood of health problems.

Were I to offer him a serving of one of my vegetable stew specials, I wager he'd turn it down. (He never actually approaches me, though. I must have a mean look to me.)

So, there's a chance that he's a foti — fat on the outside, thin on the inside — but in a negative way (the standard view is that a foti is healthier than a tofi, thin on the outside, fat on the inside). This is to say, he's not getting the right nutrition. He's got plenty of company on that front.

'It's a sign that I've been in Colombia too long that I have doubts about the bona fides of the boy's begging.'

Indeed, most of the fare on offer in Colombia's ten-a-peso panaderías should come with a health warning. In addition to high quantities of salt and/or sugar glued together with poor-quality flour, the majority of bakeries use what are in essence poisonous margarines and preservatives.

The giveaway is in the shelf-life. I don't think I've ever seen panadería products go mouldy. One can only wonder what these powerful preservatives do to one's microbiome.

Beg to differ

As for eating wholesomely, some argue that pursuing a healthy diet is far more difficult for society's less well-off. Unhealthier foods are cheaper and more convenient.

That doesn't fully hold true in Colombia. Here, when it comes to diet, it's not always money that does the talking. Convenience often does the "conversing", coupled with, I guess, cravings.

This is because one can buy fresh fruit and vegetables at competitive prices all year round.

Colombia's fruit & veg: Cheap-ish and cheerful (if they're not overly laden with chemicals).

In my part of Bogotá, it's common to see a range of such foodstuffs retailing at around 1,000 pesos per pound — bananas, butternut squash, carrots, green beans, papaya, peppers, potatoes, pumpkin, tomatoes and much more besides.

Throw in the amazing avocado, regularly on offer for five for 2,000 pesos, and we've got the makings of a fairly cheap salubrious snack. (One only hopes, naively perhaps, that these natural goodies aren't laden with harmful pesticides.)

OK, fish, meat and poultry aren't quite as economical but they're not off the charts either, not when compared to what one might fork out for a nutritionally poor panadería treat.

This is why I say convenience and cravings do the conversing, not monetary concerns.

Fair enough, not everyone has access to kitchen facilities to cook food from scratch. And Colombia's worst-paid urban workers often have little free time on a typical day. Between the commute and work itself, 14-hour shifts are common.

As for my panadería's pudgy pauper, I'd have to engage in some espionage to find out his exact circumstances.

A sign, perhaps, that I've been in Colombia for too long that I have doubts, owing to his overall demeanour, about the bona fides of his begging.

Would he take a banana as readily as he takes a bit of bread? Maybe if it was deep-fried he would.
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