Enamorado de Colombia

Oh, how I love this country! It's been almost a month since I've returned to ''mi nueva tierra'' and I love every minute of it. It is so difficult to describe in words just as to how happy I feel here. I just remember for the first few nights, feeling a rush of boiling energy swirling around my chest like a whitewater river. I also remember slowly filling my chest with the Bogotá air; feeling like I could float to the top of Monserrate. It was almost the same sensation you feel when you fall in love with a new woman.

Never in my life had I felt so happy, so accomplished; I sometimes ask myself what I did to deserve so much euphoria? Only in Colombia have I ever felt this way. I must be one of the luckiest men in the world right now. Wow, I never thought I would ever say that.

There's a stretch of road in Bogotá the taxi drives through every morning. It's a bridge where I  get the most picturesque view of Colombia's capital city. I see the tall, rolling green mountains from the downtown area of Bogotá staring down upon me like a guardian; dwarfing Torre Colpatria, the tallest building in all of Colombia. The view lasts maybe 15 seconds before it's blocked by a stretch of stores, but it's the one thing I look forward to most on my commute to work.

Colombia has had a terrible reputation for a long time. There are still several out there thinking that Colombians constantly live in a war zone; that Colombia is only a place filled with drugs, violence, and sadness. I've had friends even ask me if people drive cars in Colombia. We all of course know better than that. Colombia may look like an old, scary haunted house on the outside due to its history, but if your mind is open enough to walk through the front door, you will find a beautifully decorated home full of warmth, comfort and happiness.

I sometimes wonder if I was a Colombian in a previous life. Ever since I could remember, I had always been looking for a place where the people were genuinly nice, where the weather was fine, where I would have not one but several close friends, and where the women were beautiful.

I found that place in Colombia. I honestly felt like I came not just home but to heaven and I really cannot imagine myself anywhere else in the world at this moment. I just can't wait until I have the opportunity to share this wonderful country with my family back in the United States. The only thing I'm missing in my life at the moment is a girlfriend, which I think can wait.

So far RCN has been abolutely fantastic. I honestly couldn't have asked for a better job nor a better place to work. RCN may be Colombia's largest television network covering the entire country but everybody is so relaxed, so polite, so content and so genuinly nice. You never see people slamming down phones or running around in a temper-tantrum rage. It's the big studio that's like a little family. Everybody is a friend here.

I don't consider myself a Colombian celebrity yet but I've already had my share of features and interivews already. Brian Andrews and I were interviewed by Estilo, which is like the Enterntainment Tonight of Colombia. It was my very first interview in Spanish but I basically told everybody my story as to how I fell in love with this country and how happy I feel here. I was very nervous but I think I pulled it off very well. To my knowledge, the interviews haven't aired yet but should be coming soon.

My second interview in Spanish was with the famous 'La Negra Candela,' a well-known gossip journalist here in Bogotá. Oliver Diglesias and I appeared on her radio show Picantísimo (See Part 1 and Part 2), and it was good thing Oliver came along, since I could't understand everything she said. Oliver, however, loves to talk a lot I noticed, but I think I said enough. You can see a link to the interviews in the right column.

I was curious one day and typed my name in Google and was surprised to find the website Farándula Criolla had featured an article on me. I couldn't help but smile and feel satisfied when it called me, ''El gringo más colombiano...'' (The most Colombian ''gringo'') Keep in mind that gringo, a nickname for Americans, does not have a derogatory meaning here in Colombia, as it does in some countries. Perhaps I really was a Colombian in a previous life, afterall. The same article was also printed in a Cartagena newspaper.

So there you have it, folks. I'm in love with this country and I don't plan on leaving for a while. Only in Colombia can you find a culture so rich, a land so beautiful, and a people so genuine. Oh yes, and how could I forget the food? Only the best you'll ever taste. Colombia: never, ever change, please. You have so much to be proud of. ¡Qué bonita es está vida!