Life from Canada to Latin America, one word at a time.
“Dear 1037148,” wrote one admirer to a golden elm in May. “You deserve to be known by more than a number. I love you. Always and forever.” (Atlantic Magazine) Airports are my favourite. There is nothing to do but sit, think, eat hamburgers, and spray myself with expensive perfumes. Whatever is left behind is simply
When I was growing up, Canada Day meant a giant cake in the park, face painting, and a parade featuring kids on bikes and all three of the fire trucks. Sometimes, there were even potato sack races and candy tosses. This year, I painted my face and straightened my hair. I hobbled around in stilettos,
It rained the whole three days we were in Puerto Asis, Putumayo. Instead of the blast of hot, humid, air I was expecting when I stepped of the plane, we were meet by gray skies and drizzling rain. From the weather to the alien looking pineapples currently in season, with their spiky skin, everything was
A strong woman is a woman who is straining. A strong woman is a woman standing on tiptoe and lifting a barbell while trying to sing Boris Godunov. A strong woman is a woman at work cleaning out the cesspool of the ages, and while she shovels, she talks about how she doesn’t mind crying,
During my first real brush with culture shock in Colombia, I ended up sitting on a bag of cabbages in the back of a truck and sobbing. It was the last day of the Mampujan march and the whole process had challenged my idea of organization and logistics. We had survived the planning beforehand, the
Before coming to Colombia, I spent a summer working with an Aboriginal women’s group in the Yukon. I thought I knew things, but one of the greatest lessons I learnt was how little I actually did. As I researched and read, I learnt more deeply about the realities of missing and murdered Aboriginal women, colonialism,
Vilma is in charge of the kitchen and the coffee and gives me my daily inspection when I arrive to fill up my mug. Within five minutes, I know if I have made the right clothing choices or not. When I cut my own bangs, Wilma was clear that it had not been a good
I celebrated my 30th birthday on Thursday night. Confession: it was not really my birthday, nor am I turning thirty. Rather, for a variety of reasons and crises, my real thirtieth birthday was not the celebration I had hoped it would be. So, we decided to redo it, and in the process, restart the decade.
One mark of being a foreigner here is comparing stories. Bring up the visa processes and expect a collective groan before someone launches into a complicated tale filled with woe, blood tests and paperwork. We love to outdo each other with tales of time spent standing in lines and being sent from one office to another.
“The barrenness of the poetic task: as if every day we look out at a courtyard of rubble and from this are required to make something beautiful.” – Theodore Roethke, quote found on the ever lovely Calm Things blog. For lunch sometimes, I go to a vegetarian restaurant near my office. The food is okay,
Anna L. Vogt 