There are an extraordinary number of notary offices in this country. Notarias are everywhere, which leads me to believe that this is, like many Latin American countires, a society that loves, or is mired in, paperwork.
Coupled with the plethora of notarias are the equal number of copierias. No small town like Popayan needs so many copy places and yet they seem to be two to the block. One would have to posit an obvious conneciton between the notarias y la copierias. I can only say that I am glad I do not have to wade through whatever paperwork morass these folks must deal with on a regular basis.
To add to the preceding two paragraphs, there are an inordinate number of papelerias in this lovely country. However, given the preceding two paragraphs, the mystery of why there are so many paper stores becomes less of a mystery, no?
Colombians, like Thai and Lao folks, hate large bills and hold on to small change as if it were the last coin they will ever see. Woe betide you if you whip out a 50,000 peso note, which is a whopping $25. Even at the bus terminal, where they have a drawer full of small bills, the teller will give you the frowny-face if you try to pay for a 30,000 peso ticket with a 50,000 peso note.
The two predominant groups of travelers here are Deutsche and Francaise. Ass I type this blog entry, I have a conversation in German going on on my left and in French on my right. My German fellow travellers are the sherpas of the world wanderers. I have seen kinder no older than my son carrying packpacks that simply dwarf their bodies. I did not know that Deuter even made backpacks of this degree of enormity. Then, to keep themselves from falling over backwards from the sheer tonnage they are hauling. they hang a smaller backpack from the front of their tiny bodies. They appear to be luggage with legs. With regard to my French travelers, I can only say that I have never heard a relationship arguement carried on with such passion and such duration as that which entertained me one of my nights in Popayan.
There are two fairly common sights in Colombia with an obvious connection. The first are the "Love" hotels. Usuallly on the outskirts of town, these places sport names like "The Love y Sex Hotel" and are obviously geared for those interested in a shorter stay. The second part of this are the fairly common sex shops. They are what you would expect, with windows displaying frenchmaid outfits, skimpy construction outfits for the boys, all of your garden variety fetish costumes. I have not ventured into either of these establishments, but such is what I have observed. As a side note, I would offer that the female mannequins here are amongst the scariest I have ever seen. There is no way to be delicate about this: They have enormous and physiologically impossible breasts. Not only are these plastic mammaries huge, they jut skyward at an angle that defies gravity. They are disturbing.
To close, I would like to mention the giant bumblebees. They are not exactly bumblebees, and they are not exactly hornets. If one were to breed the two, one might produce a two inch long armoured pollinator that is jet black, and that would be the creature I frequently see in the same flowering trees as the myriad humming birds. I have not gotten close enough to find out if they sting.
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