defeated by a ceviche
So, obviously, ordering a ceviche in a small town 250km from the sea is a bad idea. I knew that when i ordered it, but i didn't care, because i hadn't eaten anything all day due to feeling a bit weird and uncomfortable. I now think that perhaps i was suffering from heat exhaustion, and the fish just pushed me over the edge.
About 4 hours after i ate, i started violently ejecting everything out of my body, from both top and bottom orifices. It continued overnight and into the morning, which meant i got very little sleep. Normally i'd have some strong coffee in the morning to recover, but after the hell my stomach went through, i didn't feel up to it. I ate two bananas and a half cup of oats. I sipped water, which came right back out the other end.
I really wanted to not travel again, but my hotel in Agustín Codazzi was not great. The tap in the bathroom had a constant drip, and there was also a leak, so the floor was permanently wet. Not the greatest place to try to rest and recover. So i decided to try to make it to La Jagüa de Ibirico, another mining town about 55km down the highway. No weird cross-country routes today, just the flattest, straightest, shortest ride i could find, to a town with several hotels to choose from.
Despite the short distance, it was an absolutely hellish ride. The temperature hovered around 38C/100F all day. There are a lot more trees down this end of the valley than in the northern end, so there was more shade, but it didn't help much against the oppressive heat. Not to mention my nausea from the food poisoning. Ever since i got into the valley the skies have been hazy. I'm not sure if it's from forest fires, or from the slash-and-burn agriculture, or just general pollution, but everything felt like it was suffocating me. Every passing truck belched out putrid fumes.
The highlight was the numerous stops i made along the way, to try to get some kind of thing to settle my stomach. At one spot i got a fresh squeezed orange juice, which wasn't the wisest move, but i needed something cold. Then i got an apple soda, which also wasn't great, but the person had dug through their entire cooler looking for something not very acidic, so i felt like i owed it to them to go for it. While i sat there i talked with the locals about their cure for a bad stomach. They offered me soup, but i know the soup here is full of meat and bones, and the stench of dead animal was the last thing i wanted to deal with. We all agreed steering clear of milk, cheese, eggs and anything fried was a good idea.
At one of the next towns i found a bakery with a huge tray of bread fresh out of the oven. That's exceedingly rare in these small towns - usually it's not even clear if the bakeries bake their own bread, or just get it delivered from some central location. I asked for a bread without milk or eggs in it, and got two bread rolls... which turned out to have butter inside them instead. Honestly, it's utterly hopeless trying to eat vegan in Colombia. You can't even buy bread without animal products in it.
Despite the butter, the hot, fresh bread did seem to go down alright. I chatted with the bakers too, who were really interested in my bike tour. Reminds me of the guy in a previous town who i bought a malta off, we chatted too. Definitely the people in these smaller towns are more chatty and less hard-edged than in the bigger towns of Colombia, which basically busts my theory that the national culture is shaped by the political violence... given the violence is more present in rural areas than any big city. Perhaps it's just the usual big city/small town thing.
La Jagüa de Ibirico, despite sounding like some kind of exotic relic that Lara Croft would be after, is pretty much the archetypical small town. There is absolutely nothing notable here. Or, at least, that i have discovered. Not even a big town square. It just feels like a haphazard jumble of run-down buildings that only really exists because there is a mine and a highway nearby. I like walking through these towns, because you get to strip back all the bullshit and see exactly what humans need to survive. Bars and restaurants. Barbers and beauticians. Phone shops. Vehicle mechanics. Butchers, bakers, greengrocers. Tailors. Pawn shops. The end.
I often think about my life and my career when i travel through towns like this, and i realize how utterly useless i am. Being a software developer has got to be one of the ultimate bullshit jobs in the world. You push code around, and it doesn't even matter, because the vast majority of applications aren't really things that are especially useful. They're just random shit that only exists so that investors can make more money. I spend my whole life making shit that nobody in any of these small towns would ever care about or use. All these Silicon Valley twats who think they're changing the world, all they're doing is putting more money in the pockets of people who were already rich in the first place. It's disgusting. I hate my job so much. It's not a real job. Imagine i got teleported into a small town like this. What would i do? What could i do? I can't fix cars or tractors or motorbikes or trucks. I can't fix anything. I can't do sales. I can't cut hair. I can't run a business. I suppose i could cook, but what would i cook in a place like this? Pizza? Burgers? Fries? White rice and a piece of meat? That's the only things people eat out here. I can't produce anything that people actually want or need. I'm useless.
I suppose this sounds like i am depressed and in some kind of existential crisis, but i'm not really. This is something i have noticed time and time again over the past decade or so as i traveled around. There are common necessities that exist all over the world, in every country, in every town... But white collar workers don't really produce those necessities. The pandemic just made that even more obvious. Who's essential? Pink collar workers are essential. Blue collar workers, sure. But paper pushers? We're pointless. The world just keeps on humming without us.
Sometimes i watch a period show like Our Flag Means Death and wonder what i would do in the time of pirates. What would i be? I can't sail a boat. Would i just be a scribe? That's it, isn't it? I would still be a fucking paper pusher. In ancient times, i'd be the one recording births and deaths on some stone tablet somewhere. Chip, chip, chip, that's my life, that's all i'll ever be. I'm not bummed about it - it is what it is - but it just comes into stark focus from time to time. I think it's important to travel in these places and realize just how useless i am. The only thing i have to give is my story, and even that's not an especially gripping one.
I extended my stay another day. Yesterday i got into the hotel around 3:30pm and immediately passed out, only waking up to get another two bread rolls. (Filled with butter, of course.) I slept all through the night till this morning and still woke up exhausted. The food poisoning is part of it. Cycling through the heat is another. I suspect inhaling all the diesel fumes hasn't helped either. My body is wiped out. I am going to spend all day today in bed. I might try to find some food in this town that is a bit more interesting than scoop of rice with a slab of meat, but i don't like my chances. Oh well. I need to recover before i can cycle on. Not just physically but emotionally. Maybe i can find a fun movie to watch.
About 4 hours after i ate, i started violently ejecting everything out of my body, from both top and bottom orifices. It continued overnight and into the morning, which meant i got very little sleep. Normally i'd have some strong coffee in the morning to recover, but after the hell my stomach went through, i didn't feel up to it. I ate two bananas and a half cup of oats. I sipped water, which came right back out the other end.
I really wanted to not travel again, but my hotel in Agustín Codazzi was not great. The tap in the bathroom had a constant drip, and there was also a leak, so the floor was permanently wet. Not the greatest place to try to rest and recover. So i decided to try to make it to La Jagüa de Ibirico, another mining town about 55km down the highway. No weird cross-country routes today, just the flattest, straightest, shortest ride i could find, to a town with several hotels to choose from.
Despite the short distance, it was an absolutely hellish ride. The temperature hovered around 38C/100F all day. There are a lot more trees down this end of the valley than in the northern end, so there was more shade, but it didn't help much against the oppressive heat. Not to mention my nausea from the food poisoning. Ever since i got into the valley the skies have been hazy. I'm not sure if it's from forest fires, or from the slash-and-burn agriculture, or just general pollution, but everything felt like it was suffocating me. Every passing truck belched out putrid fumes.
The highlight was the numerous stops i made along the way, to try to get some kind of thing to settle my stomach. At one spot i got a fresh squeezed orange juice, which wasn't the wisest move, but i needed something cold. Then i got an apple soda, which also wasn't great, but the person had dug through their entire cooler looking for something not very acidic, so i felt like i owed it to them to go for it. While i sat there i talked with the locals about their cure for a bad stomach. They offered me soup, but i know the soup here is full of meat and bones, and the stench of dead animal was the last thing i wanted to deal with. We all agreed steering clear of milk, cheese, eggs and anything fried was a good idea.
At one of the next towns i found a bakery with a huge tray of bread fresh out of the oven. That's exceedingly rare in these small towns - usually it's not even clear if the bakeries bake their own bread, or just get it delivered from some central location. I asked for a bread without milk or eggs in it, and got two bread rolls... which turned out to have butter inside them instead. Honestly, it's utterly hopeless trying to eat vegan in Colombia. You can't even buy bread without animal products in it.
Despite the butter, the hot, fresh bread did seem to go down alright. I chatted with the bakers too, who were really interested in my bike tour. Reminds me of the guy in a previous town who i bought a malta off, we chatted too. Definitely the people in these smaller towns are more chatty and less hard-edged than in the bigger towns of Colombia, which basically busts my theory that the national culture is shaped by the political violence... given the violence is more present in rural areas than any big city. Perhaps it's just the usual big city/small town thing.
La Jagüa de Ibirico, despite sounding like some kind of exotic relic that Lara Croft would be after, is pretty much the archetypical small town. There is absolutely nothing notable here. Or, at least, that i have discovered. Not even a big town square. It just feels like a haphazard jumble of run-down buildings that only really exists because there is a mine and a highway nearby. I like walking through these towns, because you get to strip back all the bullshit and see exactly what humans need to survive. Bars and restaurants. Barbers and beauticians. Phone shops. Vehicle mechanics. Butchers, bakers, greengrocers. Tailors. Pawn shops. The end.
I often think about my life and my career when i travel through towns like this, and i realize how utterly useless i am. Being a software developer has got to be one of the ultimate bullshit jobs in the world. You push code around, and it doesn't even matter, because the vast majority of applications aren't really things that are especially useful. They're just random shit that only exists so that investors can make more money. I spend my whole life making shit that nobody in any of these small towns would ever care about or use. All these Silicon Valley twats who think they're changing the world, all they're doing is putting more money in the pockets of people who were already rich in the first place. It's disgusting. I hate my job so much. It's not a real job. Imagine i got teleported into a small town like this. What would i do? What could i do? I can't fix cars or tractors or motorbikes or trucks. I can't fix anything. I can't do sales. I can't cut hair. I can't run a business. I suppose i could cook, but what would i cook in a place like this? Pizza? Burgers? Fries? White rice and a piece of meat? That's the only things people eat out here. I can't produce anything that people actually want or need. I'm useless.
I suppose this sounds like i am depressed and in some kind of existential crisis, but i'm not really. This is something i have noticed time and time again over the past decade or so as i traveled around. There are common necessities that exist all over the world, in every country, in every town... But white collar workers don't really produce those necessities. The pandemic just made that even more obvious. Who's essential? Pink collar workers are essential. Blue collar workers, sure. But paper pushers? We're pointless. The world just keeps on humming without us.
Sometimes i watch a period show like Our Flag Means Death and wonder what i would do in the time of pirates. What would i be? I can't sail a boat. Would i just be a scribe? That's it, isn't it? I would still be a fucking paper pusher. In ancient times, i'd be the one recording births and deaths on some stone tablet somewhere. Chip, chip, chip, that's my life, that's all i'll ever be. I'm not bummed about it - it is what it is - but it just comes into stark focus from time to time. I think it's important to travel in these places and realize just how useless i am. The only thing i have to give is my story, and even that's not an especially gripping one.
I extended my stay another day. Yesterday i got into the hotel around 3:30pm and immediately passed out, only waking up to get another two bread rolls. (Filled with butter, of course.) I slept all through the night till this morning and still woke up exhausted. The food poisoning is part of it. Cycling through the heat is another. I suspect inhaling all the diesel fumes hasn't helped either. My body is wiped out. I am going to spend all day today in bed. I might try to find some food in this town that is a bit more interesting than scoop of rice with a slab of meat, but i don't like my chances. Oh well. I need to recover before i can cycle on. Not just physically but emotionally. Maybe i can find a fun movie to watch.