Midnight in Bogota; escapism fail

New Year's Eve in Colombia is a day for big family reunions, so many people go out of town, throw house parties or hire tables in restaurants.  The noise throughout the evening from the houses in my street were so joyful, traditional music and people of all ages singing and laughing.  A lovely tradition.  Apparently the 24th - 26th December is also reserved for close family, lucky them.

I wandered down the street at 11.30pm, bidding 'Feliz Anos' to the armed guards stationed along the way, having their own quiet party to music on their phones.  At the bottom of Calle 10, the party I had been expecting in the plaza had been called off, for fears that the political demonstration that had set up camp there might hijack celebrations.  So I picked up pace down Carrera 7, one of the city's main streets to find the big fiesta, the one streamed live on television. The normally crowded street was mostly deserted leaving the security guards, those who had escaped their families, those who had no family and the homeless to fill the space.

It was a ten minute walk and I nearly turned back, happy that I had seen the Christmas decorations and heard the sound of private parties behind locked doors.  I've not been a fan of the midnight point of New Year's Eve for a while; it has always been an anticlimax, an unfulfilled promise.  While closing a chapter you step onto a blank page with trepidation knowing that it will be so easily soiled.  

So it was enough for me just to have a new kind of memory, a new place, nothing profound expected.  But having hesitated, looked at my watch with 5 minutes to go I decided there was no harm in a few more steps, just to see where the road led.  With 30 seconds to go until midnight I was suddenly surrounded by music bouncing off the buildings and above me the graphics on the tower shouted the countdown.  I reached the edge of the party where I could see the crowd.  I stopped and stood with those also on the edge, the street sellers hoping to make a good night's income, those who had no one to go into the gathering with, tourists and migrant workers who looked like they wouldn't belong with the crowd.  At midnight I watched an elderly homeless man rip the rubbish bag from the bin and sift through the contents, while a teenager did the same on the other side of me. As the humble fireworks lit the sky a boy no older than 6 or 7 pulled a trailer of drinks in front of me, far too heavy for him, and into the crowd.

I came here expecting some form of escapism, hoping for a break from the norm, assuming I wouldn't fit in.  As the year ended and started life came and slapped me for being so stupid, as I stood in one of the most real places on earth.

In Colombia, wealth and power is concentrated in the hands of the elite - they dominate politics, monopolise resources, and repress social movements, trade unions, political opposition and others seeking to challenge the balance of power.

Colombia has the highest number of internally displaced people in the world, estimated between 4 and 5.5 million, and in the past 20 years more than 70,000 civilians have been killed or have disappeared.

Despite being a middle-income country, one in three Colombians lives in poverty. Poverty is widespread in rural communities and particularly affects those who have been forced off their land.

A recent UN study indicated that just 1% of the population owns 52% of the country’s land, which has contributed to making Colombia one of the most unequal nations on earth.

The reason for the heavy military and police presence in this part of Bogota is to encourage the tourist industry.  I have no problem with that, even the poorest in this part of town are relatively safe compared to those behind the tourist curtain and there is plenty of potential for work and prosperity for all the social classes.  

I went into the party, through security to the carefree revellers.  I enjoyed the traditional music and the apparently well known pop anthems blasting out.  Several tipsy couples did the 'we're the only two people in the room dance', except here they don't sway - they merengue.

I expected to feel like I had walked into to a different world, but those in the city identify themselves as Colombians and they are connected to their country.  There is a very real sense that the majority stand on the edge of the party, struggling and oppressed in one way or another.   The danger of a thriving tourist industry, and the glossy representations of the country on TV, is that the real Colombia is swept under the carpet with problems blamed on militants and small guerilla factions.  The people of Colombia aren't fooled.  Their cries as the New Year rolled in were ones of hope and change, of dignity and progress.  Those inside the party evidently feel lucky, but they are not blind.

I walked back through the quiet streets (heavily policed still, it's ok parents) wondering whether the reason I found New Year's Eve so disappointing was that I had hoped it would be a moment of freedom, of pure hope and expectation.  Maybe it's the realness that takes away the fear of the blank page, the opportunities not to keep it perfectly neat but to get dirty hands, trip and struggle, rifle through the rubbish for something good... that makes New Year an occasion.

So much for a care free holiday.  Thank God.