Real City Tours: The #1 Free Walking Tour
March 9, 2015 By
Donny Bergeson
“Hey man, have you gone on the walking tour yet?”
I’d been asked this question frequently since arriving in Medellín a
few weeks ago. All three of my roommates had been fervently recommending
the tour to my wife and I, almost from the moment we got here.
And so I used the city’s metro for the first time in order join one of the free walking tours in
El Centro by
Real City Tours.
I exited the metro and scanned the crowds of people for the trademark
red shirt, clipboard and white hat I’d been told to expect. After a
moment, I spotted the tour guide sitting nearby and went over to sign
up.
Pablo is an enthusiastic man in his late twenties. He’d lived in
Europe for almost a decade before returning to his native Colombia.
He directs half of the people who’ve shown up to go with him and the
rest to go with his associate, a woman with the same clipboard and hat
combo.
Known as a Panama hat in the U.S., this signature piece of headgear is a traditional Paisa fashion.
He tells our group of fifteen or so his name is Pablo. After walking
with us down some stairs to an area with a giant black and gold painted
19th-century steam engine, he begins to tell us the early history of
Medellín using the railroad track as a timeline.
A forest of light in Parque de las Luces
Instead of writing a simple synopsis, my aim here is to describe how
the tour made me feel, how brilliantly it blended pre-written material
with unscripted interactions, and how I felt any question I asked was
met with a thoughtful response more nuanced and less speculative than
the answers I’m accustomed to receiving from tour guides.
Pablo is passionate about his home and its history, however
complicated, from the migration of European people that kickstarted the
age of conquest to the “criminal with my name” as our tour guide called
him, that cast such a pall over the late 20th century.
I appreciated the way the stories of the past are gracefully weaved
into the realities of the present. Nothing happens in a vacuum.
The Colombian government chose some of the most violent and
poverty-stricken places in the city to stage its comeback, so often the
same building will show this twin history. A den of prostitution and
hopelessness becomes a civic building while the drug dealer’s plaza is
transformed into the main public square.
This transformation is at the heart of the new Medellín, and Pablo
shows us the city he loves, warts and all, in order to illustrate that
change.
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Melcocha in the making
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My sugar quota for the decade in one serving.
As we walked, I had my first Colombian michelada from a street
vendor. It’s a refreshing drink, combining the juice from a lime with a
Colombian beer (usually Pilsen), served in a cup with a salted rim.
It was better than the Melcocha, a taffy-like candy that is probably the most sugary sweet substance on earth.
A highlight for me was getting to see
Botero Plaza.
Of course, I’d read about it before and seen pictures, but standing
before the giant black sculptures was as beatific and transcendent as
being inside one of Medellín’s many gold leaf ensconced cathedrals.
The sculptures are large, yet inviting. Friendly, yet heroic. The
enormous figures don’t dwarf the viewer, but rather remind them of the
bigness, the largesse, inside of themselves.
The smiles on the human figures are as inscrutable as the Mona Lisa.
The giant black cat is a riddle; a sphinx hiding an ineffable secret.
What do you dream of, big black cat?
The tour has a good mix of famous spots and off the beaten track moments.
After Botero Plaza there’s the colorful textile district, street food
vendors, long alleyways full of folks selling sunglasses and pirated
DVDs, and this incredible relief sculpture, hard for me to even
describe, that arcs towards the heavens with the story of Colombia in
bronze and concrete.
Not pictured: all the porn for sale
I appreciated how Pablo would draw our attention to things happening
around us, little snippets of day to day life that let us into aspects
of Colombian culture.
The tour becomes whatever’s happening that day, like when we turned a
corner into a crowded square where people were gambling on what was for
me a most unusual game.
A guy was laying multicolored little bowls numbered 1 to 10 on the
ground in a circle around an unnumbered yellow bowl. The crowd placed
their bets on the numbered containers; the anticipation in the air was
electric. Something was about to happen.
In an instant, the middle bowl was flipped to show a guinea pig, who
after a moment of trepidation, sprinted to hide under the bowl marked
with an 8. There was a celebration as people claimed their winnings.
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What is under…
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Voilà
As we continued on there were more vendors selling pendants, belts,
jewels, posters, even violins, antiques, various bric-à-brac and fruit.
A boy and his father were singing songs for a small audience that
seemed to know every word. We walked further through the noisy streets,
stopping for a quick empanada or to grab a beer for the walk.
The last moments of the tour were spent with two Botero sculptures
that both illustrate and make real the terrible violence that gripped
the city, as well as the dizzying hope for a better tomorrow, for a more
peaceful future, that is already being born.
Our very presence as tourists was proof enough of a monumental
change. We were evidence of the shift. After the tour was over Pablo led
us back to the metro. The sun was setting in the city, yet the new day
had already arrived.
Details
The tour must be booked in advance through the
Real City Tours website, where you can also find the days, times and meeting points.
The tour is free, but after the three plus hour extravaganza, you
would probably feel like a cheapskate for not leaving a donation. The
donations are anonymous. You may also want to wear sunscreen or a hat.
