Quibdó, 12 February 2016

There’s something I call absence of sea. It’s a particular sensation, a series of singular emotions that take hold when it’s a long time since I last saw the sea. It’s a kind of yearning, and so physical – I notice it on my skin – that you could say it’s like getting the shivers. It makes me feel almost homesick, and on the verge of sadness, even if it’s a happy time. Then my every pore starts crying out, and I know for sure that what I’m missing is the sea. Gazing at each other, touching each other: me and the sea. So whenever I have that sensation I need to hurry to the nearest place where we can be reunited at last. Absence of sea has made me travel to Capurganá, to Necoclí and, of course, to Bahía Solano on several occasions.

I haven’t written to you for a long time. I’m not quite sure why not, but I’m here now because I’m beginning to feel something similar to absence of sea. In this case it’s a kind of absence of you. I’ll try to bring you up to speed with what’s been going on.

While I was in Juradó, I decided to come and live in Quibdó. Five days after that last letter I wrote you, I sorted out the few things I had in Bahía and travelled to Quibdó. I rented a flat in the centre, and my husband finally sent over all the stuff from Medellín.

I’d already brought my cats, and now it’s the three of us, Mandarina, Sasha and me, in this sweltering city on the banks of the Atrato. I hadn’t planned to come back here. I don’t have the best memories of it from my childhood, but a lot of things have changed since then, not in Quibdó but in me, so that now I see it differently.

As of four days ago I’m the new head of communications at the Chocó Chamber of Commerce. It sounds as if I’ve thrown out my shorts and flip-flops and shut myself up in an office, but that’s not how it is. This is a great opportunity that makes the dream house by the sea feel much closer, and in the meantime lets me serve the land I come from.

Tomorrow I start a diploma in reading promotion, and with it my project, Motete. We’ve chosen three areas of Quibdó where I’ll start running the workshops.

Life is still coloured green and blue. I haven’t seen the sea since December, partly because we’re going to Brazil in August, for the Olympics, which we’ve dreamt of doing for years, so we’re budgeting for that. We have tickets now, and accommodation. We’re doing well. So I’ve put off a couple of encounters with the sea here, in order to meet it in August in Rio de Janeiro.

Microbusinesses Colombia got in touch to ask me to help with some comms. On Monday, someone will visit from Medellín, the person I’m usually in touch with. I’ll let you know how it goes. I enjoy it a lot.

Hugs,

Vel