Grandkids evaluate Colombia


Seeing Colombia through the eyes of first time visitors is interesting, but through grandchildren’s eyes it’s fascinating. They cut straight through to what pleases or frightens.

Breakfast this morning was interjected with cries of “more mango”. They run around in vest and pants in the ever warm climate. And sing-song words like gracias, buenos días, and chao soon enter their vocabulary.

Freed from Health and Safety Regulations they ride in cars without seat belts, clamber on brightly-coloured but not safety-protected swings and join in the melee of a world where people are more important than rules.

Of course there’s a downside. The see-saw doesn’t have a moulded seat bottom for it’s just a swinging log. Cockroaches and mosquitoes are realities; wandering peacocks ever so big. And adults loudly coo over youngsters with red hair.

But it’s a small price to pay to have your mind so expanded that it will never be the same.

I wonder what God feels like when he sees our world? Well, he only had one child and he sent him into it.

Photo: Chloe in her new surroundings

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