A Friday of interaction with Angels and Demons in Bogotá

I will tell you two stories that I experienced, together with my mother, in Bogotá, hours before the election of mayors and local administrations in October 2019. Here goes:

The Angel…

My mother, an older woman, had a medical appointment near the El Country Clinic around 2 in the afternoon. Due to Bogotá traffic, he was late. When she arrived in the area, a boy, well dressed and educated, approached her, who, distraught, was not sure how to get to the address.

The boy very kindly offered to take her. My mother told him that she was running late and that perhaps she had already missed the appointment. He said not to worry, to make another appointment if he missed it, but not to get bitter about it, that there are more important things to worry about in life.

Now calmer and surprised by the boy's interest and maturity, my mother asks him what he was doing alone on the street. The boy commented that he was visiting an aunt's house who lives in the area, but that he got lost from time to time and that he knew the area and all the buildings' doormen very well.

Upon arriving at the address of the medical appointment, the boy greets the doorman and tells my mother that he was leaving her in safe hands. Then he says goodbye.

My mother tells the doorman how kind the boy who brought her was and asks him if he knew him, to which the doorman says that it is the first time he has seen him there. The child disappears among the people passing through the area. The appointment was not missed.

The demon…

I was in Carulla on 85th Street buying some cans of food for my cat, nothing out of the ordinary, and “burning” a little time while I met my mother, who had a medical appointment near the Clínica el Country.

While walking through the aisles of the supermarket looking at the promotions and sales “branded” with Halloween, a woman of about 50 years of age, with a pale and shiny face, with medium-long black hair and a dark blue raincoat and paint “Chico-chic” from “good people” followed me, made angry gestures and grumbled what seemed like curses under his breath.

I didn't even think about it, I thought that maybe she was, like “some of us” usually do, talking to herself, recreating some argument in her mind. But no, the lady followed me island after island making gestures, until on one of them, the one with the wines, I stayed looking at her. She neither hesitates nor lazily begins to raise her voice and insult me directly.

“Son of a bitch, guerrilla, murderer…”

Strange, my head has difficulty processing the surreal scene.

"If you!" He says while looking at me pale and angry. “Raul Reyes in the Carulla on 85!” Still in disbelief, I look at her without responding while she raises the volume of her voice. “Murderer, guerrilla, look here is Raul Reyes in Carulla on 85.” And starts walking towards the boxes. Faced with the scandal I finally react and go after her.

I catch up with her and ask her what she wants to tell me. “Madam, repeat to me what you are telling me.”

She neither rudely nor lazily rebukes me. “You are Raul Reyes”, “murderer”, “guerrilla”. “Raul Reyes so cheerful in Carulla on 85.”

Although I have a beard and was wearing an olive green cap, I don't think I look like Raul Reyes.

“Madam, I am not who you say. If you want, I'll show you my ID,” I say, trying to contain the volcano of anger that begins to stir from my feet to my head, passing through my stomach and chest.

“The IDs falsify it, murderer.”

The people in the boxes begin to look strangely at the embarrassment. Pale, with a slight tremor in his hands, I answered, "Okay, let's call the police, you confuse me with someone who IS ALREADY dead and call me a murderer, that's insult... let's call the police."

One of the cashiers and a couple of customers begin to ask them to call the police as the woman screams. A customer in one of the lines shouts “Raul Reyes was killed in Ecuador, you crazy old woman.”

The lady begins to sneak among the people entering and leaving Carulla while I decide to stand in line to pay for my cat's food. A woman with her son tells me that I don't look like Raul Reyes and that if I were Raul Reyes the insult would not be justified. To which I tell him that for me it is an insult that they called me a murderer, a guerrilla and a guy who did a lot of harm to the country. But he was also a guy who had been dead for more than 10 years.

Thinking that the hubbub stopped there, I tried in vain to calm myself down, because the lady who was insulting me turned her spear to insult me and tell me... "If you don't want to be insulted, take off that beard and that hat..."

And he finished with… “Guerrilla killer”

The only thing I can say is… “Two days before the elections we are like this, seeing demons where there are none and electing devils to govern us. "Our society is made up of people like this."

The security then pretends to go to the “lady” and she quickly leaves the Carulla.

One of the cashiers, seeing me trembling, approaches, takes me to the bakery checkout so I don't wait in line, and offers me a glass of water to calm me down, a gesture that I appreciate but I tell her it's not necessary.

Just like that, on any given Friday, you come across an angel or a demon. They make or break your day.

* In the photo the “resurrected”