January 2023
Cartagena de Indias, Patrimonio Cultural de la Humanidad, fue fundada en el año 1533 y todavía guarda cierta suntuosidad de aquella época. Casas antiguas de arquitectura española con esplendorosos patios centrales y hechizantes balcones llenos de flores. La ciudad es todo realismo mágico: puede ser, a la vez, nacarada, carmesí, rosada, azulada, parda, anaranjada, morada, o esmeralda. En sus empedradas callecitas angostas se respira leyenda, melancolía, galantería, jolgorio, y belleza natural.
Por la tardecita, a eso de las 5:00, estos colores de Cartagena se tornan mágicos bajo la luz del atardecer tropical y toda la ciudad se convierte una colorida cacofonía. Las ventanas y puertas, las fachadas y paredes de colores vibrantes me contagiaron de alegría, me invadieron de encanto, y me sentí como Florentino Ariza, aquel personaje de Gabriel García Márquez que creyó morir de amor. Como diría el colombiano premio Nobel de Literatura en su autobiografía Vivir para Contarla: “Me bastó dar un paso atrás dentro de la muralla para ver [Cartagena] en toda su grandeza a la luz de las 6 de la tarde, y no pude reprimir el sentimiento de haber vuelto a nacer”.
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Cartagena de Indias, Cultural Heritage of Humanity, was founded in 1533 and still has a certain sumptuousness from that time. Old houses of Spanish architecture with splendid central patios and bewitching balconies full of flowers. The city is all magical realism: it can be, at the same time, pearly, crimson, pink, bluish, brown, orange, purple, or emerald. In its narrow cobbled streets one can breathe legend, melancholy, gallantry, revelry, and natural beauty.
In the late afternoon, around 5:00 these colors of Cartagena become magical under the light of the tropical sunset, and the entire city becomes a colorful cacophony. The windows and doors, the facades and walls of vibrant colors filled me with joy, enchanted me, and I felt like Florentino Ariza, that character of Gabriel García Márquez who thought he was dying of love. As the Colombian Nobel Prize for Literature would say in his autobiography Vivir para Contarla, "It was enough for me to take a step back inside the wall to see [Cartagena] in all its grandeur in the light of 6 o'clock in the afternoon, and I could not repress the feeling of having been born again”
Read MorePor la tardecita, a eso de las 5:00, estos colores de Cartagena se tornan mágicos bajo la luz del atardecer tropical y toda la ciudad se convierte una colorida cacofonía. Las ventanas y puertas, las fachadas y paredes de colores vibrantes me contagiaron de alegría, me invadieron de encanto, y me sentí como Florentino Ariza, aquel personaje de Gabriel García Márquez que creyó morir de amor. Como diría el colombiano premio Nobel de Literatura en su autobiografía Vivir para Contarla: “Me bastó dar un paso atrás dentro de la muralla para ver [Cartagena] en toda su grandeza a la luz de las 6 de la tarde, y no pude reprimir el sentimiento de haber vuelto a nacer”.
***
Cartagena de Indias, Cultural Heritage of Humanity, was founded in 1533 and still has a certain sumptuousness from that time. Old houses of Spanish architecture with splendid central patios and bewitching balconies full of flowers. The city is all magical realism: it can be, at the same time, pearly, crimson, pink, bluish, brown, orange, purple, or emerald. In its narrow cobbled streets one can breathe legend, melancholy, gallantry, revelry, and natural beauty.
In the late afternoon, around 5:00 these colors of Cartagena become magical under the light of the tropical sunset, and the entire city becomes a colorful cacophony. The windows and doors, the facades and walls of vibrant colors filled me with joy, enchanted me, and I felt like Florentino Ariza, that character of Gabriel García Márquez who thought he was dying of love. As the Colombian Nobel Prize for Literature would say in his autobiography Vivir para Contarla, "It was enough for me to take a step back inside the wall to see [Cartagena] in all its grandeur in the light of 6 o'clock in the afternoon, and I could not repress the feeling of having been born again”
