Envigado Oral- Dr. Juan David Restrepo

We continually seek out English speaking Doctors and Dentists in Medellin so if a little health tourism is part of your aganda for visiting, you will at least have a few recommended physicians to consider.

A friend recently had to have several root canals done (at way below US and European prices) and our other Dentist friend Dr. Juan Carlos Meia Escalante recommended an associate in Envigado.  Now, my friend is not exactly over zealous about going to a Dr. or Dentist in the first place.  In fact, he has outright panic attacks…..seerriioouuss ones!

Dr. Restrepo agreed to come to Dr. Mejias office to perform the procedure.  I forewarned him about my friends “panic syndrome” and he assured me everything would be OK.  He, he he.  Little did he know my friend.

After an hour of trying to get a little novocaine in his mouth Dr. Restrepo finally decided to take a break and re-group with a diferent approach.  A little hypnosis/calming technique finally got everything underway.

 

Anyway, Dr. Restrepo did such an excellent job and very affordable prices, I decided to put him on the MTG website as another Medellin Dentist specializing in General Dentistry, Endodontics (root canals) and laser whitening.  He also provided a laymans explaination of various dental reconstrucitive and restorative procedures along with photos and price ranges. This shoud give you a good benchmark to compare other prices in other parts of the world.

 

And get this;

1-He will schedule Saturday or Sunday appointments in advance of your arrival if you only have a couple of days to spend in Medellin;

2-He will provide a “Web Cam” examination or review digital X-Rays (if you have them) and give you and opinion on what procedure you should consider and the approximate costs;

3-You can call him on his cell phone or send him e-mails and he will actually answer;

4- He has agreed to be on-call for any English Speaking Medellin Visitor that may have an emergency requirement (chip/break a tooth, have an abcess, have a filling fall out etc).  Can you imagine that in the US or Europe????

Feel free to contact him directly and if you mention Medellin Travel Guide, he will give you an additional 10% discount.

Feria de Las Flores has come and gone but photos and videos were not all that was taken!

A large 10 day event like Feria de Las flores attracts visitors and tourists from all over the world.  Coupled with the fact that Colombiamoda arranged it’s ending to coincide with the beginning of the Feria and you already had a city full of foreign guests.

I was speaking with a friend who told me he got his pocket picked at Cabalgata (the annual horse parade) but thankfully they only got a few thousand pesos.  His friend had warned him to hide his big stash of cash in a zippered pocket.  During the conversation, a girl piped in and said she had her cell phone stolen out of her zippered purse.  Within minutes, two other people related similar incidents of having money or cell phones stolen by pickpockets.

Well, I have always preached being cautious in Medellin.  Not wearing flashy jewlery, not carrying large sums of cash, holding onto your items, backpacks, cell phones etc (especially near El Centro).

So, the day of Feria de Los Silliteros (Flower carriers parade) came and I was looking forward to seeing this event for my first time.  We decided to go to Plaza Mayor where we could see the ending of the parade and where the judging an reviewing stands were located.  Seems every other Paisa had similar ideas as the crowd was about 100 deep and 300-400 yards long in both directions on both sides of the street.  We began to punch our way forward like every other person there in hopes of getting close enough for some photos and video.  At one point we got into a rip tide of people trying to get out and people trying to push forward and got squeezed pretty hard.  I pulled away and immediately knew I had been pick pocketed.  Sure enough, even though I had it in my front pants pocket of some pretty tight jeans, the cell phone was gone.  I didn’t get too upset but knew it was going to be a lot of work replacing all the numbers I had stored in my SIM chip. My friend immediately tried to call my number to see if we could hear it ring closeby but alas, they had already turned it off and it went straight to message. I was just amazed at how quickly and easily they had taken it.  I usually have trouble fishing my phone out of my pocket when it is my own hand going in after it!

So, we re-grouped and walked down the Calle a ways, looking for another vantage point where we might get a closer glimpse of the parade.  We saw a spot below a passover and the crowd looked pretty manageable.  Armed with my wallet in my left pocket (secured by my left hand inside the pocket) and my shoulder valise tightly pressed over my right pocket, we started making our way towards the crowd.  At one point, my date found an opening and made a beeline for an open space on the street.  I was right behind her until a kid got separated from his father, the father trying desperately to retrieve him and again a sudden surge of people going in both directions squeezed me.  But, I was secure. I had my wallet in my hands and my valise firmly snuggled over my other pocket….or so I thought1  Yep!  Got about 24,000 COP.  I never felt a thing. These guys were pros!

We backed out of the crowd onto a nearby sidewalk. My date explained how many proessional pickpockets from all over Colombia came to Feria de Las Flores because of the huge crowds and large number of foreign tourists.  As we were talking, the police arrested two female pickpockets that had been caught by the victim.  Neither were my thieves. I still felt a small elation that some were being caught.

I was convinced and wanted no more of this encounter (or losses) so we left.  We went home and watched the Feria on live TV and even filmed a bit of it.  Wish it could have been live and next year, we will find a vantage point in a less crowded area or in reserved grandstand seating.

The next day, all my friends were aghast when I told them the story.  I was out a cell phone and 24K pesos.  As we sat in our favorite coffee restaurant in Parque Lleras recanting the experience, two more people at a nearby table were telling us of their experience of being pickpocketed the previous day.  As we listened intently, I looked to my left to check on my valise and guess what…..It was gone!  I couldn’t believe it.  It was in a chair 6 inches from my left leg.  It was in plain sight of my peripherial vision and my friends direct line of sight.  It was in plain view of our neighbors telling the story.  Only 1 person passed between us during the entire conversation.  These people are too good. The police were not much help even after we described the only person that moved between us.

 

This time, it was a little more costly;

A 3CCD LCD Digital Video Camera; 7 Megapixel Sony Point and shoot camera, house keys (requiring us to change our locks) office keys, (requiring us to change 12 locks), a receipt book for business expenses (which I will never remember them all), business cards of clients and vendors, 2 calculator’s, tape measure, Cross Pen and Pencil set and various other things. I lost some irreplaceable video (until next year) and photos. 

The police explained there were many professional thieves in Medellin for Feria de Las Flores and as much as they tried to protect citizens, these are experts and they are very fast, have a network of accomplices that move any stolen merchandise very quickly.

What can you do?  It does no good to get mad.  It is gone!  You cannot find it.  It can be replaced.

Will I go to Feria de Las Flores next year?  You bet I will but will have more secure observation points.  I may even hire a security guy for the days of the parades to be my wingman.  A big guy that nobody will push around.  I will have zippered pockets, not carry much money, will tie down my camera bag inside any restaurant and just be a little more cautious.

Has the experience made me negative about Medellin?  Not one little bit! These are professional thieves that come here from all over Colombia to prey on the citizens and visitos that want to participate in the largest annual event of the city.

 

Viva Medellin but beware and very cautious with your valuables when you are in large crowds during Ferias.  These theives are very, very good!

“I won’t know them”

Alex Miguel Hernandez R. wrote to me, “I left Medellin when I was 4 years old and 30 years later I am returning for the Flower Festival to visit my family”

He has never met a large number of his family.  Aunts, uncles, cousins and a grandmother who is still living.  He grew up in a bi-lingual family in South Florida yet he never really knew the city of Medellin where he was born.

“Your site inspired me to make a visit to the home of my family” he wrote.

His father, a prominent attorney and businessman, packed up the family and their posessions when Alex was merely 4 years old and moved to the US.  His father was fairly fluent in English but the rest of the family spoke only Spanish.  They struggled to survive in an English speaking environment, sent their kids to both public and private schools and spoke both English and Spanish in their home.

Alex never met his grandfathers.  One died of natural causes while the other was killed by rebels who opposed his political views.  Three of his uncles met with untimely deaths due to the FARC and several of his cousins disappeared due to drug gang related activities.

“My family in Medellin will not know me and I will not know them”, he wrote to me.  But I want to ride in Cabalgata at the Feria de las Flores in honor of my father. “He used to ride in the parade every year with his brothers and family.  Can you help me find a horse I can ride in the parade?”

It was a challenge we could not resist.  Calls went out to friends, acquaintances, people in restaurants and our small network of gringos in Medellin. After almost 3 months of seemingly futile efforts, finally, a friend put us in touch with a tour operator who had access to over 200 horses available for rent for the Flower Festival.  Call it the Mother Lode! “He can rent anything from a mule to a thoroughbred stallion” (the latter being somewhat expensive by local standards).  Alex rented the stallion without a blink of an eye. 

An accomplished equestrian due to his fathers insistence on maintaining the family’s historical roots, Alex decided to spare no expense on his return to Medellin, honoring his fathers tradition of riding in Cabalgata and finally meeting his extended family.

“You have been so helpful I do not know how to repay you” he recently wrote to me. “Write a short atricle of your experiences revisiting the home of your birth” was my response. “Consider it done”,  was his American English colloquial response.

We look forward to reading about his experiences.

Alex, bienvenidos a Medellin!

Colombiamoda ends, Feria de Las Flores Begins

Local lingerie and beachwear designer Leonisa made it’s usual grand entrance and captivated the audience with its sexy, lavish creations pointing out the fashion trend of the upcoming summer season in Colombia. “The bright coloured red, pink and yellow lingerie embroidered with laces and glitter seemed to match perfectly with the the show entitled “Latin Furor”. The Leonisa catwalk show is perhaps the most difficult to obtain tickets for as it’s models are always breathtakingly beautiful as well as revealing in their display of “Ropa Interior”
         
“The celebrated Spanish designer, Custo Dalmau,  stole the spotlight this year at Colombiamoda. His brand, ‘Custo Barcelona’, widely known for its t-shirts and other casual clothes, closed the last and final night of the event with a show that mixed outfits from both winter and summer collections.”
         
“The blending of fabrics in dark and light colors highlighted this years collection and brought to a pinnacle his adept ability to create new designs that the public will buy.”
         
Colombiamoda claimed that from January to April 2008, the Colombian clothes industry generated sales worth $879 million dollars up 42.2 percent jumping from $325 million to $476 million dollars from the same period last year.

 

The following day marked the 51st annual beginning of Feria de Las Flores.  This year, the feria organizers placed the world famous Cabalgata on the first Saturday instead of the last Sunday of the event.  It seemed to be a stroke of genius as the Cabalgata attracted record crowds and participants in the parade (as if that were possible).  Staking our position in front of Carrefour on the Autopista, we were quickly immersed in a sea of local paisas partying, watching the parade, visiting with friends and enjoying a beautiful sunny day in Medellin.  Within hours, it became a standing room only event much like a crowded concert.  Bodies seemed to merge with one another and moving amongst the hordes of people became more and more difficult as the afternoon wore into the evening.

Observations from Cabalgata 2007 versus 2008;

-The parade was in the opposite direction this year.  Last year it went from N to S.  This year was fron S to N.

-It seemed like more people and more parade participants (as if that were possible?)

-Last year, parade watchers were kept back against a roped off area.  This year, the crowds were going back and forth to the opposite median, posing with riders and walking amongst the parade participants.

-Last year, the parade seemed to move along rather easily. This year, there seemed to be frequent bottlenecks that frequently halted the parade.  It certainly was better for taking video.

As a parting note, we left before the crowd became even more engorged on Rum, Aguardiente, Beer and other locally grown products.  Still, we have never seen so many beutiful women in one place at one time in our lives.  Absolutely breathtaking!

 

Medellin Travel Guide

2008 Feria de Las Flores Schedule changes

The Mayors office of Medellin revised the schedule of events for Feria de Las Flores and unfortunately, MTG did not catch the change. Normally, Cabalgata is held on the last Sunday of the 10 day event but this year, they moved it up to the first Saturday of the Feria.

 

Cabalgata is actually on Saturday August 2nd, beginning at 2:00PM and continuing until….well, probably all night!  Please refer to the Alcaldes event schedule for the latest updates.

We will be there today taking photos and videos.  Unfortunately, we will not have our tent and planned activities.  We kinda got caught with our pants down on this one.  Our bad and we will just have to do a better job of planning for next years event.

 

Our apologies for any inconvenience.