The return to my roots

On my second day in Colombia, I felt very emotional by traveling through the mountains, seeing the little towns, the brightly colored houses, and the children running on the streets. The journey, more than traveling from one place to another, was a journey through time. The highway became a dirt road, a muddy slope, a steep trail, slowly climbing up to the clouds, and then walking down among the coffee plantations.

I recognized the green, humid, and everyday landscape even though it was my first time passing through it. I smelled the damp soil, the moss in the forest, and the coffee cherries when they were still attached to the trees. The sweet aroma hit me suddenly, like a breath of fresh air, and it surprised me because I didn’t know I could still remember those feelings.

My emotions were coming back through the sound of the cicadas, the song of the birds, the waterfalls running down the steep slopes. Then the rain came; it also brought back memories, the distant sound of thunder announcing the storm, the lightning, the wind blowing strongly, and the downpour unleashing its power and flooding everything in its path. Finally, the clouds parted to make way for the moon, hidden in a faint rainbow amid the night.

Ortalis columbiana (Colombian Chachalaca), Guira Tanager (Hemithraupis guira), Black-billed thrush (Turdus ignobilis)