Pirates and little boys in Buenaventura Columbia

Everyone bent over to have a look. There they were a couple of little boys, about seven or eight years old. They were eating the last bits of chicken off the bones and then biting the ends off and sucking out the marrow. When the boys saw all the strange faces looking at them they dropped the bones and tried to scramble away. Robert grabbed one and Klaus the other. Their thick black hair was matted and long, their big brown frightened. They were filthy and skinny their ribs showing above the too big cutoffs they wore. Bill spoke to them in Spanish asking why they were hiding under the table in the first place. They replied they were hungry and knew they could get the scraps from the tables. They did it all the time. About then the cook came out of the kitchen waving a pan yelling at the kids telling them to get out - don’t bother the customers. John Mc held out the rest of his uneaten chicken to one of the boys. He grabbed it without hesitation. Looking at the cook Mark spoke up as he reached for his wallet, “give me a couple more orders for these kids.” Everyone agreed and chipped in for the food. The cook just shook his head as he headed back to the kitchen, muttering that this would just make them worse.
Bill talked to the boys for a while. They lived in a shack by the waterfront with their father and 5 other siblings, some younger, some older. Their mother had disappeared earlier in the year.
The cook hollered that the order was ready and slammed it on the counter. Randy went to pick it up and gave it to the older of the two boys. He took it and held it like it was the most wonderful thing in the world. It probably was. With many, many “Gracias, Muchas Gracias” they ran down the roadway and around a corner with their prize. It was a quiet group that headed back to the hotel.

When they opened the doors to their rooms and turned on the lights the floor was seemed to be moving! The roaches went scurrying into the corners and up the walls. Bill said he’d never seen anything like it. Some of the bugs had horns on their heads; others seemed to be the size of small mice. No one wanted to lie down. Bruce said he knew what to do, they needed salt. It is what they did in Vietnam to keep the bugs away from their sleeping bags.
He left to purchase enough salt to spread around their beds and bags. But it would only be for one night. Randy still swears the bugs could open the doors to get in.
At the break of day, after a restless night, they went down at the Gulf Trader’s dock. There was no boat tied up to the wharf. There was no boat in sight in the harbor.
Over to the agent’s office. Well there are still some problems with the dock workers. It couldn’t be unloaded today even if it was here, so come back tomorrow. Back to the hotel where Bruce called Cali to let us know they didn’t have the vehicles yet. Tomorrow maybe. Ugh, another night with the “animals.”
This evening they went to Harry’s Bar - a tavern and grill down the street from the hotel. Harrys was a three story wooden building with a balcony on the 2^nd floor that was supported by two green wooden pillars. Under the balcony were a few tables and chairs for outside dining. At one time the building had been white, now it was kind of a no color with its share of moss and mold growing on it. It faced a plaza with a flag pole, palm trees and stone work fountains. The menu here had more than chicken on it. Inside there was an old wooden bar and with six or seven card tables with folding metal chairs for eating. The tile floor was covered with straw. Behind the bar hanging from pegs on the wall were a couple of nasty looking double barrel shotguns. Bill wondered about them, strange to see them right there in plain view. They would soon learn their purpose.
It was around nine o’clock when they finished eating. As they were at the bar paying Harry for their meals all the lights went out. Harry hit a switch that caused the rolling shutters in front to slam down. They were locked in and everyone else was locked out. It was pitch black inside. He grabbed a handful of wicked knives from under the counter and told them each to take one. The locals immediately stood backs to the walls, knocking over chairs and tables in their haste. Their knives were in their hands.
Harry yelled “Everyone up against the walls. And don’t move, I have a shotgun and will shoot anything that moves.” The tone of his voice quelled any arguments.
No one spoke or moved.
About a ½ hour later the lights came back on and the shutter went up.
“What the hell?” asked Bill of Harry.
In an undertone Harry explained that a couple of times a month smugglers paid the men who ran the generators to turn them off. While the lights were off the cargo boats unloaded their contraband into small powerboats that then ran into the swamps.
John Mc said he believed it as most of the men in the town did look like pirates - one even had a peg leg and an eye patch.
After that adrenalin rush they slowly walked back to the hotel hopefully for some sleep. Maybe the salt was working. It had been spread around the rooms all day. No such luck by the second night the bugs were smarter and crawled up the walls to the ceilings and dropped on them. And so it went for two more days. During the night of the third day the Gulf Trader docked.

Meanwhile back in Cali Lucy and I were trying to keep busy and keep the kids happy. We all needed more socks so I asked the girl behind the desk if she could tell me where the Sears store was. She pulled out a map and drew me the directions. So John, Paul, Gil and I started walked to Sears. We made it with no mishaps. I carried no purse and wore no jewelry. Our passports were in my shirt pocket and my money in my front pants pocket. John (12yrs) walked on one side of me and Paul (8yrs) on the other; I held Gil’s (6yrs) hand. It turned out to be a longer and hotter walk than I had anticipated. We stopped once at a little park and got ice cream cones. Luckily Paul could speak enough Spanish to order for us. We got to Sears and bought the socks, all the sizes were in European size ranges, so it took a while to figure out which ones we wanted. It was strange to see the brands other than Kenmore in the appliance section. We looked around a bit then headed back to the hotel. On the way we stopped at a little restaurant and had our hot dogs and coke.
The next day Lucy and I decided to take the kids to a movie. “Return from Witch Mountain” was playing but it was in a theater quite a ways away. Again the girl at the desk helped us out. She told us what bus to take and where to get off. We got on the bus okay but somehow miss the stop where we should get off. When we got to the end of the line and the bus turned back towards the city we realized it. Lucy talked to the driver and he promised us he would let us know when to get off. He did and we went into a nice, cool little theater. I was surprised that the movie was in English with Spanish subtitles. Actually I was glad that it was. We all enjoyed it and caught the bus back to the hotel with no problems.
That evening we got the call that the boat would dock the next day and they should be in Cali by evening.

Back in Buenaventura the Gulf Trader finally docked. The shipping agent had told everyone they had better be there when the vehicles were unloaded as they couldn’t guarantee the safety of anything left alone. You might find nothing but a shell left if you weren’t there at unloading.
The unloading process began. The cars came out first then the vans, last would be the motorhome.
Bruce left for Cali as soon as he finished the paperwork on his van. He was worried about Lucy and Lyle being there alone for so long. The soccer van had to be emptied of the BMW and the bike needed to be put back together. Everyone worked on that. Juan had shown up the day before to claim his car and auto parts.
Bill wanted to get on the ship to see the motorhome but the dock supervisor wouldn’t let him. Watching the process was the 1^st officer of the ship and he was American. Bill went over to talk to him and again asked to be allowed on the ship to see the motorhome. It was arranged. Bill got to go down into the hold and check things out. All the other vehicles were unloaded, only the motorhome was left. It had to be placed on the nets and lifted out. Bill offered to drive the motorhome on to the nets but was told he couldn’t because of insurance issues. In other words, if anything happened while he was driving it on the ship, the insurance wouldn’t cover it. He agreed to guide the 1^st officer as he drove it. The nets were lowered and positioned in front of the two sets of wheels. It was driven slowly until the wheels were centered on the nets. The driver got out and everyone had to get away from the vehicle. The order was given to raise the nets enough to check their positioning. Bit by bit they went up, folding around the wheels as they lifted. The lifting stopped, everything was checked again. Bill had to leave the hold now, again for insurance purposes. He went back to the dock where all activity came to a halt as everyone turned to watch the motorhome rise out of the hold. No problems, up over the deck of the ship, then the cranes slowly swung it over the dock and lowered it. Gently it came to a rest on the wooden pier. Everyone began breathing again. It was driven forward to clear the nets and they were then hauled away. It was Bill’s again.
He went inside, everything looked okay. The cigarettes and ash trays were where he had placed them, oh, but the Playboy’s were gone!
Everything had to come out. The motorcycle and trailer had to be put back together and the trunks had to go on the roof. And the sky was starting cloud up.
Mark, Robert, Paul and Klaus tackled their van and the BMW. Bill, John Mc, Randy, Juan and Maynard started pulling stuff out of the motorhome. Trunks and stuff that had been on the trailer were scattered around. Bill slipped a couple of the dock workers some money to keep an eye on it. Randy and John Mc started putting the Honda back together. The rest started on the trailer. The tongue and wheels had to go back on and then it had to be loaded up. Several hours had gone by and they sky was now a very dark gray, it would start to pour soon. The trailer was together and some of the trunks were back up on the roof. The trunks had to be done before the rain began because the screw holes had to be caulked or the roof would leak. The motorcycles were together and the soccer van was ready to roll. Maynard and Juan both left for Cali. It was decided that Randy would ride the Honda back that way the rest of the stuff could just be put on the trailer. When they got to Cali it would be packed correctly. What few things that were still in the motorhome would stay there for now.
About half way to Cali the heavens opened up. The sky was black and the rain was coming down in sheets. Randy pulled ahead of the motorhome and motioned he was going to make a run for it to the hotel. Bill waved him on.