Medellín, Colombia - our house and the walk up to ICOLVEN (now UNAC)

Circa 1970.  The whole family in front of our home in Medellín.

As many of you know, my family lived in Medellín from 1969-1972.  Yes, in the pre-Medellín drug cartel days.  This post is all about the house and trying to show what things look like now.  You may get bored if your last name has never been ¨Burden.¨

When Duane & I arrived in Medellín on October 23, I really wondered if our house would even be there.  That was because I kept hearing how Medellín had grown so much and lots of apartment buildings had been built where houses once were.  As I walked to our neighborhood that Sunday afternoon, I was both excited and nervous.  I very much wanted to see our house intact!

To try to provide some sort of orientation:  we lived on Carrera 82a between Calle 33aa and Calle 33.  Calle 33aa is the street we walked up to get to the college.

Turning onto our street from 32aa and looking toward the house.

The empty lot is now a large apartment building.

The son of the owners was running for governor of Antioquia.

That is definitely the house we lived in!

This is passed our house looking back at it (closer to Calle 33).

I made more than one trip up to the house.  When would I ever get to do this again?!  I made friends with the neighborhood security guard (apparently a lot of governmental officials live in the neighborhood) and took his recommendation to come back at 8 or 9 in the morning and just ring the doorbell and explain that we used to live there and see if they would let me in to have a look around.  It didn´t prove that easy!

Duane & I went on Friday, October 28, but we were rejected quite soundly!

Apparently, when Dad heard of the rejection of the lady of the house, he started emailing and calling...  And, apparently when Brenda heard we were going to be in Medellín for another week, she discovered flights were cheaper if you want to fly in two days rather than in two weeks.  SO, on November 1, Brenda arrived - a WONDERFUL surprise!  AND on Novermber 2, thanks to Dad´s networking....  Carlos Ortiz, one of Dad´s students back when we were here, drove us over to the house.  He went to the door alone, was in there for at least 5 minutes if not 10.  He then came out and said we could come in.

We sat in the hallway - down the stairs from the living room and talked with the man of the house.  He was very nice and I think he was fine with it all.  Although, it did take the picture of us in front of the house with our bikes to convince him that we were at the right house.

We got to peak in what was our music room, the kitchen and we went out into the yard.  But it was clear that we were not going to be invited upstairs.  While that would have been nice, I was fine with it.  Just from seeing the living room and the kitchen, the house really is different.  The kitchen has cupboards all the way around and the door to what was our music room is on the opposite side of the that wall.  The living room has wood paneling from about waist level down to the floor.  I am sure I would have liked to see the upstairs, but I was happy -  it just was great to be in the house for a little bit.

We made conversation with the man of the house.  He has been heavily involved in politics - a congressman for many years, then the minister of the interior (of the country).  He got his doctorate just in 2006 or so.  His study was our guestroom.  The lady of the house did the quick walk by and did not stop to say anything.  They have lived there since 1978.

Yes, their son lost in the November 30 election, but apparently they knew 6 months prior that he had no chance of winning.  So... that cannot really explain the grouchy reception Duane and I got on our first attempt to visit the house!

Brenad and me with the politician owner.

The backyard is completely covered in tile.

Sadly, I think this is the only picture we got of Carlos!

Brenda and me at the corner.

Brenda walking toward our house - as we would have done a million times.

Getting closer...

...and closer.

Not sure about if these videos will work, but they might...

This is looking from the front of our house down the street both ways ...



This is walking from the house to the corner:

 

I have more videos, but I couldn´t get them to load with out having error messages...  So that is all for now!  Vmonk