As I mentioned in my last post, I am historically not a person for walking tours. I usually prefer to do my self-guided tour or go with a Couchsurfing host or go with a friend. I usually only go on a tour if it is a place I am required to go on tour, like Chernobyl or really something specialized. I can be slightly misanthropic, and my ADHD catches up with me. But I did give in and go on two tours in Bogota. The first one was good, but the second one was a unique experience.
Breaking borders tours is an initiative led by former gang leaders. They take people to Bogota’s Egipto neighbourhood. They give testaments to the areas criminal past and the complex Colombian social structures, making it hard for social mobility. In a way, social mobility in Colombia is similar to that in the United States, but even on a larger scale. The zip code where you are born will determine most of how your life factors out. Again, this is something everywhere, but it really applies to much of the Americas, definitely more so than Europe.
I’m not sure if living in the Czech Republic for a while made me a very skeptical person who shoots down everything, but I first thought it was either A. Some poverty gawking tours for gringos or B. Some kind of scared straight tour that some more affluent Colombian parents might send their spoiled children to keeps them from misbehaving. But the more I read into it, and I got it vetted from someone I trust in this subject. I decided to give it a try. I was not disappointed. It was how I spent my last day in Colombia.
You meet a guide at Chorro de Quevedo Square in Candelaria. From there, you make the walk to Egipto neighbourhood. A guy led the tour named Andres; I think he said he was a social worker or grad school student. He spoke English and German, as he spent some time in Germany for his studies. He had a couple of Egipto local guides accompanying him. The tour is 30,000 COP ( Around 8 USD). Of course, it is nice to leave a tip as well. The tour is around 2 hours long.
This neighbourhood used to be one of the most deadly in Bogota. It was quite interesting to see how in just 10-15 minutes, you go from the old colonial part of town to this area. One of the guides said it was pretty convenient for many gang members to go down to Candelaria and rob, extort, kidnap some more well off student living there. Two rival gangs controlled the barrio for over two decades. There were over a thousand murders that happened here in the 1990s. Almost everyone living here has a close connection to someone that was murdered. A couple of the guides showed some of their gunshot wounds as well. The guides were frank and candid, which I appreciated.
This graffiti of the Gator and the Bear drinking the Chicha symbolize the coming together of the two tribes
What is Chica? It’s a fermented corn alcohol that many people living in Andean cities are proud of. I accidentally put my foot in my mouth by making fun of it. It is kind of like a beer made from corn. It’s actually the oldest fermented drink in the Americas.
The initiative branched out from a local university program started in the early 2000s to cut back on robberies. The university started to offer free tourism classes to some former gang members. One of these gang members would go on to start the Breaking Borders tour. The name ” Breaking borders” itself is the goal of what the tour guides want to accomplish. They would like to bridge the gaps and close the borders.
The proceeds of the tour go to help fund programs for the community. Their goal is to start more social programs initiatives for underserved youth for Colombia, which help them break some of the obstacles they have in front of them.
I highly recommend going on this tour. It goes towards a fantastic cause. You get a nice walk in, great views of the city and learn about some of the city through a local lens. This initiative helps empower the local community by teaching them new skills that can help them help themselves. It’s not just tourism. Still, tourism is one of the outlets that many locals have to educate others about Colombian social issues and give a new perspective on Colombian life that does NOT play into this glorified narco tourism bullshit. It does the opposite. From what I have seen on social media, the initiative manages to still do well through covid times, which makes me happy to hear about it.
For more information, check their Facebook page or Instagram