I went to Taganga today to make a visit and was struck once again by how unique this village is. The town lies just on the other side of the northern mountains of Santa Marta. From the office it took me about 30 minutes to arrive. You could say that Taganga is the best and worst of Santa Marta. It’s a mecca for backpackers from around the world. In any given visit you can meet people from all over the world, and especially Israelis. Actually that’s one of the reasons I went.
(Personal note: I’ve gotten the bug to start working on my third spoken language. For a while I was sceptical because I thought that learning a third language would mess up my Spanish. I now think that I’ve reached a point where I won’t forget all of my Spanish if I work on another language. By the same token, I wouldn’t want to work on Italian or Portuguese because those would mess up my Spanish. Hebrew on the other hand would only help me with my understanding of the Old Testament, but we’ll see how long the bug lasts.)
At any rate, in Taganga you’ll see people from Holland, from Israel, from the United States, from England, etc. The town is not highly developed like El Rodadero, which for some can be a draw (think dirt roads and mostly small houses). In the past it was dedicated to fishing, but today it is dedicated to tourism more than anything else. This tourism is especially geared towards activities that are not legal. Thankfully, this activity is not usually evident during daylight hours.
I talked to two Israelis and met a Colombian girl who speaks fluent Hebrew. She said she learned it in Taganga talking to people who come to her fruit stand. The bad news is that most of the Israelis come for short periods of time and then leave. I’ll have to look for someone who could be my tutor.
The exciting news from this trip was that the woman I visited is willing to open her home for a Grupo de Impacto. We’ll have to start praying and see when we can start!
(Photo courtesy of zug55 on flickr.com)
