Part One

It feels a bit silly to say this, as I type I am in a country house, listening to the soft tones of the crickets, and the Spanish language spoken with the poetic Colombian accent. Dragonflies dance around the pool with white butterflies overlooking a sweeping view of the emerald green valley below. It’s easy to see how Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote so romantically about his country.

Beautiful sweeping views of the Anapoima valley.

But cast my mind to 26 December 2021 and the reason I left for my travels. Even to think about it fills my mind with stress. Looking after a disabled, vulnerable and dependable parent really takes its toll on you. I’ve often felt it was like Benjamin Button in a sense that life transcends; in this case, the person only gets more and more baby-like with time passing, and it breaks your heart. And then you feel guilty for leaving and living your life, like you’re not deserving. But it’s not like they stayed and look after their parents, so why should you? In fact, no one else is expecting you to, except for maybe whispers from ancestors or invisible voices from childhood and time now gone.

Business and work was going really well, I had helped to create a safe and beautiful home for my parents, but I just knew that if I started a new year in the same routine, my work and wellbeing couldn’t survive, let alone thrive. I was burning out or was living on empty. I left to remember what it felt like to be with people of my generation, without the worries of killing someone with an invisible enemy.

I have dual nationality: British and Colombian.

I am so fortunate that I can speak both languages, and have nurtured over the years friendships in my mother’s country of birth; Colombia. Through that, friends have migrated to Mexico, so there is where my adventure began. With a flexible British Airways flight to Mexico City, I stayed to celebrated Christmas Day as a family with my parents and brother, then took my mostly empty suitcases to Heathrow.

Leaving Heathrow for Mexico City on 26 December 2021.