Back to The Future

I don’t remember how old I was when my parents told me that I was adopted.  I was young enough to where the details seem vague but old enough to never have forgotten how I felt. I was in elementary school and on my way home with Michael Sydorko, my childhood best friend. We had stopped just outside my house to sit and talk before he would continue on his way home.  It was here, sitting on the rock formation across from my house, where Mike said “Hey, I hear that your parents aren't your real parents”. I remember saying something like “Yeah right, whatever” in an attempt to quell, what I believed to be, an obvious lie.  I remember thinking that he was out of his mind, yet, at the same time, a seed of wonder had been planted. Could it be that my parents weren’t in fact my real parents? No! It couldn’t be, could it? I returned home and Mike went on his way to his house. That night, over dinner, I asked my mother and father whether in fact they were my real parents. Their response changed  my life forever. 

The question was simple - Are you my parents? Upon asking them this question, they began to show me photos from the orphanage, which, at the time, was located in a weird sounding city - Bogotá. They showed me in an atlas book where Colombia was located. Colombia seemed, in those moments, to be so far away and foreign. Yet, at the same time, it seemed to be very close to me. From that day forward my parents, my sister, and I started to attend annual and semi-annual gatherings, picnics, and social functions put on by a local adoption agency that dealt directly in adoptions from Colombia. I remember going to summer picnics and feeling like I belonged. I remember playing soccer with a bunch of other kids that looked like me. We were short, had black hair, and, like all Colombians, had a natural knack of playing fútbol. I remember listening to Feliz navidad and La Bamba at a Christmas event. While I had no idea what the lyrics were saying, I remember loving the music. Ironically, Ritchie Valens, the singer of La Bamba, was another latino/hispanic male who had grown up in the United States and never learned how to speak spanish. Not being able to speak spanish always bothered me as a child. It made me feel like I was missing something. I would hate when people would talk to me in spanish thinking and expecting that I would be able to respond to them. Only in the past couple of years has the feeling of vergüenza diminished due to my newfound ability to speak spanish at a conversationally proficient level. 

The rest of my childhood and adolescence is speckled with events that directly or indirectly touched upon my Colombian roots. Since that dinner discussion, I have always dreamed about going back to Colombia. As foreign as it might have seemed that day looking at Colombia on a map, I always knew that one day I would return to the country of my birth. I just didn’t know when or how it would come to be, but I knew that it was a pilgrimage I had to take. So, we’re now going to get the Delorean up to about 88 MPH and go Back to The Future.

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On June 19th, 2012 I touched down in the international airport in Barranquilla, Colombia. Since arriving, I’ve been working, as a Peace Corps volunteer, for a Colombian NGO - Fútbol con Corazón. Aside from my work with FCC, I’m in the process of starting up a youth group and organizing the construction of an outdoor recreation area which would be made, for the most part, out of recycled materials. As I admitted in my last entry My Barranquilla Life, there are some days that I forget that I’m in Colombia. Most days, I forget that I’ve waited almost twenty-four years to be given the chance to live, laugh, and enjoy life in Colombia.  For so long, Colombia was a country located in a far off distant region of the world. It was a land full of people that spoke a language that I didn’t understand.  It was a country, so close to my heart, that I never quite understood. However, Colombia will never again be a country located in a far off distant region of the world. It will never again be a land full of people that speak a language that I don’t understand. It will, however, be a country close to my heart that I will enjoy getting to know. 

This past Friday, Colombia was, as it has been for almost three months, all around me. I found myself immersed in a sea of yellow national jerseys. Yellow was, without any doubt, the color of the day. On the way to the stadium, everything was dominated by the color yellow and supported, as if they were back up singers, by the nations other colors of blue and red. Colombian flags hung from balconies, store fronts, residential buildings, office buildings, and were being waved from taxis, trucks, trailers, motorcycles, buses, moto-taxis, and anything else that had to do with transportation. Everyone from grandma to grandson wore the national team jersey. I wore my Colombian jersey with pride and blended in with the rest of the yellow mob that made its way towards the stadium. The Estadio Metropolitano Roberto Meléndez would be the stage for this World Cup qualifier between Uruguay and Colombia. Colombia prefers to play its qualifiers in Barranquilla due to the heat and humidity, which, more often than not, physically and mentally demoralize their opponents. The feeling outside of the stadium was one of optimism. Uruguay provided Colombia with more than a formidable opponent and to beat them, even at home, would take a well orchestrated team effort. The temperature at kickoff was around 100 degrees fahrenheit. My new blog photo is a panorama that I took moments before the kickoff whistle blew. The game was a normal 90 minutes with a 15 minute halftime, yet it seems like one big goal celebration blur. At the final whistle, Colombia had beaten Uruguay 4-0. It had done the unthinkable. It had succeeded in not allowing the two time World Cup winners, current Copa América holders, and Diego Forlan(the MVP of the 2010 World Cup) to scoring a goal. It had also managed to dismantle the Uruguayan defense and score not one, not two, not three, but FOUR goals. The first goal came in the 2nd minute and the fourth came in the 90th minute which made for an exciting game from start to finish. As I said before, the game, looking back on it, was a blur. The crowd, the noise, the colors, the wave, the scoreline, and the fact that it was my first time going to see the Colombian national team made it one of the most memorable games of my life. 

Wearing the Colombian national jersey to watch the Colombian national team was surreal. My parents had given it to me for Christmas when I was in High School and since then it had always been hanging in my closet waiting to be worn on a special occasion. This past Friday was more than a special occasion. It was a historical moment for Colombian fútbol. It was a brief demonstration of what Colombia has to offer to the footballing world. Analysts and Critics denounced the game as a “flash in the pan”, although these sentiments were swiftly erased by Colombia’s 3-1 win in Chile this past Tuesday. For the moment, Colombia sits comfortable in second place in the continents World Cup Qualifying Rankings. There are still more games to be played but for the time being, Colombia is one of the best in the world. 

Since I was a child, I’ve always dreamed about being back in the country of my birth. So, seeing the national team play this past Friday was like going back in time. It was like revisiting a world from my childhood or adolescence. A world in which Colombia only existed through my adoption photos, on the television, and on world maps. A world where spanish was running through my veins but not coming out of my mouth. A world where Colombia seemed so far away but still always looked back at me in the mirror. However, this is a world I no longer know. So, was I actually going back in time or going back to the future fueled on a lifetime of emotions about Colombia from my past? I think it was the latter. Being just another yellow jersey in a sea of yellow jerseys was the first time that I’ve ever really felt Colombian in my life. Sure, I’ve always identified with my ethnic heritage but being just one in a sea of many was something I've always wanted to feel. So, while I didn’t have a Delorean or know a Dr. Emmett Brown, I’ve made it back to the future and my future looks Colombian!