I was on the Coast last week, literally, for a change (I got a wee dip in the Caribbean) and it was great fun, as usual.

It’s always just so unexpected.

In the ladies’ toilets at the airport in Montería, there was a workman perched on the toilet seat, working on the cistern and singing unselfconsciously along to his radio.

On the bus on the way to the town where our event was being held, there was a drunk man, and no seat for him so he held on to the bar, but occasionally one hand flopped down and patted me on the head. “Hold on with both hands,” someone told him. Finally, a young country lad (complete with machete strapped to his thigh) let him have his seat where he promptly fell asleep.

And on the plane home, I listened in to a grandfather and grandson finding shapes in the clouds:

“It’s an elephant! No, a crocoelephant! No, a crocophelantceros! A car! No, a cake!”

In between we had a successful camp for 30 Children’s Club leaders. The highlight of that was when two of them, older women who are neighbours, received a phone call to tell them that they were going to get materials to build a house. They actually jumped for joy!

A sleepy cat.

A stack of plastic chairs. (In the evening, the family will sit on their porch and greet the people going by with a cry of “Adios”.)

The shoes left outside while the lady of the house sweeps the floor.

And on television, El Chavo del 8, a Mexican sitcom from the 70s, which is on every Saturday.

An ordinary Saturday on the Colombian Coast.