Online dating in Colombia...or...Breathless in Bogota.

[purogringo]

Wow. There's some really good stuff in this forum posted in the past few days. I haven't been checking in and have missed some interesting stories. Anyway, here's the latest from the trenches...
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Before getting to the meat of this mini-report, here's a little background. I'm 41, no kids, and looking to start a family. I do fine with American women, but I'm finding that women under 35 tend not to be very enthusiastic about men over 40. That's not the case in Latin America generally. (And while there are many very attractive women in their 40s in the states, the fertility issue becomes problematic.) More importantly, I would really like to have a family that's bilingual and bicultural, which is another thing that led me here.

I've done a lot of online dating in the states, with some very good success, and my approach is to enjoy spending an hour with someone and learn something interesting about them, even if I don't see a second date. So I figured I would try doing some online dating in Latin America, which is laden with issues to be sure. In the couple of weeks since I signed up I had found some interesting and attractive women and decided to take advantage of a week off and a cheap flight to Medellin. From there I found a flight to Bogota for reasons I'll explain below.

With that, here's the report...

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Well. I'm writing this after a very interesting day in Bogota, where I've been for only 48 hours and have finally seen some of the beauty that men on this site seem to rave about (though I have to agree with Spart--not a lot of whiplash). Frankly, I don't think the women in Colombia are necessarily any better looking than anywhere else on the planet, but I suppose that depends on what gets your motor running. My physical ideal should take me to a different part of the world altogether, but I have other priorities like Spanish speaking, intelligence, and proximity to the states. And after my disappointment with the surprisingly parochial women in Barranquilla, I wanted to see if the women in Bogota were more cosmopolitan, which for the most part, they really are. As the Brits say, it's as different as chalk and cheese.

So I was completely on the fence about taking this trip and decided to do so only after I found really cheap airfare for 9 days to Medellin, which is a very nice town with great weather and friendly paisas. What also drew me there was a woman I had met on the internet. (I won't say which sites just yet--do your homework and you'll find them.) She had some really nice photos, is a doctor, and we got along great when chatting online for all of a week. Still, I don't even bother risking dinner on a girl I meet online in the states without having a drink first, so what the [snip] am I doing taking vacation time and spending half a grand to see someone I met online in Colombia. Well, I guess sometimes you have to say [snip] the what.

Of course, we meet and although she's rather cute, she's a little heftier than her photos suggested so I wasn't all that into her. (I hear your collective groan--this has happened to all online daters on either side of the gender line.) Still, we had a great day and a half together, but as much as she was a good match in many ways, the physical chemistry just wasn't there. I had tried to set up some other dates with women from LAC and CC in Medellin, but they weren't panning out as quickly as I had hoped. I guess Sunday is a difficult day to set up things on your own so on Monday I decided to fly to Bogota, hang out with a friend I made in Baq, and check out things there. By that I mean see what kind of luck I have with online dating as well as investigate options at some of the agencies in town for future trips.

Now let me say that although going the online route is somewhat cheaper (I spent $100 on each site for a year long membership), your spanish had better be good, you need to be organized, and you probably won't be able to set up more than 2-3 dates a day. Most women tend to work all day so getting more than 2 an evening can be tricky. I had a pretty good response rate online, in part due to decent photos but as important if not more, to a good profile I wrote in Spanish. Many of the women said they read it and felt reassured that I was a good guy. (At this point I would say an agency is probably a better bet, but more on that later.)

As for setting up dates, a simple email saying I was in town was usually answered with an email address, a cell phone number, or both. (You don't have to have a phone here since you can pay to use cell phones for 10-15 cents a minute on most street corners.) Some women would ask if I had MSN to chat and even though I now did for the past week, I didn't bother with that. I just called them, asked them to speak slowly with a Mexican accent (a bit of a humor litmus test), and set up a time to meet later that day or the next, all in a few minutes.

So I got off the plane around 5pm in Bogota and was immediately impressed. It is a very nice city with crisp fall like weather because of the altitude, but is not as grey and drizzly as I had feared. The city is laid out like Baq on a grid, but with parks and plazas and a gorgeous old colonial section that has the look and feel of Europe. The differences in the cities is also reflected in the women who live there.

The rumors are true--the women here are generally better educated and more worldly. For example, my first date I set up with a cute 28 year old who has lived in Germany, speaks decent English, and travels for work. I would have considered seeing her again, but she's out of town until after I leave. What's more, they dress a little more conservatively here--probably due to the weather. Call me old fashioned, but I'm just not into the lettinitallhangout stuff on the coast. I prefer a woman that leaves a little something to the imagination. OK. I prefer a woman that I wouldn't be a little embarrassed to introduce to my parents.

Anyway, my second date was with a woman that reminded me more of those from the coast--simple, straightforward, and very sweet. She was physically attractive but that wasn't enough to make up for what wasn't there for me. Moreover, she just didn't get my sense of humor. What's really odd is that because she lives in some kind of a dorm with an 11pm curfew, she asked if she could spend the night in my hotel room if we wanted to stay out later. Had I not been staying in a crappy hostel I would have considered it, but in the end that was a good thing.

Tuesday I spent the morning walking around the city and sight seeing, then wasted the afternoon waiting for a woman who changed our meet up time from 3 to 430 then didn't show up until about 515. I was ready to chew her out for being so inconsiderate (yeahyeah I know it's part of the culture, but I tell dates I'll be there on time and people here know how to be punctual as well), but instead I just told her I had a headache and had to go. Admittedly, if she had looked as good as her photos, I would have stayed to see what she was like.

Later that evening I met up with a very cute 27 year old, but there wasn't any chemistry at all. Right off the bat, she asked if I noticed that she spoke like a high class woman. What?!? That may be how they speak, but that ain't *how* they speak. She advised me not to use Colombian vernacular like "bacano" or "mammar gallo"--that's the language of the lower class. Her dream was to go to LA to visit the Viper Room. Check please.

The next day I had set up 3 dates--2 hours each back to back--all in a nice part of town called Parque 93. The last one cancelled when I called to confirm, which turned out to be a blessing since I really hit it off with the second one. (The first one was kinda young at 24, and although she had a killer body, I wasn't that interested.) The second date was 33 and this was her first time meeting anyone online. She had actually arrived early and was sitting at a table when I first walked in. Very pretty--not drop dead gorgeous--but more importantly, she was sweet, intelligent, and composed. And although she admitted she was a little nervous and even scared to be meeting a gringo from the internet, I didn't get that impression at all.

We were enjoying our conversation and after an hour or so she proposed we go for a walk and since I no longer had another date, I obliged. When she got up from the table, I finally got a peek of her very nice body. Yikes. Here's one who had it all: intelligent, pretty, and petite. This one has potential. We walked for a while then returned to have dinner at a nice restaurant, where she declined to order anything more than an appetizer and a drink. I'm pretty sure she did this because she did not want to look like she was fishing for a sugar daddy. She even insisted on paying for our cab later on. Nothing like that even came close to happening in Barranquilla.

I'll be seeing her later today, and have to cancel one of the dates I had set up, but I'm excited about seeing her again. More on how that goes later...

[no comment]

Puregringo,
That's a good informative report, I look forward to the next one.
My situation is similar to yours... over 40, no children.  I use two internet dating sites and just figured out yesterday why I periodically have been contacted by women bothered by the fact that I'm looking for women without children. We communicate in Spanish and they've asked me, "why do you think it's a sin for a woman to have children?" Nunca dije eso I tell them, of course it's not a sin. I suppose they have been reading a version of the website where the software has translated words and mangled meaning. I wrote in my profile,"busco una mujer...sin hijos." (looking for a woman without children) It must have flipped "sin" into pecado, the Spanish word for sin.

[Kiltboy1]

Purogringo

I like the report and you have approached this like I did after my first disaster. I figured it out that the best women for me were the ones that actually had something to show for there life, educated and was into good conversation about interesting things. I love the coast and the women from cali as far as pure out hotness, but hotness goes away with time and unless you are looking to trade in ever few years like many guys here seem to look at this process, the classy ones have the longevity. My wife is very classy, sexy and dresses the part but has legs that kill !!. We were at a sports bar last weekend and was leaving and this guy yelled out"DUDES LEAVING WITH THE HOTTEST CHICK IN IN THE BAR "  So, educated, classy and sexy you can absolutley find if you choose a city like Bogota that produces those types. Medellin does too, but I did not like Medellin too much except for the weather. I prefer the more upscale cities unless I want a beach vac .Keep the report coming and let us know your progress

KB

[Researcher]

         I settled on Bogota myself after checking out other cities. IMO, there may not be the quantity of women there but there was quality. At first I was a little discouraged because I was so used to meeting tons of women but not having to "sift" through so many made my search easier. After all, I was looking for one woman.

        Good luck with your search Purogringo.

        Researcher

[purogringo]

no comment: The mix up about "sin" in your profile is hilarious. That must have confused a lot of women. Gringos everywhere thank you for fixing that.

[purogringo]

Brief trip. Brief post. Here's what I learned in a week or so of online dating down here in Colombia, a day and a half in Medellin then about 5 in Bogota. I met about 10 women, and have found one that I really like. I'm not sure I'm ready to call an immigration attorney just yet, but we'll see how things go over the next few months. Anyway, here are the bullets:

- Online dating in Colombia is like online dating anywhere else. You're never sure if there's chemistry until you see each other in person. I remember RJS and his experience in Peru, which resulted in bodily harm--a sunburned penis and a broken heart--after 4 months of online courtship. A big reason I made this trip was a woman in Medellin that I had met online a week or so earlier, and it was the all too common story. Had we invested a lot more, it would have been a real downer, even without a blistered pecker.

- If you decide to go the online route down here, you don't have to do much besides have a good profile, make contact, and then set up a date. Most women were willing to meet the same day or the next day after a simple email saying I'd be in town and that I wanted to meet them. You don't necessarily need to have an online relationship with email or chatting before meeting either. This is a little different than in the states, where a few emails and maybe a phone call are often customary. The woman I ended up really clicking with returned nothing more than a couple of brief emails and then a call to set up the time and place of our date. That said, a lot of them will want to instant message and use a webcam, though that's hardly essential. Oh, and expect the occasional flake, though not very often.

- The women in Bogota really do it for me. They're generally more cosmopolitan, educated, and a little more petite than what I encountered in Barranquilla. Although they're somewhat more reserved in dress (still, the tight jeans and pants suits are quite the revealing norm), I found myself enjoying the scenery all throughout the city. On dates, conversations flowed more smoothly and involved topics like politics, travel, and more than just hobbies, pets, and where your family lives. Another stark contrast from Baq was their insistence on paying for their own taxis and frequent offers to pay for drinks or meals. In Barranquilla the women never failed to ask for cabfare. I'm not sure why there was such a difference and I'm not sure what it means. Oh, and I don't want to get into a debate on where the best women are--the whole reason there's a debate is because it's subjective--but rather say why I feel the way I do.

- Bogota is a good city to visit. It has interesting architecture, museums, and the kind of vibe you feel in a major city anywhere. There are plenty of things to see and do, including just walk around and stumble upon street performers, city parks, and the occasional political demonstration. The weather is cooler than on the coast, but was better for walking around the city. It was kind of like San Francisco--warm during the day, and a bit chilly at night. The coast was much warmer, but it was too hot to do much walking around outside, especially since the custom is to wear long pants instead of shorts, which would have made the heat bearable. One thing I could do without, however, is all the diesel exhaust, which seemed worse in Bogota than anywhere else (maybe because I was outside more), especially in the older parts of the city. Medellin had warmer weather--like southern California, but since it rains more often, the surrounding hills are green. They say the people are nicer there, but I pretty much find if you're polite, people are nice everywhere. I can't really comment much on the women--they're supposedly more fashionable, but probably like the difference between New York and Boston. Besides, you'd probably have to be a woman to notice anyway.

- Online dating is cheaper than going through an agency, obviously, though it requires some organization. I did the $1500 introduction in Baq vs $100 for each website--LAC and CC. But there are some advantages to having an agency schedule the dates, and hopefully more than just 2 or 3 a day to make it worth the trip. (Jamie's service had a LOT more volume than that.) I suppose online would be better if you lived there already or were just vacationing, but for 1-2 weeks, it's not very efficient. Also, when you're using an agency, the women understand that you're meeting others besides them. Online, I found it a little more difficult to dicuss that issue. Lastly, one nice feature of an agency is that they can offer advice and feedback about the women you're meeting. There are a couple I'm considering using for a follow up trip to Bogota (LAI and Intros by Consuelo) depending on how things go with the woman I met. I definitely like her enough to keep in close touch, but I'm not ready to start filling out the visa forms just yet.

We'll see how that goes--it'll be 2-3 months before we see each other again. This is the tough part...

[civilizedchaos]

Great report Purogringo, but where specifically did you hang out in Bogota? Having been there once, I found the only appealing area was Zona Rosa. Candelaria seemed very poor, lots of street merchants and beggars and not particularly conducive to meeting chicas.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

cc

[RJS]

It was not my pecker that got burned, although I was roasted so bad sex was impossible for more time than I would have liked.