... in response to Farc near Cali?, posted by AGUILA on Apr 24, 2005[This message has been edited by Traveller]
Ok, about a month ago I was sitting at Barclay's having some drinks on A Sunday. I full fire team plus a slack man walks by with about 5 meters seperation each. Each guy was armed witha AR-15, grenades, armor, helmets, and gas masks. Each had a magazine in their rifles. I wouldn't want to bet if they were loaded or not. They went up one side of 6th Av. and then later came back down each side of the sreet. There wasn't any tension like they were expecting anything. Many of the club waiters came out an offered the guys water or cokes. A couple did go into Fandango, but I think that was just to see what kind of women were in there. Two soldiers talked to cops and two waiters in fornt of Barclay's for about 2O minutes.
I think it was just a show of force or PR showing for the people that their military was indeed around. OR, maybe it was the same thing only to show FARC agents that the people's military was indeed around. Don't know exactly, just speculating. I've seen these patrols around the air base and 3rd Battalion but never down 6th Av. Especially, not as heavily armed as these guys were. Come on, grenades? Cool to know they are on the job.
I went to the Bus terminal last week thinking about taking a bus over to Tulcan and then onto Quito. If you're interested it's 30,000 pesos on Trans Ipiales to Tulcan and about $5 USD to Quito from Tulcan. Anyway, I asked if it was safe for the ride to Tulcan from Cali. The agent hemmed and hawed but she said that the road was "Hot" (Caliente) at the moment. I took that as maybe bandits were setting up road blocks or something or maybe the FARC I don't know for sure and she wouldn't elaborate. Thier buses take off every hour starting at 4:30 AM until 11 PM, so your chances at getting through unmolested are pretty good. I just didn't feel like taking the chance with my camera and computer.
Other than that little tidbit, I haven't heard about any trouble other than that standoff up in the distant hills.
