The Great America

HMG Guest Writer: Alvaro Daza

This is a story of Alvaro journey while he was in the America.

It is enough to sleep to imagine the famous American dream that has been talked about for so long, that which consists of achieving what you propose in a country that has been for decades a recipient of people from all countries that we can imagine. 

United States, is one of those places where you are surprised, beyond the random things you can think, there is a lot of learning just imaginable from the perspective of now. 

When I arrived in America, I entered Houston before the astonished look of a security guard who let me in, thank God, without a return ticket, I had a huge fear of not knowing how to complete such a large company, however, thanks at the hand of God and to people who were angels, I was able to continue my journey through more cities in this country that gave me too many teachings. 

I will remember for life, when I arrived in New Orleans and was received by my friend Alex, whom I met at the time of my arrival and who stayed with me kindly in his house, in the French quarter, a picturesque area that vibrated at that time due to the error of the referee who had taken the local team from the super bowl and why they organized a great Parade in the city, that day, I had to leave at night towards West Palm Beach where I had to plan what my adventure in the country would be like to after a few days and, leave for Miami where I met an Argentine who was lost and thanks to whom I met again with the purpose of this adventure. 

After Miami, travel to Washington D. C, were productive days in which, thanks to Laurie Sears, a veteran of Iraq, I was able to visit Annapolis and Baltimore to enjoy the Odessa ballet and some important meetings with Rotary clubs and the women leaders of the area; I almost did not leave with such hospitality, however, I had to go to New York, where, when I arrived, I had nowhere to stay. 

The days in the Big Apple were a challenging experience, from staying in a nudist house with my good friend new Frenchman Jay, or being finally admitted to join the Youth Assembly organized for young ambassadors from around the world and to thank I could enter Marline, the capital of the point surprised me when I could see Felipe, an old friend and meet Prawesh a PhD student at Columbia for 23 years. 

After New York, I was in Boston, Cambridge and Everett, where I had the privilege to share and talk in talks with students from Harvard, MIT, North Eastern, BW, BC and Berkley College of music, the experience has been one of the most enriching in my life, so much, that when I went to Chicago, I missed everyone with all my strength. 

Then came the turn of the American Mid-West, I think my first impression when arriving in Chicago, the city with the best collection of buildings in the world, is that people are very cold, however, being there I met the owners of Ron Parce, a liqueur flavored with glory, Latinicity, a restaurant run by a Venezuelan who knows what George Ellis does, who hosted me and changed the way I see the world. 

Part of the mid-west was traveling quickly Indianapolis, Louisville, St Louis, Nashville, where I met the designer George Ellis and Kansas City, where I had the opportunity to interact with wonderful people like Estefania, Fernanda, Roberto and Lalo, friends that I made and that They opened the doors to me in this that was a rest stop. 

Then I made the longest trip I’ve ever made in my life by train, 34 hours from Kansas to Las Vegas, a city that gave me the impression of screaming for a new opportunity, this was the beginning of the East Coast, where, as second stop I had Santa Monica, a place where I met three Colombian friends who reminded me that friendship exists; In those days I was also in Los Angeles, where the most frustrating moment of the trip came when I hit a wall trying to contact a person who never paid attention to me, Juan PA Zurita, as they say, is one of those people who sometimes shows something which in my opinion maybe is not entirely, at least it made me want to fight against those barriers that prevent us from finding ourselves as people without the lie of fame, it was a very hard blow, against the ground and for a few days I was frustrated, done before writing this note I was but limitations exist only in our mind and we are capable of what we propose to even overcome our failures and frustrations. 

I continued to San Francisco where it was awesome. I met people from Instagram, Facebook, Google, Apple, Uber, AMERICAN airlines, Tesla, Nasa and more an my Consul very gently organized for me a meeting with that people as well with scientists from Berkeley and Stanford University. 

After San Francisco I Continued to Seattle where I received the support of people from Microsoft in head of his vice-president, Amazon, Boeing and other business, then I continued to Canada where I met a friend who helped me a lot in Vancouver, thanks to him I met his mom in Toronto and that marked possible for me to be a speaker in 6 conferences, in one of those I received from the audience a Canadian Flag and a Book that was signed for everyone in the room, my travel continued to Ottawa where I met the ambassador of Colombia in Canada who helped me with everything there, by the way a guy from Toronto helped me for trying to reach Canada prime Minister but it was not possible because of the elections, then I moved to Montreal and I finish a perfect agenda there with people from Latin America, and other non-Hispanic countries who supported me and gave me the space to talk and funds for buying my ticket to Europe, that’s why I went back to Vancouver because the ticket was cheaper and I met the ambassador of Colombia in Jamaica who was the former Cónsul in Vancouver. 

Now I’m am in Europe, very soon I will let you know how this adventure is going, from now I’m convinced of the power that we have for changing the world!