Visiting Garavito's Tomb

Placing flowrs on Garavito's grave. 

Sunday and Monday are the big days in Bogotá's Central Cemetery. That's when the faithful visit the tombs they believe can grant miracles.

Two of the unlikeliest saints, Bavaria Beer founder Leo Kopp and astronomer Julio Garavito (the guy on the 20,000 peso bill), were bedecked with an extraordinary quantity of flowers today.

Visitors to Garavito's tomb traditionally rub a 20,000 bill against the column, which is supposed to attract wealth to the rubber. The tomb also happens to be the cemetery's traditional spot for smoking pot. Today, one pothead told me that smoking weed there brought one even more money.

Or, perhaps the connection is that both potheads and astronomers like to get high.

Believers line up at the tomb of Bavaria Beer Brewery founder Leo Kopp...

...who was covered with flowers.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Of Superstition and Precipitation

 In Bogotá's Central Cemetery, believers wait to ask for assistance at the tomb of Bavaria brewery founder Leo Kopp. 

The news that Bogota paid a shaman to prevent rain at the Under-20 Football World Cup and Pres. Juan Manuel Santos' inauguration has drawn attention to Colombians' many superstitions.

Juan of Money is here. 

The shaman,  a campesino coffee farmer in Tolima Province named Jorge Gonzalez, evidently did a good job on the World Cup, which suffered little rain. However, his work on the presidential inauguration was a little more questionable, since it drizzled that day. But the shaman pointed out to El Tiempo that he was at least somewhat effective, since it might otherwise have rained much harder.

Doña Mercedes, in her esoterica shop. 

"The winter was hitting really hard," he told El Tiempo. "I'm good at controlling the rain, but I'm no god."

Nevertheless, a reporter who visited Gonzalez' farm in Tolima wondered why Gonzalez, who learned his powers from a book about King Solomon and employs a pendulum as his only tool, could not prevent floodwaters from destroying his own coffee plants.

But the rains affaire is only an example of an ubiquitous phenomenon in Colombia.

El Negro Felipe, Maria Lionza
and el Indio Guaquaipuro,
called Las Tres Potencias.

Colombian superstitions range from the charming and harmless, such as the believers who line up on Sundays and Mondays in Bogotá's Central Cemetery to whisper in the bronze ear of Bavaria Beer Brewery founded Leo Kopp, famed for assisting with legal and economic problems.

Who'll stop the rain? Put the
chaman on this unseasonal
downpour in Bogotá.

Turn on the radio in the morning and you'll hear seers promising to give you health, love or a winning lottery number. Caller after caller dials in with testimonials about how the psychic changed his or her life. Who falls for this? Evidently, enough people do to pay for daily radio time.

I also visited La Candelaria's Calle 10, where several shops sell esoterica supposed to bring love, luck and wealth. Doña Mercedes, who runs the El Señor de los Milagros esoterica store, told me about figures like Dr. Gregorio, who is supposed to bring health, La Reina Maria Lionza, who brings love and luck, and el Negro Felipe, who brings good fortune in business.

Dr. Jose Gregorio amongst Catholic symbols. 

Why, in the end, are these 'superstitions' any different or less valid than established religion? While I talked with Doña Mercedes, whose shop mixes Catholic and esoteric objects, people lined up nearby in Plaza Bolivar to see a few drops of Pope Juan Pablo the Second's blood.

And Colombians are not alone in being superstitious. In the U.S., to see what it was like, I once worked as a late-night telephone psychic. Incredibly, people with college degrees and professional jobs paid something like $15 bucks a minute to ask me questions about their future. All were down on their luck, lonely, unemployed and desperate. I tried not to predict, but just gave encouraging advice and suggested they talk instead to their ministers, neighbors and relatives. I even told them that the whole psychic thing was a fraud and got them off the phone as fast as I could. Still, some had a stubborn faith.

"Isn't there anybody there who really believes in psychic powers?" one caller asked me.

Just open these boxes for health and love! 

Finally, the phone rang one more time. It was the psychic company boss, who hadn't been psychic enough to detect that I had lied to him from the start about my supposed powers.

"We've been monitoring your calls," he said. "You're fired. You'll be hearing from our lawyer."

I never did. So much for his predicting powers.

Related post: Let the Indio Amazonico Solve Your Troubles.

Esoteric shops on Calle 10 in La Candelaria. 

Seeking fortune at the tomb of Julio Garavito, the man on the 20,000 peso bill. 

Catholic and esoteric objects mix. 

Love me!

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

You Can't Prohibit Faith

The tomb of Julio Garavito, and beside it one venerated by prostitutes.

The tomb of astronomer Julio Garavito in Bogotá's Central Cemetery has long been the unlikely destination of the superstitious, who believe that it can bring good luck and even wealth. Altho Garavito, a man of science, would undoubtedly have rejected the superstition, the belief does have a connection to reality: Garavito is on the 20,000 peso bill.

Dear Visitor: We remind you
that expressing faith is prohibited....

Visitors often left flowers colored blue, the same as the 20,000 peso bill, and even painted parts of the tomb blue.

Recently, the cemetery administration renovated Garavito's tomb, raising it and erasing the messages believers had written to Garavito, asking him for miracles or thanking him for favors received.

The cemetery folks also put signed on neighboring trees reminding visitors that leaving flowers, writing messages, burning incense and other activities were strictly prohibited in the cemetery.

Naturally, and thankfully, believers have ignored the warning and the tomb is decorated once again.

A woman rubs a 20,000 peso bill against the tomb, hoping for wealth.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

A Magical Mystery Tour thru Bogotá's Central Cemetery

The tomb at the cemetery's entrance. Said to belong to a rich kid who
drowned in Germany, many believe it can grant miracles. 

Bogotá's Central Cemetery is a place of history and religion, but also magic, miracles and faith.

A believer asks for aid.

It's a sort of free territory, suspended in time and separated from the city, where ordinary rules don't apply. Believers plea to the long-dead for miracles. A Jewish-German beer company founder becomes a Catholic saint in Colombia. An astronomer becomes of the object of veneration and superstition. The tomb of a rich boy, a nobody in life whose name has been erased by time, becomes a miracle maker.

Amidst this magic and miracles lie the Great Men of Colombian history - generals and guerrillas, political leaders and presidents.

In life, Colombia is a classist society with little social mobility. But in the Central Cemetery, rich and poor mix, common citizens lie near presidents, guerrillas near generals and revolutionaries near dictators.

The tomb of astronomer Julio Garavito,  and behind it that of a woman
called the saint - or martyr - of the prostitutes.

Garavito's tomb - and even some flowers - are painted blue to match the color of the 20,000 peso bill, which carries his image.

Dollar signs urge visitors to rub the 20,000 peso bill against the column for good luck.

Believers ask Garavito for his blessing and aid. What would this man of science think of such superstitions? 

Candles at Garavito's tomb. 

A message of thanks to Garavito. 

Alongside Garavito, flowers at a tomb said by some to belong to a prostitute with a heart of gold, by others to a rich woman who helped the prostitutes and was murdered by her husband when he discovered her. Another tradition holds that lying down on the tomb helps a woman become pregnant. 

Reality also twists and bends. History mixes with legend and the tombs' true histories become lost to time, erased and replaced with more colorful and perhaps more meaningful tales. The tomb alongside astronomer Garavito's is visited by prostitutes, who tell two stories: one of the women buried here was either a rich woman who helped the prostitutes until she was discovered and murdered by her husband, or herself a prostitute who gave her earnings to the poor. Reality also bends in a second way, as kids visit the cemetery smoking pot, one with a bong made from an apple.

Flowers bedeck the tomb of presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galán, assassinated by Pablo Escobar in 1989.

Poet Jose Silva, who is on the 5,000 peso bill. His life was tragic and he was said to have been in love with his sister Elvira, who shares his tomb. 

A Polish nationalist, whose hopes for a free homeland died while he was in Colombia, and who died soon after.  

Catholicism mixes with mysticism and folk beliefs and science with superstition.

Believers line up to ask favors of Leo Seigfried Kopp, a German Jew who founded Bogotá's Bavaria beer brewery and is remembered for his good works. 

Asking Sr. Kopp for a favor. 

A thank-you note for miracles granted by the Bavaria beer brewery founder. 

A Catholic mass at the Jewish brewery founder's tomb. 

One of the priests told me that he didn't believe in the Leo Kopp legend, but that  it's a good place to do mass. 

Kopp's ear - always open for believers.

The cemetery is also a refuge, from laws and social pressures. Kids smoke pot, and nobody seems to care. A girl from the nearby prostitution district sits on the tomb of astronomer Garavito, gets stoned and wails 'amor mio' (my love) over and over again. I've met her on the street, where she's seems sensible and sane enough. Marijuana seems to be the drug of choice here, perhaps the elixir for communion with the afterworld.

One of the four Bodmer sisters, who died in infancy or childhood.  This one is said to be pointing the way toward heaven for her sister who died the following day. Today, people leave the sisters tributes of flowers, candies and toys. 

One Bodmer sister's hand, holding sweet gifts,
points the  way to heaven for her sister  who died the day after.

Asking favors of Jose Mercado, a union leader killed and murdered by the M-19 guerrillas. 

A more real-life wish - a visitor promises a fallen communist leader that his philosophy will triumph. 

The dead don't make judgements, either on the other dead or on the living. Inside the cemetery, transvestites, drug addicts, believers, performers and eccentrics all seem to find acceptance.

This guy had just gotten out of jail, and came to the cemetery for unclear reasons. He seemed to be stoned on something. He's showing off his artwork. 

The closest thing I've seen to a spirit. This woman was dressed for a video shoot. 

This blind woman plays her accordeon at funerals in the cemetery. 

Do spirits wander here? If they wander anywhere, they must come here.

An angel, with pigeons, overlooks the cemetery. 

Candles for sale outside the cemetery.