Hii!

As many of you might know, three years ago I traveled to Colombia for the first time, and over the last three years it has turned into my home. I started joining a surfschool with my now partner, who has been building his surfschool for many years, and recently started building a surfbar/restaurant next to the school. Behind our place, is a beautiful piece of land that is owned by someone who has a big love for Kogi’s; the indigenous people of Colombia. It has always been meant to grow into a place for the town where everyone can come together. The Kogi’s still make their rituals right on this beach and the local kids are part of our school too, where we teach them how to surf and give them English lessons.

However, three weeks ago, an extreme storm arrived to Colombia, causing waves that we hardly ever experienced. It took its absolute toll on almost the whole coastline of Colombia, including our hometown. We are left with hardly any sand and sadly, hardly any restaurant and surfschool on the beach. The sea has taken everything that was build on the coastline, causing many people to be with nothing left to work with. This includes us. In just one night, almost the entire structure of the school got destroyed plus all the stock of the restaurant, since the fridges and freezer didn’t work anymore. What took someone years to create was taken by the sea in just one night.

And now due to personal reasons, the owner of the land where the school is rented on, is moving to another town and he is about to rent his land to someone else. Meaning there are only two options left; he rents it to someone else and we would have to leave everything. Or, we would rent it. Since we have been there for a long time and have always been in line with the potential and visions for the land, it would be our absolute dream to create it into a beautiful place for everyone! But a lot of work needs to be done. Everything has to be rebuild from scratch. And even more than before, since we agreed with the owner to make it a place for the community, like how it was always invisioned. Meaning we will dedicate ourselves fully to take care of the land, including living together with the Kogi’s that are living there ánd creating a space for the local kids for surf and English.

For the last three weeks we have been busy taking down everything of what was left by the storm. And now, since the aftermath of the storm finally calmed down, we can begin to start to build back up again. But it is a lot of work and it will take time before everything stands again. It would be our absolute dream to create a beautiful place again and even the smallest bits will help so much!