^{Posted by Liza Schmidt , MA Student at CLACS and Global Journalism}

^{Recipient of the Tinker Grant 2021}

^04/07/2022

With funding from the CLACS Tinker Foundation Field Research Grant, I went to Colombia in January to investigate “transformation tourism” in Medellín, the country’s second largest city. For years, Medellín was associated with violence and drug trafficking. But by 2018, the global perception of Colombia had changed so much that the New York Times named the country the #2 Place to Visit in 2018. Between 2011 and 2019, the number of foreigners visiting the country tripled, reaching a record breaking 4.5 million foreigners in 2019. 

I chose to focus my research on the Comuna 13 neighborhood of Medellín, which seemed like a perfect microcosm of how the reputation and reality of Medellín—and Colombia—has changed. In 2002, Colombian government sent tanks and soldiers into Comuna 13 to rid the area of the gangs and guerillas that controlled it. These military operations left thousands dead, disappeared, or displaced.

Twenty years later, the neighborhood has changed. Now, it is filled with humble but brightly painted homes, giant graffiti murals, and government-installed electric escalators that provide free transport up the steep hillside. In the last few years, Comuna 13 has become one of Colombia’s top tourist sites, visited by thousands a week.

I first visited Comuna 13 in 2017 on one of the area’s early tours. The area was mostly residential, with some large and colorful works of graffiti and few tourists. Over the next few years, I went back several times, and on each visit, there were more and more tourists. 

When I visited this January, the area was significantly changed. On the weekends, the narrow pathways and electric escalators were crammed with tourists and lined with souvenir shops and stands. Speakers blasted different tunes—salsa, bachata, and reggaeton—and vendors hawked their products, creating a cacophony of competing sounds. Every day of the week, from 9 am to 7 pm, their neighborhood is visited by mobs of tourists. I thought surely the area’s residents must find this overwhelming, must think that tourism had been taken too far. 

I began interviewing people who lived in the area. I started with Stiven, my long-time tour guide, who told me how he is now building a house for him and his mother with the money he has earned giving tours over the last five years. He also put me in touch with other people in the neighborhood, like Maryori, whose mother started one of the first popsicle shops in the area when tourism was just beginning. Now, their business has grown and they have turned their family home into a shop and moved elsewhere. For Maryori, who is also a tour guide, sharing the story of her neighborhood and her own experiences on the tours she leads has been a cathartic and healing process, and she is thankful for all the economic opportunities it has provided her family. Alexander is a member of the breakdance group “Black and White” that performs at the top of the electric escalators. For his dance troupe, tourism has given them the opportunity to make money doing what they love and give kids in their community a new, positive example for earning a living, helping keep them out of gangs. Community council president, Huilmar, explained how the city government has contributed to the area, donating funds and other resources to community-led social initiatives, like music and English classes. Luis, who sells juices and other beverages, recounted how much the neighborhood has changed and how the community continues to look out for each other in hard times. During the pandemic, he said, tourism halted and people were forced to find other work. Many made masks or took construction jobs, and those who had more offered food and support to their neighbors who were struggling

Kbala and Ana Cristina, who gave some of the first tours in Comuna 13, had slightly more critical outlooks. Ana Cristina thinks that the area is overrun, and that the increase in visitors has turned the neighborhood into a “Disneyland.” Kbala takes issue with the way that tour guides from outside the community paint a rosy picture of the area’s history and take business away from the local tour guides. Jhon, who works for the city of Medellín counting the people who take the escalators in Comuna 13, admitted that the crowds and noise can be overwhelming. Older residents, especially, he said, have complained. But, he reiterated the community’s closeness, telling me how in December he distributed presents to neighborhood kids while wearing a Santa suit in the hot sun. 

At the end of the day, tourism is a tool. In Comuna 13, I have seen how tourism has empowered the neighborhood; how the community has used tourism to propel development, progress, and peace. But I have also observed how, once set in motion, tourism has defied the community’s control, stripping them of power in new ways. Through my ongoing thesis work, I am investigating the ways in which tourism has both empowered and disempowered the Comuna 13 community with the hope that other neighborhoods looking to develop their own community tourism—both in Colombia and elsewhere—can learn from their example.