By Juan Pablo Plata.
La Casa Amarilla, Mompos, Colombia.
Hotel San Rafael, Mompos, Colombia.
1. As someone who has worked extensively in journalism, what inspired you to transition into the hospitality industry and open your own hotel?
While my wife Alba and I have opened two small hotels in Mompos, we began this journey in 2008, and neither of us have left behind our original professions. It was always a side venture and an adventure to restore some colonial houses in Mompos and try and kick start some economic stimulus in the town. I feel that my journalism dovetails quite well with the hotel business and certainly, all of these years of experiences in Mompos have provided me with a more profound knowledge and understanding of Colombia and supplied me with significant inspiration for my new book.
2. How do your experiences as a journalist—traveling, storytelling, and meeting diverse people—shape the way you run your hotel?
I think as a journalist, I look at things differently and this helps when you meet people from all walks of life. Obviously, we don't do the day-to-day running of the hotels any longer since we are full time in Bogota as our children go to school here, but I think that when it comes to receiving guests, I have a natural and comfortable manner in which I treat all people with respect and as equals. Just because you are a high-ranking politician or an "empresario" I am going to treat you respectfully, but no different to a European backpacker.
3. What’s the most surprising lesson you’ve learned about human behavior from managing a hotel that you didn’t encounter in your journalism career?
When you work in the service industry you start to understand that people are predictably unpredictable and sometimes incredibly obtuse. Sadly, one remembers the problematic guests more than the most rewarding ones. What is great about having the businesses in a far away destination is that this is a perfect filter on the type of people that we receive and therefore the vast majority of our guests are truly wonderful people.
4. You’ve written about Latin America for years—what unique aspects of the region do you try to bring into the guest experience at your hotel?
Interestingly enough, international visitors to Mompos have read up on the destination beforehand and are open to the hypnotic momentum of a tropical location. Europeans love the laconic pace of life in Colombia's interior of the Costa and this is something that I encourage them to embrace. I can tell them that Mompos is not a "Disneyland" and that it's not full of activities but to breathe in the ambiance and enjoy this open-air museum. They love it. Colombians themselves are more difficult, they want to fill every day with activities and are upset if things don't work like they do in Medellin and then, here I am, a foreigner resident in Colombia, trying to explain the realities of the culture on the Caribbean coast.
5. How do you balance the demands of being a hands-on hotelier with your work as a journalist, especially when covering stories that require travel or deep research?
I think of myself as a fisherman with about seven different fishing rods cast into the water at the same time and hoping that they don't all catch fish at once. It's just a question of prioritizing and delegating to a good team in Mompos.
6. What’s a story from your hotel that you think deserves to be told—something that captures the essence of your guests or staff?
Story excerpt below: And then in 2020 I met Juana.
Diminutive does no justice to her stature. Elfin is a better description. She seems small enough to carry in your mochila. She told me once that she’s in her sixties, she looks to be closer to her eighties, but a life of poverty and drudgery in the conditions of Mompós possibly aged her as it does so many.
Juana is purportedly a black magic witch, therefore not be crossed. She wanders a well-travelled route each day, her hunchback making her recognisable from afar. She has an impish, if childish, grin and eyes which dance energetically. One fall would be the end of her. Maybe she suffered rickets as a child as her legs flex like a bow and her clothes are worn and discoloured from use. For a while Juana would drop by my house to offer advice through the window, on other days hers was the bench to one side of the San Rafael.
I always had a few small notes handy to help her on her way and we shared a laugh plenty of times. I did ask her outright about her witchcraft but she avoided the question and clasped my forearm, not for support, but almost it seemed as a warning. As she did so, a Momposino approaching on his bicycle caught my eye and waved his finger in a “no” gesture. His expression was definitely one of fear.
Juana was everywhere for a while and so I asked after an unpleasant occurrence which had taken place recently in our home.
One night, Alba heard a knocking and disturbance in the house. We were all getting ready for bed and I was dispatched to see to the issue. It was vulture, its odour of rotting food and ripening garbage hit me first, to the left of us down the corridor. I moved to find a rake and scare it out, once flinging open the vast colonial doors in an attempt to usher it out.
Quite the sight for the policemen in their van surveying the plaza, a gringo in his pajamas floundering after a vulture. Before I managed to scoop up the sizable bird, eyes watering from the smell, it entered another bedroom, flew into the kitchen, knocked over a vase in the dining area and vomited in several places.
It was later that I was told by my accountant – who else? - that witches in the region were known for turning into avulture in order to enter houses. If the vulture entered a room, then the person normally occupying that room was the target.
My brother in law?
We had to perform a limpieza cleansing where all floors and areas where the vulture had stepped were scrubbed and mopped with a concoction including a herb known locally as Mata Raton. This Madre de Cacao[1]shrub is believed to cure alopecia, boils, bruises, burns, colds, cough, debility, eruptions, erysipelas, fever, fractures, gangrene, head-ache, itch, prickly heat, rheumatism, skin, sore, tumours, ulcers, urticaria, and wounds. It is toxic for many animals, perhaps to a vulture, I don’t know.
And then, I had to bathe myself first in rock salt and then with rosemary and other herbs.
Why did Liana, my accountant, know about witches turning into vultures? Liana is from Gamarra, known for its witches as I have previously mentioned and her neighbour was a witch. On occasion, the neighbour would make mention of things happening in Liana’s house at night time, to Liana irrefutable truth that the vulture had entered and cast her beady dead eyes over her home in the dark of the night.
Juana listened intently through the window to my retelling of the tale and expressed concern. She recommended the limpieza as well in addition to mentioning that she had seen a dark figure wandering around the house for several nights. Could this have been the witch? This was bad, she said. She would pray for us.
“There is a deep sense of resentment and envy towards you in this town, Richard.”
7. In your opinion, how has the rise of digital media and platforms like X changed the way journalists and hoteliers connect with their audiences?
Sadly, so much is now dependent on clicks and algorithms. I am shutting down my X account on 5 March, I decided on the date of the beginning of Lent when people traditionally give things up, as it has become a cesspit of hatred and disinformation. If I post something, usually, you end up on the end of some sort of criticism rather than support. This said, we need to find platforms upon which to promote our businesses and work...it's a question of finding the correct niche.
8.What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced in the hospitality industry, and how did your journalistic problem-solving skills help you overcome it?
This is not a particularly easy question to answer, I've had to think about this a fair bit! I think it's directly related to my work as a journalist and opening a small hotel while Mompos was still in the Wild West and "security" for the town was provided by offshoots of paramilitary groups. So, I had to keep my head down, do my own thing and not draw any attention to myself....you'll have to read my book.
9. If you could host any historical figure as a guest at your hotel, who would it be, and what question would you ask them as a journalist?
We've had some pretty great guests over the years from artists to musicians, writers and politicians and more. I suppose I'd like to have George Orwell as a guest and to tell him that his book: The Road to Wigan Pier, was the inspiration for my doctoral thesis in which I focused on some of the poverty and issues of post-industrialization in downtown Bogota, Colombia.
10. Looking ahead, where do you see the intersection of journalism and hospitality in your career—any dream projects that blend the two?
Well, the dream is to write books about Colombia to better understand my adopted homeland and to share my profound love for this country with others. For this reason I have written The Mompos Project: A Tale of Love, Hotels and Madness in Colombia, due to be released on 19 March 2025 which details many stories of my time here since 2007. And, this is why Alba and I started a small publishing company: Fuller-Vigil, to publish lesser known stories and promote new authors, writing in English, about Latin America. Ideally, we are seeking to publish two books a year and want to focus on northern South America, but we are open to all unsolicited manuscripts.
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