1. The big thing I see here that I don’t see in Canada……soldiers with scary-looking assault rifles on the streets. Not many…..but just enough to make a naïve Canadian boy a little more careful.

2. 400-year-old sidewalks whose stones are as shiny as marble in some places. They get that way, I’m told, because they’re so old and worn they look like they’ve been polished. The sidewalks are about 3-4 feet wide. You have to turn sideways if you pass someone going in the other direction.

3. Children begging in the streets. If you say yes, you’re surrounded by dozens of others. If you say no, you feel awful.

4. A sign in Spanish over a business that says…..”Public Writers.” For illiterate people who need some writing done.

5. A big open sewer. There’s no sewage treatment in San Cristobal. It all goes into surrounding rivers untreated.