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As I said 'it was to get a mortgage'. I asked my doctor "what if it is positive?". His reply, "We'll try another mortgage company then!".

Okay in that case, getting a local +57 Colombian telephone number, you will need to go in person to Tigo, Claro or Movistar. You will require a passport to activate the plan. There are plenty of different plans to choose from.

They're convicted?

We have in another thread a lot of information about the scam centres located mostly in Myanmar. These trafficked up to 250,000 mostly from around Asia to work in mostly dreadful conditions persuading generally those from older generations around the world to part with their hard earned cash. Thankfully China has started to do something about this. With the help of the Thai authorities, one of the biggest scam chiefs, a Chinese national named She Zhijiang, has finally been sent back to Beijing. Today's Guardian newspaper highlights another form of scam, one operating in Amerca's heartland. Northwestern Mutual is one of America's most admired companies. Founded 168 years ago it sits at #109 in the Fortune 500 list. It also tops Forbes list of the best employers for university graduates. Internships which might lead to full time jobs are coveted by students. Posters at recruitment seninars tourinely tout the company as "The Career You Want at a Company You’ll Love." Although given the revelations in The Guardian article, I totally fail to understand why. Jeremy Barr, a senior at Texas A&M University, was attracted by the company's PR. He was chosen for an internship. Jeremy was offered a job in the company's Texas office. He was sent away with “market information surveys” to complete. The worksheets, seen by the Guardian, required Jeremy to interview 10 friends or family members about their finances – listing their names, occupations, phone numbers, and asking each of them to refer him to 10 more people he could contact about their financial planning . . . He was chosen for an internship. Jeremy was offered a job in the company's Texas office. In spite of its questionable practices, the insurance industry is doing all it can to prevent government interference. SInce 1998 it has spent $4 billion in lobbying fees. The training began immediately, but there were no crash courses in mutual funds or market trends. Instead, the new recruits were told to take out their phones, open their contacts, and upload at least 200 names into company software. Then start calling. The goal: 40 dials a day, documents seen by the Guardian show. Friends, cousins, ex-roommates, teammates, anyone who might answer. Jeremy was told to leave 20 missed calls at a time so it looked “urgent”. When someone finally picked up, there was a script to follow: a cheerful announcement of his new role, followed by an invitation to meet and discuss their financial future. If the person on the phone agrees to meet, their financials are input into Northwestern’s software, which spits out a financial plan. Invariably, it will recommend the most expensive life insurance product, known as “whole life”, according to internal documents and interviews with workers. A more senior adviser typically joins the call and gets half the commission. Reps have quotas for these meetings, according to 14 sources, and an internal document from the New York office, that requests five new bookings per week. According to the author, 21 current and former Northwestern workers all had the same stories. Recruitment, they said, is a decoy for harvesting contacts. Reps are not being groomed as future financial advisers, they claim, but pushed to sell life insurance to friends and family. After one month 80% of interns dropped out. Jeremy stayed on and became top of his group. But despite being the product Northwestern encourages all its employees to concentrate on, whole life policies make tons of profit. Many cash out within a few years when they realise they cannot afford the premiums. Those lost premiums are basically profit. Basically, though they are just a lousy investment. An investment in the S&P 500 in 1990 will have grown about 3,700% while a Northwestern policy would have yielded just 44% over the same period (based on its current dividend rate of 5.5%). So, a stock market investment will have grown about 85 times more than the cash value in a whole life policy. Inflation since 1990 is around 146% so the Northwestern investment would have lost value in real terms . . . [Like so many others] Jeremy, once the last intern standing, eventually broke too. He had sold more than 50 policies to clients which he knew often did not serve their best interest. Guilt caught up with him. Just over a year after that hopeful spring morning, he quit. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/nov/24/northwestern-mutual-insurance-jobs-hiring

They don't, but to @floridarob point, all have protocols in place. Many will ask to see your room key when entering the lobby --no key, see ya! The larger hotels use cards to access the elevator which is easier to bypass. You likely will have better luck in Bogotá where the vigilance is slightly less. In Medellín, particularly in El Poblado and surrounding zonas (Manila, Castropol, Provenza, Las Lomas, etc) they are looking for any hint of sex tourism. So the first visit might be okay, the second and the third? The front desk staff will be in your business. Chisme is the national sport, it won't take long for the staff to all know what you are up to. As noted, they have seen it all, and just want to avoid any drama.

A little curiosity. First, I am the world's lousiest cook. I can do eggs and a few other things, but I just have no interest in cooking whatever. Second I am an unashamed chocoholic. Friends of mine are going to Muscat next week where there is a much praised original chocolate shop run by two sisters. My friends have promised to bring me back some! So a dessert that always has my juices flowing is a chocolate mousse. Yet in all my years of travelling it is rare that I have found one that really had that gorgeous mixture of taste, texture and consistency, even in a top restaurant. Too many are just too thick. Few have the right texture, a sign that insufficient egg white has been folded into the mixture. The best I ever tasted was served as a buffet lunch item in the La Ronda revolving restaurant on the 33rd floor of Hong Kong's Furama Hotel, just along the waterfront from the iconic Mandarin Hotel. It was perfect in every respect, even to having just the merest dash of cognac to add to the flavour. I took guests and clients to that restaurant many, many times. It was a huge buffet. As common nowadays it had different sections, including unusually for those days an Indian section. After a couple of visits when I realised there was no chocolate mousse, I was told that only two smallish bowls were available for each lunch serving. From that day on, I advised all my colleagues that the first thing they had to get from the buffet table was a generous portion of chocolate mousse which would then wait on our table ready for dessert time. Worked a treat! Never in my travels have I found one to better this from the Furama Hotel. Sadly the great views and its chocolate mousse ended when the hotel closed in 2001. https://www.theguardian.com/food/2025/nov/25/whats-the-secret-to-great-chocolate-mousse-kitchen-aide

I'm gonna puke.

Security at the door or elevators.... they're not new at this, they've seen it all, more with straight clients.... the stories the security at the hotels, reception and Airbnb have told me, I'm glad I'm gay. Apart from not knowing about the VZA guy not having a Colombian ID, which I was unaware of at the time was a law to stay in a hotel.... I'm glad they do ID checks.

Trumps "Double-C*NT" Twins..... "Its NOT a Lie if you wear a cross when you say it !"

"FOLLOW ME....Subscribe to My Wiki FEET Page"........

How does this exactly happen in a large hotel, thought?--I can't picture it--there's no way the reception can know who is and isn't staying there. So if the Venezuelan went straight for the elevators or you met him outside and accompanied him (if the elevator requires the key) how would anyone know he wasn't staying there? (Of course, there's the odd idiot who, even though you say just walk straight through to the elevator, somehow can't find it and goes to reception🙀)

Thx

I clicked play on the video and then stopped it, it's time to sleep, sun is coming up .... I don't need that running around in my head keeping me awake 🥺

They will know immediately... I speak Spanish from Mexico and the phrases and abbreviations in Colombia not only vary by region, they might as well be speaking Thai or Arabic 😝 Google Translate won't help either 🥺

I forgot to mention, even though they get their ID, doesn't mean you will be scott free of problems. In Bogota I had 2 guys up, the guy that I was in contact with didn't give his "friend" his fair share of the money, so he tried to come back to the room to get more money from me... the front desk called and said your friend is coming back up, I told them he's not allowed up and security threw him out.... they've seen it all, this was at Embassy Suites.

Don't be surprised... @macdaddi can affirm, Hotels are very strict with visitors. I've always booked a room for 2 even though I travel alone, even so I've had some try to charge an extra guest fee, to which I've told them to just register him. The Hampton Inn Medellin refused a Venezuelan guy because he didn't have his VZA passport or a Colombian ID.... we had to go to a sex motel. The Airbnb I rented the next trip, they let him in with his VZA id.... I'm ok with taking, registering ID's... even in places like Thailand where the risk is lower. But Colombia doesn't play around and if you room is for 2 and you invite someone, be prepared to pay or stand firm that they're visiting and not staying overnight,,,,

We haven't met before, otherwise you'd know not only would I accept, I'd video it .... ask @BjornAgain he has gotten to know me better recently, not in the biblical sense, before @vinapu or @Keithambrose pipe in with that 😁 23cm, (9 inches) is considered average btw in Brazilian saunas .... who didn't see this reply coming 🤷‍♂️

Haha mate, fair play, in an Ibis the “premium king” room is basically a glorified shoebox with a view, so yeah, maybe my depth perception was off from trying not to elbow the minibar mid-thrust. But trust me, when you’re bent over a balcony railing that’s narrower than a Thai alleyway and feeling like you’re about to launch into Silom traffic, that 23cm Ghanaian hammer felt like it could split the Chao Phraya in half. Next time I’ll bring a tape measure and a spirit level to prove it wasn’t just the jet lag playing tricks. Or better yet, book the Le Meridian and invite you for a live demo?

Sent--thanks! I typically stay in AIrbnbs when I go to Brazil, but in CO, the Bogotá portion is because my husband needs more Hyatt nights, therefore Hyatt Place/Convention Center, and in general he prefers hotels (he might be more open to AIrbnbs if only I would just make him breakfast😋) so in Medellin we may stay at the (Accor) Tribe in tourist central. Unless anyone knows these hotels in particular, in Colombia is there a typical policy of midrange chain hotels regarding visitors? In such hotels in Brazil I've stayed in, visitors would just come and go, like any guest, although the elevator/lift may require a key. The check or keep the ID of visitors would be ideal; the forbidding of visitors worst (although in a large hotel I dont know how that could be enforced)

So do my friends, neighbors, and co-workers.. 😉

Well, at least in California, a paramedic can pronounce death if (and only if) the decedent is in full rigor mortis (which can take up to 12 hours). Otherwise, a doctor must pronounce death. In the hospital, doctors usually pronounce death far before then. Death can be established by exam even if the patient is on a ventilator (breathing machine/life support): Note that certain spinal cord reflexes can be present even in a dead person. If the patient is not on a ventilator, and the patient isn't breathing and has no pulse/heartbeat, then the absence of a corneal reflex and oculocephalic reflex (doll's eyes) confirms death. Simply not breathing and not moving is not enough to establish death.

Thanks for the explanation. I didn't detect a joke, must be too much daydreaming on my part.......

Tried to activate my Tigo eSIM yesterday and it got quite far along but ultimately wouldn't activate, presumably because Im not in Colombia yet. Privacy aside, I think a local number on your WhatsApp will moderate the rates requested (the only question is to what extent...) I don't know if there are any particular Colombian expressions that can further localize your opening line; in Brazil mine has "Blz?" (which is not something google translate is going to come up with.) 😉

Yes, they eventually found him at Jomtien Complex with a boy on his lap. 💀