Colombia - Culture Smart!: The Essential Guide to Customs & Culture

Colombia has a spectacular and variant landscape, embracing tropical beaches, highland plateaus, the rugged, snow-capped peaks of the Andes, arid deserts, and dense Amazonian jungle. Colombian society is equally diverse. Stylish, cosmopolitan cities coexist with poverty in the beautiful countryside. As a result of the 16th-century Spanish conquest, modern Colombia’s multiethnic society is a synthesis of Spanish, indigenous, and African traditions—evident in the music, in the food, and in Barranquilla’s famous Carnival. The Colombian people are emerging from decades of crushing civil war and lawlessness with their spirits unbroken. Animated, lighthearted, and ever ready to enjoy the moment, they are looking to the future with hope and are eager to share their rich and beautiful country with the outside world. This pocket-sized book reveals Colombia’s key customs and traditions, examines life at home and at work, and introduces some distinct and delicious culinary quirks. There is also advice on safe travel, vital information on how business is done, and how to communicate effectively across the cultural divide.

Kate Cathey is a writer and anthropologist. She attended Sarah Lawrence College in New York, where she studied Art History, and later graduated with a B.A. in World Arts and Cultures, concentration in Anthropology, from the University of California, Los Angeles. Since then, she has traveled extensively in Latin America, researching and writing about regional cultural and culinary traditions. In 2009 Kate moved to Bogotá, Colombia, where she directed cultural travel programs and was a contributor to Bogotá’s English-language newspaper, The City Paper.