I’ve only been to Guatape once so far, but according to Enrique I’ve never actually seen it. He made this comment at the town bar where we were drinking a few beers and it came on the heels of an equally aggressive comment. “Well,” he said to the man next to us, “Matt here doesn’t even know how to swim.”

Since the last century, a fundamental change has occurred in Medellin safety and that change has rippled outward to the regions surrounding this notorious hub. Security has triumphed, and not simply as an ideology. The structure of the Medellin – and much of Colombia’s – safety has shifted in an effort not only to preserve and embrace its culture, but, as we’re finding out more and more, to improve tourism as a new and valuable facet to the city’s economy.

Meanwhile, the corrupt aspects of Medellin life have declined. The institutions that undertook formal and informal negotiations to wield power, gain wealth, and abuse the system have been eclipsed. The days of palpable money laundering and drug dealership have not vanished entirely, I was explaining to my friend Henry back in the States, but there’s been a sizeable improvement (or at least consolidation) of illicit behavior.

The lawless have, for the most part, been replaced by the goodhearted. Which draws back to the age-old inquiry you get from friends and relatives after visiting this part of the world.

“Is Medellin safe?”

Few questions in the realm of Latin American travel have generated more belligerently incorrect answers than this one. Many assume, in the true nature of a stigma, that Medellin’s past still rambles on, that the Pablo Escobars of Medellin still operate like it was 1980.

The real explanation involves taking into account the obvious: yes, Medellin is a large city (three million people) and yes, not unlike any other large city, it has its fair share of crime. Where most people go wrong though is imperceptively assuming that murders and knife fights happen out in public, on a regular basis, and, most ignorantly of all, in areas that a tourist might find himself, say, photographing a church.

This concept, after having visited Medellin on several occasions, reminds me of a product I once saw in SkyMall.

“Children’s Bulletproof Vest,” the item read. If I’m not mistaken, it was advertised alongside a twelve-pronged water sprinkler and a doghouse that offered three floors of spacious seating. The vest could be worn under a shirt or jacket, came only in jet-black, and, according to the description, could stop a high-powered rifle from mid-range.

There was also a photo of a young boy standing in front of a school bus in what I initially interpreted as a life preserver vest. It was a decent selling point but I would have been a dimwit not to ask myself the following question: Where in the world, would a child need a bulletproof vest?

It’s as if someone’s assuming children, particularly this white child from an upper-class suburb, spend their time after school in the nearest ghetto or delivering large sums of cash to banks. In the same way that children simply shouldn’t be in surroundings that require a bulletproof vest, foreigners should not find themselves in dubious regions of Medellin. Beyond the fact that restaurant menus aren’t translated to English, there’s frankly just not a whole lot to see.

This allusion stated, the places in Medellin that will interest most visitors are known to be very very safe. The malls, the tourist sights, the plazas. If one wanted to go in search of danger and peril, he would have no problem as gangs control many of Medellin’s lower-class barrios.

Across numerous interviews, I learned unsurprisingly that the large majority of crime in Medellin is incestuous, which is to say that, if you’re not involved in the community, chances are, you’ll never see or hear from them. It can be easy to romanticize Medellin’s crime – to assume that gangster and drug pins dine in the same restaurants as us peasants. But the truth is just not so.

Confronting the crime stigma is something that you’ll surely encounter on your visit to Medellin. Whether it’s a taxi driver or shop owner, locals are patriotically quick to reassure foreigners about safety. It is clear they love their city and that they’re distinctly aware of its tarnished image in the world. In doing so, they face a difficult, albeit not impossible battle, to achieve some of the acclaim Medellin truly deserves. Photo: Laloking97 from Flickr

It was on my way to the famed village of Santa Fe de Antioquia, also known as the mother city, that a small one-armed man entered the bus and began a sob story about how he lost both his limb and his wife in a car crash sometime last May. “I miss her dearly,” he said. “She was my heart and my soul. She meant the world to me. Which is precisely why you should buy some of my pirated DVDs. Care to have a look?”