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Arisis Velasquez Restrepo and William E. Smith 14

December 23, 2012 Bill and Aris with Aris's grandson Alejo between them at the Bogota Holiday Inn Airport.

Arisis Velasquez Restrepo and William E. Smith 13

December 28, 2012 Bill with Aris and Aris's oldest Son Gerardo's family and Daughter Sandra Marcela and her boyfriend Camilio on a balcony of the Bogota Radisson Royal Hotel with the northern end of the Andes Mountains in the background.

Arisis Velasquez Restrepo and William E. Smith 12

December 25, 2012 Group picture of Aris's Neiva family at the home of Libardo Velasquez Restrepo (pink shirt) Aris's oldest brother with Bill and Aris.

Arisis Velasquez Restrepo and William E. Smith 11

December 25, 2012 Aris, Bill, Aris's older sister Mervy and niece Carolina in Neiva, Colombia at the Pacande Hotel.

Arisis Velasquez and William E. Smith 10

December 24,2012 Arisis and Bill with Arisis's mother in Neiva, Colombia.

William and Arisis

An internet acquaintanceship between William E. Smith and Arisis Velasquez Restrepo turned romantic in the Spring of 2010 when they exchanged poems. Bill sent her Yeats awkwardly translated into Spanish and Aris responded with a well known Latin poem called “Missing You”. With this as a start the two began to hit it off. They exchanged family information and personal life stories and began to talk to each other every day.
In the fall of 2010 Bill invited Aris to visit him in Pittsburgh for the Christmas holidays. Aris got herself a passport and attempted to obtain a B -1 tourist visa. Unfortunately Aris was denied the visa.
Still eager to meet each other in person Bill traveled to Bogota, Colombia on February 11, 2011 and spent 7 days with Aris.
On Sunday February 13 Bill was treated to a welcoming dinner at the Bogota home of Aris’s sister Mervy Velasquez. He was well received and thanked Mervy by playing a jazzed up version of “Chopsticks” on the family piano.
During the week long visit Bill was able to meet with most of the members of Aris’s immediate family, her adult sons and daughter, at least twice. The highlight of the trip was on Wednesday February 16 when Bill got to participate in the enrollment of Aris’s 2 year old grandson Esteban Alejandre in a parochial preschool. As Bill had spent several years as a Florida kindergarten teacher this provided him an extra insight into Colombian family and community aspirations.
Over dinner with Aris that evening a special toast was raised to the “Future President of Colombia”.
Bill returned to the US and he and Aris continued their daily communication as before. Another attempt was made during the summer of 2011 to bring Aris for a visit. Again she was denied a tourist visa.
Bill and Aris decided that if she couldn’t come to the US that they would meet where neither was required to have a visa for a short visit. They settled on Panama City, Panama and met there together for 10 days beginning on March 26, 2012.
On the evening of March 27 at a famous Panama City Italian restaurant called Cafe Pomodoro Bill presented Aris with an engagement ring.
Aris and Bill had a wonderful time together in Panama. On March 30 they took a day trip by taxi to visit the Pacific Ocean beach at Playa Blanca where Aris saw the ocean for the first time.
They visited the Panama Canal twice. The first time on March 29 by taxi ride to the Miraflores Locks to observe the canal in operation in an outdoor theater setting.
On April 1 they rode a tour boat through two locks of the canal and learned a lot about the history of Panama and the Canal and got to observe its future adjacent expansion.
On April 5 after a tearful goodbye each returned home. Bill made a promise to move from Pittsburgh and settle in the Tampa Bay area before proceeding with a K-1 Visa application for Aris. This was because in the Tampa area a large portion of the population is fluent in Spanish and both of Bill’s adult children have well established Florida families.
Bill and Aris stay in touch daily as they have in the past using the technical video capabilities of Facebook and MSN Messenger.
In October Bill purchased a home in the Rocky Point area of Tampa and is now fulfilling his promise to apply for a K-1 Visa for Aris.
Bill has made plans to visit Colombia again over the 2012-13 Christmas holidays. On this visit a significant amount of time will be spent in Neiva, Colombia where Aris grew up and her mother and oldest brother still live.