Inkwell Colombia Announcement

 

INKWELL INTERVIEW

 

So Morgan, I’m so glad to hear that you’ve been well. Tell me how you’ve been and what you’ve been up to.

I’m good! After China, I sort of bounced around a little until I settled in Colombia. It’s a beautiful country, man. Deserts, volcanoes, jungles, the Andes, cloud forests. It’s breathtaking. I currently live in Cali, on the Western side of Colombia. I teach AP English Language at an international school here in an open air classroom, so iguanas and small capybara-like rodents scuttle through my classroom every now and then. My school grows its own coffee and chocolate, and mango trees grow naturally on campus.

 

For those Inkwell members who don’t know you, why don’t you tell them a little about yourself.

Hey, my name’s Morgan Shillingburg. I’m originally from West Virginia, and I like to think I live as a cultural ambassador to Appalachia. Nearby friends I am forcing to answer this question on my behalf have this to say about me: “Darkly funny, intellectual, can speak to anyone about anything because of his wide range of knowledge, enthusiastic about education, deeply empathetic despite a chronic case of Resting Bitch Face.”

 

How was your experience in Inkwell?

I loved it! I made pretty much every friend I had in Shanghai either directly through or indirectly through Inkwell. I keep in contact with almost all of them to this day. I was in Inkwell in the early days, just a month or so after it found its rhythm. I quickly became part of the Old Guard and my ego loved that delicious, delicious status. You kids today don’t know how good you’ve got it. Back in our day, we’d have only 4 people in a meeting! And we liked it that way, dagnabbit.

I hardly ever submitted, because I’ve been working on a novel for years and years and I don’t find the workshop structure to be super useful for a novel. BUT a good workshop is a great place to fish for beta readers.

 

So, you decided to start an Inkwell in Colombia. Tell us about that choice and what the writing scene is like there.

First off, great job spelling Colombia correctly, with that o in the middle. Spelling it with the forsaken u is about the only thing that would make an extroverted, friendly Caleño, home of salsa dancing, angry.

I ended up in Colombia because I was looking to be a part of a community, to really get to know the families of the students I teach, to have a better work-life balance, and to learn Spanish. I said this in an interview for a Latin American school and they said, “Great answer. Those schools exist, but they’re in Colombia.” It was one of the greatest No’s I’ve ever received in life, and it’s why I ended up in this country.

I’m extra happy to be in Colombia because it’s the homeland of magical realism. They have a rich literary tradition of Spanish writers here, what with Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Alvaro Cepeda Samudio, Mario Mendoza, Fernando Vallejo, Laura Restrepo, etc etc etc.

Cali is also a cool city with some cool legends. There’s one I quite like about a demon of hedonism who was trapped in a nearby mountain by a priest who sealed it with three crosses at its top. What he didn’t realize is that it can sneak out as the sun sets and the wind whips over the Andes, driving people to salsa dance and sinning in a vibrant nightlife until the sun comes up.

 

What do you hope your writing group to be like?

I hope it’s full of eccentric weirdos. I hope it’s a good mix of Expats, immigrants, and native Colombians who want to stretch their legs in a second language. I hope we’re productive, but we end up being great friends, the way the Shanghai writing workshop ended up for me.

 

Who can join this group?

Absolutely anybody, provided they’re writing in English. While it’s geared toward fiction short stories, we’ll let any poet, screenwriter, or nonfiction writer submit.

 

Why should someone join your group?

Cali doesn’t have a huge expat community. I have found other writing workshops, but they’re all Spanish language based. Outside of that, we already have a budding group of kind, funny eccentrics.

 

What kind of meetings are you having?

We’re just finding our llave right now, so it’s hard to answer that question. So far, we’re just meeting up and writing out little doodle stories by hand, but I hope to pivot to the way the Shanghai writer’s workshop ran things. Submit before the meeting, read it ahead of time, and then talk about the pieces as the night goes on. As I see what sort of writers the community is made up of, we’ll adapt accordingly.

 

How can someone join your meetings?

We have a presence on Meetup.com, but we also have a Whatsapp group. We’ve locked in a meeting café, but once we have a regular established meeting time, we’ll start advertising on Facebook and putting flyers out on one of the many nearby college campuses.

 

Why do you like writing?

Writing feels like unravelling a big knot of yarn in my head. I feel better and more organized after I write something, even if it’s not very good, and even if no one else will read it.

 

What do you feel like makes a writing group really good?

Openness, egolessness, community, humor, a sense of construction. I want to create a space where I am inspired by the people around me.

 

Anything else you’d like potential writers to know about you?

Nah, it’s best to maintain a mysterious aura.