¡Tomá mate!

Final Thoughts

2008-06-12T23:36:00.000-07:00

So I'M HOME! I've actually been home for about 3 weeks now, have gotten some temp work and am on my way to full time work. But it doesn't feel like I've been home that long as I'm still kind of settling in. Thanks to all who visited Toma Mate! I'm going to post one final "Things I wish I had known before going to Buenos Aires post" as I feel like there was a lot of stuff I learned the hard way that might help out future visitors. I also may or may not finish my top ten list. Otherwise I'd say this blog is just about done. I think I may be addicted though, so I will continue to post at my new blog: http://sweetcanvas.blogspot.com. Take a gander if you wish & thanks again for reading :)

No. 2 Sweet Jesus alive, the Argentines know how to do dessert!

2008-05-14T04:50:00.000-07:00

Right before leaving for this trip I spent a few weeks living with my parents. One morning I came across my dad unwrapping a Payday at 9 am.

"Dad, what are you doing? It's 9 o'clock in the morning. Shouldn't you be having cereal or toast? An English muffin perhaps?"

His reply: "Elizabeth, I'm an adult. I can do whatever I want."

I've found that the Argentines have a similar attitude when it comes to their love affair with sweets.

(Imaginary dialogue between me and the population of Argentina)
Me: "But you're thin and gorgeous; shouldn't you be eating healthy foods low in calories and sugar to stay this way?"

Argentines: "Soy Argentino. I can do whatever I want. I'll eat a breakfast of medialunas filled with dulce de leche, a lunch of ice cream, alfajores for a snack and still be más flaco y guapo que vos. Jejeje."

I seriously don't understand how (especially the women) are able to stay so trim with the abundance of sweet things all around and their steady consumption of them. It's incredibly annoying, as being the child of a man with not one sweet tooth, but a mouth full of sweet canines, incisors, bicuspids, and molars, I have quite the addiction to sweets myself, however I am lacking the Argentine mentality or superpower or whatever it is that keeps sweets from taking up residence in one's waistline. But anyway, the point of all this is that Argentines love their desserts and I am going to miss their unabashed, sin verguenza manner of eating them.

This, my friends, is a land of desserts, and delicious, scrumdidlyumptious ones at that.

First of all, there are bakeries ALL over the place. Seriously, you pass one every few blocks, where medialunas (croissants) and other facturas (pastries) are abundant and cheap. One of my favorite cafe snacks is tea with a few medialunas on the side.

Another treat that you can get just about anywhere is the alfajor. There are all sorts of varieties. There are artesanal alfajores (left), which you're likely to encounter at a bakery and are essentially dulce de leche sandwiched between two soft sugar cookies sprinkled with coconut, and sometimes dipped in chocolate. There are also a number of packaged ones you can get at the grocery store or at kioscos. While I don't like those nearly as much because they don't have the same homemade quality, they still are pretty darn delicious. Havanna is probably the most popular packaged alfajor and kind of an elitist brand with its use of silver and gold foil wrappers and cost that is about double the price of other brands.

As I said, alfajores are filled with dulce de leche. However, this isn't the only way to eat the caramel spread that has been called the Argentine counterpart to America's peanut butter. Dulce de leche can top, fill, be drizzled upon (or globbed onto depending on your mood) fruits, cookies, pastries--you name it. I've even witnessed Argentines eat it plain on a spoon. My favorite thing to do was dip granny smith slices into it as it has a very similar texture and taste to that of caramel apple dip you can get in most grocery stores back home.

For the equivalent of about 20 cents each, the bon-o-bon is quite possibly one of my favorites, with its light crispy shell and creamy, smooth peanuty-flavored filling, all dipped in milk chocolate. The best part about bon-o-bons is that they're so rich just one will satisfy your chocolate/sweet cravings. Though when offered more it's pretty hard to say no.

So yes, these are the sweets I am going to miss, though Lord knows it might be a good thing for me to get back home and no longer have the temptation, as one can only justify so much dessert eating after going running. However, living at home I probably will have no problem getting my dessert fix as my mom is a bakeaholic.

Sidenote: I may or may not be bringing home some of these delectable delights, so if you're interested in trying one, give me a holler!

The end is near...

2008-05-12T05:15:00.000-07:00

This is my last week and I've decided the best way to finish up is to do a 'top 10 (or so) things I'm going to miss about Buenos Aires' series, though not in order as I'm coming up with them as I go.

No. 1 The street art of Elodio
We first noticed the work of Elodio--a 23 year old Chilean street artist who has art all over Buenos Aires and Chile--while living in our first apartment in San Telmo. I don't really know much else about him, though via google I've managed to find his blog, photostream and YouTube profile. Though there is a lot of street art in San Telmo, Elodio seems to be one of the more prolific artists, and you can encounter his li'l guys every couple of blocks. I didn't realize just how much ground he covers until Eriks and I moved to San Telmo a second time and got to know the neighborhood even better. We frequently came across new Elodio people while walking to UBA, church, or Parque Lezasma. His consistent style makes his art instantly recognizable, and whether stumbling upon a new work or passing one because you know it's there, seeing Elodio's work is a real treat. I found myself intentionally walking down the calle Peru to class just so I could pass his robot, boy riding a dog, and boy holding a teddy bear. While one could talk about his use of color, balance, design, honestly, I think the main reason I like his work so much is that it's just so dang cute. And, of course, it includes a depiction of a robot and ewok-like dogs and teddy bears. Now that I'm in Recoleta I don't regularly pass it on my walk to school, and I'm already missing the warm little happy feeling I get seeing it. If you find yourself in San Telmo, keep an eye out for the street art of Elodio, though it's hard to miss.

Elodio Blog
Elodio Photostream
Elodio YouTube

Changing roommates

2008-04-28T11:43:00.001-07:00

Eriks left on April 15th--his 7 months were up and he had a family wedding to get back to. As a kind of final activity we went to dinner and to see Rent with some friends, which was fun, though because it was in Spanish and I had never seen it before, I totally couldn't for the life of me figure out who had AIDS and who didn't. Luckily Laura and Gwen both knew the English version quite well and were able to fill me in during intermission. It was a

really nice time and a good last thing to do. While I was completely willing to go out to fancy dinner (like we did before Moni left) or do whatever else Eriks wanted to do his last day in Buenos Aires, he (being Eriks) decided what he really wanted to do was just have a movie marathon with yummy snacks as, after living here for so long we've seen/done most of the things we've wanted to do, and this just gave us the opportunity to relax and hang out. Saying goodbye was pretty hard as I'd gotten so used to having the guy around, but I know we'll always be good friends and we'll see each other again sometime in the near future.

I was a little worried about getting lonely being so used to having a roommate to watch movies with, eat the food I cooked, go to church with, play games with, etc. However I've kept busy going to Spanish classes and going out with friends from those Spanish classes, and since he left I've consistently had new roomies to fill his shoes. The first was a girl named Jenny who is down from San Diego to teach English for a year. I met her through Gwen (a friend from CMRS also down here doing the ex-pat thang for 7 months now); apparently they went through the same TOEFL program and their teacher put them in touch. Jenny didn't have anywhere to live, and as Eriks had just left and there was an empty futon in the apartment, I offered it to her until our lease ran up. She stayed for just about a week and it was really great. She had brought down Season 2 of The Office and Pride & Prejudice which made for a few good relaxing nights. We also went on a couple of runs around Puerto Madero together and went out to eat and to bars. Jenny managed to find an apartment a few days before I checked out my flat and went to Azul for the second time, which worked out perfectly as it meant that I got a few days to myself but wasn't living completely alone since Eriks left.

And now I have these two girls as my roomies. We get along for the most part, though Bonnie sometimes gets a little too fresh, occasionally chewing on my hair when I'm sitting on the couch and kneading my stomach and (strangely) boob/chest area. I'm cat-sitting for Steve, a friend from church who is away on a business trip (he works for the U.S. Embassy). I really lucked out as otherwise I'm not sure where I would have lived these last two weeks in Buenos Aires. I guess I could have done the staying in a hostel thing, but let me tell you, living in this 3 bedroom 4 bath apartment on the nicest street in Recoleta is a lot more comfortable! It was kind of a trip going from living on the border of La Boca to living in the most luxurious of barrios, with the Plaza Hotel across the street and a Louis Vuitton boutique kitty corner to the apartment entrance. Though I'd say at this point in my life, San Telmo is probably more suited to my lifestyle, it's been nice getting to reside in a slightly more pampered, pleasant looking part of town. It's also great because I'm only a few blocks from the MALBA and a couple of miles from the Palermo parks, which is ideal for running. (I've started training(ish) for the SF Marathon in August. I don't know if I'll actually do it, but it's got me running regularly which is good.) While the cats as roommates aren't that different from Eriks in the sense that they get hungry a lot, I feed them a lot, they like to watch movies with me and they're are pretty talkative, I think the whole not having opposable thumbs thing and not speaking anything but cat language makes me still miss having Eriks around a little, as it means they can't even offer (regardless of whether they actually do or not) to do the dishes or participate in an occasional game of Palabras Cruzadas or Cribbage. Though perhaps I'd actually win if I played them...

But at this point I've only got about 5 days until I go home to a house that's constantly full of people, between my parents, Max our German exchange student, and friends/visitors, so maybe I should value this time of having a lot of living space all to myself with only two cats to share it with.

Azul

2008-04-19T10:59:00.003-07:00

Eriks and I were asked to accompany a group from St. Luke's Lutheran Church in Bloomington, Minnesota as translators during their week-long trip down here working with their sister church in Azul. No one in the group except for Pastor Mark spoke much Spanish (and Mark at a beginning level), they were keen to have a translator. They found out that Eriks was down here from his grandma, who is a member of their church, and got in touch with him to see if he'd be interested in filling that position. Eriks, thinking his two classes at the UBA weren't quite enough, asked if I could join and if we could act as a translating duo. Mark said they'd love to have us both, and so there we were, committed to going on a church trip as translators. I have to admit, I was quite nervous being the primary translator, and up until actually arriving in Azul, we had no idea exactly what kind of work the church would be doing other than that there had been some talk about a meeting about the budget. However, I figured that if God wanted us to do this, He'd give us the words.
And He did. We made it through a lot of conversations and situations I don't think there was any way for us to prepare for. We were faced with a variety of tasks, from translating prayers to breaking down the language barrier in counseling sessions; in one day I found myself going from translating a discussion about the future of the set-up of the church's preschool with a state representative, to being on a local Argentine radio station interviewing the pastors and staff of St. Luke's. While by the end of it all we were both exhausted, we both feel this trip was such a blessing. Through it, not only did we get to meet and befriend some wonderful people from St. Luke's, we also got to have an experience that we both believed our time down here was missing. Yes, we'd traveled a lot and gotten to know some great people, and through church I'd done a bit of volunteer work here and there. However, we both felt that, for the most part, our time down here had been kind of, for lack of a better word, selfish. This being said, the trip to Azul, coming near the end of Eriks's time here, was the perfect final

activity for both of us because it allowed us to see a part of the country you don't really get to know as a tourist and to truly get to know the people--to eat dinner with them, to converse with them in their homes, to befriend them. And I think we both felt (even though in a small way) it was an opportunity for us to leave this country that has treated us so well, a little bit better off. Plus, it was so much fun working with the kids at the preschool (I think I was missing working with kids because I haven't babysat in over 7 months!). Eriks learned how to hold babies, which is good since he's going to see his new godson for the first time this summer. It was also great to really connect with one of the families, the Olivas, as I tend to like having a family away from home when I go to other countries. There are a ton of different ways that I feel this trip blessed my life and I just feel so grateful for getting this opportunity. So way to go Grandma Harriet for mentioning we were down here!
~~~~~~~~~
As I said before, I really connected with one of the families. The youngest daughter, Dani, dances and invited me to come to Azul to see her perform last week. So I made the trip one more time a week ago to say goodbye one last time before I leave. It was a really different experience going on my own, and I definitely was missing the whole St. Luke's group and Eriks as the bus pulled into Azul. But it still was a nice trip. Dani was wonderful as Little Red Ridinghood, and I got to have some great conversations with the family over homemade parilla and just hanging out. We also spent Friday in Mar del Plata, which I didn't think I was going to make it to and made me excited to return to the Pacific, which will be in exactly a week. As much at home as I have felt during this trip, meeting such genuinely good people and enjoying myself, I feel content with my time down here coming to an end. It's passed by quickly, but at the same time has been really full in so many wonderful ways. I have no regrets, nothing I wish I could have done or seen, but rather am leaving with a whole suitcase full of stories and memories of experiences--like that in Azul--that I never expected I would blessed with opportunity to have.

Fuego

2008-04-19T10:59:00.001-07:00

I almost forgot about something rather interesting/exciting/a bit terrifying that happened in mid-March. In the middle of the night, fast asleep sometime around 3 am we were woken by our doorbell and shouts of "Fuego!" in the courtyard. There was an apartment in our building on fire.
While it didn't spread to any other apartments and no one was inside, after putting on jackets, shoes and grabbing our keys and telephone (in retrospect passports might have been a good idea) we stumbled out into the courtyard and could see giant flames leaping out of the window and licking the outer wall of the apartment a floor above ours and two over. The apartment building was evacuated and we were all left standing out front in the thunder and lightning as firetrucks pulled up and firefighters ran in and out of the building with hoses.
It was all over in a little less than an hour. We heard that it might have been caused by lightening striking a wire, but it's hard to say. I guess that kind of thing happens fairly frequently here. All I know is that no matter how many fire drills you go through, you're never entirely prepared for the real thing.
~~~~~~
After that experience, when the smoke descended upon Buenos Aires a few weeks ago from the fires out in the countryside (if you didn't read about it in the news, check out this BBC article), when I woke up to the smell of smoke and a sore throat, my immediate thought was that it had happened again. Fortunately there wasn't another fire in our apartment building, though it still was pretty awful having to walk around and breath in smoky air. While it made for some rather gorgeous sunsets with the hazy air absorbing the tangerine rays of the sinking sun in the evenings and making the sky kind of glow, I found myself with a constant sore throat and many people were even wearing face masks. While the smoke was deemed 'not dangerous' by officials, it certainly wasn't comfortable and I can't imagine what it would have been like if I had asthma. But after a week and a half it cleared and the BsAs aires were bueno once again.

March: Back in BsAs

2008-04-19T10:37:00.000-07:00

It was really nice to get back to Buenos Aires. I'm not quite sure how people go backpacking for so long. I love traveling, but I don't know if I could live in hostels for more than a month. The apartment ended up working out perfectly size-wise and in terms of location. Plus it had a DVD player which was excellent because it meant we could actually watch movies we picked out, rather than the random assortment provided by Argentine television stations or bus services. There was a movie store a few blocks away that we quickly became regulars at.

It was really great to catch up with people from church and friends. Eriks friend Allison also came to visit which was fun and a good reason to stop bumming around watching movies but actually go out (we had a pretty lazy first week back claiming that we were 'recovering' from our trip). I also started a two-month long 2 hr/day, 4 days/week Spanish language course at the University of Buenos Aires which I'm still taking and really enjoying, especially because the people in the class are fun and come from a variety of different countries: england, scotland, brazil, france, china...the list goes on.
Between classes and visitors and movie watching the month passed by quickly. Before we knew it we were celebrating Easter with people from church at Kevin's and packing for our final trip while in Argentina acting as translators for a group from Eriks's church in Minnesota, St. Luke's. I think I'll wait to post about that experience as it deserves its own post.

Last Stop: Iguazu

2008-04-19T10:34:00.000-07:00

Our final destination was Iguazu Falls. It took about 26 hours to get there which was way too much time. I actually ended up getting sick at the end (I think I caught some kind of flu) which meant our first day in Iguazu I spent in bed at the hostel. Luckily I was feeling much better by the next day.
Iguazu was a great way to end our trip. Even though it was overcast, the falls were gorgeous. While Iguazu was a bit touristy and felt almost like a zoo with a little train that takes you to the Gargantua del Diablo (Devil's Throat) of the falls and well paved paths to the other vistas.
Iguazu was really enjoyable, though I have to say I enjoyed going to Machu Picchu, El Calafate and Ushuaia more. At the same time I feel pretty lucky to have gotten to go and for this trip overall.
That evening we left for Buenos Aires, both pleased with how the trip went and ready to settle down for a little while.

Salta

2008-04-19T10:18:00.000-07:00

We spent a week in Salta and it was lovely. After a very active first two and a half weeks of our trip, we decided to take our week at Salta as a time to relax. And it was exactly the place to do that as the pace of life there is pretty slow. We walked around the city a lot, got ice cream, hung out in the plazas, read, and went to the movies. Three times. I actually already blogged about this while I was in Salta, so I'm not going to spend too much time on it and if you want to read it, here's the link. But here is a brief overview of the main things we did in Salta and some photos:

Walking to the top of Cerro de San Bernardo

These are some views of Salta from the top. We decided to walk though you can ride in the gondolas.

This (female) dog followed us all the way from our hostel up the hill. We couldn't lose her or figure out why in the world she wanted to walk up some 1,000 steps with us. We discovered she was female on the way back down the hill, as a male dog joined our party of three, trailing closely behind her.

Trips to Hoyts
We went to Hoyts three days in a row. We started out with There Will Be Blood and loved it. The next day we saw Charlie Wilson's War and then the following day Cloverfield, and they progressively got not as good but it was still fun to go to the movies.

A desperate attempt to get back to Argentina

2008-04-19T10:03:00.000-07:00

As we hadn't booked any bus tickets ahead of time, getting back into Argentina was quite the ordeal. Unfortunately there wasn't a bus that went directly from Puno to Salta, which I guess is understandable as it's probably in total about a 40 hour journey.
So from Puno we took an overnight bus to Tacna; in Tacna we caught a small hour long bus that took us through customs across the border into Chile. Apparently you can go via taxi, and there were a number of cab drivers who were trying to take us, but (obviously) that's the more expensive route and I was bothered by how persistent they were. So we asked around and found a bus for about a fourth of the price. We were the only foreigners on the bus though and stuck out like sore thumbs, but I was happy to have used my Spanish to avoid a tourist trap.
We arrived in Arica sometime before noon only to discover that all the buses to Salta (or anywhere in Argentina) were booked up until the 30th of February! However there were buses to Calama, a quiet city in northern Chile where there was the potential to catch a bus into Argentina. We booked our tickets right away, converting pesos and leftover Soles to Chilean pesos because they wouldn't take credit cards. The bus didn't leave until that evening around 9pm, and thinking that we weren't going to stay in Chile very long we decided not to get out Chilean pesos, but rather try and live off what we had--about the equivalent of $4USD--for the day. This meant that we spent most of the day on the beach. I was feeling so gross after over 24 hours in buses that I went for a swim in the ocean in my underwear! Luckily there weren't too many people where we were so I think it was okay.
It was extremely hot, so we tried to spend most of the day under palm trees. Even though we put on sunblock, we both managed to get sunburned; however, other than this and feeling overall gross, it was actually a really nice, relaxing day spent playing cards, reading and walking around.
Our big purchases for the bus ride to Calama with our $4 were bottled water, a package of crackers and a bunch of bananas. Hey there big spender. No wonder Eriks lost so much weight on this trip! It ended up being enough to last us until the next morning when we arrived in Calama around 6am. Nothing opened until 7 so we waited around and asked which bus companies had trips into Argentina. Unfortunately there were only two.
Someone was watching out for us, because as it turned out there were only a few more seats available on a second-class bus to Salta with the service Geminis. It didn't leave until the following morning, but after that there was nothing until early March, so we found an ATM and got out enough money to buy those tickets rent a hotel room.
We accidentally took out more Chilean pesos than we actually needed (it's hard doing the math when you're dealing with hundreds of thousands of pesos!), but decided that we deserved to have a day of comfort after our roughing it to the extreme, so after showing and napping, we went out for a big lunch and dinner and ice cream too! Calama ended up being a beautiful little city and a wonderful place to take a break from the bus riding.
The following morning we hopped on our bus to Salta. The ride too something like 16 hours but it ended up not being too bad. The desert was beautiful and we even got to see some salt flats which was neat. We got into Salta at about 10pm and boy did it feel good to be back in Argentina!

desert somewhere in Chile nearing the border of Argentina

Salt flats in northwestern part of Argentina...I'm not quite sure where exactly. It was really neat to see though as we didn't get a chance to go into Bolivia to see the salt flats there.

Beautiful desert landscapes outside of Jujuy

The colors of the mountains were unreal; reds, oranges, yellows and even green sometimes (not from plants, but the actual rocks/minerals were a jade green color!)

Puno

2008-04-19T09:36:00.001-07:00

Along with the hostel for our last night in Cusco, we also hadn't yet booked our bus tickets from Cusco to Puno. We knew that the bus left at 8am, so we woke up around 6, left by 6:30 and prayed as we walked to the station that there were two seats still available. Luckily when we arrived at 7am there was plenty of room, so we bought the tickets, checked our bags, and then picked up some fruit and doritos
(our travel food of choice).

I was incredibly excited about this next leg of our adventure; I had visions of a pool of sapphire blue water twenty times larger than any lake I'd ever seen, and spending the night in a hut of tule on one of the floating islands. But as it turned out, Puno was not at all what I was expecting.

It was an 8 hour journey, not especially scenic, and when we arrived we were wondering what in the world we were doing there. The weather was awful, making Lago Titicaca not the sapphire blue I had imagined, but an ugly grayish brown, that, while reminding us of the River Plate and of Buenos Aires, also reminded us of how disgusting the color of the River Plate is and how Buenos Aires deserves a better looking body of water by its side. Even the logos were crappy. I may not be a graphic designer, but if you have to turn to a cartoon-like unicorn's tail for inspiration for a font design that connotes flight and speed, then maybe you ought go into some other line of work. At the bus station we asked around about trips out to the floating islands and found one that we could go on before our bus out left, but it was overpriced and just overall shady. So we decided to pass and just explore Puno for the four hours until our bus left. For about $2 USD we asked one of the bike rickshaw drivers to take us into down town Puno. This is where he let us off:

It actually doesn't look that bad, and was probably the nicest part of the whole city, but part of the reason is that this photo is so small--you know, one of those 'it looks better from far away' situations. I

This is Lago Titicaca. See what I mean?
Apparently the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca is where it's at, but we couldn't cross over because as of this past December, Bolivia decided to follow in the footsteps of Brazil and require the same of U.S. requires of them: expensive Visas.

Here are a few other shots from our wanderings. Eriks pointed out that this one is a perfect representation of Puno and I agree:

We did get some really good, cheap chicken for lunch. But good chicken doesn't make a city worth staying in. As ridiculous as this sounds, the highlight of our time spent in Puno for me was getting to watch The Ewok Adventure, which I haven't seen since I was about 5, but still love. Unlike watching Dinosaurs as an adult, I found myself at 22 years old thoroughly entertained and not let down at all. Plus Ewoks are just so dang cute. How couldn't one want to watch them talk in their gibberish language or dance by flailing their arms about, hopping and then clumsily falling over and rolling on the ground. Eriks was kind of weirded out by it, couldn't believe how bad the fight scenes were, and kind of entertained by how well I fit in the with group of 15 or so children who couldn't take their eyes off the t.v.

Our bus finally arrived an hour late, which was kind of annoying as by 9pm we were ready to high-tail it. Little did we know that stepping onto that bus to Tacna was only the beginning of a difficult 3-day journey back to Argentina.

Machu Picchu

2008-04-19T09:26:00.000-07:00

While one can walk the Inca trail from Cusco to Machu Picchu Pueblo, during February it is closed due to rain and it takes about 4 days, and we didn't have that kind of time. So instead we opted for the only other option: Peru Rail.

We had to be at the train station by 6:30 to catch our ride to Aguas Calientes (or Machu Picchu Pueblo). It was a four hour journey, but it went by quickly as there was so much to look at outside. We took the backpacker's train, which was nice enough, though kind of a tight squeeze, especially since the man sitting across from Eriks was about as tall or possibly taller than he is, which meant there was some knee to knee action. Looking out the window was incredibly gorgeous though. I'm such a sucker for natural frames in photos, so I especially liked the almost movie screen borders that the window sills made, making me feel (especially when I was listening to my Ipod) as though I were watching a film of a continuously evolving landscape.
When we reached the train station in Aguas Calientes we walked through a large indoor market with all sorts of alpaca sweaters and socks and carved gourds and Andean flutes and jewelry into the central part of the town. It was tiny which meant that it wasn't too difficult to find our hostel. On our way there we happened to come across some incredible luck. A man who spoke English (and heard the two of us speaking in his native tongue--I know, what are the odds?!?) offered us a free entrance ticket to Machu Picchu and two free shuttle tickets, telling us that he had to leave and wasn't going to be able to use them. Not sure whether or not they were legit, we accepted and decided to ask the hotel, and sure enough they were and saved us about $60 USD! So thanks random guy (because I'm sure you're going to come across my blog...)!

We then checked into our hostel, which looked a lot like a hotel...because it was a hotel. Apparently within the two years that my guidebook was written it became a 3 star hotel. I don't think Hostelworld.com is aware of this change either. Unfortunately we didn't realize this until after we had bought raw chicken and rice and veggies to make for dinner. We asked if we could use the kitchen, and the manager kind of reluctantly said yes, but the hotel chef, Juan Carlos, was more than happy to help us. We quickly became friends with Juan Carlos, and that evening cooked with him--er rather he practically cooked our food for us, teaching me the right way to make rice (I'm a HORRIBLE rice maker) and adding some of his garlic and other spices to what started out as a simple dish. His younger brother, Juan something-or-rather, was visiting and hanging out in the kitchen too, so we got to know them and a few of the other staff pretty well and just had a great time, though the manager of the hotel didn't seem to appreciate us walking out of the kitchen with our own dishes and sitting to eat them in the hotel restaurant, especially since there were other people eating at the restaurant and paying for their food. To kind of make up for it, we ordered two Pisco Sours: a lemony alcholic beverage with a frothy top (from egg white) that you can order in both Chile and Peru, though its birthplace is up for debate. Juan Carlos taught us how to make the Pisco Sours and they were spectacular. We made sure to leave him a big tip and then headed to bed to make waking up at 4 am slightly less painful.
We actually did a really good job of waking up early and getting out the door. Machu Picchu opens at 6:30am and we decided (since we couldn't do the Inca Trail) to walk there from the city as opposed to taking the bus. We gave ourselves about an hour and a half for the climb, which ended up being enough time, though it was a lot more difficult than I expected, especially since we were at a high altitude, which meant I got short of breath faster. However, we eventually made it to the top, and it was great seeing it gradually get lighter the higher we climbed. At the foot of the mountain the vegetation was thick and rainforesty; but the higher we climbed, the trees thinned out and there were more lookouts where we were able to see the mountains that surrounded us as well as the the clouds. At first it seemed as though it was just foggy, but I quickly realized that we actually were just in the clouds themselves.
This was a photo I took on our hike up the mountain. I just like how it turned out and have no other reason for posting it.

When we reached the entrance there were already people lined up, but we were able to get in quickly and it wasn't too crowded as there's a daily limit of 400 people allowed to enter. At least half of the these people just go for the day and the train doesn't arrive until about 10am. When we first entered, we couldn't see that much because it was so cloudy, so we just sat down and took turns reading the history of Machu Picchu out loud from my guide book. While Eriks was reading, I was looking towards the ruins, but couldn't see more than 200 feet away so I sat down and looked over at the entrance. But when I looked up again a few seconds later, the cloud had passed and right there in front of us was the impressive stone city. Since getting to that point in my life where imagination and magic in daily life comes only here and again, I have been lucky enough to experience a few very magical moments, where fantasy and reality kind of merge sending chills scurrying up your spine.

I don't really know what to say about Machu Picchu, other than that I think it may have been the highlight of our entire trip and if you can make it out there, by all means go. Here are some pictures to give you an idea of what it looks like.

At the top of that hill way in the distance is another site that you can walk to, but they only let so many people go at a time; unfortunately Eriks and I discovered this too late in the day. I guess we'll just have to go next time.

This was how cloudy it started out being, but by about 10am the clouds had cleared. I kind of enjoyed how mysterious it made it though.

There are random alpaca wandering around that you can try to touch though they either ignore you or walk away. This one couldn't believe I had the gall to take a photo of it.

This one was getting a back massage. Apparently there are also little people that wander around the ruins of Machu Picchu.

Eriks and me, happy to be in Machu Picchu

Me walking down the ruins.

That afternoon we checked out of our hotel and headed back into Cusco, where we luckily found a hostel to stay as we hadn't booked anywhere. We were terrified to sleep in the beds; I slept in my sleeping bag and Eriks slept completely clothed atop the comforter, though he claims to have still gotten bed bug bites. But we couldn't be too bothered, still walking on air after our experience with the Incan ruins of Machu Picchu. Though maybe it's easier for me to say this than Eriks as I wasn't the one with little red bites all over my ankles...

Cusco

2008-04-16T06:28:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned earlier, it took over 20 hours to get to Cusco, so by the time we arrived we were desperate to get off the bus, especially Eriks who was on the verge of upchucking his alpaca and potatoes (or whatever it was they fed us the night before).
When we arrived to our hostel, the Piccola Locanda, we were pleasantly surprised to find that not only was it close to the main plaza, it also was not what I would consider a hostel but more of a bed and breakfast. For about $10 each we got our own room with two little twin beds, a sky light, and a beautiful view, the option of borrowing movies (though they were pirated copies which meant that when we tried to watch The Fountain it kept skipping) and a really nice breakfast every morning.

This was what Cusco looked like from our window:

As soon as we got settled in, showered and napped, we went out for dinner. Crazily enough, walking down the little cobble stone back alley that led to the main plaza I ran into Sofia Weverka, a girl I haven't seen since I went on tour with Villa Sinfonia two years ago in Italy and that I've played violin with, well, since I started more or less. It was pretty wild. Apparently she's taking a semester off of college and studying in Cusco, and we just happened to be walking down the same tiny street at the same time!

Eriks and I ended up going to one of the many restaurants around the plaza that offered a four course meal for only 15 Soles. I decided to be adventurous and try the 'cuy' (guinea pig) for my main course. It looked something like this (I didn't bring a camera). While the head had been removed, there definitely was a little guinea pig foot still there with little guinea pig toenails. I didn't eat that part, though I did eat most of it. It was decent and worth trying, though it was pretty greasy and I think I prefer Argentine beef to Peruvian rodents. And I know, I know you're probably thinking 'How could you eat a guinea pig?!?"

Honestly it wasn't that hard, though a few days later when we went walking around the ruins I felt kind of bad when I saw these guys:

Ah well, I guess that's life, or the food chain rather. The fact that this is my reaction I think is a good signifier that my vegetarian days truly are over.

The next day we walked around the city, bought visitor passes that allowed us to visit a number of museums and historical sites. I especially liked one that had a large collection of Cusqueñan paintings.

By the afternoon I was feeling kind of sick to my stomach, and so we took it easy and decided to visit the Incan ruins in and around Cusco the next day.

The follow morning we woke up early, dropped our laundry off (we both hardly had any clean clothes left) and then set out for the ruins. My guide book gave loose directions

on how to get to them all. We got turned around at some points but managed to reach 3 of the 4 sites which was good enough for us. It was a lot of fun just walking away from the city into the hills, seeing piggies on the side of the road and farm land.

The ruins were all fascinating, and it was so neat wandering around them and just exploring.

One of my favorite things was this natural slide that kids still use and is nothing more than rock smoothed down by rainfall and years of bottoms sliding over it.

That evening it was Eriks's turn to get sick with some kind of stomach-flu like virus, possibly due to or exacerbated by the altitude. So while he rested I explored the city and spent a while in the humongous indoor market buying vegetables and meat to make a good soup. The market was full of individual vendors selling everything from food to wicker baskets to flowers.

Eriks luckily was able to eat some of the soup and felt better by the next morning which was good news since we were leaving for Machu Picchu.

Peru!

2008-04-08T05:31:00.001-07:00

On more than one occasion since being down here I have found myself sounding really dumb (but having no other way to express it) and saying: 'South America is BIG.' I think I didn't quite realize just how ginormous this continent is and how loooooong it can take to get from one city to the next before getting here and trying to travel. Originally Eriks and I wanted to bus our way through Chile up to Lima, but quickly discovered that this alone would probably take about a month and it would be a month entirely spent on the road. So we coughed up the money for a flight from Ushuaia to Lima as (like Tierra del Fuego for Eriks) I did not want to leave South America without having seen Machu Picchu.
The flight was broken up into two parts (a 5 hour to Buenos Aires and a 6+hour to Lima) which meant we arrived around 11pm and spent most of the day at 30,000 feet. Once we arrived we got a cab (all of our cab drivers in Peru ended up being pretty awesome and super friendly) and drove past loads of casinos and American fastfood restaurants (they even had KFC, TGIFridays,etc.) and finally arrived at our hostel. It was pretty overwhelming to go from the remote, natural beauty of Ushuaia to fastfood and American chain restaurant overload, so we quickly decided that we would get a bus out of Lima the next day, though not before trying Chifa (Chinese food), the recommendation of our friend Steve who also has been missing good spicy ethnic food.
The hostel we stayed at was quite nice and super cheap--about $7USD per night per person. The following morning we got up early and went to the bus station and purchased tickets for that day leaving at 5pm. When we got back we walked around in search of Chifa and discovered that the neighborhood we were in (Miraflores) was situated right next to the ocean and actually was quite nice and perhaps worth staying in a few more days. But we had already bought our tickets and so we explored as much as we could, thoroughly enjoyed our spicy Chinese food, and then made our way to the bus station.

Cruz del Sur

Cruz del Sur is purported to be the nicest bus line in South America (by Peruvians). We didn't find it much different from the Argentine bus lines, except for their overplaying of pan flute (I think I've had my fill for the next 15 years of the blasted instrument) and the fact that we were served 'traditional Peruvian cuisine' which meant that the ambiguous, dry meat in trays happened to be alpaca instead of some cut of beef. Our bus ride, just like its Argentine equivalents, featured an amalgam of movies (ranging from Tim Allen's latest suicide-prompting The Shaggy Dog--Eriks's description of this is worth reading--and Thai film Ong Bak the Protector to rotoscoped A Scanner Darkly and Barbara Streisand's The Prince of Tides); however the scenery on the other side of our windows was a horse of a different color, and most of the time I chose this moving picture over the above mentioned ones.
It was amazing and so green and lush compared to that we had seen in Argentina. Though beautiful in their own ways, Peru seemed much more tropical and jungley, and so mountainous. We kept climbing and climbing until we were practically in the clouds (I took altitude sickness meds just in case) and looking down over the edge of the road (which wasn't hard as there were no railings--eep!) the green mountains speckled with small mud houses and squares of farmland spread out below us like a blanket.
Though incredible, by the time we hit hour 21 and were pulling into Cusco, we were ready to be off that bus, especially Eriks who was either suffering the effects of too many windy roads or the agony of seeing Tim Allen sans clothing (or both) and feeling sick to his stomach.

Continuing on down south...

2008-03-25T16:55:00.000-07:00

From El Calafate we flew even further south, past the Strait of Magellan down to the very tip of South America: Tierra del Fuego. We arrived sometime around 12pm at the airport of the city of Ushuaia, a seaside town situated between mountains and the Beagle Channel. Our plan was to camp in the national park of Tierra del Fuego, but I hadn't been able to book anything in advance and had only read in my A Rough Guide to South America that renting tents and camping out was possible, but seeing as how it's a few years old and over the course of the trip there were quite a few discrepancies between the prices/existence of certain things and what we encountered, I wasn't sure whether or not indeed we would be able to camp. So we booked a hostel for the first night--which with its heated floors and nice kitchen was a nice place to be--and spent our first day organizing our next four. Luckily camping was a possibility according to the hostel owner, so we decided to leave the following day for the park, camp for three nights, come back to the city the morning of the 8th in order, take a 5 hour boat tour of the Beagle Channel that afternoon, spend the night at the same hostel and then fly out of Ushuaia the morning of the 9th. After booking our tour of the channel (approximately $40USD) we walked around the city, bought stuff for dinner that night and camping supplies: a pie tin and a single spoon, 4 Knorr soup packets, crackers, apples, chocolate, rice and granola bars. Then we headed back to the hostel and relaxed, took advantage of their Wi-Fi to book hostels for Peru and check email, and went to bed early so we could get an early start to our day.

The only way to get into Tierra del Fuego National Park is via one of the family-run shuttle services located in a parking lot in the middle of the town. It costs $40 pesos, or roughly $15USD for a round-trip ride and you can either have them drive you all over the park or drop you off and pick you up somewhere, that same day or any day during the week at set times. It took about twenty minutes to get to the park. Sharing our van was a Brazilian couple who got dropped off at the beginning of a trail before where we were getting off-- Lago Verde campground.

I had read (and this part was true) that there is a free camping area and a paid campground with sites. We weren't sure where it was exactly that one rented tents, but we had decided to try and rent tents and camp in the free one to save money and plus it sounded more adventurous. So the driver dropped us off at the free site and told us to be at the lodge at the paid site on Friday at 2pm for pick up. However, it turned out that the free site, while very nice had no signs of tent rental, so we left most of our stuff hidden in the bushes and walked the twenty minute walk between the two only to find that they wouldn't let us rent a tent and camp over there. Eriks proposed we just forgo the tent rental sleep outside that night (he offered to let me use our one sleeping bag and said he'd sleep in jackets) on the free site. Being nervous about having my laptop on me and the threat of rain I preferred to just rent a tent at the paid campsite for the night. While I am not especially good when it comes to foresight, here I was brilliant, as that night it POURED. Absolutely poured. But I'll get to that in a minute. We rented the tent and paid for the site (about $50 pesos a night) and while I set up our tent--a dinky '3 person' one (which really means big enough for three people who are shorter than six-feet, skinny as a rail, and with no belongings other than the clothes on their backs) --Eriks walked back and got our stuff.

Once we were all settled we went on a short hike out to the bay. Along the way we saw lots of rabbits and birds along with beautiful views of mountains, rivers and forests. We walked a few small trails (deciding to do the level 4 difficulty one the following day) and ended up at the mouth of a bay where there were a few tour groups arriving on buses. One of them was a group of senior citizens all clad in matching red t-shirts on their way from Ushuaia to Antartica. Eriks fit right in. We asked a few of the tour guides and found out that it costs about $10,000 USD just for the ride between Tierra del Fuego and Antartica; however, you can pay as low as $4000 book it in person the day before and a ship is desperate to sell the last few tickets. Seeing as how we weren't even planning on spending that much on our month long trip combined and already had our tickets to Lima, we decided to pass on this and maybe go when we are seniors ourselves.
When we got back from our hike that evening we started a fire and made our own mini grill to cook the first of our series of soup concoctions. This one was a chicken vegetable rice camera-flavored one. I say camera-flavored because, being so proud of our handiness, I wanted to document the moment only to find that my camera thought it looked so good it decided to jump out of my pocket straight into the boiling soup for a taste. I grabbed it out in a flash, but alas, while my memory card is fine, the lens is still damaged. Gah, first my Ipod in a cup of tea and now this. While I should have zipped up my pocket, this was some kind of freakish accident. I'm pretty sure my electronic devices can stand me and decide to end it all. Luckily it wasn't the better of the two cameras I brought.
After soup and crackers we retired for the night, only to wake up in the middle of the night to heavy rains making their way inside our tent. It was a tough night, as there were literally puddles and we woke up to it still raining out and all of our stuff was still wet. We spent the day reading and hanging out in the lodge, eating cake, and playing cards. Around 5pm we were super antsy and the rain had kind of let up, so we did another small hike. It was a trail along the lake and though it was pretty muddy, there were lots of trees to keep us from getting too wet and the mountains looked gorgeous all snow-covered from the rain the night before. Luckily we discovered a camper's room that had a gas stove because there was no way we'd be able to get a fire going and we used that from then on to cook dinner and met the other people staying there: a mom and her two children from Switzerland, a man from Buenos Aires and a young Canadian couple.
The next day we woke to clear skies which was a relief and decided to do the difficult trek. It was mostly uphill through the forest at first, and after about an hour we came to a vista where we found the candian couple having water and some snacks along with a group of Israelis. We took a few photos, had our apples and crackers and chocolate, and were about to head back when the Canadians asked us if we were going to do the rest of the hike. Apparently we had only gone about half way. We decided to give it a try, which ended up being the best decision (other than actually renting a tent) of our camping experience. The further we hiked into the forest the more we started to see snow until we after about an hour reached a clearing and found ourselves at the base of the peak of a mountain that was so snow covered the trail wasn't visible. At this point, being only in tennis shoes and jeans, we normally would have passed on going all the way to the peak, but the Canadians in their proper hiking gear were willing to trailblaze and we thought we go as far as we thought we could behind them. Walking through knee deep snow that was so fresh we ate it for hydration (we forgot our water bottle) we made our way up the mountain and what a reward it was for our hard work to have a 360 of mountains, forest, blue sky, the Beagle Channel, Ushuaia all around us. It was spectacular, and I of course loved it all the more because there was SNOW EVERYWHERE! All in all the hike took all day

(about 8 hours) and was a wonderful way to finish up our time camping. The next morning we packed up our stuff, caught the shuttle back into Ushuaia, just in time for our boat ride.

After our incredible experience out in the wilderness, the boat tour was kind of a let down. While it was great to see adorable chubby preteen penguins and blubbery seals, it seemed like for the price and the amount of time invested (five hours) we should have gotten to see a bit more. Oh I forgot. We saw a lighthouse too. And they put on March of the Penguins. Still didn't seem like it was worth it, especially since the whole time all I could think about was how desperately in need we were of showers. Maybe had it not been so foggy it would have been better also. Ah well. That night we slept so well, clean and dry and ready to head up North to Peru with its promises of slower Spanish, real spicy Chinese food ('Chifa' as they call it, and weather warm enough to dry out our still damp towels.

Flash Slideshow

February Travel Extravaganza

2008-03-10T11:31:00.000-07:00

And now I shall commence my recordings of our February travels, beginning with El Calafate. I suppose it might be worthwhile to begin with the week before we left, just for the sake of catching up. The last week in January was pretty busy, or at least busier than I expected. Roberta left on 17th, leaving us with about a week and a half without visitors to focus on tying up the lose ends of our travel plans and trying to find a place to live upon our return to Buenos Aires. Eriks still had classes everyday and exams coming up which made it a little more difficult to find the time to visit places and search website after website for a place. Luckily, however, we found a loft in San Telmo that we wanted to rent, though the owners didn't confirm with us that we could until about two days before we had to leave, which made things a bit more difficult than they could have been, but it all worked out in the end. We got together with some friends for the last time, I got some writing done and got the apartment ready for us to check out of and then before we knew it it was the night of January 31st, we had checked out of our apartment, dropped off our stuff at Katie and Luis's and Luis was driving us to Jorge Newberry Airport.

El Calafate (February 1st-4th)
We spent the night in the airport, which wasn't especially comfortable, but our flight was so early that this meant that we were only there for about 5 or 6 hours, playing cards, working on a mathematical puzzle that Luis told us about (which I still haven't figured out), reading, checking out the duty-free goods, and trying to get a little shut eye lying across airport seats. Around 5 am we boarded and promptly fell asleep. Four hours later we were descending into one of the most surreal landscapes I've ever encountered.

We took a cab into the small city that is El Calafate, checked into our hostel, and then wandered around for the rest of the day, walking around the down down area and the nature reserve. The town doesn't have a whole lot to offer, but the type of people drawn to this land of alien colors and fantastical scenery can't be bothered by this--that isn't why they've come. And that wasn't why we went. We went to see the glacier.

Our second day there we rented bikes for half the day brought a picnic lunch with us. We sa and biked just about as far down the coast as we could andw a lot of wildlife including flamingos (I know! I didn't expect it either), horses and quite a few dogs and puppies. It was plain beautiful and a good way to spend the day before our glacier trekking. Had I not booked our hostel for our whole time there, we might have tried to go to El Chalten, a neighboring town and park, but I guess we'll just have to save that for another time.

We scheduled to do the 'Big Ice' on Sunday--an all day activity costing about $150 US when it was all said and done, including the park entrance. Probably one of the more expensive activities of our trip, it was definitely worth it; we spent 4 hours trekking on the glacier, bundled up and cramp-on clad, and it was unlike anything I've done before. I feel like it's easier to describe the experience with photos, so here goes:

Flash Slideshow

The following day we checked out of our hostel, bussed to the airport and were on our way further south.

Berta comes to town

2008-03-06T06:38:00.000-08:00

Roberta arrived on the 3rd, which meant her trip and my brother's overlapped 5 days and actually was pretty convenient as this meant that we could all got to Tigre and Uruguay together. As I've already written about Tigre before (though this time we actually took the boat along the delta and made it to the market) I'm going to focus on Uruguay.

Colonia:
We booked our tickets online to take the ferry across to Colonia for the day, which cost there and back about $50 USD per person, so not especially cheap, but a fun thing to do. It took about an hour to get there, most of which we spent playing cards. Colonia is a quaint town with cobblestone streets, a plaza whose main feature is a simply church , a few small museums and a beach. It was a very relaxing day for us. We saw most of the city within an hour, hung out at the park for a bit where they had these awesome barrel swings, bought stuff for a picnic and then went to the beach. We ate, played more cards, Berta and I walked along the shore and but our feet in the water (it is the Mar del Plata and still a little too gray and warm for us to feel comfortable going all the way in), had coffee and played more cards at a tiny beach front cafe of sorts, and then headed back to BsAs on the slow boat, which took about three hours. It was a nice day trip, but I couldn't really see Colonia as being anything other than that and am glad to be living in a city that has a bit more to offer in terms of entertainment.

Mendoza
On the evening that my brother left for home, Berta and I hopped on an overnight bus to Mendoza. The food was mediocre and the entertainment...let's just say that 'Elsa & Fred' did not make my Netflix top 100 queue; however we were both so excited for a few days out in wine country and just to be together that it didn't bother us.

Our main activities in Mendoza were: walking around Parque San Martin, visiting the four main plazas of Mendoza city, going up to El Cerro de la Gloria, and doing the Bikes and Wines tour. We met a nice German girl named Karina who was staying in our room at the hostel and joined us on our biking and wine tasting adventure. There were about 10 stops on our journey, mostly wineries, though we did start out at a chocolate and dessert liquor manufacturer and my favorite winery (Tempus Alba) on the route also had an olive orchard. We decided to do most of our wine tasting at Tempus Alba (though we happily accepted the gratis wine that came with the other wine tours) and paid to try their Syrah, Tempranillo, Rose and Malbec mix along with their olives. At the end of the day I was a little sore because my bike was lacking gears, though it was NOTHING compared to Bariloche, so I couldn't complain, and I think by the end of the afternoon with all the free samplings it was easy forget the aches and just revel in the sheer gorgeousness of biking along shady dirt roads in the middle of a sea of purple grapes and green vines on a summer's day. We went out for pizza that night and beer afterwards and then left the next day, bringing along massive sandwiches and other treats just in case the food was of the same caliber as it was the way there. It was a lovely trip, not only because we got to do some of the things we missed out on last visit, but because it was the perfect environment for Berta and I to get some good girl time in and catch up after nearly four months of being apart.

Back in BsAs
Other noteworthy activities that we did while Berta was in town included: making sushi for Marc's going away party, rowing in Parque 3 de Febrero, being Argentine and going out until sunrise, visiting the Ecological Reserve, my first encounter with a martini in Puerto Madero (which ended up being Berta's first encounter with drinking her own and her friend's martini at once as it wasn't quite my thing), cooking parties, interesting encounters (and courtships) with Argentine men, and other sorts of adventures.

Home(ish) for the Holidays

2008-03-06T04:44:00.000-08:00

Not being home for Christmas was kind of hard; however, having our siblings around, a dinner including Stovetop stuffing and pumpkin pie, Monica's Christmas gift to me (a mini tree that we decorated with homemade paper ornaments and popcorn), and good friends around made for as nice a Christmas away from home as one could ask for.

We got home from Bariloche two days before Christmas. Before leaving we had promised Irena we would help her with the Chrismas decorations at church. This ended up being quite the activity. It involved spending the day before Christmas driving out to Ruby's (another sweet little elderly lady from church) home--a kind of estate of sorts in the suburbs of Buenos Aires Capital--to 'gather greens.' As per usual with St. John's related activities, it's difficult to know what to expect, and even when I think I have a pretty good idea of what something will be like, there's always room for a surprise or two. This time the surprise was discovering that 'gathering greens' was more than just plucking a few leaves from bushes and then tying them with a red bow. 'Gathering greens' ended up being a two+ hour activity, with Irena directing the boys to climb up into trees and on ladders and actually saw down entire branches, which Kristine and I would then collect, hose down, cut into smaller pieces, and put into what totaled about 6 giant garbage bags. Though more work than any of us were expecting, it was enjoyable enough, and after Irena and I decorated the following morning , the church actually did look quite beautiful. I found myself making some 40 little bunches of evergreen, bows, fake birds and golden pine cones. As I strung them together Irena informed me that"Every year [she] like[s] to give them a little surprise--this year it's the birds," adding an "Aren't they just darling?" as she picked one up from the pile. I didn't hear any exclamations or gasping over the birds Christmas morning, but people did seem to enjoy the decorations and Irena was pleased with them and the compliments she received, which made our efforts worth while.

Christmas eve we had some friends over for a pre-Christmas Christmas dinner since we were already going to our friends Kate and Kelty's apartment for a party and dinner on Christmas day after church. Marisa came over early and helped me with the cooking and desert making, which was really fun because in the past we've spent a lot of Christmas mornings together on our family hikes, so this felt not all that different from any other Christmas. We roasted a chicken, made mashed potatoes, stuffing, pumpkin pie, peanut butter cookies, and other good eats, and once everyone arrived and we starting eating it was all quite enjoyable.

After everyone left and we cleaned up, Kristine and Tim crashed, exhausted after a long day exploring the city (Eriks had taken them on tour while I decorated the church/cooked). Eriks and I stayed up a bit to watch some of the fireworks from our balcony. People began setting them off at midnight, and it was really just a gorgeous sight, the horizon dotted with firey blossoms that would explode and then fade away. There also were paper lanterns released. They must be a fire hazard because I've never seen them in the U.S. , but they sure were beautiful and my favorite of all that we saw. Above streets and high rises, they were glowing orbs that kind of just slowly floated along in the open air wherever the light wind took them, like giant fireflies, until they too died down and melted into the darkness.

Bariloche Day Five: Car Rental

2008-03-06T03:41:00.001-08:00

Our last day in Bariloche we decided to rent a car and drive out to some of the other lakes in the region (there are about 7). For $200 pesos (gas not included) you can rent a small two door manual car for 24 hours--not a bad deal when split four ways. Eriks was the only one of us who felt remotely comfortable driving stick, and he did a good job, though for the first two hours of our trip he couldn't put the car in reverse (it turned out you actually had to pull up on the stick) which meant whenever we wanted to go backwards Kristine, Tim and I had to pile out and push while Eriks kept it in neutral!
We started out our day at the lookout we didn't make it to on our bike ride and then drove out to see three other lakes, one of which we stayed at for about an hour to have lunch. Here and there we'd get out, but otherwise we drove for most of the day and got home a little after sunset.

Here are some photos from the day:

On the Road...

2008-02-24T03:37:00.000-08:00

So I never finished the Bariloche entries or wrote of our our holiday season or even started on Berta´s visit. Time just kind of slipped away the way it does when you need or want it to stick around a little longer, and before I knew it, Eriks and I had found a new apartment for March (a small loft on the outskirts of San Telmo), were all packed up and sitting on a plane making its way down south. Ah well, I´ve always been an underestimater, whether it was guessing the number of jellybeans in a jar in 3rd grade(I was HORRIBLE at estimation exercises and always thought there were 50 when there were really 600), taking a stab at how many other people there are in a baseball stadium (I once guessed 4,000 and there were 40,000!), or in this case, how much I can actually get done in a limited amount of time. So I guess this was no different. I´m not able do them now, either, as I can´t use my computer (and access important photos) at the hostel we´re staying at right now in Salta and I am definitely not starting any entries about this trip as photos are essential. But I thought it might be a good idea to make a short post about where we´re at on our trip: Salta.

In the Northwest of Argentina, Salta is a lazy little city out in the middle of the desert, which is exactly what we were looking for after about 20 days of activities and flights and bus after bus after bus. We´ve been here for about 5 days and are leaving on Tuesday morning for Iguazu Falls bright and early. We have mostly spent our days doing a whole lot of not much, which has been extremely enjoyable. We´ve walked around the plazas, eaten icecream, gone to the movies twice (There Will Be Blood, incredible!; Charlie Wilson´s War, so-so; Julia Robert´s ´´accent,´´ horrible), barbequed at the hostel, and just read and played a lot of cards. I picked up Running With Scissors from the hostel´s bookshelf a few days ago, as I´ve gone through the books I brought along and that was practically the only one in English other than a book of Yeats. Again, so-so, though I guess one can´t exactly expect the cream of the crop in literature to sit amongst books that have intentionally been left out of backpacks during the repacking process. The most strenuous activity we´ve done while here was hiking up some 1000 stairs to the top of a hill overlooking the city, but the stairs were nothing compared to Machu Picchu and only took about a half hour to climb, so it didn´t feel all the strenuous. Today if we´ll go to church is we come across a church service while walking around, but otherwise we´re looking at a third day at Hoyt´s movie theatre to see Cloverfield Monstruo and then probably will watch the Oscars and make popcorn. I´m not sure what tomorrow holds as the only other movies left at Hoyt´s are the likes of The Game Plan featuring Dwayne ´The Rock´Johnson and National Treasure II. Unfortunately No Country for Old Men doesn´t come out for another week, but I guess that´s something to look forward to when we get back to BsAs, which at this point is only a week away. Wow, only a week away. I guess this trip is just another instance of time flying, but so it goes...

Bariloche Day Four: Rafting

2008-01-25T09:38:00.000-08:00

After all the activity of our second day we spent the following day picnicking on the beach, playing cards, wading in the water of the Nahuel Huapi and getting ready for our next big adventure: white water rafting.

The rafting company picked us up at our hostel around 9 am in a van of about 10 other people from different hostels. We then proceeded to leave the city of Bariloche and drive about two hours East toward Chile. It was a great way to wake up, looking out the window at towering mountains, rivers snaking through valleys, the flora and fauna--including the occasional stop to allow a wandering horse or cow to cross the dirt road.

Around 11 we reached a small farm, complete with chickens, a cow or two, and a barn that held all the rafting gear. Inside there was a table offering coffee, tea and facturas to fill up on before we suited up for our two hour rafting experience.

We then stripped down to our bathing suits (or underwear in some cases) and were geared up.

We looked like this --->

I'm not going to lie, I kind of felt like I was part of Team Zissou, sans the red beanies. But we got yellow helmets instead, which meant
I looked like this:

instead of this:

Not really. I wish I could blame my, ahem, special expressions on the helmet. Apparently I'm not the most photogenic when it comes to action shots. And other shots for the matter, but whatever. This one had Monica in tears and nearly peeing herself for about about fifteen minutes, so I guess something good can come of bad photos.

Anyway, we drove out to the river, loaded into two rafts (10 in each), which meant that the Cahill-Dunens group had to separate and I had to brave the rapids en Espanol. It was cool though because I really liked my fellow rafters--a group of four from Colombia and a couple from Spain.

We all did pretty well. Tim managed to fall out of the raft. Twice. The first time Eriks pulled him back in. The second time he took Eriks with him; the raft went sideways and Tim found himself sitting on something that wasn't raft. It was Eriks's chest which meant that Eriks's head was in the water. So they both let go and had a chilly dip.

At one point we all got the opportunity to abandon the raft and just float along the river. It was flipping cold, but refreshing and delicious (apparently most of the water in Bariloche is okay to drink). You had to float with your legs in front of you which meant you didn't have a lot of control over where you floated and we all kept kind of bumping into each other. It was pretty humorous.

We got back into the boats and then banked on the Chilean border where the bus was waiting for us. We undressed amidst sheep and rolling green hills and went back to the farm for asado.

(Slideshow of photos from the day)

Flash Slideshow

Bariloche Day Two: Mountain Biking

2008-01-22T12:23:00.001-08:00

We spent our first full day in Bariloche mountain biking around the Circuito Chico, which featured some amazing views of the Lago Nahuel Huapi. To the left I've traced out the route we took along with the stops we made (this was as big as Blogger would let me post it, but if you click on it, it will open in a new window and be much larger). It was a full day indeed that left us sweaty, tired, and HUNGRY, but most of all feeling extremely accomplished. All in all we estimate (with our slight detour) that we biked a total of about 6 hours and 60 km (40 miles). Quite the adventure.

We arrived at the Bike Rental site (via bus) around 12 pm, paid our $45 pesos each, geared up with helmets, water, and maps, and were off.

The first five minutes were easy. And then Eriks got a flat. Luckily each bike had an extra set of tires so Tim went to work on it and within 10 minutes we were on our way again. The paths at times were rocky, we had another close call with aggressive dogs, and there were a lot of hills, but the views were incredible.

Within about an hour we reached the first main stop: a view of Villa Llao Llao (the top resort in Bariloche). After taking some photos, we road some more and arrived at the entrance of a trail to a grove of Arrayanes trees. We locked our bikes up and hiked until we encountered a cluster of trees with soft orange, peeley bark and twisting, gnarled trunks. We came across this one and couldn't help but climb it with all its natural footholds.

We then returned to our bikes, mounted and forged ahead, but got a little carried away joyriding down what seemed a never ending hill, and accidentally passed our next stop by about a half mile. Unfortunately this meant we had to go back up the massive hill we had just cruised down. Definitely had my gears set to 1 at that point. We made it though, and had our picnic lunch on a secluded beach along the shoreline.

With full tummies and renewed energy, we biked on to Lago Escondido (Hidden Lake) and then all the way to Colonia Suiza. On the way to Colonia Suiza we passed a small stream that the bike rental woman had told us we could fill our water bottles with. Me being, well, me, I got oh-so-excited over this. I'm pretty sure I read too many Laura Ingles Wilder books as a kid and as a result am ridiculously enthusiastic when I come across a 'living off the land' kind of situation. Actually, remarkably I was not the only one thrilled at the prospect of drinking right out of a stream. By this point in our journey with the heat and humidity and dust having fresh, straight from the source cold water tasted sooooo good and all four of us were grateful for it.

About an hour and a half later, after biking by a few pastures of sheep, we made it to Colonia Suiza. It was too touristy for our taste, so we used the bathrooms and continued on. It was here that we took an ill-fated turn. As opposed to going left, we went right which resulted in our route growing an extra 20 km or so. After an hour of riding completely off our mini map, we reached a fork in the rocky, dirt road and really had no idea which way to go. Thank God a man on a horse crossed our path. He got us going in the right direction to get back to the main freeway. At this point it was about 6:30 pm and we needed to be back at the bike rental place by 8, so it was pretty lucky Mr. Gaucho showed up, especially since prior to talking to him we were seriously considering going in the opposite direction!

Because of our detour, we didn't make it to Lookout Point, our final stop; however, two days later we rented a car and drove up there.

By the end of our journey we had to do some walking of the bikes uphill and were ready to be done. We were so exhausted and hungry we kind of just sprawled out on the couches at the rental agency and gobbled up the homemade granola bars they gave us. We were all famished after burning what must have been a bajillion calories between the four of us. To prove my point: As we were sitting there, Tim told me I had some remaining crumblies of my granola bar on my shirt, an I jokingly offered them to him, but ate them before he could respond (assuming he didn't really want them). He then admitted that he was so hungry he actually would have eaten them. Then Eriks said that if Tim had said 'No' he would have gladly accepted the offer. Luckily, before our hunger reduced us to base human beings, we made it back to town and gorged ourselveson two very large pizzas.

Though tiring, spending the day mountain biking was a great time, very affordable, and left us feeling super proud of ourselves. Definitely worth doing, especially since had I not gone I would have missed out on getting what is possibly the sweetest tan/sunburn line of my life. You know you is jealous...

It's faded (mostly) by now.

(Slideshow of photos from the day)

Flash Slideshow

Bariloche

2008-01-22T12:21:00.000-08:00

Flash Slideshow

In the early morning of Dec. 16th we arrived in Bariloche, a small city nestled against the Andes offering good slopes in the winter and rafting, hiking, biking and outstanding vistas in the summer. From the get go we were all pretty much in a state of shock from the pure gorgeousness of it all, between the unreal blue colors of the sky and lake, the snowcapped mountains and bushes overflowing with yellow blossoms that filled the air with sticky sweet scent reminiscent of ripe plums. Seriously heavenly and a wonderful welcome after a long bus ride.

We took a cab into town, checked into the hostel, got some brunch, played cards, walked around, found a pizza/empanada joint that had the Liverpool vs. Man U. game on, played some more cards, took showers and then went down to the shore.

After taking some photos, we decided to walk along the shore as far as we could, which ended up being a good distance, though we definitely passed through private property a few times, almost got attacked (Eriks specifically) by three German shepherds, and got back to the main road via the backyard of a run down house featuring three hippied out men and a woman (99% sure they were squatting) smoking the doobie and drinking beer. They let us pass through and one of the guys jokingly asked Eriks if he gave him a few pesos if he'd go out and buy him some more beer. While much friendlier than the dogs, they were preeeeety tripped out, which I think made seeing the four of us emerging from the bushes a little confusing, or perhaps all the more entertaining (?)

We then walked back to the hostel but stopped for some well deserved ice cream. This place had some of the most deeeeeelectable limon ice cream and became a regular stop for us on this trip. Tired from the bus ride we decided to take it easy that night and prep ourselves for the next day's activity: mountain biking.

The visitors arrive

2008-01-22T12:20:00.001-08:00

On December 13th two VIPs walked through the gates of Ezeiza. Both my brother (Tim) and Eriks's sister (Kristine) decided to visit for Christmas and fortunately for us (as it is a 45 minute, $80 peso cab ride out to Ezeiza) booked their flights within an hour of each other without even realizing it. Though the apartment was a wee bit crowded, it was great having them around, especially for Christmas. Plus it gave us an excuse to travel and get out and do some of the things in BsAs we've been putting off doing, like going to the zoo and taking tango lessons.

As soon as we got back to our apartment after picking them up from the airport, we introduced them to two of the things that make Argentina a tasty place to be in: Choripan and Chimichurri. While we aren't regulars per se because we don't go every week, we have been known to frequent an establishment by the name of La Rosalia for their $3 peso Choripans and this-is-the-real-deal-where-locals-go atmosphere, complete with a grill master who commands a 3 by 5 foot parilla constantly stocked with some 40 chorizos and a dozen or so large cuts of meat.

Afterwards we walked around our neighborhood (Palermo Viejo) a bit and then relaxed a little at home and had dinner in Puerto Madero.

The following day we went to the Japanese tea garden in Parque 3 de Febrero where we saw some ridiculously humongous carp, played soccer with some people I met via craigslist (can I just say that I heart craigslist, seriously), got ice cream afterwards with the group at Volta , which is supposedly the best ice cream chain in BsAs (it was pretty dang tasty), and then had a parilla and packing night in preparation for the our 18 hour bus ride the next day to Bariloche.

Excuses, excuses.

2008-01-21T03:50:00.001-08:00

To everyone who has continued to check my blog despite my severe lack of consistency in posting this past month, many apologies and many thanks for continuing to visit. The time of entertaining visitors reached an end last Thursday afternoon as Roberta drove off in a taxi to Ezeiza. It was a month(ish) that was extremely successful in terms of good times and traveling, but not so much when it comes to writing of any sort, including blog entries. However, I have about ten days until Eriks and I begin our February Travel Extravaganza, which means this week I'll be attempting to document the happenings of this past very full, enjoyable month before even more blog-worthy experiences are had and I get too far behind. Basically (if anyone is still reading this) as Berta would say, Post o'clock is about to transpire, so stay tuned.

Farewell to a biscuit.

2008-01-12T11:09:00.000-08:00

Monica left a few days before Christmas. This meant we had one whirlwind of a goodbye because the week before the day she left we traveled separately (Moni to El Calafate and myself, my brother, Eriks and his sister to Bariloche) and so had less than 24 hours together before she had to be at the airport. Unfortunately it wasn't enough time to feel like we could really do anything together other than sit and show each other our photos from our trips and make breakfast and marvel at how quickly four months can pass. Unfortunately it was just enough time to start to feel pretty sad. But we both knew it was for the best. Moni was able to go home and surprise a few very special people and is at a point in her life where she's ready (being a year ahead of me) to start doing something a bit more responsible and productive. And I suppose it might be a good thing for me to have more alone time in terms of me actually buckling down and finishing some of these stories I've started. However now that the distraction of having a monthplus of visitors has reached an end, quite often, whether it's roasting a chicken, making a trip to Jumbo, passing Palermo park, or simply finding a certain pair of purple flip-flops beneath the coffee table, this potato misses her biscuit.

Crossing the Andes

2007-12-04T05:49:00.000-08:00

Flash Slideshow

On Monday morning we checked out of Hostel Lao and went back to the central Bus Station, boarded a small shuttle, and began our journey into the Andes. It took about 6 hours to reach Santiago, where we checked into Hostel Andes rested a bit, explored some of the city, and then went out for dinner and had our first encounters with Pisco Sours and chicken Al Pil Pil.The following day was spent in Re ñ aca & Vi ñ a del Mar, small coastal cities about two hours in bus from Santiago. Boy was I happy to see the Pacific again! While Buenos Aires is great, the Mar del Plata doesn't have any beaches and is an icky greyish brown. While none of us went swimming because it was too cold, we did stick our toesies in, walked the length of it, and ate locally caught fish at a restaurant right on the beach which featured one of the coolest waiters I've ever encountered who went by the name of Jorge and was not only incredibly friendly, but quite funny as well, especially when he was impersonating Argentines. That night we just laid low at the hostel and the following morning were on the bus returning to Buenos Aires (about a 22 hour journey all in all, including the 2 hour layover in Mendoza). While there are numerous details and anecdotes I've failed to include as I've got some other things to do first, here are the photos from the trip. Unfortunately the order is backwards so you'll just have to imagine them going the opposite way. Either way they begin and end with photos from the Andes so I suppose it doesn't matter all that much.

A toast...

2007-11-29T07:16:00.000-08:00

Flash Slideshow

We somehow managed to make it to all the places we intended to. It was not easy though; this trip had its fair share of hurdles, from discovering the morning of our departure that our tickets were booked for Santiago del Estero, Argentina not Santiago, Chile (and having to argue in Spanish with some difficult Portenos who couldn't be bothered to fix their own mistakes) to realizing that most Bodegas are closed Sundays (the day we planned on doing most of our wine tasting). However, all in all, it was an excellent time and full of some of the most beautiful scenery I've encountered. Plus we were just so thrilled to FINALLY be real-traveling, not just taking a day trip to Tigre or the like (though those are enjoyable too) that it made this experience that much more enjoyable.

After an 0vernight bus ride to Mendoza, we arrived around 9:30 in the morning to Hostel Lao
and between the hammocks in the backyard that can be rented (15 pesos/night), some guy plucking the strings of a beat-up acoustic guitar, and expat twenty-somethings lying about on the grass and lawn furniture it was so pretentiously "hostel" that I could hear Monica gagging behind me as I checked us in. However the staff was really nice and the people we shared rooms with were friendly enough, and when Moni and I actually gave lying in the hammocks a chance (we were waiting on the boys to finish up their chess game so we could go out) between the relaxing sway, the warm evening air, and the sticky sweet smell emanating from the huge, fragrant gardenia bush in the garden, I couldn't be too critical, even if it did seem to attract the sort that would classify themselves as a 'hostel boy/girl.'

Upon checking in, showering, and resting a bit, we then headed out for some wine tasting only to discover that most wineries and bodegas closed at 2pm and weren't even open on Sundays! We did manage to visit two, the first featuring a museum and guided tour, the second being a tiny vineyard with one man working the bar who didn't seem too enthusiastic when I asked if there was a tour, and so we didn't stick around too long.

That evening after our long day spent frantically trying to fine open bodegas, we treated ourselves to a nice bottle of wine and dinner at a fancy schmancy restaurant called Francesco.
While the service ended up being pretty horrible (Monica being the only one of us with serving experience, and because of this, more attuned to good vs. bad vs. 'you're horrible even for Argentina,' left her two-cents and for the first time frugal with the tipping) the food was quite tasty. We then called it a night sometime around 1 or 2am and headed back to the hostel for a nice sleep.

The next day the boys and girls split up and while Marc and Eriks spent the day at another Bodega, Moni and I walked to Parque San Martin, the massive Municipal park in Mendoza that features a lake, gardens and numerous paths, one which leads to the Hill of the Glory. While we intended on climbing to the top, we could figure out how to get there and missed out on that but still had a great day. I'm pretty sure we walked something like 10 miles or more altogether, so we definitely appreciated just relaxing in the bar of the Hyatt over a gorgeous bottle of wine Eriks and Marc splurged on from the Familia Zuccardi and appetizers. Sipping on the spicy, dry, full red it was a nice ending to the first leg of our trip.

I'm definitely going to try and squeeze in another trip to the Argentine hub of wine and olive oil before I leave as it's fairly inexpensive (about $75-$100 r/t) for transportation and I am determined to do bicycle wine tasting down here before I return home. Plus now I have a better sense of how to plan. Roberta (my good friend from USF and roomie last year) is visiting in January and I think that would be right up her ally. Wine, bicycles, rows upon rows of bright green leaf clad vines against a clear blue sky and the purply sillouhettes of the Andes still topped with snow--what more could one want? While the mom (that for whatever reason has developed as of late--too much babysitting???) in me answers that question with "Leaving the vineyard in one piece, sans fractures," the foolish, young adventurer in me can't help but squeal in excitement at the thought of it.

Metamorphosis

2007-11-21T04:24:00.000-08:00

So two mornings ago I awoke to discover I had metamorphosized into a girly-girl. Eriks was on his way out to the Uni of B.A. for Spanish classes, and as he was pulling the door closed noticed a dead cockroach behind it. As I am normally quite level-headed about these sorts of things (last year I was the 'man of the house' when it came to unwanted insects and have never had any problem dealing with arachnids and other sorts of crawly critters) I was fine letting him go and taking care of it myself, even though this was my first encounter with Periplaneta brunnea. Eriks advised me to use a paper towel and not to squeeze too hard to avoid crunching (ickkkkk), and left. And I with a false confidence began the task of disposing the wretched creature.

Napkin in hand, I bent over and ever so gently tried to slide the napkin underneath the guy only to find, HORROR of HORRORS, it was STILL ALIVE. A few of its creepy, skinny, strangely hairy little legs twitched and I found myself in the blink of an eye all the way in the bathroom after doing a strange leapy-dance-shimmy action across the living room and emitting weird versions of 'Gaaaaahhhhh ugggghhh eeeeehhhuuuuuuggghhh"--the kind one would expect to escape the lips of a seventy-eight year old man attempting to skate across a thinly iced over lake full of piranhas rather than a twenty-two year old woman. But I am not a screamer and those were the sounds that came out. After a few minutes I managed to calm myself down, laugh at my unexpected reaction to the slight movement of a being one one-thousandth my size, and muster up enough courage to not only tackle the task at hand, but make a video about it. However, while making the video and zooming in, la cucaracha, my friends, moved again. And while I only scurried about ten feet away this time, I decided the best solution was to wait out its impending death and hope that by the time it kicked the (little cockroach sized?) bucket, Moni would be awake to provide moral support.

I waited four hours and it still wasn't dead; Moni woke up and I needed to be on my way to meet Eva for our weekly Spanish/English conversation time and the blasted bug was still kicking, literally. 1:45pm rolled around and there was nothing to do but suck it up and dispose of him. It took me a good 5 to 10 minutes, a dustpan, a plastic container, and a fair amount of weird spastic jumps and retreats into the kitchen, but finally the job was done. Rumor has it recordings of the events described will be posted to the tomamate video archive once Youtube stops being a jerkface and uploads them, so stay tuned. For now however, I think the two visuals I have provided in this post capture the experience quite well. Oh and for the record (and yes it's fiction, I know, I know, however) there's no way someone would last more than two seconds upon finding themselves turned into a giant roach. Based on my experience I am 99% certain that the natural corporeal reaction to seeing ginormous cockroach legs twitching about right in front of your face is the immediate ceasing of blood flow to the heart and that Kafka had no right making the outrageous claim that one could continue living in the form of such a grotesque creature. Gaaahhhhuuuuggeeehhhh--just recounting the experience I'm getting escalofrios.

San Antonio de Areco

2007-11-05T06:02:00.000-08:00

I've been really bad about posting these past few weeks, mainly because life has gotten a bit busier--we've made new friends, been more social, etc., etc. So in the next few days I'm going to play catch up, especially since we leave for Mendoza on Friday and will have tons to report after that experience!

A few weekends ago Katie (English) and Luis (Argentine), a young couple from church that Eriks and I have befriended were kind enough to take the three of us for a day trip to San Antonio de Areco, a sleepy little city about a two hour drive north of Buenos Aires. Declared a National Historical site, it is known as a santuario gaucho and is home not only to a museum dedicated to gaucho-ism, but also where Argentine Novelist and Poet Ricardo Güiraldes's character Don Segundo Sombra hails from. Situated next to the Rio Areco, in San Antonio the tallest building is the iglesia on the city square, there's enough green to make an Irishman feel at home (apparently at one point there was a thriving Irish-Argentine population in San Antonio), and it is not abnormal to see a vehicle with a horse-power of 1 parked next your standard 120 hp mode of transportation.

Our day there was an overall delightful experience and a much needed escape from life in the big city. We arrived sometime around noon and started out with a nice lunch a restaurant on the plaza where we sampled pastas, caprese salads, chorizos, and had our first experience with the potato tortilla, a flying saucer shaped humongo potato-egg dish that is not especially flavorful but oh so filling. Monica ordered it but between the three of us we still couldn't finish it. Bellies full we traipsed over to the Museo Gauchesco where we got to see real authentic Gaucho artifacts, Pirates of the Carribean (the ride, not the movie) style models, and a well that prompted us to reenact a certain scene from a certain movie we had seen only a few nights prior on Old Hallow's Eve. See if you can't tell who Monica is imitating.

Ahhhh now we have to leave for Mendoza--but I will finish this post when I get back. Hasta miercoles! Ciao ciao!

Sober up, it's time to vote.

2007-10-31T22:28:00.000-07:00

As many of you may already know, Argentina has a new Kirchner in the house: the (in?)famous Christina. If you're interested in reading about the election itself, click here, as I don't really want to rehash the details, and instead will relay my experience with the Argentine Presidential Elections.

Since our arrival we have encountered plenty of posters advocating presidential candidates, glued in sets of 50 or so to walls, etc., like these of Christina. Two things worth mentioning about them: firstly, these are some of the WORST head shots I have ever seen. Honestly, they make Hillary, Gore, Obama--shoot even George Dubya-- look like America's Next Top Model contestants. Seriously, the women have mascara so clumpy it feels like you're looking at a before and after Maybelline ad (sans the after) more than presidential candidate promotional materials. And while I don't think leadership ought to be based on looks, at the same time I don't quite understand the mentality behind some of the almost ghoulish images--maybe they're saying "Hey, I don't invest in my looks, I invest in my mind" or "No time for personal upkeep, I have a country to think about!" It certainly doesn't help that many have graffiti on them. I can't figure out whether this is due to the controversy surrounding the candidates (many Argentines didn't feel there was a point to voting and actually tried to sell their votes) or if it is because these posters are covering up all the places one normally tags. Whatever the case, some of it is pretty bad; the worst one we saw was one of the lesser known candidates with swastikas drawn over her eyes!

Another thing worth noting about the elections was the fact that from 8pm Saturday night to 8pm Sunday (voting day) alcohol was unavailable and bars were closed. As we didn't have to vote the next day, we had a few friends over Saturday night for drinks and cards. While it's kind of a nice idea (making sure that your country is sober when votes are cast) when Monica went to the grocery store Saturday afternoon she said the alcohol shelves looked like some kind of beverage ghost town, which makes me wonder whether this law only limits the amount of drinking done outside of the house.

On Sunday Eriks, myself and our new friend Esther, after visiting the Recoleta Center for Design, stopped by one of the voting centers. Housed in a University of Buenos Aires building, the place was packed. Unlike the U.S., here it is illegal not to vote, so even college students could be seen in the crowd. So no need for P. Diddy down here, or an Argentine equivalent, though if there were his slogan would be something along the lines of 'Vote or Fine' because if you don't have an excuse for not exercising the franchise you actually have to pay, literally.

Here Eriks peruses the myriad names and contact info of the voters of this barrio. There really were thousands and inside it was swarming with people lined up at different poll stations. For whatever reason men and women vote separately so the lines were composed either entirely of women or entirely of men. Perhaps another attempt to limit distraction and help citizens maintain focus while voting? Whatever the case, it was really interesting to get a chance to see the process first hand, though honestly if I were Argentine I would find some way to vote absentee to avoid the lines and crowdedness.

Regardless of whether or not the elections were fair or El pingüino's pingüina is cut out for the position, it was kind of neat being down here to see a woman (the first for Argentina) win the presidential election. Perhaps one might even say it's good prep for next year back in the U.S.A...

Tomato, Tomahto

2007-10-31T10:39:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago in broken Castellano I was talking to my violin teacher about my utter confusion concerning the pricing down here. Basically everything BUT food is really expensive. For example, technological devices go for about three times more than they do in the U.S. It's remarkable to me that Argentines can even afford them, though based on the prices advertised it appears it's the norm for people to put them on layaway. It's pretty ridiculous, but you can even pay for athletic shoes in cuotas (payments) because the cheapest pairs cost about $80 USD! I didn't pack all that much to come down here, being under the impression that with the glorious exchange rate a shopping spree would be in order, only to find that clothing is just as (or even more) expensive than in the U.S. More than anything I am just baffled that Argentines with their salaries in pesos can afford to pay such outrageous prices.

After my little rant, Esteban made a joke about buying tomatoes on layaway. I gave him a quizzical look and he proceeded to explain to me the current tomato issue in BsAs. The previous day I had bought a few and noticed they were about a peso each--rather pricey for a basic roman sort-- but chalked it up to it not being the right season or something. As it turns out, tomatoes ought not to cost $18 ARS/kilo, but rather $3.99, and this discrepancy can be attributed to governmental inadequacies when it comes to the analysis and prognostication of official inflation and market price figures.

There was boycotting some two weeks ago and as a result unsold, rotten tomatoes. I didn't notice when it was going on as I've avoided the tomato shelf since Esteban pointed out their pricey nature. For now they've joined things like 'a cute pair of shoes' and 'a few nice shirts' on my list of Special treats I'll buy myself around Christmastime. Maybe if I'm good I'll find a tomato in my stocking. In all honesty, I'm not hurting too hard for them and Eriks and Moni never liked them all that much in the first place, I just think the whole thing is kind of interesting. Now if it were a beef, chorizo, or dulce de leche crisis, that would be a completely different story.

(BBC article on tomato boycott)

ANIMALES!!!!

2007-10-26T14:00:00.000-07:00

Buenos Aires is an extremely pet-friendly city and it is taking all of our self-control in passing the pet stores on the way to Coto or Parque 3 de Febrero not to throw down the cash for a fluffy ball of cuteness. Portenos love dogs. Though they're not great at picking up after them, whatever time of day you go out you're bound to see people taking their pups on walks and dog walkers with some ten or so canines on leash. After quite a few visits to Mexico and seeing mangy dog after mangy dog on the street I was surprised to find that most of the dogs here are well-kempt.

These two dogs were by far the most impressive. We chanced upon this pony-dog combo at the Gaucho Fair, with two pups atop a pony riding like it ain't no thang.

The cats aren't bad either--at least those outside of Recoleta cemetary
(the cemetery kittens are the mangiest, creepiest critters I've ever seen, and it wouldn't take a whole lot of convincing to get me to believe they actually are the souls of the the dead who couldn't cross over trapped in the bodies of fierce looking felines) Anyway, one of the best places to find cats is the Botanical Garden in Palermo, where cats run free and like some Where's Waldo or I Spy game, upon entering the garden a discerning eye can spot them lounging about under trees, in trees, in bushes, etc.

We found this crafty guy perched on the shoulder of one of the figures in a sculpture.

Other members of the animal kingdom worth mentioning: llamas (gaucho fair) and our favorite pair of ducks--we've seen them together every time we've sat by the lake.

I'm seriously contemplating abandoning my flight home and arking my way back. Just kidding...kind of--we haven't even seen the penguins yet.

Jipee-ji-jaaaa, Jipee-ji-joooo

2007-10-23T05:19:00.000-07:00

Or at least I'm guessing that's how they'd say it down here with their y's pronounced as j's; oh Argentine pronunciation!

This past Sunday we had our first adventure out West--or at least to one of the Westernmost barrios of Buenos Aires, Mataderos, where on Sundays they have a feria gaucho (cowboy fair). It was also our first experience on the BsAs colectivos (buses). Now let me tell you, I don't care how good you are at reading maps or if you have some kind of sixth sense when it comes to directions. Trying to figure out the BsAs bus system is like trying to teach yourself astrophysics and even if you have your 'handy' Guia-T in tow, you're still not going to get it right the first time. Heck, even Argentines (or at least the ones I've talked to) stick to the two or so buses they already know and otherwise take the subway/taxis. The reason it is so complex it that there are some one hundred bus lines throughout the city and quite a few different bus companies, resulting in the 50+ page Guia-T. It in itself is deserving of a post (which I will do once I figure out the blasted thing.)

However, despite getting on the wrong bus at first (you want to take the 55, not the 36 for those who are considering venturing to Mataderos), we made it out to the gaucho fair by sometime around 3pm, where we found hundreds of little stands offering leather products, foodstuffs, and other gaucho (along with some completely unrelated) objects. In the center of the main plaza which acted as the heart of it all was a stage with live music and a good sized crowd of tourists and locals, a number of which (mostly middle aged and elderly couples) were doing some traditional dances to the music.

Also worth mentioning were the delicious tamales and fried pastries. Let me say that none of us are having problems finding things to eat down here!

Anyway, we walked around, enjoyed watching the gauchos competing in some horseback riding contest where they would go full speed down a sand covered strip of street toward a rope hanging from a horizontal beam and attempt to clip something (we couldn't figure out what) to the rope. There were a few little kids participating as well, and though none of them were successful, the crowd gathered round gave their attempts extra applause.

We managed to see most everything in a few more hours making this the perfect day trip if you're looking for an easy escape from the city life. The feria gaucho and the barrio Mataderos offer a small town feel without the hassle of leaving the boundaries of Buenos Aires and all for a mere $1.60 pesos round trip.

A walk in the park

2007-10-17T06:40:00.000-07:00

We've finally gotten a reprieve from the crazy thunderstorms. It is Spring here which means the weather alternates between rain and gorgeousness. While I love falling asleep to the sound of rain and don't mind waking briefly in the middle of the night to crashes of thunder and flashes of lightening, having consecutive days of it made leaving the apartment difficult--who honestly wants to get dressed up to go out only to get drenched? But the past two weekends and most of the days in between have been beautiful enough to warrant multiple days spent writing, reading, sketching and walking around Palermo Park.

Their equivalent of Golden Gate, complete with a Botanical Garden, lake with paddle boats, zoo, planetarium and a plenty of paths, trees and roller bladers on the weekend, Palermo Park offers plenty to do and plenty of places beckoning you to lie down in soft grass and do nothing at all. Unless you're an Argentine teenager; then apparently there is
only one option: making out with your significant other for hours upon end shamelessly--almost competitively--against the bajillion other couples just like you flopped down on the grass by the lake. Multiple times Moni and I found ourselves surrounded.

Last week I stumbled upon a bust of Borges in a subsection of the park called Rosedal and spent an hour sketching. It came at a good time as I was feeling kind of uninspired that day; he tends to show up at the right times. Plus it was really neat because a few elderly Portenos on midday strolls stopped to talk to me in Castellano about my drawing.

Rosedal is home to a an extensive, extremely fragrant rose garden and some of Buenos Aires's amazing trees. We're in the middle of spring right now and the trees I've see here are out of control incredible; there's just such a variety and some of them are absolutely massive with full canopies that offer a lot of much appreciated shade to girls like me who were not blessed with sun-loving melanin. This one Moni and I couldn't help but monkey around in.

After a little over half a month living in Palermo in our (second) apartment we've become well acquainted with the neighborhood and really feel at home in our place. We have our favorite grocery store (Coto), fruit/veg/meat markets, have experienced some of the local nightlife, and spent a few nice evenings on our patio eating grilled chorizo and vegetables off our own parilla.

It hasn't all been 'a walk in the park' as two weeks ago the gas pipe for the apartment building was being worked on and for four days we didn't have gas which meant no hot water or oven/stove. Luckily we rented this apartment through an agency and they were able to place us in another apartment nearby for those days.

Getting locked out on the roof wasn't so much fun either. I decided to finish Catch 22 out there and the porter locked me out!
Luckily Moni came to my rescue, though it took yelling through a crack in the window of the door down our hall and then throwing little pieces of whatever rocks and crumbles of drywall I could find against our bedroom window. She had her earbuds in which meant it definitely took 15 minutes for her to hear me (plenty of time for visions of staying out all night and worse case scenario plans of places to sleep to develop), but she eventually did and somehow explained to the porter in broken Spanish that her "Amiga...esta en...el 'roof.'" Definitely not going to stay out there past 4pm again!

It's also been rather difficult meeting other young people; it's so much easier to make friends when you're in school. While we've met a lot of really nice people through church or mutual friends, they're either over the age of 30 or not Argentine. And while the three of us for the most part get along really well, we're all ready for some new companions to join our group. I recently emailed the MALBA about volunteering/interning so hopefully I can start doing that and Eriks has his first day of school today so we're bound befriend other young people soon. It's hard because while I did have my first date last Friday with an Argentine I met at a bar (and was really more than hoping to date him, hoping to befriend him so that I could make friends through him!), at the end of it it became obvious that he wasn't looking to be friends (at all), which only confirmed that bars really aren't the main place I want to be meeting people, and while I'm enjoying having all this free time I think that I need to get involved in one more thing in order to get to know people with similar interests. Hopefully something will work out with MALBA; if not I think I'll look into a sports club and joining a futbol team.

Otherwise life has been pretty good; I'm feeling like this is exactly the break I needed. I'm getting to experience what it's like to write regularly and am feeling a lot more secure in my future plans and what it is I actually want to do, as there is plenty of time for reflection. I guess overall I just really appreciate being able to actually relax after 15 or so years of going full-speed with school and everything else; getting to do this in such a beautiful place is just icing on the cake.

Estoy Enferma...Blah.

2007-10-10T07:01:00.000-07:00

Moni got sick last week and now it's my turn to have out of control "mocos" and a tickle cough, which means that after spending most of yesterday inside because of a thunderstorm, even though the rain has taken a break I'll probably end up staying in today as well. Boo! Especially since today is the day I actually have commitments (volunteering at St. John's) and was planning on going to a tango lesson tonight. The worst part of it all is that the only Doctor around is shady Dr. Simi. I'm pretty sure he's actually Mr. Monopoly, who, after getting in trouble for not paying property taxes, decided the only thing to do was flee the country, change his name, and start a questionable pharmaceutical practice on Estado Israel with the slogan: "The same thing but cheaper!" I suppose I do have another option; down the street is Dr. Ahorro. This guy (if his looks are any indication of his age) puts Doogie Howser to shame when it comes to precocious knowledge of medicine. Though frankly I don't trust a five year old to give me prescriptions even if he does don a lab coat and throw his arms in the air in salutation as all bonafide cartoon medical professionals here are prone to do...? Anyway, I'm not actually that sick or in need of medical assistance; I'm just bitter that I'm under the weather when the weather is finally fine, and wanted a reason to post these photos because I think they're rather humorous. I guess today will just have to be a day of reading, writing, and cold chicken soup (our gas is out because there's work being done on the apt. building's pipes) unless I can find a way to heat it up in our toaster oven...hmm. Suggestions anyone?

What We've Been Up To: B.A. in B.A.

2007-10-09T19:06:00.000-07:00

Come to think of it, we have done a fair amount this past month. We've tasted the delectable delights of the Parillas and some of us dared to try the more ambiguous of cuts included (later discovered to be pancreas and intestine).
If you find yourself in BsAs be sure to go to La Brigada in San Telmo--they serve the rarest steak I've ever seen or tasted, which I think in itself is reason enough for Eriks to justify being here for another 6 months and made me cry to think that I was once a vegetarian. Well the second part isn't quite true, but it was pretty durn good.
While Argentines seem to have gotten some foods wrong, for the most part their food is exquisite and (unfortunately for our wastelines, but fortunately for our pocketbooks) extremely cheap. However, first let me focus on the stranger of food and packaging encounters we've had. First of all, milk either comes in cardboard boxes (cheap wine style) or plastic bags (?). Secondly we've come across a number of extremely racist logos, such as that of Blancaflor (perhaps their Aunt Jemima equivalent), that wouldn't fly in the U.S. even 60+ years ago. Lastly, there are milk juices. Need I say more? The milk juice that I accidentally purchased was one that had the consistency and color of milk, tasted like liquified green apple Jolly Ranchers, and was fortified with fish derivatives to provide omega3. Unfortunately, I was too naive to realize that a giant image of a fruit on the front of a carton does not necessarily indicate that the container houses juice (and juice alone) of that particular fruit. Seriously, did someone actually at one point decide that apple-milk-fish-juice was a GOOD idea?

Whatever the case, though some of their food is pretty bizarre and we've discovered (to my dismay) that they are not big fans of spicy food(apparently they get enough calor during their summers that spice of any kind is superfluous), overall it is REALLY good, and the fact that you can get a Chorizo for a peso, a pound of ground beef for approximately three, and a huge chunk of our new favorite cheese, Cremoso (a cheese of the same texture as brie but milder tasting) for ten is still mind-boggling to me even after a month. While we've found that technological objects and imported clothing are not as low in cost as we had expected and hoped for (including electrical razors, much to the chagrin of Moni and myself since this meant we had to teach Eriks, who reached a near Sasquatch state, how to shave old-school style--there's a video if you're curious) food here is even cheaper
than I anticipated. Though of all these things, the best deal down here was the free hug I got the last Sunday at Plaza Dorrego; I'm such a sucker for guys in tye-dye (sigh).
But enough about food; we've been doing things other than just eating. Monica and I have been writing (and painting/drawing) in cafes and a few times in Plaza Dorrego. We've gone to the
Recoleta cemetery where Evita is buried and the creepiest of felines lurk; we've spent a day in Tigre, a city along the delta that is about an hour north of BsAs by train and looks like the Thames in Oxford, with wooden house boats docked along its sides and plenty of row boats for renting. Within our first week we were lucky enough, after spending the day in Palermo park, to chance upon a wine tasting convention on our way home and decided to participate in spite of our rather under dressed state (except for Eriks--it must have been SO embarrassing for him!). For a flat rate of $25 ARS we got to taste test hundreds of Argentine wines and come up with our own list of favorites. That was a night that didn't seem like it could be topped; that was, until we went to Theater Maipú! Last week, the family of Eriks's good friend, Liz
Bateman, was in town and kindly took us out with them to dinner twice and on their last night to Theater Maipú. Knowing nothing other than that Tommy (Liz's second cousin, who is a priest and used to live here some 20 years ago and made many connections during this time) had gotten complimentary tickets for us, we were surprised to find that "Konga" was a cabaret-like show featuring (except for one woman) a cast of drag queens! While I came down here more expecting to see tango shows than drag, never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd get the opportunity to see drag-tango. Truly a uniquely entertaining experience, and as Monica stated so well, "You haven't lived until you've found yourself watching a drag queen on point doing a rendition of Swan Lake while seated next to a Catholic priest."
Hmmm What else? What else? Eriks and I spent a day at the MALBA and got to witness their arts outreach programs en Espanol, mind you. We've also been going to St. John's (or San Juan's)--a small Anglican church in the Microcenter (downtown area) of BsAs that has morning services in Spanish and English and whose parish has an average age of 65. We enjoy it even though we're by far the youngest regulars; we've befriended a youngish couple (Katie, 29 and Luis, mid-30s) and I've become buddy-buddy with the little old ladies that I volunteer with on Wednesday afternoons serving tea to homeless craftswomen that come in for a few hours to work on their knitting and socialize. Last Saturday I found myself selling calendars at the church Bazaar--it's just too hard to say no to these women--though, in all honesty, I had a really good time.

While we have yet to actually tango, I had my first tango violin lesson tonight with a guy by the name of Esteban who plays for a local band called Orquestra Tipica de Fervor de Buenos Aires. It was a lot of fun and weekly lessons should keep me busy. Well it's getting late and I think it's about time I called it a night; I'm not quite adjusted to this Argentine schedule and 3 am on a weeknight is LATE to me! But the long and the short of it is that we've been thoroughly enjoying our stay thus far and are bound to have more to report, especially once we start traveling further outside of BsAs. Rumor has it Iguazu Falls is our next destination and will be a trip made during the next few weeks, so stay tuned!

Bienvenidos a Buenos Aires!

2007-10-08T08:09:00.000-07:00

It has been a little over one month since our plane touched the landing strip of EZE and we found ourselves in this city of Tango, Porteños, and, of course, mate. And while a lot can be accomplished in a month (and to a certain extent, a lot has been accomplished in our month), honestly it has taken a lot more time than I anticipated for us to get settled and for me to start doing the things I hoped to do down here (as the rather, ahem, delayed nature of this blog indicates). Meh, I suppose that's the way these things go and there's not really a point to having expectations as it wouldn't be an adventure if we knew exactly how everything was going to go.

Anyway, point being, all three of us are in a more settled state than we were a month ago and are ready to start relaying to you our experiences abroad (if you want to check out Monica and Eriks's blogs or see more photos and videos from our travels the links are on the right --> ) through reviews, videos, etc. For this first post I suppose the best way to go about it is to catch you up on everything leading up to me now finding myself seated on the patio of our apartment on Pringles Street.

Arrival

Half a day on a plane is a LONG time. Though Moni and I managed to entertain
ourselves with conversation, a game of "Let's try random Bertie Bott's
Everyflavor Beans" (FYI: WARNING! STAY AWAY from rotten egg if you can; it's not even worth trying once) and were blessed with an empty seat between us, it still was an insufferably long flight and by the time we got off we were extremely antsy. Luckily going through customs was remarkably a piece of cake; no questions asked really. I thought for sure since we don't have Visas we'd be given a hard time, but with a smile the officer stamped our passports and we were through! Eriks arrived about two hours after us and we cabbed our way to San Telmo, where we met Ana, the owner of the
apartment we'd rented via the internet for a month. We settled in, explored the neighborhood a bit, and finished the night off with a nice meal, a good bottle of wine at a restaurant around the corner--all for about US$10 each! This whole exchange rate in our favor business is THE BEST.

The Apartment Situation

Our first apartment, located at 931 Bolivar in the barrio San Telmo, was...quaint, let's say. Nestled in the center of the bohemian neighborhood of BsAs and located only a few blocks away from the famous Plaza Dorrego that on Sundays is chalk full of stands selling crafts and antiques and features local Tango dancers and bands performing for tourists. Also frequently visited places near us were the indoor vegetable/meat/cheese/random antiques market that was directly across the street from our place was and the sweetest bakery in the history of the world located two floors below us. It was in the latter of these places that Monica and I quickly became addicted to writing while sipping tea and eating fresh empanadas, jamon y queso tostado, or our favorite cookies--heart-shaped, crispy, light, sugary bundles of goodness that we got into the habit of calling "poop cookies" because one of us joked that they were like little heaven poops.

Anyway, it was a nice enough way to begin our stay down here, as rustic as it was at points; within the first few days we discovered that our thin balcony doors were not conducive to keeping out the whistling of the buses' air brakes; the colored glass windows lining the walkway to our kitchen had cracks that let the rain in; having a bedroom that separates the living room from the main bedroom is not the most convenient layout; and construction NEVER ends when the landlord says it will. So we spent hours online, visited apartment after apartment until we found the place we are now living in. While we're paying $50 USD more for it per month, it is in a residential neighborhood (with lots of trees!), does not leak, is quiet because it's on the 8th floor, has a patio with a parilla (grill) and a gorgeous view (second photo) and, most exciting, has wireless (at the old apartment only Eriks's computer could connect to the internet). While it was a huge pain trying to get the money to pay for the place as the Argentine banks have a screwy system where one can only take out $300 pesos from an ATM at a time and can (maximum) withdraw $1000 pesos per day, we somehow figured it out and have this place rented through January 31st.

Introduction

2007-10-04T07:52:00.000-07:00

Why Buenos Aires?
This trip was born during a moment of crisis I experienced at 30,000 feet returning from my Great Aunt's funeral in Boston. Not ready to go straight to graduate school and wanting to take a shot at writing, I happened to be reading short stories by Borges at the time and thought to myself, "Good God, Elizabeth, you need to decide what you're going to do with your life! You have no definite plans, nothing holding you back. Now's the time to travel and write; that's what you really want to do, so do it. But where?" I looked down at the book in my hands. "I'll write where Borges did." While this was not the only rather outrageous plan I dreamed up last fall, unlike doing an internship in NY, moving to a random small town in France, writing in a hut in the middle of the desert in Arizona, somehow things actually lined up to make this one happen, and I now find myself here, a recent graduate from the University of San Francisco holding a degree in Art History, but spending days sipping tea in cafes, attempting to gain something close to fluency in Castellano, and writing. And to be honest, it's nothing short of glorious.

My Two Dear Travel Companions:

I met Monica and Eriks while studying abroad at a quirky little institute by the name of the Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Oxford some two plus years ago; Moni was my roommate (and quickly became my best buddy) and Eriks
was one of the good people I happened to befriend and travel with during my time there. Since then we have kept in touch, and as the two found themselves in a place where traveling for a little less than a year was possible, when I told them of my desire to spend some time in the city of Borges, they said they'd be down, and I had meself two amazin' travel companions.

Our Plans:
While we all bought return flights to BsAs (which means we have to fly out of BsAs) at this point, our time down here is pretty much up in the air; Moni is talking of moving to Belize come January, and Eriks and I are not sure if we will stay here after January, or give another country or province of Argentina a try. However, the three of us will be keeping blogs of our encounters; the links to Moni's and Eriks's are on the right, along with links to our videos, photos, and my writing. Feel free to poke around, make comments, etc. and thanks for reading!

p.s. In case you're wondering about the title, it's a colloquialism that means "No kidding!" though it literally translates to "Drink (yerba) mate!" And for the record, there is some SERIOUS mate drinking going on down here.