In Review

I got back from Montevideo last night, and I couldn´t have been happier to be on Argentine soil after all of the stress I had endured during the previous 10 or so hours; more on that later. I do want to say that Montevideo was awesome, and that RJ showed me a really good time. We managed to find something to do just about every night, and everything we did was really fun.
After putting up my last post, I went to RJ´s soccer game. His team lost, but it was pretty cool because the teams were better than I expected and the atmosphere was nuts; the other team´s fans were chanting, banging instruments, and shooting fireworks throughout the game. We got home around 12:30, showered, changed, and went to a party for all of the exchange students. We got home at around 3 or 4, slept about 4 hours, and met up with some Spaniards, to take a bus to Punta del Este for the weekend.

Punta:

The first night was rainy, but the second day was much better, and we walked around the entire peninsula and took a bunch of photos. One side of the peninsula is the river and the other side is the Atlantic Ocean, so that was pretty sweet -- the Atlantic side seemed nicer, and had much bigger waves.

RJ had class a few times during the week, so I spent that time walking around the beach in Montevideo and reading a book, The Miracle in the Andes, about a rugby team that had their plane crash on the way to Chile and had to find a way out after several months of living in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. Nuts. We also spent some more time hanging out with the Mexican girls; we went to play pool a few nights ago, and for my last night we cooked some Daddy´s BBQ and went out salsa dancing. I think it should go without saying that as Mississippians we were at a huge disadvantage on the dance floor, but the girls were nice enough not to laugh too much. There were some guys out there who were nuts, and the club had closed-circuit tv showing the band and the front of the dancing area, where all the bad-asses seemed to be, so it was fun to watch that.

It would be impossible to write about everything that happened during my week in Uruguay, but it really was a blast, and I know RJ and I came out of it with a lot of good laughs, many of which came from trying to translate idiomatic expressions from spanish to english and from english to spanish (dos triquis?). That´s always fun.

Salsa night at Azabache:

Oh, I almost forgot to write about my problems leaving Uruguay. Well, the first problem was that I realized I had left my keys at the house, walked back home, couldn´t find them, and then head to run to the bus station, a good mile at least, uphill, in flip-flops and a button-up in 80 degree heat. With a backpack stuffed full of stuff. I ended up missing my bus, covered in sweat, and having to pay $10 more to switch to the next available one. When I got to the boat portion of my trip I was forced to raise my voice with the customs agent, which probably wasn´t a good idea, but the guy was an idiot.

Guy, showing me the receipt from my ticket to Argentina: Do you have this from when you came?
Me: Nope.
Guy: Well, you need it to get into Argentina.
Me: Nobody told me. What can I do.
Guy: Look for it.
Me: I don´t have it.
Guy: (demanding) Look for it.
Me: Are you kidding? I came 7 days ago, how am I going to look for it when I am positive I don´t have it?
Guy: Go ahead, but they aren´t going to let you into Argentina.

So, I was a little worried the whole way over, but when I got there no one even looked at my passport or receipt or whatever, I just ran my bookbag through security and walked to the subway. The guy was seriously an ass, and he didn´t seem to have any idea what he was talking about.

Anyways, I´m heading home tomorrow, and while I´ve been looking forward to coming home for the past few weeks, I´m starting to feel more emotional about leaving. This has been my home for the past 4 months, and while I know I´m going to be glad to see my family, Karma, eat American food, etc., I´m going to end up missing a lot of the stuff here. That being said, I will be back in March, and it has been an incredible learning experience. It´s hard for me to gauge objectively how much my Spanish has improved, but I know for sure that I have learned a lot by travelling and living in a completely different culture, and I don´t think there is a better way to really get to know yourself than by distancing yourself from just about everything you are used to for a third of a year. Not too get too deep, but there are a lot of chances for reflection when you are on your own, and outside of the influences and pressures of Gulfport, Oxford, Mississippi, the South, the United States, the Northern Hemisphere, etc., etc., and I certainly don´t regret having come here.

I look forward to seeing everyone when I get home, and to seeing Buenos Aires again in the Spring. As Adam Kendrick once said: It´s been real. It´s been fun ...

Uruguayan Update

So far so good in Montevideo. I just wolfed down my first Chivito, the "Canadian" Chivito that RJ mentioned on his blog a while back: steak, pepper, onion, lettuce, egg, ham, cheese, bacon, and a bun that was way too small for all of the aforementioned ingrediants. It was legit.

Yesterday we went out with the Mexican girls and ended up meeting some of RJ's other friends at a club. I cleaned house playing poker. We went to the beach today, and I'm about to go to see RJ play his last game of the season.

R's family is really nice, and they have a hoss dog. Gonna run for now..

Election, School

4.0, suckas! I finished the semester with all A´s, which is a good feeling, an even better feeling, in fact, than finishing the semester during the first week of November (which is a pretty good feeling on its own).

Now, uh, excuse me while I climb onto my soapbox.

This really doesn´t have much to do with Argentina, but I think the election results are pretty exciting. I wasn´t a die-hard Obama or McCain supporter, but it´s obvious that the rest of the world is --that is my insight from abroad. Argentines everywhere, and really non-Americans around the globe, from what I´ve read, are excited about the results, and it would be nice to see the U.S. return to being the respected and admired country that it has been.

Now from the soapbox: I´m not sure how many of you non-adolescent or non-Mississippian readers have been exposed to this, but there has been a terrible amount of (for lack of a better word) bitching on Facebook since last night, and if I have to read another comment about our ¨terrorist¨-¨communist-¨socialist¨ future president ... well, it will be one comment to many.

It shouldn´t have to be said, but we live in a democracy, and if you can´t take it when your candidate loses there really isn´t much e-whining can do to help you. You can continue to vote for whoever you want, but moving to Fiji, México, Canada, New Zealand, or whatever other country you are going to threaten to move to isn´t going to matter to anyone but you, so we don´t need to hear about it. Furthermore, you might want to rethink that move if you are trying to get away from Obama supporters, because most countries have indicated they would vote about 80 to 90 percent for Barack, far more than the U.S.

From the reactions these people are having you would have thought Barack had rode into Washington on a Panzer, with Osama Bin Laden as his VP and an exhumed Fidel Castro as his Secretary of State, and forcefully imposed his crazy ideas of ¨redistribution of wealth¨.

If you are one of these people: take a deep breath. You´ll have another chance in 4 years.

I´m going to leave it at that. I figured my own blog would be a better place to get that off of my chest than contributing to back-and-forth facebook bickering. Moving on:

Tomorrow I will be going to Montevideo to see RJ and his friends, so that should be a blast. Expect pictures to follow.

Until then..

Almost the End

My time in Buenos Aires is quickly coming to an end, so I figure I should probably write an entry looking back on my trip. I´m not ready to do that yet, however, so I am gonna just put up a few photos that I have taken during the past few weeks, and a couple of brief explanations.

Halloween, my Mike 2 costume:




La Boca, with a llama.

Serious steak dinner. This place was pretty nice, and while we had to wait thirty minutes they passed around ¨free¨ champagne and grilled sausages outside.

Drinking Mate in Recoleta on Saturday afternoon

Glorious American lunch

Another trip to Recoleta Cemetary.

Alright folks. I´m going to see RJ soon, this Thursday if everything goes as planned, and I´m going to spend about a week over there. School is all but finished, I only have one Spanish exam to go.

Living the dream

Exams are well under way, and I´ve been beating them up like they owe me money. I´ll be shocked -- shocked! -- if I don´t get A´s on the two tests I took today, and if I can finish up my paper on Venezuela this afternoon I will be all but finished with my first semester of Argentine schooling. I must say, it´s a good feeling, not least of all because I know a celebratory rib eye and cuban (legal here) cigar await.

I really don´t have much to write about anymore, since my past few weeks have mostly been filled with penny-pinching and studying, but Gladys, the house mother, left this weekend, and everyone enjoyed our newly-gained autonomy. Until she returned.

While I don´t want to delve deeply into the situation, a definite United Front has formed among the exchange students and the host mother, with good reason (that really doesn´t merit being discussed here). I only mention it all because of the audacity of the end of the weekend hystrionics, and because of the hilarity of our United Front and our recent slogan: ¨there is a new sheriff in town.¨

With the house to ourselves we were able to do whatever we wanted to without being blamed, guilt-tripped, or mean-mugged, and for the first time in a while everyone was smiling. I don´t want to imply that no one is ever happy, just that everyone is never happy when everyone is sharing the house´s common areas. We cooked up a B.A. (and that doesn´t stand for Buenos Aires) American style lunch of Daddy´s BBQ Chicken, potato salad, pasta salad, and beer. The chicken was juicy and delicious, and we chopped up the remnants for the huge ass bowl of pasta we ate at dinner. It was like the Taco Bell commercial: we didn´t know what to do, except yell ¨I´m FULLLLLL!¨

Our house mother returned Monday, and, apparently, flew off the handle, claiming that the house was dirty (I don´t know how she was able to distinguish the dirtiness of the house from the usual layer of filth) and, from what I hear, berated our (rent-paying) female roomate, because she was the ´woman of the house´. This is all antecdotal evidence, because, thankfully, I wasn´t there to witness the shit-storm, but it is clearly out of line, and I have a feeling that in about 10 to 15 days when people start moving out, Front Desk will receive a few reports.

That being said, I really love living with the majority of my roomates, and, if anything, we have bonded over the experience. The house, for the most part, hasn´t put a damper on my semester, but instead has encouraged me to get out and do something. anything. other than sit around and watch Prison Break all day.

On Thursday night I went out with Mike Segundo and his girlfriend, who claimed she had never stayed out to see the sun come up. We went out just in time to catch the end of happy hour -- 2 a.m. -- and after multiple bars, including one with, for god knows what reason, a ton of hot dog buns everywhere, and another where a slurring scottish guy asked us where to buy coke (where the hell did he get the ´I-know-where-to-buy-coke-vibe´?), we finished up with a plate of medialunas, a few orange juices, and a long bus ride home. Good times, good times.

Frank celebrated his birthday the other day, and I got a phenomenal, 2-inch thick, perfectly cooked (rare) rib eye for 15 bucks. It was unbelievable. It was like butter, meaty, juicy butter. The only bad part was that when we were going home the taxi driver took us on a ridiculous route, and when I called him out on it he immediately shot back: ¨that´s the problem with you Americans, you´re always in a hurry.¨ Are you F´n kidding me? I´m paying you by the minute, you bum. I was about to ¨fly off the handle¨, but decided against it, since I was splitting the fare with 3 other people and it only came out to a few bucks each anyways.

On another note, Lil Wayne is blogging for ESPN.com. How bad of an idea is that? I love Lil Wayne, the best rapper alive, but the column is absolutely retarded:

http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?section=magazine&id=3648624

The only funny parts were when he said he likes to watch the Nascar channel where you ride shotgun with the driver, because they cuss a lot, and the goon to a goblin reference (and non-sensical explanation). ESPN: I want my 5 minutes back.

Pictures

Found a place to upload the pictures that should have gone with the blog below:

Tempus Alba, the high-tech vineyard






Plaza San Martín, Mendoza:


San Martín de los Andes:



More San Martín de los Andes:

Mendoza, these trees line every street:

Post-arrival:


The side of the road on the bike ride:

Mendoza

What an unpleasant way to wake up -- there was an earthquake this morning, or at least I think there was. Nothing major, no infrastructure damage or anything like that, but the room definitely felt like it was shaking, and the effects of the wine tour had worn off hours before, so that didn´t have anything to do with it. Mendoza has been leveled by earthquakes in the past, which I guess isn´t surprising when you consider how close it is to the Andes, and it seems like these folks are used to it, because no one said or did anything. I do know my roomate woke up as well, and he started snoring when he finally went back to sleep. When I went upstairs the computer upstairs had a recent google search for ¨mendoza seismic activity¨, so I guess I wasn´t the only unsettled gringo.

You can just chalk that up as a little more excitement at the end of a really good day. I woke up early and went to the bikesandwines office. They said the wineries aren´t within biking distance of the main office, but that wouldn´t be a problem because I could catch a ride with the Argentine hippy bad asses waiting outside -- apparently taxi drivers aren´t the only people who drive crazy down here. Judging from the way the way they were driving, these guys had confused their reggae-painted VW van with a Porsche. It made the ride a lot more exciting, although the smashed-up windshield was a slightly unsettling testament to the dangers of their sketchy driving.

Upon arriving they gave everyone a map, a bright yellow bike, and an indication of where our first stop was (which was pretty cool because it was a wine museum as well as a winery). There was also a stop along the way that was an artesanal chocolate and liquore factory, but the rest of the places I visited were wineries, 4 in total. They were all unique for different reasons, but my favorite two were Caranie and Tempus Albus. Caranie was a small ¨boutique winery¨where the owner gave the tour ... she and her husband wanted to buy land in Argentina after the economic collapse and they got a great deal on more land than they really wanted. The land already had grapes growing on it, and they were French, so they spent a year studying the vinting process and then upgraded all the machinery and started creating and bottling their own wine. Cool lady.

Tempus Albus was a really nice bodega, everything was new and shiny, and they had a wine bar upstairs where you could get 3 generous pours of the wines of your choice for 7 bucks. I picked the Syrah, Malbec, and their premium blend, which was by far the best. There were about 6 or 7 other folks, English and Australian, on the beautiful deck upstairs, and we spent about an hour talking about travelling, soccer, accents, and the Argentine lifestyle.

The bike route itself was pretty long, and I was wiped out at the end of the day. The roads varied from paved to gravel to dust, but tall trees lined most of them and the mountains were clearly visible on the right said of the road. The sun and the countryside was as enjoyable as the wineries themselves.

My bus leaves in 8 hours and I don´t have much to do except hang around the city and try to get a little bit of reading done. I went to the modern art museum earlier today, and I might check out the aquarium later, if it isn´t too expensive to get in. I will upload pictures eventually, but the computers here are terrible. I have spent 50 minutes trying to upload 5 pictures without any success.

RJ is in Brazil playing soccer for 5 days right now. Must be nice..

This is the Last Stop

I arrived in Mendoza today, the land of sun and wine. Well, there isn´t much sun, nor have I seen too much wine, but the vineyards are all outside of the city -- obviously -- and I think the weather should clear up mañana. Having said that, I´m really impressed with Mendoza.

I already told RJ, my hostel is like the Real World house of hostels ... it´s awesome, clean, pretty funky and cool looking, with a back terrace with a grill and kitchen, pool, foosball, ping pong, DirectTV. It has an adjoining bar, the Publick House, that looks really cool. It has everything. And it costs me half of what the place in San Martín did, where all I had was a tiny, wooden room. My elbows scraped the walls when I tried to do push-ups. Tiny. Also, I did the math today, lodging and travel over the 8 day trip will come out to just about 200 bucks U.S. total. Not bad at all!

The trip from San Martín was more or less hellacious, because the bus arrived an hour and a half late, complicating things because I had a connecting bus in Nequen that had to wait for me. The worst part of this was that I had a chocolate treat after lunch, expecting to eat between busses. Not so. I did get another alfajor on the bus. And then another one, because they wanted to apologize for the delay. Breakfast on the bus today? Alfajor. Within 18 hours the only possible nutritional sources I had were chocolate bars. Combine my low blood sugar levels and a crappy bus, and you can imagine how I felt. Luckily, I had a gigantic steak sandwich when I got in that was out of this world. Just a huge ass loaf of bread with fried egg, steak, ´Golf Sauce´ a.k.a. a mixture of mayo and ketchup, ham, and cheese. It was delicious.

In San Martín I had buffalo bresealoa and ciervo a la cazadora -- Deer: hunter style. Both were great. Tonights gastronomical treats will be the Chimay Tripel I just bought and grape leaves and shawarma from the Lonely Planet recommended Mediterranian place that is within viewing distance of the hostel. Ciao!

Stop 2: San Martín

I made it into San Martín de los Andes today, and while it wasn´t what I expected, it´s still a really really nice town. It´s quaint, which isn´t necesarily what I was looking for, but it´s very secluded and I plan on renting a bike and getting into the trails and what not a little bit tomorrow. It also is supposed to have really great venison and trout, so that´s what I´ll be eating tonight.

The Lonely Planet guide had led me to believe that it had a lot of restaurants and bars around the lake, and one restaurant is described as being the ¨cheapest place to eat on the lake¨. Well, there are only two buildings on the lake, so it´s not like that was a great bit of insight.

Lonely Planet came through big time with the hostel it recommended for Bariloche though, and I met some really cool people. The hostel was probably the best part of the stay, next to Cerro Campanario, which I have some pictures of right below. The views were incredible, the pictures don´t begin to do them justice, because they can´t convey how big and impressive the lakes were and how they stretched all around you. Even still, the pictures are pretty cool..

One of the best parts of the hostel was the view, which you can see in my previous blog, but the staff and the people living there were awesome as well. In fact, I probably met more cool people in that hostel than I have during my whole trip so far. I spent most of my time with a couple of English guys, a Danish couple, a Dutch guy and an Austrian, but I also had really good conversations just hanging out with a couple of Argentines, and with a South African couple last night. The hostel had a great sense of community. We found a pub owned by an English guy as well, so the Englishmen and myself went there to watch Uruguay get beat by Argentina on the big screen. On the way home I decided I was going to take advantage of the big kitchen, and buy some groceries.

I was going to make something easy, something that wouldn´t require a lot of ingredients, so I got a bag of cheese ravioli, a can of tomatoes, and a kilo of ground beef. I was paying more attention to the price than anything, and I ended up with way more beef than I expected ... I didn´t think much before telling the guy what I wanted, and I had thought a pound was 2 kilos, not the otherway around. Long story short I had an entire bag of pasta and a little over a pound of meat. I couldn´t finish it, but I definitely got my moneys worth.

I´m staying in Residencia Italia tonight, and I´m going to try to get to Mendoza on an overnight bus trip tomorrow, if I can. I´ll put up some San Martín and Mendoza pictures in 3 or 4 days, most likely.

Into the Wild

Arrival! 21.5 hours on a bus, and I never thought it would have went so smoothly. A few hours in they brought around your choice of tea or coffee, with an alfajor and some toast and jam. Dinner came later, which I thought was a little weak, because it was salad and a couple slice of ham, but it turns out that was just a starter, and I got a steaming container of beef and spinach that put airline food to shame. It also came with two complementary glasses of red wine.

I got in at about 10 a.m. this morning, and walked around town, took some pictures, ate at a wonderful Mexican place owned by real Mexicans! and went to a Patagonian museum.

There is a place that brews their own beer that looks great, sitting on the lake, for dinner, or for after dinner, and a local delicacy is roasted lamb. Trout is also big. Can't wait. Here's a picture, I took some more, but my camera is apparently broken, I hope I can figure it out before ascending the peak tomorrow. The piece that covers the memory card and battery popped off, I can't get it back on, and it won't turn on without that piece.


Mom ... I'm staying in Hostel 1004, like I told you. Sunday, at 9 a.m., I leave for San Martin de los Andes.

EDIT.Change of plans on the pictures ... I fixed the camera, but facebook won't let me upload them directly, so I am going to put a handful more here and use this site to try and put them on facebook. Enjoy.Yep, view from the hostel.




Centro Civico.


Cathedral.


The square. Notice the Saint Bernard in the bottom right. They are everywhere around here, but you have to pay to take their pictures, just like everything else in Argentina, or any touristy part of the world.


Mexican place. Legit.

Out of the Frying Pan and Into the Fire

Alright, that title probably doesn´t have much to do with anything I´m about to write about, but it was a chapter in The Hobbit. Great book, from a great man, J.R.R. Tolkien, who has a great quote on R.J´s blog and my facebook: ¨Not all those who wander are lost.¨

I think that kind of sums up the trip I am about to embark on. I have an idea where I want to go, and what I want to do, but I have very little in the way of real plans. I know that I am leaving in about 16 hours, and I am going to spend about 20 hours on a bus that will take me to Bariloche, the Telluride/Aspen of South America. I don´t know if there will be snow, but I imagine there will be. I am also going to stop, I think, in San Martín de los Andes, and Mendoza, the wine country. I plan on doing some bike tours, wine tours, and maybe paragliding? We´ll see.

I may be able to get a computer to post an update or two during the trip, but if not I will post again when I get back. I don´t know when that will be, two Sundays from now at the latest.

He came, we saw, we conquered.

Where to start? Well, first off, I´m tired, and I´m about to go hit a nap, because this weekend wore me out. It was probably one of my top 2 or 3 weekends here, and I´ll try to give y´all a quick review.

The concert. Was. Sick. We got there early-ish: very early by Argentine standards, but average to late by Michael´s Festival Standards. I wondered if we were at the right stage when we first found it, because there were no more than 100 people listening to the band that was playing. When the band finished about 75 of these people left, and we hunkered down in the front row, on the rail. For a Dave Matthews concert. That only cost 30 dollars. Now that´s value.

We picked out the fellow Americans with ease, and spent the next three or four hours talking and waiting. Some of the bands were good, some were ... well, I think my wording at the time was ¨queerer than a 3 dollar bill.¨ This was mostly directed at the guy who kept winking at the almost all male crowd and doing a Ricky Martin-esque ass shake, while wearing skinny jeans hemmed with polka dots and some other super-homo accesories. We couldn´t stop laughing though, and one of the songs was pretty catchy. Fito Paez played just before Dave, and this was both the begining of the good music and the begining of an important realization:

Argentina has a couple of things they are known for: tango dancing and going to soccer games. And military dictatorships, but that´s a different story. They also have a few customs which are less well known but just as much a part of their way of life. One such custom is jumping up and down and singing. Cool, right? Wrong, because when you have thousands of people jumping and pushing on you it actually sucks, and, at times, can strike fear into your heart as you almost fall down because you are standing on the ledge of the barrier and you feel like you are going to end up getting trampled. At least that was my personal experience.

Despite the jumping, the concert was awesome. Really awesome. During the second song, or an extension of the first song, depending on how you look at it, the sound system stopped working. I thought there was going to be a riot, and I was between a crowd and a hard (metal barrier) place. And then it happened. Dave descended into the crowd and came right at us. And then stopped, and started shaking hands and thanking all of the Argentines that had come out, walking THE OTHER WAY. So close. RJ´s hand was within inches of touching the man, the myth, the legend, but it was still really sweet. Other highlights include the encore, All Along the Watchtower, in which Tim Reynolds substitituted (and demolished) the Stairway to Heaven solo, improving the middle part and then, to blow the few minds that hadn´t already been, playing the last part with his teeth. Which I have filmed. It was, as we say, ¨ridonk¨, or ridonkulous.

Another highlight was Two Step. A lot of popular DMB songs have certain parts where the crowd participates, but I have never heard this done before, and I´m not sure Dave had either, because he was absolutely loving it. During Two Step, if you know the song you just have to imagine the intro riff -- which is also the jam. During the jam the crowd started chanting daaaaaaaah dah dah daaaaaaaah, for about 5 minutes while the band just rocked out. The crowd was, basically, another instrument accompanying the seven guys on stage, and Dave started to scat (the jazz-speak freestyle type thing) towards the end. It was, also, ¨ridonk.¨

During the jumping and shoving I did manage to tear my shorts, and of the 7 americans 4 of them and countless others had security pull them over the rail because they were so uncomfortable, but those of us who stayed were rewarded with front row seats to the aforementioned encore performance during which Tim Reynolds ascended into the stratosphere of most mind blowing guitar performances I have seen live, joining Warren Haynes, Luther Dickinson, and Davy Knowles.

After the concert we went to a place which really opened my eyes to what sushi can (and should) be. If you´re from Gulfport you probably know that Samurai is good, but there is a difference between a place that has great sushi because the rolls are huge and filled with awesome and exotic stuff -- coconut shrimp, mango, whatever -- and a place that just has such high quality fish that a simple piece of niguri or a regular Philadelphia roll tastes like heaven in your mouth. And that´s what Moshi-Moshi did. We also did a sake tasting, 8 kinds of sake, and they were all good, but there was one that had gold leaf in it that was a definite fan favorite.

The next day we went all around the downtown area, and did lots of cool stuff, and then met up with RJ´s friends, the mexican girls and the Spaniards, a little later. This was cool because:
A.) I don´t have a cool social group like that, and the people were a lot of fun.
B.) Two good ratios were present at this gathering: 2 native English speakers to 7 or 8 native Spanish speakers, and 3 guys to like 7 girls -- as Dylan Drake would be able to let you know, this is a ratio rarely found in Oxford.

All kidding aside, the whole group was really fun, and I´m envious of RJ for having such a tight-knit group of pals. I´m excited to go hang out with them all again in about a month. RJ may or may not have lost the memory card with the pictures from the weekend, but I will upload them if I can find it.

T-minus a few days until I take off for the Andes. Weather is about 80 all week in Mendoza and in the 50´s or maybe low 60´s in Patagonia. Can´t wait.

Take care folks, until next time.

RJ Arrives, Dubious Begining

Uf. RJ got in yesterday and I´m not sure whether you could call it a great begining or not. I´m inclined to say not, but I´m also inclined to not let it put a damper on the weekend.

Everyone got off the ferry and RJ´s friends all split off to go to wherever they were staying, mostly because they had brought a lot of luggage, but RJ had only brought one backpack. I live about an hour and fifteen minutes to an hour and a half, or a really expensive cab ride, from Downtown, so we opted to go to Van Koning and wait for his friends to get ready before meeting up with them later for dinner.

We had been sitting down for about 10 minutes when the manager came over and asked: ¨Are you missing anything?¨ Um, no. ¨Did you have anything, a bag maybe?¨ RJ starts feeling around on the ground, can´t find it. I know we both experienced an indescribable sinking feeling. ¨Yes, I had one.¨ The guy gestured for us to wait, and ran outside. He didn´t find them, but apparently he had seen two guys stop behind RJ for a minute and somehow grab his bag. I say somehow, because I don´t know how they managed to do it; at the time this happened there were 11 people in the place, not counting the staff. 11. He should have had the bag inbetween his feet, not at his side, but it just didn´t seem like anything could have happened in a nearly empty bar on a Thursday. These guys really are pro´s, and they are good at what they do.

So that was obviously a very dissapointing way to start the night. RJ lost his camera and North Face backpack, not to mention 3 days worth of clothes and a pair of shoes.

We still needed to eat, so after staying there for about an hour longer (what else did we have to lose? -- get it?) we went to go find dinner. There is a really hip place around the corner that is known for having large lines to get in and really good, reasonably priced food once you do get it in. It was about midnight so we were able to find a table for 2 without waiting, but it was still packed, and we ordered like real Argentines, without seeing the menu. Parrilada para dos. What this means is that as soon as it came off of the grill they brought us more or less a whole cow, including the innards. Blood sausage, intestine, flank, ribs, sweetbreads. All of the delicacies. Plus a big bowl of fries. And a litter of Stella Artois. 61 pesos ... a little under 20 bucks U.S. You will be hard pressed to find that kind of deal at the most popular place in any neighborhood in the country.

Of course, it was cash only, and I realized that after we ordered, which led to me leaving RJ stranded while I followed the hostess´instructions to the nearest ATM. The instructions, of course were wrong (honest to God truth: I´m not sure that I have ever received accurate instructions from an Argentine on the street. EVER. And they give them readily, they just don´t know where they are going). I asked another guy: ¨There is one two blocks that way, I think.¨ Wrong again. So I end up sprinting about 10 blocks to the bank nearby where I used to live and then sprinting the whole way back. I´m hurdling garbage on the side of the road, cutting through traffic -- people are pointing, wondering what´s going on. I felt like Clark Kent, urgically looking for a phone booth with none in sight. It was that dramatic.

So between Van Koning (they comped everything -- about 25-30 bucks U.S. -- for us because they felt bad, and because the waitress, apparently is responsible for watching for stuff like that) and Las Cholas (the Parilla where we ate) we consumed a great quantity of excellent quality food and beverage for about 20 bucks U.S. All things considered, it could have been better, obviously, but I suppose it could have been a lot worse. We could have not already done all the great stuff we have done, could not have tickets to what is gonna be a great concert today, and could not have great plans for the rest of the weekend. As I justified it to RJ, using Mom´s famous 5 year plan -- when you look back in 5 years, you are going to remember having a great weekend and doing all kinds of cool stuff a lot more than you are going to miss 500 bucks.

Waiting for Dave

I really can´t wait for the DMB show, and I have been watching videos of their concerts all week. There are two reasons that Mr. David J. Matthews is underrated, aside from his excellent rhythm guitar playing: his masterful storytelling, which, thankfully, rarely veers into political territory, with the exception of a few FEMA comments in post-Katrina New Orleans:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHy0q86Kl_Q

and his sweet dance moves (and how bad is Stefan, the bass player? Geeeez.):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skOY7nKH144

And Tim Reynolds is going to be with the band. And it´s highly likely that they open with Bartender or Don´t Drink the Water. Can´t wait.

RJ gets in this afternoon, so maybe he´ll finally have an excuse to put up some good pictures again.

I thought that my midterms were finished, but I have one more Monday in Spanish, so my Andes trip may start as soon as Wednesday afternoon or Thursday morning.

Waiting for RJ

It´s been a week since I last wrote, but I really haven´t done much except study for my exams and go to Van Koning for a couple of hours on Saturday night (after Ole Miss upset Florida, of course).

I watched the Presidential Debate. I think both candidates have their strong points, but I can´t get over Palin. The more I see of her the worse it gets. There is a good clip on youtube of Matt Damon talking about her: ¨it´s like a bad Disney Movie. The hockey mom with 2 years of experience becomes President.¨

RJ changed his plans so that he could come in a little earlier (good call), and he will be here in something like 18 or 20 hours. I have a basic itinerary planned out, it´s going to be excellent. Stay tuned for updates on our adventures.

Midweek Update

It´s Wednesday afternoon, which means I only have one more class left before the weekend, and I figured it would be a good time to check in with some important updates on things I have mentioned in previous blog posts.

1.) Holidays: http://malinargentina.blogspot.com/2008/09/argentinian-gladiators-and-day-of.html

I got a lot of feedback on this, and it´s official, the Day of the Gnocchi is a real holiday, and Argentines and Uruguayans celebrate it on a monthly basis. I was also told that it is customary to put a bill under your dinner plate on this day, because it brings good luck. No word on if there is a Gnocchi Fairy or not, but I like to imagine that there is. Unfortunately I can´t say for sure which day of the month is ñoqui day, because I have heard both the 20th and the 29th. Until I can clear this up, eat them twice a month to be safe.

Also, while I´m on the Holiday topic. While getting onto the bus today I heard something on the radio about The Day of the Girlfriend, which apparently isn´t just Valentines Day any more. It may be today, or it may be coming up soon, I didn´t hear enough to figure that out, but I´m begining to think these ¨holidays¨are being created by the Government to increase spending and stop the economy from being so crappy. The chocolate industry must be booming, but that probably has more to do with my previously mentioned alfajor habit.

2.) Midterm in Argentina Sociedad Abierta: http://malinargentina.blogspot.com/2008/09/pop-midterm.html

I beat my midterm up. Like it owed me money. We got our tests back yesterday and I got a 10 out of 10, an A-plus. This was a very good feeling, especially considering the circumstances and how unprepared I was when I showed up for class. 1 down, 4 to go.

3.) This doesn´t relate to a blog I actually wrote, but it relates to one I thought about writing, which counts for something. Starbucks is huge here, but there is only one. I have never seen this particular Starbucks without a line out the door. It is slightly more expensive here, as is McDonalds (I treated myself to an Oreo McFlurry yesterday after finding out how well I did on my test), and the menu is similar, although Argentinized. They have Maté Lattes, and Dulce de Leche Frapuccinos. I hear you can also get a real Capuccino there, because a ¨capuccino¨here is normally a sweet drink that is basically a coffee with a bunch of chocolate. I have learned that Argentines find a way to add sugar to everything, including sandwiches -- for dinner one day our house mom brought home ham sandwiches, half of which were on puff pastry that was covered in sugar. I kid you not.

Here is another blog on Starbucks down here, it´s a short and entertaining read.
http://atexaninargentina.blogspot.com/2008/05/will-starbucks-be-hit-in-argentina.html

Argentinian Gladiators and The Day of the Student

Student´s Day: an important celebration on the Argentine calendar? Not really, but it´s there, and someone is going to celebrate it. That´s the Argentine mindset, and maybe I´m begining to adopt it myself, because I didn´t really feel like sitting on the couch and watching AC Milan get drilled again by a lowly Serie A side.

Now I already know what you are thinking: ¨Wow, a holiday just for students? What a nice idea ... Argentines must really appreciate the hard work that these kids are putting in.¨ Not so fast. We have seen not only the Day of the Student, but also the Day of the Grandparents, the Day of the Friend, the Day of the Teacher, and, among many others, The Day of the Gnocchi, since I have been here. I kid you not. I walked down the street one day and every restaurant seemed to have a Gnocchi special -- one of them claimed it was the Day of the Gnocchi, and as hard as it was to believe, I think it was an official event. Because I believe that Argentines do appreciate the hard work the Gnocchi is putting in, and because I couldn´t make that up.

Naturally, when a country schedules so many ¨holidays¨ a few of them are going to overlap, as was the case today, and while this may at first seem like poor planning on the part of whoever is assigning arbitrary days to these random, meaningless celebrations, the conflicing holiday today was The Day of Spring. The first day of Spring. Spring Day. And Student´s Day. Sounds like Spring Break. Sounds like fun.

Now for the down side. Whoever scheduled these days did so on a Sunday. Weak. And on a cloudy, altogether un-spring-like Sunday. The gall.

Anyways, my roomates and I went out to a local park where there was supposed to be some stuff going on. Not quite what I had in mind, but I´m glad we went. Sure, most of the students there may have been ¨elementary school students¨. Sure, the games may have been designed for ¨small children¨. Has that ever stopped me?

The human foosball looked enticing until I saw the inflatable American Gladiators set-up. I´ve always wanted to be an American Gladiator (of course I´m thinking Nitro, Turbo, and Gemini, not the freakish Wolf Guy that was on the Hulk Hogan version last year) and this is my chance. Game on. The gauntlet was thrown, and Mike 2 and Mike 3 climbed into the inflatable ring.


I leapt onto the inflated pedestal right away, and right away I realized that a 180 pound guy displaces a lot more air than a 75 pound 3rd grader. I wish we would have filmed it, but the picture above is going to have to suffice. I couldn´t get onto the pedestal for more than two seconds without it buckling beneath me. I face-planted immediatedly, and continued to do so throughout the ¨bout¨, laughing hysterically the whole time. It was stupid, but it was a lot of fun. There was also free candy involved, so Student´s Day, and the Gladiator Ring in particular, gets my approval.

I guess that´s the upside of having two holidays in one day ... if Spring Day is ruined by terrible weather, there is another excuse to go do something dumb.

Moving on. I forgot to mention, but last week I got hit by a biker. Not a Hell´s Angel, thank God, and not really a Lance Armstrong type either. Local paper boy would be more on the right track. I got BLINDSIDED.
Anyways, it was completely this guys fault, but when I got ran into he was the one that got wiped out. I limped away with a cut knee and bruised hip, but the most damage was done to my manhood, because I gave out a really terrible shriek when I saw this guy hurtling the wrong way down a one-way street.

Enough of that ... here´s a photo I took a while back that I just got around to uploading.

My pleasure reading has reached a stand still, but my school reading has really picked up, and I expect to smash the rest of my midterms in a few weeks and enjoy my Andean trek guilt-free. Ah, my Andean trek. I can´t wait. I´m not sure how much, if any, of this trek will be spent in the Andes, but the majority of it will certainly be spent in their shadows, which is close enough for me.

RJ should be here in under 2 weeks. He is going to love it. That´s all for now, happen Student´s Day, and take care.

Mostly Pictures.

Here are a few photos I have taken over the past week, the top two were last night, in the Bosques of Palermo, or the Forests of Palermo, which is kind of like Argentina´s answer to Central Park. It is not as nice as Central Park, but it does have a cool lake with a lot of ducks and swans. They have paddle boats that you can take out in the Spring, so I might have to give that a shot some time and release my inner-child. Or maybe not.

The bottom two are from last week, one is an antique store in San Telmo and the other is just a pair of doors that I saw in Palermo.

I´m getting really excited about being done with midterms, because I know the first few weeks after them are going to be awesome, starting off with RJ´s visit and the Dave Matthews Concert.

I´m going to study, hit the gym, and watch some soccer today, nothing too exciting. I might try and follow the Ole Miss game online -- go Rebs.

Pop Midterm?

What. A. Nightmare. I´m talking about the cold-sweat variety, the kind that starts when you´re sitting in class wondering ´why are so many people here early?´and then hear: ¨Man, I´m just ready to get this over with.¨

Wait, what? What do you want to be over with? I want to ask, but I don´t want to look like the only idiot in there. And then everyone starts pulling out passports -- we need to bring our passport to the midterm, but none of my midterms are for another 2 weeks, right? Wrong.



This is a scary realization, as is the fact that I don´t have my passport. Or my real student ID, which we also need, which is another story that is going to get me angry if I start to tell it, so we will leave it at that. Anyway, my drivers license and substitute ID work fine, so I sit down, pull out my pen, and continue worrying. My teacher writes the questions on the board. Number 1 I feel confident I can bang out ... number 2: What were the social movements in Argentina in ´95 and 2001, and what social classes were they made up of. This is a ´biatch´of a test question, because if there is one thing Argentines like to do it is to get together and complain, a.k.a. manifest, a.k.a. create ´social movements´. The good news is that the second part of the question is a cinch, because almost all of the countries´major social movements are comprised of the lower and middle social classes.

The other good news is that this is the class I have taken most seriously. I have done all of the readings, I have annotated all of the readings, I have taken extensive notes, I have paid attention in class, and, most importantly, I know what the teacher wants to hear. I fill up every inch of paper given to me, I glorify the struggle of the lower class, and I give her a few gems like: ¨the only real achievement of the military dictatorship was to unite the people behind President Alfonsín in 1983, and to begin a new era of Argentine politics with greater transparency and with constitucional successions of power.¨ Something like that. Anyways, it could have been a lot worse, and while it´s possible that I didn´t hit it out of the ball park, I have to feel like I can still snatch an ´A´in this class.

So what else is new with you, Mike? I knew you were going to ask that. This weekend I went to what I thought was going to be the Natural History Museum. It was the National History Museum, and so while I didn´t get to see any dinosaurs, I did see the Liberator General San Martín´s bed (it was tiny ... it looked more like a loveseat. He must have made Napoleon look like Andre the Giant) and a painting of Evita and Juan D. Perón. The museum, like General San Martín´s bed, was a lot smaller than I expected, so after checking out the 2 or 3 rooms that we rode and hour on a bus to see, my roomate and I went to San Telmo. San Telmo is well known for its fair, but it is also well known for its antiques. I didn´t know why, because last time I went was late and a lot of the stores were closed. But there is an incredible selection of cool stuff to be found, although most of it is very expensive, especially by Argentine standards.

One of the coolest finds was a Katana carved out of ivory. Super legit. I have no idea if it was from ancient Japan, but judging from the other awesome stuff in the store it had to be. They also had a really cool collection of Rolex, Breitling, and Omega watches that might have been from the turn of the century. Very sweet. Old cameras are really popular too, which I found a little bizarre, but some of them are pretty sweet. A street vendor had one that I liked a lot, but when I asked him how much it was, I liked it a little less -- 300 bucks, but apparently it still works and it had some sort of historical significance because of its use by Germans in one of the World Wars.

To end things on a happy note, I found a good place about a block from my gym, so I try to grab lunch there 3 times a week, usually after my morning workouts. Its name is La Esmeralda, and while Esmeralda is known for making fresh pasta that people come and buy in bulk, you can also get meals to go. For between 4 and 5 bucks I can take my pick of all kinds of pasta and all kinds of sauces (as well as a package of shredded parm and a roll of bread) and have myself a nice meal when I get home. The spinach and chicken ravioli with four cheese sauce occupies a warm place in my heart.

Until next time..

Full Moon

I wonder if the American Werewolf in Montevideo is howling.

I snapped this picture about 5 minutes ago on the walk home. I´m currently reading Big Sur, by Jack Kerouac, in Spanish, and struggling to get through it, but it´s a good kind of challenge. I just bought a book of short stories too, so we´ll see how that goes.

Black and white fotos, quick update.

Attached are some of the pictures I have taken over the last eight to ten days. I´ve been getting to know my camera a little bit and experimenting with different settings, exposures, etc. I´ve been pretty happy with the outcome, although what you see here is the result of my quantity-over-quality method, where I take about 60 pictures a day and hope a few turn out alright. Enjoy:





Yesterday my roomate and I went to an American bar to watch some NFL action and eat some buffalo wings, so that should help sustain my American food cravings and keep me out of McDonalds or Burger King for at least the remainder of this week. It will do little, however, to help sustain my growing chocolate cravings, which have a lot to do with my regular consumption of alfajores, a local delicacy involving two little cookies sandwiched around dulce de leche, a caramel-flavored spread, and covered in chocolate. They are delicious, cheap, and worst of all, readily available. I´m going to try and smuggle some home for the family to try, but I might end up eating them all on the flight. No promises.

Vamos Argentina, Vamos! Futból and Football

I`ve been riding an emotional rollercoaster since I posted last, and, thankfully, I´ve reached a content plateau, thawing in the kitchen, reviewing the days events, drinking a mixed hot-chocolate-slash-coffee, and knocking off a chapter here and there of the book I´ve been tearing through since yesterday. More on that later.

First, a quick review of the ups and downs. Up: Hear that tickets to the Argentina vs. Paraguay game are a possibility. Down: Hear tons of false information about how tough they will be to get; don´t get them. A few days pass.

Up: House mother says she can get them.
Down: House mother says she can´t get them.
Up: House mother says she can get them.
Down: .. game day, where are tickets? I gave her my money like 2 days ago.
Up: Tickets arrive.
Down: Walk outside. 40 degrees. Wet. Raining. Windy. Bone-chilling.
Up: Ok, I´m getting tired of this, but you see what I´m getting at. Things were awesome when I got to the game though, and despite the horrendous weather I was more than happy to soak in the atmosphere. The Paraguayan die-hards, decked out in red and white stripes, were opposite the Argentine barra brava, the standing-room only blue-collar section full of waving banners and flags. Both sections were bouncing in unison as they exchanged chants, songs, and taunts. I didn´t understand any of them, except the one where the Paraguayans would give a hearty ¨Paraguay!¨and the Argentines would puncutate it with a quick ¨puto!¨, the rough equivalent of tagging ¨sucks!¨ onto a rival players name after he is announced at a baseball game. The other cheers were more clever, I think, but the intricacies were lost on me.

I doubt anyone is too interested in having me break down the game, but while a couple of questionable calls from the ref negatively effected the game, it was great to see such talented players. Leo Messi created a little bit of magic to tie it up after what was easily one of the most embarrasingly awful goals I have seen a team concede, at any level, in person. I need to see a replay before I assess the blame, but the keeper, Abondonzieri, has been the media whipping-boy lately, I think, and the 12 year boy next to me was yelling colorful profanities at him as he was stretchered off the pitch.

I´ll put up some photos when I upload next, but none of them turned out too great. I did take a couple of cool videos.

I trolled the main street nearby yesterday to try and find a scarf to show my support for the team. I didn´t find any scarves, but I did find a John Grisham book, Playing for Pizza, that I picked up. I wanted something to read at night to help me sleep, but I´ve knocked out 170 pages since yesterday, so it´s not going to give me much benefit in that regard. It is entertaining though, and it deals with a former NFL quarterback banished to the hinterlands of NFL Europe ... the fictional quarterback and I struggled with many of the same problems upon arriving in a foreign country, which makes it extra interesting. Dinner is ready ... peace!

Words and Pictures

Technical difficulties: solved. I was able to use my roomate´s computer to upload the pictures, so here are a few of my favorites.

The MALBA, outside:


MALBA, inside. Sneaky, sneaky.


Old Argentinian couples dancing in the square, San Telmo.

San Telmo, the part that reminded me of the French Quarter.

More San Telmo, with a beautiful late afternoon sky.

Puerto Madero, with one of the few roomates not named Mike: Frank.

The weather has been really awesome here lately, and although it is a bit humid today, this marks the third consecutive day of Michael in sandals. Exciting times.

I am contemplating doing a few different things in the next few days, but nothing is yet set in stone. As always, I´ll keep you posted.

Technical Difficulties

First off, I hope everyone is doing well back home. I´m glad to see the Rebels won, and worried to see that Hurricane Gustav(o) is bearing down on the Coast, but from what I´ve heard this storm is going to hit Lousiana harder than Mississippi. Tough break for them, but it´ll help me sleep a little easier tonight.

I did some cool things this weekend, but most of them would seem a lot cooler if I had pictures. Unfortunately, I am experiencing ¨technical difficulties¨. Hopefully I´ll find a way to resolve them and retrieve the pictures, but until then you are going to have to look at the ones I pulled off of the ´net.

I went to the MALBA, a Modern Art museum, and by far the coolest art museum I have been too. They had some really neat stuff, including a series of photographs of a man dramatically posing as if he were getting shot, with the bullet-holes going through the actual glass and the photograph, and a sculpture with a little fish living in it, titled ¨Fish Habitat¨.
They had a few famous artists I recognized -- Frida Kahlo, and the Colombian guy that paints really rotund people. No photos at all were allowed. But I am sneaky. I got a few cool pictures that hopefully I´ll be able to share. Here are a few I pilfered from the net. Note: the picture attached is not the bullet riddled one I mentioned. Shooting stuff must be artsy down here. I dig it.

I also went to a famous old neighborhood I hadn´t seen yet and saw some folks doing the tango in a beautiful square on a beautiful night. The weather has been great lately ... in the seventies, I think. The neighborhood seemed almost New Orleanian, if that´s a word, with older architecture, smaller, colorful buildings, and a charming grittiness. I have to run to soccer right now, so I´m going to paste in a picture that doesn´t really adequately show the neighborhood.

If all goes well the pictures will be up in a day or two.

Future Plans

I spend a lot of time reading my Lonely Planet guide (thanks Sue!) and finding stuff to do around the city. In fact, just about every weekend I wake up, read about something, and then go see it. To date, this approach has yielded great results, and I rarely venture downtown without having plans hatched that day, with the help of my ever-present guide. While I have not yet checked out many of the museums around town, I have seen many of the restaurants, cafes, bars, monuments, parks, streets, and fairs. I´ve even started to get a little bored with reading about the city, because I have already seen most of the main attractions in Recoleta, Microcenter, Palermo, and the other nice, safe neighborhoods, and as a result I have started to focus my reading more on the other parts of the country.

There is a lot to see.

I am tentatively planning on taking a week off of school right after midterms and taking a few bus rides around the hemisphere. I want to go to Mendoza (¨the land of sun and wine¨) and the Lake District, which is just above Patagonia, at the feet of the Andes.
I have talked to RJ to try to get him to join me in my journey, and the tentative outline was taking a bus to Mendoza and spending a day or two looking at some grapes and mountains.

And then going down to San Martin de Los Andes, one of Che Guevara´s favorite cities on his famous motorcycle trip. It´s a beautiful lakeside down with a lot of cool stuff to see, and a nearby park, with Volcano. Itinerary: A day in the city and a day hiking around the volcano.

City:

Volcano, Park:

And then, into Bariloche, northern Patagonia, a famous Argentine getaway that was originally settled by Germans and Austrians. It´s mostly a ski resort now, but has a lot of really cool stuff, and I would like to do some white water rafting there before coming home.

In a couple of weeks I will reassess my funds and schedule, and try to talk RJ into joining me on this trek.

¨The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun."— Chris McCandless