1004

Some people in EL Bolson had recommended that I stayed at 1004, a hostel on top of building that supposedly had the best view of all of Bariloche.

Sure enough, the view was kick ass and it was hella cheap. If you were willing to sleep on the floor of the living room, it was only 2 dollars a nite. I had been sleeping on the floor for the past two months, it was nothing. Besides, I had a camping mat.

Better than El Bolson, Bariloche had more stuff going on. Unfortunately I had gotten a big NO from University of Minnesota and began to feel a little anxious about my scholarship.

Professor Garand from Louisiana State University had sent me comforting news, saying I had done all right and everything should go well, but I didnt want to end up in Baton Rouge

To make matters worst, I got a NO from Pittsburgh, which pretty much meant Ohio State and Illinois were out of the question.

Anxiety was eating me up alive and I had to get outta there. I went on a four day trek to Laguna Negra and Cerro Lopez.

I have found in camping and trekking a whole new hobby. Packing a tent and burner gives you access to such awesome places that you would never be able to get to otherwise.

I am glad to be finding an agreeable path back to nature. My mochila has empowered me, once again, to get to know myself better, find agreeable means to my habits, all while being very healthy and spending very little money.

Roughly one month after I left Bariloche, I was wandering the streets of La Paz, Bolivia, when I realized I had wonderful fingers... but only the streets of La Paz will explain what that means. Eventually I will get to it.

El Cajon del Azul

El Bolson is a hippie spot 75 miles South of Bariloche. Hippie spots and their free-for-all, easy going slow pace are really fun... for the first ten minutes. Than it is all about people pretending to be really friendly so they can bum smokes.

Having lived in Berkeley, I am pretty schooled at how to avoid hippies, but some times they get on my nerves. Fortunately, El Bolson had something else other than hippies, it has El Cajon del Azul.

The Azul is a river and the Cajon is a gorge that was carved by the river. It was a spectacular place, even though the weather was really crappy.

The ascent up there was really, really beautiful. A four hour walk through beautiful forests, filled with birds and llao-llao covered threes, all accompanied by the soothing soundtrack provided by the river waters.

I walked up with these two sisters from Comodoro Rivadavia. They were currently living in Buenos Aires so they could go to college. We walked all the way up to the Cajon and there was much "onda". I was feeling very good about the attention I was getting from the ladies. Paula was the oldest one of the sisters and was what appeared to flirting with me. It wasn't your average making eyes and smiles but it was definitely flirting.

She was only going up the hill to the Cajon for a couple of hours, as she had to be back down that evening. We hung out for like 20 minutes and they had to leave. Paula gave me her number:

Te vas a Buenos Aires? (are you going to Buenos Aires?)

Bueno.... (well !)

Bueno, si te vas, hay que llamarme. Che, veni a Buenos Aires. (well, if you come, you have to call me... you should come to Buenos Aires)

I wrote her phone number 'cause even though I knew I was not going to Buenos Aires, it was good to flirt.

Unfortunately, it rained practically the whole time I was at the Cajon. I couldn't even camp out. It was awesome though, and really solidified my interest in trekking.

Razorblade bound

After leaving Frances, I stayed a couple of days at Rio Arrayanes, a river with many of those trees I described before. The camping was okay but people were very loud at nite. I was hurting for a real shower and a shave so I decided to head North to El Bolson for some well deserved hostel time, with ice-cream, internet and every thing else an good hostel can provide.

Horacio, Lucio y Compania

Every morning while at Frances, I was greeted by this family who would walk by my tent. They were 8 in total. Horacio and Carmen were the proud parents of Gala, 13, Camila, 9, and Lucio, 5. Daniel was a friend of Horacio's and Pablo's father. Hernan was a life long friend of Pablo's and refer to him as Castor (the beaver), making allusion to his teet, long corrected by the use of braces.

Every morning, they would parade their canas (fishing rods) to a good pot, all hoping to catch some trucha (trout). Daniel would lead the pack and Lucio would fall behind. They were friendly and one day, after catching a big one, they invited me to go have dinner with them.

Other than enjoying very tasty fresh trout, it was a great opportunity for me to catch a glimpse of the functionings of an average Argentina family. In all fairness, Argentineans live very similarly to Brazilians, with very few distinct trade marks.

Mate is a unifying element of Argentine culture, playing the same role of rede Globo in Brazil or sitcoms in the states: it gives the family an opportunity to gather around an object and discuss the day together. In the case of the US and Brazil, it is the tv; here it is the bowl of mate. They eat insane amounts of meat, which when combined with insanely hot mate can lead to a painfully early death caused by stomach cancer, at least that is what Chatwin said. (Bruce Chatwin, In Patagonie, penguin books)

They are crazy about soccer, way more than Brazilians are. But what I found most intriguing is their anti-americanism, or anti-yanki, as they say it themselves.

In ths case, anti-yankism was epitomized by Horacio, the father. It is so funny how the reason for every bad thing that goes on in Argentina some how goes back to the US. If some three year old child trips and fall, chipping a tooth, it is either because some imperialist White American actually plotted a way to bring grief upon Argentina by intentionally putting irregularities on the side walk; or it is because some American company holds the entire market of baby food and intentionally took away all the calcium from Argentinean kids' diets.

It has gotten to a point where American responsibility for the Argentine demise is so strong that there is no point in actually fighting against it. It is as if Argentina is just a puppet of American Imperialism and there is nothing one can do.

Horacio was a very welcoming, genuine and full hearted Porteno. They all welcomed me very well, acting as the host family of P.N. Los Alerces.

Perhaps the cutest one of them was Lucio, the 5 year old. Always sporting his cana, Lucio was a temple of serenity. Where other kids would cry their eyes out, Lucio went unphazed. His mother had given up on trying to keep him clean, as he made a point to get himself as ditry as humanly possible.

This one night they invited me to some trout and they also had some pasta with red sauce. I dont need to remind you of the type of havoc children can reap out of red sauce, but Lucio really took the cake. Covered in sauve from his chin to his forehead, it is hard to figure out where he manage to find so much sauce from such a small plate.

With no booster chair and no one to mind him, he kept bringing the plate closer and closer to the edge of the table, until it was dangling from the edge. Just like you average child, Lucio wasn't really aware of how much strength you actually need to cut pasta. Combine the child's excess of force with a plate of pasta dangling from the table and what you get is a catapult that showers Lucio with red sauce from head to toe... nothing short of a Jim Carrey movie.

What I loved the most about Carmen was that she never made Lucio feel bad about stuff. If it were me, the first thing I would say is "look what you did". But that wasn't what Carmen said, instead she turned to him and said...

"Ahhhh, Lucio mira lo que te paso" (ahh Lucio, look what happened to you)

Maybe that was why he was so happy all the time, he carried no sense of guilt. He was adorable.

He came to me one day , as I was getting out from my tent, he looked at me and said.

Tenez cana (do you have a fishing rod?)

No

Bueno, veni y puedes usar la mia (that is fine, come and you can use mine)

I immediately thought of my sister and Pedro, my unborn nephew. I was wondering if you can actually teach someone to be this nice or is it just something one has in them.

My whole week at Frances was awesome. I only left because there were many other places I wanted to visit and I had to move on at some point.

Playa del Frances

Named after some French loner who roamed the park, playa del frances (Frenchman's beach) was very different from Lago Futalaufquen camp.

Immediately after the boat launching ramp, there was a trek that lead to a more secluded area, unaccessible by cars and thus shielded from noise and people in general.

I found shelter under a most beautiful Arrayan tree, a type of tree I had never seen before.

Arrayan is a Mapuche word for " growing only over water". It is a very distinct type of tree, with a light cinnamon colored bark and white flowers no bigger than a penny. In trying to picture it, I would advise people to picture a guava tree with a very light bark, covered in tiny white circular leaves. It is a beauty. For those who still cannot picture it, just search for a photo.

This was, perhaps the best campground I ever pitched my tent on. This is a very difficult statement to make, since I have officially made Poincenot my favorite place on earth. However, as far as the very vicinity of my tent, this place is unbeatable.

The three was a perfect reparo (shield) from the wind and rain (luckily, there was no rain), not to mention how charming it was. At night, there was not a voice to be heard or artificial light to be seen.

Not four meters away from my tent stood Futalaufquen lake. I cant tell you how awesome this place was. It was my home for a week. It made perfect sense to me, after my sojourn with the noise people on the other camp, to become a loner and just roam the park aimlessly... maybe they would name a beach after me.

Lago Futalaufquen

My first stop at the park was lago Futalaufquen, a huge lake of glacier origin.

Cascata Irigoyen was the first camping libre I went to, but it was accessible by car and that meant coolers and kids walking around.

I was very disappointed at the place. The park was obviously beautiful but the people were making it horrible; there was thrash everywhere, loud music and drunken fools, not your average trek and camp kind of environment.

After two days at this not so nice spot, I end up at Playa del Frances... and that was more like what I was looking for

Esquel and Los Alerces

The end of ruta 40 lead me to Esquel, a small town only there to serve as the gateway to Parque Nacional Los Alerces.

In dire need of some camping fixtures, I got myself a new sleeping bag, mat and pot.

After spending the nigth at a refugio-like spot, I was off to the park

Ruta 40

After my well deserved lukewarm shower and shave, I was off to Esquel and Parque Nacional Los Alerces.
Between the parque and myself, there were 1000 miles of ripia (loose gravel) road, all combined in what is know as the ruta 40 (route 40). A shitty ass road that links nothing to nowhere and is only kept in use because dumb ass tourists such as yours truly keep on getting sucked into giving it a shot.
Dusty as f#@k and with absolutely nothing to see, it makes it kinda hard to justify its own blog entry, but than again it is so shitty that it actually deserves mentioning.

Laguna Torre

After so many good hikes, I too got those famous quarter size blisters everyone talked about.
Fro two days, I did nothing. My blisters kept filling up again and again, even after I would poke wholes on them.
I met two Argentines, a pareja, who appeared to have come to Chalten to put their relationship to the test.
Their very first night , the girl had a nightmare and woke up the entire campsite with the loudest yell. The guy had lived in Brazil when he was 5 years old and spoke good Portuguese.
We chatted a lot and they were very friendly. We decided to head to Laguna Torre together in the next couple of days, as soon as my blisters healed okay.
The hike there was a lot of fun. They were friendly and even though they were both in better shape than I was, they slowed down to my pace so we could all enjoy the trek. They gave me some good pointers on places to stay and spots to go. She was addicted to "the Lord of the Rings" and on our way to the Lagune, we had to walk through this forest that was exactly like Treebeard's. We kept making references to teh book and really felt like we were a fellowship ourselves.
This might sound really dorky to the average reader, (assuming anyone is ever even going to read this), but if you were there, you would really join us in our dorkiness... Believe me, this place is magic.
Lagune Torre was really cool, the days were beautiful and the it was a good farewell from Parque Nacional El Chalten.
After like 3 weeks, I found myself walkign away from the East End of town. My back was arched from the weight of my backpack. I too was threading soft steps, in hopes not to upset my newly gained blisters. There were quarter sized without a doubt.
I was on my way to Rancho Grande to have my well deserved luke warm shower when I saw this couple walking up the beginning of the trail.
They stoped me and asked
"Is this the way to Poincenot Camp ?"
Yep, I said,
"Is it about five hours up"
"Just about" I answered.
"That is not too bad"
My answer to that comment was a plain "not really" but I actually thought to myself...I wanna see if he is going to walk this proudly when the mountain is done with him"

Laguna de Los Tres

Laguna de los tres, one of the many day hikes from camp Poincenot, stands for lake of the three. The three makes reference to the three glaciars that feed the lake. You can see all thee when you are on its shores
This is actually the bluest form of blue I have ever seen, be it in water, sky, crayons or what have you.
The glaciar is right there, in front of you, thus it is needless to say it is absolutely impossible to bath in, despite how blue and inviting it might look. Three second of water up to your shins and your knees buckle.
Laguna de las piedras was anotehr lake, also about three hours from the campsite.
The charm of las piedras is its piedras... gigantic bolder you have to overcome in order to get to it. At las piedras, you can easily get to and walk on the actual glaciar. I dont know how safe it really is to walk on a glaciar and seeing how I was utterly alone and the last person I had seen had been 4 hours prior, I figured I should just watch from the distance and stay safe.

Funny thing about men

The funny thing about man is that it is not enough that he has, owns, conquers or witnesses something, he has to brag about it.
It was not enough that I had seen an ice block the size of an 18 wheeler truck drop 900 feet. What got to me the most was that I could turn to someone and say
"Did you see that!!!"
Sure enough, he felt the same way.
I felt somewhat stupid but I guess that is life. One of the good things about traveling is you learn a little bit about yourself, and hopefully you make peace with it.
There was a joke a heard once and I never gave it too much thought, or even really laughed much. However, after this happened, I must confess I found myself appreciating the joke immensely.
It goes something like this:
Guy gets stranded in a deserted island with the most gorgeous model. She dismisses him but eventually they start doing it. After about a month of doing it every possible way, position, hour of the day or day of the week, she realizes he is not into it anymore. She approaches him and asks what is wrong
"What is the matter, is something missing, is there something I can do ?" she asks.
"Well, since you asked, there is one thing you can do" he replies.
He proceeds to instruct her to dress in men's clothes from head to toe and meet him on the other side of the island. Reluctantly, she accepts.
As she is waiting for him on the other side of the island, he walks up to her and says:
"what is up"
"Nothing, what is up with you" She replies
So he looks at her with a big smile on his face.
"Dude... you won't believe who I am f~@king !!!!!!"


The funny thing about men is that, sometimes, it is all about who you can tell it to.
ps: by men, I mean mankind, so ladies, it is about you too

Laguna Sucia

Trekking up the mountain really made me a little grumpy, but it is nothing that a good night of sleep wouldnt cure.
I woke up to a beautiful day of blue blear skies. The Fitzroy mountain was smacked right in front of the camp. Camp Poincenot stands on a hill, inside a forest and well protected from the powerful winds. At the north end of the camp runs a white-pebbled riverbed creek with glaciar water that is barely above freezing temperature. I am talking 35F.
From the camp there are various daily treks you can pursue, they take you to vista points, glaciar lakes, river lakes, you name it...
The first spot I chose to visit was laguna sucia (dirty lake), which is called dirty for I dont know what reason. It is so blue it makes the sky look white in comparison. It is only not as blue as the laguna de los tres, but bluer than any other lake I have ever seen.
There is a humangous glaciar and a waterfall that is about 300 meters high. The sendero (path) up there is not one suggested by the rangers, so not that many people actually go visit it. For a good two hours, I was the only person there, which was awesome.
An Argentine made it there in perfect timing, as a huge piece of ice, about the size of a school bus, began to slide down the glaciar.
The roar of the ice hitting the lake makes thunder sound like a tooth pick hitting your teet. I was awesome that I saw such a huge spectacle of nature and it was good that this guy was there to see it, because I dont think I could have lived without watching such an incredible display of raw power and not have turned to someone and said:
"Did you see that !!!!"

Poincenot

Poincenot is the first campsite one encounters when going up the mountain from Chalten.
It is a free camp and it takes about 5 hours of an uphill battle to get to. I was up for the challenge and went for it with that bold ear to ear smile... which was only good for the first half hour. It wasnt long at all and my mouth was shut quiet for the remainder of the time.
For two hours I followed this sendero (dirt path), hoping they were misinformed about the 5 hours and secretly believing it was only going to be 2 hours... and that the camp was just right there, after that one big tree by that turn....
My secret hopes didnt materialize and instead , what happened was I just began to curse my way up the mountain, as a way to forget about the 40 lbs backpack that was on a mission to make my knees buckle.
I eventually made it to the camp. People from all around were all in awe of the place.
"Ohh, it is so beautiful", said one
"Yeah, it is amazing" said another
"I've never seen anything like it" replied a third person
My reaction was more in the lines of
"Get this mother f@#!~* backpack off of me !!!"

Not quite like New York City

As I have mentioned, I made it to Chalten at twelve o'clock at night. I didnt see a thing , but it was dark so I didnt expect to see much anyways.
It was funny though, when I woke up, to see that there actually wasnt anything to see. The town, if you can call it that, is one dusty strip with what would be a supermarket, one public phone and one restaurant. At the end of the strip thre is a campsite, and at the very beginning there is a tourist information that doubles as a post office and pharmacy... at least they are efficient.
Roaming the streets , or better yet, the one street, are backpackers, trekkers and rock-climbers from all over the world: Switzerland, Italy, Germany, US and Israel, just to name some of the ones I talked to. Every country is represented in the Avenida San Martin, the only street of Chalten.
Every person you see sports a big smile, but its funny how there are two predominatly different smiles that you can tall apart.
Proud and tall, taking bold steps towards the east end o the strip is athe smile of thfe one who is about to go up the mountain. It shows many teeth and clean shaven faces of men or tanned cheeks on women.
Not as proud or as tall, but definitely more enthused, is the smile of those returning from teh mountain. Their back have long arched from teh weight of their backpacks. They thread soft steps, in hopes not to upset their newly formed quarter sized blisters on the soles of their feet. Their reward awaits at the west end of the strip: a lukeworm shower and opportunity to shave and the ability to look at those sporting the other type of smile and say "I wanna see if he is going to walk this proudly when the mountain is done with him !!!!"

Chalten

So I was off to Chalten to see Mount Fitzroy, another one of Argentina's beautiful postcard spots.
The Fitzroy mountain range was name after its discoverer. Mind you that when I say discover, I actually mean its White discoverer, for the Mapuche indians were already pretty aware of the mountain by the time Fitzroy first layed eyes on it. The indians named it Chalten, after which the national park is actually named. The mountain is not the only one, but perhaps the most stunning attraction of the park.
I was booked for a mere three days of camping and I thought it would be enough to check out the entire park... silly me.
I made it the entrance of the park at midnight. I set my tent and waited for whatever the next morning would bring me.

A Small World and its Biggest Retailer

On the morning, I am supposed to be off to Chalten, which according to my trip guide Mariano, it is Argentina's version of the Torres Del Paine, only better.
I woke up, got all my stuff out of the room and stayed at the hostel's lounge, hanging out and whatnot...
Mariano, not my trip guide but the owner of the hostel who had lived in Brazil, came out to the lounge to hang out. He began reminiscing about Brazil while trying to convince me that Maradona was better than Pele. We had a few laughs, I never take that stuff seriously.
I asked him what he used to do in Brazil and he pointed towards my shirt, which had an enourmous C&A logo on it.
For Americans, who probably dont know what C&A is, it is a Dutch worldwide retailer.
Mariano goes on to explain how he was part of the C&A management program.
I instantly began to laugh, as I too had been a part of the program, before I was so graciously "let go"...(which is another way of saying I was fired)
No kidding, I said, which store?
Republic, he replied
Me too
No way
Was Carvalho your boss?, he asked
He sure was, I laughed....
Wow, I had just experienced two enormous coincidences in less than 24 hrs. First I ran into Tyler's friend and now I meet this guy who worked in the same store I worked, 3 thousand miles away...
Mariano and I actually had a whole bunch of mutual friends, even though we were so many miles apart and had just coincidentally met 2 days prior.
The world is, regardless of its big glaciers and its big retailers, a pretty small place.

A Small world, and its biggest glaciar

El Calafate is a small town of a single main paved road that pretty much survives out of the tourism industry, more specifically the Moreno Glacier
El Glaciar Perito Moreno is one of the world's most famous, and perhaps most beautiful glaciers. I could write thirty pages and still fall short of explaining its grandiosity. It is 200 feet tall and three quarters of a mile wide, moving two yards a day.
In order to get there, you take a bus from Calafate, pay20 pesos and look at it for as long as you want. Much like the Eiffel tower, you cant look at it for that long, so after a while you start looking for other natural beauties that you can find around the parks, such as beautiful birds and beautiful blondes.
I eyed this one girl who clearly was a gringa. I figured I had taken enough pictures of the glacier so I went to make small talk. The great thing abotu these wonderful spots is that if you find someone with which you would like to strike a conversation, all you have to do is make a comment about the place and how amazing it is. Chances are they are also in awe with it and will be just as eager to talk about it as you are...
So I figured I would cash in on this amazingness. I walked up to this girl and said.
Beautiful place, dont you think?
It is amazing, she said.
There you go, I had myself an openning. Between the "where are you from" and the "how long have you been travelling for", I had myself a conversation. We were both waiting for the next bus back to town and we ended up talking for a couple hours, only stopping to watch these huge blocks of ice that are the size of a yellow school bus fall 200 feet into the water, which by the way makes a thundering sound... it is pretty awesome.
So when my bus back to town was about to leave, she took off her aviator glasses and told me to looke her up in town sowe could go out for wine later on that nite!
I felt like a million bucks and rode back to the hostel with a smaile on my face that was bigger than the glacier itself. Four hours later I was all preped up... which is backpacker terms means I showered, shaved and put a clean shirt on.
We met at this wine place and when we got there, she asked me to go sit down while she went to the bathroom. I got us a table and when she came back, she sat on my side of booth, leaving the other side empty. Never in my life was I so sure that I was going to me a little something something.
She sat down, grabbed my hand and asked what kind of wine I drank.
Whichever, I said, thinking to myself that she had grabbed my hand and it was sooooooo on.

We made small talk, making references to different places we had visited... blah blah blah
It was time Imade my move, so I thought I would start by switching the conversation to something a bit more personal. It went like this...
So, enough of Argentina, tell me about yourself ( I know, it is cheesy)
Well, I am originally from Virginia...
And it all started to crumble from there...
She went on about how she did 2 years of peace corps in Paraguay and blah blah blah
As I heard the story, I started to put together the story of the Turlock Kayakers in the Kombi (see previous blogs) and chances were that I was wining and dining with a newlywed who was probably an overlyflertatious blue-baller.
Before she could on with her story, I interrupted her and said.
"Check this out, I met Tyler"
Tyler who, she asked
Scott's girlfriend.
Oh my God, where did you meet her? I just saw her recently, she came over to visit.
I know, I said, to your wedding.
Talk about your long awkward pause.
It all went down from there. She went to the bathroom andwhen she came back, she sat on the other side of the booth.
It was no thing though, we drank our wine, got drunk and forgot all about it. Nothing happened, but it was an incredible coincidence nonetheless. In the end, we exchanged emails and walked back to our hostels, alone. Two weeks later, she sent me an email sayng she would be in Brazil with her husband for Carnival and that she would drop me a line. Sure, I thought, we'll get together.

El Calafate

My excursion through Patagonia started 44 hours away from the Buenos Aires bus station, in Calafate.
I am not even going to talk about the trip down there because, in all honest truth, I slept almost uninterruptedly... that is a lot of sleep.
I made it to Calafate around 2 in the afternoon and some guy came to me right of the bus talking about a hostel.
I usually dont listen to the people right off the bus, but this guy seemed nice enough. He told me how it was a nice place. He told me to think about for a couple minutes and he would wait on the side for my decision. As I waited, he started singing a Brazilian song. I walked up to him and said I was from Brazil, to which he replied his brother, who also worked at the hostel, lived in Brazil for two years. I said I would take the room. He directed me to the hostel and told me to ask for Mariano, who would be waiting for me at the reception desk.
I cannot begin to explain how well people treated me, it was amazing. Brazil and Argentina have quite a rivalry and I never expected so much kindness. They invited me to eat with them, treated me to drink, it was awesome.

Boqueteros and the Argentenian crisis

I had an entire day to kill before I took lengthy bus ride South.
Much like the previous days, it was hot and I didnt want to go out. I hung out at the hostel and at night I figured I would do what I always did at hostels... hung out with other travellers and hear their stories.
My hunch paid off, as the hostel was packed with cool people, all very open and receptive.
Mariano was about to end his shift and made me promise to come back and tell him about my trip and the "Mariano Trail".
There was a chick reading a newspaper and the headlines read "Boqueteros obtienem mas un exito".
I laughed at it, for reasons I should explain. I used the headline as an excuse to go talk to her.
"Hi", I said
"Hi", she replied.
Can you tell me what a boquetero is?
She was nice as well, brown eyed Argentine by the name of Cecilia.
Turn out a boca is a small tunnel and a boquetero was a tunneler. In this case, two men
were building tunnels under banks so they could rob them.
The headlines talked about how the boqueteros had stricken again.

Portuguese and Spanish are very similar languages, with many words in common. Sometimes meanings get swaped and somethings that mean A in Spanish could mean Z in Portuguese.
In this specific case, the same boquete that means tunnel in Argentina means something very different in Portuguese. Basically, we use the same term to define girls given to oral sex, thus explaining why I had found the headlines so funny.
Cecilia was actually from Buenos Aires, which made no sense. What was she doing in a hostel?
Turns out she was out of a job and couldnt afford rent so she moved into the hostel.
The economic crisis in Argentina of the previous year was severe and many people had lost their jobs.
She was a lawyer from a prestigious univeristy who had lived in London for two years while working in a law firm. Somehow that was not enough for her to keep her job.
I told her about the English lady in the Falls and the whole "made redundant" thing ...
"I got plain fired", she said.
Cecilia had recently gotten a new job and she was going to wait a few months before renting an apartment.
She wanted to be on the safe side.
We talked for a while, it was interesting to hear stories about how difficult it is to survive in a big town.
Good way to kill time.

Mandinga

I made it to Buenos Aires early the next morning. I had already been to Buenos Aires repeated times so I had little interest in it, but considering it is such an important transportation hub, I figured I would end up there sooner or later.
At the tourist information spot, I was told that a hostel called Mandinga was a good place for your buck so I headed its way.
I checked in a dorm and, to my surprise, there was another Brazilian in the room. When I say "to my surprise", I mean that Brazil and Argentina are huge soccer rivals, which pretty much makes them huge rivals in pretty much everything else. Even though Argentineans do visit Brazil, very few Brazilians make it to Argentina.
On account of that alone, I never thought I would be received in Argentina with such warmth. Every Argentine I met has been so kind that I have a hard time leaving from one spot to the next. At Mandinga, it wasn't any different.
I didnt want to do anything on account of how hot it was. I pretty much lounged the entire day. It was around 3 in the afternoon when Mariano, this guy who worked at the reception desk came up to me and asked
"No te vas a salir?"
"No... it is too hot to go out, I will just stay in" I replied.
Mariano was a Porteno (meaning a native of Buenos Aires) from San Telmo, a neighborhood that was made famous for its easy going bohemian citizens. If that was their reputation, he was living proof it, with long hair and an unshaved face, stingy clothes and a complete anti-yank attitude.
We beganto talk and he asked me what my travelling plans were. I told him that on account of not having a guide book, I didnt really have a set plan.
"I want to see the Moreno Glaciar" I said.
"It is hermoso" he said
"Then Torres del Paine"
"No boludo, Chile no..."
I actually should devote an entire blog to the word boludo, which is an important staple of Argentinean Spanish (a.k.a Castellano), but I will worry about that later. For now, it suffices to say that Argentines are easy going people (for the most part) who hate two things: the United States and Chile.
Torres del Paine is a Chilean national park in the Chilean side of Patagonia and Mariano took offense to the fact that I chose to visit the Chilean Patagonia over the Argentine side.
"Since you dont have a guide book, I shall write an itinerary for you.", he said.
" We'll start with the Moreno Glaciar..."
So Mariano went on to write this very comprehensive outline of where I should go and where I could stay.
"Tienes carpa?"
"Yes, I do have a tent." I said
Okay, then you can go here and here and there and here and there...
I read the itinerary and noticed he left Torres del Paine out.
"What about Torres de Paine", I asked
"A la mierda con las Torres" (loosely translates to f@#$'em)
"Go to Chalten instead", he followed.
The thing about travelling without a guide, as I've said before, is that you have to rely on the kindness of strangers. Mariano was a stranger and he was most surely kind, so I figured I would take his advice. After we were done with our conversation, I heeded his adviced and walked to the Buenos Aires Terminal, its main bus station. Empowered by his enthusiasm for the itinerary he had just put together for me, I got me a ticket to the next bus leaving to Calafate.
It cost me 160 pesos (roughly U$40) and it would leave the day after. The bus trip lasts a gruesome 44 hours.

Coyote

The next morning we were off to Paraguay
As we were walking the four blocks to get to the border, I began to think that Cindy might need a visa to get into Paraguay.
"Do you need a visa to get into Paraguay ?", I asked
"Yeah"
"Do you have one?"
"No"
"How do you supposed you will get in?"
"Surely they will issue one on the spot"
Surely they did issue it, at a cost of 80 pesos (roughly 25 American dollars). Cindy was mad like hell and refused to pay the fee.
"It is ludicrous that a country would charge money just to let someone in" she said.
"The US charges 100 dollars, four times more", I said.
"But we have a lot to offer...", she replied without batting an eye
I thought how funny it was that an American gets asked for a visa and cannot comprehend the concept around it.
She was aggravated enough and I didn't want to make things worse by lecturing her about how the only reason Paraguay requires a visa from Americans was because America requires a visa for Paraguayans. At this point she was already crying, and mumbling something about how she could get a dress for 80 pesos and blah blah blah, so I suggested we went for a glass of water so we could cool off a little bit.
I asked the border patrol where we could get some soda and he pointed me towards this whole in the wall place that sold drinks.
We walked there and while she was getting a soda, I realized we were like 200 meters away from border control, inside Paraguay.
I looked at Cindy she had this big smile on her face.
"Do you realize ..."
"That we are actually inside Paraguay", I interrupted... " yes, I do..."
"Are you actually gonna go in?"
"Hells yeah", she said
The bus spot for the missiones is right there !!!!"
We walked from the soda kiosk to the bus stop, took a bus and went our way to the missions of Trinidad and Jesus. The entire time we kept making fun of Cindy, saying she was an illegal and if she couldn't find work, maybe she should try sitting in front of the Paraguayan Home Depot.
"How does it feel to be an illegal immigrant?"
On our way to the missiones de Jesus, the bus driver kept on making eyes with her, so I suggested she married him so she could her Paraguayan green card.
We had a lot of fun that afternoon.
On our way back to Argentina, I went to get my passport stamped and she waited, walking back and forth between vendors, guards and people getting in and out of buses.
I came back with a stamp and there was a border patrol officer who asked the people on the way to reenter Argentina to make a line for document check. I instantly crapped my pants and I imagine so did Cindy. We got in line and she sighed "What now?"
I was actually very surprised how she was rather cool about the whole thing. She looked at me and simply said "I guess I should have taken your advice"
"About paying the 25 dollars for the visa?", I asked.
"No... about marrying the bus driver for my green card !!"
The border officer barely looked at people's passports and when it got to us, I shoved my passport out front and he said:
"Brazil... bueno, tranquilo, sigue" (Brazil, great, go in)
So I said "the three of us" pointing to the two girls...
The guard grabbed the two girls and pushed them through. We walked the four blocks back to hostel, laughing our asses off. We only stopped laughing to get some durazno ice cream.
I had a bus to catch so I just had enough time left to get my backpack at the hotel and go. I stopped at their room real quick to say good bye.
Cindy came to the door on my way out and gave me a huge hug.
As I struggled to put my enourmously awkward backpack on, she leaned over and gave me a little pec on the lips...
"You are my favorite coyote ever..."

The Andy Richter seat

I got room at the Hotel Posadas and there wasnt really much left to until the next day. I asked the lady at the hotel's front desk where the border was and she said it was only 4 blocks away. I figured I would walk there to just take a peek, and stop somewhere for some ice cream. The walk was quick and I did find some ice cream so I was supper happy. I got durazno flavor (peach ice cream, what was I thinking).
When I made it back to the hotel, two girls had just checked in the room next to mine. One was an English diving instructor who lived in the Bermudas. The other, Cindy, was an Oklahoma State graduate (go sooners ?!?) from Florida who had followed her boyfriend all the way to Sunnyvale, California, where she taught ESL to Indian and Japanese computer programmers. They invited me to go have stake with them. I said I'd tag along but would eat, since I had already dined my share of durazno ice cream (in hindesite, it was delicious)
Diner was very pleasant. The girls were cool and made interesting conversation. I was fixated on Cindy's mouth, as she had the most beautiful lips. She was an all right girl that didn't exactly stand out, but she had superstar lips. I really wanted to kiss her. The English girl, however, quickly caught on to my intentions and became overprotective of Cindy, throwing mad salt on my game.
I didnt mind, it is not as though I have to kiss every girl I came across during my trip. They ate and when they were done, the waiter came and asked if I wasnt going to eat anything, so I replied.
"Yo soy el guarda espaldas de las senoritas !!", implying I was only there to accompany them. Just as the waiter stopped laughing (more out of politeness then anything else), I heard Cindy ask what guarda espaldas meant.
I said it meant I was their bodyguard. As I looked away, she looked to the Brith and wispered
"You can guard my back any time"
I thought I may get that kiss after all.
We began to talk about our travel experiences and they asked me what I thought of the Andy Richter reserved spot. I had no idea what they were talking about.
"You know who Andy Richter is, right?"
"Yeah", I said. "Conan O'Brien's sidekick"
"Right, the blonde chubby guy with the goldie locks."
"Did you ever notice how, on the buses, there is alway a little chubby blonde kid with a cooler ?"
"Yeah", I said, it is for the terere.
Right, and where does he seat at?
next to the driver.
And what happens if a passenger gets on the bus?
He moves one seat over.
Where does Andy Richter seat?
Next to Conan, I replied
And what happens when a guest comes on?
He moves one seat over.
And it all made sense, I thought it was funny the the whole terere issue had been a reference for two travelers (them the Swiss girls at the bus station).
We made it back to the hotel and I thought it was time for that kiss.
They asked me what I was up to the next day and I said I was off to Paraguay to check the Jesuite Reductions. I said they were welcome to come along if they wanted. I said I would come and knock at their door at 8 in the morning.
Okay, replied the Brit. We will come knock at your door if we wake up earlier than that.
We will get to check out each other's rooms, said Cindy.
That was the line I was waiting for...
You can check out my room right now, not much to see but you are welcome to see it if you want, I said.
Before I could even finish my invite, the British girl interrupted me "No one is checking no one's room". She pulled Cindy into their room and what was the end of.
Way to #@*& block me...

Drinking and Driving in Posadas

From Puerto Iguazu, I took a bus to Posadas. The capital to the Missiones province of Argentina, Posadas is a small town in walking distance of the Paraguayan border. My goal was to spend the night there, walk to Paraguay the next day, check out the Reducciones Jesuiticas , then walk back to Argentina.
When I arrived at the bus station, I had to find of a place to spend the night and I turned to my most honed skill: pinpoint foreigners. It only took 30 seconds from stepping foot of the bus before I saw these two girls holding a lonely planet book. I asked them for any suggestions for a place to stay. Although this was my third backpacking trip across multiple countries, it was the first time I ever travelled without any guidebook whatsoever, so I have to rely on the kindness of strangers in order to get around. Fortunately, backpackers are almost a brotherhood. In my 10 years of experience backpacking, I don’t recall a backpacker ever leading me astray.
I will leave the whole guide book issue to some other blog post, but I can’t go without saying that not having a guide has been great fun so far…
Okay, back to Missiones. The Interesting thing about this area of Argentina is that people drink terere non-stop. For those who don’t know what terere is (basically anyone who is not this area), it is basically iced tea, unsweetened. What makes it so particular is that it is not infused. Basically, you fill the whole cup with herb and pour cold water in it, and then you drink the entire thing immediately after you pour the water. The overwhelming quantity of tea herb makes up for the fact that the water only sits in the cup for 15 seconds. It is a cool and refreshing flavor.
The two girls I spotted at the station were Swiss. They told me to get on bus 23 towards el centro (downtown) and get off at the hotel Posadas, where I’d find a room for 20 pesos, or 5 American dollars. I asked them how long of a bus ride it was. They laughed and said “It depends on how many terere stops !!!”
I didn’t quite get what that meant, but I thanked them and rushed to a bus stop where I saw a bus 23 getting ready to pull out.
The bus was empty I didn’t really pay much attention to what was going on, but I couldn’t help but notice it made all the stops, even though no one got on or off. I began to pay attention to the driver and I realized that he would stop at every bus stop, or every intersection for that matter, so a little kid could come in and fill up his terere cup, giving thorough meaning to the sentence “it depends on how many terere stops !!!”
I was still laughing at that when the driver made what appeared to be another terere stop. Instead, he told me I should get off and walk a block up, where I would find the Hotel Posadas. I thanked him and went for door, but I before I could get off, I had to wait for this little kid, who was filling up the terere cup. I guess it was a terere stop after all.

Puerto Iguazu

The Argentine side of the falls went well, even though it was hot as hell, just like the day before. At night, I stayed at this nice hostel, which was packed with Israelis... They were all loud, unfriendly and uninviting.
I was sharing a room with this German girl who lived in Brazil and spoke Portuguese impressively well. The front desk had lost out keys and we were locked out for two hours. The German girl and I talked the whole time and for a while, I thought there was something there, but then they found our keys and she went fast to sleep...
So much for reading people well !!!

Matters of National Security

The next day, Ramiz and I walked to the border so we could go check out the Argentinean side of the Falls. We were checking out from the hostel and this Korean girl (unlike the Norwegian girl, I am sure this one was Korean) askd if she tag along with us. When we got to the Brazilian side of the border, the two of them had to get a stamp from the Brazilian immigration. The Korean girl didnt have her paperwork sorted out.
The official claimed there was some form missing and there was no way she could leave without straightening it out. If she didnt find it, there would be a hundred some dollars fine and endless paper work... a true South American trade mark.
The immigration officer asked me to go over her backpack with her, he insisted that I was thorough. We searched high and low, inside and out but we just couldnt find the form. He insisted that we kept looking because it was a big deal. We searched a second time but still turned up nothing. At some point, he said it was in her best interest to find it because not having this form was a matter of Brazilian national security and she could be deported and never be able to return to Brazil again.
I didnt really know this girl and wasnt about to become her lawyer so I asked her one final time if she could have possibly lost this form. She shrugged and said she'd never gotten one. I turned to the immigration guy and said " ohh well, fine and paperwork it is"
I was sure this guy was just fishing for a bribe and I figured I would speed through this, but when he realized she really didnt have the paper work, he got a blank one and had her fill it out as if she were entering the country rigth then and there. He then stamped her in and out, looked at me and said:
"If I were to file the report, I would have to accompany her into a room with no AC for like two hours and I just dont want to do that, it is too hot !!!!"
...Way to worry about Brazilian national security. Ten minutes later we were stamped into Argentina. Cool, a trip is not a trip unless you get a stamp on your passport.

The Falls

The next day, Ramiz (the Israeli with the expensive backpack) and I went to see the Brazilian side of Iguazu falls. It was hot as hell and humid as Mississippi (which, coincidentally, is another type of hell) , but the place was awesome nonetheless. It is amazing how there is so much water and still, one can get so thirsty.
Until that day, I didnt have any interest whatsoever in the falls. I always thought of it as a big shower running nonstop; but once I got there, I changed my mind. I was going to take a bus that evening to see the Missiones in Paraguay, but I decided against that, in favor of spending another nite at the hostel and crossing over to Argentina on foot so I could check the falls from the Argentinean side.
Considering I was at the hostel and had nothing else to do, I felt it was okay to bum around at the pool. I went to order some food and the Kombi kayakers invited me to go sit with them.
The Turlock guy, the one with pillow marks on his face and whose name I cannot remember, was all bummed out because they wouldnt give him a permit to paddle the falls. They were waiting on Scott's (one of the other kayakers) girlfriend so they could go get drunk and forget about how their adventure had just been crushed.
I sat there, had my food and a few laughs when the same very attractive girl with the big bikini showed up, kissed Scott on the lips and asked:
"Are we off?'
"Tyler, this is Carlos... Carlos this is Tyler", said Scott.
To which I replied nice too meet you.
They decided they would stay and just drink at the hostel, agreeing that they all wanted to get drunk and riding the Kombi was dangerous enough when they were sober.
I hung out with them for a while, actually chatting with Tyler most of the time. She was originally from Virginia and moved to Sacramento to become a kayak instructor (apparently there is a very lively kayak scene in Sacramento), just like the others. About six months ago, she had a friend who did 2 years of Peace Corps in Paraguay, bought a Kombi in Brazil and did a tour of South America in it. This girl eventually went back to Paraguay and married some local farmer she had met during her PC days. Tyler had come to the wedding, bought the Kombi off of her, convinced the others to come down with their 9 Kayaks to go look for rapids... so much persuasion.
I didnt necessarily much care about the story, but she wasnt hard on the eyes so I kept on listening. The others were out of commission by then so I just kept on chatting with her until eventually they all went back to their tent. Once they were all gone, I found my way back to the pool.
It is amazing how you can be in a pool at 2 o'clock in the morning, a true testament to how hot it was.
There were 6 other guys in the pool and as far I could tell they were from all over the world . This one Norwegian chubby girl was making out with one of them. I jumped in the pool and just stood there, with half my mind on tomorrow and the other half on how someone can drop everything and pack 9 kayaks into a crammed VW bus in a foreign country. As I stood there, the Norwegian girl (which, by the way, could be Russian or Polish or Albanian as far as I know. I just assumed she was Norwegian because she was blonde and spoke a funny language that wasnt Portuguese, Spanish or English) came close to me and asked:
"Can I get a kiss?"
Surprisingly enough, I was not surprised by it. As though stuff like this happens to me everyday, I simply asked why she would want a kiss from me. She, also unphased by my question, told me that she was going to go around the pool and kiss everyone in it.
"Good enough", I thought.
Before I could even say yes or no, she reached in and kissed me. I rested my hands on her waist line and she pulled back and said "no hands !", quickly moving on to the guy next to me, who apparently heard her saying she was going to kiss everyone and was ready to get his share of the deal.
Funny thing where people draw their lines. It is okay for her to go and kiss everyone in the pool, but I rest my hands on her waist and she got all righteous on me. Needless to say, the kiss was rather dim, evidenced by the fact that I quickly returned to contemplating how amazing it is that you can pile 9 kayaks on top of a VW bus. I can see 2, maybe 3, but 9... com'on

The Kombi

The hostel I was at was also a camping site. On the back of it, there were all these trucks with tents set up next to it. I saw this one particular bus that said "around the world on a bus" painted on the side and I got curious about it. I decided I should go check it out.
I was walking around and eventually approached this lady who was around one of the tents. She was British and looked like she was around 40. She explained to me that the bus was part of a company that had all these buses around the world. As a customer, you fly into a continent, they pick you up and you follow their itinerary. It seemed cool at first, but now that I think of it, I rather go free and stay at places I like or leave early if I dont like it.
That was it for the bus thing. I kept on talking to the lady and I must say that I love how the British are so proper that it can even make them look foolish. It started when I asked this lady how long she was going to travel for and what she did for a living back in England. She told me she was going to travel for as long as her money lasted, considering that she was made redundant
I was intrigued by what exactly being made redundant meant so she went on about how her job was in a department and there were changes in the job descriptions, making the position she held unnecessary. Considering others would now be doing what she did, keeping her would lead to redundant work, therefore she was let go.
"You were fired", I said
"That is one way to put it"
A straight forward way, I thought, but I didnt say it. It just seemed silly to me to go on about the differences between being fired and being made redundant when ultimately, in both cases, you are unemployed and left behind.
"They are different, you know", she said with royal accent.
Sure they are... I thought, but again I didnt say anything. She was very nice and there was no point in being confrontational. I had learned what I wanted to know about the bus so I figured I would go about my way.
On my way back to the pool, I saw and old Kombi, which is the Brazilian name of the VW bus. On top of it there were no less then 9 very expensive looking kayaks, all stacked up on a neat rack.
The "gringo flag" went up again. Kombis in Brazil are seen as the corniest of the corny and no Brazilian with such cool kayaks would ever get caught dead riding a Kombi. Not to mention that each one of those kayaks alone would probably costs twice the price of the Kombi.
I immediately thought of my sister. It is kind of an inside joke between us that I am such a cool guy that if I were to ride a kombi with 2 fuzzy dice hanging off the rearview mirror, people would start to ride kombis just so they could look like me. I insist that one day MTV will feature a music video with me and Marcelo D2 (a very cool Brazilian rapper) riding a 2 colored kombi.
Anyways, next to the beige colored kombi, this white guy with pillow marks on his face confirmed my "gringo flag" feeling.
Originally from Turlock, CA, this guy moved to Sacramento to become a kayak instructor. A couple of months ago, he and 3 others saved some money and flew to Brazil with a passport and 9 kayaks. The bought a kombi and began to look for rapids. He told me his goal was to paddle the Iguazy area. He was a nice guy and I wished him luck getting a permit. Being from Brazil, I actually knew he wouldnt paddle that area in a million years on account of the bureacracy. I didnt say anything because I didnt want to burst his bubble. He looked sleepy and said he was going to go back to sleep in his tent. We shook hands and I went back to the pool.

The Gringo Flag

When I was about to take off from the Sao Paulo bus station, I saw this kid; he looked like he was not a day older than 20. He was frail and had long hair, sporting a very expensive backpack. His backpack was flawlessly new, without any wrinkles or scratches. What a newbie, I though ... might as well wear a Gringo Flag.
Foz do Iguazu is not a place many Brazilians really have an interest in, evidenced by the fact that I was the only Brazilian on the bus. When you add destination, looks and the expensive backpack, I was sure this guy was a gringo.
This bus took off and the frail gringo stayed at the station. The ride to Foz was uneventful. A Paraguayan girl kept getting phone calls from what appeared to be her Brazilian boyfriend. She went on and on about how it was the last time he had pulled out a stunt like that and this time she was gone for good.
I made it to Foz and went to get a cup of coffee. Their version of a grande was a bucket of coffee that was enough for five. I was staying there, waiting for my bucket of coffee to cool off, when the frail body gringo got off a bus that had just arrived. The driver handed him his expensive backpack and he was off somewhere.
I finished my coffee, or what my share of it was, and went to the information desk to get some info about a hostel. I didnt even have to ask, as a cute looking girl struggled with her broken English to direct the gringo to the nearest hostel.
I jumped in and asked if we could share a cab there... he said "all right"
The gringo turned out to be an Israeli who had just finished his 3 year mandatory military service and was off to his 6 month trip. I didn't know this, but later I would find out that Israelis love South America, but South America doesn't necessarily love them.
The gringo, Ramiz, and I made it to the hostel and I began to ask about the Falls and how to get there. I was hot as hell and I actually wanted to sit there and do nothing. There was this huge pool and it didn't take long until I was drawn to it.
I spent the whole day at the pool and as I was about to leave, I saw this really attractive girl. She had on an enormous bikini, which immediately flagged her as a gringa.
Rock hard abs, light skin and blue eyes. I watched her for a bit, but it was just too much to bear. What was the point of watching all that if I wasn't going to do anything.