¡SALTA!

Hey yall,

I just came back from an EPIC trip to Salta, Argentina about 20 hours up north from Buenos Aires. Here is a little bit about my experience and some pictures I took (yes, I now actually own a camera).

A surprisingly pleasant 20 hour bus ride

My only previous experience taking the bus was taking the greyhound from Long Beach to Oakland on thanksgiving breaks, so I was expecting to rough it out in Buenos Aires. Boy was I wrong! The bus was super luxurious, Farrah and I got a seat on the upper deck of the Bus and the seats actually tilt back far enough and has a place to put your feet so that your body is making a 170 degree angle! Also, as always in Argentina you’re offered unlimited vino tinto (red wine) and vino blanco to make you sleepy enough. On the way there we sang Suze happy birthday celebrated with a good amount of wine. I woke up 11 hours later with only a few more hours left!

We arrive in Salta to a quaint city with beautiful colonial architecture, catholic churches, and a cozy plaza. The place felt so…unusually familiar. I was quickly flooded with memories of Xela, Guatemala where I had spent a week living in an apartment. It felt good to get out of the ‘Paris of South America’ and experience something smaller, more personal and calmer.

It’s-a-me-a-Mario!

The next day we woke up bright and early and went on a full day excursion up north. My group that I ended up traveling with the whole time was Liz, Susana, Suze, Jon, Farrah, Thy and me (yes, not many men study abroad). We all got in a truck with a guide named Mario who couldn’t speak a word in English. He was awesome. Not only did he know so much about geology, but he was hilarious and loved to talk about sexy women. I finally was able to practice my Spanish!

The day was a blur of unique natural formations. I don’t really even know how to describe the things we saw so I’ll just put some pictures up.

road on the way to purmamarca

salinas grandes, salt flats

7 colored mountain in purmamarca

Wine, canyons and delicious goats

By the end of the first day touring the north, Mario said he’d love to take us to Cafayate the next day and stay with us until we wanted to return to Salta to get back on the bus back to Buenos Aires. Apparently he had a date with some hot girls and his buddies. The 4 hour drive down was very pretty. We took a road called “Quebrada de las canchas” which looks very similar to the Grand canyon with unique formations and colors.

We stopped by a parrilla (bbq) restaurant and I ate a platter full of chivito (baby goat). It was finger lickin’ good.

In the afternoon, we went to some bodegas to do some wine tasting. While I’m the last person to be a wine connoisseur, it was cool getting free wine. I also bought two bottles of very solid Torrontes and Malbec for about $4 each. After we had enough wine in us, we rented some bikes and went on the most stunning bike ride I’ve ever been on through wineries, grape farms and mountains. Here is a picture:

The next morning I did some more biking with Jon, Suze and Susana and we wandered into this huge golf resort/grape farm that must have been 7 miles wide. It had its own restaurants, cafes, lagoon, etc. It was this strange paradise along the highway.

We met up with Mario around noon and he had told us that “Cuando estabas durmiendo, yo miraba tetas grandes.” Apparently, while we were sleeping last night, he went to see a wet t-shirt contest at a Boliche(one of many Mario moments). We finally headed down for some trekking in Quebrada de las canchas.

Dammnn that was beautiful. I forgot how much I missed hiking and trekking. It was surreal just walking down a dried up river and venturing up to the top of vividly colored mountains. I honestly could have done this all day but we didn’t have enough time. I guess that’s what my trip to Patagonia in November is for.

Sitting atop a mountain during the trek, I thought of two things. 1. How God is a more creative and significant being than we’ll ever be. 2. I can’t believe this is my life right now. It was one of those moments like I don’t care what happens tomorrow, I’m content. I’ve experienced enough life. And just when I’m having this epiphany that I don’t need more anymore in life, Mario asks us if we want to go bungee jumping for $20. Oh hell YEAH I’m down. We drove to a beautiful lake and 3 minutes after getting out of the car, I was strapped in standing on the edge of a platform about to jump 350 ft into the water. I was on such a high from the trip that I honestly wasn’t nervous and just jumped—and man words cannot describe how sick the experience was.

Other than all the beautiful nature I saw in Salta, I think the other cool thing about this trip was meeting really down to earth Argentines at hostels. Whether it was Sergio, some bros from Buenos Aires that we went with to the Boliches or chicks from Cordoba, I felt that I was finally able to get to know the people of this country. I realized that when you travel, it’s just a more liminal environment and everyone is down to hang out and get more personal. Ironically, I made more porteño friends (people from Buenos aires) while I was in Salta that I’m going to get lunch with in the weeks to come. It’s awesome to practice my Spanish and also probe on some of the different perspectives they have.

some of the people at the hostel playing some drunk ping pong

All in all, I’d rate this trip an A and while I’m definitely glad to be back in Buenos Aires can’t wait for the trips to come! (October-Iguazú Falls and Colonial Uruguay. November-hopefully Patagonia.) I’m thankful for having this amazing time to just chill and travel though I’m sure I’m becoming more and more of a lazy ass every day, thank you Jesus!

Buenos Aires, beginnings

Hey everyone, I’m finally here in Buenos Aires, Argentina! I’m going to try to blog once every two weeks to recap some of the experiences I’ve had and the things I’ve learned. I don’t expect it to be quite as adventurous as my stories in Guatemala, but I’m definitely hoping to grow and have some eye opening experiences.

El capitán

The plane ride to Argentina was fairly smooth. The only crazy thing that happened was 20 minutes before we were about to land in Buenos Aires, I can’t find my passport! I was so nervous and told the flight attendant that I might have left my passport in our layover in Lima, Peru. For some odd reason she calls the Captain of the plane to come to my seat and the minute he arrives, he shouts “What is that!?” and points at this thing sticking out of a book I was reading. It was amazing…I thought to myself I could have had to forget about this entire semester so whatever else I get to experience from this point on is a blessing..thank the Lord!

Homestay experience: Chacarita

If you read my blog when I was in Guatemala, you know that my homestay in Antigua was a tortillería (tortilla shop) for the town with an outhouse for the toilet and bucket baths. This house is completely different! I have an awesome room that has a balcony and shelves for me to put all my stuff and we even have our own little common space for the international students to hang out. The only drawback is that it isn't in the safest area, and it is far from other places (45 min to get to class).

First of all, the people in the house are much more talkative and down to earth. There is a pretty good mix of international students and porteños (Argentines). There are six students (2 from Michigan, one from Oklahoma, one from Washington and one from Wisconsin), three daughters (16, 19, 21), one brother, and a mom. So there’s basically always someone to talk to (either in Spanish or English) or someone to do something with. Dinner time is awesome because we all sit together and speak Spanish and talk about all kinds of stuff—good restaurants to try, politics, things to do in Argentina, etc. In my first week, we’ve already managed to get into some heated debates where we’ve said some intense/offensive things. I just try to drink it all in. I’m actually very surprised by how fast everything from Spanish 4 (a year ago) is coming back to me.

It’s also awesome because the girls are about our age and go to Universidad de Buenos Aires(UBA) so we get a small “in” into the local scene. The first week there was a midnight parrilla (BBQ) where a bunch of porteños from UBA came and grilled all this delicious meat. People didn’t start eating until 3 am and heading back home until 7 am, loco! We sat in a circle and chilled, but I definitely had a hard time keeping up with them, understanding what they were saying, etc. It’s tough because I want to make some Argentine friends here, but it’s still hard for me to express my personality with the language barrier. I hope that by December, I can be comfortable enough with my Spanish to make people laugh and form substantial relationships.

Boliches & the night life

I’ve never been in a city that has such an intense night culture. First of all, everything is pushed back about 3-4 hours around here, including meals. I still remember the first night where I just sat in my room miserably starving, waiting for food until 9:30 pm (which is early by their standards). Also, whereas in the US, the bars close around 2 am, here a lot of the clubs don’t open till 2 am and people dance until 7 am! Some people who are really into the party scene have decided to change their sleeping habits so that they sleep after school from 3-10 pm, eat dinner, then go out again. My first Boliche experience was last Saturday at this place called “Crobar” where we danced to some crazy argentine electronica band until I felt like I was going to pass out. I got back to my bed around 7 am, in time to see the sun and felt completely exhausted. Needless to say, I felt so crappy the next day and getting around the city at night is a headache. The subtes(subways) don’t work and it can take up to an 1 hr a half to catch a colectivo (bus) and go back home.

Las Villas

Buenos Aires is definitely an amazing city with beautiful colonial architecture, parks, and plazas created by centuries of national favoritism and international trade. It is called the ‘Paris of South America.’ In the first week of the program, I was experiencing the city, going to theaters, bars, cafes, etc but knew that in this place of intense wealth, there was intense poverty. One of my housemates, Cass introduced me to a volunteering program called “L.I.F.E” that goes out to Villas (slum towns) that surround the city of Buenos Aires. These communities are basically informal settlements formed by migrants from the interior provinces of Buenos Aires who came for jobs but found that the urban development authorities could not accommodate them in the city.

I signed up and now do school support twice a week, which means basically helping children with homework, playing games with them, teaching them math, etc. It’s basically just an excuse to spend time with them and offer attention. It takes a while to get out to the villas, and we have to hire a driver from the villa to pick us up from the city because Taxis won’t go to these 'extremely dangerous' areas. Luckily, we all wear shirts that signify we are with the organization and everybody in the slum knows about us. It’s been a great experience so far encountering the praxis (intersection of theory and practice) and seeing how social, political and economic forces have created these settlements. These villas come in all forms. This past Thursday, I went to one called Ejercito Celestial.

This villa is an abandoned hospital that the city stopped constructing halfway in the process. It’s made of brick and resembles a huge parking garage. As you can see, none of the windows were constructed and there are about 50 or more families up there in their own mini city. It was definitely the oddest sight I’ve seen here.

Up next:

-Cultural musings. Why it is okay to show up 40 minutes to late to class in Argentina, why everyone here spends hours keeping up with news about politics and the economy, why food here isn’t very innovative, and why the public transportation/city planning is in some aspects, a disaster.

-My trip to Salta! (this coming Tuesday to Monday)

-My strange but refreshing experience at the Barrio Chino(China town)—being trilingual has never been so useful!

-the type of people I’m meeting here (either militantly liberal or intense partiers)