From nada to novel

So much has been going on since I last wrote in this thing that I´m not really sure where to begin. Its been a month or so since my last post, and I´ve been up to all sorts of things. So I´ll just try to pick out a couple of highlights and then maybe backtrack to things later on as I remember them. I really envy the people I´ve met here that have these big full journals with a day by day account of their trips, I wish I was more like that. Anyways, on with it...

A couple of weeks ago I went to my first tango show, at Cafe Tortóni. It was an interesting experience, pretty touristy as that is the most famous place to go here, but it was worth doing. Especially since we got a discount through the school. Some of the best tango that I have seen here has been in the streets, people dancing for change. Its beautiful to watch, so very sad and dramatic.

There is a dance remix of Nancy Sinatra´s Bang Bang playing on the radio and it is very distracting, in the way that roadkill or car accidents are distracting.

I got to see my first football match here too since I last wrote, between Boca Juniors and Gimnasio. That was incredible, we had an amazing time. The fans here are absolutely wild, chanting and yelling the ENTIRE time. At one point a Boca fan threw a banana at Gimnasio´s goalie, and he promtly picked it up, peeled it, and ate it. Boca ended up winning 3-0 which was probably good, it would be dangerous to leave that stadium with pissed off fans!! All in all, it was a great experience, and I really want to go see River Plate play Boca now. They are the two most famous Buenos Aires teams, and it is kind of like a yuppie vs working class dynamic. There is a game coming up soon but tickets are expensive and sell out fast, so I am going to see what I can work out.

Weekend before last I went to Uruguay, with Mike and Adeline. It was a really nice couple of days, I got my visa renewed, and got a little breather from the city. We took the Buquebus to Colonia, and I was completely fascinated with the Buquebus. Its not so much a bus as a huge ferry boat. It felt like travelling in a moving airport terminal. If I could take the Buquebus everywhere, I think I probably would. Anyways, Colonia is quaint and pretty, it was built in order to smuggle things into Buenos Aires back in the day. We also found a great sliding hill, which provided at least a good 30 minutes of entertainment. Karlen, if you read this, it was even better than the one in Brugge!! For most of Friday we just wandered about looking at the scenery and being devoured by mosquitos. I´m convinced that a curse was placed on Colonia which turned all the people into mosquitos. Finally, after paying about 15 US for a ham sandwich and a coke, we decided it was time to hop on the bus and make our way to Montevideo. I loved Montevideo, it is very charming for a big city. Of course I was happy as a clam to be able to walk beside the ocean, and its managable to get around without buses and taxis for the most part. We had a great hostel there with a very central location and friendly staff, called Red Hostel. On one street, several pieces of modern sculpture were displayed throughout the sidewalks, it was a pedestrian street like Calle Florida. Its the sort of thing I love, so we really enjoyed walking through those, and they led straight down to the water. There are heaps of pretty plazas with big statues of men on horses whose names I don´t know. We actually got to catch part of a really bizarre play sort of thing that was going on outside of the theater as well, it was fantastic and free. After that we went and got chivitos, I really don´t understand how Uruguayans are so tiny. The national dish basically consists of: beef or chicken, ham, cheese, mayonaise, canned peas, pimientos, a fried egg, tomato, lettuce, more cheese, bread of some sort, carrots, and I´m sure whatever else just happens to be lying around. The ingredients are basically just piled on top of each other with two pieces of bread on either side which are far far too small to be of any use. Somehow, it tastes fantastic, especially after walking around all day on an empty stomach. I saw some of the most dazzling jewelry and crafts in the stalls around the main strip, and bought some kind of wrap thing for myself that can be worn 7 ways apparently... I can only remember about 2. One of the nights we went to a free concert on the beach thrown by some really popular rap group from Uruguay, it was actually really really good, and I am kicking myself for not writing down the name. On Sunday, before we took off to return "home" from our little vacation, we checked out their market... It was like garage sale rummager/flea market addict heaven. You could buy anything from old keys to vegetables to dvds ripped for about 2 U$S.

So... whew. My fingers hurt. And I´m kind of cranky today because we have no water in the house, I´m not sure why, but I woke up and there wasn´t any. Therefore I got no shower, and sat around at the internet all day in an attempt to avoid talking to people face to face who could smell me. I think I have some empanadas with my name on them. I will try to recount some more stuff soon, after reading all of this you´ll be sick of me anyways!! Lots of love for everyone.