sAlexander.org blog | Stories from south of the border

My Life Since Argentina

Sat, 03 Jan 2009 19:34:53 -0800

Life has definitely been interesting since Argentina. To say the least.

For those of you who didn’t know, or haven’t found out, I returned from Argentina in the beginning of November. While my original return ticket was set for early December, I had planned from the beginning to have a flexible departure date. Ya know, in case of a complete economic melt-down in the United States. In everything I did in Argentina, from housing options to gym memberships, I made sure to allow for both early and late departures from the beautiful country.

Colorado

After arriving back in Colorado, I spent three days in Colorado Springs before deciding that I needed to be closer to the job-hunting-action. I did a bit of craigslist browsing until I found a nice apartment in Boulder that would allow me to rent on a month-by-month basis.

I’ve been living in Boulder for the last two months and loving it. I have a cozy apartment on the north side of town, and a really fun roommate; considering that I found my roommate on craigslist, I feel quite lucky that he turned out to be such an easy to live with, awesome dude.

Passing the Time

While living in Boulder, I’ve been doing a lot of three things: job hunting, webdesign, and loving the outdoors.

Job hunting has been going moderately well; while I still haven’t found the right position, I’m making good progress. The company I’m most interested in working for is NREL, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. I’ve managed to get in contact with an extremely nice woman who has given me a tour of the facilities and put in a good name with the hiring managers who are looking at me. I’ve been in contact with the HR department and the hiring managers for the engineering group, and things appear to be moving along; not moving quite as fast as I’d like, but moving none the less.

Webdesign has been really enjoyable. While in Argentina, I finished most of the projects I was being paid to do, and now I’ve been able to concentrate on the projects I’m excited about. While this gives me a ton of freedom regarding how I spend my time, it doesn’t pay. I’ve started my professional blog at www.nanogordo.com, set up a service to help manage your todo lists at www.todotrees.com, and begun designing websites for non-profit organizations at www.npdesign.org. I’ve been quite busy, and loving every minute of it.

Outdoors really is the hightlight of living in Boulder, or Colorado in general. Lately, I’ve really been enjoying climbing, and have signed up at a local bouldering gym. Snowbording, running, hiking, and enjoying the cold-air-plus-sun combination have all been a big portion of my week.

All was going quite well until about a week ago, when I dropped a tasty cliff in Vail, and felt an incredible amount of pain in my left knee: torn MCL, no running-walking-snowboarding-climbing-outdoors, 2-6 week recovery, no surgery. Could be worse. Much worse.

The Holidays

The holidays were great this year. I spent a bit of time in Vail before heading down to Colorado Springs to spend time with my family for Christmas. Santa treated me extremely well, and the time with my family was awesome! Nicole and her family came up, and Nicole will be staying with me for two weeks. No complaints at all.

With the knee injury, I’ve been spending a lot more time indoors, and I’ve been learning how to have tons of fun while at the same time minimizing the amount of walking I do. I have found it more difficult than I expected to stay away from all of my favorite past-times (running, snowboarding, biking, etc).

It was under these circumstances that I met, and fell deeply in love with, my younger brother’s Wii. For Christmas, Matthew (read: younger brother) was given Guitar Hero and Wii Fit, two very well thought out inventions. I spent plenty of time working on my guitar strumming and balancing on the Wii Fit board. I even went back and mastered Wii Tenis. Yey me!

Post Holiday Holidays

After spending a week in Breckenridge with Nicole and my family, my post-holiday holidays started, which consists of a week in Vail with Eric Max, and old buddy from Rice, and member of the infamous Team Mech. After a grueling two hour drive until 3am, we arrived in Breckenridge last night, and plan on continuing to Vail this afternoon. Wish us luck, and more importantly wish Emax luck with not breaking his Femur again.

My Life In Mendoza

Fri, 12 Dec 2008 01:08:07 -0800

Wow, I don’t even know where to start… I arrived in Argentina in June 2008; about a month and a half before I choose to study and live in Mendoza. I decided to come to South America because I wanted to travel the world, understand a different culture, a different language, and explore myself as a person. I was ready to face challenges, conquer them, and leave Argentina a stronger and more well-rounded person.

While traveling the country and looking for a city that suited me, Mendoza caught my eye. It seemed like it was small enough to feel at home, it had a great running park, and was close to the Andes mountains. I thought I had found the perfect place to start a life. I, of course, knew I would have some struggles, but I didn’t realize that being in a foreign country, speaking a foreign language, and not knowing anyone would be as difficult as it was. However, I figured that no matter what obstacles I had to over come in Mendoza, I would leave South America stronger person for them.

I met with a councilor at the University to discuss starting my psychology classes for the semester. She warned me many times that she did not think my Spanish was good enough to take the classes they offered at their University. She recommended that I consider taking Spanish classes in Mendoza before starting at the University. It was discouraging to come all the way to South America with the intention to study and to hear that I wasn’t prepared enough to take the classes. However, because I had come so far I felt that I had no choice, but to try to do my best in the classes. So, I enrolled in three psychology classes and one class about the Political History of Argentine.

I was so nervous to start my first day of classes. I had no idea what to expect and I just wanted to get through the first day alive. When I walked in class, I stuck out like a sore thumb. Everyone looked at me like I was something they had never seen. I remember the first time I asked a question, silence fell on the entire class and I felt every eye watching me with curiosity. The first couple classes went fine and I could understand most of the ideas the professors were trying to get across. One of my hardest classes throughout the year ended up being my psychotherapy class, where I learned about the famous Lacan and his seemingly wild theories. The beginning of the semester was more of a struggle, I felt like I had to prove myself to the teachers, students, and myself. However as the semester went on, I became very pleased with my professors, interested in my classes, and friendly with my classmates, who were always willing to help me. In the more advanced classes, I saw a passion for psychology within the students, that I had not yet seen in my few psychology classes in the United States. I even began to understand and agree with some of Lacan’s wild psychoanalytic theories.

During my life in Mendoza, school was not my only concern. I was living with my boyfriend from the United States, four students from France, and two Argentines in a house on one of the busiest streets in Mendoza, Aristeres. The living situation was one of the most difficult parts of my time in Argentina. The roommates and I were all very different people and had a difficult time relating with the each other. This difference in personalities caused a tense living situation and the house never quite felt like home, like I had hoped to find in Mendoza.

I started to take Tango classes at a local gym in the park, two or three times a week. I fell in love with the dance’s passion and precision. When I danced I felt like it was something I understood; I was graceful and eloquent, feelings that I lacked in my average days of stuttering through sentences and trying to find my place in Argentina.

Throughout the semester I would take quick trips to try to see as much of South America as possible. I would find myself planning and looking forward to the next trip, where I would find a differnt beauty of South America I had never seen.

About four months into the trip, my boyfriend made a hard decision and left to go back to the States to look for work. To be honest, him leaving me in Mendoza was one of my biggest fears. I hadn’t found the feeling of home in Mendoza and being with him was the only time I felt truly comfortable and happy.

When he left, I told myself that I would use the time I had alone to fall in love with my life in Mendoza and find the beauty that I couldn’t find while being with my companion. I thought that I would learn from the challenge and yet again, come out of the experience a stronger person.

I then felt more alone than I ever had. I had friends in Mendoza, but no one that I was close with. The smallest snide comment from my roommates would stab me in the heart. I felt like I had no one, but myself to relate to anymore. After a while, I started to adjust to the life alone, and I tried harder and harder to develop closer relationships with the friends I had.

Once school was ending, I took a trip with a girlfriend to Peru to walk the Inca Trail; it was one of the best independent experiences I had in South America. However, it didn’t measure up to some of the trips I had taken with my boyfriend in the past. I found that life really was sweeter when there was someone that you loved to share it with.

I have recently come back from my trip to Machu Picchu and taken all but one of my finals. My grades have turned out very well, many of them better than I and anyone else thought they could have been. I have a week left in Mendoza and I have started to realize and feel that my return home is right around the corner. A part of me is ecstatic to see my country again and the people I know and love. However, there is another part of me that is confused and feels like it hasn’t finished what it came down here to do. I feel like I have many unanswered feelings and questions about my life; I don’t feel like I have everything sorted out, the way I was expecting when I planned this trip to South American.

I have come to accept that throughout my years, I am always going to be trying to understand and sort out the details and expectations of my life. I think that is what keeps people motivated and learning. Those moments of clarity and understanding, come and go unexpectedly, they let us know that we have grown and matured. However, the moments of complete confusion and question, are the moments that make us and mature our souls.

I don’t think I will fully understand how this trip has affected me until it is over and I have started the next phase of my life. I am leaving Argentina without one regret, it was, mentally, one of the hardest six months of my life, but no matter if I come back to the states understanding myself better or not, I have this experience as my own. It is an experience that I, alone, can understand. A part of my life that no matter how many stories I tell, will never amount to the actual six months. It was a choice I made and stuck with, even through the hard times and the doubts. I tried my hardest to make my life in Mendoza as enjoyable as possible. I may not leave feeling like I conquered Argentina, but I know that this experience has taught me things that living in the United States would not have. I will leave Argentina without looking back and if I were asked if I would do it again, I would answer, â€œin a heart beatâ€.

Torres del Paine- Days Three and Four

Thu, 23 Oct 2008 23:06:25 -0700

Days three and four were an incredibly enjoyable part of the entire journey, and the landscape was completely different than the other two days. For days three and four, we hiked out to glacier Grey and back. The glacier was incredible, and I’m very happy to have taken the extra day to make the journey out.

The beginning

We started out by meeting up with two of our new English friends, Alister and Will. We had briefly met them earlier in our trip, but had not spent too much time with them, mainly because they were staying in the cabins along the route, and Nicole and I were staying in the free camp sites.

We started out at an incredibly fast hiking pace, and kept the pace for the next five or six hours. This unfortunate pace[(yes, the pace was so fast as to use adjectives such as unfortunate, unreasonable, ridiculous, and silly)] was caused by a huge misunderstanding: us Americans were under the impression that the English dudes enjoyed a brisk hike, and the English dudes were under the same impression about us Americans. Fortunately, we sorted everything out that night, and the final day was set at a much more reasonable pace. Hey, who doesn’t want to sprint up mountains with a huge pack on the back?

The path

The hike to the glacier was quite windy, blowing us all over the place. A few times, we actually had to grab a hold of the hillside and wait until the wind settled before continuing for fear of being blown off of the path. We hiked through the upper section of the mountain, much like the first day, but this time covered in small ponds and lakes instead of a cutting river.

The glacier

The glacier was incredible; it was shocking to hike up over a mountain peak and see a slab of ice, larger than I ever imagined. The glacier moved down through though a mountain valley, with it’s elevation slowly decreasing towards our hiking path, and the face of the glacier split around an island. While the face of the glacier was only 30 or 40 meters (by my estimation), the middle section of the glacier rose to an massive height.

First shower in three days

We finally made it to the campground, and decided to stay near some of the cabins rather than at the free campsite; while we had to pay a few bucks each, this gave us access to warm showers. We took our first showers of the trip, a glorious, glorious feeling. After spending three days hiking in the cold, a warm shower cleansed the spirit.

Good bye Torres del Paine

Our trip ended with us taking the Cataman, or boat, back to the entrance of the park. I am glad to have taken the boat as the last piece of our trip; it gives a great view of the entire park, with most of the famous features visible at some point at the ride. I much preferred being able to discover each of the parks pieces over a four day period, rather than seeing a quick overview from the beginning.

Overall, the trip was incredible, and I’m happy to have done it. It was definitely a life changing experience, and I hope to experience similar trips in the next couple of years. If you have any recommendations… let me know!

Torres del Paine- Day 2

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 03:07:51 -0700

Having arrived yesterday in the infamous Torred del Paine park of Chile, I am now a two day veteran of the park. No more feeling like a noob, I’m a pro today; no more getting pushed around by the occasional branch, I’m going to be pushing back; no more getting blown around by the wind… actually this one will happen no matter how long you spend in the park. For those of you who missed the adventures of day one, go back and check it out.

Morning of Ice

This morning was cold. I mean really, really cold. The type of cold where it takes an hour or two of laying in the sleeping bag, plus a hot cup of tea, before you’re ready to face the world outside of the protection of your sleeping bag.

We took it pretty easy this morning; although we had a long day of hiking ahead, there was no real rush, and as long as we were packed up and ready to go by 9 or 10, we’d make our destination. Not to mention I haven’t even busted out the super-powers yet.

Although I had my doubts when I first woke up at 5:30am, the day turned out quite beautiful. Skies were blue, winds are low, spirits are high, and bodies are warm-n-dry. All important.

Our goal for the day was the campground named Italiano. It’s a good distance away, but luckily the path was flat-ish most of the time. The first couple hours of the day were the same scenery and the same route that we took yesterday, and they went pretty quickly. It was the rest of the path where things got really interesting.

Afternoon of Beauty

The rest of the day was incredibly beautiful. The entire day, we were completely surrounded by beauty: to our left stood two or three gorgeous lakes, each a different color of blue due to the differing amounts of glacier flour in them; to our right were a few different mountain peaks, all peaked with snow, all surrounded by a thin mist of clouds; in front of us were rolling hills covered by the occasional stream; behind us, well, we talked about that yesterday. The entire day truly felt majestic. We enjoyed walking at a nice, easy pace and enjoying the wilderness around us without being overly worried about or destination.

For lunch, we had soup and sandwiches… again. In fact, all of our meals are repeats: for all three breakfasts, we have oatmeal with apples; for all lunches, we have soup and sandwiches; and for all dinners, we have pasta with red sauce and cut-up hot dog meat. Yummy.

Hiking thoughts

One of the strangest things about the second day of hiking was the weight of the pack… it wasn’t bothering me at all! In fact, to the contrary, I felt a bit strange without the pack on. My body has adapted to weighing an extra 30 or 40 pounds. The first day, I never thought that I would miss the weight of my pack, but today, I definitely did. Good thing I had 8 hours (or 26.5 km) of hiking with it on my back.

During all of that time with the pack on my back, I was having an incredible amount of fun, and I started to wonder how I could make it a more permanent situation. Some thoughts included “Food for the Earth,” a hippie food stand[(run by me, of course)] up in the middle of nowhere, and all profits went to helping the park and the environment. I even considered applying to be a park ranger; I was having way too much fun while hiking.

Evening of Exhaustion

The evening turned out to be quite tiring; the last leg of the hike was definitely the worst. At one point, we were scrambling up a rock-slide on all fours; luckily the rocks had settled years ago. We were hiking up until about 7:30 or 8, and the absolute latest we could stay out hiking until dark was 8:30; we were cutting it pretty close. Luckily we arrived at campamiento Italiano before dark, had a chance to set up our tent in a nice, wind sheltered section, and make some delicious pasta with hot-dog slices. Yum yum yum.

Night of Sleep

Tonight will officially be the second night in a row that I have gone to sleep before dark. It’s pretty incredible. We have a long, long, long day of hiking tomorrow, so we’re letting our feet rest for a while.

Good night!

Torres del Paine- Day 1

Mon, 20 Oct 2008 15:24:00 -0700

Our first day in the world renown Torres de Paine. I must say, it has been everything, if not more, that I expected from one of the top outdoor retreats in the world. We are lucky to have come during the down season of the park. All of the trails have been completely empty of humans[(but they are filled with tiny, chippering birds waiting for you to drop a corner of your sandwich)], and getting around has been a breeze.

Arrival to the Park

We left Puerto Natales this morning at 8:30, and arrived here in the park shortly after 11:00. When we departed Puerto Natales, the sky was dark with clouds, and a constant sprinkling was falling out of the sky. When I woke up from my short nap[(two hours later)] the sky was completely clear; not a cloud!

Thanks to this beautiful weather, we’ve decided to conquer the Torres section of the hike first. Had the weather been poor, we would’ve headed on over to Glacier Grey, and hoped for a clearing in the next couple of days for the Torres.

For those unfamiliar with Torres de Paine, a very popular path choice for hikers is the ‘W’. Imagine taking the letter W and laying it flat on the table. Where the Black lines form the W is the path that we will be taking through the park; where there is empty space above the black lines of the W, there are mountains; and where there is empty space below the black lines of the W, there are lakes. The entire ‘W’ normally takes four to five nights (depending on your hiking speed), but unfortunately, we must do the ‘W’ in three nights. None the less, it will be incredible.

Setting Off

Before setting off on our hike today, we met a nice couple, Torry and James, from England, whom we’ve been hiking with all evening. The four of us together set off on a great adventure into the wildness. We started up a steep, brown, dry slope. It took us about an hour before we reached the cumbre[(top of a mountain)], where we squiggled down into a green valley carved by a large river. The pure scale of the scene was incredible, and unfortunately, not something that I could capture on camera; as I looked around, the scenery looked like normal mountain scenery, but double the size. I would find myself staring at a single mountain for an extended period of time, wondering to myself shouldn’t that be just a bit smaller?.

After reaching the first mountain Refugio, our last glimpse of ‘civilization’, we continued up to the free camping area for another two hours. The scenery drastically changed every ten minutes; at one point, we’d be trucking through a forest filled with small-trunked aspen trees; a few minutes later, we would find ourself on a windy, narrow pass along the side of a gravely mountain; and after a few more short minutes, we would be hoping from rock to branch to path and back in an attempt to stay out of the icky marsh below our feet. But regardless of what scenery we were walking through, we were able to look up and see the ever growing figure of the Torres del Paine.

Hiking Thoughts

A few quick observations while hiking:

When passing my days as normal, I find my mind plauged with tasks relating to technology and the internet; I have to email so-and-so, I need to search google for this, I should look on wikipedia for that, I need to add this to my blog, I need to read that blog, etc. I never really realized how much I thought of these things until I entered into Torres del Paine, and the thoughts stopped. Just completely stopped. I think it has something to do with the knowledge that I can’t access the Internet for the next four days, or the overwhelming presence of natural beauty around me, or my mind concentrating more on survival in the wild, or a combination of all three. But whatever it is, I like it. It’s a nice break from the burdon, and blessing, of modern technology, bringing me back to classic technology. No longer am I typing to complete my tasks, but using a lever made out of a fallen branch to help balance a beaten up tin pot on a rock. No longer am I sending email, but actually walking over to another campsite to introduce myself to a couple from Colorado. No longer am I completing tasks the way I have been trained, and in some cases have trained myself, but I’m completing tasks creatively, using methods and inventing technologies that I’ve never seen before; the methods and technologies might be simpler, but none the less, they are mine. I’m not talking about a lack of technology, I’m talking about a simplification of technology. And it is nice.

I’ve also found myself incredibly optimistic and excited. Unnaturally, and in some cases, excessively, optimistic and excited. I could fall in a river, and instead of being a burden, it would be an exciting experience. A bear could wobble up, remove my backpack, put it on his own back, and wobble away; apart from being an awesome encounter with an incredibly smart bear, it would be a fun challenge to survive the rest of the trip without food and extra clothes. All of the barriers that usually burden me while completing my tasks seemed to have disappeared, leaving nothing but hope and dreams in it’s place. We’ll see if this continues after a day or two of sleeping on the ground in a tent slightly shorter than my height, and waking up to the cold air without the easy escape of a heater. Not to mention no showering after four long, exhausting days of hiking.

Thirdly, it has been incredibly nice hiking for hours with no distraction other than natural beauty. I find it almost meditative, being able to think for hours upon hours with no distractions. Rather than thinking a great number of thoughts caused by the incredible bandwidth of information entering your mind in the cities, I find myself repeating the same thought over and over, refining it and perfecting it until I am ready to move onto another thought. It brings about more quality thoughts, rather than a large quantity of thoughts.

Arrival and Base Torres

After arriving at our campsite and setting up tents alongside a small stream carrying potable water from the cold snow to the valley’s river, we made the grueling hike up to the base of the large towers that stand as a symbol of the park. Luckly we were able to do the hike without the 30-40 pounds of weight on our back.

Where as the first section of our journey was a nicely carved path through the mountains, this section is not so nice. We find ourself hiking through a wet stream that leads directly into a steep boulder field that peaks into a slushy snow-marsh. Without a doubt,this has been the hardest section of the hike. It takes a bit over an hour.

But wow was it worth it! When finally reaching the top, we were greeted by a mystic view that I never expected. When looking at the Torres from a distance, they look young and energetic, splashed with sun and contrasting greatly against the blue sky. But when looking at the Torres from the base, where you can see the small misty clouds, always surrounding peaks of this elevation, and the aqua blue-green lake at it’s base, the towers look old and wise. The first and 60th minute I spent staring at the scene brought equal amounts of awe, and this is a gift rarely given; the beauty of this unique view did not seem to be wearing off, and no matter how long or often I started at it, my mind refused to believe it was anything other than an exquisite painting carefully placed to trick visitors.

What I experienced sitting at the base of the Torres is something that everyone should experience. It doesn’t have to be at one of the most southern locations of the world, but it should be real; don’t trust the lies of pictures and painting, but let your eyes see the scenery without borders.

Off to Bed

Tonight will be the first night in years, or possibly a decade, that I have gone to sleep before darkness. While normal Spencer would find the idea of going to sleep before dark laughable, outdoors in a cold tent and tired Spencer finds the idea absolutely delightful.

Nighty night.

Path to the Torres de Paine

Sat, 18 Oct 2008 21:01:00 -0700

After leaving Bariloche, we played a quick, global game of Where in the World are Spencer and Nicole. We took a day bus from Bariloche to Puerto Montt, spent a night in Puerto Montt, flew from Puerto Montt to Punta Arenas, quickly bussed to Puerto Natales, ariving late at night, and left early the next morning to Torres de Paine.

The bus ride from Bariloche to Puerto Montt was quite beautiful, although I spent most of it catching up on the sleep that I deprived myself of the night before. It marked our first, of many, border crossing of the Patagonia trip[(it also marked the 20th time I have crossed the Argentine-Chile border)].

Puerto Montt, I am sad to say, was a bit disappointing. The main disappointment was caused by the fact that we were unable to visit the surrounding areas of Puerto Montt, which is supposed to be the real highlight of the area. Sometime in a future trip[(with the number of future trips I already have planned, this one might have to wait for a future life)], I would love to take the four day Navimag[(A ferry-ish thing)] journey from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales. It travels through some areas that look breathtaking on a map; I can only imagine how it looks in real life.

Upon arriving to Puerto Montt, we had a very difficult time finding an affordable hostal. In fact, the most economical option was a hotel, and it marked the first and only time I payed for a hotel in South America. Shame on me.

The following day, after passing through a very, very lax airport security[(â€œIs that a knife you’ve got there? Okay, you can take it with you, just try not to do it again!â€)], we enjoyed a cafe in the airport. In Argentina, when asking for a coffee, they always use expresso, where in Chile, when asking for a coffee, they default to the icky nescafe powder; I had forgotten about this subtle difference, and had to order a few times before I got the cafe latte that I desired.

Arriving in the Punta Arenas airport, which doubles as a military base, was a very exiting feeling; we had made it to the southernmost city of Chile, situated right along the Magellan Strait! This was a moment I had dreamed about for years, and I had finally made it!

A quick bit of history: Punta Arenas was founded upon the once lucrative Magellan Strait. It quickly became a very, very wealthy city; it was located on a very popular trading route, and the sheep that populate the area produced very expensive wool to be traded with the passing ships. All of this changed in 1952, when the Panama Canal was built. Many of Punta Arenas’ numerous mansions were abandoned, and the city quickly fell in to poverty. All of this changed once again, when an abundance of oil was found near the city.

We were only able to spend an afternoon in Punta Arenas, gathering supplies, eating ice cream, making calls to plan the rest of our trip and seeing the city, before shuffling along to Puerto Natales on a nighttime bus. In Puerto Natales, we rented our gear from a hostel filled with incredibly knowledgeable workers. We rented everything we needed: a backpack, a tent, two sleeping bags and pads, a stove, cooking dishes, waterproof pants, etc. And then we spent our final night in a bed before heading off on a three night camping adventure.

Torres de Paine, here we come!

Bariloche

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 21:00:29 -0700

Bariloche was our first stop in the long trip to the Patagonia. Located an unpleasant 17 hours south of Mendoza, we arrived in the early afternoon, and were scheduled (read: forced) to leave the following morning in order to catch our flight out of Puerto Montt.

The city of Bariloche was gorgeous, almost as though it had been designed from it’s founding by a renown architect; we quickly found out that the city had in fact been planned by a renown architect, NAME. The city was located on the edge of a large, intensely blue lake, with the ground gently sloping upwards, away from the lake. The avenues filled with chocolate shops gave tribute to the influence of an old Scottish immigrant that gave the city, and the trees and flowers around all shouted â€œSPRING!â€. While walking through the city, I couldn’t help but to notice the incredible resemblance to Queenstown, NZ, and an aura that echoed that of Breckenridge. In fact, the whole lake district area reminded me a lot of the south island of New Zealand.

But the real treat of Bariloche wasn’t the actual city, it was the surrounding area. Shortly after arriving into town, we took a bus to Cerro Companero, a large hill, serviced by a ski-lift, that gave an incredible 360 degree view of it’s surroundings. We opted to walk up the hill â€“ it was only a 20 minute walk â€“ and pleasantly found ourselves slightly overheated when we arrived at the top; Bariloche, for the most part, was a very cold place.

The view from the top was incredible. It is hard to express in words, and equally hard to show in photographs, how beautiful the panoramic view was. It truly was an experience that, given the opportunity, everyone must experience for themselves. The hill we were standing upon hardly felt like a hill at all; it felt much more like an isolated island, surrounded by dozens of other isolated islands, floating in a majestic lake. On the hill, while I should have been pondering the raw, natural beauty of the surrounding lakes, I couldn’t help but wonder what route the numerous roads took through this area; I knew that we were leaving to the southwest, but for the life of me, I couldn’t find a connecting string of islands headed in that direction, nor bridges connecting them together.

After leaving the hill, we headed back into town to taste the extraordinary chocolate, converse with the locals, and have a glass of wine with a few of the many gringos housed in our hostel.

Yum, yum, yum.

Perfected Plans for the Patagonia

Wed, 08 Oct 2008 21:41:54 -0700

We’ve just finalized our plans for the Patagonia… it’s going to be an astounding round trip of over 3774.78 miles! Yeeeha.

Below is a table filled with where we will be on each and every of the next 12 days. Following it is a map of the locations.

Enjoy!

Date	Location	Description
Oct 8th	Mendoza, AR	Our home in Argentina
Oct 9th	Bariloche, AR	Cool ski-town on the edge of the Patagonia
Oct 10th	Puerto Montt, CH	Town in the lake district of Chile, also on the edge of the Patagonia
Oct 11th	Punta Arenas, CH	The southernmost Chilean city
Oct 12th	Torres de Paine, CH	From many accounts, the most beautiful place in the world!
Oct 14th	Glacier National Park, AR	A huge glacier in Argentina
Oct 16th	Ushuaia	The sothernmost city of the world!
Oct 17-18th	Antartica?!?!?	This depends on the charter boats available
Oct 19th	Santiago, CH	Back to the central area of Chile
Oct 20th	Mendoza, AR	Home sweet home… yey

View Larger Map

FutbÃ³l: Godoy vs Boca

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:45:05 -0700

This last weekend, a group of seven or eight gringos and I went out to a futbÃ³l game here in Mendoza. It was quite the experience, and it’s definitely got me pumped up to see some more games.

The afternoon of the game, it was as though an enormous electromagnet was hovering above the soccer stadium, pulling each and every Argentine to the soccer stadium by that little piece of iron in the nose. The entire city of Mendoza was streaming to the soccer stadium, some carrying flags to support the local team of Godoy Cruz, and many carrying flags to support the travelers from Buenos Aires, the Boca Juniors; the Boca team hosts the best players from Argentina, and was ranked far above Godoy (4th in the nation out of 18, versus Godoy’s 17th place ranking).

When we arrived at the soccer stadium â€“ after being subjected to a violating pat-down by the police â€“ we found a crowd of over thirty thousand fans waiting for us! You should have heard them cheer when we walked through the iron gates that separated the tranquil outside world of Mendoza from the rowdy seismic eruption within.

Despite the level of Anarchy when we arrived, we came to realize that half of the fun hadn’t even started. As crazy as the current fans were, the game was currently like a college party full of high schoolers: the soccer hooligans had yet to arrive. You could see their area, some of the best seats in the house, completely empty, and you could hear far off drumbeats and cheering, but the actual hooligans were no where to be seen.

We had to wait another thirty minutes before their arrival, but it was worth it. Seeing the hooligans rush into the stadium — much like you would imagine inmates rushing out of a prison during a break-out â€“ was quite the site. Accompanied by trombones, drums and other instruments, the arrival of the hooligans initiated a war between the Godoy and Boca sides. Luckily for the thousands of fans present, the two sides were still separated by two moats, dozens of riot police, much carefully placed barbed-wire, and large sections of razor sharp chained-link fencing; the most the two sides could do was scream chants, twirl flags, and hoot their horns.

I didn’t think the level of excitement at the soccer stadium could have gotten any higher, but I was proven wrong. Upon arrival of the two teams into the stadium, every single voice was cheering, every single hand was making a motion that to the untrained eye looked much like a salute to Hitler¹, and all of the tourists had their camera’s out. A flag on the Boca side, which was 80 meters long by 80 meters wide² , shot down to cover half of the popular section. Thousands of people thew up little shreds of paper that matched the color of their team, which gave â€“ other than feelings of sadness for our environment and the cleanup crew â€“ the impression of a stampede of blue and yellow.

Here is a video I took from the calm cheering section of the Boca side. To the left is the main Boca section, across the stadium is the family seating area (which is quite empty), and to the right is the Godoy section. If you would like to see a much better video taken from within the Boca cheering section at a different game, check out this crazy video.

I was already having the time of my life, and the game hadn’t even started yet! The enthusiasm of the crowd is something completely foreign to us in the United States; you wouldn’t even see this type of enthusiasm at the Superbowl, nor at the baseball world cup³. The even more surprising fact was that the cheering continued throughout the entire game, peaking at goals, and dropping slightly for injuries.

At the end of the first period, the score was tied 1-1, but Godoy, much to my surprise, was outplaying Boca. Every attack seemed more forceful, every defender seemed quicker, and every player seemed to connect with the soccer ball on a spiritual level. Shortly into the second period, Godoy scored a second goal, and then a third goal, and finally, with five minutes left in regulation time, a fourth goal. Godoy, the black horse, won the match 4-1! Although I was sitting on the Boca cheering side and could show no emotion of happiness when Godoy scored, inside I was screaming and jumping with each and every score by the local team.

As the final whistle blew, neither team let up on the cheering. As we left the stadium, covering any Boca jerseys with jackets, I couldn’t stop repeating the Boca cheer. I still can’t stop repeating the Boca cheer.

Boca, mi buen amigo,
Esta campaÃ±a volveremo a estar contigo
Te alentaremo de corazon,
Esta es tu hincada que te quiere ver campeon,
no me importa, lo que digan,
Lo que digan los demas,
Yo te sigo, a todas partes,
Cada vez, te quiero mas.

Boca, my good friend,
this cheering field will return to you,
We will cheer from our hearts,
Your time has come, and you’re destined to be champions,
It doesn’t matter to me what they say,
what everyone else says,
I will follow you, wherever you go,
Each time, loving you more.

Footnotes

¹ fifty seconds into the video below, you can clearly see a fan doing the salute in the bottom right corner of the video

² and other dimensions as well

³ even if the Cubs were playing!

La Serena

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 16:09:34 -0700

This last week(Sept 15-19), Nicole found out that she only had class on Monday and Tuesday, leaving us with a modest five days to explore wherever we wanted to. We considered many options: Iguazu, which was too far, minimum 35 hours each way; Patagonia, also too far, and too cold; ValparaÃso, which was a bit too familiar, although it would’ve been very nice to visit all of our friends from the last summer; and finally, La Serena, which was … perfect!

La Serena is located about eight hours north of Santiago, and is quietly situated along the coast of Chile. It boasts a thriving population of around 300 thousand Chileans, and has a much more Spanish feel than the central Chilean cities, like ValparaÃso and Santiago.

Arriving on September 18th in the early afternoon, the streets were completely empty and a majority of the hostels were completely full; unknown to us (embarrassingly so), September 18th is the Chilean independence day, the equivalent of our 4th of July. Businesses across the nation are closed, and the Chileans are either enjoying themselves with family, or traveling to places for a great time. As great as it was to arrive on one of the most important Chilean holidays, it was also a bit difficult; we were unable to see the city as it actually is 360 days of the year, and purchasing things was quite difficult.

None the less, we managed to have a great time. We filled three days full of fun; we arrived late Thursday, September 18th, and spent most of the night resting after our 20 hour journey from Mendoza; Friday, we explored the region known as valle Elqui, and went to a nighttime observatory viewing; Saturday, we spend time on the large streches of beach in the La Serena area.

The Observatory

Without a doubt, the observatory was my favorite part of the La Serena trip. The best word that I’ve found to describe my experience at the observatory is majestic. It really was quite magical looking out upon the Chilean landscape with in the early night while the stars slowly come out to play.

And boy did they come out to play; I have never seen the stars with such clarity. After viewing Jupiter, Venus, Mercury, and Mars, along with a young, open star cluster, we got a full lecture about the birth, life, and death of stars and star clusters. Although I have a decent understanding of Astrophysics, I have never taken a class on Astronomy, which I regret very much now, and the entire lecture was very informative.

It was also quite cool to learn about the construction of the largest telescopes. Because of the dry air, clear skies, high altitude, and relatively safe area, La Serena is one of the best locations for telescopes. It currently boasts the largest telescope in the world, named the VLT, which stands for the Very Large Telescope_. The VLT consists of four 8.4 meter telescopes that work together as one telescope, with a relative diameter of over 16 meters! Wow! A 100 meter telescope was being designed, named the OWLTelescope, or Overwhelmingly Large telescope, but it was canceled due to vibration problems caused by wind. In it’s place, the EELT, or European Extreemly Large Telescope, is being built, with a diameter of around 42 meters and a cost of â‚¬800 million. Not too shabby.

The Beach

The beaches in La Serena were quite incredible. Filled with happy Chileans, the beaches stretched well beyond the horizon, nestled in tightly with the overlooking mountains. The weather was perfect for beaching when we arrived in La Serena.

When I found out that Nicole had never flown a kite in her life, I took it into my hands to break her of this crime. After much searching, we finally found a kite on the beach for CH$1000, which is the equivalent of USD$1.80. Cheap Cheap¹.

Unfortunately, the kite broke after about 2 minutes of use; the first big gust of wind broke the main wing supporter in two. Luckly, I went to school for 4 years to learn how to fix these kinds of problems, and using a bit of the fishing string and a lot of lashings, I had the kite fixed in no time. That’ll show you, Mr. Cheap-Kite-Dealer-Man.

Conclusion

A trip well worth the time.

Footnotes

¹ Quick joke: What do birds say when they fly over Wal-Mart?

Ooo and Ahhh

Mon, 15 Sep 2008 17:04:58 -0700

Another piece of good news vs bad news. Once again, if you’re the glass half full type of person, skip on down to the good news. But if you prefer to see the glass half empty (or the engineering way: the glass is twice as big as it needs to be), skip on down to the bad news first.

The Good News

Life is full of good little supprises, and I got one of them a couple days ago. My family, who knew I was missing the Tex-Mex I have come to love so much, sent me a package full of spices. I’ve got everything I need to make… anything! Tacos, Fajitas, spicy pasta sauce ¹, and Mexican-style salsa. Yummy!

The package was the second item I’ve received by mail down here in Argentina, and I have to throw out a big thanks to the mailers. It’s quite hard living thousands of miles away from all the smiling faces of my friends and family, but every time I receive a quick note from a friend, or a comment on my blog, or a package full of yummy spices (especially this one), it makes the distance seem much, much smaller. So, this is for all of you who have participated in the above activities… Thank you!!!

The Bad News

The world is full of bad news: Ike hit Houston, McCain is still campaigning, the public school system focuses too much on standardized test, etc. But one piece of bad news has hit me hard recently: my computer died.

That’s right… Mackenzie is dead. She has done much for me over the last two years, but on Saturday, September 13th, the hard drive stopped spinning. Fortunately, the hard-drive is still covered under warranty and will be fixed on my return to the US. Unfortunately, I will be waiting until my return to the US to fix the hard-drive; this does bring about some problems to a web-designer.

Nicole is being very kind and sharing her computer. We increased the partition size of Ubuntu (Linux made easy) and decreased the partition size of Windows (I’m slowly getting Nicole off of Windows… adding some pink highlighting to her Ubuntu theme helped more than I ever imagined possible), and now I’m all set up and ready to go! Yeeeehaaa!

If you skipped the good news, go and give it a quick read.

Conclusion

Life is still great… so enjoy it!

Footnotes

¹ reminds me of the good ole days living at Sheridan, with Matt’s excessively hot pasta sauce and excessively large plasma TV

Watch Out Houston!

Sat, 13 Sep 2008 03:02:16 -0700

This blog post goes out to all of our homies in Houston and the surrounding area. Being down here in the very center of South America with very temperate weather, it is hard to believe the storm is so huge in the Gulf. But sure enough, Ike is hitting Houston, and from the photos I’ve seen, it appears to be hitting Houston quite hard. Having multiple friends and family members in the vicinity, not to mention millions of fellow Americans, my thoughts (and my web browser) are centered around Houston.

As always, my source for news regarding Ike has been the New York Times. I must say that, as always, I am very impressed by their timely and extensive coverage. Before the hurricane has even had it’s full impact on the city of Houston, the NYT had numerous articles ready for reading on it’s website.

Best wishes from Argentina, and God speed Houson!

Tango - The Dance of Argentina.

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 21:39:10 -0700

As I’ve traveled, I’ve always made a point to give the local dance a decent effort. In Russia, I learned Swing. I’m not really sure if it can be considered a local russian dance, but at the location where I was teaching English, it was incredibly popular. In Chile I learned to Salsa and Meringue, and now in Argentina I am working on my Tango. I don’t claim to be experts at any of them (in fact, I would consider myself below par on all of them), but I do claim to enjoy the learning process.

I must say that of all the dances I’ve tried so far, Tango is by far the hardest to learn. With all of the other dances, you start with a basic step (surprisingly called the basic step) and slowly add on moves as you skill improve. For instance, with salsa, you start with the basic 8 step routine, and then throw in an inside turn, and then an outside turn, and then you learn how to link them, etc. Although you might not look great until you get a good number of moves under your belt, you’ll at least be dancing the dance the way it was meant to be danced (say that five times fast).

But Tango is very different; although they claim to have a basic step, I’ve yet to see anyone, beginner or expert, use the basic step. With Tango, there are no set moves, and rarely are there set routines. It is all about “feeling the music”.

Nicole and I have been spending many a nights dancing Tango; this week alone, we went Tango dancing four nights. We’ve been taking lessons at our gym here in Mendoza and enjoying it from tip to toe. After 10ish lessons, I think that Nicole and I have finally gotten a grip of the basics and are ready to move onto the harder stuff.

Wish us luck in our learning process, and as photos and videos become available, I’ll make sure to share!

Olympic Photography

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 02:03:22 -0700

Being as I don’t have a super reliable source for the olympics (see my olympic fun article for details), I’ve been using a lot of the New York Times’ articles for my Olympic news. Not only have I been super impressed with their live coverage — that’s right… a newspaper company offering live coverage of virtually all big events — but I’ve also been impressed with the photography included on their website.

As much as I love video, I must say that viewing the olympics this year as mainly still frame images was very… enlightening. Still frames were able to capture things that video did not, and the photos were able to give me an incredible “man… I’m at the olympics” feeling, something that I’ve never quite gotten with video. Take a look for yourself. A good starting point is the best moments from the olympics at the NYtimes. A few of my personal favorites came from the daily overviews, but I must say that this gallery has a few incredible shots.

The photography I’ve seen on the NYtimes website has really motivated me to put more effort into taking pictures. We’ll see if it anyone can see the difference in my photo galleries.

Enjoy the photography!

Olympic Fun

Sat, 23 Aug 2008 18:46:45 -0700

I had a great time watching the Olympics this year! It was a bit more difficult than I expected to watch them here in Argentina, but I ended up finding a few reliable sources for my Olympic fix.

My main supplier of my Olympic fix was a Irish Pub a few blocks down the street from my house. They had 15 or 20 TVs, and on any given night at least half of them were set to the Olympics ¹. It was a cool environment, and it makes a nice memory; whenever I think of the 2008 summer Olympics, I will also think of sitting with Isuar in the Irish Pub.

My two favorite olympic experiences:

1) I was sitting in the Irish pub, minding my own business, and who comes on the TV? Funmi Jimoh! Fumni (pictured above) was a class mate of mine at Rice, and we also ran together on the same track team for two years. They showed Fumni’s first jump all around the world, and I was lucky enough to be watching! Fumni went on to the finals of the long jump (not bad for a first time olympian… to say the least!) and finished at 12th place! Congrats Funmi!

2) Last night, the frenchies (my roommates here in Mendoza), Nicole, and I all went out to watch the 1am futbol finals. We wandered by the Irish Pub (which was packed full), and then moved on to a large bar with a very large TV. By the time the game started (we arrived quite early to ensure good seating), the bar was packed full of excited Argentines, and when Argentina scored the only goal of the 90 minute game… the crowd went wild. It was cool to be a part of the Argentina fÃºtbol scene; it reminded me of watching the Tri Nations rugby games in New Zealand, or the Houston Rocket’s Clutch Championship as a young kid. Ahhh, good memories.

I hope all of your Olympic experiences were just as great! See ya in four years, Olympics!

¹ strangly, one of them was set to a camera directly next to the TV… apparently there was a large demand for self-watching

Hiking and Hot-tubing

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 06:30:46 -0700

A few roomates, Nicole and I went hot-tubbing and hiking in a small pueblo near Mendoza. It turned out to be quite the fun trip.

The name of the small town is Cacheuta, and it’s purpose (as far as I could tell) was to serve as a vacation spot to the city folk of Mendoza, and all of the other folk from other cities visiting Mendoza. Our group went the morning after the Mendoza marathon, and the hot-tub was filled to the brim with post-runners soaking their pain filled legs. Fortunatly, all of them were very, very nice to us foreigners, and we were able to have a few livid conversations; topics ranged from US politics to cool locations in Argentina/Chile. Oh, and just in case you were wondering, the other 6.3 billion people that fill this planet are rooting for Obama… so do the world a favor and bring the count up to 6,300,000,001 supporters.

After sitting around and enjoying life in the hot-tubs for a while, we moved onto hiking. We journeyed down into a valley carved out by a small creek, and took a 2 or 3 mile hike along the boulders that filled the valley.

My First Chess Tournament

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 03:08:43 -0700

One thing I’ve been doing a lot recently is playing chess. I have been going to play chess with a group of people at my gym here in Mendoza, and have been enjoying it a lot. It has been a great connection with the Argentines, and a great way to get out and do something. Plus chess is Rock Awesome.

When the head honcho of the group announced an upcoming chess tournament, I said “heck… why not? It’ll be interesting, at the least.” So I did it.

Yesterday was the first of 5 games, and I’m proud to say that I won! When I first got to the tournament, I was in a bit of chess shock; not only was the room filled with 25 or 30 chess boards, but it was chock full of an incredibly diverse group. Players at this tournament represented every age group (old, young, middle aged) and every social group (quiet chess people, skateboard shoe wearing folk, soccer obsessed people in their adidas jump suit).

The game was 1 hour for each player, which was a huge relief for me; my Blitz skills are a bit off right now. My game ended up taking around 30 minutes for each player (an hour total).

For those of you whom play chess, here is the game. My opponent resigned after 26 or so moves:

My First Game

1. e4 e5
2. f4 exf4
3. Nf3 Nf6
4. Nc3 Nc6
5. Bc4 Bc5
6. d4 Bb6
7. Bxf4 Nh5
8. Ne2 Qe7
9. O-O Qxe4
10. Re1 O-O
11. Ng5 Qf5
12. Nxf7 Rxf7
13. Rf1 Qf6
14. Bxc7 Qe7
15. Rxf7 Qxf7
16. Bxf7+ Kxf7
17. Bxb6 axb6
18. Qf1+ Ke7
19. c3 d5
20. Nf4 Nf6
21. Re1+ Kf7
22. Nxd5 Rxa2
23. Nxb6 Ne7
24. Qc4+ Be6
25. Qxe6+Kg6
26. Qxa2

sAlexander is on a New Server!

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 21:03:07 -0700

Exciting news for all of the followers of sAlexander… I’ve officially moved to a new server! Now you won’t have to wait as long for the exiting blog posts and pictures to load from my site.

You might be asking yourself, “How much of an improvement am I really getting? I mean… people brag about changes all the time, but I rarely notice the difference.” Alright, I’ll tell you… the website now loads over 10 times faster! I did a quick test on the Website Speet Tester, and I clocked times for both my old server and new server. I ran 4-5 tests to try and get a good average (I should have saved the bunch of them). The minimum speed increase I found was 9x faster, and the max was exactly 19x faster, averaging around 15x for five tests. In the image below, my new server is on top, while my old server is on the bottom.

I hope that everyone out there enjoys the new speed… and although I’m sad to be leaving behind Site5, I’m very excited to be a new member of SliceHost.

Our Address

Sat, 09 Aug 2008 21:05:37 -0700

Alright, everyone who has been waiting for my address down here in Argentina, the time has come. Drum roll please…

Spencer (and/or) Nicole
Aristides Villanueva 230
(5500) Mendoza, Argentina

Postcards, notes of love, puppies, and candies are all welcome and much appreciated¹.

¹ less so if the puppy arrives… less than living. But the thought still counts

Week of Cooking

Sat, 09 Aug 2008 20:52:09 -0700

This is the week of cooking for Nicole and I! Yesterday, in preparation for the huge lunch we will be making tomorrow, Nicole and I made tortillas from scratch. Today, I made a breakfast for Nicole, myself and six of our roommates, which included Pancakes, two toppings¹, and bacon. Mom, Grandma, Mamaw, and anyone else who has ever made me breakfast… thank you! I never realized how difficult of a task it is to make breakfast for a large group. It could’ve been worse… we didn’t start the meal till nearly 12:00pm; I actually got a couple legit complaints that the breakfast was too early.

Tomorrow Nicole and I will be making a bit of tex-mex for the roomies. Fajitas, to be more specific. We’ve bought everything we need to make the meat, tortillas from scratch, salsa picante, and guacamole. I’m quite excited for the big cookout… and the spicy food as well; we don’t get much spicy food here in Argentina.

With regards to cooking, I encountered a great cooking blog! The title of the blog is Homesick Texan, and it is filled with great recipes from Texas! There are many things I love about Texas, and I must stay that the food is quite high on the list. Homesick Texan does a great job of writing very captivating articles to accompany the delicious recipes. So far I’ve tried out the Pancakes and the Tortillas, both of which I highly recommend.

¹ Syrup, unfortunately without maple, and a cream cheese sauce coined by Nicole’s family

New Footnotes at sAlexander.org!!!

Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:06:40 -0700

Exciting news about the footnotes on my website…. they’ve changed!!

Due to the killer response to my impromptu quiz¹, I’ve decided to change the way that footnotes display. Unfortunatly, you won’t be able to get the full affect of the footnotes unless you’re viewing the post from my website². So, if you haven’t already, hop on over to the post on my website

So for all of you viewing this post from my website here is the low down… lets start from the top:

Hover over one of the footnotes with your mouse³. You should see the footnote appear in a box next to the mouse. Convienent, eh? Thank Laura Campo for her comment that gave me the idea ⁴.
Now, go crazy and click on one of the footnotes⁵. For 95% of the people browsing the internet, the footnote will appear in the text! For the 5% of you with javascript disabled (or those browsing from an rss reader), you will be redirected to the third item:
At the bottom of the page, you can still find a full collection of all the footnotes! That way, if you’re like Bruce and prefer to use the footnotes as a brain teaser / puzzle, you’ll still have the opportunity to do so.

For the rails developers out there who are interested in implementing this method on your own website, it is quite a simple addition to RedCloth, and I’ll be posting the code in the next couple days so you can have some cut-n-paste fun.

For everyone else who doesn’t spend their spare time designing websites, I hope you enjoy the new feature! It should make my footnote laden posts a little easier to digest, and for those of you whom avoid useless commentary whenever possible, you can continue to scan right over the footnotes without thinking twice about it.

¹ a whole three people!

² The footnotes won’t appear on an RSS syndicator due to security reasons

³ here is an example for ya to work with

⁴ although I secretly think she got it from xkcd’s grand implementation of the same feature… regardless a great recommendation for this site

⁵ another example for you to work with

My First Week of Spanish Classes!!!

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 16:11:51 -0700

Technically I haven’t finished my first week, but I have been to four classes so far.

I will admit it is a struggle to sit through a two and half hour class in Spanish, but I think overall they have gone well.

I definitly stand out in the classes as a foreigner. However after this week of experiencing struggles with everything from the pronunciation of my name on the roll sheet to answering questions in front of the class, I have a new respect for the foreigners that go to school in America.

In my physiotherapy class the professora came into class and immediately started her lecture. Throughout her lecture she kept starring at me; I guessed she was trying to figure out whether or not I knew what she was saying. During the lecture a girl ask the profesora her name, which I could not understand, so I asked her to write it on the board. While she had her backed turned to the class, writing on the board, she said, “This girl is not going to understand anything I am saying.” and then she asked " How is you Spanish?"…Luckly with this professor I could understand almost everything she was saying. I responded with “It’s good, but not perfect.” (the whole “conversation” with her back turned to me)!

Even though this may seem like a small accomplishment to some, I felt like I had passed a test in front of the teacher and the other students…however after class I had mistaken a girl’s question “como te llamas” (what is your name) with “como tomas” (what do you drink)…I know it is an easy one, but in my defense she was holding a Matte cup! All and all the week has been full of successes and mistakes, which is to be expected.

Everyone has been surprisingly nice to me in my classes. It has been nice to see a different side of the Argentines than from what Spencer and I have experienced throughout our Argentine travels.

Everyday I feel more and more at home here. Today at the supermarket someone asked me for my recommendation of laundry soap and another person asked me where the sugar was, so either I am starting to look more comfortable within my surrounding…or I look like I work at CarreFour (the supermarket).

I am looking forward to learning a lot this semester, hopefully by Dec I will understand all my lecture perfectly and be able to participate in class discussions… I have my fingers crossed!

New Additions to the Website!

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 15:47:11 -0700

Alright everyone, I’ve got some exciting news for everyone out there… but lets take it one piece at a time.

Gravatar

sAlexander comments now support Gravatar! What is Gravatar? Well, directly from the website:

“A gravatar, or globally recognized avatar, is quite simply an avatar image that follows you from weblog to weblog appearing beside your name when you comment on gravatar enabled sites. Avatars help identify your posts on web forums, so why not on weblogs?”

You might be asking yourself how this pertains to you as a commenter. Well, if you’ve signed up for Gravatar, then when you comment on my website, your picture will automatically show up, rather than Mr. Default Man.

So do it! Be crazy! Live a little! and give Gravatar a try¹!

Share The Post!

If you look at all of the posts and photos on my site (yes, yes, including this one), you’ll see a big, ugly, traffic sign (which I personally designed… so only I’m aloud to call it ugly) with the words “Share the Post!” written on the sign. If you click it, and wait a few miliseconds, the sign should morph into four different symbols.

The first is for reddit, and online news collector. The second is for del.icio.us, an online bookmark sharing site (which I have recently joined and really enjoyed). The third is for Facebook, and the fourth is for Digg, which is much like Reddit.

So how do these pertain to you, Mr/Mrs Reader? Well, if you finish reading a post / looking at a picture, and you really, really loved it… then share it with other people around the world! If you’re unsure which service to choose first, give Digg a try… it doesn’t require you to sign up for anything. But if you’re looking to sign up for a great service, consider del.icio.us.

Footnotes

¹ To sign up, go to www.gravatar.com, and choose to sign up. The process is quite speedy, so you should only have to set aside 4 or 5 minutes… unless you’re particularly indecisive about your nickname, or which photo to use.

Las LeÃ±as

Mon, 04 Aug 2008 22:33:04 -0700

Our day at Las LeÃ±as did not turn out at all as I had expected it would, but none the less, I had a great time. Lets split the day up into two pieces, and I’ll let you pick which to read first. If you’re the type of person who likes bad news first, just keep on reading. But if you’re the type of person who prefers good news first, or just no bad news at all, please skip on down to the good news.

Before you read any of the following, I would just like to say that I had a great time on this trip, and my spirits stayed very high the entire time. If I had the opportunity to do it all over again…. (I’ll answer this later).

The Bad News

Okay, so lets start from the top. About 2 months ago, after much internal debate and many changes of heart, I decided not to bring all of my snowboarding gear down to South America. This included everything: board, boots, jackets, gloves, pants, socks. The whole shebang.

I didn’t think that this was all that big of a deal; I knew that I might have had to spring a little bit of extra cash to rent a nice snowboard, but I could find something that would work. WRONG! In all of these calculations, I had forgotten to take into account that there are only a hand full of Argentines that cross the 6’3" (190cm) height, and apparently none of them rent snowboards. Oh well… so my board wasn’t exactly perfect. I’ll live.

The entire trip, we had been planning to use an incredible discount that the mountain offers to it’s near by ski-bum towns: If you stay in Malargue¹, you get a 50% discount on the lift tickets, and a 30% discount on rentals. Not too bad, eh? Unfortunately, we missed it my 2 days (we arrived on the 28th, but due to Buenos Aires holidays, the discount was invalid between the 27th of July and 10th of Aug.). So everything was a ~~ton more~~ bit more expensive than we expected, but what choice did we really have? We had to get in at least one day on the slopes², but we decided to change our plans to include one day of snowboarding instead of three or four.

So we got all set up. We found a hostel, we rented our snowboards, we paid for transportation to the mountain, etc. We were committed.

We arrive at the mountain nice and early³, and what do we find? White out conditions. And due to the white out conditions, 3/4 of the mountain (the good part of the mountain, I might add), was closed, and the other 1/4 could close anytime without warning and without refund. Oh, and no discount⁴, nor free hot chocolate⁵. Oh well, we were committed.

Now might be a good time to recall the fact that I didn’t bring any of my snowboarding clothing down to Argentina. So I’m stuck in a whiteout, wearing bluejeans, sunglasses, a light jacket, a very warm hat⁶, and thin, thin gloves. And they didn’t rent lenses on the mountain; they only allowed you to purchase a crappy set for $60.

And just to throw one more piece of straw on the horses back, my lift pass fell off of my jacket after an hour and a half of snowboarding. Despite the fact that I had my receipt right in my hand, they would not let me back on the mountain, nor would they refund my money or give me a new pass. I’ve been using lift tickets for quite a while now, and I’m quite confident in my ability to attach them to my jacket. Oh well.

Luckly, this is where the good news starts. It’s a great fact of life that when things just seem like they couldn’t possibly get any worse, something grand happens.

The Good News

Nicole and I, after having a very challenging morning at Las LeÃ±as, met a gentleman from England⁷ who turned out to be our life saver. He let Nicole borrow his jacket (her biggest need) and let me borrow his goggles, helmet, and warm gloves (my biggest needs).

After I came back to the food lodge after a few great runs⁸ with no lift pass, he introduced me to 5 of his friends from all over the world. They were all on the way to a sauna they knew about on the mountain, and they offered to let me join. I of course said ‘YES’, as I couldn’t snowboard, and I didn’t want to sit around all day in the food lodge. All of them were incredibly nice to the stranger (me), and treated me like one of the bunch.

We chilled in the sauna for a while, played some poker, had a traditional Malargue meal at the hostel, drank some wine, and enjoyed life. Nicole and I had decided that one day on the mountain was enough, and booked the bus back to Mendoza at 2am, but at least we had some friends from our side of the world to talk to before heading out.

Now, if you’re one of the optimistic people, go back and read the bad news …or don’t!

Summary.

To answer the question I started with…

If I had the opportunity to do this all over again, I wouldn’t. But none the less, I had a great time.

Footnotes

⁰ Impromptu question. How many of you actually read these footnotes while reading the article? How many actually read the footnotes at all? I’m trying to decide if I should keep them or not, and your feedback (as a comment or email) would truly help!

¹ We were staying in Malargue!

² We would’ve just felt silly having spent all of the money to get there, and not even done one day of snowboarding.

³ Early, that is, by Argentine standards.

⁴ My father, for all those who know him, has trained me to always ask for one. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn’t. Sorry Dad, no go this time.

⁵ Ask me about the time I got stuck on a chair lift for 30 minutes with the Family at Wolf Creek, and the mountain gave us free hot chocolate in exchange. Totally worth it.

⁶ Always.

⁷ Cambridge, actually. The world really is a small place, Campo.

⁸ There was a TON of powder… ~~inches and inches~~ centimeters and centimeters.

Our trip to Malargue

Fri, 01 Aug 2008 22:30:14 -0700

A few days ago, after hearing about coming snow at Las Lenas and a great discount given to those staying in a hostel near the mountain, Nicole and I decided to take a quick weekend trip down to the mountains. The trip down was quite uneventful, and only took 6 hours, plus a one hour layover in San Rafael.

San Rafael was a very cool little town of 100,000 people. It boasted the largest population of bike riders that Nicole and I have encountered so far; bikes were scattered all over the street, and nearly everyone in the town was sporting their own bike. The people in San Rafael that we encountered were also incredibly nice, much nicer than the average person in Mendoza. Although were only able to explore the streets for 45 minutes, I feel as though we got a good impression of the city.

After San Rafael, we continued onto Malargue. We had booked a hostel on a friends recommendation¹ and thought we were all set up for the night. Things changed once we arrived in Malargue. After some difficulty finding directions to our hostel, we hired a taxi to take us to the front door.

The hostel was way out of town, on the order of 5 or 6 km away from everything. Usually, this would be fine; being isolated did give the hostel a cool, rural feeling. But Nicole and I had no food, no car, and no way to get into town (without paying the $15 taxi ride, each way)… so we decided to change to a new hostel in the city, and while we were at it, we rented gear for tomorrow.

And now for a good night of sleep so I can do some good snowboarding tomorrow!

¹ Ecohostel

The Asado

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 09:31:37 -0700

Yesterday’s asado (BBQ) was and incredible experience. Not only because the food was incredible and the wine was tasty, but because it was another opportunity to hang out with those who live next door, and an opportunity for us to speak in espaÃ±ol for a few hours.
Actually, a few hours is a bit of an understatement. Although the actual meal didn’t start until about 2:00pm, the cooking began much earlier, and if you’re looking to have some good, quality spanish conversation, there is no better place to do it than around a grill. I got out there at around 12:30, and the meal lasted until well after 5:00pm… quite the time commitment!

I would like to stand up for the Argentineans, and say that they truly are very hard, productive workers¹, but this Monday’s feast doesn’t boast well. Nicole reminded me of a quote from a movie², where a huge slacker said “… so does South America. I went to Argentina one time, and everyone seemed to be sitting around. It was beautiful.”

photo. 215 | Description

photo. 214 | The full Asado team.

photo. 216 | The sign.

Great experience, great food, enough said.

¹ They really are hard workers, no doubt about it. But they act more like the Europeans in the fact that they put a lot of value on enjoying life with your friends and family, and not just enjoying life at work. Not to point any fingers at the US… but come on, 10 days vacation per year!

² The movie was You, Me, and Dupree, and sadly I got bored half way through and stopped watching.

A Motivating Last Lecture

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 22:22:24 -0700

I was browsing around the Scientific American Blog this afternoon, and ran across a very interesting video about a professors ‘Last Lecture’.

Here is the idea: the professor, Randy Pausch, was daignosed with pancreatic cancer, and after a long battle, was finally told that he had three to six months left to live. As one of his final acts of life, he gave one final lecture to a crowded theater.

His lecture is full of deep life lessons that are explained in such a simple way. He continuously brings up the fact that in life, one often runs into brick walls. These brick walls are not meant to stop us, but simply meant to weed out those who don’t truly want what they’re trying to get. He stresses the fact that one should not be deterred by these brick walls, but instead use them as motivation to keep pushing.

Overall, it was an incredible 1 hour and 15 minutes, and I would recommend it to anyone who needs a bit of a pep talk.

My New Bike

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 18:11:34 -0700

I finally found myself a bike to use for transportation¹! It has a few things I’d like to change about it, but it gets the job done. Not having a car, and not being super familiar with the bus system here in Mendoza, I was walking around the city a ton just to get from place to place. Now I have my trusty, rusty², blue bicycle to get me around.

Nicole and I were participating in a welcoming party for some of our roommate’s friends³, and I happened to stumble upon the bike by luck. I was talking to another one of my roommates who is leaving tomorrow, and I busted out the question “… you don’t happen to have a bike, do you?” Well, he did! And he sold it to me at a huge discount; I paid him just over U$S 22 for the bike.

I still need to find myself a road-bike, but this is a great start. By riding around my pretty blue bike instead of my road-bike, as it isn’t the flashiest thing in the world, I won’t have to worry as much about theft.

All in all, the welcoming party not only turned out to be a great way to welcome new friends and spend some time with the current ones, but also a good thrift shopping party. And just to add some frosting onto an already delicious cake, I also found myself two chess players⁴. Yey!

¹ Not a bike to use for recreation… still looking for a good road bike. If you happen to know of any in the Mendoza, Argentina area, let me know!

² Not really… it just rhymed well. The bike is quite rust free.

³ For those of you who don’t know about our new roommates, or our new house, check out the post about our brand spanking new house.

⁴ Although both of them are leaving within the next few days.

RSS feeds now available!

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 10:04:35 -0700

This blog is for the devoted followers of sAlexander, who have a hard time sleeping at night knowing that a post might exist that has not been read. Well, I have good news… RSS feeds are now available for sAlexander.org!

RSS feeds are a great way to stay in touch with both the blog posts and photo galleries on my website. By subscribing to the RSS feed, you will automatically be notified of any updates to the blog and/or photo gallery.

The setup method is quite simple, especially if you’re already signed up for a google account (or a gmail account). You may view the screencast video of the rss setup, or read the next paragraph.

Simply choose the RSS button from your address bar or from the bottom left corner of the site. Choose the feeds to which you would like to subscribe (I recommend both blog and photo feeds), and click on the link. Your browser should now prompt you to choose a program (I chose Google reader), and you’re set!

Congrats… you’re now living on the cutting edge of sAlexander!

Our New House

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 19:15:04 -0700

We did it! After a long, long process of dealing with Argentinian Real Estate, we finally found a house for the next five months that we are happy with. It is in the best location that we could have ask for, four blocks away from Parque San Martin (the largest park in South America), and about eight blocks from the University. The street is filled with fun places to hang out like cafes, shops, and bars.

On first impression, we walked up to a rusty white gate, shocked that the house was actually on the market; we even had to double check the address… sure enough this was what we had been searching for. After we passed the second gate, which had a much nicer appeal, we saw the charm the place had to offer. There were two houses surrounding a garden area with tables, a barbecue grill, and a shaded area to enjoy the outdoors. We will be staying in one of the two houses with a guy from France, who will be arriving in a month. There are three bedrooms, a living room, a kitchen, and a bathroom. After seeing all the other options, this one definitly did not have the modern style we had seen in a few of the other houses, but it had the most space of any of them. We now have big plans to take that space and change the old house into our stylish home. At first, we felt like it was a negative that the house wasn’t as stylish as some of the other houses, but we have decided that decorating it to have a little of our own personalities will make it feel more like our home.

There are about five other people that live in the other house with the owner and his girlfriend. They are all from around the world and seem be friendly and speak Spanish…which are the main requirements for friend seeking right now.

Tomorrow morning at 9:30, we will move into our house and start the process of making a home. We are very excited and will post before and after pictures of the house.

Hey, I'm House Huntin Here, Homie.

Mon, 21 Jul 2008 20:05:00 -0700

We’ve been hunting apartments for a few days now, and it has been exhausting! Things that I would find quite easy in the States are incredibly difficult here; for instance, the real estate agents are not forward, and are in many cases evasive, about the fees that they charge for their services. None have discussed it with me before viewing houses, and one has even refused to tell me until after viewing the house. I find it a bit… sketchy, but I think it is the norm around here.

Also, the working hours of the Argentineans are infuriating. Imagine these business hours: 10am-1pm, 5pm-8pm. Everywhere¹. Everyone². Everything³. It is so hard to get anything done; after waking up, eating breakfast, and running ⁴, I feel like it is 12pm… and then whenever the Argentineans wake up from their siesta, it is nap time for me!

We’ve been calling every house that is for rent by the owner, and working with real estate agents, neither of which feel like answering their phones on Saturday and Sunday. When we only have a few days to get everything done, and two of those days are Saturday and Sunday, it becomes quite the hassle.

¹ Shops, stores, schools, etc.

² Real estate agents, random people, rastafarians.

³ Even the pets!

⁴ Which is happening less and less now that I am walking 100 km per day. Okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration… it’s more like 75 km.

Goodbye Chile!

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 20:05:10 -0700

We’ve officially said goodbye to all of our friends in Chile… how sad! We crossed the border back to Santiago this Saturday, and are now back in Mendoza, our home for the next 5 months. Our plan is to do some apartment hunting for the next few days, and hopefully encounter something sooner rather than later; each day we don’t have a house, we have to pay the inflated Mendoza hostel tariff¹.

I will be posting photos soon so that you can check out our housing options, and once we find a house… you’ll be the first to know!

On a side note, I’ve recently started picking chess up again; I joined the internet chess club and have been playing a few games per day²! It’s pretty exciting, and if anyone out there wants to play a game, keep an eye out for sAlexander.

¹ Prices here in Mendoza have skyrocketed! Last year we paid $25 pesos (about USD$8) per night; this year, at the same location, we’re paying $70 pesos!

² I’ve played 20 games in the last week! Wow!

Â¿Quien Muere? - a poem by Pablo Nerudo

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 15:38:35 -0700

This is an english translation of a beautiful poem by Pablo Nerudo. Enjoy!

Who dies?

Dies slowly he who transforms himself into a slave of habit,
repeating every day the same routines,
who does not change brands,
does not risk wearing a new color, nor talk to those he doesn’t know.
Dies slowly he who makes television his mentor.
Dies slowly he who avoids a passion,
who prefers black to white and the dots on the “i” to a whirlpool of emotions.
Dies slowly he who does not overthrow the table when unhappy at work,
who does not risk the certain for the uncertain
to go towards the dream that is keeping him awake.
Who does not, at least once in life, flee from sound thinking.
Dies slowly he who does not travel, does not read,
does not listen to music, does not find grace in himself.
Dies slowly he who destroys his self love,
who does not accept help from another.
Dies slowly he who passes his days complaining of his bad luck or the incessant rain.
Dies slowly he who abandons a project before starting it,
who does not ask about a subject he does not know
or who does not answer when being asked about something he does know.
Dies slowly he who does not share his emotions, joys and sadness,
who does not trust, who does not even try.
Dies slowly he who does not intend excellence,
who does not learn from the stones on the road of life,
who does not love and let someone love him.
Let’s avoid death in soft quotes,
remembering always that to be alive demands an effort much larger than the simple act of breathing.

-Pablo Nerudo

Our return to Chile

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 15:41:47 -0700

Today is Spencer and I first day back in Valparaiso and Vina Del Mar of Chile. We both got in touch with our families (Chilean) and they have invited us to stay with them. I am staying with my family, while Spencer is about 15 min down the road with his family.

It is really weird for me to be back here again. I am sleeping in the same room as I did last summer, the family is the same, their routine is the same, and it feels like I have gone back in time and I was never gone for a year in the states.

It is also very nice to have the feeling of a home again. Although, we are not unpacking everything and making a â€œhearthâ€, when I walked into my room today, I felt like I was home for a little while.

There is a new ISA student living here, he is the familyâ€™s fourth foreign exchange student (I was their first). He seems to be enjoying the family and is not looking forward to going back to the states. He has told me all about the trips and the daily lives of the ISA students, which were all very similar to my memories of last year.

Later on tonight I am going to join Spencerâ€™s family for dinner (like the old times), then return back to my bed, to prepare for tomorrowâ€™s journey down memory lane.

Vina Del Mar and Valparaiso are cities where I will also have a home in South America. I will be sad to leave, however I am excited experience a new life in Argentina, hopefully by the end of the year Spencer and I will cherish Mendoza as much as we do Vina/Valpo.

Mendoza, Nuestro Hogar

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 23:47:47 -0700

In our recent trip to Mendoza, Argentina, we unexpectedly discovered the city in which both Nicole and I would like to stay for the next five months. Although weâ€™ve both been to Mendoza before (Nicole once, myself twice), we didnâ€™t fall in love with the city in the same way the first two times.

In our travels through Argentina, each city has been incredible: Buenos Aires had so much culture and could have kept both Nicole and I busy exploring for the next 5 years; Cordoba was a very youthful, alive city, where we no doubt would have enjoyed the university atmosphere; Salta was incredibly gorgeous, comparable to New Zealand (which says a lot, in my opinion), but at the same time modern and fun.

When we got to Mendoza, we found a bit of each mixed into one â€˜smallerâ€™ city (it is home to 1.5 million Argentines), but we also found much more; the city was the most active city that weâ€™ve come across so far. The Parque San Martin was host to many activities, from families playing soccer in the fields during their Sunday family days and bikers getting in their daily workout in the trademark biker outfit to business men getting in a quick run before/after work. We partook in many of these activities, from running through the lovely park to kicking the futbol back and forth between the two of us (while the Argentines laughed at how poorly we were doing so).

After spending 8 days in Mendoza (we had planned to spend 2 or 3), we have definitely made up our mind that this is where we want to be for the next 5 months. We have begun searching apartments, and have already found some good leads. Nicole has started the application process to the school, and I will be searching for volunteering opportunities in Mendoza once we return. Wish us luck!

Salta's Surreal Surroundings

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 12:11:50 -0700

Today is Nicole and I’s last evening in Salta, Argentina. The town has treated us quite well, and we’ve had a great time exploring the surrounding area; it is hard to imagine that one place could be surrounded by so much beauty and history¹.

We started our time in Salta by exploring the town for a couple days, and then a quick trip to San Lorenzo. San Lorenzo was gorgeously green and very beautiful. We went on a hike for a few hours, and managed to pick up a pack of dogs along the way.

After our time in San Lorenzo, the road trip ensued. We met up with a friend of ours that we met in Cordoba, and rented a car for three days (yey Gol!) to travel the surrounding areas.

We started by traveling down to Cafayete, which is the wine production capital of Northern Argentina². The drive to Cafayete was one of the most beautiful drives I have ever experienced; it was a type of arid, desert beauty that I’m not accustomed to in Colorado, but at the same time, the scale of the mountains and valleys is comparable to those of Colorado. We saw a number of large rock formations, ranging from frogs and monks to the sunken titanic (I’m putting my vote for sleeping dinosaur, not titanic), along with huge cliffs and towering mountains.

After spending the afternoon in Cafayate, we decided to endure the 5 hour drive to Cachi durring the night, which was a good choice as the drive wasn’t as beautiful as our other drives, but we still had to do it. On the way, we saw an erupting volcano³, but decided not to approach (after much heated discussion), and instead did some rally racing through the Andes. We stayed the first night at an interesting hostal in Cachi, which felt much more like the owner’s home than it did a hostal. After a good nights sleep, we woke up at the crack of 11:00 ⁴ to contiue our journey through the country.

The drive from Cachi to Salta was incredible_! A good majority of the drive was in the Parque Nacional Los Cardones (Cactus National Park), and was filled with cacti that towered up to 10 meters 5 highphoto/150! After passing through the cacti fields, we descended the 3,300 meter⁶ mountain to the city of Salta (situated 2,000 meters down).

When we arrived in Salta, we spent some time at a cafe (eating and using the internet, usual cafe activities), and then prepared for another departure to Purmamarca. Sean, our road trip buddy, was feeling very ill, and decided not to join us; Nicole and I secretly (well, now that it’s written here it’s not much of a secret) think that he just got sick of us.

Nicole and I journeyed alone to Purmamarca, and spent the night in a lovely hostal next to the town center. We were able to chat with a the owner of the hostal regarding a variety of topics, ranging from how to correctly pronounce the name of the town to the political situation in Argentina⁷; she wasn’t a fan of the political talk.

The next day, we drove through the Quebrada de Humahuaca (Valley of Humahuaca), and visited quite a few sites. One of the most memorable was the Inca ruins in the town of Tilcara. Ontop of a hill in Tilcara, the weather-worn, 600 year old ruins of the Inca tribe have been rebuilt into a mock village, where a visitor can truly feel how it would be to live in the ancient civilization. It included many stone houses (which I think my younger brothers needs to give a shot at constructing… I expect a full Incan village by the time I get home!), a church (an Incan church, not a Christian church), and Incan style monument to all of those involved in the excavation and construction of the village.

Another memorable moment was getting a traffic ticket in Humahuaca for driving the wrong way on a one way street (it’s impossible to know which way to go on these silly streets). After much arguing with the ‘officer’, and making a few elegant changes back and forth between being able to speak fluent Spanish and not knowing a word, I accepted the ticket. The turning point in my decision really came when I saw on the ticket that he had my first name as “Colorado”, and my last name as “Driver’s Licence”. He even managed to write down the license plate of the car incorrectly. I don’t think that’ll pass in a court of law, or even a friendly conversation.

After visiting a few other small towns, we ended our trip through the pseudo-civilization surrounding Salta (and celebrated by going to a movie theater and watching a movie in English).

¹ Northwestern Argentina (and most of Chile) was the home of the Inca tribe from early 15th century to mid 16th century. The Inca tribe considered mountains to be a holy refuge, a home to the gods. Salta, being full of huge mountains and close in proximity to the Llullaillaco volcano, was one of the most settled regions of the Inca tribe.

² Northern Argentina, due to the extremely warm climate and low humidity, is known for it’s white wines, where as mid-Argentina is known for it’s reds.

³ This has not been confirmed, but I’m pretty freaking sure.

⁴ We were tired, and we were up late into the night driving. Give us a break… geez.

⁵ Don’t use meters, huh? Well, too bad, you should learn it… 10 meters = 32.8 ft. Want to have some real conversion fun? Try to figure out what $2.85 pesos/something (something is unknown… I’m guessing a liter) is in US units.

⁶ Learn it already! 3,300 meters = 10,825 ft.

⁷ Way too much political stuff happening here… just look at the news.

Castellano

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 16:07:45 -0700

In most parts of Argentina, excluding the extreme north and south of the country, they do not speak espanol. They speak Castellano, pronounced castezano. It is, of course, very similar to spanish, but there are a few main differences.

The Vos form

In spanish, when speaking to an authority or a stranger, Usted is used, and when speaking to a friend, tu is used. In Castellano, Usted is still used, but tu is replaced by the word vos (a shortening of vosotros_). For example, instead of saying “Tu hablas espanol?”, you would say "_Vos hablas espanol." Fun, huh?

Well, the fun only starts there. When using vos, you no longer have stem changing verbs (as the stem changing verbs don’t change in the vosotros form). So, rather than “tu tienes?”, in Castellano, it would be “vos tenes”. Still fun?

But that’s not all! In “tu tienes”, tienes is pronounced with the accent on the next to last syllable (normal spanish pronunciation). Well, in “vos tenes”, the accent is moved to the last syllable (coming back to vosotros, it would actually be the next to last syllable of the vosotros form, but a few letters are being omitted). This is perhaps the trickiest piece for me, as it influences me to change the infasis on the following words.

Pronunciation of “ll” and “y”

In Castellano, they pronounce their ll (normally pronounced like the ‘y’ in very) more like a z (similar to the ‘s’ in version). This makes thing surprisingly difficult to understand; words that I am familiar with in Spanish now sound very different in Castellano.

Lunfardo

Lunfardo is the slang used in Buenos Aires (it actually used to be its own language, but it has, obviously, been replaced by Castellano). There is a ton of it, and I know very, very little of it. It isn’t much use to us now, as we will not be traveling in Buenos Aires for a while, but eventually, I’ll have to learn it. Well, however large it is, it can’t compare to the infamous Chilean slang.

So… what do you think? Vos queres hablar castellano? Or more importantly, vas podes entender castellano? I’m still working on it.

The Rule Book for Mate

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 16:54:14 -0700

Mate is a traditional Argentine drink and is very popular among the people. It is not uncommon to see bus drivers, people at work, or people walking on the street with Mate in their hands.

It tastes similar to very strong tea in the United States, however the yerba (herbs) floats freely in the Mate (the cup) instead of in a tea bag. To drink the yerba, a bombilla (a metal straw with small holes at the end of it) is used to filter the yerba and get the liquid.

The process to drink the Mate is to fill the cup 3/4 with Yerba, shake the cup so that the Yerba settles, stick the bombilla (the link is in spanish, but there is a good picture of a bombilla) under the Mate, pour sugar or honey on top of the yerba (for us sensitive gringos. Many of the Argentinians prefer Mate without sweetening), and then fill the cup to the top with hot water. A cup of Mate is drank in a couple minutes, so everyone carries a thermos with hot water so they can refill the drink.

The essential Mate parts are:

Yerba- herbs

Mate-cup (there may be some confusion here, because the term Mate can be used to describe both the drink and the cup that is used to house the drink.)

Bombilla- metal straw.

We were informed by an Argentinian that there is Mate etiquette here in Argentina. It seems much like the indian ritual of passing the peace pipe around a circle of tribesmen:

The traditional way to drink Mate is to pass one Mate around in a group of friends or family. Each person drinks their one cup of Mate and then passes it to the next person.

Whoever owns the Mate cup must drink the first cup. In America this action seems rude and stingy, however the first cup of Mate is very strong and bitter, so it is considered rude to give it to a friend or family member.

Each time a Mate cup is finished, the cup is passed back to the owner of the cup. That person fills the cup with water and honey or sugar, and then gives the cup to the next person in rotation.

When their are many people drinking the Mate, it is rude for a person to take their time drinking the Mate, so you should drink it being conscious that everyone is waiting for their turn.

Mate is drank alone, but if friends or family members are around it is polite to ask if they would like to join you.

People should not buy a Mate for themselves, they should only have a Mate if someone has given them one as a present.

When a person does not want any more Mate or non at all they should say “gracias” (thank you in spansih, but no thank you when it involves Mate).

When little green herbs start to float to the top with out all the other herbs it is time to throw the Yerba away. If you want to drink more you can throw half of the yerba away and put new Yerba inside or fill the whole thing with new yerba, obviously all new yerba will be a little stronger than only half of the yerba being new.

Funny Story of Mixed Communication.

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 16:43:53 -0700

Spencer and I sat down this afternoon to have some lunch with our new friend, Jasper, from Holland. We were talking about making empanadas for dinner (in English), and Jasper said he liked “pollo and mice” in the empanadas. Both Spencer and I were shocked that people ate mice in Argentina.

We asked him if they were popular in Holland as well. He said they have lots of mice fields and asked us if we had any in the States. Spencer and I told him we had fields that had mice in them, but eating mice to Americans was like eating cats in Holland… it’s unheard of. And we would never dream of raising mice in fields just for eating purposes.

He looked at us like we were crazy. Then Spencer started singing “little bunny foo foo, hoping through the forrest, scooping up the field mice, and bopping them on the heads”. The whole time, Jasper was just looking at us without a clue as to what we were talking about.

We had a few mice tangents, and many mouse noises and actions were made, including the classic “squeek, squeek” and little mouse paws from Spencer.

Finally, Spencer asked if they bought the mouse whole before they cooked it. Jasper starting laughing and said “oh no… not mice, maiz, like corn” (maiz is the Spanish word for corn). We all got a pretty big laugh out of it for a couple minutes. I guess that is what happens when you have multiple languages floating around. If you want to get the full impression of how he felt during the conversation, re-read the above paragraphs, substituting corn in every time you see mice. It’s pretty hilarious.

Good and Bad News

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 13:55:15 -0700

So, bad news for all of you who are currently waiting for photos… we’ve managed to loose the cable that connects my camera to the computer, so many of our Buenos Aires pictures are inaccessable. Other bad news is that the pictures we will be taking here in Cordoba, we won’t be able to upload them to the internet until our new cable arrives. There is a chance that we can use Nicole’s camera to take the pictures and upload them through a computer here at the hostel (which has the proper connection), but that fix will only last so long.

The good news is that we’ve safely arrived in Cordoba! We took the night bus last night (which departed at 10:35pm and arrived at 7:45am) and got here in one piece… yey! We’ve done a bit of city exploring this morning (most of it on a run), and are now watching the Holland vs Russia football (soccer to us silly Americans)… our Dutch friend is pretty excited (see the latest picture)

Our Last Days in Argentina

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 17:03:46 -0700

Yesterday was the first day we had bad weather in Buenos Aries, but it didn’t stop us from touring the city.

We decided we were going to visit Evita Peron’s grave site, located in the Cementerio de la Recoleta

On our way to the cemetery we stopped at Plaza San Martin to look at the amazing trees that filled the plaza. They looked like trees out of a fairytale, the limbs towered over our heads, and the giant roots reached out of the ground. After we took a couple pictures we continued on our way to find Evita Peron.

The cemetery was dismal, yet beautiful. It looked like a giant city of tombs for the dead. It took us awhile to find Evita because we were expecting a spectacular grave site. We finally found a tomb with many other peoples names engraved into the stone, one of the names read Evita Peron.

More new plans!

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 11:09:16 -0700

We’ve changed our plans again! Big surprise!

After looking up the weather in Iguazu, we’ve decided to postpone our trip due to rain, and go to Cordoba instead. We will check out the schools in Cordoba and look for alojamiento (lodging) as well.

We plan on being on our first (well, Nicole’s first) overnight “cama” bus to Cordoba from Buenos Aires. It should be exciting, assuming we can get the tickets (we are leaving right now to buy them).

After we get settled in Cordoba, we will continue on our trip as planned (Iguazu, Salta, and other cities along the way).

Exciting New Travel Plans

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:55:39 -0700

Staying in the hostels for the last 6 days, we’ve had the opportunity to talk to many travelers about potential travel in Argentina. We’ve heard about many a place, but a few have stuck out above the others, and we’ve decided to add a bit to our travel itinerary.

Our original plans were to travel from Buenos Aires to Cordoba, and then Mendoza. But we’ve decided to add a bit of travel to the northern falls of Iguazu (I know many of you may not follow the links I add to these posts, but you should really check out that last one. Good pictures.), and also to the northern city of Salta.

So now our plans are as follows: We will leave Buenos Aires this Friday morning/evening for Iguazu, spend a few (3-4) days there (and in neighboring towns), head off to Salta for a few days, and then bus to either Cordoba or Mendoza, spending about a week in each. After finishing our two weeks in Cordoba and Mendoza, we will head over to the Chilean side of the continent, and visit our friends in Santiago and Valparaiso (hopefully with a trip to Pucon as well, but it all depends on time).

Our first day of classes at UCA

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:03:34 -0700

Nicole and I have both successfully been accepted to the Universidad Catholica in Buenos Aires (Nicole as a foreign student, and myself as an estudiante oyente, which is a student that is only auditing classes and does not require credit), and we visited today and spoke with some professors and previewed a class (Nicole previewed the class. I knew I would die if I had to listen to 3 hours of Freud… in Spanish!). Nicole greatly enjoyed the class, and understood nearly all of it.

We’ve made a ‘friend’ within the Universities administrative department! (We like to think of her as a friend, but she probably thinks of us as ‘those annoying Americans who bother me all the time with silly questions in broken Spanish’). She’s helped us out a ton with the application process, and has helped point us in the correct direction in the application process.

Our crazy night in Milhouse (our hostel)

Tue, 17 Jun 2008 19:14:33 -0700

Warning! This entry discusses the mistakes of our roommates. Although all of our actions were G-rated, this is a PG13 -rated story. But, as always, we were angels (mom, dad, family) and/or awesome badasses (friends).

A bit of background information: We were rooming in a eight person dorm style room with two guys from England and )three guys from Ireland; we all met each other the day of the crazy night.

Spencer and I decided we were going to take it easy and get to sleep early so we could wake up to have a long day to explore Buenos Aires. The rest of the roommates were going out to party Buenos Aires style (clubbing until 6-8 am) and we were in bed well before they returned (they returned around 3:30 or 4am). All the guys got back to the hostel at about 5ish (they did not go out together) and were as loud as they could have be, trying to climb into their bunk beds. All of them were obviously intoxicated, and one of the Irish gentlemen was throwing up in a bed behind usâ€¦ not a pleasant sleep aid.

After about thirty minutes of peace and quiet Spencer woke up to a sound of pouring water. He looked across the room to see someone peeing on a bunk bed and the bag next to it. The guy climbed back into bed and passed out once againâ€¦ finally, quiet!. A few minutes later, one of the English guys walked in from the bathroom and a dialog ensues:

Spencer- â€œDude I donâ€™t know if that is your bunk or your stuff , but some guy just peed on it. You might want to find another bedâ€.

The English guy- â€œNo, that is my mate sleeping in that bed, I am sure he just pissed on himselfâ€.

Spencer- â€œNo, I think we have a misunderstanding, some guy just stood there and peed on that bed… I think your mate got peed on.â€

The English guys walked over to the bed and stepped in some of the pee and started yelling that his bag is all wet. At this point the guy sleeping in the bottom bunk woke upâ€¦ â€œOh my god, I have got piss on my legâ€ (Mind you that all of this is being said with English accents, which makes it so much funnier). Spencer and I were trying to keep everyone from hearing us laughâ€¦ it was quite a funny situation. One of the English guys started kicking the â€œpee boyâ€ while he was passed out. After a couple hectic minutes, Spencer finally convinced him that kicking the drunk guy wasnâ€™t the best solution. After much yelling about the pee, everyone settled down to sleep.

About thirty minutes later, Spencer and I both woke up to the sound of pouring water againâ€¦ the same guy was peeing in the room again (thankfully on no one this time). After finishing, he started to loose his balance and fell back next to our bed. He stood up and faced us like he was preparing pee. Spencer and I told him to get out of the room and go to a bathroom. He left for a couple seconds, came back into the room, faced our bed, and started to unzip his pants.

Before any damage was done, Spencer had jumped out of bed and shoved the guy out of the room. I got up, grabbed his arm, and pull him into the hall, planning on escorting him to the bathroom. While carrying him along, I stepped in a fresh puddle of his urine. I was then upset and annoyed, and left him in the hall to fight for himself. I returned to bed, and we locked the door to avoid any more trouble.

Without a doubt, Spencer and I had realized that at this point, it would have been a good idea to notify the hostel of problems. Butâ€¦ it was a long, cold walk to the front desk, and we chose sleep instead. We informed our roommates that the Irishman was no longer welcome in the room, and went to sleep.

The next day, Spencer and I decided to switch rooms. We didnâ€™t want any more problems with the Irishmen, and seeing that we had locked them out of their own room for a few hours, might have stirred up bad feelings. Regardlessâ€¦ neither of us wanted to experience that night again.

First days in Argentina

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 19:12:33 -0700

We’ve had an eventful couple first days here in Argentina. It’s been an enjoyable time so far in South America. We’ll be here in Buenos Aires for another 5 days, and then we’re off to Mendoza!

Arrived 3 hours late due to mechanical problems.
Took a 3 hour collectivo ride instead of a 30 minute taxi ride to save a bit of mula.
Nicole’s inappropriatly packed bags almost murdered Spencer (and Spencer almost murdered Nicole and is still trying to find a way to forgive her).
Found our hostel.
Ate at a delicious cafe for under $3 each.
Saw a few San Telmo sites, such as the Engineering School.
Purchased a 3 dollar bottle of wine, although the 75 cent bottle sitting next to it was enticing.
Enjoyed a bit of the wine while reading up on Argintine history.
Bought tickets for a tango show (later we found a better deal… but oh well)
Watched the tango show.
Danced home, being newly inspired peoples.
Slept. (finally!)
Unsuccessfully browsed for apartments in Argentina.
Took a collectivo (bus) to La Boca and had some lunch.
Shopped around and watched some more impressive, cold weather tango.
Bartered for a carrito (push cart) so that Spencer won’t have to kill Nicole and her unwieldy bags.