somethingdreamed

Tue 22 Apr 2008

The Final Week

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After nearly a week in Mendoza, it was time to move on, although it’s a city that I could definitely give some more time. My last day my friend Ty and I took a bus out into the countryside, rented some bikes, and rode off to tour some local wineries. The first that we wanted to tour was closed, but we found a second that was open and headed inside. It was a decent tour, but I kept feeling a little bit of deja vu, and with good reason. Near the end of the tour, during the tasting portion, I was certain that I had been there before. Although I had only toured 2 wineries on my last trip to Mendoza 3 years ago, this was one of them. Doh!

That night I headed to the bus station to catch the late bus to Cordoba, along with Alexia (from France) and two of her friends. Although we were on separate buses, we met up in Cordoba the next morning and found a hostel. After dropping our bags off, we set out to tour some of the beautiful 15th-century Jesuit churches in the city center.

Jesuit mission in Cordoba

Jesuit Manzana interior

We spent the following day in a small town out in the country, and then headed back for a night out on the town. I met up with my friend Eric, who’s teaching English in Cordoba, and we all went out to celebrate one of his friends’ friend’s birthday. It was a good time, but it prompted a very short night’s sleep, with the hostel check out time at 10am and all. I spent the day hanging out, and we even got to see a bit of the NCAA tournament games. That night I headed out to catch the 11:59pm bus back to Buenos Aires, my 7th and final overnight bus of the trip.

I arrived on a Sunday, specifically timed so that I could visit the Sunday markets in San Telmo and Recoleta again. I was greeted in San Telmo with a full tango street orchestra.

Street tango orchestra

The following day I finally toured the famous Recoleta Cemetery, and resolved to come back later, the next time with my good camera.

Recoleta Cemetery sunset

There was a new crew back at the Hostel Estoril, although Danny from Ireland was still there (he had arrived a few weeks before my first stay at Estoril back in the beginning of February!). In any case, it wasn’t too hard to round up a good crew to go out for some of the most amazing steaks to bea couple of months ago. Needless to say, it was just as amazing as I remember, and the rabbit was actually a really good call too.

Great steak dinner

On Monday night a bunch of us headed back to the Bomba de Tiempo, the amazing drumming circle that happens every Monday night. I spent 3 Monday nights in Buenos Aires, and went to the Bomba all three times. My second time wasn’t nearly as good as the first, but this time was fantastic. I also ran into some German guys that I had roomed with back in El Bolson, which was fun.

The nights were getting noticeably cooler in the city, but that didn’t prevent the low-key late night gatherings on the rooftop.

Hostel Estoril rooftop

Wednesday, as I was trying to check off the last few must-see things in Buenos Aires, a group of us headed over to tour some museums, including the Evita Peron museum and the Museum of Latin American Art, as well as the Recoleta Cemetery again.

Recoleta Cemetery statue

The Recoleta Cemetery, as I had discovered a couple of days earlier, is really an amazing place. It’s kind of like a small city, with each family trying to build better and more intricate mausoleums than the next.

Recoleta cemetery

Evita Peron is buried here, a long with a bunch of other famous historical figures from Argentina. One highlight for me was that as a group of us was trying to find Evita’s tomb, we encountered some Brazilians. And after speaking to them for a minute or so (in Portuguese), they genuinely asked if I was Brazilian too, and we’re very surprised when I said that I wasn’t! I can do the Brazilian accent very well, but my vocabulary is not that great. So if I talk to some Brazilians for just a couple of minutes, they’ll think I’m great at Portuguese. If we speak for 10 minutes or so, they’ll think I’m good. And if we speak for a half-hour or more, they’ll think I’m just OK. Guess I’ll need to keep practicing!

Recoleta Cemetery statue

While I wouldn’t say that Buenos Aires is quite as green as Santiago, I loved seeing all these crazy (rubber?) trees with their sprawling roots.

Tree in Recoleta

For my last full day in Argentina, I decided to head out of the city with a couple of friends from the hostel to visit some other friends from the hostel in Tigre, a river town north of the capitol. We got up early, took a one hour train north to Tigre, and then hopped a 1.5 hour boat ride to the new hostel.

Boat to Tigre

All of the rivers in the area are muddy brown, including the Rio de la Plata, which is so wide you can’t even see across it. We were cruising up the Rio Paraná, to the intersection with the Rio Colorada. (In Tigre, it seems like they have rivers, rather than streets. They even have addresses on the river!) As this is the main water shipping route to Paraguay, there are lots of really big ships as well. We passed by several rusting hulls along the shore.

Rusting hulls on the Rio Parana

Once we arrived at the Marcopolo Inn Nautico, we met up with the others from the hostel in Buenos Aires, and hung out for the day. It seemed amazing that we were only a couple of hours from a city of about 13 million people.

Rio Parana reflection

We all wanted to stay, but alas, I needed to be back so that there was no possible way of missing my flight back to the states the following day, so we took the boat back to the train back to the Buenos Aires subway, and were back at the hostel.

One final night and one final day back at the hostel, and then 10 great weeks of travel were over.

Roof top view from Hostel Estoril

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Tue 1 Apr 2008

Mendoza

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Heading back down from the mountain, Felipe and I decided to call up some of my old friends from the Universidad Catolica, and go out for a drink with them. In the end, there were four of us who went out, and it was good to see all of them again.

Dinner and drinks in Santiago

I spent the next couple of days walking around my old neighborhood in Santiago, going back to the Campus Oriente of the Universidad Catolica, where I had one of my classes. The campus is really beautiful and peaceful, and was actually used to film the fantastic Chilean film Machuca. I took one of the new roommates in my old apartment over to the campus, and we spent an afternoon taking some photos.

La Catolica Campus Oriente

That evening, we had an asado to mark the farewell of one of the German girls that had been living in the house for the last few months.

Asado en la casa

And of course there was the obligatory guitar performance of Chilean folk songs by Jose and one of his friends.

Guitar en la casa

The following day I took a 6-hour bus ride over the Andes to Mendoza, Argentina. The route passes by a bunch of famous Andean ski resorts, and the scenery is spectacular. This photo below was taken in one spot on the highway famous for its 20-something switchbacks in the road.

Road over the Andes to Mendoza

Once in Mendoza, I met up with some friends from France that I had met two weeks ago in El Bolson, Argentina, and they had graciously agreed to let me sleep at their place, in order to save some cash. I also met up with my friend Mariana, who I had met the last time I was in Chile, and Ty, who I had met at the Hostel Estoril in Buenos Aires.

I spent the first day in Mendoza exploring the town a little bit, and then the second day Mariana and a couple of her friends took me rock climbing at a bridge just a little bit out of town.

Bridge climbing

Lucho, one of Mariana’s friends, was a great climber, and he led all the routes. I hadn’t climbed in about 5 years, and I wasn’t particularly great at it when I did climb, but I decided to give it a go after one of the routes was all set up with ropes. I didn’t make it all the way to the top (probably a little less than halfway before my forearms got too fatigued) but I had a lot of fun, and it was good to just hang out in the mountains on a nice sunny day.

Bridge climbing

Tomorrow I’m heading out to Cordoba, Argentina, which is about half way to Buenos Aires. Provided the striking farmworkers allow our bus to pass without delay, I’ll spend a few days there, before heading to Buenos Aires for the last week of my trip.

Mariana bridge climbing

Tue 25 Mar 2008

Re-exploring

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I spent the last few days seeing places that I’ve already seen before, but it’s been great. On Sunday, it turned out that all of my friends were out of town, due to Semana Santa, so I headed west to the coastal city of Valparaiso. I had been to Valparaiso before, but only spent a single day. And it just happened to be the day after my camera had gotten stolen (see 2005 blog entry entitled “Crap.”). Needless to say, I wasn’t in the greatest state of mind during that first visit.

Valaparaiso streetscape

This time around, however, it was great. I left Santiago around 9am, and spent a good 4 hours wandering around the streets of Valparaiso. It was a strange contrast to the favelas (slums) in Rio de Janiero, which are pretty dangerous, because Valparaiso looks just like a very brightly colored favela, but is just a port city when it comes down to it.

Street art in Valparaiso

After my a few hours of walking around the steep and windy streets snapping photos, I headed back to the bus station and caught my bus back to Santiago, where I met up for a drink with my old friend Hector.

Monday afternoon I headed out with another friend, Felipe, to take care of some unfinished mountain business. We were both in the Montanismo I class at the Universidad Catolica, and when we had previously headed to climb Cerro Union (in winter), we were turned back by too much snow. So we set out towards the Cajon del Maipo to make another summit attempt.

Driving up the Cajon del Maipo

We were able to drive the jeep up pretty high, and after a hike of only 2 hours we reached a good campsite along the shores of Laguna El Morado. The lake has a giant hanging glacier pouring down into it, and here’s what it looked like just after sunset, complete with little icebergs and all:

Laguna & Glaciar El Morado

In the middle of the night, we were immediately awakened by what sounded like cannon fire, but it was quite apparent that a giant chuck of the glacier had broken loose and crashed into the lake. We listened for a while as the sound of crashing ice echoed around from all the surrounding mountains. Then we could hear big waves in the lake for at least a couple of minutes before they settled down again. We weren’t able to see it, but we could only imagine how big a chunk of ice it must have been.

The next morning we got up well before sunrise and made the trek up to the summit of Cerro Union, arriving just before sunrise. Here’s a shot of the El Morado mountain, with the El Morado glacier climbing up almost to the top. The glacier is approximately 8,000 feet tall, stretching all the way back down into the lake.

Summit of Cerro Union

We promptly claimed Cerro Union in the name of Chile, and then trekked back down, packed up all of our gear and headed back down to Santiago.

Claiming Cerro Union for Chile

Sat 22 Mar 2008

Back Home…

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Well, back in my old home anyway. I’m writing this post from the house that I lived in three years ago in Santiago, Chile, and honestly, it still does kinda feel like home to me.

Living Room

There are both good and bad things about traveling alone, but one of the good ones is that you can change your plans whenever you need to, or whenever you feel like it. In my case, I was in El Bolson, a small hippie town about 2 hours south of Bariloche, and I was trying to figure out how to get to Chaiten, Chile, the closest city to Parque Pumalin.

They say Parque Pumalin is hard to get to, and apparently it’s for a reason. I’m convinced that getting there wouldn’t have been too difficult. Because of the infrequent bus schedule, I was quite prepared to hitchhike, and I’m certain that it would have been pretty straightforward. But then I started thinking about how I would get out of Chaiten once I had had my fill of the spectacular Parque Pumalin, and that’s where I started running into problems. I knew that I would have to take a 10-hour boat ride from Chaiten to Puerto Montt, in ‘mainland’ Chile. I found the company that runs the boat services online, and called them to see if there were any seats available for the dates I was figuring to leave. The problem… is Semana Santa, aka Easter Week. Down here everyone has got a bunch of days off for Semana Santa, and everyone with enough money to do so ends up traveling to some other place… like Chaiten.

I spent a day pondering my options, and decided that I was more excited about the end parts of my trip than about the Pumalin part, so in the end I decided to take the 2-hour bus back to Bariloche, followed by the 6-hour bus to Osorno, Chile, following shortly after by a 11-hour overnight bus to Santiago. That way I could have a little bit more time hanging out with old friends in Santiago, Mendoza, and Cordoba. But before leaving, I had a nice asado with lots of good Argentine meats and wine, and a bunch of good friends in a rustic little cabin of a hostel.

Asado in El Bolson

I’ve been in Santiago for about 2 full days now, and I guess I really underestimated how much I would enjoy being back. I took the subway across town, passing all the stops with the familiar names that I had forgotten about. I got off at the Pedro de Valdivia metro stop, and walked the 20 minutes south to my old house, the whole while passing all the familiar old restaurants and shops, and crossing all the streets that I had walked past so many times before. One of the first things I did once I got back to the house, after catching up with my old roommate Pepe, was check the weather. Here’s what I was greeted with:

Santiago weather

Yeah, not much to complain about there. (And don’t worry, even though it said there was a 10% chance of rain today, it didn’t actually happen.) I guess I had forgotten about how beautiful and pleasant Santiago is during the summer. It probably helps that the city is a little less congested right now because of all the people on vacation, but my lasting memories of Santiago are mostly me getting sick repeatedly from the smoggy Santiago winter.

In any case, I spent my first day back mostly hanging out in the house, talking with my old roommate and meeting some of the new ones in the house. Today, however, I decided to walk all over the city, rediscovering some of the old sights and sounds that had been so familiar to me just 3 years ago. A lot of things are the same, and of course some are different. Notably, my US dollar only gets me 450 Chilean Pesos these days, as opposed to 580 last time I was here! No worries though, as I’ve got a free place to stay, and I still remember how fun it was to cook at home in Chile, given all the spectacular and cheap ingredients at my disposal here. Among the first things I ate once I got back in town: a hamburguesa italiana (hamburger with a big ole avocado on top), panqueque de chocolate (mmmm), and mote con huesillos (a type of fruit juice that comes with barley and whole peaches in it). (Oh, and speaking of peaches, I’ve been trying to find an equal to Colorado peaches throughout this entire trip. The conclusion I’ve come to, at least so far, is that it doesn’t exist. Brazilian peaches come the closest, as they’ve got pretty much the same great flavor, but they’re small, where as Colorado peaches are both tasty and humongous. I knew there was a reason why we pay $3.50 a pound for them!)

I hiked around all day, including the Plaza de Armas, Parque Santa Lucia, and Cerro San Cristobal, a little mountain located right in the center of the city. The views were great, if a little bit smoggy, but the air seemed clean enough, and the views of the Andes were amazing.

Downtown Santiago

I took the teleferico (cable car) down the mountain back into the northern part of Providencia (my old neighborhood).

Tonight I’m heading over the the Club de Jazz de Santiago, one of my old hangouts, and a place described by Lonely Planet as the most established Jazz venue in South America. I had no idea! Tomorrow I might head over the to port town Valparaiso, and later meet up with a hiking buddy. In the days that follow, I’m headed for a short camping trip in the Cajon del Maipo, just outside of town, and I’m planning to catch up with some old Chilean friends that went to UW-Madison as well. It’s great to be back ‘home’!

Sun 16 Mar 2008

Back to Patagonia

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After all the beaches and warm weather of Rio and Buenos Aires, I decided to head south to Patagonia for some late summer hiking opportunities. As I headed southwest from Buenos Aires, the terrain rapidly began to change, from fertile fields as far as the eye could see, into the barren, windswept plains characteristic of Patagonia.

Patagonian highway

The 21-hour bus ride wasn’t that bad at all. Fortunately, many of the buses in South America are about 10 times more comfortable than busses in the U.S, and they cost a small fraction of the price. This bus cost me about $55US, including two small meals. And just so we’re all on the same page here, I took a photo of one of the ‘coche cama’ seats.

Coche cama

Yep, that’s one seat on one side of the aisle, two seats on the other, because they’re nice and wide. Another peculiarity about our bus ride was that although we had a double-decker bus with seats both on top and bottom, there were only about 5 people on the bus at any given time, and only 3 by the time we got to Bariloche.

Bariloche, Argentina

I could tell that I was back in a mountain town immediately. The people seemed a little more rugged, and were recognizably more friendly. The weather was still hot though. Even though we were so far down south, the highs for the first few days were around 85F. After one day in a nice hostel, I decided to take advantage of the upcoming forecast and go for a 3-day hike in Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi.

Patagonian woods

I hiked up around ridges and through lush forests for about 4 hours, with the goal of reaching Refugio Frey, one of the mountain huts maintained by the Club Andino de Bariloche. After a steep climb of 4,000 feet at the end of the day, I reached the hut (although this photo is from the next morning).

Refugio Frey at sunrise

I camped out on the side of the lake, but was able to use the kitchen facilities inside for only 10 pesos. Sunrise over the lake the following morning was pretty stunning.

Alpine lake sunrise

The following day I hiked a brutal 6 hours to the next hut, Refugio Jakob, meeting some Spaniards, Argentines, Canadians, and New Yorkers along the way. Refugio Jakob was much nicer than the first hut, with friendlier staff and nicer facilities. The people staying at the hut were a lot more fun as well. Here’s a view of the final descent down to the lake and hut.

Refugio Jakob

We played some music on the terrible guitar they had in the hut, but then turned to cooking and eating dinner instead.

Refugio Jakob

The third day was easy, but long, and a bunch of us took the bus back to Bariloche together. I met up with one of the Canadian guys for dinner, and then we met up with some others for a jam session on some actually good guitars back at a hostel. It’s fair to say there was some talent in the house, as John was in a couple of bands back in Vancouver, and had studied music in school.

I’m back in Bariloche for a couple more days, eating plenty of steak and the famous Bariloche ice cream. I’ll head a little further south to El Bolson soon, and then cross over into Chile to visit Chaiten and Parque Pumalin, a couple of places that were not even close to on my radar at the beginning of the trip. After that, I’m heading north to Santiago, and then back into Argentina to visit Mendoza, Cordoba, and Buenos Aires again for my flight home. I’ve got a little less than a month left, and it should be good.

Mon 10 Mar 2008

Brazil

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I’m back in Argentina now, after spending nearly a month in Brazil, and truth be told, I kind of miss Brazil already! I think the culture and food and personalities of people in spanish-speaking South America are generally pretty homogeneous, but once I got to Brazil, the differences were pretty noticeable. The people look different, the food is different, the music is different, and everyone is really really friendly. We went out to bossa nova show in Ipanema for my last night in Rio, and it pretty quickly morphed into some kind of Brazilian funk/jazz show, which was interesting. In any case, it kinda seemed like the music during the closing credits of a really good movie, being of course my 4 weeks in the country.

Bossa Nova show in Ipanema

Now, back to where I left off, which was Sao Paulo. I caught a bus to Paraty, a little old colonial Portuguese town on the coast between Sao Paulo and Rio. The town is actually below sea level during high tide, which means the ocean rises up and cleans the streets every once in a while. I met up with some people from Spain and Brazil, and the next day we headed to Trinidade, a tiny fishing village just 15km away, but on the other side of a big mountain range.

Paraty

Trinidade beach

There were a bunch of amazing beaches within hiking distance of the town, and because of the fantastic Trinidade Sea and Forest Hostel, I decided to stay for a few days. The crew from the hostel was really fun, and I ended up spending a lot of beach time with a bunch of them. I had also met a Brazilian girl on the bus from Sao Paulo, and her friend owned a restaurant in ‘downtown’ Trinidade. We were all hanging out one night, when the friend mentioned that Titas were playing a concert back in Paraty the next night. Now, you probably have never heard of Titas, but there a really famous rock band in Brazil, and I actually have one of their albums back home. I had thought about maybe looking them up to see if they were playing any shows while I was in Brazil, but never got around to it. In any case, it turns out they were playing a free concert to celebrate the 341st anniversary of the founding of Paraty!! Needless to say, I ended up going to the concert. It wasn’t exactly what I was expecting, since I have their ‘MTV Unplugged’ album, but I recognized a bunch of songs, and it was a fun atmosphere.

Titas concert in Paraty

The next morning I caught the bus to Rio de Janeiro, and despite being on guard because of Rio’s reputation as a dangerous and kinda shady town, I was immediately ‘taken for a ride’. I had planned to take a city bus from the bus terminal to my hostel, but was talked into taking a taxi to the hostel, only it wasn’t an official taxi. The guy said it was a flat rate, based on the distance, and when I asked how much it would be, he said roughly 20. I asked ‘20 Reals?’ and he confirmed. Except what he actually meant was 20 kilometers.

Ipanema Beach

I was conversing with him the whole ride to the hostel, figuring that he would be less likely to try to scam someone that was friendly, but when we stopped near the hostel and I asked how much the bill was, he said ‘199 Reals’, which is about $113 US!! Anyway, I heard him say 199, but thought that it couldn’t have been right, and asked again ‘how much is it?’ He said 199 again, and I heard 199 again, so then I said ‘I don’t think I’m understanding this right, you said 1-9-9?’ He confirmed, and I was still confused, so I handed him about 30. He saw that I had a 50, and he pointed to it and said ‘no, four of these‘. At this point, I realized that he really meant 199, and then I started arguing with him. Afterall, the official taxis from the bus terminal were only 35 Reals, and I let him know that I was aware of that fact. He still wanted 199, and I told him I didn’t even have 199 on me at the time (which in fact I probably did). In any case, at this point I just wanted to get out of the taxi and get rid of the guy, so I gave him everything that he though I had (about 80 Reals) and he helped me unload my bag. I walked into the hostel knowing that I had just spent about $30US more than I should have for that taxi ride. Oh well, that was the first and the last of my problems in Rio, and I wasn’t going to let it ruin my time in the city.

Hiking above Rio

I actually wasn’t expecting to like Rio all that much. I guess I thought I would probably be too preoccupied with making sure my belongings were safe to enjoy the city. But I arrived at the hostel, and it was pretty cool atmosphere. I asked some people there what I should do after just having arrived in town, and they suggested I walk the three blocks down to Ipanema Beach. And after spending the better part of the last week on the beach just down the coast a little ways, you wouldn’t think that Ipanema would be that much different. But on weekends especially, it’s pretty incredible. First of all, it’s a giant beach, but there was hardly any space to walk around, there were so many people. In fact, you could barely see the sand at all, because the whole place was covered by umbrellas, beach towels, soccer and volleyball games and sunbathers. I almost had culture shock when comparing Paraty and Trinidade.

Ipanema beach sunset

There was a guy from Switzerland who had also just arrived at the hostel, and we decided to catch a bus over to Sugarloaf to take the cable car ride the next afternoon. Most people ride up to the top, have a look around, and take some photos, but we spent probably 4 hours up there waiting for the sun to set and the city lights to turn on. The results were pretty spectacular, especially with the Cristo Redentor statue looking down over the entire city.

Cable car up to Sugarloaf.

Niteroi

Rio at night.

The next few days were spent exploring other parts of the city with different people from the hostel. There was a lot of time spent on Ipanema and Copacabana Beaches, as well as trips up to Cristo Redentor, Tijuca National Park in the middle of the city, a couple of bossa nova shows, and to Niterói, across Guanabara Bay.

View from Corcovado

Bossa Nova show in Ipanema

I’ve also started meeting some old faces from earlier in the trip. First was Dale, a guy from Florida living in Ireland for the last 7 years who I had met on my first day in Buenos Aires. He had been staying at the Hostel Estoril for last month, before taking a 40-some hour bus ride north to Rio, and checking into the very same hostel where I was staying. He had since bought a very nice guitar off of another guy traveling through Buenos Aires, and we reminisced a little about the old days in Argentina and played some tunes.

I flew back to Buenos Aires yesterday, and immediately headed back to Estoril. Shortly upon arrival, I went to catch a famous Argentine tango show, and afterwards in the hostel I ran into my Australian friends that I had met in Trinidade. A big group of us had intended to go to a Brazilian club that (yeah, Sunday) night, and were about ready to head out at 2am (for some reason, I never get tired in Buenos Aires), when a couple of Irish girls at the hostel broke out their fiddles, and started expertly playing some traditional Irish tunes. One of the Argentines broke out his guitar, and I went downstairs to get my cavaquinho (Brazilian ukelele) and cuica (the Brazilian drum that makes the monkey-like noises). We had a nice little rooftop jam session until about 4:30am, including a rousing rendition of ‘the Lion Sleeps Tonight’, along with some Bob Marley tunes, and other songs that aren’t normally played with violins and traditional Brazilian instruments.

Tango show in Buenos Aires

This morning I saw a German girl that I had met in Sao Paulo while buying my bus ticket in the Buenos Aires bus station. Tonight we’re heading back to the Monday drum circle event that I had the opportunity to take part in last month, and then tomorrow I’m heading to the northern Patagonian town of Bariloche to officially begin the second half of my trip. It’s sure to be markedly different than the first half, with less big cities, beaches and parties, but more hiking, nature and cool weather. I’m also planning to visit friends in a couple of different places.

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Fri 7 Mar 2008

Still here…

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Hey there- Yep I´m still here. I´ve been in Rio de Janeiro since last Sunday, and I´m staying for another couple of days. I´ve got a lot of stories to tell, and a bunch of photos to show as well, but the internet (along with everything else in this city) is very expensive here! Anyway, I´m flying to Buenos Aires again on Sunday, and from there I should be able to give a more complete update. Tchau!

Tue 26 Feb 2008

Big, Big City

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Yesterday I took a tour to the top of the National Bank of São Paulo building, from which one is awarded a breathtaking view of what can only be described as big, big city. The Banespa buidling is on the center left, and looks kinda like the Empire State Building.

Banespa Building

Here are some views from the top:

São Paulo

And it looks like this in almost any direction you look….

Mon 25 Feb 2008

One Week in Brazil

Posted by robert.slowinski under General
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I’m back in São Paulo the city, after spending a week in a small city in the interior of São Paulo state, hanging out with my friend Vivi. And I offer my apologies for the rambling nature of this post, but I think I probably got about 1/2 hour of sleep on the overnight bus, only to arrive in the city at 6am! Now I’ve got to wait until 2pm for check in, when I’ll finally be able to take a nice nap.

Ok, back to the story. Vivi and I had never actually met before in person, but started doing some internet video chats a while back through some Brazilian university program in order for me to practice Portuguese, and her to practice English. (http://www.teletandembrasil.org/home.asp?NewLangID=1 is the website if you’re interested in more information).

Anyway, I caught a bus to Assis, which is about 6 hours from São Paulo, and I’m noticing a trend that distinguishes Brazilian busses from the other busses in South America: no Steven Segal, no Chuck Norris, no Jean Claude Van Damme movies. The closest we got was a half-hearted attempt to show Kindergarten Cop on one of the bus rides. But once they found out that Arnold was speaking in English with Portuguese subtitles instead of dubbed over in Portuguese, they turned it off after about 20 minutes. In any case, I wasn’t too heartbroken.

Viviane

I arrived in Assis at around 9pm, and Vivi was waiting for me at the bus station. We walked back to her apartment and I met her 4 roommates, including the new exchange student from Italy. Everyone was friendly, and it kind of reminded me of my house in Santiago, Chile. The next week was pretty relaxing, mainly because there’s not a whole lot to do in Assis (which was fine by me… I needed some time to relax and maybe get a little bit more accustomed to speaking Portuguese). They did have a guitar in the house, and the city did have some very small, but interesting bars to hang out in.

Nina the Dog sleeping

One other thing that I learned is that during the rainy season in Brazil, it rains… a lot. We have been getting roughly one strong rainstorm per day, and I don’t think stormwater management is Assis’ strongpoint. Strangely, it didn’t rain a single day I was in Argentina, but it has rained every day except for one in Uruguay and Brazil. But along with the rain, it’s been consistently hot everyday too.

Vivane, Me, Fran, Nathalia

Anyway, Vivi and I spoke roughly half and half English and Portuguese, and I think we both improved tangibly during the time I was there. Some of her friends spoke a little bit of English, but for the most part, with everyone else I was only speaking in Portuguese, and I’m staring to feel pretty comfortable talking to random people. Hopefully I’ll still remember how to speak Spanish once I get back to Argentina! Although they’re very similar, I think Portuguese is much smoother than Spanish, and therefore has a way of sneaking words into your mouth when you’re speaking Spanish, thus creating what we call ‘Portuñol’.

In any case, I’m going to spend today in São Paulo again, then head over to a couple of beach towns closer to Rio de Janeiro, and in a few days head into Rio itself. Até mais!

Sat 16 Feb 2008

Iguazu and into Brazil

Posted by robert.slowinski under General
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I´m writing this post from the 5th largest city in the world. It´s got 20 million people, and more Japanese people than any other place in the world not named Japan. It´s got more people than the whole country of Chile. Stumped? I´m in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Back in Puerto Iguazu, Argentina, I ended up staying at some strange luxury hostel, like a mix between Cancun and Argentina. It had a giant pool, and was filled with lots of young people, mostly speaking English. It was kind of a strange place to find myself just a day after waking up to 9 roosters in some guy´s backyard.

Anyway, I took the next day to just hang out at the pool and relax. Right away I ran into one guy from the Montevideo hostel who had undertaken my same bus journey about a day earlier. Later 3 other people from the Montevideo hostel would show up.

After my rest day I headed over to Parque Nacional Iguazu in Argentina to see the famous Iguazu Falls. They´re really pretty hard to describe, but pretty much any view you get of them is breathtaking, and the way we explored the park, the views just kept getting better and better. We ended up checking out the Devil´s Throat last, and the amount of water pouring down the falls almost defies description. Anyway that has seen both Niagara Falls and Iguazu says afterwards that Niagara seems more like a leaky faucet!

Devil´s Throat

The following day, I took an 18 hour bus ride over to Sao Paulo, and for the last couple of hours I´ve been hanging out and checking out the city a little bit. At first I thought the Portuguese was going to be pretty difficult, but already after only a couple of hours, I´m starting to get pretty comfortable with it. Anyway, tomorrow I´m heading off to the countryside to visit a Brazilian friend, and hopefully improve my Portuguese even further!

somethingdreamed

The Final Week

Mendoza

Re-exploring

Back Home…

Back to Patagonia

Brazil

Still here…

Big, Big City

One Week in Brazil

Iguazu and into Brazil

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