We found a Mexican restaurant while walking home the other day and last night we went back to try it out. It was actually kind of funny to see the Argentinean version of Mexican food. The chips and salsa were fried flour tortillas with what was kind of like thin tomato soup as a salsa. We got tacos – pork and chicken, neither of which had any sort of seasoning, much less spice. We also got pico de gallo (tomatoes) refried beans (canned, but not bad) and guacamole (they added some sort of cream to it rather than just salt and lemon). The worst part was that it was expensive. Skip it. We are definitely going to have to gather ingredients and host a Mexican food night. If you’re in the area let us know if you are interested.
For some reason The Simpsons are popular here. The family words in our Spanish class were even about The Simpsons. I have tried to watch it a few times on TV, but it’s hard enough trying to catch all of the words when Porteños speak in a normal voice – fake cartoon voices are way too tough.
For the past two weeks we have been taking Spanish lessons for four hours a day and my brain is overloaded. Someone at work asked me about my typical day and I realized that perhaps some of you were wondering what it is we do with all of our time – so here is a typical pattern:
7 AM – wake up and get ready for class. In U.S. time, this is quite late, but in Argentinean time, it’s quite early since most people don’t go to bed until 1AM or later.
8 AM – walk to school. Sometimes we take the subte, but it’s a nice 30 minute walk and we need the exercise. We usually arrive near the school with enough time to have coffee at a cafe close by.
9AM – 1PM – Spanish class. We are in a group class with 2 South African/Londoner guys and 2 Norwegian girls. We have just finished the beginner book and are on to the next level on Monday.
1PM – 2PM – walk home and have lunch.
2PM – 7PM – work (with breaks of course). This varies, of course, depending on when I have meetings, etc. John works on software development for the iPhone while I continue to do business processes and training for HP. We often work from the coffee shop on the corner for a few hours.
8PM – 9PM – homework
9PM or later – dinner. We go out with friends, or pick up something from the grocery to cook, or wander the neighborhood and find a place to eat.
12PM – a bit of TV/email/reading
1AM or later – sleep
Now having given you the boring details I can fill in some of the fun bits one post at a time.
Our second estancia experience was VERY different from the first. We went with a group from Ex-Pat connection to “Campo Night” for food, fun, and friends. We met the group in Palermo/Recoletta and boarded a van for the estancia. There were about 18 of us, all from different backgrounds and different countries.
When we arrived at the estancia (actually a Polo training camp), we found people finishing up Polo practice, some people caring for the horses, and many people putting up equipment for an “electronic party” later that night, but no one to greet our group. No worries, we made ourselves at home and wandered around looking at the horses and the land and the puppy for about an hour. It was quite chilly and we began wondering where our “welcome coffee and snack” was. The host from the Ex-Pat organization was on the phone with the owner of the estancia who kept insisting he was “right there in just a moment.”
So, about an hour and a half after we arrived we all crowded into the “dining room” and sat staring at plates of pastries while the hosts prepared coffee and tea. We continued talking and staring at the pastries for about 20 minutes before we finally gave up on propriety and gave in to hunger. Everyone ended up just grabbing a pastry. Someone had a few napkins stuffed in their pocket, but not enough for us all – no matter, we got crumbs on ourselves. Meanwhile, they were testing the sound system for the party later and we got to listen to techno music. We eventually got coffee and thoroughly enjoyed sitting around talking. After the coffee, they put a few bottles of liquor in the table – rum, gin, and a small bottle of unidentified green stuff which we agreed was quite good (I think it was a homemade version of Gancia).
We were all quite cold and at some point a few of us realized that the parrilla had been started outside – we all quickly moved to surround the fire. We stood around talking and then they began to bring out the wine, which, of course, made everyone happy. While most of us were outside watching the meat cook a few people helped the hosts to make salad, get plates and glasses and place settings, etc. Meanwhile they were testing the lights and sound system – we got to watch the laser and strobe lights and listen to techno music – definitely not what we expected on campo night!
We stood around the parrilla for a total of about 2 hours while the meat cooked and we talked of everything and nothing. They brought out a basket of bread and grabbed the chorizo right off the grill using the bread as a mitt. It was perhaps the best sausage I have ever had. We then went into dinner and had a huge amount of meat along with salad and bread. We ate for probably an hour and finished with a dessert of a slice of a kind of jellied sweet-potato with a slice of cheese on top. It was really interesting – kind of salty and sweet combination.
The best thing about the whole night was getting to stand around and talk to people. It was really a lot of fun getting to know everyone. After dinner we went out to warm ourselves at the bonfire, talk, (and listen to the techno music) until it was time to leave at a little after midnight. When we left there were still no guests arriving for the electronica party. We were told that they would probably show up around 1 or 2 AM – that’s the way it’s done here.
I turned 37 on Sept. 8th and had one of the best birthdays ever. John told me the night before that he had arranged a surprise for me, we had to be ready at 9:30 for someone to pick us up – that’s all he said. So, of course, I stayed awake a bit trying to figure out what it could be…
When we got in the car the next morning I still had no idea what was going on. John told me to dress in layers because we would be outside most of the time, but that was it. The other passenger in the car was a woman named Beryl from Phoenix who said something about an Estancia. I was a bit slow to catch on, but John thought I must have known at that point and gave me the details. I wish I had a picture of my face in the car – I couldn’t stop smiling!
We rode out to the Dos Hermanos estancia, north of Buenos Aires, past vast “suburbia” and then rural small towns. We turned off the highway on the gravel road to the estancia and it looked a lot like Texas – until we passed a formerly ornate building in classic European style – columns and plaster and all. It was right next to a small shack-house where there was a large pack of dogs and they were advertising pigs for sale. We were definitely not in Texas.
We arrived to a warm welcome including a great breakfast of coffee, juice, and medialuna next to the roaring fireplace. Our host told us that we would be riding horses for about 2 hours in the morning and then return for lunch and a rest, then go back out for another 2 hours followed by afternoon coffee and snacks. I was a little nervous because this was my first time on a horse that didn’t simply follow the one in front of it. We got dressed in chaps and helmets, were introduced to our horses, and away we went.
The Argentinean saddle is a bit like an English saddle in shape, (no horn) but with a large sheepskin over the top of it. I was really wobbly at first and kept feeling like I was going to fall off of the horse when we started trotting and moving into a canter. I grabbed a hold of a leather strap on the front of the saddle and managed to rub blisters into the side of my hand in record time. I had so much fun!
We rode out through the fields surrounding the main house. As it is still winter here, there were no crops, but our host pointed out the various fields (corn, wheat, hay) as we rode along. There were so many birds it was unbelievable. We saw hawks, eagles, osprey, parrots (yes, wild flocks of parrots), lots of things I didn’t recognize, and owls. The owls lived in burrows in the ground and were usually in pairs and they did NOT like us invading their territory!
After our morning ride we hobbled down from the horses and were greeted with fresh empanadas, wine, beer, and soda. It was great to stretch our legs, relax, and talk. Lunch started with salad, chorizo, mortija (blood sausage), and a cut of rib meat that I can’t remember the name of. John, Beryl, and I thought that the small table grill we had was all the meat we were having for lunch so we were all slowly enjoying it and eating a bit more salad, and as soon as the last little piece of meat was off the grill they came to get it – for the next course. Yes, there are several meat courses in a typical Argentinean parilla, it kept coming! Lomo (sirloin), bife de chorizo (a flavorful, but not as tender cut), asado, it didn’t seem like it would ever stop. When we finally convinced them we couldn’t possibly eat any more meat they brought us coffee and dessert.
We wandered around a bit after lunch to avoid a food coma and soon we were back in the saddle. This time I felt more secure, but when we started to gallop, I still held on. My blisters soon turned into open sores, but I really didn’t care. It was fantastic. I hated to see the ride end, but my knees, hand, buttocks, and shoulders were so sore by the end that it was a relief to get off the horse. We ended the day with a tour of the main grounds, more coffee, and fresh home-made doughnuts. Definitely one of the best birthdays ever!
In case they are not putting much about this in the U.S. News, Bolivia experienced 2 very violent days of rioting (12 people killed) and the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales, blamed the U.S. for backing the protesters. He threw out the U.S. ambassador on Wednesday. On Thursday, the president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez said that he had uncovered a plot by the U.S. to kill him and overthrow his government. He threw the U.S. ambassador out. The U.S. has reciprocated and thrown out the ambassadors of Venezuela and Bolivia. As you can imagine, this did not go over well in the rest of South America.
Why am I writing about this? Because today there was a HUGE protest here in Buenos Aires against the plot of the United States to overthrow the governments of Bolivia and Venezuela. It was not that close to where we live (5 miles at least) but we saw it on TV. People are upset with Bush and the U.S. government – not Americans in general so we don’t feel at all strange about being here. Our Spanish is very limited right now so trying to make ourselves understood if we got into an uncomfortable situation would be difficult, otherwise we would go down and watch the protests. They are quite organized, not at all violent, and very peaceful protests here from what we have seen – nothing like what happened in Bolivia, so no need to worry.
Both Chavez and Morales are known for throwing around accusations, but it makes you wonder. I seriously doubt that there was a plot of assassination, but wouldn’t be that surprised if the U.S. did give some sort of aid to anti-government groups in Bolivia. The U.S. government has been known to secretly back “rebel” groups to try and overthrow governments from time to time.
Meanwhile, life goes on as usual. Last night we went to a meeting called Drinking Liberally sponsored by Democrats Abroad, mostly because we miss speaking to other people and are interested in the upcoming election. We don’t have enough Spanish yet to speak to Argentinians in an intelligent manner so it was great to have real conversations. It was also nice to meet other people who had moved to BA for “no particular reason”. Many of them have been here for several years now and they are a great resource to help us figure out how things work here. Today we worked for a few hours, went and got coffee, walked around for a while, had lunch of empenadas y lorco, came home and worked more, took a break for tea, worked more, and are now surfing the Internet and making dinner. Tomorrow we are going with a group of Ex-Pats to “Campo Night” – going out to an estancia to have dinner and a bonfire and lots of talking. We leave Buenos Aires at 4PM and will probably leave the estancia around midnight or 1AM.
I decided to move our site to a managed hosting service this weekend, so everything will look a bit hinky for a couple of days.
In addition to moving to a new site, we’re moving our blog software over from Blogger to WordPress. It’s been a fairly painless process so far, and in the process I’ve gotten a nifty single-file XML archive of our entire blog history. Images import may be an issue; as you can see (if you’re reading this post soon after I’ve posted it), I haven’t gotten around to that yet.
To complicate matters, our old dedicated server in Colorado is on the fritz, so I can’t port the images over right now.
Yeah, it’s been a week and I miss Mexican food. John and I cruised the grocery stores the other day looking for ingredients. Most Portenos (residents of Buenos AIres) do not eat spicy food so finding chilies was a big concern. We did find some dried chilies in the specialty section of a large grocery store – we were very excited. We then discovered that there are often little old ladies sitting outside of the grocery stores on the weekends selling their produce – including fresh chilies! We’re saved. Now we only need a kitchen.
Once we get a place, you are all welcome to come visit, just bring some Tabasco Sauce, or Peppers, or Thai Chili Paste with you.
Ok, so it’s been over a year since we’ve made any significant updates to this site. We’ve been traveling on and off since moving back to Seattle, both together and separately. From Cape Town to Costa Rica to Corsica, there’s a lot of posting to catch up on.
We just moved to Buenos Aires today, and plan to stay down here for about 5 months. Right now we’re staying at the Complejo Tango Hotel Boutique for a few days while we get a feel for the neighborhoods and find a more permanent apartment. The hotel has a beautiful Tango dinner theater and as I’m posting this I can hear the Tango music starting up downstairs.
We’re feeling a bit drugged from the overnight flight from Seattle, but still managed to wander around the town a bit today. Already we’ve discovered they make wonderful coffee here and are generally pleased with our choice of home for the next half year.
