| |
Que
Guay - 28/10/04
Sorry, I know its been a while but I have had a hectic few weeks
(yes, we backpackers do have them sometimes!), although it
should mean that this mail, although long, should also be
enjoyable. Maybe.
Right now I can hear the dulcet tones of John Motson from the
next booth, something tells me someone is playing FIFA. However
I now believe you haven't seen a Premiership game until you have
watched one out here. Not only do you get the usual
GOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAALL!!! stuff but they play music in the studio
when the team scores, the commentators get as worked up as the
crowd, they even sing along with the chants, interesting to hear
them chanting LIV-ERP-OOL LIVERPOOL FC, and its all as far away
from the reserved attitude back home as can be. Class.
So I left you to get on the bus to from Ushuaia to Buenos Aires.
Well I got on the bus and 38 hours later got off, in a different
climate, different terrain and different world. Buenos
Aires is probably the most European capital city out here and in
my books vies with Mexico City as the best. Firstly the sights -
the US Capitol-esque Congreso building, the Casa Rosada (Pink
House) where the president lives, and with the famous balcony
that Evita used to look from, the gardens in Palermo, the Plaza
de Mayo, the national park situated just the other side of a
small river from the bustling city and also a quite interesting
art museum with a quality collection of modern masterpieces. With
my new friend Dshami I visited the La Boca district, home of
Tango, of the poor and, more importantly, home of Boca Juniors
FC, pretty cool.
La Boca, Buenos Aires
A quick lesson on Argentinian society A). Never go out to
eat before 9:30, B). Never go out to a bar before 11:00, and C).
Never, ever go clubbing before 2:00. And if you are
home before 8:00 in the morning you lose. I met up with my
friend Virginie who is studying in Buenos Aires and she took me
and our friend Janine out for a few days of BA socialising,
including a bar called Pelvis where the barmaids wear just the
skimpiest of skimpy lingerie (they wanted to go, who was I to
argue), we went for the customary tasty bife de chorizo (steak)
in Campo Bravo and drinks at Jackie O´s, had some artesanial
beers and drank lots of Pastis in a French bar....blah blah
blah.
We had to escape this routine so Virginie cut classes and joined
me and Dshami and we crossed the Rio Plata to Uruguay. Starting
off in Colonia which is (unsurprisingly) a beautiful colonial
town, very relaxing, very green, a wonderful antidote to the
maelstrom of Buenos Aires. Passing through Montevideo as Uruguay
played Argentina at football meant a deserted town centre, even
on Saturday, but the bars were a bustling hive and the perfect
example of the open-armed amiability of the Uruguayans, even at
4-2 down they never stopped smiling and chatting. Also in
Montevideo Virginie and I shared a Uruguayan parillada (mixed
grill) and I hate to say it but it was superior and far, far
bigger (is that possible) than those of Argentina. Basically
what it consists of (in both countries) is every bit of the
animal chopped up and barbecued, innards and all. From here we
headed to the coast, bypassed the resort of Punta del Este and
shot through to Punta Del Diablo, a quiet surfing and fishing
town. Staying in Winstons (a mad hippie driven insane
by 11 years in the Navy) cabana we found a horse outside and
after chatting with the owner we all - Winston, Liver (the owner
of the horse), Virginie, Dshami, me and Bruno (a Uruguayan
tourist) climbed aboard for a ride. We ended up at
Brunos holdiay cabana, met his family and spent the afternoon
drinking beer/wine and spirits and eating meat (of course). By
the end Bruno was so drunk he was treating me as his son,
dropping pearls of wisdom to me in Castallano! Virginie, Dshami
and I didn't stop there however and after cooking spuds on our
fire, and more wine and beer, Virginie and I fell asleep on the
roof of the cabana, after attempted to see the stars better.
Another day hanging out with the daughter of Bruno, Ines, first
eating lots of great fish and then lying on the beach followed
before getting a bus back to Montevideo. We left
Virginie there and headed on for the border town of Fray Bentos.
Fishermen at Punta del Diablo
Sound familiar? We took the
tour of the disused factory, which basically supplied meat to
the whole western world, guaranteed if you had corned beef in
the 70's this is where it came from, they used to
"process" 5000 cattle a day in the good times and it
was the first place in Uruguay to get electricity, Montevideo
had to wait for years later! This was the end of my Uruguayan
odyssey but the country left such an impression on me, its so
beautiful, the people are incredibly friendly and yet hardly
anyone visits, it is now my number two country out here.
Fray Bentos disused factory
Back in Argentina we headed for Rosario, birthplace of Che
Guevara. Seeing his first home it is amazing that he became such
an icon for socialism, a plush pad or what. I left Dshami in
Rosario and shot back towards the Andes to Mendoza. Nice
city, lots of tree lined boulevards and leafy plazas and a giant
park with a lake similar to the Serpentine. Unfortunately this
is where I realised that my camera was actually buggared and I
have no photos of Uruguay or Rosario and only a couple of
Mendoza. A brief stop in Cordoba, another colonial city and
quite pleasant but none to interesting for a short stop,
followed before hitting Salta in the north. If
Mendoza invoked memories of the part of Chile opposite, which it
didn't really, then Salta definitely reminded me of the Atacama
desert, hot and dry. After three successive
night-buses I was looking forward to a early night. On Saturday
in Argentina that was never going to happen and so at 2:00 I was
off with the rest of them to dance and drink the night away. The
funniest moment came on our return to the hostel when I found a
naked couple in my bed, no sheets. Hmm. The owners
think she was a hooker as apparently she told the reception it
was her brother (close family). I eventually got a couple of
hours sleep in a clean bed before taking the bus across to
Resistencia. The morning in Resistencia was quite
depressing, I saw some amazing cloud formations and went out to
take a photo only for them to turn into a colossal storm and
plunge the terminal into darkness. I got a bus out to
the nearby city of Corrientes, apparently Greene's setting for
The Honourary Council, where the weather had cleared up and the
sun was beating down. After wandering along the river bank I
bumped into two girls who I had waved at earlier, two sisters,
and they invited me to drink mate (Argentinian tea) with them.
Its a national institution , more so than in the UK, it is
necessary to carry your thermos and mate EVERYWHERE you go, and
it is an honour not to be turned down to be invited to join in.
So I did and we spent the afternoon doing just that. Even
though I was heading on to Iguazu that night I decided that I
wouldn't mind taking one of the girls out to dinner and so we
headed back to Resistencia, drank more mate with her other
sister, and ate in the terminal.
And so I finally got to Iguazu. I actually only spent three
hours at the famous waterfalls out of the four days I spent
there. They are pretty amazing, so much power and all that,
though I have to say I prefer Angel Falls. Its not
the falls themselves but the fact that with Angel Falls you have
to fly in and chug upriver Nam-style and sleep in hammocks to
see the falls whereas here you get to the admission and its like
DisneyWorld, you take a small narrow-gauge train to the first
set of falls and another up to the Devils mouth and all the
trails are on metal bridges, not the jungle trekking at Coraima
(Angel Falls). But anyway I spent the rest of my four days there
hanging out with the barmen and barmaid of a local drinking
spot. Why? Well what happened was, on the first night I was
there until about 5:30. After watching the boss
dribble tequila down himself, get on his motorbike, fall
straight off it, BREAK his leg and damage his bike (good advert
for drink driving). I went back on the next night and Valeria
(the barmaid) and I went for a walk down to the Tres Fronteras
(Argentina/Brasil/Paraguay) for sunrise and the last two nights
we all went out dancing. I also took Valeria out for a parillada
one day as well. It was one of those places where you almost get
stuck and you have to make yourself leave before it is too late.
Iguazu Falls, Argentina side
So I crawled (literally as I
stumbled out of a club and onto a bus) out of Iguazu heading for
Paraguay, necessiting a half hour bus ride through Brazil, with
its strangely familiar yet not quite Portuguese signs, in order
to get to Ciudad Del Este. This is one of South
Americas most corrupt cities and THE place to be if you want to
buy a camera, or in fact any electronics equipment, or a bootleg
CD, pair of shoes or family size pack of washing powder. I also
saw the most amazing storm ever in the evening, and a lot of you
will know how excited I get over a good storm. So much energy. I
would of got back to my hotel in time but I was trying to talk
to the girl next to me on the bus and missed my stop and so I
ended up huddled under the flimsiest of canopies along with half
of the city. Within minutes the entire street was
flooded and everything had been knocked/blown down and washed
away in an incredible example of the power of nature. I did make
it home eventually and fell asleep as the rain poured in through
my window (well I say window, there wasn't actually any glass in
it).
The penultimate stop on this adventure was Encarnacion in
southern Paraguay. I visited the Jesuit ruins of
Trinidad and Jesus which were...well...ruins. Probably
the least visited ruins in the world, there was no-one else at
either whilst I was there, foreign or local. Returning
to Encarnacion I got chatting with the waitress from the food
stall (yes they have street food here, how happy am I ,
yesterday I had bife con huevo for breakfast - beef steak topped
with fried egg and onions! - and she invited me to vsit her
church with her. I spent the afternoon kneeling
inside her church, the floor was carpetted with flattened
tobacco boxes (reminiscent of the good old smuggling days of
France and Belgium), as they sang songs and prayed to God. Apparantly
two Sundays ago the Priest, or whatever he is called, profesised
that they would be visited by a stranger from far away who
speaks English. Guess who that turned out to be?
Therefore I spent the afternoon receiving food (didn't need to
buy dinner), gifts and blessings, being the centre of attention
and making promises to spread the word back in England. All
it did for me was make me want a cigarette!
Jesuit missions, Trinidad (near Encarnacion)
And today I have wandered
around Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay. With a
population of only 1.2m it is small by Latin American standards
and as a result quite quiet as well. The usual mix of
colonial architecture, street stalls obstructing every sidewalk
and the constant belching of fumes from the bumper to bumper
traffic. But it is not a bad place to end the trip
although my room is on the wrong side of town and it requires a
stroll through the red light district to get there.
|
