guest post from molly!!! the doggs do buenos aires!!

HOLA CHICAS Y CHICOS!!!!!

beara was kind enough to let me do a GUEST BLOG POST in honor of my very first trip to SOUTH AMERICA!!! So here we go, the Bear, the Mollster, and BUENOS AIRES!!!

i think everyone—mom, dad, sarah, my roommates, etc—were a little concerned about how i would fare here. the day before i left, sarah sent me this text message:

“dogg, i am going to be there by 7:15 tomorrow at the airport! IF I AM LATE, it is probably because there are protests blocking off the highway. but i WILL GET THERE! wait for me by the McDonalds, and if you get lost, do this: start clapping your hands, and then people around you will start clapping their hands, and they’ll lift you onto their shoulders and then i will hear the clapping and find you!”

needless to say… this did not boost my confidence at all. shockingly though, after a eight hour flight from miami during which i think i permanently cricked my neck, i managed to make it all the way through customs (i didn’t even mess up and have to go back in line because i didn’t pay my entrance fee first like sarah did hahaha), found my bag, and knew enough spanish to know that salida meant exit… through the glass doors i went and there was THE BEARA!!!!

i got a very argentine welcome as we left the airport… lo and behold, my very first protest was taking place right outside the terminal. i’d see two more that day (one of which was for the Banker’s Union, which i found hilarious), and at least a half dozen more over the course of the trip. lesson learned: argentines reallyyyy like to complain. and in a public way haha.

we made it into Buenos Aires with no problems, and the first person to meet was ABU!!!! freaking tiny but so gosh darn adorable… she doesn’t know much english BUT she WAS able to tell me that sarah is “craazzyyy”. guess the bear is nuts on all continents. i also got to try mate for the first time. if you’ve read sarah’s post on it, you could see how i’d be a little hesitant to give it a whirl but it is actually REALLY good! and very healthful tasting. i think abu was impressed with how quickly i took to it haha. and bear’s host mom patricia made the MOST delicious welcome cake with strawberries and dulce de leche… so good and exactly what the doctor ordered after 20 hours of travel! 

next stop was one of beara’s favorite cafes… i attempted to order in spanish (fail) and kept saying “thank you” whenever the waiter brought us anything. at one point he put down my water and said “thank you” back. so embarrassing. bear next took me around some of the main drags to introduce me to BA. it is muucchhh different than i had been expecting… it’s busy and loud and bright and a lot like my own favorite city, the Big Apple. of course there, you have to move with a purpose or risk getting knocked off the sidewalk, and here, everyone moves muchhhh slower, more at a stroll. but there’s theatres and cafes and street side magazine stands, so i felt more at ease than i had thought i would! it also helped that there are preshy labs and golden retrievers EVERYWHERE in this city!!!

when we got home i successfully took my first real nap in yearsss… the jetlag definitely took over.  beara woke me up in time for “merienda”, which is basically a coffee break… between 5-7 pm. the american in me reallyyy wanted a cocktail, but i went the argentine route and got a café au lait. or café con leche (still the only thing i can successfully order in spanish). we went to dinner next and i was introduced to my first “lomo”—argentine steak!! I’ve never been a fan of red meat but even i could tell that they really know how to cook it down here. sarah, the steak aficionado, seems to agree as i watched her demolish three steaks over the course of my five day trip!

next was an argentine folk music show at a restaurant, where i learned two new words: clerico (sangria!!) and cerveza (beer!!). the entertainment was great but the best part of the night was when beara got AGGRESSIVE in true mb fashion with the waitress IN SPANISH! she told her we would NOT be spending an additional 30 pesos in addition to the cost of our ticket because no one had informed us of this requirement beforehand. and lo and behold, we were given the bill with only TWO beers on it, instead of the “required” four. BOOM HEAD SHOT GO BEAR.

the next day (after quiteee a bit of sleeping in), we gave our presents to abu, iñaki, and mel (sarah’s host siblings). they loveddd the giradelli chocolate (mel has actually been to giradelli square in sf!) and abu especially loved the book on california. next we trekked to the center of town, where the presidential house (also known as the “pink house” for its bright pink color at night!) is located. i got a brief intro to the Kirchners, the beloved leaders of argentina. mrs. kirchner is now president and mourning the death of her husband, also a former president of argentina. talk about a power couple (although he is quite homely lol). sarah (who according to her host mom patricia is “very political") insisted we stay and watch the abuelas march around the circle in front of the pink house. each thursday at 3:30, these old women march around the circle in a quiet protest and remembrance of family members that were “disappeared” during the military dictatorship. while we were waiting for it to start i got to see just how good bear’s gotten at spanish; she chatted up several different onlookers and had absolutely no trouble understanding them and carrying on conversations (while i looked like quite the turista as i just stood there speechlessly hahaha).

after the abuelas we visited san martín’s tomb (for those not in the know—like i was before this trip—he liberated argentina, chile, and peru from spanish rule!) and took a thanksgiving siesta before dinner. bear took me to a great restaurant (called “king of wine”). the waiters loved us, although the farther we got into our bottle of cabernet i’m not so sure if the soccer game watching patrons were too thrilled with our loud laughter. oh well. after dinner, bear’s friends paige and hannah joined us for drinks at a great bar that reminded me a lot of my faves in NYC. except the price of TWO drinks was about half the price of ONE in New york… love this place. i got to hear lots of their stories from their time here… a lot of which were quiteee farkle-ish haha.

on friday, we strolled to recoleta, one of the nicest areas in BA (and right up my ally). the buildings are GORGEOUS there and the shops are quite luxe, a lot like 5^th in NYC. next was lunch at one of her and her friends’ fave places; apparently they are pretty much known there as the ravioli kids because they all order the same pumpkin ravioli every week! i don’t really blame them: it is INSANELY good and i’m usually not a huge pasta fan. definitely a winner.

awkwardly trying to take a picture with the stage at teatro colón!! our
back row, highest level seats were kinda cramped though!! 

i got to see the study abroad offices next while bear had literature tutoring… then our daily café con leche break and then teatro colon for the symphony!! i had said to bear beforehand that it was a good thing that it wasn’t an opera because i’d have no idea what was going on, and then after three gorgeous instrumental pieces… they whip out some opera. wonderful. needless to say i had nooo idea what the songs were about, even with some of sarah’s translating. but the theatre was stunning, one of the biggest in the world, and i finally saw some actually attractive argentine men in the crowd (up until that point i’d been confused as to why they have any sort of good reputation at all… most are nothing to look at and if i heard one more “linda” i was going to lose it on the closest one near me!!!).

dogg tries her first real empanadas!! one chicken, one corn!!

after the show we met up with sarah’s friends will and brendan for dinner at los cuartitos, which is right around the corner from sarah’s apartment but she’s never been despite will’s rave reviews. the place is HUGE, with amazing pizzas and incredible empanadas. the waiters are hysterical too, they got a kick out of how loud we were and the fact that i had noooo idea what was going on given the language barrier. we got a lot of looks when i knocked over a chair on our way out (thank youuuu half bottle of white wine) but i think they liked us… we saw our waiter outside the restaurant the next night and he seemed pretty excited to see us, so that’s a good sign haha.

next was an argentine favorite: CROBAR. for those that haven’t traveled to the BA, let me get you up to speed on the hours. first of all, argentines don’t really eat breakfast. according to sarah, they drink coffee and sip mate all day until lunch which is usually around 2. coffee break is between 5 and 7, and dinner isn’t until 9 AT THE VERY EARLIEST. the first night i was here we were very UN-argentine and went to dinner at 830… while most people were still sipping on café con leche and medialunas (which are mini croissants). most people don’t eat until around 11 pm!! in fact, when we went out after the opera, there were kids in the restaurant eating dinner. at MIDNIGHT!!!! one kid WAS ASLEEP AT THE TABLE! which was actually hilarious but really?!? no one goes out until 1 am, also at the earliest, and clubs and bars are open until 7. people get breakfast afterwards and then sleep until 2 or 3 (on the weekends anyway). all in all, this timetable is veryyy different from what i’m used to (remember the molly that went to bed at 9 every night?!! she’d last three minutes in BA haha).

anyways, back to crobar. we had to wait until 1 to go, otherwise we would be pulling a huge faux pas. the club is located kind of out of the way, but upon walking in i could tell it would definitely be worth it. it is a hugeee space, with like, five bars (so much nicer than tombs where it takes half an hour to get a freaking drink!!!) and they had a live 80s cover band playing when we walked in. yes, you read that right: an 80s cover band. in argentina. love it.

unfortunately i quickly found that argentines don’t understand how to make my favorite drink: vodka soda with a splash of OJ. sarah tried but they just didn’t get the concept lol. soooo we settled on beer. after busting out some ACDC and queen, the lead singer announced that they’d like all the girls in the audience to sing along with the next song: hot and cold by katy perry. OBVI bear and i were ALL over THAT. we took over the mic they brought out onto the dance floor and jammed with the guitarist for the song. priceless.

on saturday we spent most of the day wandering again through recoleta, through one of the many BA markets and the city cemetery, where we saw the grave of evita (still not entirely sure what she did but bear insists she is very important in argentine history lol). during our pizza lunch some sort of fight broke out that pulled sarah away from our table (out of nosiness, not involvement haha), which left ME to attempt to order for us. i’m pretty sure i pronounced the word for “basil” completely wrong, but the pizza arrived correctly. so fracaso (failure) avoided!

that night we went to another argentine destination, fuerza bruta, which is… a show i suppose. probably one of the most bizarre experiences of my life… can’t really explain what happens, but at the end the entire audience gets soaked by these huge showers and it turns into a dance party/rave. hilarious, but a total acid trip. bear did have a good idea though… someone needs to open a club where every night ends with a simulated rain fall throughout the club! JayZ, get on that!!!

more of sarah's photos of molly's food. dogg likes her dulce!!
oh, and nice boob dogg. 

after the show (we emerged dry, sarah had already seen it so she knew how to avoid the showers haha) we met up with thomas to go to one of their favorite bars in san telmo. they had the MOST amazing dulce de leche crepes … i definitely want to try to bring the dulce trend back to the US it is so gooddd. and the whole time the bar was playing vintage music videos that half the place actually watched! they were pretty amazing though… who knew that MJ and britney spears performed together?!? before they both became train wrecks that is lol.

and today is my very last day in south america. most of it was spent walking through the market in san telmo, which is HUGE. it goes for blocks and blocks and blocks! we also attempted a trip to boca that was a hugeeee fracaso. the spaghetti we ordered was cooked in SOY SAUCE (?!?!) and the sangria was more smoothie than wine. GROSS. and then the most original pick up line to date: “hey, barbies, where are you from?!?” gag meee. as we were leaving (more like running quickly away from the horrendous-ness) sarah and i remembered the quite poignant phrase that was originally shouted by a giants fan after the gents lost to the A’s at the oakland coliseum: “this place is a DUMP!!!!” so true, fellow fan. so true.

tonight we are aiming to go to bed BEFORE 4 or 5 so i can get up and catch my flight back to gtown. so to close this blog post, the top ten things i’ve learned in the BA: 10. you don’t really need to tip here!! well, we always did, but a 10% tip is considered generous!! you can leave 2 pesos on the table and they’re just over the moon about it! it’s wonderful!! and you don’t need to tip cab drivers AT ALL! i think i would’ve saved about 200 if that was the case in NYC!!

9. wine is often cheaper than water. which is good because i probably drink more of the former than the latter (horrible i know, i’m like a camel though i don’t need that much agua!!).

8. you can NOT get change here, and they HATE large bills. coins are basically sacred because it is just so gosh darn hard to get a hold of them!!

7. You really can’t count on this country for anything. and i’m not just saying that, it really is true. on any given day, the bus drivers could be on strike, or the subway conductors, or flight attendants, taxi drivers, anyone!! and when that happens, the whole city can just shut down. sarah was NOT kidding when she said the only reason she’d be late is because people were cutting off highways. it’s TRUE!

6. dogs here are SO well behaved. they all walk in a neat little cluster and LEAP into line whenever they are told. they’re also all adorable. and BIG! i couldn’t believe how many labs and goldens there are, breeds that normally need a lot more space than a crowded city can offer them!

5. they really DON’T hate americans. like, at all. we were approached a bunch of times by people who wanted to chat/practice their english, and then were pleasantly surprised to find that sarah spoke spanish (again, i’d just stand there and pretend i had any sort of clue as to what was going on). and sometimes they like americans a little TOO much… we got some pretty hilarious cat calls and pick up lines. the best being, “beautiful! divine! the two of you!”

4. they do NOT make salads. at all. one “salad” we saw was hard boiled eggs, shaved carrots, salt, and olive oil. ummm what?!?!

3. argentines drink caffeine ALL DAY. which is, as sarah pointed out, why they are so crazy. mate, café con leche, espresso… they just drain it all day long. they also enjoy a rather terrifying sounding drink called “speed” which is akin to american red bull. i guess you kind of have to drink the stuff if you’re going to stay up til 7 am.

2. argentines are quite contradictory in some ways. for example, it is nothing to see a couple completely going at it and sucking each others faces on a bus at like, 2 o clock in the afternoon, but you will NEVER see an argentine dirty dancing in a club. in fact, they don’t really dance at ALL. it’s just a lot of standing and weird fist pumping.

1. sarah is AMAZING at spanish. and at being an argentine in general. she translated every menu, knew the bus system like the back of her hand, bitched out a waitress who tried to pull a fast one, made friends with random people on the street, and would carry on 2 hour long chats with abu and patricia. incredible. anyone who knows me knows how much i struggle with french (in a biggg way haha), but my sister is the exact opposite with spanish. she LOVES it. and the people who speak it, whether they are argentines, hondurans, or ecuadorians. if she didn’t have me to drag around she easily could pass for an argentine. but with miss turista following her around… i kind of blew her cover ;)

xoxoxo love you beara!!!

ferias and a few of my favorite things

my favorite sunday tradition back at home (along with downing giant bowls of crispix and frolicking with bradshaw at the dog park) is biking to the farmer's market in town with my mom (miss you dogg!!). we always mooch off the free samples and i make sure to buy enough chocolate-covered almonds to last me the week. my mom also flirts on my behalf with a half-bearded, half-uruguayan vendor who we refer to as "pasta boy". grand ole times in moraga.

now, argentina doesn't have much in terms of the farmer's markets that i love so much. they don't have much in terms of fresh california-quality produce to begin with (think bananas and maybe the occasional grapefruit), but argentina makes up for it in a special way: artisan markets. nothing can permanently replace my beloved farmer's market, but the street fairs have undoubtedly become one of the highlights of my buenos aires weekends.

albeit a tourist trap, san telmo still ranks high as one of my favorites. not only because san telmo itself wins by far as my all-time favorite neighborhood of buenos aires, but because, out of all the ferias, san telmo is definitely the most ridiculous. the market stretches for blocks and blocks, starting at plaza de mayo and ending in plaza dorrego (more or less), where you can always top of the afternoon of strolling with some live tango music and dancing. when i arrived here in the winter, i bought my very porteño-esque leather cross-shoulder bag at one of the various leather stalls and have used it literally every day of my life since then.

last weekend, my friend thomas and i hiked out to the outskirts of the city, almost an hour bus ride from where we live for la feria de mataderos. grossly underrated and underhyped, this particular market was a sight for the eyes and provided a nice contrast from the tourist-replete san telmo one. lots of gaucho stuff!! the barrio of mataderos lies on the periphery of the city where there is more land and the las pampas countryside is even closer and the cowboy culture is pretty visibilewe wandered through the packed streets and were even lucky enough to find some FREE SAMPLES!!!!!! i felt right at home!!

 i searched and searched for my soul mate like i have on countless occasions, coming up empty handed yet again. the problem is that i have a very distinct image in my head of EXACTLY what i want: dark wood, simple adornment or extra design, and big enough so i don't have to refill the thing every five seconds. at one stall, i thought that maybe i had finally found my soul mate mate after many long and disappointing months. then thomas pointed out to me that it was DEFINITELY not a gourd, but rather a mortar and pestle duo to grind corn or mash god-knows-what. fail on sarah's part.

after that pathetic misunderstanding, we came across an awesome vendor selling leather journals and address books and ended up buying matching ones with maps of south america on them!!! mine had an extra touch of hot pink for the girliness in me. we both realized long ago that our semester in argentina will NOT our last time in south america, and so we bought the journals for future travel logging, when we are back in the neighborhood once again. since thomas and i are also the best traveling pair of all time, we are planning a tentative graduation trip of adventuring through other parts of south america we weren't able to visit on this south american stint. thus they will definitely come in handy for recording memories and insights!! writing this blog has made my journaling fall by the wayside on a big scale, but oh well. i'll be going back to my favorite daily activity when i return home!! i've loved working on these blog posts, but nothing can possibly beat scribbling away in my leather journal, under the covers of my bed in the middle of the night. miss that. the coolest part of our matching journals was when the craftsman whipped out his burning inscriber thing (engraver?? no idea how one might refer to that) and carved our names right into the leather!! i look forward to writing in the south american journal in the future, i know my latin american adventures won't be ending this december when i head home for break!!

we finished the great afternoon at an old café (1900!!) which had the most amazing looking medialunas ever. but they ran out by the time we got around to ordering some!! bummer. five peso cup of wine instead?? okay. me parece bien. the place had a great old-style argentine vibe that i loved. since we got shafted on the medialunas and there were very few food options in general, we strolled around outside until we found a random little shack selling choripán and chimchurri!!

call me the quilombera

when you commit to an entire weekend in winery land, you can only expect a few sloppy moments here and there. only makes sense. however, the funny thing about my weekend in argentina's vineyard region was that i was a walking disaster not on drunk legs but on sober ones. and the longer the legs, the bigger the walking disaster, right?? 

my argentine grandmother, whom we call "abu" (short for abuela), knew i had it coming. as i was scrambling to get my life and belongings together before heading out to mendoza, an tranquil town of malbec and mountains on the border of chile, i explained to her that i needed to stop being such a total quilombo, the argentine slang word for "mess". in agreement, she smiled and renamed me "la quilombera", turning the simple noun for mess into a noun for a person-mess, i.e. ME. 

on the bus to mendoza when i was telling my friend thomas about the new nickname abu had coined for me, he pointed out that this is the all-time perfect spanish nickname for me, not just because it aptly describes my tasmanian-devil style but because it LITERALLY contains my english nickname within it. for those that don't speak spanish, quilombera is pronounced key-lomb-BEARA!! can you say destiny?? whereas my ecuadorian friends sometimes call me "osa", directly taking the spanish word for bear and adding a feminine ending (how nice of them), the argentine version suits me even better. the fact that my own nickname is embedded within the argentine word for mess proves that 1) argentina and i are meant to be and 2) being a mess really is part of my nature and i might as well accept it once and for all. during our three incredible days in mendoza, the quilombera and her friends were in FULL FORM, i think i might have rubbed off on them.

we arrived in mendoza mid-day on friday, greeted by the best weather ever and stunning snow-capped andean mountains in the distance. after checking into the hotel and gobbling down milanesa lunches in fifteen minutes flat, we jumped into a horseback-riding excursion at the last minute and caught the van that would take us up to the pre-cordillera, the smaller mountain range that precedes the main attraction, the andes. the little hillside ranch, in the middle of nowhere, featured a huge pen of goats (who kept biting my sneakers, i was not feeling that) and the cutest puppies ever. also, the mini ranch featured the hottest gaucho of all time. it was quite a pleasant scene.

do you wanna DANCE?!?! 

we were assigned our horses and the gaucho wranglers helped us up into the saddles. the second i placed my left foot into the stirrup and went to swing my right leg over the top, my jeans completely ripped, clean slice right on the inside of my thigh and under my butt. i burst out laughing and stopped, and then when i attempted a second time, the rip only doubled in size. quilombera. i was given the biggest horse out of everyone, and was slightly worried about the upcoming ride when i learned his name: "black soul". didn't bode too well. my friend thomas was given a horse named "clavel", who seemed like a sweetie, but whose name we later found out means "flower of death". how lovely!! the afternoon ride through the mountains was absolutely idyllic, definitely one of the more memorable rides of my life and "black soul" ended up being more of a sweetie than i had been anticipating. "flower of death" had some issues with the whole trotting thing and, after one failed attempt, thomas was given a shrub to use as a makeshift whip, which we nicknamed the "rally rama" (rama = branch).

me and black soul....maybe as good a horse as ALLLVIN 

one of the best parts of the two hour ride was our incredible lope through the hillside, definitely the best moment of any horseback ride. i remembered my first lope ever at the alisal ranch, when mom and i took a private lesson and enjoyed a exhilarating lope through a meadow of mustard flowers. this one was almost as amazing. my friend thomas and i got so wrapped up in the moment that we both inadvertently started whooping and hollering "dale, dale, dale!!!!" (which basically means "go") uncontrollably. the gauchos were definitely wondering what breed of crazy americans had hit town.

we enjoyed a relaxing pit stop in the shade for some mate and these salty, rock-hard bread disks that are apparently pretty common in the mendoza dessert region, but were actually pretty disgusting. gaucho hottie was all prepared with his complicated mate setup: along with the thermos of hot water and the wooden mate (the spitting image of the one i've been imagining in my mind that i want to buy), he had this cool sack thing resting on his leg, with one pocket for yerba and another pocket for sugar, a metal spoon in each. quite a lot of pieces for something as simple as mate. we chatted for a little bit with the gauchos and the brazilians who were with us on the excursion (for the LIFE of me i could not understand their spanish!! very portuguese-influenced nasality, i had no clue what they were trying to say) as we passed around the wooden gourd from person to person.

the second hour of the ride was equally awesome. we came across a pack of wild horses, which apparently can get a little bit dangerous, and one of the wranglers who was accompanying us literally had to start galloping on his horse to scare them away from us so there wouldn't be an even worse showdown. the whole thing was wild. he was galloping through the hillside, yelling at them, and even whipped out his lasso at one point. better than a rodeo, this was the real thing and we were all totally entranced watching the scene unfold. i didn't manage to snap any great pictures of the drama, but here's the basic premise.

group of wild horses (there were about fifteen others in the pack as well) in our pathway. 

our descent down from the mountain....me, will, tiffany. such a great view. 

thomas and his rally rama 

we combined our newfound cowboy-ness with some standard mendoza-ness that night at dinner, trying cow's tongue for the first time (thanks to thomas who had the guts to order it!!) and topping off our meals with a bottle of red wine. we sat back and relaxed like true mendocinos for the next three hours, taking our time and sharing many a good laugh, but also getting into some pretty deep conversations about race and discrimination at our respective universities. was that the wine talking?? who knows. in my typical quilombo fashion, my flip flops completely broke during dinner and i was forced to walk home to the hostel completely barefoot, garnering quite a few priceless looks from the locals we passed along the way. oh well. welcome to my life.

saturday was a full day of wonderfulness and wine. after our free hostel breakfast (coffee and medialunas, what else is new?!) we hopped onto a local bus that would take us a few miles outside of mendoza's main city center to the sleepy town of maipú (yes, i know what you're thinking and yes, it is pronounced that way) where many of the family bodegas are located. we rented biked for a couple of bucks and set off for what would be an absolutely idyllic days of quiet cobblestone streets, delicious reds and whites, and free chocolate along the way. for me, there is absolutely no better way to see and explore a new place than by bike, so i was in heaven. (only wishing that my #1 bike companion momma was there with us!!)

after a free glass of wine at the first vineyard (woo!!), we continued onward in our epic bike ride and made a longer pit stop at the famous trapiche winery, where something ridiculous like 10% of the entire country's wine is produced, by far the biggest production and turnover rate of all. we were in the right place for sure. we were absolutely fascinated learning about the winemaking process during our hourlong tour, and our guide ezekial got a huge kick out of us and our endless questions, about everything from the history, to the production, to the best tips for reading wine. we never freaking shut up. but he was a good sport and seemed to appreciate our curiosity, though was definitely wondering what had just landed on his classy winery tour.

olive tree!! 

the trapiche brand follows a very specific methodology that includes a lot of organic processes; for example they use droppings from the grounds' llama to fertilize the grapes and develop the most natural flavor. they also closely follow the moon cycle to know when the water will most effectively travel upwards from the roots into the grapes themselves, and cut them when they are best hydrated like that. to be honest, i know jack squat when it comes to wine but was completely intrigued hearing about the long and complicated process, and the many different factors and actors that contribute to its production. the trapiche powerhouse, which instantly struck me as this glitzy and monopolistic corporation, function a little bit like some american franchises, where individuals can work their own plots of land using trapiche's model and resources, are overseen by bosses from the main production center, and then earn money for their harvests. i also talked with the tour guide a little bit about los trabajadores golondrinas (swallow workers, like the bird) who come to mendoza from bordering countries, almost exclusively from bolivia, for seasonal work in the grape fields. god knows how they are treated and paid, but hopefully well. for me, it's always fascinating to hear about the economic base foreigners (often from countries like bolivia and peru and paraguay) provide for argentina's market and the large, though often unmentioned, workforce they represent in such processes. witness the complicated, interconnected human web that something as insignificant as a glass of red wine might symbolize: a bottle of malbec wine produced in argentina, composed of grapes picked by temporary workers from bolivia, gets imported to the united states and europe. it's not something i would have necessarily thought about before.

digital macro!! 

after our tour of the vineyard, about twice as long thanks to our incessant questioning, we headed inside with the group for an epic tasting that included four different glasses of wine!! a champagne, two reds, and a delicious dessert wine, syrupy and sugary and peach-flavored, just my sweet-tooth style. we were definitely a lot more clueless than our chilean and argentinian and brazilian middle-aged companions, but tried to suppress our chronic quilombo disease and get through the taste testing without pulling something too too ridiculous. we had some good laughs looking for BOODDDYYYY in the wine. such posers.

clever little play on words: bienVenidos means "welcome"
but here they replaced it with bebido, which means drunk!!

we visited a few other places over the course of the day, stopping for a solid asado lunch (meat and red wine = soooo stereotypically argentine) at one of the smaller bodegas and then continuing onwards to two different chocolate/liquor spots. hard alcohol is so not my thing, but i managed to at least try the orange-flavored liqueur that i ordered, while the boys went a little more all out on the taste testing. BRO. thomas bought himself a bottle of the fieriest thing i have ever tasted in my life, a bright green liquor called "the russian death"!! very appropriate!

on the way back, the police started following us and we were flipping out wondering why. they just slowly tailed us for a solid twenty minutes but never pulled us over, we were still kinda freaking out though. later, realized that they were following us to make sure we weren't drunk!! drunk on a bike would not be a good thing, but apparently that is pretty common in mendoza; lots of foreigners rent bikes and by the end of the day they are bombed, riding on the main roads along with cars and trucks. nothing to worry about with us though!! overall a fabulous day that couldn't have been any more perfect....we were so giddy and happy that we decided to bike and sing together some classic tunes like "ain't no mountain high enough". so cheesy and so fun.

thomas, will, tiffany, sarah 

we used self timer to take this awesome vagabond shot!!! great idea will!!

the next day we woke up at 5:30am in order to catch a 7:00 bus that would carry us to the tiny tiny town of uspallata, hardly visited by tourists and precisely the type of place we were looking to spend our last morning in. i had another disaster moment that, as inconvenient for me as it was, provided endless entertainment for the group over the course of the day. when i tried to put my contacts in, they stung a little bit. but naturally, i had forgotten to pack both my contact solution and my glasses, so i asked thomas if i could borrow his solution. but naturally, being me and 5:30 in the morning, i neglected to read that it was exclusively for rubbing and instead dumped a couple of drops straight into my eyeballs. the hostel was lucky i didn't start screaming on the spot. i literally could not keep the lenses in without wanting to die so i ended up just spending the day with nothing in my eyes. this is a girl who is borderline sightless without anything in her eyes. first day of my life since the fourth grade where literally everything i saw was in blur mode. i was completely vampire-looking and my friends got a kick out of it. not just la quilombera, but also la ciega (the blind one). when we arrived in uspallata after the two hour bus ride (perfect for a nap), we strolled along the dirt roads and headed to the starting point of a small hike that would give us an amazing view. uspallata is literally an oasis of green trees and adobe homes plopped randomly in the middle of nowhere, fenced in on every side by stunning pre-cordillera peaks. 

when we got to the top of the first lookout "peak", the four of us each popped a squat and took in the sweeping views, beautiful and dwarfing no matter what direction you turned to. we literally sat in silence for a solid twenty minutes (except for when i had to ask if the little moving things at the bottom of the mountain were dogs or people, i could tell there was life below with my eyes but not what kind of life) and reflected in our own quiet spaces. it was pretty cool to be able to just sit there peacefully with my friends, and not feel the need to fill the moment with pointless words. we continued onward up to the top of the mini mountain where a flag had been planted. highlight of the weekend: singing the georgetown fight song on the mountain with thomas and will. they had made it to the top before me (i was being extra careful because of my blindness) and in the near distance i could hear them singing the fight song. when they got to the hoya saxa call and repeat i understood where they were going with it all, and jumped in to do the saxa response part. so fun!! represent!!

 

epic photo. 

after taking in a few last looks of the incredible mountain range, we headed back into town hoping to find a little lunch, but not expecting that anything would be open on sunday in a quiet place like upsallata. we did encounter one restaurant, that looked greasy and gross, but were too hungry to care much. and then we discovered that this place was a gem: i had the best steak i've had so far in argentina, paying seven bucks total. who would have guessed?! i wanted a photo with my amazing steak, which i found funny because it had come with nothing more than a leaf of lettuce and half a shredded carrot (total argentine fashion), but didn't think that tilting the plate towards the camera would be a bad idea until the steak juice spilled everywhere!! thomas caught my mid-photo reaction. call me the quilombera!!

reason three million why i love argentina: the whole country gets a day off for the census survey!! which meant i packed my backpack and headed to bariloche for the weekend (of four days, lol, more like the entire week you could say). a starting point of the enormous mass that is patagonia, bariloche is a favorite among tourists (eeesh, am i a tourist?? or a quasi-porteña?? let's go with the latter for now) and draws huge crowds throughout the year, who flock for the phenomenal chocolate, the stunning mountains and lakes, and the quaint swiss-german feel of the town. 

i set off tuesday afternoon with my georgetown friends paige and deepa on one of the luxury buses that i've surprisingly come to adore about argentine travel (despite the ridiculously jacked-up transportation prices). i had purposely chosen seat number three for this particular twenty hour bus ride (yeah, welcome to argentine travel) for several reasons: 1) the front row = extra leg room for the scandinavian ogre and an even more amazing view of the scenery along the way, and reason 2) seat three is a totally isolated seat all by itself, which meant i would not be trapped by snoring mammoths all night long, and thus not wind up at the end of the ride with swollen feet!! a good move on my part. the ride was utterly relaxing, complete with a stunning sunset and individual bottles of red wine that came with dinner!! woo!!

non-swollen feet!! eeesh, looks like someone needs a pedicure though...

when i woke up from a peaceful sleep on the bus (seat three = best thing ever invented), i checked my cell phone only to find out that ex-president nestor kirchner had unexpectedly died of a heart attack. without having lived in buenos aires these past few months, there's no way i would have been able to understand the overwhelming significance of his death. though at times a controversial politician, you can't possibly deny that nestor finally got argentina back together following years of disastrous presidents and an economic crisis in 2001 that practically ended the country. he brought argentina some much needed stability, making economic development and human rights two of the most important items on his presidential agenda, and helping argentina overcome a foreign debt of $178 billion. no biggie. ohhh, and he was also the husband of current president cristina fernández de kirchner. can you say POWER COUPLE?? beloved and hated here in argentina depending on who you talk to, they are the political powerhouse of all time and have brought a lot of positive change to argentina. he was expected to run for the presidency next year, solidifying the kirchner dynasty once and all. crazy to think that i had seen him in person a little over a month before at the political rally-party in luna park. pretty wild. 

although nestor had only died an hour or two before, when we arrived in the main plaza the flag was already flying at half-mast in his honor. we stopped for a moment of silence, then headed to our cozy 10th floor hostel, which featured breathtaking panoramic views of the mountains and central lake. after dropping off our stuff, we sauntered into town for a little lunch. which turned out to be an epic FAIL. although we knew all argentines would have the day off to complete their census interviews, the reason why we didn't have class on wednesday in the first place, we hadn't exactly realized that literally EVERYTHING would shut down for the day. like, literally. every single restaurant and shop was closed, even the freaking church was locked due to the census!! despite the borderline violent wind that was creating legit whitecaps on the water, we walked down and chilled on the beach for a little bit, then headed back up into town hoping to try our luck again. we encountered one chocolate shop that was open, but unfortunately the two pieces of chocolate we bought and shared tasted 1) like a fish pier and 2) like A1 steak sauce....epic fail number two. we lucked out at the kiosk next door which had just opened, and grabbed a totally balanced lunch of beer, crackers, yogurt, and oreo alfajores. successss finally!!! we then headed back to the hostel to cozy up to quilmes and try subsisting on leftover medialunas from the bus ride. beer in bed was definitely one of the lower moments of my life, but oh well, good times!! 

overall, the week was a relaxing vacation break from the hectic pace of life in buenos aires. i can hardly say the experience was culturally relevant or educational or all that eye-opening in any sense, but the nature was stunning and the three of us enjoyed ourselves to the fullest. for our first full day in the mountains, we had arranged for a horseback riding excursion around one of bariloche's many stunning lakes. despite the biting wind and rain that accompanied us along the way, what better way to explore argentina than by caballo?? our guide ernesto happened to have a couple of "rain outfits" on hand that definitely provided us with unending laughs and much-needed warmth. i looked like a death eater straight out of harry potter. 

the horseback ride was relatively chill, and we visited a smaller but still very pretty waterfall along the way. the best part of the afternoon however was the enormous lunch that greeted us at the end of the excursion. after plopping ourselves by the fireplace to warm up after the rainy ride, we dug into a delicious asado complemented by red wine and the best potatoes ever. in between bites, we periodically returned to the fireplace hoping to get rid of the numbness in our toes and fingers. the word that defined our mini-vacation was vergüenza (embarrassment, also shame. the two are interchangeable in both spanish and in our bariloche trip) mainly because i couldn't stop totally embarrassing myself at every corner. like, for example, when i got a little too close to the flames and the wet bottoms of my blue jeans started vaporing uncontrollably!! i started absolutely freaking out!! and couldn't help but think about my favorite mrs. doubtfire scene when robin williams is running around screaming PUT IT OUT PUT IT OUT!! loves it.

after a successful day of stereotypical argentine activities like horse-back riding and parrilla-ing, we bused back to our hostel and showered up to head into town for a little chocolate shopping and dinner. we found an awesome restaurant on the main strip which eventually became our bariloche hotspot over the next few days and where the waiters would come to know us as the "sangria girls" (whoops). the casual restaurant  reminded me of my hometown haunts of nation's and pizza antica due to the community-friendly and jam-packed atmosphere, and i loved the varied memorabilia, like john lennon and bob marley posters and these totally random mobile contraptions that hung from the ceiling. the waiters got such a kick out of the three of us that they gave us extra wine in our sangria pitcher for free!!! BEST PLACE EVER. 

no real reason why i needed to make this sangria lemon photo so big. i just LOVE digital macro, that's all. 

on friday, we woke up early for our day-long trekking excursion through nahuel huapi national park. as i attempted to get dressed in the pitch black of our hostel room, i missed my pant leg and completely wiped out on the floor, waking up our hostel roommate who had arrived in the middle of the night. typical vergüenza. once i had finally gotten myself together, the van picked us up outside the hostel and we set off for an awesome day in some of bariloche's many mountains. our trekking group featured people from all over the world--spain, el salvador, britain, colombia, canada, italy, united states, to name a few. our tour guide was this adorable little argentine woman who reminded me a ton of my childhood babysitter angela, she was so sweet and friendly!! great mix of people for a great day in nature. 

no idea what this river was called, but it sure was pretty!! 

during our long drive to the national park, we made two different pit stops to enjoy the scenery, the first beside a huge ass lake (typical bariloche) and the second time by a stunning stream with the most crystal clear water i've ever scene, practically caribbean-quality and so transparent that you could easily spot the trout sleeping in the water!! the same trout i probably ate for dinner later that night at the fondue restaurant we went to!!

can you spot the fishies?! (hint: towards the left. and no, not the rocks) 

after bumbling along the dirt roads through the forest for an hour, we arrived at the starting point for our grand "trek". which turned out to be more like a pleasant stroll in the woods and was far from heart-pumping (probably better in my case, considering i haven't set foot inside a gym for the past four months). we walked in strict single-file fashion for about thirty minutes before arriving at a beautiful waterfall, where we stopped to admire the endless greenery and mountain ranges in the distance. waterfalls being right up there with dogs and ice cream in my list of favorite things, i was in my über happy place, to such a point where i couldn't help but break out spontaneously into "colors of the wind" and "just around the river bend" from pocohantas. it seemed like an appropriate setting?? vergüenza. so much vergüenza. i also felt inspired to tell my friends about the epic dream i had as a kid in which i dreamt i WAS pocohantas and i broke my legs jumping off an enormous waterfall JUST like the one we were looking at. good thing my friends understand my occasional quirkiness bouts. yikes!! 

as a california girl with a chronic aversion to anything even resembling long sleeves (fact: i only own two of them), i had grossly underpacked for the weekend, confusing the beach with the mountains. after practically keeling over with hypothermia the night before when i went out wearing a spaghetti strap tank and a thin windbreaker, i decided there was no way i could possibly survive a full day outside with the wardrobe i had packed....so, the night before our trek, i found a little shop and rented a coat for $5! SO GRUNGE and SO WARM. as you can see below, MAN, did i rock that rented jacket. hard core.

hoya saxa!!!

i'm so glad to have friends here that tolerate this crap that i pull!! 

before heading onto the second part of our trekking excursion, we stopped for lunch where i warmed up to veggie soup and realized HOW. FREAKING. AMERICAN. i can be sometimes. we had been allotted an hour for lunch, but after a whopping ten minutes the american restlessness hit me big time and i was getting pissed that we were wasting time in the day eating when we could doing stuff. the lunch break ended up extending to an hour and a half and i was on the verge of really flipping out, wondering out loud why we hadn't just been told to pack a lunch or something instead of idly wasting such precious time. boxed lunches?? yeah, that would never exist here in argentina.  one of the favorite quotes from the weekend was from my friend paige and pretty much summed up our rushed, fast-paced, time-maximizing americannes: "geez, argentines need to learn to pb&j that shit!!". i totally concurred. it was less a case of cultural shock, than a case of cultural epiphany. i've never really thought of myself as an obsessive freak when it comes to spending time, but, well, turns out i totally am. soooo yankee of me!! (that's what they call americans here). 

the next part of the excursion was a visit to the national park's glacier. we climbed a hill to reach the first lookout point, combing our way through foliage and branches, and got psyched up for our first glimpse of the ENORMOUS AND BREATHTAKING AND PHENOMENAL ICE MASS that awaited us at the top......

haha more like we psyched ourselves OUT, right?!?! we had been expecting something a little more impressive and grand than the half-melted glacier that we actually encountered. lol we definitely had a couple good laughs over our misinformed expectations though!! and though we had been hoping for something a little more, ahem, BIG, the glacier actually was kinda cool. it's only one of two black glaciers in the entire world!! and the greenish water that surrounded the melting chunks was a cool color, having mixed with the little seaglass-like stones in the surrounding mountain sediment. my favorite part of our excursion's second half was hiking through the hills and hearing booming avalanches occurring in the mountains right in front of us. my biggest fear in the entire world is being buried alive in an avalanche so it was simultaneously totally terrifying and totally exhilarating. not sure why i was having such disney flashbacks during the day, but between the avalanches and the mountains i couldn't help but think about mulan and the hun scene!! 

another shot of me rocking the rented jacket. tap that. 

thought cities constantly fascinate me and challenge me, i have a soft spot for nature and love any opportunity that lets me get lost in the beauty of our world. overall, super successful day in the mountains!! only wish we had been able to spend a little more time there ("pb&j that shit" next time, i beg you argentina!!). 

that evening, we treated ourselves to a fondue feast at one of the several posh fondue restaurants on the main strip. several decades ago, bariloche was a settlement hotspot for incoming swiss and german immigrants, something that reflects easily in the region's delicious cuisine. the fondue still maintained its own little argentine touch thanks to the spicy chimichurri dipping sauce i love so much!! perfect topping for chicken and meat fondue, definitely gonna be bringing that back to my family's new years fondue tradition. after dinner, we perused a few of the innumerable chocolate shops that line the main road, where i satiated my infamous sweet tooth with a couple bars of raspberry dark chocolate and marzipan-filled truffles, and then wound up back at the same restaurant for the second time in a row for our beloved sangria. the waiters chuckled every time they passed our table. oh well. we ourselves had some good laughs too when we realized that, despite the fact that the restaurant is called "friends" (in english, yeah bariloche is almost excessively tourist-friendly if you can't already tell), each wooden menu features a bizarre suicide-themed comic!! so morbid!!

yeah, we didn't really know what to think about all that!! a little contradictory and depressing, but also kinda hilarious. on our last morning/afternoon in bariloche before catching the 20 hour bus ride home, we enjoyed a lazy breakfast in the hostel and watched kitesurfers braving it out on the white-capped waters, wind chill and all. i was impressed, and asked my friends if they thought kitesurfing was actually as hard as people made it out to be. i didn't think so. i've tried (and failed MISERABLY) at standard windsurfing, but was convinced that kitesurfing must be pretty freaking easy in comparison, and tried to convince my friends of the same. how hard can it possibly be to attach yourself to a kite, stand on a board, and let the wind pull you around?? as we found out on the drive to the bus station, the kitesurfers we had admired from the hostel balcony were in bariloche for the kitesurfing world championship competition. my bad. vergüenza strikes again. 

we returned to the main town for some more shopping, more sangria, and more chocolate. bariloche is truly a glutton's heaven. in the central plaza, i also encountered the cutest bernese mountain dogs and actually paid five dollars to take some pictures with them, the biggest tourist trap of all time and i still feel like a little bit of an animal-rights offender, but they were just too freaking cute and i was about to cry just looking at them. what sweeties!!! overall, very relaxing and pleasant and food-filled few days in bariloche, not the most jam-packed outing of all time but such a nice change of pace from la vida loca of buenos aires!!! some more photos of our time there below....

view from 10th floor hostel. couldn't be a prettier and cheaper place to eat breakfast!! 

the view from our hostel room. 

WALL OF JAM. 

totally worth $5 to hug this little fattie 

i thought i could call myself a quasi-porteña, but here i am 100% YANKEE. yeesh. 

i have this disorder where i can't go anywhere in argentina without falling in love with some stray dog. bariloche was no exception. this sweetie lived outside (and sometimes inside) the lobby of our hostel. if this isn't a dog reincarnation of al pacino well then i don't know WHAT is. such a bad-ass. 

raspberry and plum flavored chocolate mmmmmmmmm