Pictures

The picture above is of the empanada stand I eat at Daily. I Have befriended the owner, Hugo. My favorites are the carne suaves. I have three empanadas and a beer for either lunch or dinner almost daily.

This next one is of myself, as shot by Jorge, eating breakfast. Tostadas, dulce de leche, queso blanco, peach marmelade, a couple pieces of fruit and most importantly mate. I´m holding the borrilla (not sure about the spelling, forgot my dictionary) to my mouth. It´s a metal straw with a filter on it for suckling morning mate.

This shot is in the Plaza Congresso where my school is located. The statue is Rodins "Thinker". It has always been a favorite of mine. There are two in the Americas: one at the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, the other here across the street from school in BA.

Another from you know where.

A Uruguayan fisherman at sunset. Thats all for now. Chao.

Pictures!

http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t65/johndcooley/DSC00629.jpg

first day of class

Hola amigos. My first day at school was a good one. I went in with a mission. To inpress my teacher and get myself on track for quick advancement. I did it. I crammed both Saturday night and Sunday and went in this morning well ahead of the other beginners. So beginning tomorrow I´ll be taking individual lessons. By the end of the week I should be able to join the intermedios a few lessons in to the section thus effectively completing in four-five days what was scheduled to take 4-5 weeks. If I pass the test I should be an "advanced" student by the time I leave Buenos Aires...so long as a pass the test. The problem with me spanish education at the moment is that I understand the concepts, the grammar, well into the intermediate level, but because I haven´t spoken the language in years and never spoke it frequently my vocabulary is relatively small compare to the other intermedios. Thus the one-on-one program this week. I´m to beef up my vocab and master los articulos by friday. I think it can be done. My brain hurts right now though. After four hours of class this morning I took about a two hour break and have spent the last three or so in my room studying vocab; when I get home, another hour or two. Sorry this entry is a bit boring. I needed to string together some english sentences for peace of mind and I don´t have the brainpower to be interesting.
The rest of my life is going well right now. The brief vacation to Colonia last week was perfect. After a week in the big city, my solitary stay in Colonia really helped my settle my mind. When I returned to BA I was ready to settle into daily life here. The small things are empowering. I´m a functional citizen now. I do my laundry at the lavaderia. I know where to find cheap quality food. I frequent the neighborhood verdurias (veggie stands), fruterias (fruit stands), and carnicerias. I ride the packed subway all over town. I shop at he market, and most nights have a beer and an empanada or two with Hugo the owner of the empanada shop across the street from my apartment. Normalcy is rewarding. I have a sense of my surroundings that is growing every day. Coming into a knowledge of the language too is extemely rewarding. I´ll work hard this week and hopefully for the rest of my stay here. There are many interesting things to see and do here. But I´ll be back in September. I want to spend the next six weeks here in the city living simply and working hard. At the moment that idea is more exciting than eating at the finest resaurants and learning to tango. Take care my friends.

quiet night, tart juice, fast bird

A peaceful morning in my dormitorio. I shared the room last night with fave Brazilians and all five left together this morning. I woke up to a commotion typical of a youth hostel but that I am not at all use to yet. Not beginning the day with a chip on my shoulder took willpower. The Brazilians were fine nice enough, doing nothing more than packing their bags. The horde of Swedes gathered in the common space outside of my room were up too early and had too much energy than is ok for anyone to have prior to 8:00 in the morning. I threw on my flip flops and went out for air, juice, and caffiene. The Swedes with all showered and dressed, eating breakfast, running around, laughing. I with my birds nest of hair bidden them a short buenas dias as I passed without a pause.
The streets of Colonia were almost vacant this morning. At 8:30 there were none but myself, fishermen, and a few café employees sweeping the waks and cleaning up after what must have been a late night. I wouldn´t know. I was back at the hostel by 11:00. Once I realized that my roommates were ready for bed I couldn´t resist making the most of the opportune moment: a roomfull of peaceful, quiet travellers, a chance to get a good nights sleep in this raucus hostel. All for the best. Morning and evening are my favorite times to be out in Colonia. I´ll sleep at night.
My skin is especially keen to that schedule today. Yesterday morning I rented a vespa like motor scooter for the day. Everyone here rides one of these or a small motorcycle and I thought it would be a good way to explore my new surroundings. I rode all day: first though the city, then up the coast along the beach, and finally out into the countryside--the fringe of the Uruguayan pampa. As I write this my face and the tops of my arms are a flesh-toned hot pink.
The cool air coming in from the Atlantic over the Río de la Plata and into Colonia soothed my charred face and calmed the redidual clatter in my head left from the rude awakening this morning. I walked down to a little water front café that was just opening, there too the only people present held brooms. One of them took my order: un café doble y una jugo de naranja. The coffee was jet black with a rich brown head, the juice tall, tart and fresh squeezed. They must have used a dozen oranges. Excellent.
The fruit and vegetables have been on a whole much better that those in Buenos Aires. I was in need of some good veggies when I got off the boat. Sometimes I feel like all I´ve eaten in the last week is cheese, meat, and bread. Don´t get me wrong, these are three of my favorite things but I am use to a degree of balance in my diet or don´t feel right. Porteños don´t seem to have high standards when it comes to salads or veggies. Order a salad at almost any restaurant and what comes to the table is a bowl of semi-ripe tomatoes, white onion, and lettuce in about equal proportions dressed with a bit of olive oil and vinegar. Meat is the absolute center of their gastronomic world. I mentioned eating raw carrots and celery and celery to Racquel the other day and she looked at me like I was insane. Anyway, every specimen here has been excellent here. About five doors down from the hostel is a café that caters to veggetarians. They serve a lunch buffet. I gorged myself yesterday, an act of repentance to my digestive system for the piles of cheese and dough I´ve consumed this past week. It must be said however that this place, along with Buenos Aires, have more pizza joints per capita than anywhere I´ve been before. And...despite all of this veggie talk I had a pizza last night. I washed it down with a litre of Pilsen, the home brew here in Uruguay. It´s not bad but I prefer Argentina´s Quilmes. I´ll surely down one as soon as I step off the boat in Buenos Aires.
My resolution for the day: not to miss the hummingbird. I do mean this literally, but being that it is unlikely that I´ll have another chance, I resolve to play it out figuratively. "what is he talking about?" you ask. Pause for a poem.

Slowly the west reaches for clothes of new clolors
Which it passes to a row of ancient trees.
You look, and soon these two worlds both leave you,
One part climbs toward heaven, one sinks to earth...

leaving you (impossibly to untangle)
your own life, timid and standing high and growing,
so that sometimes blocked in, sometimes reaching out,
one moment your life is a stone in you, and the next, a star. --Rilke.

Amidst one of the most inviting and beautiful settings I have ever taken part in, I felt like stone. I´de returned my moto early and walked down to the city center by the lighthouse, on the coast, out on the cobbled 300 year old port, facing west. Flat and restless. Around me, natural beauty. In the air, the sound of the ocean clapping the rocks, keeping time for the spanish guitarist beside me. And I, fidgety, lonely, and self-critical. Moments like these, moments on the banks of the sea cast in orange and in purple are supposed to reach into you, to pull you out of yourself, wake the spirit and all that, right? Right? But as the sun began to set I was left, ¨timid and standing high and growing", but blocken in. And unconscious. I can think about it now, pepaint the pictur, but at the time I was blank and my instinct to took over. My instint for flight. I wouldn´t sit still and enjoy it and instead I ran out and ahead of myself and tried to capture it. First by trying to write, but the only words that came were conceited, cliché. Then I went out for pictures and it was here that I missed the hummingbird.
It was emerald green with flecks of ruby and ice. It squaked, which I didn´t expect. The sound was definitely not a chirp that drew my attention to the tiny bird. I believe the only other time time I´de seen one it was humming around a pea blossom in the garden when I was about 4, that memory now so old and vague that I can´t be sure if the bird was real or if if it was my imagination that I´ve come to believe to be true through the years. This green bird was surely real. And what did I do? Turned on the camera, set it to high speed "action shot" setting and atrie to take a picture. For those who haven´t seen one, hummingbirds are incredibly fast, for those who don´t know me, I am not a great photographer. I chased it and missed it.
Today I will stay out of the sun and try not to miss the hummingbirds.

A quick note

I believe I have enabled comments on the old blog here, so you all can say a word without having to email me. But I can´t be sure. I don´t have my dictionary on me at the moment and I kind of guessed on "la pagina de opciones". No se.
Also, I just skimmed over that last ong blog. My apologies for the complete lack of editing. Hang with me. Things are getting better all the time. I must go now. My boat for Uruguay leaves at 4:00 and I stil have to clear customs.

Semana Santa

I am off to Colonia, Uruguay for the holiday weekend. It is a quiet colonial town just on the other side of the Río de la Plata. I´m going to kick back on the beach and take it easy. Hasta luego!

Primero Saturday

It was only 11:00 am and I was already heading back north, walking Avenida Patricias out of La Boca, one of the most eccentric and southernmost barrios (neighborhood) in Buenas Aires. The sun was burning through the clouds for the first time since I arrived in Almargo, the barrio I am calling home for the next 7 weeks. But it has been no different here in La Boca, no in the rest of the region. Sante Fe Province, to the northwest, in fighting through a mass inundación: 40,000 people have been evacuated from their homes. The rains washed up so much garbage in the streets of Almagro last week that the people took to the streets banging pots and pans in a mass call for public services. They were clean by the time I arrived, but the rain poured on. Perhaps residents of Kansas City should take some notes from the porteños on how to get things done. Next time you crash into a pothole on 39th St. gather your friends and make some noise.
But protest wasn´t yet on my mind, a mantra lifted from the pages of the holy text ''Roughguide Phrasebook: Latin American Spanish'' was: ''¿podria decirlo despacio? ¿podria decirlo despacio?...'' En inglés: could you say it slowly? could you say it slowly? Words are tools; in my world right now I am not well equipped. My feet churn, the mantra rolls on and my eyes keep close watch. The terrain in this barrio is nothing like home. Of primary concern at that moment were the elevated sidewalks--sporadically elevated sidewalks. Cement flats four feet or so off the ground stretch out from various storefronts in no coherent pattern. Up the stairs...walk aways...down. This next polatform is low enough to jump to...the sun is shining, up I go. Now I have a tendency to take things in with an ewith what I´ll call an engineers perspective: what´s it here for? it´s function, it´s role? what does it do? how well? --To give you a little slice of what it is to be me--since I´ve been a small child I´ve been in the habit of evaluating and citiqueing the efficiency of streetslights as it relates to city planning. I´ve been known to get pretty caught up. Cool.-- On this day though I became bored very quickly with the why´s of the walks and admired instead the seeming like of purpose for these things and expanded the thought to my surroundings as a whole. I held the idea in contrast to the American imperative of uniformity and efficiency at the expense of character, of individuality. I swept myself away and as my mantral rolled on and I focused on these exotic caminos de gentes I nearly fell of one. Slow down.
Achieving balance is the most pressing dillema in my life here. At home the rhythm of my feet is therapeudic. Walking is often the only way I can think clearly. Somehow the physical contract between the earth and myself calms the mind and brings semblence to my all too often chaotic mental life. But here it´s hard to find my stride. I´ve remembered my compass today; I am northbound; but I´ve forgotten how to walk.
Regardless, I put one foot in front of the other and tredge on. The near fall wakes me...and I am back in La Boca two hours previous.
The dogs here are not so well behaved as they are in Almagro. My entry into the barrio was down a barren street, wild grass growing helter skelter to my left--a blank spot on my city map--weeds I´ve never seen before pushing through cracks in the cobbled Calle Irala. I knew I was heading in the right direction when I saw La Bombedera five or six blocks ahead. La Bombedera is the home stadium of the Boca Juniors, arguably the best soccer club in all of Argentina. But my mind wasn´t on fútbol. La Boca has a reputation for eccentricity and barrio pride. At various times in its history its residents attempted to cede from Buenos Aires. It never happened for the people, but in my wandering mind the dogs might have won their own battle.
I met the representatives of the canine community before those of the human. They were free but civil, not wholly domesticated, but not ferral. As I walked this barren stretch of land I imagined--in true porteño fashion--a canine revolution, a battle for four legged independence; and I imagined their revolutionary leader: a noble welsch corgie. Based on the physique of these muts, his valor ensured the success of his progeny for generations. But enough of dogs and my strange imagination.
La Boca is a beautiful place. Look it up. I haven´t the endurance nor the ability to lay it out in words right now. But I saw it. I knew it, sitting there on that wall watching a man and a woman dance an awkward tango at 10:00am. It was an engaging scene: clotheslines strung from pink apartment to orange, women hanging clothes and sweeping stoops, children shrieking as they cahed each other through a tangle of people and trees, tourists aimless and old, men holding numbered signs to keep the respective herds together , both deterring and encouraging these lucrative wanderers to puruse the boothes chalked full of commemerative La Boca handicarafts, peruvian woven goods and emblematic tango figurines, while the well dressed but entirely mediocre dancers slide along an ancient cobbled square in slick shoes and high heels...a real amalgam of life. Oh, and I, legs swinging from the ancient wall, crashing back into myself as the speakers crack, the CD skips and the dance fizzles and stops.
Back on the Avenida Patricias, Northbound, my boots clap firmly on the tiled sidewalk and I too stop. A line from the book I was reading the night before creeps into my mind: ''We are confused and brilliant and stupid, lost clumps of living ash.'' I disgard my mantra, reserving only the last word, ''despacio'', and shake off the resin of disillusionment that lingers from the square in La Boca.
It is easy to fall into the trap of classifying everyone and everything one sees meandering in unfamiliar places, too easy to partition the ¨real¨ the other, ¨tourists¨ and self, ''authentic'' from ''inauthentic'' experience. But while it may be the case that these divisions do have a place in the world they cannot now in mine. I am in a sea of people and symbols I cannot read. Experience is all I have. And though I continued to move through Buenos Aires alone late into the night, and though my legs and mind throbbed by sunset, I drove forward with ease and didn´t fall until I hit the bed that night.

That really only brings me up to about 11:00am that first Sasturday. I don't have it in me to write well about the rest but I can offer a quick synopsis. The northbound trip led to the South America explorers club--I'm a member so I decided to check it out and introduce myself. It's a great place. English speaking internationals all over, food on the stove, books, computers. Good stuff. I'll make some friends here for sure. After that I walked though El Centro, the city center and on my way to school where I was to meet a woman that was going too take me Palermo Viejo. On the way a ran into a political demostration on Av. 9 de Julio. Hundreds of Peronists banging drums, waving flags, yelling into megaphones. Elections are coming up. I hung around awhile and checked it out. My school is located in the Plaza de Congresso, I have pictures on the way. So I walked there and walked around there. Hugo Chavez was here about one month ago and his presence is still felt. Pictures. Then I was off to Palermo Viejo with Marianna. She's a former teacher at the school. She was fresh off the plane from Brazil. Very nice lady, probably late twenties. She spoke slow spanish and I actually understood most of it. This part of toen is one of the most historic and inportant in Buenos Aires. The Argentine design movement is located here. Artists, performers, actors, architects. This is the place to be. Again, too much to tell in detail now. But long story short, I got a three hour history lesson, one on one as we walked the crowded streets drinking coffee and wine. After a long walk home I decided to finishh this big day with a big meal. Parrilla--Argentine cuisine. Parrilla is meat-centric, slow roasted goodness. I ordered Parrilla libre y ensalada completa and a bottle of red wine, a multi-course experience. It went as follows: empenada carne, chorizo, blood sausage, papas fritas, chinchurones, liver, mollejas (sweetbreads),asado costillo (a type of beef ribs), bontiola (roast pork), and matambre (delicate, slow roasted skirt steak. Good stuff. I slept well

My photo plans have been foiled again. I'll keep trying.

Take care friends!