Sand, Surf, Diapers

As Emily mentioned in her last post, there’s not a whole lot to do in the summer community of Mar de Ajo. In fact, we were initially concerned that we might grow bored during our weeklong sojourn there. The local movie theatre was showing Hollywood pap that we’d already caved in and watched in Buenos Aires, The Bingo Palace wasn’t ready to begin hosting bingo until January, and the miles of pizza parlors and alfajor shops weren’t quite the draw that they were for the kids in our host family. As a result, we spent an awful lot of time at the beach. And, as we probably should have guessed, we enjoyed ourselves immensely. In addition to copious swimming and lots of reading (I have to finish all 900 pages of Bleak House before January 3rd, because I’m not lugging it through Patagonia), there were entertaining sites to behold on nearly every stretch of sand. In fact, one of the nice things about plopping down in the same spot day after day is that we got to know the cast of characters on the beach pretty well––from a distance, of course. Sadly, we were too shy to take pictures, but I thought I would highlight some of our favorite Mar de Ajo beach regulars.

The Odd Couple. This middle-aged couple was fascinating because they did not appear to enjoy the beach, yet returned to it day after day. Terrified of the sun, they usually brought an enormous bed sheet with them, which they huddled beneath for solar protection. For a million reasons, including the strong wind at Mar de Ajo, this did not ever seem to work very well. This alone might not have been enough to make the list, but they manage to squeeze on here because the man wore a baseball cap to go swimming. Third place.

The Brazilians. We don’t actually know that this family was Brazilian (we never heard Portuguese, but we never heard Castellano either). However, my Spanish teacher once informed our class that no self-respecting Argentine male would ever wear bikini briefs to the beach, hence our suspicions. The Brazilians were fond of playing a paddleball style game on the beach each morning, wearing approximately three square inches of spandex between them. Good stuff, yes, but the highlight definitely came when the wife had the husband lay down in her lap, and proceeded to snip every single one of his goatee hairs with a tiny pair of scissors. Freshly shaved, the man proceeded to sprint into the surf and collapse the instant a wave hit him. Second place.

Diaper Man. We had observed Diaper Man from a distance during our first few days at Mar de Ajo, but it wasn’t until he set up shop immediately beside us that we got to really observe him in his glory. Diaper man was an incredibly tanned, grey-haired, middle-aged man who wore bright white shorts and sneakers to the beach. It was only while playing soccer with his son that he underwent his transformation. Tucking the legs of his white shorts into the edges of his underwear, so that it resembled a billowing diaper, he would proceed to dart around the beach, heading and high-kicking the ball with a complete lack of talent. To this day, we’re still not certain what purpose the diaper served, but we think that it might have ever so slightly helped to improve his range of motion. His teenage son was incredibly unbothered by his father’s appearance. In fact, one of Diaper Man’s best attributes was his total unwillingness to run after the ball. Following a horrendous kick, in which he caused the ball to jet into the surf, Diaper Man would furiously signal his son to retrieve the ball, which the boy did with unfailing loyalty. Diaper Man, Grand Prize Winner. -NSH

Felices Fiestas

So, Nate and I spent Christmas at the beach. We took a Condor Estrella bus out of Buenos Aires to the lovely seaside town of Mar de Ajo. As we left the city, we also left behind almost all the Argentines, and we got our first real glimpse of the almost unpopulated campo. The population of the country is incredibly densely concentrated in Buenos Aires, leaving the pampas empty except for innumerable cattle. The quietness of the countryside was shocking after the intense activity of Buenos Aires. We rode for five hours along rough roads with unbroken expanses of grass on either side. The day was stormy, and the silent lightning flashing over the pampas made them even more beautiful.

We rode in the comfort of a semi-cama bus, with seats that were nearly fully reclining. Every seat was taken, but the bus didn't feel crowded. We passed our time sleeping and watching the Argentines across the aisle drink round after round of mate.

Carlos and Ana met us at the bus station in Mar de Ajo, looking tanned and happy. They took us on a brief tour of Mar de Ajo, which has the feel of a summer community in the off season. In fact, it feels like it has been in the off season for several years, and possibly it will never be in season again. While that sounds a little depressing, Nate and I liked it. On every street there are a few abandoned buildings or shuttered stores, some with faded signs announcing that a new maxikiosko or internet cafe is opening "soon."

Nate and I spent a pleasant Christmas here, which we decided to celebrate in Argentine fashion with an asado. After a refreshing Christmas morning swim in the Atlantic, we bought a pile of meat and carbon and rented a campsite with a parilla for the day. While I've discussed asado technique with Carlos on several occasions, I've never watched him very closely, and Nate and I found lighting the carbon to be quite the challenge. We torched half of a copy of La Nacion trying to get the damn carbon to light, but to no avail. It wasn't until Nate went back to the center of Mar de Ajo and scored a bottle of lighter fluid that we got an asado worthy fire going. After this rocky start, our Christmas asado proceeded quite merrily, and I think the steaks we cooked would have made any Argentine proud. -EMW

Mmmmm, sea of garlic.

As Nate mentioned, it's far too warm here to feel terribly christmasy. It is in fact too warm to even stay in the city, so we're bailing to spend Christmas at Mar de Ajo, a beach town five hours south of Buenos Aires. Mar de Ajo apparently does not mean "sea of garlic," but instead refers to the Ajo tribe of Native Americans who populated the region, but I prefer to imagine that we'll be swimming in a sea of garlic. Our host family owns an apartment there, and they suggested, somewhat insistently, that we should spend a week there. We'll never know whether this was out of kindness or just to get us out of the house. Whatever their motivation, I've been looking forward to spending a week at the beach, doing some swimming and sunbathing.

We quizzed the girls, Vicky and Lara, on what we might expect at Mar de Ajo. Both girls prefer Mar de Ajo to the quinta. According to Lara, the primary attractions of Mar de Ajo are: delicious chocolate, great alfajores makers, and tasty bread. Also, delicious pizza. She recommended that we spend Christmas at the pizzeria.

Deck The Halls With Plastic Ivy

We keep hearing that it’s getting close to Christmas, but we're having trouble believing it. Maybe somewhere in the world people are shoveling out their driveways, but here in Buenos Aires it’s really, really hot. In most respects this is horribly unpleasant, but it does make the fact that we’re missing the holidays back home a bit easier––neither of us can really fathom that they’re actually happening.

Our host family, on the other hand, has not noticed that there’s anything amiss, and they’ve gone ahead with their traditional preparations. In what we assume is a solemn annual ritual, they pieced together the limbs of their festive Christmas tree (it’s todo plastico, of course) and hung ornaments on the branches, which are spray-painted with fake snow. They’ve also written letters to Papa Noel, put up plastic wreaths and boughs, and assembled a lovely crèche, which I never hesitate to gaze at in bafflement whenever I arrive home, drenched in sweat.

I think it was while appraising the crèche that I came to realization that that barn where baby Jesus lay asleep in the hay was probably incredibly hot. Mary and Joseph and the shepherds and the lowing cattle were probably sweating up a storm. Perhaps countries with warm climates should use this as inspirational fodder for generating wholly new traditions? Because the whole American/Northern European vibe doesn’t really work so well down here. Looking at Santa Claus suits when it’s 90 degrees outside doesn't put me in good cheer. It makes me itchy.

That said, I would like to offer the following, very important caveat. If you’re the owner of a store in Buenos Aires that sells wheelchairs, walkers, and other such paraphernalia, and you decide to dress the mannequins in your window up like Santa Claus, I totally approve of that. Nice job, dude. - NSH

Leaving Arg! And coming back.

Tourist visas to Argentina are only valid for 90 days. The easiest way to receive a new visa is by leaving and reentering the country, at which time you receive a new stamp in your passport granting you another 90 days stay. To renew our visas, and to stay on the right side of the law, Nate and I crossed the Rio de la Plata to spend a few days in Uruguay. We went to Colonia del Sacramento, an old colonial town founded in 1680 by the Portuguese to support a thriving smuggling industry that thwarted the Spanish monopoly on trade in the region. The town's been remarkably well preserved in the intervening centuries, and the historic old town has been declared a UNESCO world heritage site.

We travelled to Colonia on a ferry run by Buquebus, a company which holds a practical monopoly on voyages to Colonia and which advertises its fleet as "the fastest in the world," a claim which is not at all close to being true. Our Buquebus boat took three and a half hours to flounder its way across the river. We didn't mind the slow journey too much, as the boat had all the comforts a human could reasonably desire: fully reclining seats, intense air conditioning, and a claw arcade game.

We thoroughly explored and exhausted the sites and resources of downtown Colonia on our first day there, so on the morning of our second day we rented bikes to explore the surrounding countryside. Colonia is extremely well supplied with places to rent motos and golf carts of all description. Renting motos in fact appears to be the town's sole industry. Finding non-motorized means of transport, i.e. bicycles, was a little more difficult, but Nate and I managed to track down and rent two of the most inadequte bikes ever pedaled. We rode out of town along the coast of the Rio de la Plata, admiring the pristine, empty, white-sand beaches, which are unfortunately lapped by the mud brown Rio de la Plata, a river which does not really call to the swimmer.

It was remarkable how quickly we adjusted to the peaceful, slower pace of Colonia. In Colonia, the few cars on the cobblestoned streets drove slowly, obeyed traffic laws, and even stopped for pedestrians. As we were disembarking the Buquebus upon our return to Buenos Aires, Nate joked that every Urugyuan driver leaving the ferry would be killed instantly on the streets of Buenos Aires. There wasn't a fifteen Fiat pile up that night, but when we reached the streets of Buenos Aires I felt like I had lost all my hard won traffic navigating skills. I wasn't picked off by an insane taxi cab that night, but it took hours before I felt like I remembered how to walk the streets here. -EMW

Las Marias

Our host family, like many other porteno families, has a quinta, a small house in the countryside designed for weekend gatherings and asados. The qunita is in La Reja, a working class town about 40 minutes outside of Buenos Aires, and is named Las Marias, for Anna and her two sisters, who are all named Maria (Anna Maria, Maria Carmen, and Maria I haven’t met yet). We went with the family to the quinta this Sunday for an asado. I also had high hopes for an afternoon of lounging by/in their swimming pool, hopes which were cruelly dashed when Anna informed me that the pool was empty for some singularly ill-timed pool maintenance.

Pool or no pool, we still had a lovely day in the country. We arrived prepared with several kilos of meat, and a pile of wood. The quinta is down a dirt road, completely hidden behind a massive fence of shrubbery and ironwork. It’s a lovely house, but when we arrived it was in full lock-down mode, with metal bars and heavy security screens on every window. Anna seemed apologetic for the extreme security measures, explaining that there had been two break-ins in the past. Carlos confessed that he found the provinces around Buenos Aires very insecure, and did not care to spend nights at the quinta, preferring to leave Anna and the children there while he returned to Buenos Aires.

Security issues aside, the quinta was a great place to spend a hot summer day. It’s surrounded by surprisingly tall fruit and nut trees planted thirty years ago by Anna’s father, and we sat in the shade of a walnut tree for an asado. Anna’s cousin Enrique joined us, and we had the pleasure of answering his many questions about American habits and customs. “Why do Americans wait so long to get married? What is wrong with them, and why are they so selfish? I’m asking in a general sense only of course, this has nothing to do with you personally.” He also told Nate that he should go to Brazil because the women there are mad foxy. -EMW

Fool About A Horse

Last weekend, Emily and I decided that enough was enough, and it was time to go bet on the ponies. The fact is, we have a certain fondness for horse racing. A couple of summers ago we made an homage to the Derby, and more recently we became accustomed to making infrequent visits to Hawthorne, a course on the South Side of Chicago. We liked its distant view of downtown at sunset, the quiet jingling of the harnesses, and its bleakly Edward Hopper-esque vibe.

The Hipodromo, an elegant 100,000 capacity track in the chic neighborhood of Palermo, is a world away from Hawthorne. With its bright buildings, neatly kept stables, and family atmosphere, it seemed like a cheery throwback to another era. Upon arriving, we immediately bought a racing form and took to appraising the ponies. Betting the Trifecta or Superfecta is tricky enough back home, so we resolved to stick simply with El Ganador––the winner.

At the Hipodromo, the owners parade their horses around a small ring before each race, giving observers a chance to scratch their chins and generally act like they know exactly what it means that such-and-such horse is frisky while another has a calm, confident gait. I liked the looks of #6, a black thoroughbred with a long stride and powerful-looking hindquarters. I ambled over to the booth to slap down my $5 peso wager.

By the time we arrived at the stands, Emily and I were shocked to discover that a race was already in progress. It turned out that we were appraising the horses for the wrong race––the one I had bet on had already begun. Shockingly, #6 managed the win at 6:1 odds. With $30 in my pocket, my head started to swell. It was Cokes and churipan all around.

Needless to say, I lost the next 6 races in a row (although I would be remiss not to mention that I was about 3 feet away from a 15:1 shot). It turns out that you do much better when you don’t actually look at the horses beforehand. Emily fared better by betting less often. She picked one winner, a 4:1 favorite, and lost 3 other races. We both left in the hole, but not embarrassingly so. Which, as it happens, is the best we’ve ever fared back home. -NSH

El mundo es un panuelo

One of the short essays I recently read for Spanish class was entitled “el mundo es un panuelo,” or, “the world is a tissue.” It’s an idiomatic expression and our teacher tried to get the class to divine the meaning. What is a tissue like? she asked. Fragile? Soft? While? Disposable? We guessed. All wrong. The relevant characteristic of a tissue is that it is small. And so is the world.

This expression aside, the smallness of the world is a favorite theme of Argentines. Anna’s sister quizzed me recently on my encounters with other Americans in Buenos Aires, insisting that I must surely have run into someone I already knew, or have encountered someone who knew someone I knew.

These thoughts were not misguided. The world is small. Of the four other students in my Spanish class, three of them provide some evidence for the small world theory. One is living with a fellow Middlebury alumni and ex-WRMC dj, while another is in a band that I played on my radio show in Chicago. Nate and I have run into a third classmate so often and in such varied parts of the city that it certainly makes the city of Buenos Aires, if not the world, feel small. -EMW

La Boca

Nate and I recently went to La Boca, a barrio near the port in Buenos Aires. It’s perversely one of both the poorest and most touristy areas of the city, a combination that always makes me somewhat uncomfortable. Located near the port of Buenos Aires, the neighborhood was originally populated by poor immigrants. Lacking money, they painted their houses with any spare paint they could beg off the ships in port. Over time, the neighborhood became a patchwork of brightly painted shanties and conventillos, and is now an extremely popular subject for postcards.

It’s still an extremely poor neighborhood, and our guidebooks warned us not to stray off the two “tourist” streets. These tourist streets offer much to the tourist: waitresses who are so argentine they wear high heels and dance tango even while waiting tables, and aggressive minstrels who will serenade your table endlessly.

However, our objective in La Boca was not to be found on the tourist streets. Because the thing that La Boca is most famous for is its soccer team, Boca Juniors. Even though Nate and I hate soccer with a passion shared by all good, red-blooded Americans, we are sports fans in general, so we wanted to see La Bombonera. La Bombonera is the stadium where the Boca Juniors play, and is so named because apparently it looks like a chocolate box. I have posted a picture so you can judge for yourself whether this is a reasonable statement. It’s famous for being the stadium where Maradona had some of his greatest triumphs, and for the incredibly rowdy and raucous crowds. We were vaguely thinking of going to a game sometime, but apparently the Boca Jrs. are kicking ass this year and tickets are not easily available. Also, I may have mentioned this before, but we hate soccer. -EMW