To be honest I really have no idea what it is that happened this last week. Imagine if you will a great work of Pablo Picasso say during his cubisism period, or just about anything by Salvidor Dali. Really to me it has only ever seemed like a great blur of colors and shapes. Such was this last week. It all just seems like a great big blur. But I guess that is to be expected. On top of that, how does one disassemble a blur organize, refine and synthesize it into a coherent consumable.
I believe it was John Taylor that said, (at best a very loose paraphrase) it is a true sign of intelligence to be able to take a complex subject and break it down so that even a small child can understand. So I expose to you my intelligence (or more likely the lack thereof.) Enjoy.
If this trip down to Argentina has done anything for me it has made me remember the basics. Things that we far to frequently take for granted in the states. I for one find myself not apprecieating basic things like, palpable water, warm water with which to wash your hands, or clean and safe streets. I find myself far to frequently far more concerned with my friends most recient status update, or the most recient kernel bug fix then I am with things that actually pertain to the well being of myself and those I care about. I think I mentioned in my last post I lost my jacket on the plane from Lima to Buenos Aires. To rank cold with constant temperature there is the Provo Utah cold, which is a harsh dry cold but it doesn´t cut. There is the damp Maryland cold that cuts through the thickest coat if you have the smallest bit of exposed skin, and then there is Argentine cold which isn´t in itself worse then Baltimore, however, it is simply unescapeable. And going inside doesn´t help. Infact in the early morning inside a cement buliding can be colder then it is outside! At times I find myself holding Karina´s hands not out of the romance of the moment but more so her fingers don´t fall off. Apparently I´m better at keeping my extremeties warm. So here I am with a pullover in the inescapable cold and yet I am warming Karina´s hands. Regardless, Karina decides I´m the one who needs a coat. So after several days of her telling me how sick I´m going to get I relent and we go to Lomas de Zamora to get a coat. We went to a few stores and didn´t really see anything. I was supprised at how expensive everything was. It was about as expensive if not more as it is at home. Not that I would really know because let´s be honest, I never shop for my own clothes. So we find a coat that I we both liked and we asked the sales clerk if I could try it on. I try it on and the sleves are really short, by really short, I mean they are shorter then I liked. So we ask the clerk for a larger size and he gives us a larger coat and a much more expensive coat (that I liked better). Now I knew what he pulling a little of a bait and switch on us. I almost didn´t buy anything because I was mildly offended that he would offer me anything else other then that for which I had asked (I know I´m wierd, heaven forbid I get good customer service). Then I realized I had a choise between two evils, I could buy the slightly more expensive coat and be done shopping, or I could pass satisify my pride and decline the nicer better fitting coat. In the end my stomach made the decision for me and we bought the coat. And we went to McDonalds. Now McDonalds isn´t all that great a place to go you´re telling me, and I agree except this is an Argentine McDonalds which is one of the few things that argentina does better then the US run McDonalds. For the most part it is nicer, it would be more along the lines of an Applebees or Wingers in niceness, except minus the waiters, and the fact that it´s expensive like a circle, ie. they cut every single corner to save money and the cost is entirely round. We both got McNifta combos. Forget about the fountain drinks and forget about even getting a choice of soda. Before I had even paid they already had thrown a burger fries, and a medium cup (about the size of a small back home) with Coke on our tray. Now I probably would have just accepted and gotten over my dislike of Coke, but not Karina, (as well) before I had even paid had already told them that she wanted Fanta, and asked me what I wanted, as well as asked for salt, mustard, and fancy ketchup (why McDonalds ketchup is fancy the world will never know). And that threw a wrentch in the whole system. Apparently, orange Fanta doesn´t come out of the fountain very quickly, because we were there waiting for our drinks for about 4 minutes, all the while, I was confused as to why it was taking so long, and Karina getting more and more upset about how the french fries were getting colder and colder (again something I wouldn´t have even thought about, apparently to argentines eating warm food warm is VERY important). Finally, I paid and they actually gave me change with 5 one peso coins. I was throughly pleased with myself for having made the decision to come to McDonalds, as coins are increadibly scarse and needed everywhere. We ate, talked, and then she had to go to work, (her boss had been texting and calling her all morning long for her to come in saying it was urgent, and how he needed her, I may add by the time she got there at 3pm everything had been done and she didn´t really have anything to do). I decided I wanted to go and visit some people I met in my last area which was just a train ride away from where I was, (or so I had thought). Apparently, I didn´t remember as well as I had thought how the train system worked and I... well, I got lost. It wasn´t so much as I didn´t know where I was, I just didn´t go the right way, and it took me much longer to get to where I was going. Actually, I decided I wasn´t all that interested in going to my last area after all. I ended up going to visit a family that lives in an area called "Bosques" where I never was, but met on exchanges. But I couldn´t remember exactly how to get to thier house. I got off the train and I knew I had to take one street about 4 blocks which would dead end in thier house. Which street that was I couldn´t quite remember. So I went forward with faith in my "keen" sense of direction and my "sharp" eye for detail. And it turns out after about an hour of walking I found every single street in that half of the area, except for the one street they live on. A little discouraged I decided to go press on to my origional destination. Again, I took the wrong train. By the time I realized this and got back to the Bosques station I had the misfortuine of learing that there were protesters on the railway just beyond the station where I was going and they weren´t running trains in that direction. I figured a Disel train engine with 18 cars of inerita and several miles of track could pretty much plow through anything those protesters could have put in thier way thus effectivly ending the protest. The officials thought otherwise. So I really had two options, take the train all the other way around the loop and hope to be able to find a bus that would take me where I wanted to go which would take upwards of 2 hours, go home, or take another stab at finding that family I once met. Determined to achieve something productive in my forey into the argentine train system, I chose the latter and tried my best to retrace the steps where I would have gone. 5 minutes later I was at thier house, we talked drank more mate, and then the sun set meaning I wanted to be going soon (things can get a little touchy after dark espically with someone who is from out of town). They accompanied me to the train station and I got home just in time to get on the equivalent of Argentine rush hour which means playing sardines with an assortment of smelly, old and tired argentines on the train. I got home and ate dinner to find out the news about Bin Laden. I would be lying if I didn´t say I was pleased.
After an hour or so Karina got home and we went to the kids half house (I´ve decided the Salinas have two houses, one where the kids stay, and one where the parents stay, but one lacks a bathroom and the other lacks a kitchen, so between the both of them they have one house). We went to the other house to talk. And Karina wanted to speak english with me. Her english wasn´t quite as good as I had hoped. She wanted me to say something to her in english. So I told her "You´re gorgeous." Apparently she didn´t know what gorgeous ment. When I told her gorgeous means "hermosa" she told me I was wrong. I must admit I was a little taken aback. Apparently the only correct way to translate "hermosa" from spanish is beautiful. This was compounded with the fact that when she asked me to spell gorgeous to prove my point and I didn´t know (is gorgeous how you spell gorgeous?) and it wasn´t in her english-spanish dictionary (or I just really don´t know how to spell).
I really wanted to tell you all about the Tito Family, my trip to "La Costonera," and church on Sunday. But this post ended up much longer then I had anticipated maybe some other time.
