I had a great time at Carnaval, Guale-bout-chu?

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Elaborate costumes. Sensual dancing. Colorful floats. Exuberent music. Body glitter. Plastic breasts covered with bejewelled pasties.

Carnaval. The biggest, craziest celebration in South America. We had arrived.

Everyone knows about Brazil's famous Carnaval celebrations, but most people probably don't know that pretty much every country in Latin America has their own unique way of celebrating. Since these are all officially Catholic countries, they use this opportunity to go wild before Lent and its fasting begins. While Brazil's celebrations may be the most elaborate, it is also extremely expensive to attend and isn't necessarily the safest environment.

We decided to experience Carnaval Argentina-style. We had flown back to BsAs from Patagonia to take care of some business (obtaining our Brazilian visas, changing our plane tickets, etc.) and bid farewell to our friends and favorite restaurants in our beloved city. And it just so happens that only 3 hours north of BsAs is the biggest Carnaval celebration in the country.

Gualeguaychú (we had a lot of fun with this name) is known for two things: their Carnaval celebrations, and their beautiful women. The latter is what every Argentine emphasized when we told them that we were planning to to go to Carnaval there. When we asked the guy who ran our hostel in El Calfate what he thought of their Carnaval (he'd been five times), he said it was amazing but, he added pointedly to John, "it's too bad you're going with her," nodding his head toward me. Ha. (He told me later he was just joking about that part. Funny guy. Ha.) As a fellow travel-blogger put it, "like 60 percent of them are super hot, and then the another 35 percent are pretty hot. Incidentally another five percent have GREAT personalities."

The funny thing about it was that when we got to Playa Solar del Este, the river-beach where all of the young people spend the day of Carnaval, it was a complete sausage fest--at least 75 percent male. Apparently, they too had heard about the beautiful women of Gualeguaychú.

It was a very cool atmosphere though. Our friend Yalda, who went with us to Carnaval, described it as "Spring break...in a good way." A small beach leading up to the warm and calm waters of the Rio Uruguay packed to the brim with young people either drinking or dancing. The beach had a decent-sized stage with a sand dancefloor surrounded by mist machines, which as the day went on, got crazier and muddier. They also had a huge bar selling liters of Heinekin for $3 and pitchers of Sangria for $5--beat that, Brazil.

We had a blast sipping on refreshing sangria and people-watching. Watching Argentines, you realize they are more or less the same as Americans (just more mullets). Young people everywhere are really all the same...obviously there are going to be some cultural differences but when it comes down to it, everyone just wants to spend time with friends, eat, drink and be merry.

Supposedly Argentines drink but don't really get drunk...they will sip one drink the all night at a club, for instance, it's just not a part of their culture. But I guess Carnaval is an exception. As the day went on, it seems pretty much every guy on the beach came to hit on our American girlfriends. We stayed on the beach til it got dark and then headed over to the Corsodromo, the stadium where the official Carnaval celebration was to take place, starting at 10:30 PM.

We had awesome second row seats (that cost $5...unreal). The music and the energy of the participants was infectious, you had to be on your feet, standing on your chair, dancing and clapping and singing along. You learn the words easily as the same song plays for the entire six hours (until 4:30 AM). For six hours different dancers parade in front of you, with float after float, and it's pretty much all the same, even though they have on slightly different costumes...yet somehow it holds your complete attention. You feel like you are in some crazy trance watching it, for six hours, completely entertained. And you look around at 3:30 in the morning and see five year olds clapping their hands next to you, and across the aisle there are three ladies easily in their 70s, having the time of their lives.

And yeah, there are a lot of beautiful half-naked women, but there's a lot of beautiful half-naked men as well. And there's people of all ages, shapes and sizes participating. It was a very cool thing to experience.

We pulled an all-nighter and took a 6 AM bus back to BsAs. What a great way to end our time in Argentina. Hard to believe we are really leaving this time, for good.

While we won't miss the pizza, we will miss the people we met here, BsAs' international flavor, the often-taken-for-granted safety of this large Latin American city, the beautiful melody of Argentine Spanish, the steak, the empanadas, the cafés, the plazas, the mountains, the waterfalls, the glaciers...what a country.

Argentina, you were good to us.

Now...it's off to Brasil. Chau!

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Photos

Pitchers of Sangria...$4
Cynthia and Sarah

Playa Solar del Este
Spring Break Argentina-style.

Comments

[phil]

Drinking moderation
I heard the same thing in Italy, "Italians don't drink do get drunk they just sip on some wine all night". So not true, I witnessed many drunk Italians on a daily basis hitting on all the American girls in my program. Sounds similar. P.S. Can we get some Sasha experiences added to the travel blog