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Published: February 25th 2008
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Tango in Buenos Aires
We watched some pretty classy tango dances at a Milonga The last 10 days have been a full, dazzling adventure, and before the colors and sounds completely fade, we want to put words to a few of our more vivid memories...
The punishing flight from Chicago had been delayed by a blizzard, so it was disorienting to step off the plane in Buenos Aires into a blast of heat and humidity...think St. Louis or Washington DC in late July. Of course, it is late summer here (the equivalent of August). At the suggestion of our friends Catherine and Dale, we had booked 2 nights in a small tango house (Casa Maria Tango) where we were treated as long absent family members--kisses on both cheeks from every employee, including the housekeeper. Most of the guests are Europeans or Americans who are in Buenos Aires to study tango, and there are several tango-related events every day. We did go to an excellent tango show and a milonga, which is an informal public gathering where people go to dance tango or find tango partners. Fascinating! Bill's bad right foot is keeping him off the dance floor right now, and Carol declined to take the free Tango lesson that was offered at the Tango
Buenos Aires Neighborhood Bistro
The choice of food, including uncooked meat, was laid out in front of us at this small neighborhood restaurant near La Casa Maria Tango house. (It was just too hot and humid to enjoy clasping another's slippery body for an hour----however artistically!)
Buenos Aires seems very European with gorgeous, ornate 19th C. buildings and wide boulevards. We toured the city and especially appreciated seeing the plaza where the mothers and grandmothers of "the disappeared" still hold weekly demonstrations of protest which include a universal symbol of a baby's diaper. (The diaper icon symbolizes the fact that pregnant women were abducted by the ruling military and the resulting children were never returned to their original families but were raised by others.....nobody knows who). We also visited the crypt of the beloved "Evita" Peron.
Then on to the mountain town of Bariloche. Both of us were ambivalent about the prospect of a 20-hour bus trip from Buenos Aires to the mountain town of Bariloche, but the trip was fabulous! The seats reclined completely, and the attendant kept bringing meals (with wine) and snacks. We watched three dreadful films in English with Spanish subtitles and learned some useful foul phrases in this language we can barely speak. (Can't remember the word for "apple," but can't forget the word for "bitch"!) In the meantime, we watched
Lago Nahuel Huapi in Bariloche
This is the view from the top of Cerro Otto (Otto Peak)which is very close to our house and our school. We rode a cable car to get this picture the sun set on soft green pastures, then vanish and give way to darkness with huge and vivid stars. Eventually, we opened our eyes to see the sun rise behind looming mountains. That's when we knew that we were about to arrive in Bariloche, where we were to spend the next four weeks.
In Bariloche, we are living in a small comfy house that is our homestay. It's close to our school and on the line of the collectivo (public bus). our hosts are a retired couple who speak only Spanish (a blessing, that comes with a fair number of complications). Julia is a fabulous cook (absolutely amazing!), and her husband Jose has the formidable duty of presiding over the lengthy dinnertime conversations, which we interrupt frequently to scramble through our dictionaries. For the first six days, there was a 30-something Swiss economist named Mark, also a student at our Spanish school, sharing our house. His Spanish is much more fluent, and thanks to his intermediary role, we talked with our host for hours each evening on topics ranging from the role of the neo-Nazis in Argentina to the import taxes imposed on foreign cars imported into Argentina. Mark
La Casa de Jose y Julia
Our homestay in Bariloche is right on the busline about 7 Km from the center of town. has a very sophisticated sense of culture and humor and kept us thinking, laughing, and scratching our heads.
Studying Spanish intensively in Latin America as 60s-something gringos is an adventure in patience and humility. We each have three hours of private lessons daily with teachers (Carina y Javier) who have great skills and huge hearts. Then, like good students, we go home to do several hours of homework before dinner each evening. The lessons are quite academic--gobs of grammar--but also include a lot free conversation designed to make us truly conversant sooner. It's no surprise that Bill does better understanding the rapid-fire Spanish that we swim through constantly while Carol remains the grammar queen. (You can guess which is more useful!) There is no question that we are both in Spanish school kindergarten, longing to be worthy of a promotion to first grade.
Our first week in Bariloche has been enriched by the company of our Seattle friends, Catherine and Dale, who are studying at the same school but at a much higher level. Since they're leaving in a few days, we crammed in a couple of wonderful excursions this weekend. On Friday after classes, we went to
Carol Y Su Maestra Carina
Here is the "grammar queen" with her teacher in Spanish school. We study three hours a day, Monday through Friday, for four weeks a huge, gorgeous estancia (ranch) on the steppe outside Bariloche. The terrain is very much like Eastern Washington but with towering rock formations like we find in Utah. Bill, Catherine, and Dale joined a beret-wearing gaucho for a two-hour ride on horseback to a high point where there was a pretty log "refugio". ( Carol's titanium hip doesn't mount or dismount well, so she followed by pickup.) When "los caballeros" arrived in an impressive cloud of dust, there was a fabulous meal waiting of grilled asado (steak) and salad with wine. The area of the estancia is famous as a winter home of Andean condors, but since this is late summer, there are fewer. We looked and looked, but were unable to spot even one. Que triste!
On Saturday the four of us took a boat trip to a breathtaking nearby area that reminds us of traveling in the waters around the San Juan Islands of Washington state. The water was extremely deep and pristinely clear--in fact, we were told we could safely fill our water bottles from it. (Being cautious gringos, we didn't.) It was glorious to tramp through the myrtle forest (Bill says that the myrtles are
Guillermo Y Blondie
I loved this ride on my trusty steed, Blondie and the furry saddle minimized the aftereffects. cousins of the madrona) and learning about the problems caused by "exotic" trees introduced from Oregon, including eucalyptus and sequoia. There were many other tourists on the islands, a good number from other parts of Argentina and other Latin American countries. Immediately after lunch, the shaded areas were draped with the sleeping bodies of folks enjoying their post-lunch siestas. One snoozing silhouette looked a lot like "El Senor Bill"!
Asi es la vida en Argentina!
Con embrazos...Bill y Carol
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catherine
non-member comment
Great pictures!
Hi Bill and Carol, Just want you to know that I love your blog! Bien hecho! hugs, Catherine