Being Alive

Day Ten

Here is my number one best travel tip: Bubble wrap. It weighs nothing and takes up very little space in your suitcase. Making it home with the pottery you spent two hours selecting in some foreign market will save you about a million dollars in emotional costs plus the $10 you actually paid for the stuff.

After carefully bubblewrapping our purchases for the trip home, Tay and I headed out for our last day of sightseeing. Unlike the day before, we actually made it to MALBA. I had to pay our admission fee on my bankcard because the ticket office, like everywhere else in Buenos Aires, didn't have change. These small inconveniences were overshadowed by the terrific collection of modern art. We went through it in a couple of hours and still "Jonesing" for more art, walked over to the decorative art museum down the street.

This museum was in a French-syle mansion built in the early 1900s. The husband was an Argentine diplomat who worked in Paris. Like expats everywhere, they spent a lot of time buying stuff. (Only the stuff they bought were statutes from Rodin and paintings by El Greco and Manet.) They also bought three giant Fleming tapestries. As they needed somewhere to show off this stuff, they hired a French architect to build them a house for back home. The architect never managed to actually come to Argentina and had much of the beautiful interiors (carvings, panelings, etc.) done in France, shipped over in pieces and then assembled here.

The couple ran into a bit of a problem with their three giant Flemish tapestries. (They apparently had not mastered my trick of visualizing where things will fit in your house before deciding to buy.) They solved their problem by including a giant 16th Century English-style Great Hall.

All of this got a little pricey, however. They made an unfortunate choice of cutting costs by not building the beautiful fireplace for the Great Hall designed by Rodin, a model of which is on display. Instead, they ordered one from a catalogue.

The family finished the tour of duty in France and settled into this house with their 22 servants for the next 20 years. Once the Depression Hit, they sold the house and all its contents to the Argentine goverment with the provision that it become a museum. I couldn't feel too badly for them because that is the collector's ultimate dream--to have such wonderful taste that your home and all its contents are forever preserved for others to admire.

Tay and I took a taxi back to our apartment. We got some empanadas and pizza from the neighborhood pizza place which we ate in our apartment while we finished packing. It was the only meal we'd eaten in. The apartment rental service dropped by to check us out and give me back an envelope full of cash containing my deposit. We loaded up our suitcases in the car I'd ordered and drove out to the international airport.

After we checked in, we looked around for that the gelatto place we loved. Unfortunately, it had closed its airport location, so we killed some time by shopping at the international terminal. I was shocked at how low their prices were! In comparison, we'd overpaid for everything we'd bought. Then Taylor pointed out the prices were in U.S. dollars, not Argentine pesos, and were actually FOUR times more expensive than I'd thought. On that basis, we'd paid less than half of what they were asking for here.

Our only purchase was at the gate where I spent $8 for three bottles of water to take on the plane. What I didn't realize, however, was there was a checkpoint in the entryway after they'd collected our boarding passes outside the plane. "Do you have any liquids?" asked the security guard.

"Yes, I have three unopened bottles of water I just bought," I said. I was given the option of chugging all three in the jetway or leaving them behind. Ten days ago, I'd begun this journey by watching people helplessly complain when their honey was confiscated. I just handed my bottles of water over.

As Tay and I boarded the plane, I thought about a study I'd read that said people get more satisfaction from buying experiences than from buying possessions. It has to do with meeting higher-order needs and that our experiences feed our sense of well-being by making us feel more alive. The opportunity to explore Argentina for ten days with Taylor, experiencing the food, the museums, the architecture, the markets--even that dunking in Iguazu Falls--made me feel very alive. And I hope someday to come back for more.

Comparing Football Men

Day Nine

Today, we were on a mission to find artwork for Taylor. Combining sightseeing and shopping, we strolled along the beautiful Avenue de Julio. We paused to take photos of the Hall of Justice, before walking down to the famous opera house, Teatro Colon. Teatro Colon is considered one of the most beautiful opera houses in the world. Pavarotti, Callas and Caruso all sang here.

Lucky for us, the theater had just reopened after being closed for renovations for the past four years. Unlucky for us, they were not allowing visitors inside. We contented ourselves with admiring the lovely exterior with its sculptured reliefs. While we enjoyed the architecture that day, we were less successful at finding art. In the galleries around Ave. de Julio and Recoletta, we found two broad categories of art: very expensive good art and very expensive bad art. And by bad, we're talking tiger paintings on a black background. As our required category of art was "cheap," we gave up and decided to go see free art at the museums.

We decided to go to the famous modern art museum. After about an hour trek over to San Telmo, I discovered that I had brought us to the WRONG museum. Even worse, this museum was closed for rennovation. But as long as we were in San Telmo, we might as well check out the shops. Almost immediately, we found a Havana Cafe/gift shop. Havana makes very popular Argentine cookies with filling. We decided to bring some back as gifts. The woman behind the counter patiently waited as a I tried to decide how how I would need if I put one in everyone's Christmas stocking that I was likely to be spending Christmas with. I didn't realize it, but I was monopolizing the only cashier and people who were just trying to pay for their cafe con leches were lining up behind me. US $40 later, I paid for my sweet purchases and the line behind me breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Next we stopped at a folk art store. Earlier in the week, I had been admiring these wire figures dressed in native cloths with their arms raised as if someone was making a touchdown. I called them "football guys." Taylor decided to buy one. We spent our usual 15 minutes picking out the best example. Then I remembered I'd seen a shop two blocks away that also had them. So we walked to Shop #2 and checked out their selection, spending another 15 minutes to pick out their best example. Of course, by then we had forgottten exactly what football guy at store #1 looked like, so we had to make another trip back there, then back to store #2, before finally going back to store #1 to make the purchase. (Do we love to shop, or what?)

But in between Store #1 and Store #2 was another folk art store, where Tay and I found a selection of beautiful collages of native symbols. One collage stood out to both of us. When I tried to negotiate a better price for it, the manager asked, "Do you own a store or something?" (Do American tourists NEVER bargain here?). Regardless, he knocked another 10% off the 30% cash discount, and after a quick trip to a bank machine, I bought it for Taylor for his 21st birthday. I was happy to get a good price because I knew that framing something that size in the U.S. was going to be very expensive. But the end result would be a unique piece of art and a sourvenir of our trip that Taylor could enjoy forever.

On our trip back to our apartment, we hit rush hour. The subway platform where we changed trains was packed. People just pushed forward train after train until they eventually were able to board. Taylor was hot and cranky, so we opted to get a cab. We walked up to the street level where we found it was raining. Raining and rush hour are not good factors for taxi availability. Nonetheless, about 15 minutes later we spotted someone alighting from a taxi and we rushed over to grab it.

While the subway could have gotten us back in 15 minutes, a taxi in stop and go traffic took us 45 minutes. We rested and at 10 p.m., headed out to another Argentine restaurant for dinner. We were the first ones there, although a few more people came in after us. The decour was nice, the food was only so-so, but the biggest advantage of the restaurant was its proximity to our apartment. I had no small bills for the tip and the restaurant couldn't change my $100 peso bill ($25 U.S.) I walked back to the apartment to retrieve my stash of small bills. I felt very comfortable walking through the neighborhood alone around midnight. I made it safely back to the restaurant, left the tip and Tay and I called it a day.

The George Harrison Steak

Day 8: Iguazu Falls to Buenos Aires

While Taylor slept in, I went in search of a free breakfast. Last night, I had noticed the room service menu said that breakfast via room service was not included in the room price. Did that mean that there was a breakfast included in the room price somewhere else? The front desk confirmed my complementary breakfast buffet was downstairs.

My last complementary breakfast buffet was at the Best Western in Long Beach, where I fought for the use of toasters and the make-your-own-waffle machine with a troop of Boy Scouts. However, the complementary buffet here was a pleasant surprise. There were eight large dispensers of fresh squeezed juice, a station with about 20 different kinds of cheeses, a station with a wide variety of fresh fruits and yogurts, another station with a huge array of pastries and breads, various hot and cold cereal choices, and about eight chafing dishes with hot items like grilled potatoes and eggs benedict.

This was actually what I used to call the "standard $25 hotel buffet breakfast," which I've eaten at big hotels all over the world. The price was always $25 and the menus varied very little, except sometimes there was an Asian station. Of course by now, it's probably the "standard $35 hotel buffet breakfast." The Iguazu Sheraton was missing one important station from the "standard," the made-to-order omlet station. I did forgive them, however, as the whole breakfast was INCLUDED in the price of the room.

Tay and I took a taxi back to the airport for our 2 p.m. flight. He was covered in mosquito bites so he refused my offer of a quick hike beforehand. Between Tay's mosquito bites and my reaction to the near-drowning-by-falls, we had both had enough of nature.

We flew into a gorgeous day in Buenos Aires. We left our suitcases at our apartment and headed out for what turned out to be a three-mile walk through several neighborhoods. (I guess we made up for not hiking earlier.) We ended up at the gelatto place, recommended on our first night. We sat down and were handed a menu that did not include gelatto.

We walked over to the person scooping gelatto and tried to order there. That wasn't right either. She directed us to the cashier where we figured out that we had to order by size. After we paid, we took the receipt back to the gelatto scooper who inquired as to the flavors we wanted. The flavors were in Spanish. (If I had learned fruit flavors in one of my college Spanish classes, that knowledge had long departed my brain.) I made a guess and we got strawberry with chocolate pieces. It was yummy. Taylor's reaction was the same as the first night: "We have to have this again!"

Consulting my map, I found the Subte a few blocks away. We followed the subway signs but it didn't "feel" right. Years of being a stranger in a strange land, have taught me to pay close attention to my "Spidey senses," so we didn't board. We later found out this was the train to the outlying suburbs. We backtracked and found another entrance to the Subte line we wanted.

We rested at our apartment before heading out for dinner around 10 p.m. Google Maps had shown the restaurant as being a 50 minute walk away. But when I closed in on the destination, I couldn't find the street the restaurant was on. I pulled up the Spanish website, which showed the restaurant was, not a 50 minute walk, but around the corner from our apartment. I was relieved I had doublechecked and not hailed a taxi to take us to an address 200 feet away!

In addition to being close, Don Julio's was a cozy neighborhood Argentine restaurant. I was very proud that I had made our reservation, entirely in Spanish, earlier in the day. Now, however, they had no record of me. (I did not receive the all-important reservation number from them so I should have realized they had no clue what I was saying.) The restaurant was very busy, but they did manage to fit us in.

We had an excellent steak. Taylor and I decided it was a George Harrison steak. George Harrison is a very good songwriter. But he is often completely overlooked because he was in a group with Paul McCartney and John Lennon, the two greatest songwriters of his generation. So even if our steak at LaCabera was a McCartney/Lennon steak, a Harrison Steak at Don Julio's is still pretty good.

We ordered a better bottle of Malbec. After having a Malbec wine at dinner every night, we were developing a better appreciation for the more subtle versions. One of Don Julio's traditions is to display empty wine bottles autographed by customers. Taylor wrote, "Nancy and Taylor 2010" on our bottle of Malbec and then drew a cow on our label.

If you are ever in Don Julio's, you can look for it.

Up Close in Iguazu Falls

Day 7: Buenos Aires to Iguazu Falls

We had a noon flight which entailed me having to wake up Taylor early. Waking Tay up in the morning is akin to awakening a bear in hybernation. You do it slowly and gently, being ready to retreat if he lashes out. I do not converse with Taylor in the morning. This is is a complete challenge for me as I am one of those cheery, talkative morning people. On the other hand, Taylor is a night owl, slow to wake up but then raring to go until the wee hours of the morning, while I am pretty much asleep at 10 p.m.

The only time our internal clocks ever synchronized was when Taylor worked nights. He would come home at 6 a.m., which after a night of working to him was just very late. Having just woken up after a full night's sleep, it was very early to me. So we were both in a good mood while I fixed him breakfast.

This morning, we caught a cab to the domestic airport, a quick 15 minute ride. We walked up to the Lan counter where the agent looked only at our passports before giving us boarding passes. Waiting to board, we ate breakfast at an airport cafe (mediuluna for me and hamon y questo tostitos for Taylor). I noticed that the rule about leisurely service in Argentina is apparently suspended for airports. They brought the check with the meal.

At the gate, we were boarded into a bus which literally drove us 50 feet before disembarking us in front of the plane. The last flight I took on Lan, two years ago from Cuzco to Lima, the monitor had a hidden camera show involving people dressed in gorilla suits. This flight, I watched another hidden camera show involving people in gorilla suits. In fact, if I EVER encounter a real gorilla in South America, I will probably be killed looking for the hidden camera.

On the one hour flight, passengers were provided with two drink services and a box of snacks with three items. As it was still the middle of the night to Taylor, he slept the entire flight. When we landed, I saw that official signs showed the taxi prices to various hotels. We walked to the taxi stand and ordered the 70 peso trip to the Sheraton. A guy standing beside the table walked us outside to his car, and we were off.

The Sheraton, about 20 minutes away, is the only hotel inside the park on the Argentine side. (Americans need a visa for the Brazilian side.) I was not too impressed because it looked like a 1960s motel. (For this I was paying $275 a night?) We walked inside and saw of wall of windows overlooking the falls. Okay, for THIS I was paying $275 a night. Our room had a view of both sets of falls (the Argentine and Brazilian sides) as promised, but only if you stood in the corner of the balcony. The rest of the window had a view of a large tree. I had paid extra for a room with a view, and I didn't count the view of the tree. I marched down to the front desk and got a room with an unobstructed view.

In the lobby I booked Tay and I on the last boat tour of the day. The agent gave us a brochure marked with the meeting place and told us, "You will get wet."

But first, Tay and I walked over to the trail along the upper falls. The upper falls trail went along the top of the falls, offering really breathtaking views. Actually this park had plenty of amazing falls. There were breathtaking views from everywhere. (And me with no camera!) Along the way, Tay and I watched as a bunch of animals crossed the path in front of us. They looked liked anteaters to me, but we later learned they were some kind of local raccoon.

After our scenic hike, we walked over to the meeting point. There we were loaded into a huge open air-truck with bench seat for the first portion of our trip, the nature jaunt through the forrest. This truck was so noisy that any wildlife could hear us coming from miles away. We finally arrived at the embarkation point, and we walked down to the river. On the way down, we passed a group of young Americans who were taking a break from their whitewater rafting trip. As our obviously tourist group filed past them, I couldn't help thinking, "I'm in the wrong group. I'm supposed to be with the adventurous people, not the tourists!"

At the river, the tour guide loaded us up in a large inflatable boat. We all donned life jackets and put the rest of our belongings in waterproof bag. Some of the other tourists put on rain ponchos they'd brought.
I was excited to see a lot of great rapids ahead of us, but the boat driver took great pains to drive us AROUND the rapids. I almost groaned. Rapids are the fun part. People pay a lot of money of money to go through rapids. Here they were in front of us, and we were driving around them?

After about a ten minute boat ride with minimal rapid contact, we arrived at the base of one of the falls. I had thought the top of the falls were an amazing vantage point, but the bottom of the falls were even better.

We had been told that we would get wet. I'm not afraid of a little water. I've taken the log ride at Six Flags. I've seen the front rows splashed by Shamu at SeaWorld. But I was totally unprepared when the boat took us directly under the raging water fall. Taylor and I were instantly soaked as if someone had poured barrels and barrels of water directly on top of us. As the boat pulled back from the falls, Tay and I were shouting with laughter at the shock. Every part of me, from my hair to the underwear under my clothes, was wringing wet. I was still wiping the water out of my eyes, when the boat driver took us back under the falls for another round.

After that, they drove us to another falls where we had another bracing shower. I was beginning to feel like a wet rat someone was trying to drown. Finally, we disembarked. In the watery confusion, Taylor and I got separated from the group. It was about a 20 minute walk back up to the Sheraton, and I went "squish, squish, squish" every step of the way. My neck and shoulders were beginning to ache from involuntarily trying to wretch away from the downpour.

Back at the hotel, I took a hot shower and wrang the water out of my still-dripping clothes. I collapsed on my bed, under the covers. I refused to leave the room so Tay ordered room service for dinner and we ended up watching reruns of Monk that night, trying to recuperate.

Iguazu Falls is lovely, but I don't recommend it at such close range.