Revacation part 7

2010/04/01

We had to check out of the hotel today but apparently your still allowed to check your bags and hang out there for free so rather than haul our stuff around all day that's what we did. We grabbed what we would need and checked the rest. We then started our day by grabbing a quick breakfast at the hotel and then walked down to the beach for the 3rd time. The first time it was cool and no one was there. Yesterday it was warmer and some people were there. Today it was beautiful out and blazing hot and it was packed!! We grabbed a spot to lay our towels down and jumped into the water. This is where we got some of my favorite pics. I also did some picross puzzles as we tanned. After a few hours it was time to eat so we decided to grab some lunch at that castle restaurant at the end of the beach. I think we had to pay more to sit on the outside deck but we went for it because it was nicer then sitting in the cramped inside. It was a bit windy but we still enjoyed ourselves. The food we got here was probably, I don't want to say bad but, the non-best we've had the whole week. The chicken thing I got was good but it was small and the pumpkin mashed potatoes were good but meh.

After we ate we walked down to where all these street vendors were selling their junk. Everyone other booth was sunglasses and stupid stuff made out of wood. I made fun of it and Ale thought I was hilarious. She is so sweet and awesome. It was a good walk down there and on the way back we walked down towards the water. Here there was no beach just rocks but it was fun to climb over them and jump over the cracks.

When we got back to the beach part there was some kind of memorial sidewalk area where all kinds of famous Argentinian people cast their hands in the cement. Ale acted like I heard of some of them but I have not. Excuse my ignorance dear. :(

Even though we had checked out of the hotel, our coupons for a free spa treatment were still valid so decided to cash those in. This was an awesome, relaxing time. It broke down into 3 separate stops: the sauna, the Finnish bath, and then the jacuzzi (15 min at each stop). First we went into the steam room with the heated rocks. It was damn hot. I kept pouring water on the rocks too for some reason which just made it worse. We almost couldn't take it but the lady came and pulled us out right before we gave up. That was a hardy sweating for sure. The lady showed us where the showers were between each stop. I guess you were supposed to rinse of all the sweat and cool down a bit before the next thing. So we did that, dried off and walked back out.
We went in the next thing which I had never heard of before, the Finnish bath. It was like being in a bathroom. The sauna was wood and this was bathroom tiles. More steam came from everywhere and it was almost so hot you couldn't sit down. The steam even smelled like a clean bathroom somehow. Once again though it was extremely hot in here and I think Ale did wig out and left the room before our time was up.
We took a quick rinse off shower again and hit the last thing, the jacuzzi. This was the best. Although this one wasn't as hot (as I expect a jacuzzi to be) it was very calm and relaxing. The bubbles and jets were very soothing and we just sat there and vegged out for a while. Actually a long while I think the lady forgot about us or soemthing because it seemed she left us in way more than 15 minutes.

We got cleaned up once last time and got dressed. It was time to check out the casino.

Neither of us really see the point in gambling so we didn't have that great of a time here. We walked around saw the tables and slots. I remember having trouble breathing because there were so many smokers around. I think we played the slots for about a dollars worth and then I dragged her over to the bar so I could get a drink. She ordered some fries so she wouldn't be drinking on an empty stomach and we both got some fancy drink. It was nice. When we were done that was all we needed to see. We left. I remember being amazed at the bill. It was so cheap. Back home just one of these fancy drinks would cost more than our whole bill!

We walked thru the town and stopped in some of the shops. There was an arcade here so we went there too. I had a strange sense of deja vu at one point like I had been here or dreamed about this place a long time ago. That was weird. They had one of those cool things where you put on 3D glasses and go into the small room and sit on one of those chairs that jerk around and watched a short roller coaster movie that they advertised was in 4D. I like those kinds of things and I think Ale liked it too.

When we left there we walked back to the mall to eat some dinner. We went to a normal burger type place and then got some ice cream after. We were getting tired after such an exciting week so we went back tot he hotel and chilled in the lobby till we took a cab back to the bus station.

The bus still wasn't too packed and we claimed our same, top of the bus in the back seats that we did before. No snack this time though. When we woke up next time it would be my last day here. :(

TO BE CONTINUED

Revacation Part 2

2010/03/27

Someone must have reached across me and shut my window shade because when I woke up it was closed. That was a smart thing though because when I opened it, light blazed in. It was morning and I was almost at the airport (EZE). Nothing could stop me now!!

When we de-planed we walked down these awesome glass hallways that attached the planes to the terminal. Nothing like the retractable pieces of garbage at (PIT). I followed everyone down to Customs. We had to wait in line to show our passports and pay some kind of entry tax. Apparently you don't need a visa to visit Argentina from the US but the other way around, you do. Argentina recoops this cost to their citizens with this tax. Either way I could have used the $131 for other purposes but I knew about it ahead of time so I was prepared. After that I waited in line for another guy who stamped my passport and that was it. Get my bag and head out. Happiness!!

The area sort of funneled everyone towards a frosted glass double door that was the exit. I walked thru it and directly in front of me was a giant glass wall with hundreds of people staring at me with their faces pressed against it looking for their loved ones. Hi everyone that is staring at me. I am not the person you are looking for. Now I know how the monkey's at the zoo feel like. Where was my loved one? How was I supposed to find Alejandra in this mess? I started walking and saw the end where my area merged with the area all these people were. If I didn't see her by the time I got there what was I going to do? Ah I see her arm outstretched. I iz saved!! Hugs! Wow I'm here. You're here. This is slightly weird but not. I can't believe this. How was your trip? How long were you waiting? Where are we going now? Let's go to the hostel. Okay.

Outside a taxi man told us I couldn't bring my bags on a bus and that we should go with him. Ale said he was lying and we found and boarded the #8 bus after a few minutes with no problems. She sort of sat half on me and finally got to start enjoying each others company. We took our first picture together here. There was a rear view mirror on the ceiling in front of us for some reason and we could see ourselves in it. We did it! The revacation has started!

I got to see the country side of this strange land I was in while Ale filled me in on what was going on. The bus was empty when we got on it but the closer we got to the city the more and more people that boarded. Wow here we are, check this city out. Every block was packed with stores and there were signs and huge billboards everywhere. Wow there's a gas station, a sign to drink Coke, a soccer stadium, a train station, huge apartment buildings. This looks like normal familiar stuff but for some reason slightly strange to me. For blocks and blocks and blocks it just went on. NYC probably looks something like this but I have never been there. Ale showed me her bus schedule book. As big as this city was I was impressed she had studied this manual enough to know when and where to go. The bus wouldn't go directly to where we needed to go but we could get a taxi the rest of the way. 4 pesos for the bus but it would have been 40 pesos to get a taxi this far. I love that she knows things like that. We stopped and I dragged my stuff off the bus and into a taxi. Do these intersections lack signals? I think so. I don't know how many car accidents they have around here but from what I'm seeing it should be a lot. At least half the cars on the road are taxis and it doesn't seem to be mandatory to stay in your lane either.

Here at the hostel it is kind of weird. I had my first real interaction with someone that could not understand a word I was saying and vice versa. Luckily Ale took over and handled all this but it was neat to be right there and try to figure out what they were saying. They didn't clean our room yet or something but we could dump our stuff and by the time we came back it would be ready. Sounds like a good idea to me. My arms are killing me from hauling these bags around. There's only one remote for the air conditioners so we have to get the guy to come up here to turn it off and on. :/ Okay there's a bed and a dresser. Where is our bathroom? Oh it is the room next door. So we have to leave our room to go take a shower and stuff. :/ I got some shorts on and got my feet out of my big boots. It was cold in Pittsburgh but it's not here. We will go get a bite to eat and take a quick walk around while they finish doing whatever they are going to do to our room so we dumped our stuff and walked back out onto the street.

Right down the street from the hostel was a nice looking restaurant called Imperio's so we went in there and took a seat. Now I get to see how they do things down here. First thing I noticed, they don't give you free refills on drinks and everything is either con gas or sin gas (do you want it bubbly or not). It was fancy here. They had cloth napkins and the waiters were all dressed sharply but I could not read the menu. Yeah I see it says Pizza but what kinds are these? You don't have pepperoni down here? That is the most insane things I ever heard. Hmm since I don't know what this crap is I'm going to have to bite the bullet here and just trust you Ale to get me something I'll like. She ordered me 'Matambre con papas a la espanola'. It was awesome!!! :D Imagine a kind of regular personal pizza but instead of a bread crust that everything is on it's a big piece of meat. On top of that is ham. On top of that is a ton of melted cheese with spices and a few tomato slices. The whole thing is served with what we would call here potato wedges. It was awesome. I had a couple of 7ups with it, we took some pictures, I stole one of their classy cloth napkins and we were out.

It was a nice day for a walk. I remember seeing a block on the bus map that was in the shape of a circle. Apparently that was the park Ale wanted to show me so we went off in that direction. Watch where you step. There is dog poop all over the place. There is a burned out car filled with trash. Don't they clean up that stuff around here? Is this a foreign land thing or just a big city thing? I never figured that out. I started taking lots of atmosphere photos to remember how it felt to be there and pretty soon we were at the park. Around the outside were lots of vendors selling their stuff out of tents. Ale told me that most of the stuff there were selling was pirated America stuff. I guess it is marked up so bad in regular stores that no one buys it and almost everyone there has no qualms about buying their goods this way. That's just how it is. (I discovered this later when we found an electronic store and I looked at their PS3 stuff. Both the system and the games were about 4 times as expensive as if I would of bought them in a store back home.) There was a big pond in the middle of this park and there were a million pigeons flitting about. There were fountains in the water and cool statues around. We sat down and relaxed for a bit. We talked for a while and enjoyed each others company and the environment but there were some strong desires burning in the background. I think it's time to see if they finished our room.

I won't go into what happened next in too much detail. Let's just say the bed was insanely squeaky almost to the point of embarrassingly so. Now we can clean up and go back to meet her parents at her house and have dinner.

Wow this bathroom that we had to keep our clothes on to walk to doesn't even have a shower. Oh wait there is a hose in the sink. Oh we hook it to the faucet and hang it on the wall. How novel. :\ Wait the water pressure is so much that it keeps blowing it off the spigot. This sucks.

So we went to Ale's house and met her family. Her mom and dad and sister were all awesome I just wish I could understand them better. I got to see her house and her room. For some reason I never got the impression that her room was that small. They have a huge brick oven / grill thing in the middle of their house that is cool. Her dad grilled us all kinds of meat that we had for dinner. They kept testing things out on me to see if I'd eat it. Most things were ok. I mean meat is meat. Sure it tasted a bit different but as long as you don't tell me what it is until later I'll be okay. There was one kind of purple sausage that was all mushy and I didn't like. I found out later it was mixed with cow's blood so that was totally gross. Everything else was awesome. I gave her dad the headphones I bought for him (although for some reason Ale told him that she gave me the money to buy them. I'm not sure why. I thought he'd like me for giving him that present but if he thinks she bought it I won't have that going for me).

I also got to give Ale all the stuff I had been collecting for her. The Pens calendar, tons of American chocolate candy, a book on how to speak Pittsburghese and most importantly the less than 3 necklace. She really liked it which made me happy. When I saw it I knew it was the perfect gift since in all our chats we <3 each other. She says it's the best present she ever got and that she's never taking it off. That makes me feel good. We went back to the hostel and .. and slept. What a crazy first day!

TO BE CONTINUED