Marilee’s Travels

i am in love with marie! i took a taxi with my excess baggage to the guest house about 10am and arrived at the front door to smiling faces. my room was not ready so marie served me breakfast. she is the mother of the house. making sure everyone is fed and happy. after sitting for 2 minutes i met 2 women from the states who were going for a walk. i asked if i could come and they welcomed me with such ease. we did a little shopping and just enjoyed each others company. we returned to the house and my bags were in my room and i was given the grand tour of my home. i (soon to be we when victor arrives on saturday morning) have a great room near the back of the ´house´ with a small balcony, tv, my own bathroom, beautiful bed and airconditioning. (not for today. it was raining) i then got settled and watched one of the women have her private tango lesson. then the teacher took me for a spin. i am hooked. i have my own lesson at 930. ouch. that is too early for my holiday but i really have nothing else pressing on my schedule. so. after that i followed the women to here other lesson acrosss town via subway. (.70 cents) and wondered a bit and then met another woman from the house and i stayed with her for the group lesson. there were seriously 75 people in a space smaller than the main room of my apartment. it was crazy. i didn´t mind that my dancing was horrible and the space was crowed because the people at the studio were so nice. i received atleast 5 welcome kisses! so i booked a private lesson there for tomorrow at 1pm, also!! not to mention the free group lesson here at the house at 600. it will be a full day. in the evening annette invited me to eat dinner with her and some of the other house guests. she made pasta and we had wine and talked for hours!! a swiss, a german, an aussie… and more. ahhh… and now i will head to my room knowing that i will wake up to marie singing to me in the kitchen with hot coffee and medialunas (crossants) just for me. do i have to come home?? i think all my friends should just pool their money and we all live here… FYI there are also 2 ´house´cats that i have made friends with! (i still miss bodo) many hugs, kisses and happy thoughts for all of you!!

i stayed up til 2am flipping through channels last night. (this is the reason i do not have a big tv or cable) got up around 10´ish and missed the breakfast again. i really don´t care. around 11 i took a cab to the big, old, famous cemetry where evita and a bunch of other dead people are buried. that was pretty cool. i think i´ll end up there again when victor shows up. it was pretty impressive but it was, once again… fucking hot! i found a cafe and had my now usual 3 medialunas (crossants) coffee and water with gas. (i always giggle when i order it. ´agua con gas, por favor´ anything with gas is funny.) the going rate for this meal is about 6-7 pesos or $3-3.50. not bad. i wondered around again following my nose or where ever i thought there was something to look at. finally got done with that and remembered that there was a showing of ´pequiño miss sunshine´(little miss sunshine) playing down the street at 1800. i vegged out for at bit and then found a place to grab some empañadas for a snack. i was kinda hoping the movie would be dubbed rather than subtitled since i have seen it 2 times already. (donna p and john, it is great subtitled, too! i laughted so hard at the end, again!!) when that was over i decided to treat myself to dinner again. this solo thing isn´t too bad. atleast in a big city. i took a cab across town to what i think is the only thai place in town. i thought i was getting ripped off on the cab ride until i took the cab ride home with ´nicolas´. he thought it was fun to drive to 1801 rather than 181. once he realized that i knew we were not in the right spot… he tries to ask me out. shit… ´permiso, no indiendo´(sorry, i don´t understand.) has never come in so handy. it would have been a 20 peso ride rather than 6 peso ride if he would have kept the meter on. i gave him a world of shit in english, with lots of hand gestures and told him i would only pay 8 pesos because he was crazy and driving me all over on the ´tour de nicolas´. long story short… he drove me to my hotel with no trouble or inappropriat behavior. (the flattery was nice… though) the interesting thing i am finding about the argentine men is… they are talkers!! but harmless. so now that i have made it through my day of adventures… will head to bed and be out of my grand hotel by 10am tomorrow. it has been so fun to watch the doormen that see me come and go everyday. first in the morning sporting my backpack, jeans and sneakers. and then at night on my dates with ´marilee the wonderful´, after a shower, makeup, heals and a newly purchased outfit. they look at me as if i have a twin stached away in my room. ha ha ha.

i made it!! i arrived yesterday afternoon and took a cab to my amazing hotel. checked in and dumped off my stuff and headed out for a walk. it is in a fabulous location with tons of people and STUFF. found a great restaurant to have dinner at, at the usual 10pm hour and had a hard time sleeping with all the excitement. today i found myself at the botanical gardens by way of taxi (less than $5). i didn´t go because of the plants but for the cats. yes cats. this 3-4 block park is home to tons, possibly hundereds, of stray cats. it was so fun to just sit and have then come over to say hi. they are slightly cared for (food and water provided) by a group of volunteers. crazy. next i wondered to shopping district! wow. (denise where are you? we would have so much fun together here!) i found some great buys and really enjoyed just wandering around for 3 hours knowing that all i had to do was grab a cab, anywhere, and it would bring me back to the hotel. NO REAL NAVIGATION NEEDED!! i may go for another walk tonight to find food and tomorrow i think i will go to a very famous cemetery. (i just have to say… I AM NOT AT WORK TODAY!!!)

wow! that is alot of friggin water. today we took an all day tour. the ´devils throat´ again (the biggest part) and we also walked the lower and upper trails. it is 2700 meters wide. with about 1000 indivdual falls. the drop is 80 meters. (i guess niagra is 1 falls around 2000 meter with a drop of only 60 meters) we saw some great animals… iguanas, lizards, birds, butterflies (there are over a 1000 varities around here), little guinea pigs, a giant guinea pig thing that they make alot of leather products out of. (i have no clue what the f*ck it was) we saw also a relative of the raccoon. and i found out that i am in a sub tropical location. the falls are shared with brazil but with such a short amount of time here… i only stayed on this side and waved to brazil. the best part of the day, i almost missed out on was at the end of the tour,you could pay extra for a boat and safari ride. i thought what the hell. beats walking in this heat. (over 30 degrees C) i don´t know what that is, other than HOT!!! so anyway… i pay the $30 for the hour trip. holy shit. we get in the boat (about 20 people and 500 horse power motor) and in less than 2 minutes we are doing brodys and i am soaked from head to toe and screaming for more. we go right under two of the falls. incredible!!! note to all of you… if you do this tour, don´t wear jeans. it feels like you have wet your pants for the next hour. the other highlight of the day was going back to those main falls first thing this morning. there was so much spray from the falls that everyone was wet. i was walking to another part and turned to see an man about 70 years old with the most spectacular smile on his face. he was having a moment and i got to watch it. his expression was absolute pure bliss. as if he had worked his whole life and traveled across 3 continents for that moment… he just streched out his arms and soaked it all in.

ok… where do i start with this one. we took a bus from goya to corrients and after 3 hours arrived and had some dinner. at 1am we boarded the all night bus (because no one believes in planes or cars here). are arrival time was to be 9-930 am. not a problem… until our double decker bus hits-kills a full size bull and the driver has to go into town with the photos, the ears and brand! 4 hours later, we leave again and we didn´t get in until 130pm. we checked into our hotel. ($25… crazy cheap) we took the bus out to the falls and they are incredible!! i took a video and lots of photos that i can´t upload yet. perhaps at the hotel this weekend when i am loafing around. (Donna P thanks for the courage to leave early!) so now with it only being 830pm here i am waiting for coty to finish her nap and we will have the middle of the night dinner! let me tell you… eating this much meat does weird things to the body.

ok… in case you were wondering, i am alive and well despite the culture shock of day one and two in northern argentina. holy shit. it was a huge contrast to chile and my sister there. she and i have so much in common and really are sisters! here… it is like meeting someone new that looks really familiar. NO ONE speaks english except constanza´s mother and constanza sometimes. i don´t think she likes to and the first day… she lost her voice. anyway… it has gotten better. i went out to ´campo´ which is one of the 3 farms the family has. holy shit once again… their land has been in their family for more than 5 generations and i was standing near one of the houses and was told that in every direction and as far as i could see was… their property. it is like being on Dallas the argentinan version. with all the servants, food but alot less drama. i do have alot of photos. more than 500. (thanks for the extra cards mark) i hope that on sun-tuesday when i am at some posh hotel in buenos aires i will be able to finally have some time and patience to upload something. well.. tonight i take a 3 hour bus ride to corrientes and eat dinner there (at 10pm which is the usual time) and then at 1am take another bus north to the brazilian border to see some of the biggest falls in the world. we (constanza and i) will stay in a hotel on friday night and then take a night bus back to corrientes on saturday night (something like 6-8 hours) yipee! and on sunday… i fly to buenos aires for the start of my solo trip. 3 nights in a posh hotel before i go to the tango guest house. i cut my trip short in goya because it is a little remote for me… i suppose if i could have stayed out at campo and rode horses, played with cows and chickens that would have been great. well… sorry for the delay in writing. i hope you are all well. i am working on getting a sunburn… eating more than my own body weight in meat and loving every moment of it. thank god my cloths still fit. seriously… i wake up at 9 or 10 and eat some bread and have coffee then at 1230 we have a HUGE lunch. at 5 is tea with more sweets and bread and dinner at 9 or 10. not to mention if someone wants some icecream some where between tea and dinner. i can not belive they are all not 600 pounds. however, there are NO fast food resaurants and the resaurants they do have only have fresh local food. ok. i am rambling…. the freedom to write and write with no one waiting for me. aahhh. chau

lazy day… this is part of an email to victor. hope you are all well. denise… i miss you tons. benton, yes the traditional way to make pisco sour does have raw eggs whites. i have had a couple of those and they are damn good. i am going to try to find an authintic receipe. i have also drank the water. here is to a digestive system of steal. (i have more trouble with north american airline foods… ) ha ha ha.

so this is my last night in chile. today went to another pablo naruasa house(cant spell worth shit. he is the chiliean writer who won the the noble piece prize) i have now seen 2 of his 3 houses. it was cloudy and chilly today. lots of smog. but we walked around a posh neighborhood had lunch at 2 (i was up at 9. a miracle) bought a ring, a pair of earrings and perhaps a necklace for denise. cool stuff. tonight i am treating some of the family to dinner at a nice resaurant. a peruvian resaurant. should be fun. then tomorrow ill have time for breakfast and then time to go. oh. we also walked through a mueso and saw the works of claudio bravo and matta. (i am telling you this because i thought you might want to look them up and also because i wanted you to remind me that i wanted to looke them up also) i have been eating so good… i will definatly have to do some walking in argentina so i dont get any fatter. shit.

today was a drive through santiago to a 68 acre vineyard south of town. the most popular chilean wine. we had a tour, two tastings and got to go to the famous CELLAR OF THE DEVIL. (insert scary voice here) it was kindo of funny with it being halloween and all. had lunch out side. empanadas, shrimp, wine y papas fritas (french fries sounds better in spanish) it was a mellow day and tonight is a get together with a few friends of carolinas. have a happy halloween.

on sunday carolina drove me straight west to a town called Valparaiso. it is about 1-2 hours away through the coastal mountains. it was a perfect day to see the ocean. it is a port town so we did not go to the beach. the town is built on a very steep hill so we rode one of the many elevators that is on a pulley system that you pay a small fee to ride. i took some photos and hope to find a cafe today to upload them. (we will see) we met up with a friend of carolinas from university and had an amazing lunch. everything takes forever here. lunch was atleast 2 hours. i had my new favorite drink… pisco sour. at first it has a margarita flavor but more sour. i am hoping to bring some home. we got home around 9 and had dinner waiting for us. salmon and potatoes at 10pm. they eat all the time and seem to enjoy every moment of it. i did not sleep to well last night as the piece of shit neighbor dog was barking for an hour just across the street. chucha!!! (i guess that is soft cuss word for what i wanted call that crap dog) anyway… how can i stay mad. i do not have to work today. (thanks nike!)

well i woke up and i thought i was in portland in the winter. cloudy and cold. which is a bummer. the mountains are so close! i have a week for them to go… i am on a dial up system and feeling a little impatient with it so it looks like i will not be uploading photos for a while, instead i write here. last nights party(asado) was really fun. carolina invited her friends that know english but 4 never spoke it. mean while her actor sister inlaw who knows as much english as i do spanish was more than willing to show off her skills for a good laugh. at one point everyone was eating the mass amounts of meat that jose louis prepared on the bbq(also called the asado) and everyone was laughing and talking and i had this moment of thinking that if i consintrate enough i would undersand them and then at the same time just listening to the beautiful sounds and basking in the fact that i did not understand a word. chileans are very gentle, polite and very easy to laugh. while walking downtown with carolina i noticed that there is not a look that they have. people mostly have brown hair and eyes but there features are all so different. well… i have no idea what we are doing today. carolina is a little slower since she has a cold. oh… i woke up from my nap last night before the party and when i came out carolinas mothere was in the living room. when she saw me she began to cry and said, i am mom. then she hug me about five times saying how happy she was. she has the most beautiful light green eyes. ok. it is early and still sleep from the constint meat fest that ran into breakfast.