Eight years ago
(1992) my wife and I adopted two children from Paraguay, daughter
Rocio (then 2) and son Carlos (then less than 1). This summer we offered a
trip back to their birth country to our children. Daughter Rocío jumped at
the offer. Carlos, our youngest one, was not interested: too many cartoons,
comfortable couch, macaroni every night, our blue house. For the amount of time,
energy and expense involved that did not earn him a trip to South America!
We scheduled the trip from August 11 through August 22, 2000, hoping for a bounce on the weather coming out of winter. The timing of our trip was exquisite, of course: the winter had been the coldest one in southern South America in the last 50 years!
While in the Chicago airport Rocío struck up a conversation with Bill Masden III from Gainsville, Georgia. When we told him we were going to Paraguay he was delighted. He said it was his favorite place on earth. He went down every year to go dorado (freshwater dolphin) fishing, simply the best. When he discovered that Rocío did not have a proper stock of glitter markers he gave her a set! Quite the hunter: NRA life member, Pheasants Forever life member, Ducks Unlimited, Billfish foundation, National Geographic Society.
There was some trouble with the plane getting out of Chicago. United pulled it the standard 15 feet away from the gate and then announced that there was a repair order in on the plane, something to do with the tires. The lady next to us was reading a book entitled "Men who might not be worth killing." As a possible member of the target audience one way or the other I decided to keep a watchful eye on her during the flight. To my relief the next book she pulled out was "The Sweet Potato Queens' book of love." There is an annual parade in New Orleans dedicated to the sweet potato style of life, which includes big boobs, red hair, and a complete disregard of good taste in clothing and possibly personal hygiene. Nearly three hundred women have the right stuff to support the club activities. The book grew from their collective experience. This was sufficient to call my potential crazy passenger watch off…
After our 75-minute tire repair job on the tires we were ready to go. Maybe they should try AAA. How clever, I thought, to book over three hours between flight connections.
We took LAPA, the recently established private branch of Aerolineas Argentinas, running a special deal (translated: less than $1,000). Delta handled all the check-in arrangements. The food and service were excellent and the flight was not crowded, so we could spread out. The instructions printed on the seat back for the flotation cushion were printed in both Spanish and Russian for our convenience.
During the night we passed over the Amazon jungle. It was a very clear night, which allowed me to look out the window and see any number of isolated towns below, all fully bathed in light. They looked like small forts, which most of them probably are.
Passing through customs was a breeze. Likewise getting a ticket to downtown with the airport bus company, Manuel Tienda León. Ezeiza international airport is nearly 30 miles from downtown, so we had a pretty good tour of the sprawling suburbs on the way in.
Buenos Aires was far and away the largest city that my nine-year-old daughter had ever visited. I anticipated a challenge in finding the right mix of simple pleasures and adult culture to appease the two of us. We had booked the "weekender" rate at the five-star hotel in the heart of downtown, the Claridge. This was our first mistake, although a minor one and certainly in the right direction. It was a bit stuffy. The staff wandered around in costumes with long-tailed greatcoats hanging behind them. They were courteous to their visitors, and they all spoke nearly perfect English. The lobby had two chairs. Most guests preferred to wait in their rooms for a taxi to arrive, and then be summoned by the concierge. This practice does not suit your basic Midwestern value structure all that well. Your mileage may vary.
Normal
people probably take a long nap after a ten hour flight and an hour trip on
the bus to our hotel. We
had lunch at Asador La Estancia, Lavalle 941. It was the kind of place with an
open pit and crusty-looking old guy in a gaucho outfit. His face and hands looked
several hundred years old. The waiters acted like they had been working there
since they were small children. Perfect! I ordered the nouveau meat plate
(“21st century style” for light eaters) and immediately dove into a plate
of about 4 pounds of assorted cuts. Observing the Argentinean custom of
mineral water with wine I was delighted to discover that they served my
favorite mineral water, Villa Vicenssio.
I had somehow been living without the stuff for 30 years. There were
sweetbreads, tripe, skirt steak, blood sausage, regular sausage and a couple
of other cuts that I didn't recognize and didn't want to know what they were.
Rocio had mashed potatoes with the junior version of the above, maybe a mere
pound and a half of meat. So little time, so much meat...
With my traditional first gluttonous episode complete, we returned to the hotel, marched up to the desk, and signed up for the Señor Tango show. After that it was straight up to the room to pass out from the meal and dream of chewing on the luscious, sweet grass of the pampa. Just kidding.
About 9:30 PM, mid-afternoon in Buenos Aires, the bus came to pick us up for the show. We went to a few other hotels and picked up a large contingent of Brasilian trial lawyers in town for a couple of days, along with a French man, a Korean man and a Peruvian airline stewardess.
We were escorted into a small, indoor stadium,
for lack of a better word. Our seats were right next to the stage, which
confirmed my suspicion that we probably overpaid a tad for the privilege. The
stage was round, and had a circular dance floor that rose and fell with the
performances. There was also a tremendous amount of dry ice in evidence which
I think was supposed to signify the fog rolling in off the ocean. Or maybe it
was considered part of the female dancers' costumes or at a minimum steam
rising from the dancers...
The tango show proved to be the most ostentatious and spectacular performance I have seen anywhere. Granted I don't have a long history of attending concerts or theater performances in the last few decades, but it did the job for me. Rocío ate it up. The tango singer asked everyone to sing along to “Caminitos” which is arguably the most famous tango song of all time. We all botched it badly, including the locals. He jokingly asked if we would all like to hum along.
The last dance number was something I could
have waited maybe 8-10 years before letting my daughter see it, but
fortunately she did not have the same frame of reference that I did. Let's
just say that the Brasilians liked it!
I was bowled over after the final speech and
closing number of "Don't cry for me Argentina" with every single
(I'm almost sure) Argentinean holding hand over the heart, and belting out the
lines in unison with the two tango singers. Just a bit of the excerpt of the
final speech: "This song 
is for the people who are dying. The people who
are being born tonight. Those who are in love and happy. Those who are in love who are in agony. Those who are
not in love but wish they were. Those who are not in love and don't want to
be. Those who are sad. For all of you..." It was great. Rocio kept
tugging on my sleeve asking for a translation... More than a little impressed
myself, I blurted out the gist of the dialogue to her.
After the show I broke out my quite rusty Portuguese, inspired by the proceedings to live life to its linguistic fullest. One of the men loaned Rocio his leather jacket because she was cold. We could see our breaths. He located a bus for our return. It seems that our original driver had returned to his agency, complained that too many people had required his services, it was all too much, and then had gone home. The replacement driver, who had never seen us before, had some difficulty in locating the group while seated in the driver’s seat of the bus about a hundred feet from the parking lot. It took a group of Brasilian attorneys standing alone, not going anywhere to get his attention plus a persistent Brasilian attorney shouting at him in Portuguese.
So there we were. I was chatting away with the trial attorneys in Portuguese. They were having a ball in analyzing the transportation snafu. There were lots of references to inbreeding, inheritance laws, and to efficiency in general. The South American version of trash talking... This, of course, was absolutely hilarious coming from Brasilians, who are no slouches when it comes to these particular brands of expertise. They were also very interested in the two of us. They asked where we were from. I replied that we were from Wisconsin, to the north of Chicago. One of the attorneys had spent considerable time in the U.S. and had a pretty good idea where we came from. Another asked tongue-in-cheek if it was located north of Piauí, which is the Brasilian version of nowhere. They all cackled together. You would have thought the transportation snafu was part of the show, or at the very least expected. I had a great hour chatting with them; it completely messed up my attempts to get back in the groove with Spanish for at least two days! By 1:15 AM we were back at our hotel and just a little bit sleepy.
Along
with our pre-trip promises of allowing Rocio to make as many $4/minute calls
home as she wanted for as long as wanted, she had also been given to
understand that she could also shop as much as she wanted. I know what some of
you may be thinking. Wimpy parent. Now that we have that out of the way, on
to the shopping.
Calle Florida is full of boutique shopping centers. In the United States
you would only find such a collection at a place like The Mall of America. It
is a mile and a half long. In
addition there were any number of street performers, including men dressed and
painted in white performing as statues, and some very earthy tango dancers
(daddy, when she bends backwards I can see her t..s). The least tasteful thing
we saw (of the entire trip) was a man with a stick and and a bag stuffed with
a pillow who would beat the bag and make sounds like a
cat
screaming in agony. For some reason he found this hilarious. Nobody paid much
attention to him lest it encourage him.
McDonald's was our lunch stop. There were a few luxuries at the Big Mac, including an expresso bar, dulce de leche and an ice cream stand. Definitely upscale.
Somewhere along the way Rocio has picked up a touch of diarrhea. This was the first real, solid challenge of the trip: she had to swallow a pill. After about 20 minutes of my repeating over and over the consequences she got the job done. Not because she understood and agreed it was necessary but rather to put the conversation to an end. This feat was later commented on by some of her peers as an awesome accomplishment. Sometimes I fear for her generation.
A
short taxi ride took us to the San Telmo district flea market. It's a
beautiful little square. Most of the booths seemed to be full
of
people selling the family (or somebody's family) silverware. I picked up some
small sterling silver English forks made in Sheffield. We watched a grandfather dance a slow
tango with his granddaughter dressed in her wedding dress. Beautiful old
buildings surround the square. We have lunch in a nice old building with a
very modern menu. Another meat opportunity not missed.
Although there is no local custom of a siesta, by this time we were both exhausted. Or maybe it was just the meat. I was certainly ready to lie down in a soft, green, quiet field. The three-hour nap that followed was terrific.
Dinner was Burger King. Rocio found a table right next to a chain smoker, then complained that the person should be forced to put out the cigarette. Doesn't work that way here, I explained! Over to the no-smoking section. She had her traditional whopper. I had the salmon fish sandwich.
During this first trip to BA Rocío had grown tired of the big city. She was looking forward to the next day's trip to Asuncion. It is a bit unnerving to walk around a city where the men all look like Louis Rukheyser (Wall Street Week) and the women look like Gloria Steinem. It was a big surprise to our little daughter, whose most recent trips to Latin America had been to Mexico, Costa Rica, and Ecuador.
Having experienced some harrowing entrances and exits from Paraguay during our
adoption process I was not looking forward to landing at the airport in Asunción.
Much to my surprise, customs and entry was basically like anywhere else. Since
Paraguay had closed to adoption years ago apparently the quick buck market had
moved elsewhere. The previous week there had been a $12 million robbery of a
bank truck loading cash onto an airplane right there at the airport! It was
also the day after the vice presidential election and that also didn’t seem
to matter.
Foster mom Graciela and mother Maria were waiting for us on the other side of customs. Graciela ran the private orphanage where Rocío had stayed, and had treated her like a little princess, taking her everywhere with her. Carlos stayed at her house, where the really young kids stayed. She is a remarkable person in her own right. We were glad to see her. She recognized Rocío right away and said she looked just as expected, a lot like her birth mom. More on that later... She helped get us through the baggage inspection and found us a porter to carry the bags to her new pickup truck, the huge kind with the back seat. We drove to her house, since Carlos’s birth mom and sister were there to see us.
At the house we were also glad to see Sandra, who had been one of Graciela’s energetic helpers. Carlos’ mom Marciana had made the trip in from the country to see her, and brought Mariela her daughter, who is closest to Carlos in age. It was easy to see the physical resemblance between them. I brought out some pictures of Carlos to show everybody. Marciana was talking about how Mariela was a good student, but not studious. Also that she was somewhat shy in class, and was slow to warm up to her classmates. This is the exact same temperament as Carlos, so such behavior came as no great surprise.
I passed out the presents for everybody, which was a great relief, since they had taken up a high percentage of our baggage on the way down! I had just gone to get my camera when Graciela announced it was time for Rocio and me to go to our hotel. She drove us downtown, pausing to show us the clinic where Carlos was born. We checked into the hotel, and that was the last we were to see of her for quite some time.
Lucky
for us we were there on Asuncion’s birthday, so there were some decorations
on the monuments and the armada was parked on the river. The city was founded on
August 15, 1537. The Guaraní Indians, who had a sophisticated political
system and an influence that stretched to the Caribbean, welcomed the
Spaniards rather than fight them, making the city one of the oldest
continuously occupied cities in the Americas.
Asuncion was heating up in the week we were there, with temperatures in the afternoon over 90, so it was time to test the air conditioning and take a nap. They carefully observe the siesta in Asuncion, so this was all for the best!
After the nap it was time for Rocío to resume her shopping trip through southern South America. Luckily, there were two gift stores within a couple of doors, and one downtown about four blocks away, so the shopping was easy. It was only at this point that Rocio revealed the full extent of her shopping ambitions! She declared Asunción a much more friendly and comfortable place than Buenos Aires, and set out to do some serious trickle-down economics. Handcrafted goods were so inexpensive there wasn’t any particularly good reason to stop her!
At dinner in the Hotel Chaco dining room we met Patrick, a beverage consultant from Indianapolis, who was an adventure traveler and thought Paraguay sounded exotic. He had made some Internet friends and was looking forward to meeting them. He’d been all over the world, and regaled the two of us with stories from his travels. He had just returned from Iguazu Falls and we were anxious to hear what he had to say about it when we returned. He’d stayed at the Sheraton, on the Argentine side, which is the only hotel that faces the large waterfalls directly. His trip there was absolutely a cake walk compared to ours, as it eventually turned out, but not without its surprises.
We were leaving the next day for Iguazu, so a trip to the bus station on the outskirts of town was necessary. The taxi ride there was approximately the cost of our round trip ticket to Iguazu through Nuestra Señora de Asunciόn bus line.
We took a stroll through downtown, passing by the governor’s palace, the
legislative palace and central park taking in the sights…
The wooden donkey
would not have been a big hit in Wisconsin, but here where real donkeys are a
dime a dozen it probably has its charms!
We ran into about twenty people from the Paraguayan Ties group at lunch at La Bolsi Italian restaurant downtown. After bemusedly watching everybody scrutinize the menu for about 15 minutes I walked up to them and asked if they know the whereabouts of Chris Cowles, who was with their group. Chris is also from the Madison area. After they got over the surprise, they told us that Chris had gone out alone, but would be back at the Gran Hotel del Paraguay by 5:00 PM and that perhaps we could join them there.
Right after our siesta we took a cab over to the Gran Hotel and ran into the whole group of Americans from the Ties trip, including Bea Evans, the trip director. There were over forty people traveling together. They were nearly at the end of their trip. Rocio, far from home, was delighted to meet a whole bunch of adopted Paraguayan kids from America approximately her age, and was running around with them within a few minutes. They all had a great time together. It also went a long way to curing her desire to be back in the United States and being home with her brother who she fights with constantly.
We even had some drama that night. Chris's son Will took a swan dive into one of the large planter pots, broke it and knocked himself silly. Pretty soon we were surrounded by Paraguayan doctors and nurses. After a few palpitations it was declared that Will would live, but perhaps he should spend the night in the hospital? Considering that he was going to live and didn't appear to have any broken bones the gracious offer of an expensive hospital visit for most likely nothing was refused. Twenty minutes later he was again running around nearly good as new.
Chris had been looking forward to talking to her adoption attorney, which Bea had arranged. About forty five minutes after the appointed meeting time nobody had shown up and introduced himself. Chris was beginning to get worried. A bearded man in casual clothes was walking around in a random pattern. Chris and I looked at each other quizzically. Could he be Gustavo? Yep!
Early in the morning we packed our bags for Iguazu. I had the bright idea
of leaving the majority of our luggage, particularly the winter gear, at the
hotel. Just as I was checking out I discovered that I couldn’t find my debit card. I still had my
credit card, so I wasn’t completely down and out.
I assumed I could get some cash at the local bus stop, or at the very least at
the bus station in Foz de Iguazu. All
I had to do was stop at a bank and get some money. Foz is over 200,000 people,
so I wasn’t that worried. The banks would still be open at 2:00, our
scheduled arrival time. Actually we made it to Foz at 5:00 after a 2 ½ hour
wait to cross the “friendship bridge” which has to be the worst-named
bridge in the world. I had visions of the Berlin crossing at the height of the
cold war.
It is now about 80 degrees in Foz at 5:00. I get off the bus, sans leather
coat, thinking only about getting Brasilian money. No money changer or bank at the
bus station, which is out in the middle of a field a couple of miles from
town. Now I began to sweat a bit. I still had some US and Argentinian money,
so I could make it to the Tropical das Cataratas hotel with some cash to
spare. All I had to do was negotiate a fare in dollars with a Brasilian taxi
driver for the 26-mile trip to the hotel! Amazing how the Portuguese came back
at the right time. As we get to the entrance to the park he informs me that I
need $12 Brasilian to get into the park. I remind him that I didn’t have any
Reais (Brasilian currency) at the bus station, and I had the exact same amount
now. He fronted me the money. Getting a bit
frazzled
by now Rocio and I checked into the hotel.
I walked over the money exchange at the hotel, plopped down my credit card, and asked to get some Brasilian money. They refused. OK, I think, I’ll use the automatic teller in the hotel, just as soon as I can get a call into Mary and get reminded of my pin number. I had the pin number in an electronic organizer in my luggage back in Asuncion! Four hours later Mary and I finally get hooked up, and I run over to the ATM to load up. The card doesn’t work. (Patrick later tells me that international banks have to clear their transactions every 24 hours, or they are cut off. This happens a lot, he said. In the meantime you have no clue what is wrong.)
Not to worry, I can get some money at the travel agency when I book our tour for the next day. Surprise again, they have no relationship with any banks. They will let me charge our tour the next day, of course. We find out that we could charge the helicopter ride over the falls but not the boat ride to the edge of the largest falls. Too bad, I think.
The
Tropical is a lovely hotel, with spacious grounds, and the “Boca do diabo
(Devil’s throat)” falls just over on the other side of the road. I’m
resigned to charging everything to my credit card.
There are coatimundis (South American raccoons) running around the grounds, and the sounds coming from the nearby falls are rather soothing. Then the temperature drops below 60 and I’m reminded of my leather coat making its way back to Asunción without me.
The next morning after a nicely charged breakfast on my credit card we get
on our tour bus. A couple surprises await us. Apparently our driver and guide
get paid according to how quickly they can move us around. The longer the trip
takes the less they make, or so it would appear. The other is that every time
we 
move
a few miles we need to pay some sort of park fee, additional travel fee, or
whatever. I still have a fair share of Argentinian pesos with me, so we are
able to struggle through the fee process, just barely.
The paths on the Argentinian side are great, the views spectacular. Except for our guide continually screaming at us to move faster we are having a good time. It’s now past noon. We hit a snack bar in the middle of the park. Rocio goes over to a funny-looking fig tree and shakes it vigorously. The guide goes nuts, saying that many such trees are filled with wasps and what she was doing could be quite dangerous. Probably less dangerous than continuing the trip without any remaining cash, I think to myself. If this is beginning to sound a bit cash-obsessed I have caught my mood perfectly.
There are some friendly Californian ladies with us who are glad to walk and
talk
with us. They are very nice to Rocio. We get some great shots of Rocio and the
falls. Except for the final sprint back to the bus we’re mostly in a mellow
mood except the French man who was the only one to make a strong protest of
being hustled from one location to the next. We stop at a tourist trap on the
way back that specializes in chocolate. They have amethyst crystals five feet
high for sale! Since they take credit cards I buy a ton of chocolate-covered
coffee beans, half expecting to live off them for the next couple of days.
Back to the hotel to rest for a bit, and see if we can book the helicopter, using the friendly but warm plastic object in my wallet. The agent says that the lady last night had it backwards, so we could have taken the boat, which left about fifteen minutes ago. Cash only on the helicopter. Bummer. While I’m sitting there with a stunned look on my face some of the European tourists, of which there are many, feel compelled to stop by and indicate how worthless they feel the travel agency is. Considering it's the only one in a thirty-mile radius the agent doesn't look all that worried.
By this point the currency I have left is largely in coins. I give it a shot. I ask if we could charge for a ride back to the bus station the next day. Sure! This is about my fifth $45 taxi ride on the trip, but I’m getting more and more used to them. We also decide we’d like to get back to Asunción a bit earlier than our planned 1 AM arrival. What bus line would we like to use? One that gets us back earlier than the 7 PM departure we have with Nuestra Señora de Asunción the next day. “Gee we don’t know the bus schedules, so we can’t help you.” This from an alleged travel agent. I think she was trying to torture me, but one can never be sure. I suggest she try Pluma. She makes the call. Jackpot. One more crucial little item: do they accept credit cards? Okey dokey.
Pluma is a very good bus line and we have a pleasant trip back to Asuncion, outside of the Paraguayan customs visit. There are a number of Brasilian kids on the bus. One of them gets kicked off at the border crossing, and it takes Pluma about an hour to figure out what to do with her! By this time I’m fairly certain that I have chatted way more in Portuguese than in Spanish, which is kinda weird but interesting to me. Just as interesting as cash…
Back in Asuncion I find my debit card in my suit coat jacket, and I’m feeling a little better. It’s 95 degrees, but the money sweat has subsided a bit. After hitting about six ATMs I finally strike gold, at least $100 worth of it, in Paraguayan money, which I lovingly fondle with my fingers before deciding it would be a good thing to put it in my wallet eventually.
We run into Patrick, the beverage consultant, who has been working through
his Internet friends to experience the night life in Asuncion. He’s
looking just as worn out as we are! We relax by the pool, and I contemplate all
that cash in my wallet, a small smile building while I think about it. He
makes the cogent point that hundred dollar bills take up little room and are
very well received all over the world. I am a convert by now to the cash
economy. Enough said.
We contact Graciela for a possible trip around Asuncion. She is nowhere to be found. That’s slightly disappointing, but considering the 95-degree heat a retreat to the hotel room and air conditioning is not all that bad. Plus of course a little shopping.
Our family has sponsored a girl through the Project for the People of Paraguay for years, and we arrange to meet her at our hotel first thing in the morning. Her mother comes with her, and eventually someone from the project arrives. The mother is very direct, very straightforward in her speech. She has been looking for work as a street sweeper for six months. Her husband sells watches on the streets of Asuncion. All five children are in the program, and it is their primary source of income, along with any street sales made. They had suffered greatly during the great chacarita barrio (the local ghetto) fire when their shack had burned down. Complicating matters is that the river has been flooding the barrio, and that they actually need two places for the family, depending upon the forces of nature. Liz Paola, our sponsored child, hardly says a word. Her mother seems a little suspicious of American generosity. I don't blame her for that.
After
late breakfast at the hotel we head out for the Petirossi market. The walk is about seven blocks, about
four blocks too much for your average urban nine-year-old. Patrick graciously
listens to the high-pitched whining along the way. Once there, though, we have
a pretty good shopping expedition. He finds some oddities for his friends and
we get a really frilly Paraguayan dance outfit for Rocio. We spend the
remainder of our cash at the market, but I’m feeling GOOD about the ATM
machines.
We walk back just before lunch, intending to complete our shopping for the trip. Somewhere maybe in some guidebook it must explain that Paraguay shuts down entirely at Saturday noon and doesn’t open up again until Monday morning, but I sure missed that passage. We’re stuck without completing our shopping, although we do have dozens of gifts, most of them it turns out are for Rocio’s B-list of friends. A few tears of frustration. Shopping girl, interrupted.
This sounds like a good excuse to get some more cash! I wander out, hunting for an ATM machine not on siesta with the rest of the town. Finally I find one and pop it in. The machine informs me that only $100 per 24-hour period can be withdrawn from the network. I’m only a couple of hours away from that limitation so I am not momentarily neurotic about cash. I’ll wait. Two hours later I go out again. This time the machine basically tells me that my access to the network has been suspended due to the efforts of some maniac continually attempting to withdraw cash from the system. That would be me.
Graciela shows up later, much to my relief. A guided trip around the area? Nope. Dinner together? Not interested. What we ARE interested in is that she has a friend who is with her that is recently divorced from an American now returned home who is not making the expected child support payments. Could we help out? Considering that foster mom is a possible source of cash that might be necessary to get out of the country I am malleable on the point, and finally agree we’ll take a copy of her papers back & see if we can find her an attorney in the states.
Remembering that we had not had the opportunity to take any pictures of our son’s birth family when our foster mom first picked us up I ask if we were going to get a chance to meet with them again to get some photos. The birth family is all sick, not a chance. Rocio’s birth mom is likewise out of town attending her brother’s funeral, so no visit there either.
I’m ready to head back to Buenos Aires for the final leg of the trip, visions of functioning ATM machines dancing in my head. There were some at the BA airport that actually worked, no tricks. Maybe they hadn’t heard about this maniac in Paraguay punching in his card at half the banks in town. I would be made whole in a new country. It just might work.
Sunday morning Graciela picks us up and we head for the airport. Outside of an $18.50 exit fee/person we make it through customs and await our plane out of ATM hell, back to civilization.
Waiting for the plane, a gregarious, somewhat unruly German man makes our, and everybody else’s acquaintance. Say’s he’s been living in Asuncion for over 15 years now, but has been all over the world. Works as an engineer. Defies me to name some place he hasn’t worked or lived. Mozambique? “Yep, worked there as a mercenary.” Angola? “Mercenary there too!” He moves on, speaking alternately Spanish, English, and German to whomever seems the most interested.
We
book the 30-mile passage on Manuel Tienda Leon bus line back to the city, and
happily discover our hotel, the Crillon, is next door to their office. Very
nice place, immaculate, modern rooms, very clean. 67 channels on the TV. A
remote control for both heat and humidity. I’m
happy again. A good place to stay and get some money in my pocket. A chance to
see another tango show and eat another few pounds of beef. We’re on a roll!
Daughter Rocio has now become a professional traveler. She is muttering about crossing time zones every time we move. She’s also thinking that her dad is a pretty weird travel agent. I of course am thinking that we have avoided two national holidays, one in each country, and a possible military coup or similar in Paraguay during the vice presidential elections. And there is a tango show in San Telmo that we haven’t seen.
My beloved Buenos Aires ATM machines were waiting for me. At the fourth stop I put in the card, punched in the pin number, and the machine asked me did I want $100, $300, $500, $700, $1,000, or more? Resisting the urge, I went for door number 2. I feel like a rich man. I now have enough money to complete the trip without looking at another ATM machine.
The
Cena Tango (tango dinner) show picks us up at 7:30. This should have been my first moment of
suspicion. This is mid-morning in Buenos Aires. Why so early? A simple answer:
we are going to stop at every hotel in Buenos Aires on the way there! Along
the way we pick up a dozen Chinese athletes, all at least 6’3” and a
couple from Sao Paulo, Brasil. Praise be. Another opportunity to slip into
Portuguese!
He says he's having trouble telling the difference between the platforms of our candidates for President. I assure him that many people in the United States have exactly the same problem. I express a certain admiration for the current Brasilian President. He gives me the same gesture back that I gave him describing the ethics of our presidential candidates. That would be the wavering neutral hand gesture signifying maybe so, maybe not.
We are escorted into a large dinner theater. The Brasilians, along with the two of us, are seated next to the stage. After about forty-five minutes the Brasilian man and I decide that we will tackle the next waiter who wanders within leaping range. I’ll hit him high, he’ll hit him low. We are clearly suffering from meat withdrawal at this point, and cannot be held responsible for our actions.
Finally we get a waiter. Meat arrives. Half an hour later we repeat the
same vow concerning getting some drinks. They eventually arrive. It is now
after 10:30 and
even
in Buenos Aires evening has officially started. Let the show begin…
The songs came mostly from El Gardelito, the most famous tango singer of
all time. The male and female tanger singers alternated numbers. At this place
the woman had the most stage presence. The dancers do a lot of “jumpy”
maneuvers.
The costumes are elaborate. There are quite a few single numbers where I presume
various styles are being exhibited.
A highlight of the show is the
Andean band. They start in with El Condor
Pasa, then quickly move through a variety of numbers featuring a huge pan
pipe. They play a really rousing version of the theme song from “A fist full
of dollars.” A male dancer appears with heavy black boots, and accompanies
the music with a stunning variety of leaps, whirls, and general boot-pounding
on the stage floor. All nicely done.
On the way home we meet up with a bunch of American kids who produce rock videos for the Seybold group and continually are running around to places like New York, San Francisco, Buenos Aires, Hong Kong, Tokyo, etc. They are very friendly and very, very alert. Some have been up for more than 24 hours and do not look sleepy. They were staying at the Hilton, an enormous, gleaming, steel and glass structure with a lobby at least the size of a football field.
The weather, which has been gray, goes flipping over into a steady downpour. In addition, Rocio announces that her heel hurts. Enough that the only place she can walk to without pain is the little hairpiece store on Calle Florida. I go down to the hotel restaurant to stuff myself on the buffet breakfast and watch all the other guests with their cell phones glued to the side of their faces.
By 10:30 Rocio’s hunger is greater than her heel pain. She has enough energy to crawl into McDonald’s for breakfast. A short 45 minutes later she is ready to go. We stop for some band-aids to bind her wounded foot on the way back to the hotel from El Big Mac.
I
shovel her into a taxi to return to the Recoleta cemetery on the assumption
that the rain this time will be lighter than the rain the last time we were
there. Of course I am wrong. The skies open up into a thunderous downpour. We
are soaked to the bone. I take one last longing look at the elegant Café
Biela where I had planned to sit for a couple of hours watching the Porteños
parade past.
Back to the comfortable hotel to dry off and take a little nappie. When I awake I discover that Rocio is finishing up the final touches of braiding her hair into corn rows using all those things she had been buying at the hair store. So that’s what that was about!
I lure her out of the lair with a promise to buy a chapa (fake license plate) for her and Carlos to put on their rooms at home. Somehow we ended up with a chapa for one of her friends and a yerba mate (South American tea) kit.
Rocio had been snapping up caramelos (bonbons) from the front desk at an alarming rate. On the way back we stop at a kiosk and get a bunch. They are 5 cents apiece, or$2.50 for 300 mg (39 caramelos). Exhibit A that I am now ready to go home is that the storekeeper and I spend about five minutes going over the math. Eventually he wins, though not by logic.
We take a taxi over to Caminito street, the home of the tango, in the La Boca
neighborhood. It’s very colorful, full of artists and artisans. The wall
fresco painting on the left was one of several that we saw.
We pass the Boca Juniors stadium on the way there. The Boca Juniors are generally considered the best team in Argentina. There is much local pride in and anguish over them.
Lunch is spaghetti at a very friendly little
tasca.
After
returning to the hotel, we spend some time in San Martin park, across from the
hotel. The English Tower is across the street from the park. Argentina
invented the frigorifico, or refrigerated cargo hold. I presume the gift
of the tower celebrates the addition of Argentinian beef to the English diet,
later of course turning into mad cow disease. Go figure...
By 3:30 we are ready to check out and go to the airport, even though we are not due to leave for a few hours.
Rather than get hungry in downtown Buenos Aires, Rocio announces upon arrival at the airport that she is starving. I get her an empanada (meat-filled pastry). Doesn’t like it. Didn’t taste like the last one she had at El Asador. Once again the human garbage disposal comes to the rescue and snaps the empanada up and eats it.
By 5:23 Rocio is now playing solitaire and has settled down a bit. We learn that the checkout gate won’t open until about half an hour before our flight, due out at 7:30 or so. She states that she’s looking forward to talking to people who learned English the way she did! I point out to her that is exactly the case in Buenos Aires. I furthermore point out to her that every single person she spoke English to in Buenos Aires spoke serviceable English back to her. She is not amused or impressed. Time to go home…
For more of our adventures visit my web site at: http://webpages.charter.net/roger.glass
If you’d like to send me a message I love to get mail about travel adventures and about Argentina, Brasil and Paraguay.
There is an excellent website on Paraguay that was founded by an adoptive parent, if you are interested: http://www.pyadopt.org.
Thanks for reading my story. It was fun recalling our adventures.