More Iguazu pictures, trying to share with all of you, but until you come and see them, you can't imagine, for REAL.

Back in Buenos Aires, we had very little time, and thats when we went to the milonga actually, and to the WORST club in BsAs, called: guess what? Le Paris ! Yeah it had to be! Because we were french we got to jump the queue and get in the VIP area... great! The club was full of 15 year olds dressed to impress. Music was apalling. We had a great night.

The next days as Solene was gone, we partied without her. We went to the Malba again (museum de arte latinoamericano de BsAs), where the most famous Frida Kahlo is, but also modern art and paintings by Xul Solar and Antonio Berni.
On the top floor, there is a modern art exhibition that has a few pictures and then huge piles of paper that is just red or that says things and people can help themselves to it, there is also a big pile of lollipops (because people here eat them ALL the time). The problem is, there is a little stage surrounded by light bulbs, but we never got to see the gogo dancer that comes, whenever he likes to dance on it with a tiny silver boxer and an i-pod. Thank god the exhibition was free...

In the boutique there is not much from the museum, but handbags around 100 pounds that are skin-colour and have little circles with imitation of real tits and an anus, like they have been made with real human body parts. Sweet! Please contact me for purchase.

Iguazu Falls

The adventure continues... happily! Warm day today again, enjoying the sun twice as much, for all of you in the north and beginning of winter! Yes, warm and very sunny, start of a tan, sunburnt nose, all is good!

Starting to know things better here, looking for a placement and as everything, it is pretty disorganized and requires a lot of patience and networking... But slowly finding a way.

Last week Solène (coeur coeur coeur) and her friend Hannah came for a day in Buenos Aires, we went to a milonga (where they dance tango) in an amazing place, on the first floor in an old barn, redecorated and pretty underground. Once again, we were singled out rapidly, and asked why we came. There are blond argentine people in Buenos Aires, but still they always seem to see us from miles away.

Then trip to Iguazu, one of the biggest waterfalls in the world (highest one over 70m when the Niagara falls are just about 50!). First the Argentine side, first you walk in and there are souvenir shops, big roads, lots of people and a little train and it just feels like you're in Disneyland. But then it is like being in paradise, with untouched nature, thousands of different kind of butterflies. Believe me, everyone had told me there were loads of butterflies, and still when we got there I thought: "wow there are loads of butterflies!". They fly in circles above puddles and they look like leaves tourbillonant in the wind in autumn. And there are loads of weird animals, toucans, huge ants, MOSQUITOES, and little animals that look like raccoons -sort of- but with really pointy noses. They look cute, but then a stupid tourist tried to make one come closer, it did, but she had little bread loaves in a plastic bag , in another plastic bag and before she knew it, the coatie had bitten through the plastic bag and run away with the pack of bread loaves. Stupid tourists.
So the waterfalls, you get to walk over them, and under, the view is incredible, you get so close you're wet and you feel that's what life is about! Then there is "la garganta del Diablo" the devil's throat (popular name in Argentina for everything that is "re-barbaro" (very amazing). To get there, after taking a little train like in Disneyland, you have to walk about 6minutes to get to the veiw point. The whole time you walk over water, branches of the river that leads to the falls. I've never seen so much water, its like recovering half of Fontainebleau (not that I have any notion of time or space). And then, and then, you get to the top of the most powerful part of the falls. Its just crazy, difficult to imagine, even for me now!

After a long day spent there, exploring every bit and stopping to gasp every 20m, we got home to one of the best hostels, Hostel Inn, it has a huuuge swimming pool, nights of "as much as you can drink caipirinhas lots of people. There we met a young monsieur, 18, English, on his gap year, public school, i'm sure you can all picture him now, so funny so confident but not really, especially when the Israeli next to him (that had just finished his military service) told him that war wasn't funny so he shouldn't have joined the army, even if they paid half his studies. But he was funny, like English you know? haha

The next day, we took a taxi, so cheap that would take us to the brazilian side and back (1hour altogether for about 20 pounds between the three of us. As we got there, we saw a flash, and then a rumble, and very soon it was raining... pretty heavily for our little unprepared heads (except for Solene of course... she had one of those perfectly organized people's raincoats. I came to Argentina without a raincoat.) So we bought very sexy raincoats there and were very happy!
This side, with the rain and the wind wasn't so much like paradise anymore, more like a LOT of water! but the view was still splendid, and you get to see the falls from further, thats when you realise how biiiiiig they are. And there were school field trips there as well, so we had the chance to witness crazy brazilian youngsters running around in VERY short shorts and tops, drenched to the bone screaming and flirting as hard as they could.

All that made us want to stay in Brazil for longer, but we couldn't because we didn't have any local money, our taxi driver was waiting and we had to take a bus hooome. So we took a bus home, about 18hours, slept most of the way... exhaustion.

Salta

Salta is a the Capital of the province by the same name, in the north west of Argentina. It takes a good 20hrs by bus from Buenos Aires, but the buses are so comfortable, you, back in Europe, can not even start to comprehend!

Arriving in Salta after finding a little empty but very nice hostel, we set out to organise our next day, looking for inspiration in travel agency. We ended up doing a two day tour in the northern part of the region. We first followed the trail of the "tren a las nubes" (train to the clouds, just sounds more romantic is spanish), a train that takes 17hrs and goes up to 4,200 meters above see level. So to fight altitude sickness, people suck on coca leaves, it's kind of illegal in Argentina, but shops still advertise them on huge panels outside... It's an amazing architectural achievement for the 1920's that has never really fulfilled its aim of commercially linking Argentina to Chile and is now just for tourists.
On the way we all stopped to see incredible views, ruins from the pre-Inca period, of cities built in the middle of nothing, but on top of hills so that attackers could be spotted days before they arrived.
The train arrives in San Antonio de las Cobres (Arg), we had lunch there, little kids dont ask you for coins there, they want to give you little rocks they pick up from the floor and then don't ask for anything but expect coins. The standard argentine answer seems to be: " i don't want to steal your heritage. Its important that you keep it." So yeah little rocks are their heritage there. There is not much more there, but still... In these mining towns, men leave from Monday to Saturday to work in the mines, so mostly women live there on weekdays. Now with the development of tourism, women are busy creating artesanias, and have no more time to look after the children, it is a big problem there, children are not educated, don't learn skills anymore and the people are impoverishing.

We then moved on to las Salinas Grandes, 120km² of salt, at over 3000m above sea level. Just like everything in this region and Argentina more generally, it makes you feel tiny, so unimportant.

We had an amazing day with the guide making jokes about our beauty, giving me paper flowers, telling me poems. The gauchos (sort of an equivalent of a cowboy, but way, way cooler) say and write poems. They are said in a way (intonation) that made me think of slam in the US, and they talk about respect, injustice, work, morals. But they are traditional poems, that have been shared from generation to generation.

Trying to keep it short... We stayed a night in Purmamarca, a tiny village with nothing, it looked like St Pé those who know, will know, so peaceful, we both felt comfortable, the people (watching football in a bar) we really friendly. Good to be away from craziness of Buenos Aires for a bit. The region is famous for all the different types and colors of sediments, one moutain, the 7 colores is red orange yellow green blue purple and loads of shades of all of them. :D

In Humahuaca, the children don't give you rocks, they ask if you want them to tell you a poem. Better heritage?

When we got back to Salta, we visited the city, a very friendly atmosphere, with cafés, bars around a big place in the warmth of the evening... we french people know how to enjoy that!

After pondering an entire night whether to go or not in rented cars with an English, a Brasilian, a Spanish, an Israeli, a Argentine and 2 others, we decided, our lives were worth more and didn't want to die falling off a mountain in a car driven by a crazy spanish dude... So we rented our own car, for 2 days. We first left for Cachi a little village west of Salta, the route was incredible, I don't even know how to describe this, 3000m above sea level, the view changing constantly from really dry moutains to really green ones, to complete plains of grass to little hills of dust and rocks to mountains of sandy dirt sculpted by water and the wind. The most impressive 100km in my life, neither of us could believe what we saw.

We got a text from our guide from the first day (with who we had also gone out one night and it was made clear nothing would happen) said he couldn't stop thinking about me, where i was... So of course we told him to come (making it clear, again, that nothing would happen). He did the next day he was there, our very own personal guide. It was great having him showing us the greatest places, explaining the culture, the history... getting us free wine, cheap hotels... and no commitment!

The trip from Cachi to Cafayate was no where as exciting though as the day before. On the way back to Salta there are loads of formations in the rock, the most impressive being the amphitheare, that has an amazing sound system, all very nice! Very hard to describe the size and everything... just loco!

Vacaciones

Bueno, seguimos !

The last few weeks have been very exciting for all of us here. Firstly, on the 21st, Fiesta de la Primevera !! Spring has now begun, with very nice weather, sunny. We are all starting to dread the arrival of summer, with its high temperatures and humidity levels though...
So that celebration they have for spring is also Students' Day, so for the week coming up to the fiesta, we had all sorts of games from table football to bouncy castles...

Starting on the 22nd we then had 2 weeks of midterm exams, of course, all of Queso Castle had carefully chosen its modules, so that we had no exams, just work to do at home. All of Queso Castle, except for the poor Pimpimpim! He had 2 exams, so he had to stay home for the 2 weeks!

So Alec went to Chile, then Helena went to see whales and penguins and ice. And I with the newly arrived little Solene, set out for a little trip in Salta.

All I can talk about is Salta, the others may recount their travels. Or not.