Tragedy: On my bus from La Paz to Lima I had my camera stolen. This would explain a) why I haven´t really done any entries for all of Peru and b) why I find it hard to come back to it, it´s kind of a reminder of ALL the photos i lost. Anyways, I have one week left in my travels and have been having a great time, so I will do a proper post when I get home, when I have the time to invest in a text version. Then this guy´ll be back up as I had north within a weekend to the NWT to work for a summer! But more on that later, in the meantime I wish everyone all the best and promise to get this sucker back up and running when I have the courage. Cheers!

CHILE!! and Ian reveals further ineptitudes in the blogosphere.

So, since last time I had such a hard time with formatting when I did a photo based entry, I'd planned to upload the photos all in one go and then comment from there. But blogger didn't like that. So now you have this disaster, all photos from various points of my adventure north from Santiago all the way up to San Pedro de Atacama, where I crossed into Bolivia. The Bolivian photos will come later.
Anyways, I head into the Bolivian jungle tomorrow, but I will try and rectify this and actually explain the photos later. Cheers!

Ian Highlights How He's Possibly The Worst Blogger Of All Time By Posting More Photos In A Vain Attempt To Catch-up Which Inevitably Ends With Him Being Bored of Being On The Computer And Stopping Short Of Actually Catching Up



poetry¡veinte poemas de amor y una cancion desesperada - pablo neruda
lit¡the joke - milan kundera

Hello hello, writing you all from smoggy smoggy Santiago (apparently this is the worst time of year for the smog, see photo, makes seeing the Andes in the background tricky). Since my last entry I've visited Bariloche, Pucon, Valparaiso, Isla Negra, and now Santiago. I'm off tomorrow for a five day jaunt before reaching San Pedro de Atacama which will involve a desert that has no record of it having rained ever, a penguin sanctuary, and one of the most beautiful beaches in the world. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll give each location one paragraph, try and get in a few cool things about each, and thus catch up!


Bariloche was amazing, a city nestled on this giant lake right in the Andes, on the north edge of Pantagonia in southern Argentina. The big events: ran into Laura, the girl who burst two tires on bikes in Mendoza, with whom I rented a car along with a few other friends to do the 7 lakes drive (see photos), during which she again managed to burst two tires, right in the middle of absolute nowhere. What a debacle, the spare in the trunk was more cruel mockery at that point. Thankfully Joey, a lovely Welsch guy with us who spoke the best Spanish, managed to hitch hike back into town some 40 minutes away on a little used gravel road and get things back together. But then the dick of car rental guy charged us 210 pesos because we didn't get the right BRAND of tire when we returned. We were all pretty steamed but since he had a copy of Joey's credit card we all paid up, so I needed to do something to burn off a little steam. That something was paraglide off Mount Otto and glide like a bird over the Andes! The mixture of adrenaline from the take off and landing and the absolute piece you get up top was incredible, I've actually started thinking I might try and take it up some point in the future in Invermere.


Next it was on to Pucon where I once again tackled rafting, but of the Class 4 and 5 variety and spent my birthday drinkng Pisco Sours (a Chilean or Peruvian national specialty, depending on who you ask) in the hotsprings and partying at a little Chilean houseparty thrown by our waitress from that night. The highlight, however, was triumphing over Volcano Villarrica, an active volcano which I climbed adorned in crampons, helmet, and with my might iceaze in hand. We gained 1400m in about 3 hours of deep deep snow and did it whilst the sun rose over the valley behind us (4AM start time, ouch). The top was unreal, I'd never seen a volcano like that before but you could hear an ocean like roar coming from the magma within and once in awhile lava came crashing up so you could actually catch a glimpse of it. Great stuff.


Alright, I lied about catching up completely, but I want to write a bunch about Valparaiso cause I absolutely adored it but, unfortunately, I just don't have the patience for it now. I leave you with a photo taken from Pablo Neruda's house in Isla Negra, a tiny quaint village I did a day trip to while in Valparaiso. Neruda, despite being terrified of the ocean, was abosutely obsessed with ships, navigation, and the general romanticism of a nautical life. Hence he actually built all his houses like ships, with small hallways, low curved ceilings, and floorboards designed to creak and be slightly slanted to give you the impression that you were actually at sea. This was his drinking boat, where he and his friends would sit and get toreup in the hot hot sun, since Neruda believed that it was better to be dizzy from drink than from seasickness. He even had bells to communicate with the real ships on the ocean since he considered himself the "land captain". For some reason when I saw it I imagined all the bayview boys in the boat, each of us wearing a paper pirate hat and getting ridiculously drunk on a landlocked boat. Then Rico threw Keith overboard, haha. Brought a huge smile to my face.
Anyways, I trust all is well with each and every one of you. I also want to say a huge thank you to everyone who sent me birthday wishes, I was completely overwhelmed by my wall on facebook! xoian

1 Picture = 1000 Words? Sorry for the long entry...
music ¡ 1234 - feist, tango nuevo
lit ¡ ulysses - james joyce (40 pages to go! but those 40 pages consist of one paragraph with only one period)

Alright, simple format for the entry this time. I will simply upload photos and comment on them until I get bored, frustrated with the slow upload time at the internet cafe, or feel it has become to beautiful a day to be in front of the computer (it´s raining right now though...) And go check out Feist´s new track 1234, I adore it. Alright, Giddy up (in absolutely no particular order).

Me trying to be artsy in a wine cellar. I thought it was particularly cool since this winery was named for a constellation and that looked like the moon rising. Adrian and I spent a week in Mendoza, a city very similar to Calgary in feel on the west side of Argentina, just short of the Andes. Whilst there we rented a bikes rode out to a winery to do a lovely little tour. What I learned: rosé isn´t a mix of red and white wine, but rather red wine that was left for less time in the grape skins, therefore taking on less colour (Josh, I feel like you´re shaking your head at my ignorance...) The more you know...

A more standard picture of our running crew, a British-Canadian alliance of winos. Laura, the girl on the far left, managed to have two flat tires - one on the way out and one on the way back. I only had loose handlebars.

The Hero of this blog, haha. Don´t I look epic? And yes I´ve grown a beard, but no I´m not doing promotional shots for the Discovery Channel. This is actually pre-whitewater rafting, another of our great adventures in Mendoza.

The Hero´s sidekick! Think Sancho Panza. Wait, that makes me Don Quixote... OK maybe not the best analogy. How about heterolifemate? Hmm, Jay and Silent Bob probably isn´t the best analogy either. Anyways, Adrian unfortunately left on Friday to go back to work in Cowtown. He is missed.

Us rafting! We actually got lucky in that because of the time of season they were able to take us on a part of the river usually closed off for being to nutty. We found ourselves in constant class 3ish rapids, bobing and weaving through huge boulders and obstacles, leftback, rightback, forward!!! Intense fun stuff. Our guide also took pleasure in trying to knock us out of the boat on less dangerous areas... he almost got Adrian something fierce, but as Adrian fell over backwards, eyes as big as dinner plates and having given up on survival, our friend Vassoulla grabed him and hauled him right back into the boat. Pure hilarity.

Our day at the track, the one I talked about earlier in another entry. Remember? Where I lost 30 pesos and Adrian won 50? Dammit, who brought this up again? Whoever trained El Prostituto is getting a strongly worded letter about not giving up in the final stretch, hear you me.

Centro Cultural Torquato Tasso, the venue where we caught a mindblowing Tango Nuevo show on Adrian´s last night. I can´t remember the name of the band, but Adrian and I both bought a CD so I´ll be able to furnish it later. More importantly, the show was just spectacular, a hybrid of tango, rock, and almost dissonance played with a passion that was matched only by the quality of their music. Simply stunning and a great way for Adrian to end his trip, if I do say so myself.

Oh, getting a quite a tab going at the i-net cafe. That´ll be all for now. There´ll certainly be more entries like this, especially when Adrian finds time in his 'busy' schedule (that´s right, i used quotations mr. ineedaweekinthemountainstorecoverfrommyexcruciatingexhausting2monthvacationinSouthAmericaawayfromallcaresstressesandresponsibilites, haha ) to upload his pics to facebook so I can grab 'em. I head out of Buenos Aires tomorrow, south to Bariloche, so that´ll be the next I´m heard from. I´ll also try and do a brief entry of what we did with ourselves in our last week in BA. Ciao!

Culture Beyond Drinking, or, the Art of Gambling

music¡99% of us is failure - matthew good, fake empire - the national
paint¡alfredo volpi, felipe luis noé
photo¡heaven to hell - david lachapelle

Hello all! Been a bit of time since my last blog, a lot to tell, but once again I will trytrytry to restrict myself lengthwise.

Well, after becoming conoisseurs of the Argentine nightlife Adrian and I moved onto more cultural things this week (while still, of course, maintaining the most ridiculous sleeping hours known to man... before 3am here is nothing short of a miracle on a quiet night). First, we made our way to two galleries this week, El Museo De Bellas Artes as well as the MALBA. We also had a brilliant day betting on the horse races at the Hippodromo in Palermo, and then the next day found ourselves on a walking tour of La Boca and Palermo with a newfound local friend.

Our day at the tracks was absolutely lovely, sun shining brightly, some great swiss and english ladies by our side, as we bet on horses with majestic names such as Mr. Horse and El Prostituto (the proud son of Fat Farm). The Hippodromo was actually really cool, old majestic architecture that felt right out of the movies. Ironically, we weren´t allowed to take any photos (really for no good reason, which makes me think that they had certain clientelle who had no desire to have their photo taken) but luckily I got a video of one of the races (does anyone know if I can post video on blogger?). The excitement with each race was sweeping and you can hear the Argentines screaming and going absolutely nutty for their horses in the background as they got to the finish line (¡VALE!). As for winnings... well first I bet based on how cool I thought the horses name was. And I lost. Then I bet on how cool their parents names were. Lost again. Then I even considered previous results. And kept losing. Finally I decided that all my instincts in horseracing were wrong so I took my criteria and reversed it, therefore betting on the horse who had the crappiest name. AND I lost. Then Adrian won 50 pesos and I was bitter. Haha. All told I only lost 25 pesos (about 10 bucks) but it was a great day all the same.

The other big adventure came from a night where we had been out for Tango lessons with a few girls from the hostel down the way, but arrived halfway downtown only to discover that they had been cancelled. So we wandered about to find a restaurant and ponder what to do with the evening. As is constant in Buenos Aires we were being handed constant fliers for various places as we walked down the street and at one corner a guy tried to give us the fliers and we gave the automatic, handsupnofoulnogracias to him. However, we stopped on the corner and started talking and next thing we knew he was chatting with us, trying to guess where we were from. Turns out the guy has quite a knack, cause he nailed the Brits and the Dutch guy we were with. However, he thought Adrian and I were German, we laughed and corrected him (I think we were just happy not to be mistaken for Americans for once) and we got to talking. Anyways, he was super friendly so we exchanged numbers and said we´d hang out sometime. In the end, Julio (the guy) and his wife wound up taking us around La Boca and the markets in San Telmo and it was fantastic! Our own personal tour guide who´d worked in La Boca and knew literally everyone working the street (the Tango performers, the guys handing out fliers, the gift shop owners, and they were all ecstatic to see him!) and a whole bunch of staircases that to funny gift shops but had windows with great views of the entire area. He really only spoke Spanish, so it was great practice for me though unfortunate for Adrian who was tuned out most of the time unless he realized that Julio and I were making fun of him in Spanish... lol. Ended the day with a local restaurant where he knew the owners and had a nice meal, really great people (he´s even going to hook us up with tickets to the huge Boca-River football game next weekend). It was funny, Adrian and I half spent the day waiting for the other shoe to drop, for him to ask for something, but really he and his wife were just great people, pure and simple. And to think it all started with us refusing a flier...

In case you´re curious what La Boca is, it´s actually a cool little neighborhood that had a huge flood of immigrants around the early and mid 20th Century and saw a flourish of Tango culture, which has now become incredibly touristicy during the day and a hotspot for the Buenos Aires mafia at night, who mostly hang out in the barrio across the river. The bright colors that the houses were all painted based on the boat on which you arrived in Buenos Aires, giving an indication of both your nationality and departure. There´re also many crazy statues made of all sorts of famous Argentine figures that´re littering the streets (for example you may recognize football star and local god Maradona). Really a cool little spot for a sunday afternoon jaunt.

I may have to hold off on my little discussion of the arts this entry, since I´m low on time at the internet café and all (collective sight of relief...), but I´ll just say that the paint and photo were all from those galleries and really stunning, especially the chance I got to get to know more artists from this region. This guy Noe was particularly striking, everytime I saw a work that really struck me I´d go forward only to find it was him once again. As for the tracks, here in Buenos Aires I find myself completely removed from new music except at the internet café where I can stream tunes while doing things like writing a blog. Some links to check out if you wanna hear the tracks or learn more about the art: volpi lachapelle noé the national matthew good (for good you have to sign up to the site community).

Anyways, all the best to everyone and please write me! I´d love to know what´s going on at home (like the leafs missing the playoffs! haha not that calgary made it in in any spectacular fashion...) I leave you with a little photo of the Argentine military taking down the flag at the giant Obelisk downtown. Adrian and I assume it must´ve been laundry day. Ciao!

Dear Nick,

This was the view from my apartment in Buenos Aires last night:


What´s the view from your apartment like? Oh yeah, Nexen.

hahaha

xoIan

Iguazu, I love you! and The Life in Buenos Aires

lit ulysses - james joyce

music major label debut (fast) - broken social scene

How appropriate that I be reading Joyce right now (400 pages in!). The wandering Bloom/Odyssean hero screams of me right now. Epic (in that mixed, muddled sense Joyce would´ve loved). But in its purest sense, epic, the perfect word for the falls.

Taking a bus up from Buenos Aires to Iguazu Falls, Adrian and I spent 4 nights kicking about the falls. One day on the Argentinian side, one day on the Brazilian side and, most importantly, one day by the pool. The hostel, you see, is a converted Casino that still very much feels like a little paradise. I even got used to coming home to a nice game of water volleyball with breaks for beer at the poolside bar. All this for a hostel!

More importantly, the falls themselves were amazing. On the Argentine side we did a little tour where we got a rainforest tour in a jeep, a boat ride up the river to the mouth of the falls for a drenching and inspiring view of the falls (the pressurized water and mist cleared up adrian´s ear!) and then walked about that falls for the rest of the day, hiking to the tops of all the drops as well as getting an awesome view of the aptly named ¨Devil´s Throat¨. As for the Brazilian side, you got a view from a little further back that allowed you to get a sense of the falls as a whole, plus it wasn´t as intensely crowded. However, one of the coolest suprises of the falls were the butterflies... they were everywhere! At times you felt like you were walking through fluttering clouds and they gave Iguazu this fantastic romantic edge that just couldn´t be beat. I´ve enclosed a couple photos to give you a little idea of how breathtaking it was, but be assured I have tons of photos should there be interest.

An overnight bus home later (greyhound could seriously learn from Argentine buses, our chairs became giant beds and we were served wine and a hot dinner, champagne after dinner, plus had movies constantly playing for us on the screens), and we were back in Buenos Aires, this time staying in the neighborhood of San Telmo. After a few days of panic searching (it seems things were more booked up than we anticipated) the horseshoe up our asses bailed us out again and we found ourselves with an aprtment in the heart of Palermo with a gorgeous view from our balcony in one direction, and from our living room that has floor to ceiling windows that open up completely in another direction. Adrian and I now find ourselves taking Spanish lessons and growing accustomed to the little pleasures of our day. For example, each day around 6 we indulge in a wee matte, a Argentine/Uruguayian tea that in its preparation and consumption is very much a social event. Imagine sheesha in tea form (and yes, with the nicotine, or we think anyways). Here´s a picture of us enjoying it, you can see the little matte cup with the metal straw... each time when you drink, you add a little hot water. It has a very strong, bitter taste, though it becomes quite releaxing after awhile. Adrian spends his days musing on how he can find a way to ship back kilograms of matte to himself in Calgary. All those of you who worked with me at the JCC, you´ll also notice that I´ve had to be equally macgyverish with this stereo to get it to work with my tape adapter...

Oh yes, I almost forgot to comment on the ridiculous club life around here. Well, Adrian and I, after a long day of house hunting, had no choice but to go out clubing 3 of the last 4 nights. The clubs around here are very simply the most hedonistic things I´ve ever experienced in my entire life. The nightlife starts at 1am (and that´s the time you arrive if you´re a loser... lol) and goes on until sunrise, and after that if you really want you can find after hours clubs that go until lunchtime. The last club we were at had 4 rooms, one of which was giant outdoor foam party (this wasn´t a special night, this is everyday), one room which had a ¨green room¨photoerotic shoot going on, and another which had the stars from the latest big brother pulling people up from the crowd to dance with them and what appeared to be strippers. The other room was techno. Anyways, I´m doing a poor job of describing it but just make it the most ridiculous club you could imagine and you´re probably somewhere in the neighborhood. So much fun though, our Canadian clubs look positively childish and repressed in comparison.

Music wise I find myself listening to Broken Social Scene a lot again, mostly because their latest album is the departure point for the thesis I pitched to Ryerson that got me the scholarship listed last entry. Perhaps I´ll explain my thesis in another entry. In the meantime, everytime I leave Spanish class I always seem to want to listen to Major Label Debut (Fast), probably because the song´s upbeat and happy tempo seems to match my mood so perfectly these days.

Haha, another long entry. Something for you to read at work though, right Nicko! Don´t you worry, I´ll be sure to make my next entry in Dear Nick form so you can enjoy it more thoroughly.

hasta luego Ian