Where is the Sun?
After spending the day wandering around Igua�u Falls I really needed a large
dinner. Having dined on chocolate pizza the previous night I decided that I
ought to try something a bit different. None of the “all you can eat” places
looked very appetizing so I settled on a place that had a barbeque set up
outside on the pavement.
“Can I have a menu, please?” I asked.
“Sorry,” replied one of the customers, “this is a local restaurant for local people. There is no menu.”
Excellent start I thought. “So what can I get to eat?”
“Just tell the chef what you want.”
I turned to find a large hairy man with a
sharp looking knife standing behind me. Thinking I was ordering some sort of
kebab on a stick type affair I asked for a couple of beef things. Next thing
I know three huge slabs of steak had been cut directly from a side of beef and
put on the barbecue in front of me. On seeing the look on my face the whole
restaurant laughed and I breathed a sigh of relief. The steaks were
fantastic (although I only managed two of them, I was given the third to take
home) and I settled down to a nice chat with the various patrons, owners,
cooks and sundry people that just seemed to be hanging around. Apparently
the place was owned by a Moroccan bloke. And the meat was fresh every day,
rather than coming out of a freezer.
I was due to meet Tim on the 9th of September at the language school we were
both attending. I was supposed to leave a note for him saying where I was
and what hostel I was staying at. As so often happens when you are traveling
I just bumped into him in the corridor and found he had already checked into
the same hostel as me.
The only other person in my language class was a Swiss girl called Silvia. Great, I thought, this is almost like getting your own private tutor. However,
as Silvia already spoke French and Italian it quickly became apparent that I
was the class thicky. Over the next several days I was to severely test my
teacher’s patience. Fortunately, Tim was always on hand in the evenings to
explain the day’s lessons to me. After five days of three hour lessons, my Spanish
has improved to the point where I can almost count to ten. How is it that
after only one drunken evening in a pub in Syria I can use 10′s of different
Danish swear words (with a Danish accent), but after 15 hours of classroom
Spanish I can only just ask someone’s name (with a French accent!)?
At least the evenings were more fun than the long hours spent in a
classroom. On Sunday night I went with a few people from the hostel to a
very popular all-you-can-eat place called “Follow the Cow”. It served meat in
obscene quantities. One glance in the kitchen was enough to make you wonder
how many cows died per evening just to keep the grills filled with meat.
Monday evening was spent at a Jazz cafe. Eating, drinking, and trying to
understand how live Jazz ever became popular. Tuesday evening few of us went
to watch and listen to a live Tango band in the intimate surroundings of
Cafe Tortoni, one of Buenos Aires oldest cafes. It still has the original
1800′s decor. Wednesday night is tango lesson night at the hostel and I hope
I picked up enough to impress my girlfriend when I eventually see her again.
Thursday night is the first big clubbing night of the weekend. The entire
hostel was sitting around in the common room, drinking beer, and waiting
till 2am when it would be time to catch a taxi to Club 69. This place is a
gay club for most of the week, but on Thursdays seems to transform into the
hippest place in town. Walking in I was greeted by a couple dressed in
Arabian Nights type costumes. The effect was confused somewhat by my next
view, which was of two guys in orange jumpsuits breakdancing on stage. Most
of the image conscious people seemed to be wearing sunglasses.
As I was pondering this strange fashion I turned to notice a very attractive girl
standing next to me. She was wearing sunglasses. Immediately I gathered my
Spanish lessons together and asked her, “Where is the sun?”
I have no idea what her reply was, but from her smile and body language it seemed like she
found the remark funny and had never heard it before. I’m not even sure she
knew I was referring to her sunglasses as it had been pissing down all week,
and I could just have easily been inquiring about the weather. Anyway, as her
English was non-existent I soon got bored of her smiling at me and offers of
her drink and sunglasses so I wandered off to find someone else to talk to.
It was 8:30 in the morning when I finally shared a taxi home with three other
people from the hostel. I later discovered that one of the reasons everyone
seemed so friendly and stayed out for so long was that 90% of them where off
their faces on cheap cocaine and E’s.
Friday night I did’t go out as I had a flight to catch the next afternoon
(Saturday, September 14th) and I still had done no site-seeing in
Buenos Aires. So, early Saturday morning I set off in search of Eva Peron’s
grave. Mission accomplished, it was time to meet Tim at the airport and catch
a flight to Montevideo.
