I Am Still Alive

Sorry about the delay- I have not been in town for two and a half weeks. I had 43 emails waiting for me. Half of it was spam, but the rest, well, I have been responding to emails for almost three hours. It is great to hear from everyone.

Since My Last Entry-

I promised to tell you about some stories. I’ll tell you in order.

The last time that we were in Esquina before my last post, we stayed for several nights. One of those nights I was introduced to some of the boys in town that “are about my age”. They were brothers, 25 and 29 years old. There names were Antonio and Herman, respectively. I went with Marcela, Camille, her husband Pato, and Camille’s friend Truja and her husband to meet them at their family’s lodge in town. We stayed up after dinner around a roaring fire and drank Fernet and Coke. Fernet is a thick, black, woody, anise tasting liquor that everyone drinks down here. This of course was after a few glasses of white wine before dinner. I was feeling pretty good by the time I went to the only party in town with the brothers.

They paid for me to get in, and we followed the blasting Latino dance music up a flight of stairs. We were immediately handed a liter of beer and started to peruse the crowd. This was not an easy thing to do, as everyone at the party was wearing a costume. There was only one catch: the party was being thrown for a very flamboyantly gay man’s birthday. One could not tell if the people behind the masks were male or female, and I was not about to make a mistake. I elected to dance with my glass of beer rather than a partner. Trips to the bathroom, which beer in quantities can induce, were not fun. Everyone was very drunk and recognized me as not being from around down. When they took that other kind of interest, I told them that I was from Barcelona and that I was leaving. Then I would scramble back up the stairs to the brothers.

I did my best to follow where their friend was pulling my right hand and not spill the beer in the other, and leaned against the wall. I watched in horror as a guy in a thong took a girl's place pole dancing. I looked at Herman to my right for help, ad he said, “come on, its fun!” Jesus, people must get desperate for fun out here. I finally got him to leave with me when the thong started to come off. When we pulled up to Camille’s house it was 4:30. Herman said, “nos vemos”, I said goodnight and he pulled away. “Nos Vemos”. Hah. I don’t think so. That’s the last time I let him take me to a party.

BLUHUHUHUHUH. That was nasty. The beer made it worse. The next day I slept in till twelve and then we hit the road to come back to Carmen. When we got back, I got Negro and we went out to the lagoon to build a duck blind. We scoped out a spot and started building with pie boughs from the nearby grove. Then we covered the frame with grass and it looked great.

In the gathering dusk, Negro spotted a single duck coming in. I picked up the gun and crumpled it over the water. It was not very far out and the water was shallow enough to wade in my boots. I waded out as far as I could get and could just make out the outline of the duck in the dark, just out of reach, even with a stick that I had brought. Negro said, “maybe it will be there tomorrow”. I agreed and turned around to wade back. I heard a loud splash right behind me. The duck was gone. Negro corrected, “and maybe not”. I was scared. There was a notoriously large and mean croc in this lagoon where we had decided to build the blind. I waded back as fast as I could and half way to shore, I was sucked halfway underwater. I was very shocked at first, and thought of the croc, but it was just that I had broken through the layer of weed roots in the mud. When I tried to extricate my first leg, the second went under. It was a trial to get out, all the while with reptilian eyes watching my every move. That was scary.

I was not perturbed, however. I took a hot shower, ate dinner, and went out rabbit hunting in the truck with Negro till midnight. We had no luck, so I got up early the next morning to go get some ducks with Adolfo. Of course, we had put the blind on the wrong side of the pond. The ducks always come from the east. We didn’t get any. I was feeling pretty bad by then. I don’t think that I could have hit the broad side of a barn.

I went back to sleep and then woke up with the flu. It was a Sunday, and though I had days when I felt better, the fever only stopped coming the next Sunday morning. I have never wanted to be home more than during that week. I am happy to be here now that I feel better, but feeling crumby that long like I did and being away from home and family is awful. A man will do anything to get back to them. I am glad that I stuck it out. Marcela left for Buenos Aires today and will be back with John on Saturday. Today is Tuesday.

A freezing cold front has come in, and I still have a cough, so I am laying low with the kids and the help. I have finished Steinbeck’s East of Eden, read Of Mice and Men, then I read Hemingway’s To Have and Have Not. I will finish The Old Man and the Sea tomorrow, then read The Sun Also Rises. As you can see, I have had a lot of time in bed, though I did not start reading until the fever went. I loved East of Eden, but Of Mice an Men was not my favorite. Hemingway’s stuff is great.

After the fever-

Marcela and the kids were at Camille’s ranch- La Victoria, when I recovered. They returned Sunday night, then Marcela left again on Monday to pick up her husband, John, in Buenos Aires. I held down the fort with Marta until Thursday, when I was invited with Marta and the kids to go to La Victoria.

Camille’s husband’s family is Zeni, if I understand properly, the single largest exporter of grains, citrus, and pine in Argentina. Also, they are up there in beef exports. Naturally, their ranch, La Victoria, is quite large. It was nice to have a change of scenery, and the change was wonderful. Birds fill an open blue sky picturesquely framed by the pine trees in the distance. Cattle lie in golden fields of dry grass, and burrowing owls peek out of their holes in patches of sandy soil that are characteristic of Corrientes. Capybaras bark from the impenetrable cover of reeds in the lagoons around the house. It was beautiful.



The food was excellent, and I had some nice visits with Camille and Pato. I went horseback riding every day. I feel so alive now that I have recovered. This is all of us out for a ride in the campo.



Although I was not on him in the picture, Camille let me ride her horse, Tostado, when she did not come out herself. I was very proud to be riding him. He is a horse that would go for somewhere between 15 and 20 thousand dollars in the market. He has a very soft mouth and smooth gate, and is beautiful. I felt like a prince riding him around. The only issue with riding him is that he knows he is beautiful, and is very strong headed. He will throw you off if you don’t ride well. I was honored that a horsewoman as good as Camille thinks that I ride well enough for him, and I did not let her down. I was not thrown and I handled him very well, but it was exhausting. I could not let my guard down for a minute. I let my mind wander once, and he bolted. He thought that I was not paying attention when we were galloping and nearly threw me off with a sudden jerk to the right. I like Rosillo better.

John and Marcela came to La Visctoria from Buenos Aireas on Saturday night, and it was great to see them both. The next day we had a freshly slaughtered lamb a la parilla and roasted vegetables to celebrate. If you have never had a fresh, grilled lamb, you are missing out on life. All of us went horseback riding together, then packed our bags for Carmen.

Back at Carmen, we unpacked everything that John and Marcela had brought from Buenos Aires. John brought me peanut butter from the states, and Marcela brought me dark chocolate and soy milk from Buenos Aires. It is the little things like that that really brighten up your day. I reverently take the chocolate and peanut butter out from their hiding places every night and eat a piece of chocolate and a spoonful of peanut butter in ecstasy. And the soymilk- I did not know how much I missed cereal in the mornings.

After we got everything in order and the kid’s tutoring done for the day, John invited me to a rum and tonic in the living room. We had a stimulating conversation about politics that lasted for hours. John is a very good talker and has a great sense of humor.

On Tuesday, we had everyone over for a big lunch of roasted pork tenderloins, potatoes, sausage, salad, wine, the works. Even Marcela’s brother came from Buenos Aires. After lunch, which was marvelous, John, Nico, Martin, and I all went on a partridge hunt.

Martin brought some dogs, and we went off to the far side of the ranch. Almost immediately the dog went on point, and we followed him as he went after the running bird through the brush. When the bird flushed, I put my borrowed 20 gauge automatic shotgun to my shoulder and fired one shot. I got the fist bird of the hunt, and it was a nice, fat martineta. They behave like pheasants, and sort of look like a brown colored cross between a pheasant and a chicken. They are not common, and I was very proud of my kill. I seem to be proud of a lot of things lately.

This is all I have right now, but I will try to post more often. Until then.

No Post This Week

Sorry to disappoint, but I have been sick with the flu. I think that the fever broke and I am feeling better now, so I should be able to write some posts back at the ranch. I have some good stories from before my illness, and I will put them up next time I am in Esquina. Also, I got some new riding boots right before I got sick, and I am excited to try them out. Hasta lluego.

Hola!

Week 2

Hello all, I hope that you are enjoying your summers. I am in the process of uploading the pictures from the last entry now, so you should check them out. Enjoy!

The First Weekend- 6/23

What a weekend.

I had a fun car ride back from Esquina on Friday night. Adolfo couldn’t figure out the lights on the truck so we drove most of the way home with the brights on. Every car we passed flashed us. We were laughing and joking the whole time. Finally, he figured the lights out as we turned on to the dirt road to the ranch. Not that it mattered then.

I awoke early the next morning, and much to my chagrin, the weather looked beautiful. I could see every star in the sky. Normally, this would be great, but I had to go hunting for that last duck. Marta won’t cook three of anything it seems. Ducks fly in bad weather, and normally don’t move very much on a nice day like Saturday, which is bad for hunting.

But, seeing as Marta wanted another duck, I put on my gear and went out to the lagoon. I tried a new spot, closer to the water in the reeds that were growing in the mud. As I sat there looking at the empty sky, I absentmindedly brushed an ant off of my chaps. Two minutes later, I brushed off another. As I turned around to see where they were coming from, two ducks flew in from the trees behind me and landed in the water thirty yards in front of me. Slowly, I continued to turn around to see where the ants were coming from, trying not to scare the ducks up until I was ready to shoot them.

It just so happens that I had sat on a pile of reeds occupied by an ant colony, which now proceeded to swarm everywhere. I wasn’t about to start tearing wildly at my clothes, not with that fourth duck within reach. Of course, you must understand that I would never start tearing wildly at my clothes upon learning that I had sat on an ant hill swarming with huge, black, Argentinean ants. Keeping my eyes on the ducks, I started to swipe madly at the seat of my pants. Ants went flying. I got most of them off pretty quickly, but I had these strange burrs stuck to my jeans. Upon examination of one of these burrs in the pre-dawn light, I saw was holding a huge guard ant that had hinged his jaws to my pants. I tried to get all of them off without getting bitten too badly, keeping my eyes on the unsuspecting ducks all the while.

Now that the ants were out of the way, I could move on to my quarry. I took to steps towards the ducks, hoping to spook them. I closed my gun and watched as they uneventfully flew out further out into the lagoon and further out of bounds. Eventually a duck came within reach and I shot it, no big deal. It wasn’t a very productive morning.

Our guests for the weekend, Camille and family and a family friend all came over about midday. I helped Marta cook the biggest beef tenderloin that you have ever seen in the wood oven, and enjoyed a relaxed meal outside with the family.

Adolfo had invited me to go fishing with him and his son during the ride home the night before. He invited me to go Sunday, but because we were having a big Asado lunch on Sunday that Marcela wanted me to come to, she gave Adolfo the afternoon off so I could do both. It worked out great for everyone.

After lunch, Adolfo had the afternoon off, so he invited me to go fishing with him and his son, Negro. We all hopped in the truck with conventional fishing rods and carnecitas, which are basically little pieces of uncooked and extremely grisly garbage beef that we cut up with Adolfo’s machete. After a brief drive to the other ranch that goes all the way down to the river, we had another brief walk through the jungle before we came out onto a beautiful sandy beach.

It was slow at first, a few shakers here and there, until the sun started to get low on the horizon. Then Adolfo started pulling them in. We were fishing for anything that would take the bait, and what we caught were boga, a bigger version of white fish with teeth like a mammal and a strong honking jaw. I found this out the hard way when I climbed down the ten foot cliff to the water to get Adolfo’s first fish. It was about 16 inches long, with big scales and a tiny little mouth. I put my finger in it to grab it like one would a bass and CLAMP, “YOW!” The teeth weren’t sharp, so they didn’t pierce the skin, but I still have a bruise and it is Sunday night. They weren’t too slippery, so I just grabbed them tight after that.

I wasn’t having too much luck myself so I moved down the coast to try to improve it. I cast way out into the river and waited for it to drift into the shallows, just like Adolfo. Negro had already given up and was sitting watching his father. He is thirteen. Anyways, I started feeling taps on the end of my line. I waited for what seemed like forever for him to take it, and then set the hook. “Tengo algo!” The fight was short, boga are not fighting fish. I started to reel him up the cliff, when FLOP the hook came loose. The fish landed on the beach below, which was about a foot wide. Not wanting to lose the fish, I jumped and fell/slid down the cliff to the water, and with the toes of my boots wet, grabbed the fish before it had a chance to get away. That was exhilarating. I threw it up onto the bank to where Negro took this picture. I gave my fish to Adolfo for his family to eat, so he had five fish when we left.



Back home, I helped clean the fish behind Adolfo’s little house, and then went to have cocktails and play cards with the guests. When we finished cards, I went to go have some fried fish and flatbread fried over a stove made out of a metal garbage can. We ate with our hands on stools and it was delicious. I went back to the house and had hand-made gnocchi with meat sauce and we were served red wine. We ate with silver on white linen placemats and it was delicious. It was interesting to go between the two worlds. I enjoy them both. The ranch heands have really taken me in.

6/24

I woke up really late, at almost ten, and lay in bed for a while. I had had more dreams of people from home and was trying to be rid of them. I took a lukewarm shower and went outside to see everyone having tea on the lawn.

I had two and a half mugs of my usual earl grey tea and started to wake up. It was midday, after all. We sat and talked waiting for the asado to be ready until we all had to go put on something warmer. I wore long underwear for the first time down here today and I was still cold. The weather has changed. It has gone from the 60s with 85% humidity to the 40s and 50s with 35% humidity.

We went to have our asado in the Quincho, a room with a big wooden table with a wood oven and grill built into the wall. The room was filled with the smoky and appetizing aroma of the specialty of Argeninta- grilled meat. We sat and talked and drank wine for hours, eating chorizo, salchicha, and the best cut of pork that you have ever tasted. I don’t know what it was called, but it was amazing. I do not know if I have mentioned it, but all of the conversing that I do down here is in Spanish, with the exception of when the boys or Marcela speak to me. Even then, Marcela speaks to me in Spanish half of the time and I am trying to teach the boys some Spanish.

We ate for two hours, and I ate about a kilogram of meat. That is a little more than two pounds. I felt like a lion after having gorged on a wildebeest. I asked to be excused, as they were talking about old family arguments, and went to my room to go back to sleep. It felt like I didn’t sleep at all. I could not stop thinking about Olivia. I love her and miss her. I got out of bed after an hour, and I wanted to go for a ride.

I went out with Javier to go get the horses from the field, and we found them pretty quickly. We herded them back towards the ranch house and into the corral. Negro came out to join us and put a halter on a big beautiful dark brown horse named Oscura, which means dark. Javier grabbed me the slow horse that Liam rides, explaining that if you whack him hard enough, he’ll go. I helped him saddle the horse up, and I was going to go out into the campo, or the country, as opposed to the road when Negro’s sisters, whom we refer to as las chicas, came out to join us. Cynthia is 12, shy, and scared of everything and Joanna is 11 and adventurous. She is perpetually smiling. They both look and act at least 14. They and Negro all wanted to go riding with me for a couple of hours. I was quite happy to hear that, and I waited as they saddled up. They rode over to the gate on the main road and Negro and I went by the lagoon. My stirrups were too short, so I coerced my horse to a gallop and rode to the front gate without them, where I traded horses with Cynthia whose stirrups were too long.

I had never seen the horse before. I found out later that his name is Rosillo. He is the best horse that I have ever ridden, he is very responsive, has a smooth gait, and can run like the wind. Negro wanted to race me, and I started to say that I could never win, that he is so much more experienced, but then my competitive side took over. I said okay. Negro had to stop to tighten the cinch on his horse during the first race and we tied the second race. We took a break and let the girls catch up, and we all talked and joked and laughed together until we had to turn around.

I had been reigning Rosillo in slightly on the first two races, but for the last race, I let him loose. I did not know that a horse could run so fast. I could barely see for the wind in my eyes. I passed Negro, who had started ahead of me, with ease. The wind howled in my ears, and Rosillo’s hooves were thunder on the hard dirt. I swung my free hand up in the air and yelled with excitement and urged the horse on. Eventually, I started to reign him in. He just kept accelerating and the girls were far behind us. Negro passed me soon enough and I told him that he won, because I don’t want to embarrass him. Riding is second nature to these people. I was very proud as we walked towards the ranch and the sunset, all four of us in a row. We talked and laughed some more before herding some stray bulls out of the front lawn area in the twilight. We circled them all and whooped and hollered them out the gate.

After thanking Rosillo and putting him out to pasture, I said goodbye to the guests, who were on their way out the door. I had a pear and an orange for dinner and laughed with Marta and Sandra, in the kitchen before retiring to me room. What a weekend. I want to ride Rosillo again tomorrow.

6/25

Man I’m sore. My legs are fine, but my lower back is killing me. I think I turned all of m vertebrae into pancakes yesterday. I am stretching my hamstrings, which should relieve everything. I’ll feel better tomorrow.

I realize that I might not have painted a good picture of a typical day here at Carmen. I usually get up around 8:30, get dressed, and go get some breakfast, usually eggs, fruit and Earl Grey tea, from Marta in the kitchen. If I want to go hunting, I get up at 7. No one else is awake. The kids usually get up and are ready to be tutored at 11. I tutor Liam for 1.5 hours by reading with him and doing basic math and English exercises, and I tutor Sean for .5 of an hour, working on letter recognition and writing letters. Then we go eat a hot lunch at 1 and go horseback riding. In the later afternoon, I go hunting, horseback riding with Adolfo’s kids, or hang out in the kitchen with Marta. Then when the sun sets and the generator goes on at about 6, I go back to my room and write the blog, letters, and anything else that comes to mind. We eat dinner around 8 or 9, and I usually go to bed about 10:30 after making a fire and reading.

6/26

It looks like London outside. It is 45 degrees and raining. I went out duck hunting late, at ten, but didn’t get anything because all of the ducks were already done moving for the day, thought there were many on the water. Nevertheless, I froze for over an hour, crossing my fingers and waiting. I couldn’t feel my hands anymore, so I tried to jump the ducks that had already landed. As I approached the water, they all flew over the water with the piranhas and crocodiles in it. No point in shooting them over that. I couldn’t have pulled the trigger more likely than not anyway as my hands were so wet and numb.

6/27 – Orange Trees

Today was a great day. I got up at the nine, took a freezing cold shower (I could see my own breath in the bathroom and the water was room temperature at best), and went to have breakfast. I had a breakfast of toast with walnut butter, which is just like peanut butter. I mashed it myself from some raw walnuts yesterday. The cold front has passed us by. It was in the upper 50s and sunny all day.

I got the kid’s tutoring done early, then went out and herded the horses in from pasture and into the corral on foot. Rosillo let me put on his bridal without a problem. Normally, it is a pain in the butt to get the bridal on the horses. Getting them into the corral is the easy part.

I mounted him and rode him around bareback for a while as I waited for the others to come out of the house to go riding. Riding bareback it really fun. I galloped for a while, then got down and taught the horse to go through a tall gate that he was balking at. I led him through the gate twice, then mounted him and rode him through without a problem. I was very proud of myself.

Finally, Negro and Joanna came out of the house with Liam, and I went with Negro to go get some more horses. Negro got Oscura, and I got Liam’s slow horse that he likes to ride, which I have nicknamed Caracol, or snail. Liam wanted to take us to his “secret spot” out in the campo. Of course, it was an eight-year-old’s “secret spot” so it was really just anywhere in the general direction that he pointed. We found an old overgrown road, and followed it all the way to the end of the ranch. There we dismounted, hopped the fence, and proceeded to relieve the neighbor of some of his oranges and lemons, which were growing on trees around the crumbling ruins of a small brick house.

The oranges there were juicy and sweet, whereas the oranges near Carmen are dry and bitter. Negro climbed the tree and threw the oranges down to me where I caught them and put them in a pile. We ate a couple each and decided to bring the rest home. We did not have any bags to bring them home with so we improvised. Negro left for the ranch while I was helping Joanna and Liam onto Caracol, and they left as I mounted Rosillo. Alone, I galloped him fast all the way back to the ranch along the overgrown road. I did not see the others in the brush until they caught up with me at the ranch. Negro said he tried to catch me, but that I was going too fast.

This is a picture of how we improvised. It is a funny sensation to have oranges bouncing around in your shirt.


For dinner, I prepared some doves that I shot for Adolfo and his family. I marinated them overnight in olive oil, white wine vinegar, and chimichurri herbs. I had had some the night before. They were delicious.

I am pretty sore again after riding. I will stretch now and then go to bed. We might go to Esquina tomorrow. If not, I look forward to going hunting with Negro in the afternoon.

Week 1

I do not have internet at the ranch so I have to write everything on my laptop at night when the generator goes on, and then take my computer into town when we go once a week to upload it. I will post whenever I do get into town, which might not be very often, so the posts might be pages long, like this first one. Enjoy.

Unfortunately, the internet connection here is very weak, so I cannot post all the pictures I want right now as we have to get back for dinner. I will upload the rest later.

Rancho “El Carmen” 6/19

Here are some photos of her dad’s place that we stayed at before coming to Rancho Carmen.




And here is Rancho Carmen:


This is where I stay:



The days here at Carmen are long. I tutor the kids in the morning for two hours. The night before I usually get up at least once to stoke the fire and have to light a lantern with the matches at my bedside table to be able to see the wood. Surprisingly, it is not too cold here, but the humidity makes it feel freezing. The cold cuts right to your bones. I was constantly cold before buying a wool sweater from the local veterinary store. They sell feed, medicine, and all sorts of riding clothes.


At Carmen the cook prepares meals three times a day, and the food is always good.

I have my own guest house set up, which is quite comfortable. I have a picture of Olivia on my bedside table and my clothes all put away in the dresser. I even have my own shower with hot water. Unfortunately, my heater is a wood stove. This would not be unfortunate except that it is brand new and the idiots who built it coated the exterior of the metal chimney with tar. My room soon filled up with tar smoke as it burned from the hot smoke inside of the chimney. It got really thick before I realized it because I thought that the smell was coming from the radiator next door. When I turned on the fan, a curtain of smoke moved towards the door. Today some workers came and scraped off most of the tar, so it should be fine to go back in there.

I went riding with the kids today. They don’t like to gallop, so we trot instead and mash our brains to bits with all of the bouncing. This is me leading Sean’s horse as we got ready to ride a second time after having gone down to the store to buy some candy. While I was there, my horse let out a bunch of air and his saddle fell off completely. Thankfully, the husband of the shopkeeper, whose name is Quintana, helped me put it all back together, because I had not idea how to do it. However, I am learning. I think that I could fix it if it happened again.



When I was taking a siesta earlier today, Sean went out riding with one of the gaucho’s sons. When Sean’s horse came back with the saddle half-on, everyone got frantic. The gauchos hopped on horses bareback and galloped out into the campo in search of Sean, with Marcela driving the truck right behind them.

Sean was found soon enough. His cinch had come undone, just like mine, so his saddle slid off of the side of the horse. He fell on his side almost at a gallop, but he was fine.

Now I am just hanging out, trying not to feel hungry and trying to find something to do now that I am done with this blog. From now on, because of limited time in town, I am writing my blog at the ranch on my laptop. Then I will bring my laptop when we go into town and upload everything to the internet. That’s it for today. Tomorrow I think that the shotguns arrive so that I can go hunting. I am very excited.


Rancho “El Carmen” continued 6/19

As it turns out, the scraping of the tar was not enough, so we have to continue to burn off the tar until it stops which could be a while. The tar is definitely not healthy to be breathing all night, so unfortunately I have to sleep in the other room, which is just as nice, minus Olivia’s picture. Which reminds me, I should just move it, because I might be here for a while.

I hung out with the cooks for an hour before dinner, helped them cook, and dealt with the boy’s whining. We made “paty”s, which are basically pre-made hamburgers, and mashed potatoes and salad. We set aside a portion of potatoes for me and I mashed them up with oil and salt and pepper. I ended up eating the entire portion in the kitchen before dinner. I had two patys and some salad with Sean and Liam and Marcela. Tomorrow we might go and see the other house on the other side of the ranch. Could be fun.

Crocs and Ducks and Snakes, Oh My! 6/20

Today was a great day. The sun came out and it was the perfect temperature around the ranch. About 75 degrees. I was a bit worried that the whole 7 weeks down here would be cloudy and rainy like it had been.

After a breakfast of five eggs and some bread and when tutoring was done, I got out and went walking around the lagoon.

I saw something that looked like a strangely configured pile of mud on the side of the lagoon, but as I approached, it exploded in a flurry of water into the lake! A minute after a pair of eyes popped out of the water. Ahh! A croc! I saw three more crocodiles this morning on my little walk, and the biggest one that I saw was only about six feet long. I guess that’s still big enough to do some damage.

I also saw lots of ducks flying around all morning, but especially earlier, and many more around the lake. It should be great fun when Marcela brings home the shotgun tonight. But then, no one seems to know how to get the ducks out of the lake after you shoot them. I’m not going wading in there. Maybe I should stick to all of the doves and partridge that flush when we go walking or riding through the brush. Mentioning Marcela reminds me that you don’t know what she looks like yet.

After coming back to the house and eating a lunch of butternut squash, macaroni noodles, and leftover patys, I went to go see if Adolfo, the head gaucho needed help with any projects. I helped him to move big cedar light posts around the lawn. We had to dig a new hole for them, about four feet down, then dig them out and move them. They weighed a ton. I saw my first snake when we were clearing brush around one of the posts that needed to be moved. It was tiny, about from the tip of my thumb to the end of my forefinger in length. However this makes them no less venomous. We didn’t get a very good look at him though, he ran off pretty quickly.

Liam interrupted the work to ask me to take him over to the tanque at La Estancia Cautiva so that he could go swimming. The boys, las chicas (Adolfo’s daughters) and I all galloped over there on three horses. The boys are comfortable galloping with someone else on the back. More or less anyways.

I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to find a good place to read my book, John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, but all of the trees were already occupied by ants. I ended up settling on the porch. I read for a while, then watched the swollen sun dip pink over the horizon. It was very relaxing. I only wish that I could have shared it with Olivia.



Marcela’s sister Camille and her son Tiago, and Marcela’s other friend Mariana came over. We sat in the parlor and had fine red wine (a 2001 La Paz Syrah-Malbec blend to be exact) and bread and cheese as we waited for dinner. I skipped the cheese of course. After a wonderful dinner of rice and pot roast, we retired to the salon to drink more wine and laugh and converse. We stayed up till past midnight. Our guests stayed the night.

One of the things that was brought up in the salon was the phantasma, or ghost on the ranch. Apparently Marcela heard a wheelbarrow going back and forth outside of her window all night a couple of years ago back when they didn’t even have one on the ranch. This scared me in my tired and slightly inebriated state. Back in my room after I blew out my lantern, I could hear my heart beating in my ears. Then, slowly, came a repetitive squeak of a wheelbarrow that needs to be oiled. My mind raced for an explanation, and it came pretty quickly. There is a windmill that pumps water from the ground between Marcela and my rooms. It squeaks just like a wheelbarrow would. I slept soundly after that, kept company by the noisy family of rodents that live in my thatched roof.

6/21

For the past three nights I have had dreams about high school. Dreams that I was failing a class and was not going to be able to graduate, or that I owed the school $300 and could not graduate. Strangely though, I could not actually grasp the concept of graduating in my dreams. I guess that that is because I cannot fully grasp it now. I cannot get my head around the idea that I will not be returning to Redwood in the fall. It has been such a huge part of my life. I am in a state of subconscious denial. Leaving the morning after couldn’t have helped with what I am feeling either. It just makes graduation seem more like a figment of imagination.

I have wanted to graduate, to move on, to get out of there, for as long as I can remember. But now that it is finally here, I don’t really know anymore. It’s not as though I have any choice in the matter anyways. I should stop brooding. But it all comes out at night.

After tutoring in the morning, I took the kids and their cousin Tiago for a horseback ride over to the kiosko to buy some candy. Those kids love their candy. I am getting good at horseback riding and taking care of all of the gear. The horse that I was riding today was beaten before they got him and so is both head-shy and skittish. He always moves when he knows that you are going to mount him. I barely got my foot out from underneath his hoof today. That could have been really bad.

For lunch we all ate empanadas. They are a delicious specialty of Argentina. Basically they are a dumpling of flaky dough with egg, meat, and onion inside. I ate nearly a dozen.

After having a session of arts and crafts with the kids, Marcela got out the long awaited shotgun. I put on my chaps and boots and borrowed hunting vest and was away. I hunted for about three hours. Basically you walk through the brush and shoot at anything that comes your way. I probably scared up 8 or 9 partridges and didn’t hit one. Man those things are fast. They fly low to the ground and are small too, about the size of a clay pigeon. I did, however, get three doves which we will be eating for dinner tonight.


It might look like a pigeon, but, if you squint your eyes just so, you will see that it’s a dove.

My hot water is working again, so I got to take a nice steamy shower with my friend Rosalina. She is a tree frog that lives in my bathroom. She usually hangs out around the toilet, but today she decided to join me inside the curtain.

It turns out that Marta- the cook- does not cook three doves. She needs four. I will go out early tomorrow morning to get another. Instead we had the most tender Argentine chicken that I have ever had. It was a huge roasted chicken, basted in ojus and surrounded by potatoes and yams. I helped cook by figuring out how to keep the oven shut. I used a table leg and a two-by-four.

6/22

I awoke at dawn from a restless sleep filled with dreams of my classmates back home. I pulled on my hunting clothes and went out into the night, towards crocodile lagoon. As the sun began to rise I could see the birds flying from where I crouched in my camouflage next to a patch of tall grass. There were birds of all kinds, but I wanted ducks. It started to rain. It was going to be tricky shooting, because the ducks had to be taken over land. The sets of reptilian eyes just above the surface of the water made wading for downed birds out of the question.

The first set of birds came, four of them. They circled about once then were coming to land in the water when I popped out and took one of them. The remaining three were gone in the blink of an eye. I retrieved my duck from the brush, threw it into my patch of tall grass and continued hunting.

I got two more ducks that morning. As I was preparing to leave without the fourth dove for Marta, a speck appeared on the horizon. I crouched low to the ground and looked out from under the brim of my hat. The speck turned into a dove, heading right for me. I waited until it was nearly overhead, closed the gun and fired. The dove crumpled and landed beside me in a cloud of feathers. It was like a message from God. I don’t know what he was saying with it, but he had really good timing.

When I came back to the house, there were ducks flying around all over the place. They sleep in the trees next to the house. I felt smart. Adolfo laughed and told me to get another duck so that Marta would cook them. I left my harvest at the base of a tree and loaded my last shell. All the ducks had already left by that time.

When I went back for the ducks, Adolfo asked me how many I had. I told him three and went to show him, but one was missing. Adolfo laughed and laughed and brought the other duck out from behind another tree. Afterwards he took this picture of me.



Everyone was still asleep when I returned from my hunt. After tutoring and lunch, Adolfo took me to Esquina so that I could finally post this blog.

I know that you are reading this-

I love all of you to pieces. Jan, I love you and I will miss you enormously when I get home to a house without you in it. Have fun in Spain and then in Italy. All of you have fun in Italy. Be happy and enjoy your warm weather. I will do my best to keep in touch.

Arriving

The 18 hours of travel went quite smoothly. It was hard to leave my family and my girlfriend at security, fo I will miss them dearly, but after that I got into my groove. I have spent a lot of time traveling, and it gets easy with practice. There was an hour delay after the hour layover in Atlanta, GA, but after that the flight went exactly as planned.

I arrived in Buenos Aires after having slept for a good seven hours on the plane ride and feeling pretty well rested. I got my two pieces of luggage and went through customs no problem and went out to the terminal to try to find Christian Hiba, a friend of mine that I met last time I came to Argentina, one and a half years ago for new years eve. We stayed in his ranch house in Patagonia.

Christian and I were waiting for eachother in different terminals, but after a quick phone call from a pay phone we were on our way. As I went outside to meet him on the sidewalk, it felt like I was walking into a freezer. It is winter down here, and zero degrees Celcious with the humidity of Buenos Aires can feel quite cold and wearing nothing but a pair of athletic shorts and a fleece.

I went back to Christian's, washed up and went to meet Marcela, my employer, at her hotel. Unfortunately, the keys to her truck were nowhere to be found. We unpacked everything, double checked it and put it all back and still no keys. To make the long story of the day short, Marcela contacted hired help at her ranch and had him give the spare keys that they have there to the driver of the night bus. We went out and had carne parilla, which is basically grilled meat. I enjoyed all of it, although the cow intestine and kidney were not my favorite. It was the texture of the stuff inside of the intestines that really got me. The next morning Marcela got up early and met the bus on its route through Buenos Aires and got the keys from the bus driver. Marcela came back to the hotel and woke us all up and we popped into the car for a quick six hour drive to Esquina.

It is Sunday and father's day, so they was hardly anyone on the road and it seemed as though all of the police at the police checkpoints along the way were taking a break too, because we were not stopped once. We averaged about 125 KM/hr. I have no idea what that is in miles/hour. I think a little over 75. It went by quickly because the scenery of pastures was pretty and the kids were asleep for most of the trip.

We arrived in time for the middle of her father's father's day lunch, which was more parilla, pronounced par-E-ja. I just can't get enough of that stuff. The meat down here is so good it is ridiculous. They killed a sheep fresh that morning and have beef and chorizo sausage as well. The family is quite nice. Marcela has a brother and a sister who have a daughter and a son, respectively. They keep Marcela's kids, Sean and Liam busy, which is good.

Well, I am off to dinner with her sister. I will post more and put up pictures the next time that I have internet access. Love to all.

Leaving

I am leaving the day after tommorrow. I graduate tommorrow, spend the night with my friends, then go to the airport the next morning at 8:30 for an 11:36 flight. It is all coming really fast, and then when I am done with the 30 or so hours of travel, everything will slow down again. Again. Hah. I cannot remember the last time that my life was moving slowly. I will have a blast in Argentina. Right now I need to sign up for fall classes at Colby. I get back from Argentina on the 8th of August then head out for Colby on the 26th. Mind you, my family comes back from their trip in Italy on the 18th, and I cannot stay in my house because the Italians that they are exchanging houses will be living at mine. I will probably live at my girlfriend Olivia's or my best friend Max's house, or preferably, at my cabin the mountains. It will be really fun to take some friends up there before I head out for school.

This is me up there two weeks ago.



Funny face, no?