Soy Extranjero. #5

Focus, Luke, focus. *Must. keep. biking.* Many kilometers left to cover today and must keep must keep… hey wait a minute, is that another WINERY?… ah what the heck! :)

Though the absurd concentration of quality wineries slowed progress for several days, i managed to bike hundreds of miles this week and see some truly amazing places. Being back on the bike is very grounding for me. When I grip bartape and get into a rhythm it feels like home. Nevermind the random herd of sheep blocking the road or the fact that I just passed a tiny Fiat towing a huge truck carrying one very-embarrased-looking-cow (true story. hillarious). Luke is always at home and at peace with his surroundings when he`s turning pedals.

From Mendoza, i biked to San Rafael (Argentina). Wanted to see how Argentina`s “San Rafael” stacks up against my former hometown: San Rafael, California. The similarities between the two cities were quite striking. Firstly, in Argentina, much like California: nobody speaks english. Secondly, there are bicycles everywhere. This place looks like Valencia on a crit mass night, except today was a wednesday. Crazy bikey madness.

But several mornings of chipping ice off the tent found me in San Juan, buying warmer cloths and regrouping. I headed back out towards Ischiguasto (try to pronounce it, i dare you) and “the valley of the moon” national park. The road to Ischiguasto was all desert, complete with roadside cow-skeletons and classic 3-prong cactus as drawn by charles shultz. About 20km from the park, from behind an abandoned cinderblock shack, a street dog started chasing me. I sped away, but gutter-mut was quite fast. I clocked him at 23km/hr and then noticed he only had 3 legs! Tripod-dog had speed and stamina: he followed me all the way to the park. He camped with me that night and stood guard over the bike. When I unzipped my tent in the morning there he was, workin’ the big puppydog eyes. He proceeded to do that dog-thing where they look at you and then tilt their head to one side and I flew the white flag. I scratched him behind the ears and accepted him as my sidekick. I named him Osito (“little mangy one”).

Fleafarm and I toured the park. We chased foxes (the size of cats) and ran from rabbits (the size of big dogs) and saw the valley of the moon. So-named because it looks exactly like the surface of the moon . :-0 Wicked. Comparing the park to Zion, Bryce Canyon or Arches is fair. But substitute mule-deer for llamas and i´d say it has a higher concentration of arches, pillars, escarpments…

When it came time to leave I knew it was decision time. I had a goal of 80km, and barely enough daylight to do it in. I packed up and made myself an enormous sandwich. I ate half, and threw the rest to Osito. I knew he couldnt run and eat the sandwich at the same time. I started biking like mad and didn’t look back. I`ll never know if it was ´”hurt and betrayal” or “mmmmmmh, sandwich… what a sucker.” in his big brown eyes as I rode away. But like everyone whom i`ve run with for a time on this adventure: I’m very grateful to have shared the trail with Osito.

http://www.perpetualharvest.biz/ValleDeLaLuna/

Gracias amigos. Don’t eat and run. Always be kind to strangers. Don’t hesitate to call me if you’re hauling a cow and your truck breaks. And see you next time I encounter a town with a computer!
–Lucas

Soy Extranjero. #4

Firstly, a couple snaps. Yes sending pictures from the road WILL make it that much more boring when you come over to my house and I pull the ol’ ” lemmi show ya the pictures from my trip “… ,) (Not a good luke pic, but good looking crew eh!? We´re just like The Real World, but way more staged and annoying.)
http://www.perpetualharvest.biz/BsAs/

———————————————–
So, buenos aires pretty much sucks. Its terrible. It’s just awful. All disgustingly beautiful and dirty-cheap everything… You know i´m playing… I could charade, but the fact that i spent 3 weeks here gives me away… I think it’s is a perfect storm of converging forces: A port city at the cusp of colonial power and new world culture and resources. They’ve enjoyed a steady stream of fresh blood from europe, which fostered a good economy and kept them from kissing their cousins too much (columbia: i’m looking in your direction)… The local art, music and dance scene is unreal. The architecture is beautiful and the people are too. They don´t over or under-dress: its quite tasteful. Everything is so modern and organized the government has to pay guys to jackhammer-out random sections of boulevard so confused tourists are assured they havn’t left south america.

Yes the food is a touch heavy on the carne but its all quite delicious. The open-air markets here are the best. Drivers are very liberal with horn use, but it doesn’t always mean “I am about to pull out a gun” like it does back home. Buses are equipped with noisemakers singing various tunes of “get the hell out of my way”. I’ve actually seen bicyclists riding with whistles in their mouth, chirping at pedestrians… But the agro-ness seems to disappear completely outside of mechanized transit. The populous is friendly and nice and not tourist-predatory. The best part is they are helpful and give accurate directions when you ask (ahem, ecuador: i’m looking in your direction with a very stinky eyeball).

But on the downside, my environmentalist perspective draws alot of head-scratches. They (like anywhere outside the bay area) are thoroughly bewildered by my unwillingness to accept plastic bags with my purchases. The air here requires a steak knife during the day. Trash blows like tumbleweeds and gets caught in my bike spokes. There are no bike lanes and sidewalks are too narrow. It’s forever raining ignorant bastards in automobiles. Ignorant bastards in automobiles try to kill me when i’m biking. Lavalle street smells like cabbage and I can’t figure out why and it’s driving me crazy.

So, thats about it. I’m coming back here someday. Buenos aires hasn´t seen the last of the lucas (muuaaahahahahaha). I know where you live and I know where you hide the cheap everything and I know where i can get a pizza at 7am: so you’ll never get rid of me now. Except if you mean like now like, right now… as in, this very moment now… as I have smelled the Tinto and i’m heading to wine country. Not sure when i’m email next but I promise i’ll be very very drunk when i write it. Salud!

–Lucas

Soy Extranjero. #3

Amigo, no. seriously. Sorry. I don´t speak english. Not at all. Soy Aleman… Duechlander yah… Lo siento… Lo siento…

Being identified on the street as a potential english speaker in buenos aires puts you at risk for a different and unexpected pest: a spanish speaker who wants to practice their english . Not sure why i’m selfish. But they spoil my groove, dammit. While MY pursuit of proficiency has me out linguistically molesting every waiter, cabdriver, and barkeep without an escape option… I’m somehow annoyed when a local breaks spanish to polish his or her skills.

But that’s due karma.

So I´m doing what I can to be less selfish and give back and be a good example and defy stereotypes and break down walls and barriers… Which is really what this trip is about: meld the funk. Like living in a big house in a strange city with a bunch of freakshows with communal meals and forks and spoons being passed… Its ethnocentricity in free-fall. It’s beautiful and I’m hooked SO, I don’t have any stories of Mendoza wine country for you yet… and I won’t for at least another week, as I’m staying in buenos aires for yet-another, additional week… I promise i’ll get on with the dirty business of seeing the rest of this continent and maybe telling you about it soon.

So there you have it… I`ll send another email next week talking about buenos aires (feel like i haven´t done that!) and perhaps some pictures soon. :)

Soy Extranjero. #2

Blessed be the gods of intestinal biology. I patron the most-toothless of street vendors. I drink tapwater by the litre. Your microorganisms are no match for me. You will never ding my uber-guts. Mortals: bow before my gizzard…

Seriously though, I have a gift. Not that im really pushing the envelope on this one, but my biology’s resilience is off the hook. My hopes not my fears guide my culinary choices. In all my travels i´ve never had incident. Its a blessing. I’m donating my stomach lining to NASA when I die. (a day which will hopefully come without some horrid “9-foot tapeworm” headline)

In other news, i´ve relocated across town to a homestay in San Telmo. My housemates are 3 students: 2 columbians, and a mexican. The house has a wicked terrace up top with a view and bar-b-que. Actually, i’m hosting a parilla (bar-b-que) tomorrow, Sunday: if any of you want to come. 272 Carlos Calva, Buenos Aires, 6pm. Please RSVP. See you there! If any of you want to brave the telephone, it´s 4362-3682: “Con Lucas, por favor” then they´ll either put me on or listen for something involving “no aqui” or “el gringo piojoso”… either way thats your queue to say “gracias” and try again later.

Accompanying the move across town is my decision to stay in buenos aires an additional week. I’m having way too much fun to leave now and deemed it worthwhile to stay and get my language skills dialed before I hit the road. The class i did this week was great and I’ve been studying around the clock. I did of course manage to sneak some late-night adventures: including a great night at a tango club.

So my plan now is to push on to Mendoza a week from today or tomorrow. I’ll send a ´numero tres´ before i leave. :)

Now i´ll take a moment to answer a few of of your most Frequently Asked Questions.
You said some fluff about difficult keyboards and gringo-sniffing guard dogs at internet cafes. Were you trying to say I should not write you?
Oh good heavens no. Definitely email Luke. Luke misses you and thinks of you often. Luke is thinking of you right now and wondering “why hasn´t that rotten [your name here] written me?¨. Just making excuses (besides laziness) if my communications are briefer and less frequent than normal.

Do the toilets really swirl backwards or is that a fabrication of the Australian tourism board? I wrote Mythbusters, but they don’t do anything that doesn’t involve explosions or fire.
Totally false. Regardless of what you´ve heard the toilets here do not flush backwards. They dance the tango then go straight down. Good question though!

HAPPY EARTH DAY TODOS DEL MUNDO!!! One planet, many ways to flush.
–Lucas

Soy Extranjero. #1

(Let me preface this by saying these spanish keyboards are sufficiently goofy. I keep reaching for my trusty (yet overused) semicolon and getting the “ñ”. OR, i´ll try an apostrophe and get a blob of ascii-funk. Coupled with the breath down my neck from the line queueing behind me at the internet cafe or hostel… and wait a minute: did I quit my job for a reason? was it so I could get more quality time behind a computer? not so much. SO, if i have sufficiently tempered your expectations of my emails from the road: I shall continue. I promise that i am filling my journal with amazing cultural analysis and razor-sharp whit: which I will type and post on the internet sometime late 2012 (if my tract record for such things holds true.) )

I arrived sans bicycle and checked-bag. I saw it as an opportunity to forgo the expensive cab or airport shuttle and take the culturally-enlightening public bus. It was packed to the gills with hip portenos (buenos airianites) and blue-collar argentinians. The burbs around the airport are quite beautiful. It´s green and landscaped and looks like the bastard-step-child of Rio and Topeka, Kansas. As we rumbled onto the highway a cloud of black smoke filled the cab and the bus broke down. Nobody seemed too surprised. I seized the chance to chit-chat and get the local flavor. Without fail: they hear my tentative spanish, chat politely for a moment, then launch into an 80mph rant about something I can´t understand until smoke is coming out of my ears trying to decipher. I had fun anyway. Everyone I meet is warm and unbelievably upstanding. 2 hrs later i was checked into my hostel and macking lunch at a neighborhood panderia.

That evening I had diner with 2 pairs of english-capable cycle tourers from the hostel. The australians were on their last night of a full YEAR tour, and spanish & quebecian duo had been on the road for about 4 months and was in town regrouping for another ride north (on a similar route to what i want to do). Needless to say, they were a wealth of information and I immensely enjoyed our conversation. From an outdoor patio we watched a beautiful autumn evening unfold as we shared cervesas and tapas.

The next morning i headed down for breakfast and saw a bouquet of shoestring travelers massed in the lobby. Road-hardened canadians, irish soccer hooligans, newbies with phonecards calling home and young argentinians looking disgusted and asking themselves “why do we put up with these gringos just to save a buck on the hotel?”

My bike & bag arrived that afternoon and the burly delivery guy had to fight off my affectionate advances with a stick. Everything appears cool, though I haven´t bothered to assemble it yet. There´s actually a decent-looking bike shop on the block if I encounter problems.

I spent the rest of my second day hanging out with the spanish guy and his french-canadian girlfriend under our “spanish only” policy which we do surprisingly well at despite how incredibly-painful my lack-of-skills make it at times. Today I hit San Telmo and checked out all the amazing and well-priced art I wanted but couldn´t buy. Como se dice “I know they´re great and it´s an awesome price. But, I cut the handle off my toothbrush to save weight for this adventure: your marble statues are going to be a hard sell”.

Spanish class starts tomorrow!!! I´m thinking I´m in love with buenos aires and will stay here a full week before I head up to the wine country and begin my bike tour. All-in-all the trip so far has exceeded my already-high-expectations, but I recognize my itinerary is cake-before-steak and my real challenges are coming later in the andes.

much love, be well all, si se puede, ciao, xoxo,
–Lucas*

(*yes, I definately go by Lucas down here (easier for locals to remember) and if anyone asks: “Soy de Canada”. Soy de Canada: a phrase all english-speaking travelors should know. Pre-empts alot of hassles! ;) )

regarding that machine you’ve got there…

Global warming could put both airports, Giants stadium underwater

But look at the bright side: Barry won’t have to take steroids to hit it into the cove. ;)

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/02/01/BAGB8NSRSF1.DTL

Smile! Her dad’s payin’ for the whole thing.

At  Bryce and Rebecca’s wedding.

She’s a lumber-jack baby….

“Uncle Luke, if you’re not nice i’m gonna take this piece of wood and…”

Three incidents of American kids hanging themself after watching Saddam.

Stupidity begets…

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=2773792&page=1&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=2770465&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312