When we arrived at the Mendoza bus station, Lauren and I grabbed our bags and headed to a corner to reorganize our stuff so we could carry it more easily. While we were standing there, a man came up behind us and started to grab Lauren’s daypack. I turned around immediately, preparing to punch him.
It was Taylor.
We had convinced Taylor and Shosha to join us in Mendoza for a long weekend vacation from Buenos Aires for wine tasting. The Lonely Planet had described Mendoza as the Napa Valley of Argentina, and we were excited to be enjoying California at non-California prices. (more…)
Our ride to Bariloche from Calafate was a 3-bus 29-hour fun fest that kicked off at 4am. On our first bus ride, I handed the cell phone to Beth, who put it in her pocket and slept through it falling out and onto the floor.
When we arrived at our first stop, Rio Gallegos, Beth mentioned off-handedly over our breakfast of fries and eggs, “I had this moment of panic on the bus that I’d lost the cell phone, but then I remembered that you had it.”
After months of being in temperate zones that ranged from hot to the seventh ring of hell, Beth and I were excited about the prospect of a little cold weather. We arrived in Ushuaia, bundled and layered (with almost all the clothes we owned), welcoming the views of Winter Wonderland.
As we drove into the most southern city in the world, we oo’d and ah’d as the moonlight cast an illuminating glow on the vast white valley and snow covered mountains in the distance. It looked like something out of a Stephen Spielberg movie. We woke up no less stunned by the view from our room, white peaks jutting up before the vast freezing ocean. (more…)
To start our trek to the southernmost city in the world, Ushuaia, Argentina, Lauren and I were facing two long bus rides. The first was to Rio Gallegos, estimated to be 36-40 hours. From there, we’d have to catch another 12-hour bus ride to Ushuaia. Most people break this up into at least 3 different bus rides over 3-5 days, but the season wasn’t right to visit the sites in-between, so Lauren and I decided to fill our daypacks with books and get it over with as fast as possible.
But as a goodbye present from Buenos Aires, we nearly got robbed for the second time in that city.
While Bon was with us, my six year old laptop started to show its age. The monitor started blinking out on occasion, probably because the plastic shell started falling apart months ago, leaving some vital internal cables exposed. (And it was emitting small amount of voltage through its frame, not enough to shock really you, but maybe 15 volts — enough that if it touched the inside of your arm, it hurt.)
The laptop had been a college graduation present from my parents. When I got it, it was state of the art: 3.5 lbs, slim and fast. By the time we left the US, the good old Pentium III was pretty outdated, but perfect for our trip: small, light, competent, and mostly worthless, so if it was stolen, we wouldn’t be too upset. (more…)
Bon came to visit us in Buenos Aires and to join us on our fast 5-day trek through Uruguay for his 27th birthday. By the time his week with us was up, he said to me that he had a lot of fun, but that he was exhausted and ready to go home. Looking back on it, it was a busy week. I guess we should have taken it easier on Bon… he is an old man now, afterall. (more…)
Our first day in our new hood, Tiff, Randi, Beth, and I walked around San Telmo and searched out a park where we hung out and watched the dogs play and the hundreds of cats stalk pigeons. We also found an amazing ice cream place where I discovered white chocolate ice cream (that I went back for again and again) and I tried the beer ice cream. Yes, beer. Worth a try, but not a repeat.
We finally made it over to Shosha and Taylor’s apartment that they shared with eight other people. We walked in and were shocked at how beautiful and massive it was: high ceilings and hardwood floors, a winding staircase, a huge living room, and bedrooms that were connected by an outdoor walkway. We went to the grocery store and were finally introduced to the $1 bottles of wine (they’re $6 in restaurants), along with chunks of delicious cheese for the same price. We went back to their place, and the 6 of us feasted on our deliciously cheap appetizers. (more…)
I flew into Buenos Aires at night, hoping to meet my good friend Tiffany “Anon” Gross and her friend Randi at the hostel in Palermo where they had been since that morning. Feeling pretty confident with many years of studying Spanish under my belt, I swaggered out to the taxi stand where I promptly forgot how to say 15, as in $15. I ended up paying $20 to get into the city, which I found out later was a fair price after all, despite my inability to bargain.
We raced into the city at mach speed and my confidence continued to tailspin as I tried to communicate with the driver. I could pick up a few words here and there and responded based on those words. But I was getting the feeling that all my answers were a bit non-sequiturish. (more…)
We have been having technical difficulties for the last few days. In a valiant effort to retrieve our lost quotes page, we (our host) managed to destroy our whole site. Fortunately, we`re back (mostly).
And the quotes page has been found safe and sound. (And Lauren has begun breathing again).
Check back late tomorrow and we should be fully functioning and have a new blog up.
A couple of weeks ago, NYU Law School contacted me to inform me that I was a finalist for their Root-Tilden-Kern Scholarship. Its a full-tuition scholarship for students who are dedicated to using their law degree for public interest work. They wanted to fly me to New York to interview with a panel of seven people, including a federal judge.
Last week I flew to NY to do the interview and to visit NYU Law. I was skeptical about going back to law school at my alma mater, but on my visit there, I was impressed by the faculty and students and the support they seemed to give to people interested in public service. I also visited Harvard, but was disappointed in my experience there. (more…)
When we arrived at the Mendoza bus station, Lauren and I grabbed our bags and headed to a corner to reorganize our stuff so we could carry it more easily. While we were standing there, a man came up behind us and started to grab Lauren’s daypack. I turned around immediately, preparing to punch him.
