Adventure in Argentina

This past weekend I took a four day trip to Salta, a town in northwest Argentina. Salta is located in a beautiful valley with the Andes to the west and more mountains to the east. My first night I rented a car so that I could drive to a UNESCO World Heritage site, the oldest town in Argentina, and a few National Parks. I noticed that the breaks on the car were squeaky but I didn't think anything of it. On Friday, my first full day in the Andes I drove to Las Salinas Grandes on a 4-wheel drive road that was absolutely beautiful. I saw the sunrise between two mountains and then traveled through the brightly colored mountains into the desert. I passed by a few small towns located along the road that were tucked into the side of the mountains and then arrived at Salinas Grandes (the salt lakes). When I first saw them I was looking out my side window at them (and stupidly not looking ahead of the car) and I ran into a big chunk of soft sand. So of course the car got stuck in the sand and I had to get out and I started trying to dig the car out. I was calculating the amount of time that my water would last me and how long it would take for someone to find me when luckily a man drove by and got the car out for me. I continued on to a bridge that looked over Salinas Grandes and got out and tasted the salt. From there I drove over more mountains and along a beautiful canyon that led to the town of Pumarca. Pumarca is one of the towns in the UNESCO World Heritage site. It is located in "The Seven Color Hill" which is a mountain that is green, yellow, purple, pink, orange, red, and brown. After passing through Pumarca I went to through Quebrada de Hunahuaca, which is the valley with beautiful colored rock formations along the sides of it to the town of Hunahuaca. Hunahuaca is a town that has many native crafts and is great for shopping and experiencing local culture. The next day (Saturday) I drove through the jungle and then into the mountains on a windy road that was thousands of feet high to get to the National Park Los Cardones. Which is a National Park created to protect the Cardones cactus. After driving through the National Park (which had a beautiful view of the Andes Mountains) I went to the oldest town in Argentina, Cachi. I left Cachi and planned on continuing my journey and going to Cafayate. However, on my way down the mountain my breaks went out. I had noticed that they sounded like metal on metal all day but I figured I couldn't do anything about it out in the middle of nowhere. When my breaks went out I put the car into first gear and grabbed the emergency break. My car skidded to the side and one wheel went over the edge on the mountain. I was really really shaken up at this point and had to drive the car down the mountain in first gear. (It was a beautiful drive though). When I got to the bottom of the mountain my tire exploded. I wasn't strong enough to change it so finally a German man drove by and changed it for me. While he was changing it he looked at my breaks and told me that I didn't have any breaks left and that the tires on my car were so old that you could see the inner layer of the tire. At this point I was just plain mad. I couldn't go to Cafayate as I had planned and the company had sold me a car that had no breaks and bad tires knowing I was going into the mountains. I drove back to Salta and reported the company to the tourist police. The police accompanied me to the car company and I used all of my angry Spanish words that I knew on them. They apologized and refunded me all of my money. The next day I hired a guide to take me to Cafayate and we drove through a beautiful canyon and then went to a few vineyards and tasted some Torrontes wine (which is the famous wine of the region). It was a very relaxing day and quite nice after the adventurous days I had experienced before. Overall the weekend was absolutely amazing. I am very happy that I rented a car because I was able to stop whenever I wanted to explore and take pictures. It was really a very nice individual experience.

The sights in Italy

Anastasia arrived in Milan midday and thought she had lots of time to make it by rail to the small town of Dorf Tirol, Italy. If only she’d known of the railway system there, she’d have thought again! Anastasia made it to Merano, the city below Dorf Tirol, at around 11:00pm, when there were no more buses. (Yes, “below,” since there may be mountains in places away from Richardson!) Luckily, she ran into some friendly teenagers who offered to find her a cab, and not having found one gave her a lift in one’s car. Kaitlin had been worried out of her mind waiting for Anastasia to arrive that day. Bryan's arrival the day before was much less eventful, arriving in Milan early in the morning and managing to find his way to the castle after 10 hours of train rides and buses.

The castle “Schloss Brunnenberg” looks absolutely gorgeous, in all truthfulness: it’s situated in a valley on the side of a lushly planted hill, a vineyard covering the steep hills with vividly green, neat rows of grape bushes. The rooms in the students’ habitation, “The Croft,” are wooden with wooden stairs and wooden beds, ours being the smallest since we arrived late. The rooms are high up against the fold of the roof, with a slanted ceiling and box mattress bed. Gina, the donkey brays loudly in the mornings, and we go down to the kitchen for our breakfast supply of fresh bread, rich yogurt, eggs, and sweet juice. Gina wakes everyone up and can easily be heard echoing across the valley, so this weekend she's getting a companion which will hopefully keep her quiet and allow people to sleep more in the mornings. For those interested in accommodations, there is wireless Internet up across the courtyard, through the squeaky wood and metal door, and up the slippery, stone, spiral staircase in Ezra Pound’s personal library, a catwalk suspended above the museum room downstairs, which is open to the public.

Sizzo (Mary de Rachewiltz's son) and his wife, Brigitte, maintain the farm with their sons running the vineyard, and Brigitte cooks lunch for everyone at the castle each day during the week. These meals are lavish and filling, easily the highlight of each weekday. Everyone always is curious about what delights will be served to us, and what dessert will follow. The students have their own kitchen for cooking breakfast and dinner, though it is rarely used for large meals since everyone is always full from lunch. Laundry is provided as long as you can hang your own clothes on the clothes line.

Last weekend, Anastasia traveled with three other students to Venice, the city of bridges, canals, gondolas, and Carnival masks. For those with a weakness for souvenirs, there will be no end of lavishly artistic masks, beautiful and historically renowned colorful Venetian glass jewelry, and very expensive leather-bound blank books. For those more interested in the historical arts, Anastasia highly recommends the Piazzo di San Marco, which featured the most beautiful thing she saw in all of Venice – a view of the outside of the Basilica. Wading barefoot across a flooded ancient plaza towards a richly gilded church, which was decorated with mosaic and statues like an intricate lace napkin, was striking. For the more modern at heart, there may be the famous Biennale, an international festival of art inside a park reserved especially for that purpose, the Gardini Biennale.

Bryan, having been to Italy before, elected to spend his time studying the local region of Tyrol instead of seeing the same sights again in the famous museums. He has found no shortage of information. He and Anastasia also took a walk up one of the mountain trails, which for someone in shape takes about 4 hours. Being completely out of shape neither of us made it more than half way up, where we stopped to have lunch before heading back down, but there was still a gorgeous view of both Dorf Tirol and Meran along the way.

The class is interesting, though there is a lot of reading. We are in class for two hours each day, and one can spend anywhere from 4 to 6 hours reading for the next, depending on how fast you can read. Each day we have a group discussion over the reading to refresh the content in our memories and ensure that everyone is on the same page before a daily quiz.

Lovin' China #2

The program took us on a day-trip of Suzhou, only 2 hours away from

Shanghai by bus. We tasted a bit of history with a boat tour of the

Grand Canal, and saw the xiaoqiaoliushui (quaint houses and scenic

views) depicted by famous paintings and newspaper articles we’ve read

in Chinese class. We strolled through the Suzhou Museum, a design of

I.M. Pei, and from there walked to the Humble Administrator’s Garden.

What I loved more than anything else was the visit to a silk factory

(it’s a little nerdy, I know, but you’re talking to the person who went

to Japan to see the Toyota plant and was awed by the efficiency of

conveyor sushi restaurants). The factory conducted a tour showing us

first the silk worms on their mulberry leaves, then their silk cocoons,

followed by the boiling process and finally the method by which

machines, with the aid of workers, plaited 8 silk stands to make silk

thread. Reflecting on the trip later, I was amazed that we are still

able to drift on a canal that has been functional for over a millennium

and witness the silk production, a process that has been continuously

refined since the BC’s.

Lovin' China #1

East China Normal University is absolutely gorgeous! There are two small creeks, inundated with lotus flowers in full blossom, that across campus with trees and benches lining both banks. Students often climb the low bush trees to pick waxberries that are just beginning to ripen.

There’s something about the university that is identifiably Chinese, that is, aside from the 20 feet statue of Chairman Mao keeping watch at the center of campus. It could be the stone bridges and stone tables, or the badminton players and the elderly practicing Taichi. The back gate comes alive at night. Both sides of the street is filled up with food vendors selling fried noodles, Chinese style BBQ and crawfish along with xiaotans (excuse the Chinglish) of sunglasses, hats and clothes. On weekends, the park that is close by also fills up with children flying kites, Chinese opera singers accompanied by erhu players and students attending all sorts of dance classes. Amidst the business and international atmosphere that stereotypes Shanghai, there is in fact, still many aspects of traditional culture that can be found.

'Ciao for Now!'

Spring 2009

March 13 2009

Before I came to Perugia, Italy, I had found the blog of an American student who wrote about getting ready to come here. He stopped writing after he left. I tried to keep a blog as well, but have last updated it a few days after arriving.

I now understand what happened to him. He was sucked in by the city. Everyday after classes, Perugia offers the chance to meet and hang out with hundreds of students from all around the world. I study at the University for Foreigners, known for its Italian language courses, but here there’s also the Università Degli Studi, where Italian and foreign students study together, as well as the Umbria Institute, an American University. These three, along with a few private language schools, make the experience truly unique. I know this is true: I have talked to students who have spent a month here and gone to Florence and Rome, but many miss this small city and say elsewhere it’s not the same.

The views here are breathtaking. From my window I can see the rest of Perugia’s hillside, dotted by colorful buildings, churches, and green plazas. Walking around the city (which is quite steep for the average Dallasite) I can see Etruscan arches, built thousands of years ago around the city’s walls, leading me into the city’s historic center. Now that the weather has gotten much warmer, many students spend their afternoons chatting on the steps of the duomo, the Cathedral of San Lorenzo, watching as the people walk on the main street, Corso Vannucci.

But, enough of showing off this beautiful city. I’d like to tell you a bit about what I’ve been doing. I spend about 20 hours a week in Italian language classes – all of them conducted entirely in Italian. With my Spanish and the little Italian I studied before arriving, I somehow managed to get into an intermediate-level class. At first I had to study in order to catch up with what I was supposed to have learned in the basic course, but after about a month I was up to par with everybody. My grammar classes are 4 hours long, including a 15 minute break between each period, where we usually go to the bar (the school’s café) and have some coffee and pastries. Delicious. Coffee here comes much smaller than your average-size Starbuck’s cup, but is cheaper and much better too. I also have some verbal practice classes where we practice talking and a listening and writing class.

After classes, I often hang out with my friends. As you can imagine, I haven’t had much trouble meeting students here. In fact, you often meet too many people and have a hard time keeping track of names, especially when students come and leave often, sometimes on a monthly basis. It also helps that I live in an apartment with none less than 9 other people. I have many Dutch and English friends, but I know people here from just about every country in the globe.

We like to organize big dinners in my apartment and then go out together. The nightlife is superb, and most students live within the center, so it takes at most 10 minutes to walk anywhere. Just about everything you need is around the corner.

Of course the food is amazing. (It’s Italy, what can you expect?) Yet one thing most students complain about is the bread, since the one produced here is usually saltless and white. Apparently many Italians stopped putting salt in their bread when one of the popes decided to tax it, and they haven’t put it back since. Dark rye bread is hard, if not impossible to come by. However, the olive oil or the balsamic vinegar makes up for it all.

The rest is amazing. I’ve made it a point of trying new cheeses and meats, and one can make a meal just out of these and some bread. The supermarkets and small shops in the center don’t tend to carry a great variety of products as they do back in the states, but what they do have is local and of great quality.

One weekend I went snowboarding in Terminillo, a mountain between Perugia and Rome, and had a great time. I also went to some hot baths about an hour away from here, and visited Rome and Florence on two separate weekends. In Rome I loved the Colloseum; in Florence the Piazzale Michelangelo, which has a great view to the rest of the city, and the magnificent Boboli gardens. Soon I am going to visit many more Italian cities, as the weather is getting warmer and warmer by the day.

I would love to write more but Italy is calling me. So, ciao for now!