The Weight is a Gift

I´m sitting in the airport right now, with my Vincent Van Gogh style earpatch, awaiting my flight home. It´s two weeks early and without a trip to Antarctica, but for even more than that there is a weight of sadness.

The last time I travelled for a bit, I was gone for six months, a fair bit of time. However, I never stayed and settled down, so when my time came to go home, I eagerly awaited my flight. I can say I was 100 percent excited to go home.

However that´s not the feeling I have now. I spent a long time here in Chile and I have a deep affection for the people and the place that allowed me to share the last 9 months with them. I feel sad, because I know that my Chilean mom, Pati, will not make it up to the states to see me. I can only hope that she saves enough so that Pato and the Patis can make it. The most likely thing is that I will have to go their to see them, and with the looming possibility of a real job, and only two weeks vacation, I will be seeing very little of them

I guess these are just the realities of travel, and I knew that they played a part, but I was unaware how strong my attachment and relationship would be to these people. I mean I almost cried on the bus today and that´s really saying something considering I didn´t cry for either of my grandparent´s deaths. I´m not sure what it is about my makeup, but I just don´t break down much.

So with a heavy heart, I´m heading to my gate. I´ll sit down, probably text my mom to let her know that I´m on my way, and then I´ll take off. I´m sure that my sadness will be lifted when I get home and see my mom at the airport pickup, with Cali hanging out the window. And when I get home and have a few beers with my brother and the crew, but it´s definitely the first time that I´ve really left part of my heart in some place since Hawaii when I was a kid. What´s even stranger is that I seem to be enjoying this weight of melancholy, because even though it´s a normally negative emotion it comes from a huge emotional gain. The Pati family is a group I will never ever forget, and a family that I already miss. I miss Pati cursing like a sailor, Claudio´s singing, Pati Sue and her prankster craziness, and Pati Paz and her sweet (albeit rarely shown) caring side. Even Pato, with whom I´ve spent very little time, I can only hope that I´ll here from him from time to time.

I just know I´ll be back.

Ear Muffs

Friday was not a good day, although at the start it had heaps of possibility. A perfect sized swell was on the way for my good bye weekend, we had the kick of party the next night, all my friends from Pichilemu were coming back into town and I was getting ready for Antarctica.

It just seemed to get better too, because I went down to Nacho´s place and found that he had fixed my board and not charged me for it. I have been surfing my single fin a lot lately so I was really looking forward to getting back on my thruster. I waited for the wind to die down and then I went out for a surf with brian to catch the last hours before dark.

It was really fun, and we were pretty much the only people out in the water. We spent two and a half hours swapping waves and having fun. It was even starting to get better as the sunset was approaching. The wind was continuing to lay down and the swell was starting to line up better and suddenly we found ourselves getting even better waves.

I was stoked and decided to stay out in the water longer because I´m leaving tomorrow and won´t get a chance to surf a wave like this for a long time. I then see this beautiful wave line up and I can tell that it´s just going to be an awesome wave, but I´m a little out of position so I scramble over to a spot further outside. I get there in time but I have to have a late takeoff and as I spin and go my hand slips and I dive headfirst into the water with my hands behind me. Normally I´d have my hands on my head and nothing would happen but this time my board corked up and the rail gave me a vicious blow right to the ear.

When I surfaced I was really dizzy so I immediately grabbed my board and went in. I could feel the dizziness dissappear but I was having a hard time hearing out of my ear. I figured that it wasn´t much and that I´d have it checked in the morning.

Chris and Val just had a baby girl, Emma, and were driving home from Santiago and I was invited to go over to their house and have a little surprise party for them. Everyone was sitting by the fire and hanging around when my ear started to hurt a bit, not a lot but enough to be somewhat disconcerting. I waited for Chris and Val to get back, I congratulated them and then quickly split and went to the hospital to have my ear checked out.

Ruptured ear drum

It has to be one of the worst sounding injuries, up there with punctured lung. This of course meant that I am done surfing for a while which severely depressed me. So I got back and sent a text message to my folks letting them know what happened that I was alright, but not calling them on Sunday because of the ear and the fact that I just wasn´t in the mood for talking. So what happens? Of course, they call.

Normally my parents have a great soothing effect, but this time they seemed to have forgotten it. I had been cleared for travel by the doctor but they didn´t even ask what he said and were somewhat persistent in trying to get me to skip out on Antarctica and just come home even though going to Antarctica has been something that I was really looking forward to doing. It would be really cool to see all the sea life down there, the leopard seals and the orcas and the blue whale (the biggest mammal in the world). I was already in a bad mood and since they weren´t doing anything but worsening it I was really curt and quickly got off the phone. Should I have been nicer? Yeah, probably but in that situation I think it is at least somewhat understandable.

It should have ended there, but the next day I go to the internet and rummage through my email to see that there is a message from the organizers of the Antarctica Cruise.

Its fucking cancelled.

So now I´m not able to do anything because I´m on meds, I have a ringing in my ear, my plans have fallen through and I have two weeks left to kill and plane tickets to the south of Argentina that aren´t really worth anything to me.

So you know what I´m going to do?

I´m going home. I´m going to go to the LanChile office and trade all my tickets in for the first flight home. So whoever´s around I should be home by the weekend. See you soon.

What Goes Up, Must Come Down...

I´m back in Pichilemu and I have finished the Macchu Picchu hike. It was a lot of fun to wander around an area so pristine and severe. The mountains are rise quickly from the base of the valleys so the hiking was pretty up and down. What was surprising though, was how easily my mom and I got through everything. I had been told that this is a very difficult hike, that you go from very early in the morning (which is true) to very late in the day (not true, at least for us). Apart from the first day, we got up early every morning and finished early. On the infamous second day, which is the hardest day (with an exception for my mom and I, but I´ll get to that later), we got into camp a few minutes before 1 in the afternoon, and that included a 40 minute break for tea while we were going up the mountain. It was a difficult day, as it´s uphill the whole way, but having all that time in the afternoon gives ample time for recovery, stretching or whatever is needed for the next day. On the longest day, my mom and I got in at a hair past three and that was including an impromptu inaccurate history lesson of Peru that lasted about a half an hour in a cave while it rained pretty hard.

I was right to believe that the trail wasn´t as hard as I thought it could be, due to the lack of real hikers that do it, but I hadn´t imagined that the trail would be as easy as it was. I guess some people handle the elevation and the hiking differently than others. So while some people get a sense of accomplishment from hiking the 4 days at Macchu Picchu, I did not. It was a more pleasurable experience that really, for me, didn´t warrant a sense of accomplishment. It was a great time to wander through these gorgeous mountainscapes with my mom, a chance to roam through a unique ancient civilization´s ruins and wonder. It gave me time to just be, to think and relax. The thing that gave me a sense of accomplishment, ironically, was scaling (or better said, descending) Wayna Picchu, the short little hike on the steep mountain that sits behind the city of Macchu Picchu in the photos.

I had been told how beautiful Wayna Picchu is and I was already decided in my intent to go up to the top of the mountain and look over the city of Macchu Picchu. Just like Forrest Gump, I figured since I had gotten that far, I might as well keep on going. My mom knew this, and despite being tired from four days of hiking, she figured she´d go up there with me.

It was a pretty steep ascent, but with the ropes to pull yourself up and the shortness of the ascent, it was much easier than anything we had done during the hike. It didn´t take us more than forty minutes to get to the top. However, once we get to the top part, my mom starts to get a little nervous. Not really nervous, but enough where I see that she is, in fact afraid of heights. She handles it well though, and we ascend the last twenty meters without incident. It was not until we got on top, that I fully understood the depth of my mom´s fear of heights. On solid rocks she doesn´t even stand up and forces herself to do a weird crab crawl thing across. I am amused by this, but I don´t say anything, I think it´s just a normal fear. Then she looks at me, with the complete fear of god in her eyes and politely asks ¨Breene, can we please get down from here?¨ And so I immediately, take a picture of this. I´ll have to show it but its of my mom half smiling and cringing as she´s laying on this rock and the whole of Macchu Picchu is in the background. It´s a great picture.

Still not completely understanding what my mom is going through, I promise her that we´ll start our descent down. So I walk the circle, with my mom crabwalking behind me til we get to this little down step. Up until this point I hadn´t seen my mom deal with any descent so I am now about to realize how scared my mom is. The step that she is attempting is literally an eight inch step, that is cut from a sloped rock. Something that no one has any problem with, and it takes her about two minutes just to go down one step. Then we get to this little chute that leads to the main stairway down. It´s probably only 8 steps but it takes my mom five minutes to go down this little part. The worst part is when this goofy assed english guy blurts to his wife (I would have used ¨said¨ instead of blurts but this is one of those guys that can´t contain any of his thought and has a sort of word vomit thing going on, or as my old friend Train would say, Diarrhea of the mouth, so blurt seems to capture the manner of speak this guy has) about how if somebody fell it´s probably about 1000 meters to the water. Thanks, asshole, can´t you see my mom is taking half an hour on a 8 stair staircase. I of course don´t say this but, as politely as possible, ask him to just be quiet. He still doesn´t get it and says that he´s not rushing us and follows that up with some more word vomit about the height of the mountain. Miraculously, he decides to control his diarrhea of the mouth and my mom finishes her panicked, muscle twitching 8 stair descent to the main walkway. When we get down, there is a little break from stairs and it´s just a little path to the other side where there are more stairs. Of course my mom is hanging onto the wall for dear life as we go around. When we get to the next steps I let her go first, so I can guide her down. The steps aren´t very wide, probably about a meter, but they aren´t too narrow either. They aren´t even big steps, maybe only a foot down a peice. However if you look off to the side of them, there is an easy 300 meter shear drop. My mom has managed to keep herself in a state of controlled panic slithering backwards down the steps slowly, one by one. I´m carefully guiding her down, it´s not too bad because there is this other mother/son duo doing the exact same thing. It´s maybe 70 steps so it takes us a good while to get to the bottom. But before we get there, one of the rocks sticks out maybe 8 inches (an ENORMOUS distance for my mom at this point) forcing my mom to squeeze around it. We get to the bottom and my mom takes a break while I go to figure out the best way down. It´s just around the corner but this staircase is really steep and very long. I´d say it contains a good 150 stairs (small and narrow stairs). No one is behind us so we give it a go, this time though (At this point I´m trying to figure out the best way to guide my lovely panic stricken mother), I decide to go first, in the same fashion as my mom, slithering backwards so I can guide her every foot and give her some comfort of me being right below her to help her. It seems to be working, and we are making slow progress, but progress nonetheless.

Of course, we aren´t fast and it´s the middle of the day, so within 15 steps we have twenty people behind us. I tell people as kindly as possible, that they can´t pass while my mom is on the stairs and we´ll get out of their way as soon as possible. The guy that is right behind us (you in the orange shirt and dark beard, I will forever be thankful for being so kind) tells us not to worry and he proceeds to give my mom plenty of space and even make sure that no one passes him. There are little shelfs next to the stairs, like big stairs but they are about two meters high and wide, so I´m looking to get my mom on one of them to let everyone else pass. We get to the point where it´s completely safe to get my mom over there and I simply tell her that we are going to move to the left side and slowly slide off the stairs to let some people pass us by. ¨I am NOT going left!¨ my mom says. Okay so maybe we´ll just keep going then. I look up to explain to the guy behind my mom and before I can get anything out he says ¨no worries, take your time.¨ I was so happy to not have that chronic word diarrhetic hurrying us with his estimation of the distance of our possible fall. Especially since the stairs get even narrower. Now they are only two feet wide at the most and they have slightly broke from the wall giving the stairs a sense of being floating, which I correctly guessed was a bit disconcerting for my mom. But she maintains her poise, in midst of fright, and keeps slowly going down with my help guiding her. We finally get to the bottom of these steps and though I know that a lot awaits us, I am happy that my mom has safely descended the steepest part that doesn´t have any cables to hold on to. We drink a little from our water bottles and let the 30 or so people who have built up behind us pass.

It´s a good point because my mom can sit in this crevice and kind of get back her breath (even if she can´t let the terror go). I see a good size break and tell my mom that we are going to start up again, with me leading (because we have had the best succes, read least fear in my mom´s eyes). The first part is really steep, but it has a rope, so I go down and my mom slowly, but obviously more comfortable because of the rope, scales down as well.

This second part is decidedly different, consisting of narrow switchbacks instead of the direct downward descent of the stair. It also has a bit of bush to block the view of the potential fall, but with the mud it adds enough of an element of fear that my mom still is locked into the crawl mode. At this point we have found a rhythm though, and I am completely sure that we´ll be fine. I go down first, in the style that my mom would and then tell her what to expect. This part also offers a bit of room inbetween the steep stairs so that people can pass with some frequency and the building crowd won´t pressure my mom. So even though we are still going slowly, after a couple of switchbacks my mom is starting to relax (she isn´t relaxed though, but is less tense) and we are making good way. The cables are also giving her an added boost of confidence and two thirds of the way down the hill my mom is going down the hill forward and standing up like every one else. Still nervous and hesitant, so we don´t rush anything. We finally get to the bottom and my mom starts to cry. It´s definitely a unique cry, as it´s a combination of released fear, happiness of being down the hill, a sense of accomplishment for overcoming her fear of heights and a gratitude to me for being patient and positive with her the whole way down. I just hold her for a second, letting her catch her breath. I too am relieved, but since I´m not much of a crier, I just let out a couple of huge deep breaths. I then promise to never take my mom up a place like that again, and we both laugh.

It was weird how something like that, added so much to the trip. And although I never want to put my mom through it again, it was something completely unforgettable that allowed us to bond so much more. It added an importance or an urgency to the trip that hadn´t quite been stamped into the trip until that point. That part of the trip became so much more, like it was it´s own trip, separate from my living down here in Chile, because of those horrifying, amazing and special three hours.

Macchu Picchu

Tomorrow is a big day. My mom and I start our hike to Macchu Picchu bright and early in the morning. I think my mom is a bit more nervous than I am about the whole thing. I know that it's going to be long and tiring but I don't imagine it to be that mentally difficult, something that you just kind of keep plodding. I mean I've grown up playing golf and thirtysix hole days have to be just as tiring if not more so because you are carrying a bag of metal sticks on your back. I'm not trying to take away from the trip but I just think its going to be more beautiful and intriguing than challenging. This is also easy to say because my mom has hired extra porters for us and I don't have to carry any of the cooking gear (although it should be noted that in my extra porter bag is just my sleeping bag and the rest is my mom's stuff). There is also the great chance that I get to the end of everything and am cursing myself, but it just seems like it'll be a tiring couple of days but that there is little chance that I don't make it.

The reason I say all this is because of the people that I have seen walking around town talking about how they've done on the trek. And for the most part, I would say that there doesn't seem to be that many serious hikers. It seems like the majority of the people talking about it are backpackers/travelers and I haven't been that impressed by the fitness of many of them. My mom and I sat at this table for dinner the other night and the couple next to us had just finished the trek a couple of days before and they were gracious enough to spill some of their wisdom to us. My mom was soaking it in like a sponge, because she has been a bit worried, but nothing they said seemed that shocking. It was basically: Drink water (um, really?), bring snacks on the way and eat them (profound!) and don't try to go too fast. On top of all this, the guy had more excess body fat than my mom, me and his wife/girlfriend combined. So naturally I became even more relaxed. Who knows, maybe this is hard, but it seems a lot less daunting being here.

And Here´s the Pitch

If there is one thing that Chile has in abundance it´s swell More than any other place that I have visited, Chile has the most consistently large waves I´ve ever seen. And with that one adapts to these swells. I´ve found that over the last few months there hasn´t been any times where the waves have scared me, until yesterday. You see, the waves here are big, but relatively friendly. The bigger the wave gets the mellower it seems to be. When the waves are head high out here at La Puntilla or Punta de Lobos, you can easily find some very hollow waves. However as soon as it gets over double overhead (which happens more often than not) the wave backs off and becomes a big wall of water. It´s fun to cruise on but doesn´t provide much of a scare. And with that, it is really easy to get accustomed to big waves.

Yesterday was a bit different. It has been big the last few weeks, since my parents have left and so I´ve been paddling out on my 6´10´´ lightning bolt. It has more foam so it allows me to paddle into these bigger waves. Yesterday it looked like it would be a bit of fun so a group of us (Chris, Brian the Lion (the only selfgiven nickname to stick, plus he´s bald), Brian the Painter and I decided to go for a surf.

It was pretty fun when we first got out, a little windy but once on the waves it was well groomed and they were long. I got the first wave and rode it almost all the way into shore. I paddled back out and realized that the wave I had caught was really only a little inside wave and so I had to take a hand ful of even bigger waves on the head. That really doesn´t bother me too much. I´ve gotten used to getting rolled around in the whitewash here, I just duckdive, bearhugging my board once underwater, and I know that I´ll eventually cork up.

So I finally get all the way back out and am sitting much wider in better position for the sets. It´s a weird place for me, due to the swell angle, I wasn´t used to surfing out this far wide. It was incredibly difficult to get into the waves because of all the wind and I started to realize how steep the waves were. I miss getting into a couple of waves and then I finally line up for a pretty good size set wave and I´m paddling hard down the face, but the wind won´t let me get in and suddenly I´m stuck in the lip of the wave with nowhere to go. And for the first time in a long while, as I stare down the distance to the bottom of the wave, I´m scared. I ended up being alright. I took the punishment that accompanies getting stuck in the lip (the worst might be having to paddle through the remainder of the set, because you never get stuck in the lip on the last wave of the set), and I paddled back out and even though I´ve taken far worse beatings in my life I was all jacked up on adrenaline. I actually felt really good. But a few moments later, I began to realize how shortlived the adrenaline can be and even though it was still there, pumping, I felt how quick it seems to diminish. It was fun for me to get something a little be out of my element, it´s been a while since that has happened but I think that the better feeling for me is just getting the stoke of a good surf, not necessarily of a huge wave. I´d much rather have surfed La Puntilla a few feet smaller yesterday, and gotten a few barrels and played out there than getting the feeling of survival.

The Next Step

So my parents and brother have left, gone back to the US. My brother left me with two hours of spanish lessons so I´m trying to figure out what to do. I´m beginning to reailize that my abilities have become really advanced, and aside from simple review, there really isn´t a whole lot more to learn in the grammar part of it. RIght now, even though I speak well, I just need to continue to use it. I need to keep developing my vocabulary and my comfort with using some of the complex sentence structures in speech. For this reason I think it´s goo that I´m at the end of my trip. I´ll have a seven more weeks to continue with my progress and then when I get back I´ll reevaluate what my options are. At this point I have a few general ideas for what I could do to continue improving my spanish and to give me time in South American countries while at the same time reverse the trend in my bank account.

While the opportunity is definitely there, I am not sure I would want to be an English teacher. It would definitely give me time to be in a cool place like Pichilemu. But I would like to be in an environment where I´m speaking more spanish than english.

With the burgeoning wine countries of Chile and Argentina, the opportunities to work with the wineries would provide a good opportunity to give me time in South America and BAck home. Unfortunately, the ideal job would be being a buyer and I lack the palate to do this. The more likely of this would be to be a guide at a South American winery, but that would probably mean that I would be speaking mostly english and I would be away from home for the whole year. Ironically this field is something I grew up hating due to the fact that my old man and his cronies would gather around a bottle of wine and talk about it like it´s a person.

Spanish television has become big in southern California and it would be really cool to be involved in something where I would probably be dealing with an array of accents and dialects in spanish. And because I have background working for advertising I could probably get a job starting somewhere. However, there probably would not be too much room for travel though as it would likely be something on set and pretty stationary.

Because of the size of the hispanic work force, Construction would be another good option. It would allow me to be outside and using spanish. Unfortunately I have very little experience (by that I mean zero) with construction so I would probably have a hard time getting a job.

A dream job of mine would be to work with the Dodgers in the scouting department and some sort of scouts assistant. I would get to travel around Latin America, talking baseball and checking out places like the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Cuba, Puerto Rico and Colombia (all of which have coastline, so surfing could be done). And when I come back I´d be back in LA with the dodgers. However I get the feeling that to get in the sporting world you need to have some sort of connections or to have played the sport to get in. Maybe that´s just a misconception, but I´m definitely going to at least give that a look.

A spinoff of that would be to work for ESPNDeportes and pray that I didn´t have to work in Bristol, Conneticut. There would probably be less travel though and If I ended up in Bristol I would only be able to last a year at the most.

Probably the most ideal would be to work as an international rep (probably starting as an assistant) for a surf company (like Quiksilver/Body Glove/Rip Curl/Billabong/Hurley) and that would get me tons of time in South America, around the surf and free or cheaper gear.

I guess it´s really up in the air at this point, but at least I´ll be coming home with some ideas of what could be possible. I´m sure that there are other areas in which spanish is needed so I´m just going to keep my head up and my eyes open for what´s next.

Chilean Cheerleading Championship Cheerleaders

In my life I have spent plenty of time around sports. I´ve played most of them and have been a fan of those I learned I wasn´t fit to play (i.e. basketball, football, soccer, well anything with running really). Which puts me in the position of also having watched thousands of cheerleaders, but until now it had always been about what girls were the hottest not which routines were the best. Now, I´m living with a family in Chile that has two daughters that are incredibly involved in cheerleading. It´s a strange phenomenon actually caring what is going on in the routine but I better be able to at least fake it because the girls are competing in the first national cheerleading championships of Chile, this weekend, right here in Pichilemu. And because I´ve become so close to the family, not only will I go to the Cheer Championships this weekend, but I´m going with the whole family to Concepcion (about 8 hours south in bus) in three weeks for another Cheer competition.

It´s going to be weird going to a competition where there are cheerleaders but no sports. And focusing on routines rather than, well...you know, the girls (especially since these girls are 14 and 15). But I figure that I´ve ogled enough cheerleaders that maybe now I should appreciate all the work that they do to perform. THoughts to come, Saturday should be interesting.

You Are Afraid, Go Buy a Dog

Today was a long day. I had a few drinks last night and didn't get too much sleep and since we had a travel day, it made it for a long slow drug out day. To top it all off the forty minute drive into Buenos Aires from the airport turned into a two hour traffic jammed adventure. Naturally, I got shotgun, because my spanish is the best and I get to talk to the driver and help him get to the hotel. So we were talking and this lady driving the car in front of us is not paying attention at all to anything that's going on and she just stops up all the anxious drivers.

I mention that the lady has no idea what she's doing and doesn't even know how to drive. The driver then goes into this explanation that some people are afraid to drive and instead of owning a car they should go buy a dog. This obviously baffled me, but I laughed at it and translated to the family and they laughed too. No one seemed to know what it meant either.

The funniest part of the long drive into town was when we hit a bottleneck and the guy next to us, even though he had plenty of space, wouldn't move over. This was really annoying because there was a parked car in front of us and so the the driver rolls down his window to talk to the guy and he says "why don't you move over? There is plenty of space? You are a coward! You are afraid! GO BUY A DOG!" I just laughed because the other driver's face showed all the shock he must have been thinking "this guys is yelling at me to get a dog, he must be nuts, I better just move over." So he moved right over and we ended up getting to the hotel pretty quickly after. I'm not sure if I'll ever run into that guy again, but I'll definitely be using his saying.

Natural Beauty

The first three months I spent in Pichilemu, I saw some of the best waves I have ever seen in my life. Beautiful, crystalline barrels running down a sandy point almost everyday. I was spending more daylight hours in the water than out of the water. It was great and I couldn´t help but tell people about it. I mean it was absolutely incredible.

So my parents and brother decide to head down to see this cold water perfection. They make plans while I steal up north to Peru to avoid the winter here in Pichilemu. I spent two months away from Pichilemu but when I came back the wave had been completely changed. I knew this was a possibility as the wave here is a sand point so it´s incredibly sensitive to wind, rain and swell. There happened to be all three while I was gone. A huge storm came through with Northerly winds, monster surf and so much rain that the rivermouth broke open and poured sand into the well formed point leaving it broken out of shape like a frat boy on Sunday morning.

There has been some swell pass through Pichilemu, and since my brother has been here for a couple weeks we´ve gotten some good days at Pichilemu/Punta de Lobos, but it´s been a shadow of it´s former self. But my dad doesn´t even get to see what my brother saw. Reyn at least got to see three weeks of swells start to reshape the point, until, the day before my parents left, a huge southern ocean swell came through. I had thought it would possibly be the best thing for the point as south winds and swell usually lead to a better forming of the point, however I was wrong. The size of the swell and possibly the fact that it was more westerly than normal completely undid the past three weeks grooming. My dad got here and we paddled out for a couple mediocre (by Pichilemu standards) waves. My dad was cool enough to say that he could see the potential, but there is something about actually seeing a wave of this break. It´s like seeing a bald eagle if you are an ornithologist or a lion if you are a safari trekker. It is impressive to see in the magazines, but to see it in real life, just seems to add a special bit of magic to your life. You understand that you are in the presence of greatness, which is just as important and impressive (if not more so) in the non human world as it is within it. I think it´s great that we recognize greatness and its importance in the human world. How special it is to read Catcher in the Rye/Great Gatsby/On the Road, or watch Kobe Bryant/Tiger Woods play their respective sports. But I think it gets lost how amazing greatness is outside of the human touch. And for that I´m sorry that my dad and brother don´t get to see what the wave at Pichilemu is, or what it can be.

I would dog I have to go

One of the most frequent mistakes of english speakers speaking spanish is that they mispronounce the ´rr´in words and it comes out sounding somewhat ridiculous to all the native spanish speakers. So when I started speaking spanish I made a concerted effort to roll my ´r´s and correctly pronounce them. I hadn´t really had anybody tell me that my accent was good or bad, so I just kept going.

Until last night.

One of the english teachers at the institute, Brian, had a clam bake last night (my first) and invited a few people over. We had a great time, at first by just playing a bit of scrabble and having a few beers, but then we ate the clams and everyone just ended up scrunched together in the cozy, fire heated living room. I had started to talk to a chilean girl from Santiago, who was a friend of Brian´s old roommate. We got along pretty well and it got to a point in the night where I realized that I had been talking to her for a while and that, intermittently, she would just start giggling without (so I thought) any reason. At one point she broke out in full laughter and I had to ask her what was so funny. She was very blunt, plainly stating that my accent was funny. Of course, I didn´t feel all that great because I had felt that my accent, while far from perfect, was much better than the average gringo accent. And since I am actually trying to get better I asked her what was so funny about my accent and she said that I overpronounce my ´r´s and make them sound too much like ´rr´s. I didn´t understand what this meant until she told me what impact it was having on the meaning of my spanish.

Because we were having somewhat of a debate there was a lot of counterarguing, which led to a overuse of the word ´but´ which in spanish is ´pero.´ However, with my overpronunciation it was coming out as ´perro´ which means dog. So I basically spent two hours trying to impress this girl while frequently using the word dog as the start to my interjections. Needless to say, I slept alone last night. Dog at least I learned a lesson.

I don´t think I´m engaged anymore

I´ve finally returned to Pichilemu, after a few months away it´s really nice to be back in a place that has some semblance of home. Plus my brother is with me now so it´s been a lot of fun. It is strange, however, because a lot of the people that I knew before in Pichilemu, are now gone. I guess I didn´t realize how transient my group of friends were. My teacher, Tati, left to go teach spanish in Australia and all the other gringos have left save the owners/english teachers at the institute. Also the sandbar at La Puntilla changed a bunch (although it is in the process of coming back) so I haven´t been surfing as much because it costs a bit of money to get to Punta de Lobos. But all in all its good to be here. It is strange with my brother, especially because it´s the first time that we´ve shared a room in about twenty years. I have been really surprised to see that he´s been quicker to talk here than he would be at home. I think in large part that is due to the fact that he is here to learn to talk, but it´s helped that the family has really embraced him. Pati Paz, the youngest daughter (I think) has a crush on Reynnie. She´s always giggling and playing around with him at the house. At the table sometimes she sits across from Reyn and will break out in soft giggles every now and again. I think this could be a good sign for me, considering that before Reyn showed up there was the joke (only half joking though) that I would marry Pati Paz. I think this could get me off the hook, although then it would put Reyn in the awkward position of being engaged to a fourteen year old Chilean girl. Better him than me though, sucker.

Kidnap

I just witnessed a kidnapping. There is no joke there, I myself still can´t believe what I just saw. I guess it had gotten to the point where I forgot that I am in a big city, which has it´s dangers just like anywhere else. It´s strange but I had gotten to the point where I was feeling that Chile is probably safer than most parts of the US.

It was such a surreal moment. I had walked through town and was returning to my hostal in Santiago. I was on the main street and then turned of to the sidestreets belonging to my hostal. I had only walked maybe half a block when I saw this man, riding with all fury, and a small child (who looked to be crying) on a bike being persued by (my guess) the older brothers of the kid screaming ¨Paralo, Paralo¨ (stop him). Right as they said that I saw a guy up the street try to stop the bicycling man, but he was comically fat and the kidnapper easily evaded him. I stepped out into the street to get ready for the guy, but I made the mistake of making eye contact, making him aware of my presence and he turned down another street well before he got to me. He just kept going, vanishing down the street like a hyena into the tall savannah grass.

I´ve never felt so worthless and sorry and relieved at the same time. Worthless because I know I would have stopped him if he kept going down my street. I´m a big guy here and would have easily been able to stop him without too much effort. Sorry, because I had to watch as the older brothers ran screaming for help down the street, no chance to catch the man. Their only hope was that someone down the road stopped the man. Relieved because I realized how lucky I was to never have anything similar happen to me. It would be so easy to have happen, I mean there had to be moments when I, or my brother were vulnerable for something similar.

I sincerely hope that the older brother gets the little brother back. I can´t imagine what that feeling would be like, I can only hope the joy of his return overshadows the terror of the young ones capture.

a good article that should be read about Vick.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=easterbrook/070816

I´d like to introduce you to my Ball and Chain

I´ve enjoyed studying spanish this year. It´s really been a lot of fun, and I think that is one of the reasons that I have improved so much. One of my favorite things about spanish, because of conjugations of verbs and the close links that nouns sometimes have, you get words that are spelled exactly the same way but can mean comepletely different things. I feel like puns can be taken to a whole ´nother level, or have been (to the point where they´ve been integrated into the language).

Ex 1: Me siento

It could mean ¨I feel,¨ as in me siento triste, ¨I feel sad.¨ Or you could be saying, ¨I sit.¨ I guess the difference between those two would be obvious in a conversation, but whenever I hear some use it either way I just think in my head of the opposite. So if someone would say to me, ¨I feel sad.¨ I just think of that persone sitting sadly. Or the opposite, ¨I sit over there.¨ I think of them saying I feel over there and then them going over and proceding to feel everyone and everything in the general area like an E-ed out raver.

Ex 2: Casa

It most quickly brings to mind, house/home, but with its reflexive direct object, it also means He, she, or you (formal) marries. I get to wondering if the derivation of the word casa came from being the build in which married people (casados) lived. Maybe, maybe not.

Ex 3 (and my personal favorites): Esposas

For those who have taken maybe only a little bit of spanish, you could know that it means wives. But it also means handcuffs. I know that we have the saying back home of a wife and kids being like a ball and chain, but never have we made the leap to just start calling them, the ball and chain. I don´t think anybody would ever introduce their wife (unless among good friends and having a very understanding wife) as their ¨ball and chain.¨ One thing that should be noted on this is that it only matches on the plural. So esposa, one wife, is cool but esposas, man that´s just handcuffs. Of course, all this gets me to thinking of how we could possibly adapt this to english but it just doesn´t seem to come out right. For example, to say that my boss and I brought along our balls and chain (balls and chains? ball and chains? This is hard to figure, like is it passersby or passerbies) might not give the correct image of what I intend to say. Maybe this won´t work for English.

There are so many more of these things, and for a person so obsessed with puns (yeah, I know, I got a bad sense of humor), it makes for studying and learning spanish really fun(ny).

Reasons to not like PETA

I´m really disappointed in the Michael Vick case. I mean, I know there is a racial aspect to it, but the biggest problem for me is PETA. Without PETA, Michael Vick would have a much better chance at being treated fairly. I realize that something happened, dogs were tortured, and I am completely against that. I love dogs, I have one back at home, Cali, who is a part of the family. So much so that my mom will stop talking to me and start talking to Cali when I´m on the phone (although to be fair it´s usually when she has done something insane like: bring a potted plant into the house...without the pot, eating meat off the counter, coming into the house completely dirty, etc.). So why am I against PETA? They are arrogant assholes who think they are above the law.

Thats right, I said it, they´re jerks who think that their opinion is greater than that of the courts. How else can you explain the fact that they have (almost singlehandedly) gotten Vick to be suspended by the league, his sponsors, his teams when there hasn´t even been a conviction. There wasn´t nearly this much outrage when Ray Lewis was wanted for murder of a human being (similar situation, black athlete big crime, only PETA isn´t involved). In the eyes of PETA and all their supporters, Vick is guilty, period. The public outrage is immense and we don´t even know all the facts. All we know is that this happened at Vick´s house, but how many houses does this guy have? How often is he even there? I think is way more than conceivable to think that a guy had lent one of his houses over to some friends that might have some questionable betting practices. I mean during the season he´s travelling to all parts of the country for games and that´s ignoring the fact that he has offseason training, sponsors events, media events, charitable work (I assume) and other travel that would impede him from knowing. I know that this is a stretch, but is it that big? I mean, in high school, wasn´t there always a friend that took over another friends house while the parents were away and threw a party that ended up costing the kid with the free house a few weeks of being grounded. This would just be on a bigger scale, bigger punishment.

I guess I´m not saying he´s innocent. There is a great possibility that he is guilty. But can´t we live by the old ¨innocent until proven guilty¨ ideal? I guess I just can´t shake the feeling that PETA just want´s to put Vick´s face up and say, ¨he´s a bad man.¨ I feel like they´ve forgotton that man is an animal and needs our compassion too. Like they want to publicize their views and flex their power just to satisfy their self righteous arrogance. Can´t they just wait until after a fair trial? Until we´ve Is it really too much to ask?

Down with the Alchemist

I don´t like Paolo Coehlo´s writing. There I said it. I know there are millions of people out there that completely adore him and think he´s the greatest writer ever, but I am not one of them. I can´t even count how many people have recommended me his book the Alchemist. And being one that enjoys reading I gave it a passing try. I hated it, thought it was the worst book I have ever read. I have given him another chance, and I´m glad I have, but I still am not a fan. But what this second book has done is given me insight into why I don´t like Paolo Coehlo´s writing.

I have nothing against the man, in fact I think I would probably enjoy his company. He seems to enjoy what he does (intuited from his books) and I like the message that he seems writes about. I like the idea that we, as people, should seek to find out what we want in life. We should be true to ourselves and not think of ourselves as machines meant to go in straight lines. All of that I´m cool with. I just think his writing (from the two books, and I´m mainly emphasizing The Alchemist) not that good.

What makes his writing boring/tedious/trite to me is that it doesn´t seem like he´s trying to write a story by which everyone can interpret and learn from in their own way. It´s more like he´s trying to create these templates for people to learn the exact same thing. I just think it´s funny because it´s juxtaposed on living an individual, passionate life. For me this makes the story turn hollow and mass produced, and even though I recognize his easily accessible messages it loses its meaning by that mass produced feeling.

I think the first priority in a fiction novel should be the story. This allows the message/s to lie naturally within the frame of that story, in the crevices. A good example of this, albeit a film, are the star wars films, where they are telling a captivating story with the Force as the back bone. It sits better in the film, even though it´s just as obvious, because the Author/Director has focused on creating a captivating story, unlike the Alchemist where there seems to be an overuse of vague semi-profound words but there isn´t much within the story. I realize to some extent that this minimalism of story telling is one of the things he is famous for, but I think it was overdone.

I think he has tried to emulate Jorge Luis Borges, but hasn´t quite pulled it off.

Have You Heard of Sofia Mulanovich?

It´s flat as a lake right now. Literally, because I´m in Puno which sits on Lake Titicaca (done laughing at the name, cool) and it is freaking cold. It´s really pretty too, in a rugged, there are no trees kinda way. Too be honest though, I probably wouldn´t even be here if it wasn´t for the fact that Danny and his girlfriend are showing up tomorrow. I haven´t seen him in a few months and it´s on my way back down to Chile so I thought I´d stop by.

The funniest part of this whole thing, is that I´m carrying around my surfboards and all these Aymara people looking at me like a complete idiot, followed by them coming up to me and telling me about their female world surfing champ. I´ve never seem so many people care so much about a sport so arcane and irrelevant to their lives. I mean, prior to Sofia Mulanovich, I would be surprised to see that anybody here know anything about surfing.

Well, I´m trying to write while listening to the BS report from ESPN.com, this is not very helpful. I need help with Fantasy Football, because it´s my first season in Football.

Look Out for the Black Foot

LAN finally decided to give my boards and I made the quick decision to get the hell out of Lima. It only took me a 10 hour bus ride to get there. Unfortunately, I had the man with the unstraightenable arms and so he was giving me the forearm shiver for the whole ride. Plus you have the driver who couldn´t stop honking the whole night. I think that honking is placed on the Peruvian drivers test.

Sample question:

You are driving along the highway and you need to make a lane change, but there is a car right next to you. What do you do?

A) Put your turn signal on and wait paciently until the driver is out of the way.
B) Speed up and cut the asshole off
C) Honk loudly and spin the wheel

I know the Californian answer would be (B) but here it´s (C). I´ve never seen so many lane changes with another person occupying the space in the lane. Needless to say, with this style of driving I did not get much sleep.

And once I was in Pacasmayo the fun didn´t stop. I saw that the surf was pumping so I tore into my wettie and ran out the gate. I got a taxi out to the point (I´m being very lenient with the word taxi, more like a three wheeled moped with a parasol on top) because it´s quite a hike to get out to the point and it´s all over rocks.

I had almost made it and I was watching the surf when all of a sudden the ´taxi´ hit a soft spot in the sand and capsized. Luckily for the ´taxi´ my foot broke the fall. Unfortunately for me it left me with a pretty good sized bruise along the top of my foot. It was also sore.

I did still surf though and found Pacasmayo to be a really fun wave and extraordinarily long.

But that´s not why I´m here.

About an hour south of Pacasmayo lays the little port city of Puerto Malabrigo and on the southern end of the bay is the longest wave in the world (not counting tidal bores). On top of being thigh-burningly long (okay I know it´s not a word but Dr. Seuss made up weirder words) it is as close to perfect as any wave I have ever seen. I happened to arrive on the eve of the swell and today was one of the most fun days I´ve ever had. Just long uncrowded lefts that were peeling all the way through the bay. It was one of the coolest things I´ve ever seen. I think I might try to wait it out and surf it one more time before I leave. It´s definitely worth it.

Nerdiness is Infectious

Some of you may have read my little blurb on how I dislike exclamation points. That I feel that they are the worst form of punctuation out there. Well I was talking about this with some of the people that I was hanging out with in Santiago and we got to discussing: if exclamations are the worst, what are the best?

Well I´ll tell you, elipsis and parenthesis are the coolest. Elipses are cool because they can make anything (especially text messages) sexy. What is more sexually loaded: ¨Do you want to come over?¨ or ¨Do you want to come over...¨ Its easy to see that the first one could be sent to your mother while the second one would probably be sent to someone completely different and probably in the later hours of the night.

Then there is the parenthesis, which are cool because they allow you to interject random comments (like the fact that I have a strange interest in punctuation) whenever you feel like. It´s for when the comma just doesn´t cut it and you really need to say, ¨hey, look this is really random.¨ And since I do that a lot, I like the parenthesis

In One Piece

I´m completely relieved because I actually have all of my stuff with me. I had a rough couple of days and I´m glad everything is back in my possesion. I thought I had lost my passport but it turned out (surprise, surprise) that I´m just dumb. I spent the whole morning looking for my passport and my other documents (which included the number to call to get my boards) and I had given up. I even called my mom to say that I lost my passport. I ate a bit of lunch, and decided there is no way I could have lost my passport. So I went back to the hostel and tore apart my backpack, just like I did the first time. No luck. Then I turned it upside down and shook it like a bad parent would shake a baby. At first only coins and trash fell out and then in a small heap was my passport. God was I glad to see that.

But I still didn´t have my boards and I had an early flight the next day so I had to tell LANchile that I was going to Peru and that they had to deliver my boards there. Well, I initially got some disconcerting news, they had no idea where my boards were. Which did not give me the best feeling. But at least they then had my address. When I got to Lima I checked in with the Baggage Claim people and they said that my board had appeared and was on the flight to Santiago and that they only needed to fly them up to Peru for me to get them. Then I called last night and they had no idea what I was talking about, back to being nervous. But all that was wiped out when I woke up this morning and the concierge (that sounds too nice for a person at a hostel, but I don´t know what else to call him) told me that LAN had called and the surfboards would be in. Complete relief, and now, they are here.

So now what? I got to go try to find a bus ticket up to Pacasmayo. I think I might just go tonight so I can at least get the back end of the swell that is filling in right now as we speak. I might have to pay the guys to let me leave, but oh well, everything is back with me.

No Boards, Dragon Breath and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Flight

Back in South America, my boards however, decided they rather liked Australia and they are going to stay atleast one more day. This could be disastrous as I fly to Lima very early on the 20th. So basically, if they don´t come tomorrow I´m not sure what I´m going to do. I´ll probably try to talk them into sending it up to Peru, but if they can´t do it, I will have no idea what to do. I might have to reschedule my flight if they don´t get the boards to me. Hopefully that will mean that they will reschedule for free because they are the ones that lost my boards.

This has led to some below average hygiene maintainence (not that it was good before). I figured that I dídn´t need a shower before I left, actually I wasn´t given any time. The shuttle bus came to pick me up when I was still in my boxers. I figured that I could at least brush my teeth at the airport. I was wrong. The line was such a clusterfuck that I had to stand for two hours so I wouldn´t lose my place and by the time I had checked in I had to put my ¨liquids, gels and aerosols¨in my board bag. No worries, just brush my teeth as soon as I get off the plane. I was actually thinking that I could just get some time in the layover to buy a toothbrush. Nope, my airplane takes off an hour late, giving me only 15 minutes to rush onto the plane, at which point I´ve started to break into a sweat.

So now, here I am, Mr. Sweaty Greasy Dragon Breath, getting onto the plane and what happens? For the only time in my life I get the seat next to The Hot Girl. Let me explain this for those who don´t understand. Everytime I fly I spend my last twenty minutes in the Airport Lounge scouring the area for my particular flight´s most attractive girls. On most flights there are between 3 and 6 decent to good looking girls with one standout. I pick which ones I´d most like to sit next to and when I go onto the plane it´s like a small lottery. I see all the girls and check which ones have empty seats next to them. Most of the time, about half the girls have boyfriends so I´m usually looking at 1 or 2 single good looking girls on my flight. If I´m on first I´ll watch them come in, examining the aisles looking for the seat. It´s always a bitter disappointment when they pass by. I really have not had much luck with this, in fact, until today/yesterday, I´ve never sat by a hottie let alone The Hot Girl.

So of course, I sit next to Her today, not a hot girl, but The Hot Girl. She was a sexy little colombian named Maria and here I am, greaseball hair, sweat/BO, and the worst breath ever. Every time I opened my mouth I thought someone farted. So obviously I´m a little self conscious and shy. To top this all off, I´ve got a seat that doesn´t stay still and absolutely the least legroom of any flight I´ve ever been on. So I´m now fidgeting and squirming, releasing gaseous explosions from my mouth, sweating even more from the fidgeting and here this beautiful little columbiana is not even moving. She slept the whole flight in the fetal position (imagine how small you have to be to sleep in the fetal position on a plane). I there existed the possibility that I frightened the girl.

But other than that debacle, the flight was great...oh, yeah, wait my inflight entertainment was scratched to death and I couldn´t play inflight movies or music. I kept getting these screetching noises, feeling like I´m in a Vonnegut novel. And then, on top of all this, they lose my bags. So now I don´t have my bathroom kit, or my boards, I´m still clearing out rooms when I open my mouth, my hair has never looked greasier, and if my breath isn´t killing people then my BO sure is.

I love traveling.

In a Lame Duck Period

Last week, I got to see my parents, Reynnie and Scottie for the first time in almost five months. It's basically been the longest strecth of time I've ever gone through without my family. Strangely enough, I only got a pang of homesickness when I was with the family. Even more strangely, it was the first time I've missed two places. I was missing Pichilemu and Laguna too. Not on equal terms, for sure, but it was strange to have created a separate life for myself down in Chile. The intensity by which I missed Pichilemu was nowhere near as strong as for Laguna, but still it was unexpected.

I will say I had a great time last week in Fiji with my folks, Reynnie and Scottie. We got one great day of surf, a couple decent days and a few crap days. I guess that's about how surf trips go. You can rarely get every day good, I don't even expect it, I'm always just happy when I get one or two good days in total. I was definitely most worried about Scottie coming all the way over to Fiji and getting skunked, but luckily we got an all time day on Monday that was easily good enough to show Scottie the potential of the whole reef set up there. His first wave at glassy Pools was just a screamer and when he was paddling back out I've never seen him so excited. Now this is Scottie we are talking about, and he is perpetually excited, but his face seemed to say it all. I guess his words did to, he was pretty hyperbolic but in combination with his facial expressions it had a definite sincerity.

The rest of the week wasn't as good, it got smaller after monday, but we did get a bit of a farewell swell on friday and some decent waves at Pools again. It was definitely the most I have ever surfed Pools on a trip. But even though the surf wasn't as good the rest of the week, we all still had a great time, and the tension of getting good surf was lifted with Monday, so everyone was pretty relaxed the whole trip.

Except of course the Cohens, who seemed to forget that there were only fifteen people on the island and were hassling everyone for waves. This isn't to say that they are bad people, they are actually really nice. Dennis, especially is a laugh, but being on the island they forgot to leave their SoCal aggression behind. Dennis would paddle up to the top of the point after every wave and would definitely take a wave in every set. He consistently pressured people for waves and would paddle around them to catch a few waves. He even flat out burned me on a wave that was clearly mine. The worst part of all of this is that it gets Reynnie, Scottie, Me and some of the others into picking up some of our old habits of sitting way inside and consistently jockeying for position. We didn't go full bore though, we usually would try to take the in between set waves so the older crew would get plenty of waves and we never said anything to Dennis because we were getting plenty of waves, even if they weren't sets, but I did feel badly for the others who weren't expecting to have a hard time getting waves. I guess it was just frustrating to have people on the trip who just have no idea about surf etiquette.

Oh well.

But now I'm back in Australia, prepping for my lengthy journey ahead of me. I have a plane flight to Santiago on wednesday that will take me about 18 hours, that will get me in on the 18th. Then I fly to Lima on the 20th at 6 in the morning, meaning I probably won't go to sleep at all, only to be followed by a 9-11 hour bus ride to Pacasmayo. Once there I'll be camped out for the next 7 weeks or so. I had initially talked to my friends about going to Costa Rica with them but I haven't been able to find anything cheaper than 1000 dollars, so it looks like that's a no go. Not a big deal, maybe I'll just go back to Chile a bit earlier to hang out with Reynnie. That should be fun. I guess things are still up in the air but I'm not too optimistic about going to Costa Rica.

But to be back in South America is going to be great. I'm getting to the point with my spanish that I'm really comfortable, even if I don't speak quite as well as I want to, so I'm basically looking to clean up all my mistakes before I get home. The break in Australia was really nice but I'm ready to go back to the tierra baja.

County Bondi

I'm in County Bondi, as Jimmy likes to call it. I'm in Australia, but I don't think I've hung out with anybody but people from the UK. Jimmy is Irish, his two best friends Sean and Danny are English (although their accents are completely different: Danny sounds like a surfer version of Ali G and Seanie sounds like if Prince William was a surfer, quite a contrast for people that grew up only a few miles apart.) The larger crew that they hang out with is also largely from the UK. I went to a birthday party with them last weekend and it was for a scottish guy. The people around the table were also exclusively from the UK, there might have been one aussie amidst them. I'm basically in a warm climate version of the UK, but I guess it could be worse. At least those guys know beer.

As for what I've been up to, well surfing and not speaking spanish (with exception of the other night when a german friend of Jimmy's came over and we spoke in spanish for about forty minutes). The surf has gone absolutely flat, I haven't seen a rideable wave in the last few days. That said, I got some great waves this weekend up in the National Park and at Maroubra (home of the famous Bra Boys). Just basic fun beachies. Since there hasn't been much surf here and there really isn't much to do, I just go watch the miniature waves break on the shore and stare at girls running by here. I'm actually quite enjoying myself. The girls here are ridiculously good looking and justing sitting watching them run by/tan/whatever they do has been a welcome distraction to help me get through the surfless days.

Tomorrow I'm off to see the folks, for the first time in almost five months, so that should be cool. It looks like we'll get a bit of surf in Fiji, nothing big, but atleast we'll have good weather to go with it. I think it will be cool because I've got a few gifts for the crew and it should be fun to 'get on the piss' (as they say down here) with Reynnie and Scottie.

Making My Way Downtown

I'm in Australia now. It's weird because I'm approaching people and starting to speak in spanish, only to realize that they speak english. It's happened to me at least three times already, twice to bus drivers. I'm sure that it'll be easy to switch back once I return to South America but right now it seems to be an english only trip. I have had friends say that they got tired after a while and they just wanted to speak some english, but I've found it to be just the opposite. I am wishing that I had spanish speaking friends around me at all times so that I can continue to develop my abilities. I think it's because I don't really have to think about what I'm going to say in advance. I can get my point across without having to plan anything in advance (although I do fumble up some grammar and find my self auto correcting during this process) so I don't really worry about the language barrier anymore. Also, while I don't have a perfect accent, I find that I'm clearly able to pronounce words correctly without struggling (although I slur through "padre," is there something Freudian in that?). Spanish has become such an important thing to me that I don't see myself tiring of it anytime soon.

So I'll just keep reading and writing in spanish until I get back there, but for now I'm in beautiful Australia. Although it's been a semi adventure getting here. I first had to undertake a 20 hour flight (a great omen at the start, no board bag fee, this is basically the best sign of a good trip for any surfer, like a rabbit's foot but less furry and cruel), but it was made interesting when about a half dozen or so Australian pro surfers decided to make a early departure after getting bounced in the first rounds of the WCT contest up in Arica. Among others the group included: Tom Whitaker, Adrian Buchan, Luke Stedman (those three sat next to me), Mick Lowe, Shaun Cansdell and I believe Ben Dunn (but I could be mistaken with Dunn). I basically eves dropped on the majority of their conversations (which wasn't much considering I slept 8 hours straight, without waking from the first leg to Auckland) and when we landed in Auckland I started talking to Buchan. He was a pretty mellow guy, not at all bothered by the fact that I was asking him about the contest and the waves. He said that the wave up in Arica was a good one, but that there really wasn't much around there and he would have liked to have seen other parts of Chile. I felt lucky that I had spent my time in Pichilemu and surfed Punta de Lobos, Puntilla and Infernillo instead of being up there. When we landing in Sydney all of us were staring out of the plane doing a surf check. It's easy enough to do because the plane lands right over all of the surf spots in the southern Sydney Area. The were talking about going straight from the plane to a wave called "Ours," not surprisingly it is a very localized break (although I'm not sure why check out how mean it is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFKAzlNcC3o). I was hoping they were going to name some other waves so I could get an idea of where to go, but they didn't. And when I arrived at Jimmy's place in Bondi there was too much swell and the beach was full of "straight handers" as the aussies would say.

But the real adventure of this trip was getting through immigration and customs. I know, you're going to bring up my beard and the fact that I bear resemblance to Fidel Castro. But I honestly don't believe that it had much of an effect. On passing through immigration I was pulled off to the side and informed that I now need to obtain a visa before entering Australia, just like all other americans. This definitely put me ill at ease as I had just seen the Terminal and had no desire to live the next ten days in the Sydney Airport (Theoretically, if I did have to stay in an airport for ten days I think Sydney would be my second choice afer Singapore). The lady was a little confused after found out I was here to visit an Irish guy but she just looked at me, smiled quzzically and of to the top secret immigration lair. So I sat outside the top secret immigration lair for about 30 minutes pondering ways to live off Duty Free food and no showers for the next week and a half, when the immigration agent came back out to tell me that she just granted me a visa valid for one year with stays allowed up to 90 days. I was shocked that it was that easy for that big of an error. Immensely relieved I made it to the customs area where I was further detained because I had answered yes to at least the following: Prescription medication, having been in South America within the last 6 days, being in a rural area (Easter Island). I'm sure that the beard didn't help me and made the agents more attentive, but no one is getting through customs without inspection when they have put three yes answers on the declaration form. The lady that sifted through my stuff was actually surprisingly nice and was even inquisitive as to what I'd been doing. I'm not going to say this was flirting but it was as close as it gets with a customs agent. She eventually let me go, without any problems. I thought I was free but I still had to make it to Jimmy's place in Bondi.

I still don't have my atm card, and won't for another week, so I'm reluctant to use cash and for that reason I didn't take a cab to Bondi. I have done this before so I didn't think it was a problem, I'd just take the metro in. Unfortunately, it was morning rush hour on the metro and being a unshowered traveler with a board bag and a large back pack doesn't make too many friends. I let the first few trains go by, and then the third had enough room for me to squeeze into. I got stuck next to an absolutely gorgeous girl. I was so unlucky. She gave me dagger stares for the entire trip. I think that the more attractive the girl is, the more evil their stink eye has to be, and it was obvious that this girl had hers honed down. I mean she wasn't even backing off and we were only a foot away (not exaggerating, it was a tight squeeze yesterday morning). I finally got to my junction with a handful more stink eyes (although none came close to the beautiful girl's), and made my transfer to the Bondi Junction train. I had a bit more space and was beginning to relax. I got off the train and got on a bus and finally made it too Jimmy's place in Bondi. I was tired and sweaty and finally completely understood why every single traveler I meet asks me if it is a hassle to travel with my boards.

So now I'm here, a few surf sessions under my belt (both of which were not good, I've been surfing "straight handers" for the last two days) and I'm feeling pretty good. I'm hanging out with Jimmy, who is a class guy. He's got a great apartment and I have the fortune of having his spare bedroom (huge luck as there was a french girl living here and split before I arrived and the next guy is going to move in the day after I leave). I really wasn't planning on a bed and I am very grateful to have it. We haven't really done much because I passed out on the couch early last night and Jimmy went to bed early as well (he's a plumber, early to bed early to rise sort of stuff) but there is the possibility that we'll be making a little overnight surf adventure down south this weekend. I can only hope because he might have to work. He's made it sound like a great wave so I'm going to cross my fingers and hope we go. Not real worried about it though, I mean Jimmy has done so much for me already that whatever's extra is just gravy.

Winter Break (I´m in the Southern Hemisphere, It´s opposite from home)

Today marks the end of my first half in South America. Tonight I fly to Australia to visit some friends and then hop over to Fiji and see the folks. I know, this is a difficult life, but I´ve come to grips with it. I´m just going to try to do the best I can to make it through. Survive, day by day. It´s a rough life, but somebody´s got to do it.

I´m really excited to head on to Australia. While I´m not going to get to see the WA crew (The Heussos, Jezza, Kim), which is a bummer, I am excited to see some other friends (Jimmy, Gemma) that I haven´t seen in a while. I think seeing Jimmy is the funniest because I going to Australia to visit an Irish friend that I met in South Africa. I´ll get to his place for the first part of the Aussie run, then see the folks (plus reynnie and scottie), and then hang out with Gemma. I´m not going to get to see Gemma on the first go round because she´s living the tough life in Greece and won´t be back until I´m around the second time.

I feel a little guilty about doing this. I´ve told a few people this and they are like ¨you are going to Australia and then coming back to South America? Why?¨ I guess I don´t really have any other explanation apart from the fact that I lived at home last year (well for a while at least) and I saved enough where I could do and I´m not sure when I´m going to have opportunities like this to spend three and a half weeks in Australia and Fiji (I´ve said this before, notably to go to Fiji the first time during midterms, I got the professors to begrudgingly let me take the tests at different times. One of which was particularly curmudgeonly about it. I guess for good reason, I mean I was leaving a test to go to Fiji, not a lot of sympathy expected from that. Little did I know that I´d be going back multiple times, to the point where it has become an annual family trip). But I guess you never know when this lifestyle is going to stop, when I´ll get a longterm job. Just taking advantage of what I can, while I can.

But South America will be missed. I have, however, started to read in spanish (read malaonda by Fuguet and El Aleph by Borges, El Aleph is really good and I recommend people find it in English) and went and bought some books today to keep my spanish up for the break (because I´m probably not going to be speaking it). I´m pretty psyched on my books, I had some help in the bookstore and the guy that helped me seemed so excited because he got to help someone who is relatively intelligent but has had no exposure to any of the spanish literature so he just went around showing the best books and his favorites. We probably talked through books for 20 minutes until I selected three. None are by world reknown authors (no Marquez, Allende, Neruda, Borges, etc.) but within the latin american community they are notable. One of the books won the book of the world award (that is way more impressive sounding than the Pulitzer or the Nobel prize award). If I like them I´ll write them down so people can read some good Latin American books. Anyway, I´ll miss it here, so I´m just going to kill a couple of hours before I go to the airport by thinking of all the great things of Chile.

Rapa Nui

I just got back from Easter Island last night and it was incredible. It definitely lived up to its billing as being a magical place. Not only is the island incredibly tiny (only 11 miles to the other side) but there are no other islands anywhere near. It´s just this little patch of volcanic rock dead square in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The moai are also impressive as they are what you think they are, immense rocks, a sort of more sculpturally intricate version of Stonehendge in Englad. They would be a pain in the ass to move with a forklift and a crane let alone just man power. I did notice that of all the moai on the island only one had nipples. I´m not sure what this is to mean. It could be that the other´s nipples were rubbed off in centuries of erosion (think wetsuit rash multiplied by a million). It could also be that there could only be one mother moai (it was one of the bigger more important moai, one of the fifteen in a row) and that the ancient society revered the one mother. And as honed as my anthropological instincts are, I´m really not sure what to make of the one nippled moai.

The other highlight is the people of the people of the island. I was known ¨california¨or ¨la barba¨on the island. The population is so small that not only do the locals know all the other locals (population 3500 roughly the size of my highschool) but they know all other visitors of note. I was one of the few surfers to visit the island and due to the winds, I only surfed in town and met the majority of the locals. It was the most anti hostile vibe I´ve ever been around, especially because my spanish is pretty good at this point. Everyone was coming up to me and talking to me. I met all the local groms, the local vetrinarian, half the airport crew, some restaurant owners and this girl that wore a celest blue wetsuit with a matching duck billed hat with ear covers (my dad has now been moved down to the second dorkiest looking surfer i´ve seen, which is really saying something). Everyone would say Hola as I was walking down the street to check the surf. If I was sitting on rock looking at the surf one of the locals would come and sit right next to me and talk about it. I even met one kid, Joaquin, who saw me off at the airport. It´s such a beautiful culture. I will try to go back someday.

The Exclamation Point

I think that the exclamation point is my least favorite punctuation mark. I think it is by far the most useless bit there is. I feel like there are very few good writers that use it (Johnathan Safran Foer does but he is more than unconventional). It seems like, unless you really know what you are doing, the exclamation point is meant for people who don´t know the english language well enough to use forceful words instead of punctuation (these are the same people that capitalize everything in their emails, when they do that all I hear is screaming).

Forward HO

Going for the rare double post, but I think I got sidetracked in the last one and felt like it had settled into a Pichilemu as a whole thing. I think I had set out to write about the things that I love and will miss about Pichilemu and the things I´m looking forward to in the coming weeks.

Pichilemu has been a perfect place for me to hang out at the beginning of my trip. It has combined the two best things possible. Good surf and a good spanish school. I really wasn´t planning on staying here for as long as I have but I´m glad that it´s worked out the way it has. It´s got such a good vibe down here. The school is really cool because the people that run it are friendly and do a very good job taking care of the people there. A perfect example of this was when Chris was going to an asado to watch the Cavs/Spurs (Chris is the only sports junkie in town, so I usually talk baseball with him. Being from Ohio his teams are the Browns, Cavs and the Indians. Interesting contrast to my Dodgers, Lakers, No football team. Wait LA doesn´t have a football team, what the hell?) game at a house of one of his english students. It turned out that we were going to leave relatively early, because the game didn´t show up on television. I realized that we were a ways from my house and it would have been a puzzle with no lights to see the streets, so I asked Chris if he´d give me a ride back to my place even though it was out of the way. He responded with ¨Breene, I´m from Ohio.¨ I was a bit puzzled as this was not an answer I was expecting. I was looking for something more along the lines of ýes´or ´no.´So I tried to clarify with Chris, ¨hey, Chris...uh, that´s great...but, really, I have no idea what that means. I just wanted to know if you would give me a ride home.¨ Chris just says ¨Being from Ohio means I won´t leave you hanging.¨ ¨So that´s a yes, right?¨ ¨Yeah.¨

Val´s great too, and she´s now starting to live up to her nickname of the pelota (spanish people pronounce Val as ball and it just evolved into pelota, the spanish equivalent to ball) as she is pregnant. It´s kinda funny because she is, even by Chilean measure, petite and so seeing this little belly pop up on her is funny. She and Chris have created a really cool atmosphere at the school, made it so it´s more than a school but a hang out. They have an english teacher who lives in the school (it is more of a house than a school anyways) and the entrance is right next to the living room where you are more than likely to see a handful of people just hanging out, going through old surfer´s journals, playing chess or watching a movie. It´s definitely the traveler/surfer´s hangout.

Brian is their resident english teacher/crazy man. He is the leader in nicknames (Slater, Hungry Man, B, and the Lion*), but a really good guy. He is perpetually stoked and you are likely to see his big grille out in the water at Infernillo (always less crowded, rarely as good as Puntilla though). He loves to talk about surfing feelings involved and if you are down to just hang out/play guitar/chess/shoot the shit, he´s your man.

Tati is the local spanish teacher. She handles the whole load of spanish students (seeing as there are quite a bit fewer since its mainly travelers), and does it well. Everyone enjoys their lessons with Tati, as she does a good job about making things relevant and interesting.

She´s also a really cool person and has had asados at her house a few time. Not surprisingly, like most Chilean girls she hits the disco...and hard, leaving at closing time frequently (about daybreak). This makes hanging out with her a lot of fun, although, to be honest I don´t have the energy to do the all night clubbing thing. I´m accustomed to getting up early and surfing a lot so by the end of the day I get pretty worn out, but it´s fun trying.

Tati will be leaving for a bit though. She just got her Australian working/holiday visa and will be taking off for Brisbane to study english and teach spanish. She´ll be missed here.

Then there have been the smattering of all the other travelers. There was Ike, my first hick surfer that I´ve met. Really cool guy and made the southern drawl fit with the surf crew. Craig was an older version of Tom Mcmahon (a friend from home), just as curmodgeonly, same surfing style, it was weird how much he reminded me of Tom. Magdelena, Craig´s wife, super cool girl, the yoga teacher always in a good mood. Simon, the resident budgee (a small bird) expert, he built a cage for these birds out of a shoddy old bathroom in the backyard of the school. Brad, a friend of Chris and Vals from their time in Monterey, who does one of the best australian accent imitations of anybody I know, and he has definitely got the gift of gab. The Matts, and aussie duo of destruction, one being from Margaret River, and he is just a complete psycho (but in a good way, not like the duckwoman). Jordy, the monstrous 16 year old kid that made Pichilemu his home more than anybody else. He had a ton of chilean friends and just seemed to get along with everybody. Peter, who is the king of garabatos (what chileans say for bad words), and was the center of attention in my house just because the family consistently found him shocking. Marcelo, the brazo that stayed in the house too. The family, Pati, Pati Su, Pati Paz, Pato Andres and Claudio, they were crazy just like any other family and a lot of fun being around.

I´m going to miss everyone, but I´ll be back.

Next up, Easter Island. I´m amped. Belly button of the world, here I come.



*self given nickname so it´s debatable, but it´s comedy factor is good considering he has the Slater shaved/bald head that makes him the antithesis of Lion looking

Pichilemu

I haven´t really been writing lately, I guess I fell out of the habit. It´s just that with being back by the surf I have been spending so much time either in the water or near it. I pulled 5 two a days in the last week and a half, which pretty much eats into my internet time. By the time I get to the internet café (seeing as my laptop died tragically in a freak shampoo drowning accident) I just check my email, sports section of the LA times (check in on my dodgers) and then to check my fantasy baseball team. After that, whatever I might have wanted to write, seems to slide out the window because I´m thinking of sports. Well today is a bit different, it´s my last day here in Pichilemu (at least until September) and I felt like there should be some closure to the situation.

So I guess I should just start with the most noteworthy news. I´m engaged...or so I´ve been told. My chilean host mom has just betrothed me to her thirteen year old daughter. I haven´t really been too sure how to react to this, but I´m going to take it as a good sign. I mean it´s definitely a bit weird when the older sister told this to me. Yeah that´s right the older sister. So the mom just straight out skips the older one to give me her youngest daughter (although to be fair the older one is only fourteen). I wonder what the dowry is going to be, I mean I´m not sure how much a teenaged girl goes for. I´m guessing, at minimum, a cow, three chickens and a new television. It seems like that would be fair. I´m hoping though I can maybe throw in another cow or two and get the rights to the house (a ridiculously cool fixer upper, a small European mansion with views to the ocean but in terribly run down condition). Maybe I´ve been focusing too hard on fantasy baseball, I´m just stuck in trade mode.

Pichilemu is a strange place because there are a lot of places like the house I´m living in, old beautiful houses/casinos/buildings that are just in terrible shape. The thing is that no one wants to sell their places but they also have no problem just leaving things the way they are. I mean this area that I´m staying in (a two minute walk out of the town towards the point) is overloaded with potential, but everyone seems to be perfectly content just getting enough to live comfortably. I completely understand that, but at the same time I think they should have a sense of debt to the area that they are in and feel that they owe it to keep it in the best possible shape. I mean the Hotel and Casino Ross is just completely rundown. The casino definitely has it the worst, it went from being the epicenter of town, a palace of luxury to the birdhouse. All the pidgeons just hang out all day on the roof (which, like the morros at Punta de Lobos, has turned into a spattering white and green of bird shit). The inside houses the local ruffian cats, with broken windows in all areas. I´d have to imagine that it does not smell good inside.

One of the main reasons I don´t understand this is that all the Pichileminos are so proud of the fact that they were once the hottest place to come to when the Casino was working. Now it has the typical surf town appeal, not that it´s bad, but it is a complete departure from what Pichilemu once was. Cheap run down hospedajes, little restaurants, an internet café or two, a couple empanada/french fry shops, the empanada man (who has this voice that´s a mix between Will Ferrel´s Voice Immodulation man and a Texas Auctioneer...in spanish), these are the things that are here, hardly the hip vacation spot is was 50 years ago.

I think one of the problems is that they are all worried about keeping the integrity of the town and if they sell the buildings (which would probably go to somebody out of town) then a monstrosity might pop up. That I guess would be a way worse thing to have happen. But there has to be somebody that has a bit of money AND integrity.

Surfing is Fun

´´That´s how great surfing is. We can pile up all this commercialism and bullshit and it still survives.´´ Steve Pezman

I´ve made it back to Pichilemu, and the surf has been less than spectacular so I´ve been going through the surf magazines/videos at the language school and, with the exception of Gerry Lopez, Mark Cunningham and Steve Pezman, I´m tired of all this old surf writers talking about the glory days of surfing like its in the past.

I´m not sure if these guys realize it, but their readership is probably considerably younger and has very little connection with the seventies/eighties/whatever-time-you-want-call-golden-age of surfing. I´m sick of all these washed up surf writers (especially Sam George, who couldn´t possible seem more sappy and insincere) telling me how great it used to be (even younger Brad Melekian has fallen into this spiral). Maybe they should pull their heads out of their respective asses and realize that surfing is incredible right now (and will always be).

Here´s an idea as to what exists now.

Wetsuits: Honestly, just in my time surfing (only 15 years), wetsuit technology has improved incredibly, to the point where people are now looking at all corners of the globe in search of travel. I actually have interest in going up to British Columbia, Ireland, South Island of New Zealand and the South of Chile. I´m not sure that I would have this desire without modern wetsuit technology. It allows me to come down here, to Pichilemu, and surf for hours at a time in a 3/2 wettie that is incredibly flexible and not get any rashes. It´s gotten to the point where I´ve had conversations with Danny about how we don´t really mind surfing in wetsuits or travelling to places where wetsuits are necessary because we don´t get the rashes we would with boardies (although a good warm water trip is still highly appreciated).

Travel: Easy, affordable and goes to all corners of the globe. The emergence of cheap air travel has lead to the exploration of more and more remote places. People go to the Maldives (the center of the Indian Ocean), Easter Island (the most remote island in the world), and the Galapagos fairly easily. It takes a bit of tolerance for airplane food (which hasn´t seemed to have gotten that much better) and being able to sit in small seats for a prolonged period of time (at least many airlines have personal entertainment), but this has made so many places that much more accessable.

Surf Forecasting: Leaving for a trip on short notice? Just pick where the waves are going to be the best. Surf forecasting allows for a couple of weeks of insight, something that wasn´t nearly as prevalent twenty years ago. Then you had to look at the current weather maps and guess for yourself. Now, just hit up surfline or wetsand or whatever and they´ve done all the projections for you.


I think before complaining about what surfing was, or used to mean, they should look at what they are now enjoying because of the increasing popularity of the sport/art. So what that it´s more crowded, I gaurantee that its a hell of a lot LESS localized than it was before. I can now go surf silver strand or huntington pier and many other waves that were formally localized without incident. This was not the case a while back. Would I like if there were a handful fewer people in the water at Lowers? Of course, but I know that I can go out there, even now, on a crowded day, and get the stoke that has kept me coming back for so many years.

Horses, Tango and the Duckwoman

Today was awesome and started out normal. I had plans to meet my friends at the bus station to get a ride out to an estancia, which we successfully did. The estancia was amazing, it was out on the pampas of Argentina, a couple hours outside of Buenos Aires. I had an awesome time because it was the first time that I had been riding in a while. Lynn and Caroline had ridden a lot so they helped me out. I galloped a little so that was really fun, but the thing that I'll remember is the food. They had an asado that was incredible and I can't believe how many plates of meat they brought out for us to eat. I could have sat there all day eating if I hadn't gone out to ride in the afternoon too.

We got back and I bought tickets at the bus station to go to Foz de Iguazu, then Rachel and I went to a tango show. The show was really amazing but the night will most likely be remembered for what happened after I left the tango show.

I had just dropped Rachel off in a cab, heading for Palermo, and I decided to walk my way back. I was pretty tired, feet and legs were sore from riding and I smelled pretty bad. While walking back, I just happened to run into a girl that I met in Pichilemu. I didn't know her very well but she was friendly enough to invite me to go to a reggae show with her. I initially told her no because I had/have no cash on me (I'm writing shortely after getting home) but she told me that she was going to pay for drinks, so naturally I went.

She started to talk to me and began telling me how she had a deep love affair with an artist from Pichilemu. I didn't know her or anything about this so I just said "oh." That, apparently, means "please continue and add more details." So she continued with more details. Apparently she had met this artist and they had had an affair, she thought they were in love. Well, shocker, he wasn't leaving his girl for a white chic that was moving back to the united states in less than a month. So she's there and realizes it wasn't going anywhere and decides that because the guy "wasn't being true to himself," that she should tell his girlfriend. Two things should be noted at this time: 1) she speaks horrible spanish, I mean terrible and 2) she's a complete nutter. I'm not talking about those girls that get emotional because you didn't interpret what she says (mild craziness, but something that is possible to deal with/we need to learn to deal with), I'm talking she will buy drinks for random guys and start dancing at the front of a stage for a group that has not inspired any other dancers so that she is obstructing many views (although I'm sure most didn't mind, she is attractive). This is exactly what she did tonight. The only person she got to dance with here to the reggae is this girl that quacks like a duck during all the songs. I enjoyed my free booze and the reggae show. After it finished, a bunch of the guys came over and started talking to us about music. We (I) were (was) conversing the girl that quacks like a duck (who the bandmembers and workers actually call duckwoman) stole my hat. I was pissed, because I love my dodger hat and it's also my only hat. So I waited for my time to get the hat back (which I did) and I noticed that the girl was speaking to the barpeople...and didn't look happy at all. I went over there to find that they charged her for a 100 peso bottle of wine (she called the waitress a lying bitch, so that wasn't helping her cause) when she had asked for a cheaper bottle. Neither her nor the waitress in charge of the bill spoke a common language so it's understandable that there would be a difference in price (although I would not be surprised if the waitress did this on purpose, the south americans think it's cool to overcharge americans, it's one of there past times). She gets all pissed and walks outside, I try to talk her down and I see that one of the bartenders has come outside. I tell her that I'll go talk to him to see if I can get some money back.

So I'm talking to this guy and I'm making headway when I look around and the girl has just taken off. I don't know what to do so I apologize to the barman and take off. Absolutely nothing bad happened to me, I didn't have to pay a cent, I kept my dodger hat and I enjoyed a show, but I can't help feeling bad for the girl, even if she is a complete nutter.

Hostile Hostel Life

Yesterday was a weird day, everything I love and hate about hanging out in hostals. I had a long night on Friday (I hung out with a friend from UCLA, Lynn and her friend Rachel and Lynn's twin Sarah). So I obviously woke up really late, way later than I normally do, at around 2. I hadn't any plans for the day until I got an email from Lynn saying that she, Rachel and Sarah were going to go to the Buenos Aires cemetary (way more amazing than it sounds and a lot less creepy) and after were going to hang out in the park, drink maté and listen to music. They had given me a time and a place, but neglected to tell me how to get there. I was a little nervous so I asked reception and this guy behind me quickly tells me that he's going that way right now if I want to go with him. Obviously I took the free help and went with the guy.

He was a really cool guy, Juan from Columbia, that is here in Buenos Aires to study literature (letra) at one of the many universities here. I've recently started reading in spanish (real reading, like books) and so I was asking him about the best authors to read and he gave me two names that I'm going to investigate (Borges from Argentina and Marquez from Colombia). I tell him I've read Marquez, but only in english and somehow this quickly transforms into a discussion about books in english. He ends up telling me that his favorite english author is Faulkner and I was curious how the translation would, well, translate. He quickly responds that he didn't read Faulkner in spanish but in english. I thought that was quite impressive, seeing as I have never read a Faulkner novel (although after reading {though maybe not understanding} Gravity's Rainbow by Pynchon I think everything will be easy.

After we got to the Cemetary stop on the bus, he tells me that the Library is a cool place to check out and really close. I thanked him and we parted ways, me to the cemetary, he to the library.

Hanging out with Lynn and crew was really fun, because she really learns a lot about the places she's in and tried to be best tour guide possible. And then hanging out and having maté in the park was just nice and relaxing, except for the mozzies that come out at dark. When we left we had talked about meeting up later that night but it wasn't a certainty.

It's hard for us to get in contact with lynn, her phone doesn't really work the best and the phone in the hostel is definitely not up to par. The phone here has the habit of cutting off when you least expect it. Last night, it kept cutting off early, so I tried to call Lynn four consecutive times. And after it all, I still only left a message. So that just leaves me in the hostel, hanging out with my computer and perusing the internet. They have free wifi in the hostel, which is really cool, but it only works in the lounge. This means I spent a lot of time just sitting on the couch by myself, which invites the solicitations of the hostel crazies.

Hostel crazies are a common phenomenon, everyone who has stayed in a hostal will have a really random/bad/scary/funny experience to tell. My worst/funniest/scariest experience has been a mainstay. Even after traveling all through Europe in 2005, it came when my brother and I were in Ireland in 2004. We stayed at the dodgiest hostel ever, and we were aware of it as soon as we arrived. We got into the hostel and the beds were all horribly stained, sunken (truly sunken as only a hostel goer can understand) and there weren't much in the way of sheets. There was also these 4 shady russian guys in there. We were a little nervous so we just put our bags down and took off for the night. We had dinner and a few beers but didn't stay out very long because we didn't feel comfortable with these guys next to our stuff. We got back, and while getting ready for bed, I was asked by the russians if I wanted, you know, to do any cocaine with them. A little shook up, I decided against it and went to go to the bathroom. When I walked into the stall the ground was all wet (thank god I was wearing sandals) and there was no bowl, just the head of the toilet and it was still running. I rushed back to the room and Reynnie and I had a quick pow-wow, slept (if you can call that sleeping) and left well before checkout the next morning.

Back to me on the couch, open to solicitations. I'm sitting there following fantasy baseball, checking emails, just killing time when a condom falls into my lap. This is something unusual for me so I look up inquisitively to see this coked out (or maybe now sober but had done enough coke in her time for a very small country), incredibly skinny and faked tanned lady standing right above me. Like most coke heads, she is of indeterminable age. She looks a solid 60, but probably is closer to 35. In addition, her combination of coked out look plus fake tan gives her a leathery look (which is appropriate I guess, seeing as Buenos Aires is famous for it's leather). What's classic about this whole situation is that she is wearing a very short dress and is inviting me to a party (also asking for me to pay a bit for the party). I say thanks for the condom (although it's not necessary seeing as I already have a woman repeller aka bushy beard inc. neck beard), but that I am going out with my friends later.

So she leaves me alone for a second, and I just sit there waiting for an email from Lynn telling me where to meet, no dice. Of course I knew this was going to happen. When I need something to get me out, I get stranded. While waiting Leather Coke lady has invited some other person to play pool, and the pool table is right next to the couch. Every time she walks by or takes a shot, she warns me not to look as she bends over or leans to hike up her dress. I definitely feel more uncomfortable. I notice that I'm sizing her up to see how much damage she could possibly inflict if she set her mind to it. Very small. And skinny, but you know what they say, never underestimate the strength of a coke head. Well, maybe they don't say that, but they should.

She finishes her game and decides to come and talk to me and with all the people watching I don't move to show my weakness. As with the lot of cokeheads, her ability to talk has been heavily impaired because of the cracked, pulled in cokehead lips. This makes understanding her near impossible, especially since this is all in spanish. She starts small talk/flirting. The "oh, so where are you from?" "do you hate bush?" "what part are you from?" followed by "so you have Shwarzennegger as your governor?"

She loved that Arnold was the governor of my homestate and found every opportunity to bring him back up. I find a way to get out of the conversation so she goes to another part of the lounge. I'm left in peace, but I'm starting to get really hungry and Lynn hasn't emailed me to tell me what's up. 10:30. Email from Lynn, going to a birthday party (which I was aware of, but she didn't seem to thrilled about going to the party and was thinking of just hanging out with Rachel and me). Well I've got to get out of here and get some food.

I think the queasy-ness of the previous situation drastically built my appetite and I am starting to think of going a little bigger than the average dinner. But first I have to put my computer back. On my way back this lady is in the back out the lounge talking to this group and as I'm about to pass by she yells at me to come over. She asks me what I was looking at on the internet and I tell her I'm a big sports fan and I was following my baseball team. She responds by saying to her friends "this guy is from california and Shwarzennegger is his governor." Goddam you, Arnold. Had you not been the governor I might have been able to slip into the dark recesses of this coke head's short term memory challenged brain and she'd leave me be. Her friends laugh about it/at her and that gives me enough time to start to walk away again. She yells again for me to come over and just proceeds to do bad spanish impersonations of the Terminator (which is hilarious now, but I was overwhelmingly uncomortable at the time and only managed a light guffaw). Her friends laugh at this/at her again but louder and gives me enough time to slip into my door and tuck my computer away. I grab my coat and blow by her on my way to dinner.

I get out and have a great dinner, beef with peppers, mushrooms and potatoes with a light italian red sauce and a split of wine to myself. There is some football (soccer) on the tube and I thouroughly enjoy myself.

I get back to the hostel a little after midnight (late dinner because I was waiting to see if I was going to dinner with Lynn but pretty normal time for Argentinians), and to my great relief Leather Coke lady has left. A huge burden has been lifted. I find some of my friends from the few nights before and they implore me to take a swig of wine and suddenly a guitar has popped out. There are two guys in a band, an Uruguayan and a Brazilian, and they proceed to play these really beautiful latin songs. They wear out and a chilean guy asks to borrow the guitar. Surprisingly, he also can really play and has a great voice. He's playing mostly Chilean songs and when he realizes that one of the girls is getting really into, he switches from the politically loaded folks songs of Chile to the Chilean ballads. I don't blame him, the girl was into it.

It's funny how a day at the hostel can start out simple and good and rapidly devolve into a uncomfortably comedic moment and back into a great night. I guess the unpredictability of the hostel is what gives it such a unique atmosphere. I understand why people don't want to stay at hostels, but for stories sake, you'll get no better environment than a hostel.