Crazy Colter's Cultural Crusade

Simple Man

2008-05-06T07:26:00.000-07:00

And be a simple kind of man.
Be something you love and understand.
Be a simple kind of man.
Wont you do this for me son,
If you can?
--Lynyrd Skynyrd
Last Friday was a day full of simple pleasures and it just makes you realize how much enjoyment you can get out of the smallest things. Here’s some highlights:
· Walking through the streets of Montevideo
· Sunshine on a cool fall day
· Kicking through fallen leaves on the sidewalk
· Cleaning and doing chores for someone
· Pork chops with home-made applesauce
· Peach cobbler and ice cream (I’m seeing a food trend here…)
· Fresh tortillas and breakfast burritos that a group of friends pitch in to make together
· Modeling mathematical systems on my computer (so what!?!, I’m a nerd…)
Try to go out today and find some small things that give you enjoyment or brighten your day even though they might seem insignificant if you weren’t looking for them.

Greet one another...

2008-05-06T07:23:00.000-07:00

All the brothers here send you greetings. Greet one another with a holy kiss.
1 Corinthians 16:20
I can’t believe I’ve forgotten to mention one of the most defining cultural aspect of our trip down here: the kiss-on-the-cheek greeting. We were warned about it from the beginning, but it didn’t make it any easier to go cheek to cheek and make a kissing sound with someone you had never met before. It was especially interesting the first time we went to church, to get have to greet about 15 people as soon as you entered the door in this manner. But the cool thing about it is the fact that you have to put a lot into your greeting, instead of just sticking out your hand and nodding. You have to put your whole body into the greeting. Now, don’t get me wrong, I really miss a good, firm hand shake, but this is kind of growing on me, so don’t be surprised if you get an authentic Uruguay greeting the next time I see you… :) Another thing to note: in the U.S. it’s acceptable to go into a room and go off to do your own thing. Here, it’s customary to go around and greet everyone that you know. I’m going to try to make it a goal to be more Uruguayan in the future regarding this aspect, to show interest in people and not just my own agenda.

Viaje a Brasil, parta uno

2008-05-02T07:25:00.000-07:00

Finally you get to hear about some of our recent week long trip to Brazil!
It seems the biggest mode of transportation here in South America is bus and because of this we took a bus all the way from Montevideo through the Misiones Region of Argentina (a thin little strip between Paraguay and Brazil that doesn’t look like it should belong to Argentina) and on to the Brazilian town of Foz do Iguaçu. In total it took us over 20 hours to reach our destination. We had a couple of cute little meals provided on the trip in true Uruguayan fashion: about half is ham and cheese items and the rest is covered or filled in dulce de leche, a sweetened condensed milk very common in desert type things. We had a little game room in the bottom of the bus (that’s right, it was a double decker!) so we were able to play cards and some games to keep us entertained. There was a TV/music system as well, so that we could zone out while watching a movie to help pass the time. Then, the bus had very comfortable seats but it was still long night of not much sleep.
Traveling through Argentina, we stopped at the house of an author who, I think, has his roots in Montevideo. His name was Horacio Quiroga and he had quite the interesting life filled with tragedy. He built a house in the middle of the jungle and raised his children in the home that he carved out of the forest. Most of his writings (including one that I’ve read, “The Decapitated Chicken”) are dark, yet raise moral questions of human relationships. From his property you can see the Paraná River and across into Paraguay. Quiroga became quite the jungle-man: building his own canoes, furniture, and practicing taxidermy of the animals in the area.
Then we moved on to see an old Jesuit Mission. If you’ve seen the movie “The Mission” you know a little bit about the history of these missions. The Jesuits came in an effort to convert the natives and therefore their missions became sanctuaries for the Guaraní people as they learned the ways of “civilized” culture and practiced Colonial Christianity. Even though the mission itself was crumbling, the architecture was very impressive. We also got to see Timbó trees which the natives used to make canoes and a live Yerba Mate tree. Later we went to a lunch with asado, Latin American BBQ and a geode showcase from the local mines next door.
When we finally got to our nice 4 Star Hotel, we were pretty exhausted. So most of us lounged around and relaxed for the rest of the day. Several of us watched the 1st Harry Potter movie in Portuguese, none of which I understood, but I had just finished reading the book so I had a pretty good idea what was going on. Following dinner we had the first of many late-night, epic soccer games out on the field next to the hotel.
The next day, Sunday, was the Argentina “Falls Day”. Cataratas del Iguazu (since Argentina speaks Spanish), know on some lists as a Wonder of the World, is split down the middle by the Argentine and Brazilian border, and the national park is therefore shared by the two countries. The majority of the falling water is found on the Argentina side and during the morning we walked all along the top of some average size water falls, taking pictures, sweating in the heat, and staring gape-mouthed at the gorgeous scenery. Then, some of us took a boat ride on the river that took us around the corner so that we could look up the river and the amazing Garganta del Diablo (Devil’s Throat) where most of the water drops over the basalt layer. It was so much fun to open up and actually get to act like a crazy tourist! Screaming and yelling, we were driven into some of the falls for a quick shower and then rocketed in the jet boat down a set of rapids and on another mile at full speed.
We were let off and hiked up a hill to a truck that was to take us back to the main visitor’s area for lunch. The truck had benches in the open air and we had a tour guide supposedly to point out the flora and fauna as we drove back. Well first, there was no “fauna” per se, which was expected from the noise of the truck. Second, the microphone didn’t really work and our guide had a heavy accent, so she was hard to understand. But we did get a 4x4 drive through the jungle and saw plenty of different types of trees, plants, and butterflies. The coolest of the plants were the hanging plants living in a symbiotic relationship with the trees, not being parasites but only using the trees to get high enough to get sunlight. Also, we got to see a huge Rosewood Tree, possibly one of the rarest, and therefore most expensive, woods in the world. There are so few of them left that I think they are protected.
After lunch, we got to take a train, which played “The Mission” soundtrack as it went along, up to a trail head that would take us out over the Devil’s Throat to look into the mist and witness the power of the waterfall. The “trail” itself consisted of a raised walkway that went over the water of the river above the falls. We continued seeing fish, butterflies, and even a caiman, a small alligator, along the way. When we reached the falls, I can’t begin to describe the emotions you have as you stare into this giant horseshoe of water throwing itself over the lip of the falls, splitting into a thousand tiny droplets, and descending amidst rainbows to the river below. It’s another one of those things that you can actually consider awesome without flippantly using the word. I took a lot of pictures, some of which you are seeing now, and some video to try to capture the feelings I had, but sadly it never will. I hope that I can view some of this documentation with you so that I can try to share some of my excitement.
We hiked back to the trailhead and then rode the train back to the main tourist area. Along the way back to the bus, we saw a lot of sellers of crafts and even a little music group of Guaraní children singing in traditional fashion. It was very pretty to watch and listen to. Then it was back to the hotel for some food and relaxation. We met later on in the evening for a mini communion service and sang some songs. It was really cool to reflect back on the power of God we saw in the falls and how that makes his method of saving us that much more poignant. Thus ends part one of Colter’s Brazil story…

Uruguayan Labor Day

2008-05-01T14:15:00.001-07:00

Today, May 1^st, is the Uruguayan Labor Day. And when they take a day off for Labor Day, they take the day off. All the businesses close, no busses run, and there is about half the usual traffic on the road. I don’t understand why we can’t do that: take a day off completely and relax (or get out and enjoy nature or something). But no…in the US, our capitalistic ideals cause us to have Labor Day sales in stores where we can go out shopping and “save” money. People work because they know that some people are going to be out shopping and want to buy their product. Or we know that if we work when no one else does we can get a day ahead or catch up a day, whichever our case might be at the moment. It was also very refreshing to go out on a run today and see people outside having fun enjoying the cool fall weather: kids playing soccer with their friends, couples walking hand and hand through the park, and parents spending time with their son or daughter.

The only problem that I have with that, is that “we” don’t get to have a day off! Our first of two days of finals are today. I think they went pretty well, although it continues to signal the end of our wonderful journey here in Montevideo. Things are definitely winding down and most of us are torn between staying here and going home.

Another cool thing about today is that it’s my Grandmother Wagner’s Labor Day. That’s right, it’s my mom’s Birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!!!! I love you.

Ser, o no ser... (To be, or not to be)

2008-05-01T13:50:00.000-07:00

Éso es la pregunta.

So I’ve talked about some performances that I’ve been to at the Teatro Solís but not much about the theater itself. We took a tour of the building last week and here are some cool facts that I learned about it:

· 151 years old (opened in 1856) so that Uruguay would have a permanent theater

· 1998-2004 closed for most recent refurbishing

· 1250 person capacity with floor and box seating (5^th floor box seating called “Paradise”)

· Ceiling of performance hall: painted on canvas (looks exactly like plaster sculpture!), 11 masks for 11 emotions, 11 names of writers and composers

· 3 chandeliers (big, medium, and small, in 3 different parts of the theater): made from 5k crystal in a factory in England that was bombed in WWII

· Horseshoe shape inspired from Italian Theater

· Stage/Platform directly in front of the stage that can be moved to 3 different positions: flush with the floor seating to add more seats, raised to the stage level to extend the stage, and lowered for a pit orchestra

· Backstage: 7 catwalks, 6 dressing rooms, state of the art sound and light system

Performances I’ve attended so far this semester (in the TS):

· Classical Guitarist

· Brazilian Rocker

· Argentine Ballet

o Performance of “Carmen” and several other numbers

o Big Band music with swing dance influenced dancing

o Final number was a Tango influenced ballet

o Really fun to see the influence of other styles of dance in the ballets

Oh, to actually be famous...

2008-04-19T18:42:00.000-07:00

This afternoon we went out and braved the smoke for a quick game of Frisbee golf. Ken had a few discs sent down in the mail and we thought we’d put them to good use. So, we walked to the park close by and played a “pick-up game,” where we just took turns pointing out the next tree or light pole that we would hit. To top it all off, there was a Nacional soccer game going on in the stadium located in the park where we were playing. Now, if you remember my soccer game entry and all the rabid fans, well, we could hear the deafening cheers across the park. It was so cool to step up to the “tee box” to the sound of cheers, screams, and fireworks. I knew that the crowd was loud, but not that loud. We discussed what if would be like to actually be at the center of the attention like that and perform to cheers and applause like that. We also thought that we could be running away from lions in the Roman coliseum, but it’s always a better dream to think about being victorious to the sound of a riotous crowd…

Humo

2008-04-19T11:17:00.000-07:00

No, humo isn't short for humor or humorous. There's nothing funny about it actually. Humo means smoke in Spanish and I can't seem to escape it. Smoking cigarettes is very popular here in Uruguay and you can't walk down the streets without breathing someone's second hand cloud. Now, the sky has become hazy with smoke blowing in from Argentina. We spent what seemed like a solid month breathing smoke from forest fires back in Kalispell and it felt like such a relief when I got away from it. Except, you can't escape it: my eyes are itching again and I have to take my allergy medicine to combat it. The interesting thing about the fire is that it is coming from a forest blaze started by a group of farmers as a way of protesting something I don't really understand. But the fire has grown out of control and is now supposedly the biggest that Argentina has ever had. Lot's of forest and farmland is being burned, but hopefully no property or loss of life will occur because of a silly protest.

Home, Home on the Range

2008-04-17T11:54:00.000-07:00

So this entry is a little tardy…well, really tardy. As in it slept through class, but better late than never, eh? Experiencing culture vicariously through a sporadically writing 20 year old is so fun, isn’t it?
On March 29th, about 3 weeks ago, we took a group trip to an estancia, or a working ranch, about a 2 hour drive into the interior of Uruguay. We were planning to have a lot of fun with ample free time to do whatever we wanted to get out of the city and relax in some fresh air and sunshine. We rode bikes around some dirt roads. Branson and I even found some single track through a glade of trees: Mountain Bike Uruguay! Yeah! Then we could take either row boats or canoes into the lake on the property. Cody Veteto and I took a canoe around and had fun singing “Kiss de Girl” to the other row boats, attempting to draw a comparison between their row boats and the one in Disney’s Little Mermaid. Sadly, our amazing humor seemed to be lost on the ears of our compañeros. Later we had a lunch of really good food with grilled beef and chicken and all types of salad. After lunch, a smaller group of us went out horse back riding and talked our guide into letting us run the horses. He, the guide, took us around the lake and ran us through a narrow strip of trees giving me the feeling of chasing deer or elk through the woods. What a rush! I’ve never loped on a horse for that long of stretch. It was an amazing feeling. Back at the main casa, we swam in the pool and took turns being crazy and throwing each other into the pool. Adding to the entertainment, Hansen Penya, our program director’s 6 year old son, kept wanting us to throw him into the air. Naturally, we Core-Four tried endlessly to get him to flip in the air. We never got it, but he was a good sport! :) At 4:00 we had a Merienda, a type of high tea, with more tasty food. When we were completely stuffed, we boarded the bus back to Montevideo.
Upon returning, several of us climbers went to a Rock Climbing BBQ that we had been invited to. It was a fun time socializing (in our broken Spanish) with our friends outside of a climbing context. Climbers have to be some of the funnest people I’ve ever made friends with… Although we had eaten all day long, or so it seemed, we ate a lot of food at the barbeque. This included trying some more “exotic” entres: kidney, intestine, and blood sausage. Mrs. McAlister, my 9th grade history teacher, would be so proud of me. None of us cared much for the texture of the kidney or the taste of the intestine, but both were deemed mediocre by those present who had had it before, so I will never know if it actually would be something I’d like or not.
Some future things with the rock climbing club: we have a climbing trip to Minas next weekend and I’ll try to take some pictures of the gym we’ve been going to in order to post them here.

Hey look! It's a "Watch-Frog"!!!

I'd like a Mate. Shaken, not stirred.

2008-04-12T13:47:00.000-07:00

Now, by popular demand, you get to learn about Mate...

While preparing to go down to Montevideo, one of the things that we were told to look out for culturally was a drink called mate (pronounced mah-teh, with emphasis on the first syllable). It’s a hot drink made by steeping the leaves of the yerba mate plant in hot water and drunk from a gourd. Much like coffee or strong tea, mate contains caffeine and people down here were supposed to drink it all day and all night in order to keep up with their crazy lifestyles of late night parties and early rising for work. And, honestly, we weren’t disappointed when we arrived: most everyone does indeed drink it.

Drinkers of mate themselves aren’t hard to spot either. You see then walking down the street with a thermos of hot water under one arm along with a gourd-looking thing with a metal straw sticking out from it. The calabash gourd, itself called the mate, is usually covered in leather and can be decorated any way that you’d like. The metal straw is called a bombilla and strains the leaves as you drink (seems interesting to drink something hot through a metal straw, but that’s what they do). Also something you would notice are all the leather materas, or “mate bags” that people carry slung over their shoulders to hold their thermos and gourd when not in use.

To emphasize its popularity, I’ll point out that it is the National Drink in Uruguay, Argentina, and Paraguay and also has a firm footing in southern Brazil. And people drink it everywhere and at any time. I mentioned earlier that the senators and representatives even drink it while in session at the Legislative Palace. Every gas station that you go to in Argentina has hot water available to fill up your thermos, however you should think twice about drinking and driving. In Uruguay, drinking mate while driving is illegal and drinking it while on the city busses is also prohibited mostly due to the danger of spilling hot water on yourself or others.

Originally, mate was drunk by the Gauchos of Uruguay and Argentina. These original cowboys can attest to the nutritional value of the drink. Their diet generally consisted of meat and mate! It was also something to pass the time while they sat around the fire after a hard day’s work.

There are regional differences to mate. In Uruguay, it’s pretty much only drunk hot and in the calabash gourds. People are very particular about their gourds and even have separate ones if they decide to add sweet water or tea to the yerba leaves. They say that it has to be the certain type of gourd to bring out the flavor. I can’t tell any difference, it’s all pretty bitter. The people in Argentina are less “hard-core” about the gourds and sometimes prefer to drink it in smaller plastic or metal cups. But still the drink is mostly hot. Further north in the hotter regions of Brazil and Paraguay, people drink it more like a chilled drink with iced water or tea with lemon. Most of the plants harvested are located in Paraguay, where it originated. Also, in Paraguay, many people add other herbs to their yerba leaf concoction. Overseas, Syria has become the largest importer of yerba mate and it is a popular drink there and in Lebanon. I don’t know if they drink it any differently or if it is as popular as here.

Another thing that make drinking mate so appealing to me is the sharing culture that goes along with it. Many people drink it alone, but it’s very common to see couples walking down the street with one gourd and thermos between them or to see a group of people sitting in at a restaurant or in front of a house passing a gourd between each other. One person has the thermos and “prepares” the gourd by adding the leaves and the bombilla. Then hot water is poured into a cavity created on one side of the gourd. The preparer takes the first drink to test the preparation/flavor. If it is satisfactory, he refills it with water and passes it to the next person. You have to drink all the water until you make a slurping sound with the straw and then hand it back to the preparer. He will refill it and pass it back until you thank him while you return the gourd. I think it’s pretty cool to be able to share a drink in a community like that.

I don’t think that there is any equivalent in the U.S., although espressos, lattes, and other coffee drinks come close. There is a need in both our cultures for the stimulation of caffeine and therefore it’s pretty common to see many people going to work or class with drink of choice in hand. What we don’t have in the States is the idea of sharing our drinks: “What’s mine is mine and you’re not going to have any of my $4.50 double-shot vanilla-mint espresso.”

Spring Break Part Four: Some Reflection and Final Day in Peru

2008-04-12T13:43:00.000-07:00

Our last day in Cusco was a more relaxing, lazy day due to the intensity of the day before in Machu Picchu. I had fully intended on doing an extended hike to some of the ruins outside the city, but due to a lack of interest (on both the people I was with and myself [I needed someone else to be interested because of safety concerns in those particular ruins]) and a general feeling of foot weariness I decided no to. We slept in and had the breakfast we had become accustomed to over the past week in hostels: bread with butter and jam and coca tea to drink. I was ready to get back to Montevideo and have some oatmeal. The rest of the day was taken up with more shopping and wandering of the city. We visited the Coricancha museum, which is the great Sun Temple of the Incas, and had a tour of the catholic church built on its ruins. Then a friend and I hiked up to a large statue of Jesus overlooking the city that we could see from our hostel around dusk, just to say that I had at least started the trek that I had wanted to do earlier that day. After that was a little dinner and some card games. We felt exhausted and certain that it must be midnight when we decided to go to bed. However, when I looked at my watch it was only 9:30. It’s so weird how much our perception of time can be altered.

The next day began our long flight home. We first flew from Cusco to Lima with more amazing views (see Part Two below). Then we had a 9 hour layover in the Lima airport. We all made the best of it with card games, jokes, and reading. Thank goodness all our flights were on time and everything else went smoothly because after a night flight to Santiago and a 3 hour nap in the Chilean airport, tensions were forming in our group and patience was running thin. We made it home all safe and sound, minus some items we had forgotten or misplaced along the way, but with more than enough stories and memories to make up for them.

It’s really hard to know where to begin on a reflection of this trip. As I’m typing this blog entry I’m sitting in a hotel room in Foz de Iguazu on an amazing Brazil trip that has been a lot of fun (you’ll hear more on that later, hopefully before June), but can’t even begin to hold a candle to the Peru trip. I have never downloaded so many pictures from one trip onto my computer before. It is interesting to contemplate why I have so many pictures from our Machu Picchu excursion in particular because most of them all look the same. All of us with cameras were constantly taking pictures of the city even though we were really only getting different angles of the same thing. What made us take so many pictures? I think it can be explained in a spiritual sense: how we are inevitably worldly beings and when we experience something so awe-inspiring, something with beauty that transcends anything we have ever experienced before, something that allows us to see a little bit of God, we have no idea how to respond. As a result, our group resorted to taking picture after picture in hopes of capturing the entire experience, knowing that digital pixels will never do it justice.

Alone on Putu Kusi, I reflected on another thing: the Incan city of Machu Picchu is so impressive due to the Incan architecture built high in the mountains. Man, made in the image of God, can do powerful things. And yet, even with all the blessings that God gave them, the Incan people still worshipped creation: the sun, the moon, the rain, and even the Inca (the leader of the people) himself. What a huge expression of the grace of God, loving humans even while they completely ignore him.

For some final reflection, I’ll leave you with another underdeveloped thought of mine. I learned a lot about the Spanish conquest of Peru and how the Europeans inevitably had a negative, degrading view of the indigenous peoples, often calling them savages or “uncivilized.” What is it that makes someone civilized? The Incas had a sophisticated form of government, miles of roads built high in the Andes, and social structures that allowed many people of different backgrounds to live together. The conquerors came and plundered the towns that they came across, raping women stealing food from the people. I think a lot of us need to reexamine the way we view other people, even if it be subconscious...

Spring Break Part Three: Machu Picchu

2008-04-12T13:40:00.000-07:00

Tuesday morning saw us up bright and early for our bus/train ride to Aguas Calientes, the closest little town to Machu Picchu. Aguas has grown up mostly from tourism to the Incan city and to the hot springs that give it its name, but also from a hydroelectric power plant in the vicinity. The entire trip there was filled with view after view of huge, mysterious mountains shrouded in mist. Once to the town, we dropped off our stuff at the hostel and loaded another bus up to the city itself for a guided tour of the ruins. There are few things in this world that live up the word ‘awesome’ that we throw around so much. Machu Picchu, with its massive stone buildings that have stood the test of time surrounded by the gorgeous Andes Mountains, lives up to such a word. The weather added to the effect: we had a mixture of rain, clouds, and the occasional clear view of the entire city. We learned a lot from the tour guide, about which theories regard the purposes of each structure and the different theories on the purpose of the city itself: how it could possibly be a religious center, a place to study the stars, or even an Incan University. She also informed us about some other possibilities for hiking in the area, and a few of us began to form a plan…

We boarded the bus once again, for our switch-backed road back down the mountain for a buffet lunch included in our package. We were entertained by live Peruvian music just outside the door and enjoyed a wonderful meal with each other after our soggy morning at Machu Picchu. After a little bit of a struggle at the ATM, a group of us walked down the train tracks toward a train head that I had found online and the guide mentioned earlier that day. The hikers’ trail leads up Putu Kusi, or Laughing Mountain, and would provide a spectacular view of the ruins from the summit. However, it was almost nightfall and we only wanted to have a look at the trail which is famed for its wooden ladders leading upward through the rock, one of which is supposed to have at least 161 rungs on it. We made it to the ladders and headed back down, not wanting to get lost in the dark getting back to Aguas Calientes.

While looking for some other members of the group, we ran into a girl from Nevada studying abroad in Chile this semester. She was supposed to meet up with her uncle and go on the Incan trail, but the company botched her spot and she was going to have to meet them in the city on the next day after entertaining herself for 3 days. We ended up eating pizza and playing pool with her and some other students she had run into on her trip to AC. Through our conversation, we discovered that they were planning on hiking up the ruins from the town early the next morning. Being the hard-core group that we were, we made plans to meet them in the square the next morning and accompany them up the mountain to Machu Picchu.

Rising at 4:30 am, we met our new friends in the square and hiked up to ruins in the dark. I had my headlamp and Branson had his flash light, but we ended up not needed either because of moonlight lighting our way. We beat many of the people who took the first busses up the city and were able to get into the sanctuary in time to see the sun top the peaks to the east of the city. Then we got in line to climb Huayna Picchu, or Young Peak, the highest sugar-loaf mountain situated behind the city in photographs. They only let 400 people climb the mountain everyday and you have to early in the morning if you want to have a chance. We stormed the peak, and never looked back in our conquest of the area.

The views from the top were worth every stinkin’ stone stair we had to climb to reach it. One of most incredible things was the building and terraces built on the top for a sort of watchtower to protect the city. We climbed almost entirely in a cloud and were disappointed we weren’t going to get a view of Machu Picchu. Fortunately, the clouds decided to thin and break frequently on our way back down, causing a pause in our descent and a mad scramble for our cameras. Before going back into the ruins, we climbed Huchuy Picchu, the second highest sugar-loaf peak you see in the pictures for more incredible views. The coolest thing about this peak is that there was no one else up there, we had the summit to ourselves. After that, we hiked through the city ruins and up to the ancient Incan Bridge which provided passage along a sheer cliff in order to finish a road system down the Urubambu Valley. Then it was back to the city and up to the Inti Punktu, or Sun Gate, where the Incan Trail comes into the sanctuary. By that time, our group (now nicknamed the “Core Four”) was feeling our escapades of the morning and took our time walking back to the main ruins. We were ahead of schedule and allowed ourselves some chill time just sitting and viewing the city and appreciating the awesome-ness of its structures and location. Walking among us and the other thousand tourists in the sanctuary were a heard of wild llamas complete with several young ones. It was very cool to see them walking around the terraces, trying to picture what it all might have looked like when it was flourishing. Then we literally ran back down the mountain (racing the descending busses) and refueled back in town with Snickers bars and generic brand Gatorades. We topped off our incredible day by climbing Putu Kusi and its many ladders. It rained on us the entire time but, once again, we lucked out and the clouds broke for long enough to catch yet another angle on the ruins of Machu Picchu. Finally it was back to the town for a quick bite of some delicious chicken enchiladas “to go” as we caught our train back to Cusco.

I Got Rhythm, I Got Music

2008-04-12T13:34:00.000-07:00

The Wednesday night before we left for Brazil, we went again to the Teatro Solis to watch a Brazilian rock artist Chico César. His show was very entertaining and he involved the audience a lot (I wish I could have participated more, but since he was speaking in Spanish and singing in Portuguese…I know, more and more excuses). It opened with him and his drummer accompanist playing/singing a number while he was playing a weird looking instrument and manipulating the sound with a synthesizer. As the rest of the show continued he played two different guitars, sang, and danced while the drummer had some solos. In an attempt to explain his music/style, I would have to say that he was a mix of Bobby McFerrin and John Mayer, light rock with guitar but using a lot of mouth percussion/sound effects and body movements. Overall it was very enjoyable and was a good introduction to our Brazil trip we took the next week.

Another Brick in the Wall...Teachers! Leave them kids alone!

2008-04-12T07:22:00.000-07:00

I'm really enjoying all my classes and this semester has been one filled with growth for me as a scholar and a follower of Christ. I look forward to using my experiences in the classroom and on the streets in my future. (Another cool thing about classes down here: we only met 4 days a week, giving us 3-day weekends every week! Talk about getting spoiled…)
Here’s a list of the classes I took:
· Beginning Spanish I & 2
· INTS: Latin American Studies
· Christianity in Culture
· Differential Equations (Guided study)
Beginning Spanish 1 & 2: Studying Spanish in a semi-immersed environment has been a lot of fun. It actually gives you incentive to learn in class because you’re actually going to go out and use the stuff you just learned. We have the class 4 days a week and we really have to work hard to keep up with our crazy teacher Amelia. She is a really great teacher and balances bookwork with oral practice and singing contemporary Spanish songs in class. We also have a Spanish lab where we can practice the vocabulary and grammar and pronunciation in a smaller group context. Many days in lab we learn “scripts” and then have to go out of the house and talk to random people. Very stressful for a introverted person like me, let me tell you. But the people of Montevideo are really nice and all you have to say is that you're learning spanish (Estoy aprendiendo espanol.) and they become really nice and helpful.
INTS: Latin American Studies: This is a class that studies basic structures of culture and the history of Latin America and Montevideo/Uruguay in particular. For assignments we get to go out and explore museums and monuments and statues writing about what we saw and experienced in a journal. Lynette Sharp-Penya, our on-site program director, teaches this class.
Christianity in Culture: This class, taught by Prof. Ken Cukrowski, is teaching us to examine culture while thinking theologically. We’ve discussed issues such as capital punishment, abortion, women’s rights, and homosexuality. It’s been very interesting both to hear the views of other students in my class and to develop my own thoughts and beliefs on these issues. Where culture is concerned, we’re getting a double serving by examining the culture of Uruguay and Latin America and then compare it to our culture back home, often discovering some unfavorable things that we do in our daily lives, especially with regards to our treatment of other people.
Differential Equations: DE has been quite an experience for me and Marissa, the other physics major studying abroad this semester. We had to take the class as a prerequisite to a lot of upper level physics classes that we will have to take in the future, but obviously they don’t offer anything like that down here. So, we are taking it as a guided study, basically teaching ourselves the ins and outs of modeling with differential equations, doing homework on our own, and faxing our tests and quizzes to the professor back in Abilene. It’s been a lot of work keeping up with the class at ACU, but the work will pay off in the long run.

And now next semester I get to look forward to Thermodynamics, Solid State Physics, Math Methods for Physics and Engineering, and Business and Professional Writing. Whew! I'll take back anything I ever said bad about classes in Uruguay...

Spring Break Part Two: First Events in Cusco

2008-04-12T06:59:00.000-07:00

Because our flight from Lima to Cusco wasn’t extremely early in the morning, we had a nice and relaxing breakfast (consisting of bread, butter, and jam along with an amazing freshly squeezed papaya juice and tea) and packed up our belongings. The flight itself was mesmerizing. I had my face literally glued to the window from the moment we took off until we landed about an hour later. The views, “Oh the Joy!”, were out of this world: tall mountains and glaciers, high grassy plateaus dotted with villages and crossed by roads that looked treacherous on a good weather day. Unbelievable! The views from that flight were worth the trip already and we had just gotten to Cusco…we still had about a week of fun, filled, action-packed adventure awaiting us!
We met our drivers who would take us to our hostel with a little less difficulty than we had in Lima (thank goodness). Along the way to the vans, we were immediately and constantly approached and asked if we wanted to buy things, most notably coca leaves and coca candy. The leaves of the coca plant have been used for an extremely long time (even dating back to the days of the Incas or earlier) for medicinal purposes and for help in high-altitudes. It is suggested that you chew or drink the tea upon arriving in Cusco, since the city itself sits at 12,000 feet. (Can you imagine that as well: we flew into an airport at 12,000 ft. No wonder we got a good view of the mountains we were flying over, they were right underneath us!)

We got to our hostel and were immediately served coca tea which I might say is very good. The view from the upstairs balcony was incredible. You could look out and see the whole valley of the city of Cusco since our hostel was situated on the side of a hill. I’ve already mentioned some of this view before so I won’t go into too much detail. The rest of that day we spent walking around the city, acclimatizing, and setting up tours and adventures for the beginning of the week.
That night, we ate at a little grill down the street from the hostel and I was able to add some more items to my “strange food” list. Everyone ordered a joint cuy so we could all try it. Cuy is a Peruvian specialty and is roasted guinea pig. It didn’t look appetizing at all when it came out, but I didn’t think it was all that bad. I do believe that I am alone in those sentiments however… As my main dish I ordered grilled alpaca, very similar to a llama. It was very tasty, similar in taste and texture to venison. After dinner we had to run back down to the main plaza to talk to the travel agent lady we had found earlier that day and sit through a frustrating session of bargaining with them about prices. They had said one price in the afternoon and had upped it now that we had our money there to pay. It all ended up worth the haggling and the frustrations of the night quickly faded as we climbed back up the hostel (breathing like an asthmatic the whole way) and could see the lights of the city below us. Incredible!
The next day, Sunday, we boarded a bus that took us out to Action Valley, a company specializing in adrenaline sports. They claim to have the highest paintball arena on the planet and offer “sling-shot” rides. However, we had come for the bungee jumping… It is the highest commercial bungee jump platform in the western hemisphere sitting at 122 meters high. When you jump, you free fall a total of 105 meters with a 3 second, un-abated freefall. There were six of us that dared to jump and all six enjoyed ourselves immensely. It’s very difficult to describe the feeling that you have when you jump off a platform at over 400 feet in the air. Lot’s of things go through your mind at once including, “What have you just done?” or “What a cool view.” or “That ground is coming really fast and the wind is bugging my ears.” or “Man, I wish my mom could be here, wait on second thought…” After the first fall though, all your fears are gone and you can enjoy the rest of the ride. Four others in our group also did a really long zip-line and zoomed over our heads at a pretty good clip. The rest of the afternoon was dedicated to more Cusco exploration and souvenir shopping. That night, several of us went in together and cooked our own pasta with red, meat sauce. Very delicious after a hard day acclimatizing. (The daring 6 of us who bungee jumped)
Mondy, we went on a raft trip. Hardly any of our group had every gone rafting before, and what a way to start out rafting through the Andes! Just the drive to get to the put-in was amazing: huge mountains, corn fields, sheep, people spinning yarn in the fields while watching their sheep. The rafting itself very enjoyable and we were blessed to have very good, and fun, guides. They even pulled us over at one point and had us play some “rafting games.” However, right at the beginning we had an accident: on of the rafts didn’t make a corner in the river and got broached, or pinned on a rock. Several fell out and our raft pulled one of them in but the rest were able to remain calm and eventually work themselves off the rock. Our guide also let me take the helm towards the end of the ride and I treated my pals in my boat to some good ol’ fashioned Middle Fork piracy… Back at the rafting headquarters, we had a sauna and a good, hot lunch. Then it was another incredible ride back into town for dinner, some more souvenir shopping, and sleep.

One thing worth mentioning is the Parade of Senor de los Tremblores, or Lord of the Earthquakes. During one of Cusco’s major earthquakes, a crucifix was paraded around the city and as a result the earthquake stopped. Thus, they continue the tradition every Monday of Holy Week in order to protect the city from future earthquakes. The main square was packed with thousands of people standing shoulder to shoulder watching the procession. We couldn’t get through and had to walk a long way around to our hostel after dark. Looking back toward the square at one point, you could see just how big the throng of people was. This is a good illustration of the mix of religions that resulted from forcing Catholicism on the people of South America. You usually got a mix of Catholicism and pagan rituals.
The next day we were on our way to the Lost City of the Incas…

My Peruvian Spring Break Part One: Lima

2008-04-11T17:59:00.000-07:00

Our Spring Break excursion started out with class and, once it got rolling, never looked back! On Thursday after lunch we got picked up from the Casa by Remise, a kind of taxi that you can order before hand. We stepped out the door to see 4 jet-black vehicles with our sunglassed and suited drivers awaiting: we felt like we were being driven to the airport by the secret service! The flight itself was uneventful, thankfully, but we did have some trouble in the Lima Airport connecting with the van that was supposed to take us to our hostel. Usually you get something arranged beforehand because the Lima airport is notorious for having taxis sitting outside with bad intentions… We made it safely to our hostel and collapsed into our small, but comfortable beds.

Also important to note, we withdrew some Peruvian currency in the airport. They are called “Nuevo Soles”, or just “soles”. Singular it’s “sol”, or sun, which sounds very similar as one might imagine to the English “soul”. The rest of the trip was filled with puns about people owing each other their souls, or how the dinner cost me my soul. Very entertaining!

The next day we woke up and took a taxi downtown to the main square, Plaza de Armas, and toured the area. We paid for an English tour of the nearby Franciscan Cathedral which is also famous for the catacombs that lie beneath the building. I don’t think I’ve ever seen an actual human skull in real life before and I couldn’t help but shudder when we were taken by a neatly arranged pile of them. After that we walked back to the Plaza to await the changing of the guard which happens everyday at noon at the government palace located on the main square. Looking around at some of the other churches, we ran into the rest of our group which had stayed in a hotel the night before. The fanfare that goes into the changing of the guard is pretty extensive and I am amazed that they do it everyday. A band comes out and plays and the ordeal involves many soldiers in historic garb high stepping to the beat of the drums. It was also interesting to see the contrast between the historic soldiers and the actual military/police in camo that were guarding the politic area.

For lunch, we walked down toward the Plaza de San Marin looking for a restaurant serving ceviche, or cebiche, a famous Puruvian dish made from raw fish essentially “cooked” or pickled in lemon juice. We found a restaurant on the square itself serving an entre and an appetizer and drink for 6 soles. The fish was very good but had an interesting texture considering it isn’t cooked. After our food adventure, we took a taxi to the Museum of Art. The way they had it displayed was very interesting: you enter to see the pre-Colombian art first and move through history. As the Spanish conquered the area they forced their artistic ideas upon the native artists completely changing their form of expression from ceramics, metal work, and textiles to painting. It continued into modern day artists and it was very cool to see actual works from Peruvian painters.

Once outside, we were greeted by the chorus of car, taxi, and bus horns that were our constant companion while in the city of Lima. I’ve mentioned this before, but the traffic of Lima is supposed to be the craziest in all of Latin America. It was here that we witnessed a man try to slash the tires of a taxi next to him on the road…while driving! Another funny site to see in the streets were human traffic lights. A person would sit/stand on a platform at an intersection and actually direct the traffic.

Later that night, after returning to our hostel for some relaxation before another planned gathering with the entire group, one of my friends, Sarah, and I went out for a walk along the ocean’s edge. Now I didn’t say “beach,” because the shoreline of Lima is kind of interesting. The buildings and path on which we walked are above the beach on a sort of bank. The beach in the Miraflores area (the neighborhood that we were in) is also made entirely of small stones, very different than any other ocean shore I’ve ever been to. As we walked we were able to see surfers in the waves, parachute ride things, a famous park with “Love Mosaics”, and some pretty cool statues. The sunset over the horizon was very beautiful and it was hard to pull ourselves away to go to the next thing.

For dinner we caught a taxi to the hotel our friends were staying at downtown and walked to a nearby Chili’s restaurant for dinner. You have no idea how much people can miss chips and salsa when you go out to eat, but let me tell you, once you don’t have it for 3 months, it’s pretty nice. The food was very good and the atmosphere very conducive to conversation and having a good time. Then, my roommate Mark has a tradition of taking pictures at Starbuck’s coffee shops that he finds in foreign countries that he and his parents travel to. After that, it was back to the hostel for a much needed night of sleep. However, to our dismay, it was even hotter than the night before, and sleep was hard to come by.

Palacio Legislativo

2008-03-30T13:29:00.000-07:00

This past Friday, we took a tour of the Legislative Palace of Uruguay, located here in Montevideo. The building itself is an awe inspiring construction. You’ll have to look up some pictures online (http://www.parlamento.gub.uy/palacio3/p_visitavirtual.asp?Lang=Eng): it commands a large area and its marble columns at one of the entrances are impressive. There aren’t very many buildings in the area that are as built as high either. Its idea was born in the early 1900’s because the Legislature at that time didn’t have any official place to meet. They met in people’s houses and rented buildings for larger events. Actual construction began in 1908 and was overseen by an Italian architect giving the building its distinct design. They finished work in 1925 in time to celebrate the centennial of the country.
If it’s possible, the inside is even more remarkable. The first room that we entered is called something like the “Room of the Lost Steps” and it separates the halls of the Senators and the Representatives. Located in the center of the building, this room has ceilings, artwork, and design fit to be in some of the cathedrals that we have visited. This in itself is interesting when you remember that Uruguay is one of the most secularized countries in Latin America having gone through an extensive process beginning in the 19^th century. The tour guide informed us that the room was constructed entirely from 52 different kinds of marble, all taken from quarries in Uruguay. Above our heads there were also amazingly detailed mosaics (if I hadn’t known they were tiled I would have thought it was a painting!), beautiful stained glass windows imported from a artisan in Italy, and 24 k gold and crystal lamp stands. Next we moved to the ballroom, where everything is original, nothing being restored. The entire room was built with wood imported from Italy and at the center sat a huge Turkish rug and an enormous table carved from one piece of oak. We were also shown the library which is also completely handmade with wood furnishings including bookshelves of a type of rose wood claimed to be the most expensive wood in the world. It’s the 2^nd largest library in Uruguay and is open to the public. It was cool for us to see some people actually in the room studying.
After being blow away by the architecture, we followed our guide to the rooms which the senators and representatives meet twice a week. It was kind of surreal to step onto the balcony and look into the area where the politicians sit. I’ve only seen scenes like it in the movies. Uruguay’s system of government is very similar to ours and has had tow major parties like us since its creation: the Red Party and the White Party. Only recently has a 3^rd party emerged: the Broad Front, a liberal-socialist type party, which is the party of the current president. As they conduct meetings, the elected officials sit segregated with the older parties on the sides and the new Broad Front party in the middle. In the Representative chamber, there are 99 representatives, most of which are from Montevideo and there is also 1 Independent member elected. I don’t know exactly where he sits during meetings… One thing we noticed, were 2 coasters sitting on each of the desks. When asked about these, the guide laughed and said they were for coffee and tea. She also said that the members are now allowed to drink their mate during meetings (they hadn’t always in the past) but that they haven’t gained the liberty of having 3 coasters on their desks…
Two more cultural things: First, Uruguay flies three flags in many places. One has a red diagonal on it: this was Artigas’ flag as he fought for independence from Spain. One has the inscription “Libertad o Muerte”, liberty or death: this was used by Lavalleja and the 33 Orientales (roughly “Revolutionaries”) when they returned from Buenos Aires to fight for independence from Brazil. The third is the current flag with alternating blue and white stripes on the right and a sun in the top left-hand corner. Second, the Uruguayan seal or shield is shown in many places. It is split into four sections each with a symbol: (going from top left, counter clockwise) Scales=justice, Horse=liberty, Ox=richness, and The Cerro(the highest point in Montevideo)=strength.

The Wild West Should Meet the Original Gaucho

2008-03-26T08:11:00.001-07:00

On Sunday, we got opportunity to go to a Uruguayan rodeo and fair. Holy Week, the week before Easter, has been renamed Tourism Week as part of a separation of Church and state process that began the 19^th century and as part of last week they put on a week of festivities here in Montevideo. They call it Semana Criolla, roughly translated at Heritage Week. Gaucho (the cowboy of the Southern Cone) culture is a huge part of the Uruguayan tradition and much of it was being celebrated while in different presentations we were able to attend while we were there. First, Ximena (one of our Spanish lab instructors and good friends) took us to see the end of the rodeo part. The riders, dressed in Gaucho wear, would mount a horse tied to a post and ride the bucking bronc swinging their whips above their heads. It probably wouldn’t have been the favorite place of a PETA member, let’s just throw that in there. Then, we walked through an artisan market while looking for some other form of entertainment. We found a magic show/circus in progress and I at least had a very good time watching the proceedings and trying to understand what they were saying. Man it’s hard to come back to Montevideo and hear Spanish after listening to the clear speaking of Peruvians! Then we went to see a song and dance show presenting folk dances and music of the past. It was very fun. Mom, you would have loved it. Other than that, we were able to talk with Ximena about different aspects of Uruguayan culture and share with her some of the funny things that we do in the States that is different than here.

I tried to take notice of the similarities and differences between a fair/rodeo here and back home. Honestly they were very similar. We saw a lot of families spending time together and the smell of hotdog and hamburger stands filled the air. The biggest difference was the lack of games or rides that you would normally find at a fair in the states. It was a relief not to be accosted by carneys every step you took.

Crazy Taxi Drivers and Dog Poo

2008-03-26T07:49:00.001-07:00

As I was running this morning, I thought about some interesting things to tell you about city life in Montevideo. We’ll see if I can collect my thoughts:
Trash:
I’ve been taught growing up that you don’t litter and my coaches in High School repeated over and over that they weren’t my mother and therefore were going to make me run if they had to pick up after me. So, upon arriving in Montevideo, they way people treat their garbage was kind of a shock. First, they have dumpsters where we carry our garbage and they are regularly picked up by the city. However, there are a certain “class” of people who live in the outskirts of the city and come around either on bicycles or horses pulling trailers and they sort through the trash for anything that might be useful. This serves as the recycling service as well since they pull out all the materials able to be recycled and turn it in for money. It seems as though this has become a way of life for both them and the rest of the people of Montevideo. Some leave food, usually leftovers, out in front of their houses or hang plastic bags from the trees with stuff that they can use. Also, if you have a plastic or glass bottle, the custom is to leave in on the sidewalk next to the dumpster.
Secondly, people don’t have any qualms about throwing trash on the ground all over the place. You especially see this on the main streets where people are hired to stand out in front of businesses and hand out flyers to passerby. Entire the block around the distributor is littered with the pieces of paper that he or she just handed out. I think the reason behind this is creating jobs. There is a huge unemployment problem in Uruguay and even if you do have a job it’s for very low pay. So, if there is trash on the ground the government can hire workers to clean it up. Everyday that I run through the park close to the Casa, I see workers cleaning up trash from the grass. At the beach as well (I don’t remember if I’ve mentioned this before) they clean the sand of garbage and whatever floats ashore from the river.
Streets:
The traffic is crazy here in South America! It’s very interesting to watch drivers interact with each other via flashing headlights and their horns. As they drive they don’t really give any concern to the painted markings either. If there is a space between two cars you’ll see a driver squeeze through honking all the while to let the others know that he is there. In Peru, we rode in a couple of busses who would pass other vehicles in the strangest places. I think we passed another bus as we went over a speed bump once, so we were both going about 5 miles an hour!
We’ve thought about renting some kind of scooter to get around town faster, but I think I would kill myself! The traffic is crazy, but I’ve never seen such good drivers. They put people in the States to shame with their attention to the task at hand, awareness of the road and other vehicles, and quick response times. I feel more comfortable riding in a taxi here I think than I would in the states. We had a couple of close calls in taxis in Lima, Peru (where the traffic is supposed to be the worst in all of Latin America) but no accidents. We also got to see some road rage in Lima where a man reached out his window and tried to slash the tires of a taxi next to him because the driver wouldn’t let him merge! To be honest I’ve only seen three total accidents while I’ve been here. The first happened in Minas where everyone had the typical small town reaction. It looked as though the entire police force was there directing traffic (all of 2 cars every 10 minutes or so) around the accident and people up and down the street were hanging there heads out windows to see what all the “hubbub” was about. The second was in Cusco where we saw a taxi back into a light pole while trying to turn around in their ridiculously narrow streets and shattered his rear window. The third was this morning while running I saw a motorcycle and a car slide into each other. Both parties were okay and it didn’t look as though there was much damage, but it really surprised me to even see an accident after all the experiences we’ve had.
Sidewalks:
The sidewalks here are one heck of an extraordinary mix of amazing ingenuity and frustrating inconvenience. They aren’t a complete slab of concrete, but instead are made of individual concrete tiles stuck together. It seems like a great idea allowing the roots of trees to grow without breaking the costly sidewalk and when they’ve worked in the water works nearby, all they’ve had to do was pull up the tiles and dig down to the pipes, replacing everything when they were finished. But inevitably as you walk down the street there are broken tiles everywhere, tiles missing, and the tiles put in place but not stuck down. These latter are really annoying after it rains and they seem to float on the surface of a hidden puddle, only to splash your entire lower body when stepped on. There is also the problem of dog poop that one must dodge while walking down the street. This kind of applies to the first category in that we’ve been taught to pick up after our pets in the States. I really don’t know who ends up cleaning up the “sidewalk feces”.

In contrast, people like to take care of their sidewalks. It’s common place to see people outside their home or business cleaning the walk with a bucket of soapy water and a broom or even just sweeping the leaves off into the street. People take pride in having a clean place in front of their respective homes or shops.

La Paloma era muy bonito.

2008-03-24T12:44:00.000-07:00

So this is a little behind, but a couple of weeks ago we took a combined trip to La Paloma (along the east coast of Uruguay) and the surrounding area. I liked the picture idea that I had for the climbing trip and BA so that's what I'll do for this one. Here goes:

One the first day in La Paloma, a group of us decided to take surfing lessons. Here are the six guys who braved the cloudy weather and crashing waves to learn the art of surfing.
First part of the lesson included learning to jump up from a lying down position to standing. On the beach it seemed pretty easy, on the board in the water: not so much... I don't have any actual surfing pictures because my batteries died about 2 minutes after this photo. :(
We took a 4x4 ride to a rocky ithsmus called Cabo Polonio and this is the lighthouse that warns ships of the perilous rocks.
We got to hike to some sand dunes just outside of town as well. Here's Branson, Mark, and Holly enjoying the views. It was kind of wierd hiking between the dunes and the surf in the light conditions we had: felt like we were on some strange planet with no life around for miles.

Here are more dunes off in the distance. We hiked to the nearest one visible with the two dots on it in the left side of the picture. The dots in the picture are our resident professor's family Ken, Karen, Krista, and Katie Cukrowski. (I think if you click on the picture it will load in a different window bigger).

A picture of Sarah Boyd and I standing at the top of the lighthouse shown earlier. You could see for miles around (probably because everything was so flat). The four of us up there couldn't do anything else except stand there and take it all in. Gorgeous!

Now here's a fun game. I hope I'm right about being able to click on a picture and loading a larger version in a different frame, because it'll be harder to play without it. Here's the deal. This is a photo from the top of the lighthouse there is a napping kitty-cat on the rocks below. Can you find her? (Hint shown below)
This picture is taken at Punta del Diablo. The waves would come in and crash on the rocks of the point, resulting in amazing photo opportunities. This is Branson in the foreground, one of my hiking buddies you'll hear a lot about in the Machu Picchu Blogs coming soon to a webpage near you.

Lastly, we visited a huge colonial era fort built by the Spanish. From above it is shaped in characteristic 5-pointed star and is now a type of museum with displays of how fort life would have been. As cliche as it might look I was not looking forward to "putting my nose back to the grindstone" the next day at school.
Also, included in this trip, but without picture evidence: French-style breakfast in a room in our hotel facing the Atlantic Ocean, a dinner in which I got to try shark, a horse-back riding trip along the beach, and a Sunday morning service we had on the beach behind our hotel which was awesome! Fun trip. Que pasan bien ustedes (Spanish for y'all...)!

Duh duh duh duuuuuuh, duh duh duh...

2008-03-23T09:55:00.000-07:00

Hello friends and family! I have officially returned from my adventure in Peru rediscovering the long lost city of the Incas. Today I've been recovering from a 24 hour stint in international airports. That was rough! The trip was amazing as well, if you ever have a chance to visit the Peruvian Andes, drop everything and do so, they're fantastic. Being looking for a full trip blog (or parts of one anyway) coming soon.

As a tease, here is a picture of an unnamed Indians Jones wannabe climbing on HuchuyPicchu:

View From Cusco

2008-03-15T20:42:00.000-07:00

Hola Amigos!
I couldn't help but to post something about this spectacular night. We've made it to Cusco after a whirlwind tour of Lima and now I'm sitting in a beautiful hostel on a hill above Cusco looking at the gorgeous lights of the city, breathing the cool, fresh, mountain air (we're at 12000 ft by the way), and posting a message that my friends are going to read all over the world. Small world...
I just want to throw out the fact that I'm following in love with the andean highlands and Cusco. If everyone ever wants to come, I'll gladly come back!! Maybe I'll quit school and move here and speak spanish all the time...
I'm thinking of y'all,
Sus amigo,
Colter

Cue the Indiana Jones theme music...

2008-03-12T20:19:00.000-07:00

This is an "adios" to all of you! No I'm not going to quit doing the blog, but I'm off on a weeklong adventure to Peru to explore the Lost City of the Incas: Machu Picchu!
Be expecting lots of excitement and fun anecdotes when I return.
Chao, que tenga un buen dia.

Casa Tour Part II

2008-03-08T11:45:00.001-08:00

And finally as promised, here is the second instalment of my house tour to you all. For a recap, the first part introduced you to my humble room and my roommates. This will give you a taste of the rest of the house.

Welcome to Casa ACU!

Here we are at the front door. Quite large as you can see. The whole thing opens so the family living in the church building can park their car inside. The size and decorative metal work is left over from the building's days as a coffee factory.

This is a picture of the courtyard in the middle of the house. The windows that you can see lead to our program director's and professor's apartments and the perspective is looking out my room window. It's been really fun to have a central courtyard and be able to talk from room to room across the way. Imagine doing your homework at your desk and being able to ask your teacher a question by talking out the window!

This is a picture of our kitchen. Mariela, one of our cooks, is pictured in the left side of the picture. She and Raquel are amazing cooks! I've probably mentioned that before, but it's good enough to deserve repetition. I also learned from Raquel how to make empanadas, a Uruguayan staple, and am excited to make them back at home. And get excited Dad: I also learned how to make hot, fresh tortillas from scratch! Are you drooling yet?
This is the "loft," where we have access to a TV and couches to hang out, chill, and enjoy movies or games with friends. Through the door on the left is a little work out area that isn't much, but it's always nice to have a space to go and do some pullups, pushups or stretch after a run (when you're hot and sweaty and just want to hide your tired-ness).

This is the computer lab, being demonstrated by Courtney. There are 9 computers with internet access and 2 printers for our use. Most of us have our own laptops, but the internet is usually faster up here and it's nice to be able to work on group projects in here as well since we aren't allowed in rooms of the opposite gender. I understand that they need to do it, but it really gets anoying!

This is a picture of the classroom next door in the church. Posing for us here is Ken Cukrowski, our guest professor who teaches my Christianity in Culture class, and Amelia, my beginning Spanish instructor. They're both really fun!

Hope you enjoyed the tour. If you have any questions or comments don't hesitate to send me an email or comment on this post. Que pasan bien!

Photo Update

2008-03-06T09:35:00.000-08:00

Here's some photos of two of the trips that I've already blogged about (refer to BA and rock climbing blogs for a more detailed explanation of events mentioned):

Buenos Aires TripNight on the town: all dressed up for our Tango Dinner
Casa Rosada: Like the Whitehouse, only rosada (pink). The balcony in the center is where Madonna made some famous speeches in her role as Eva Peron in the musical of the same name.

In a rather large church. You are looking at the mausoleum of San Martin, one of the most famous revolutionaries of Latin American independence. I learned about him in my junior year of High School in "History of the Americas" class and now I actually get to visit where he lived. How cool is that?Some statues in the La Boca neighborhood representing three very important people to Argentina: (from left to right) Carlos Gardel, the famous Tango singer, Eva Peron, former first lady of Argentina, and Diego Maradona, the soccer player that led Argentina to a World Cup win.The strange rabbit animal whose name I just learned: a mara, or patagonian hare. Interesting, they let them run wild in the zoo.The tomb of Eva Peron (I said she was famous didn't I?).The Subte, the subway system of BA. My first time on a subway!Just "Monkey-ing Around" in the Natural History museum.

Minas Rock Climging Trip:
My climbing buddies: Mallory and AlanMuchos Uruguayos, Muchos Amigos!
Alan just finishing a route. Notice the non-verbal gesture he is making. Not the traditional US thumbs-up, similar but including the index finger. It means that the person is happy. Alan just got to rock climb a 30 meter route, therefore he is happy :P

Just hanging out, contemplating the answers to life's biggest questions. Oh, and rock climbing too. "Hold me Alan!"

While My Guitar Gently Weeps (or Alvaro Pierri's anyway)

2008-03-05T07:41:00.000-08:00

A week ago today, a couple of us students attended a concert at the famous Teatro Solis (theater of the sun, or something like that). The outside of the theater is very impressive: huge white columns decorate the front entrance with a magnificent golden sun at the peak of the roof. Then, being inside the auditorium itself is mind-boggling. The ceiling is high over your head with the names of famous writers, musicians, and playwrights displayed in grand array. The sides of the contained the classic box-style seating that you see in the opera houses of movies. Not quite the immense scale that you would need binoculars or anything, but still pretty cool (although we sat on the floor and didn’t get the whole high class experience…).
When we got seated, we noticed that the stage was set with only one chair lit up with a spot light. Now we had bought the tickets and gone to the concert thinking that it was to be a man playing traditional Uruguayan instruments. However, we figured out right before the show that we had mistranslated the show title and it was going to be a famous Uruguayan classical guitarist, Álvaro Pierri. Not to be dismayed we settled in to enjoy the show.
And boy, were we impressed! After a little presentation of some kind of award, he went backstage and returned with guitar in hand. He sat down and introduced the first song, tuned his guitar, and began to play. I’ve been in very few public places that were ever that quiet in enraptured attention. Pierri’s fingers basically flew over his guitar at times so fast you couldn’t tell where they were on the fret board. Some times during the music he would seem to curl around his guitar with his face a couple centimeters away as musician and instrument became one with the music. He played with such ease, enjoyment, and passion that it was infective to the audience as we sat there and gaped at his ability. By the time he finished his first 20+ minute long opus (completely memorized I might add) we were completely hooked.
Between songs he would give a little incite into the composer and the piece itself (this is all what I could understand with my limited Spanish). And he must have been a funny guy because he would make remarks that made the audience laugh but I couldn’t comprehend. I felt like a little kid again listening to laugh-tracks on TV shows telling me when things were funny. All we could do was smile and pretend that we weren’t as confused as we actually were. “Smile and nod, just smile and nod.”
He also made some sounds come out of that guitar that I never would have thought possible. Some of the songs contained sort of percussion and others strange strumming techniques. My question is how you’d write something like that down on paper? As one sat and listened to the music, you could let your mind go and imagine anything you wanted: soaring over the cerros of Uruguay or through the mountains of Montana. I guess that’s why I like classical guitar music so much. The concert finished with tremendous applause and the audience beckoned him back for three encores, with the last seeming to say, “I’m good, this song is amazing yet short, and I’m tired so go home.”

Everybody Must Get Stoned...or climb them anyway!

2008-03-03T10:34:00.000-08:00

I’ve been really fortunate this semester in that I found the only rock climbing gym in all of Uruguay (and it happens to be only a couple of blocks away from our house!). The wall is located in the local YMCA, which is called the Asociacion Cristiana de Jovenes (Christian Association of Young-People) in Spanish, and several of us students have placed membership there. Three of us, Alan, Mallory, and I have been frequenting the rock climbing wall about 3 times a week. It’s been a great place to train for climbing, to make friends, learn about Uruguay, and to practice Spanish.
Recently, we were asked to go on a rock climbing camping trip with the group. Not wanting to be stuck in Montevideo we gladly accepted and went on to have the time of lives. Here’s our weekend in a whirlwind: rode on a rickety, old bus, rock climbed, ate Uruguayan food, rock climbed, pretended to know Spanish, learned Spanish, practiced Spanish, swam in the river, rock climbed in the river, ate Uruguayan parrilla (grill: we had ribs), slept, and repeated.
On the trip we got to meet a lot of the Uruguayans that we had been climbing with over the past couple of weeks and have made some pretty good friends. One of our closest, has been Pablo. We met him from the very start when we toured the ACJ, most likely because he speaks the best English out of anyone I’ve met while living down here. And he’s crazy: he’s the best climber I’ve ever met, he’s single and in his 30’s, and we found out on the camping trip that he’s a ham! While we were waiting for the ribs to grill on Saturday night, he kept trying to get the kids to sing and dance to no avail. And the 3 of us also call him our “mom.” He helped us out a ton on the camping trip, most comically by bringing us every kind of food available to try: “You don’t have to eat it if you don’t like it, just try it” he would say.
He also has one of the coolest jobs ever. I don’t know if he works for the ACJ or not, but we’ve come to learn that he has a private business creating fitness programs for special needs people, especially those with Down Syndrome. Alan and I were able to see him work with a group with DS in the rock climbing area and it really touched me. In the future I want to do something like that. Maybe not specifically with handicapped people, but just the aspect of using something that I love like rock climbing to make a difference in the world really appeals to me.

BA continued

2008-03-03T09:44:00.000-08:00

Continued…
So we’re still on the city tour and go to visit more of La Boca neighborhood, specifically the caminitos. The Caminitos were sort of like tenement houses where immigrants fresh off the ships in the Buenos Aires harbor could go and live. They are brightly colored because the only paint that the people could get was that which was left over from painting the nearby ships. BA is extensively European and they can thank the many immigrants who came over on ships in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries. We got out and walked around one touristy area and were able to walk through an artisan market and were blown away by some of the fantastic paintings and sculptures that we saw. Back on the bus, as we continued to drive around we passed many huge parks or squares that you would picture seeing in any large city. People were stopped for picnics, or tea/mate time, or even that much needed siesta. You couldn’t help but notice another familiar occurrence on the streets of BA, especially near parks: dog walkers. Our guide said it was very common for people to hire dog walkers to take their dog out on private or public walks. As for the public walks, it wasn’t uncommon for us to see a person walking 5 or more dogs all at once! Imagine the pooper scooper you would have to carry around! For our final destination, we visited the Recoletta cemetery where the members of the namesake high-class neighborhood are entombed. One of the highlights was to see the tomb of Eva Peron, the wife of a former President of Argentina, one Juan Peron, and heroine of the working classes. She was both controversial and beloved by the people during her husband’s terms as president and it was a sad day in Argentina when she succumbed to cancer at a young age. There is a Broadway show called Eva Peron telling the story of the young woman’s rise to fame and an Argentine version Evita that we watched earlier as part of a class. Madonna and Antonio Bandera star in a movie version of the former.
After the tour, we were set free until dinner time, and four of us decided to visit the Natural History Museum across town. Because of its distance, we rode the Subte (the BA subway system), me for the first time on a subway! It was every thing that I ever dreamed a subway would be…loud and bumpy and gave me a nasty case of vertigo when I got off. Other than that it was a pleasant experience. At the Museum, we saw all kinds of weird and wild stuff from a South American perspective. When I say that, I don’t mean that Argentine scientists name things differently that we do, only that many of the dinosaur and prehistoric animals I had never heard of before, most likely due to their only being found in South America. It was very fun to wander around with my friends finding funny ways to “interact” with the exhibits to produce comical photos. After our private tour (and being thoroughly exhausted and very hot and sweaty) we retreated back to the hotel.
For dinner, we walked to a restaurant called “La Estancia” (ranch) and had another unbelievable meal. We had the choice of an appetizer, beef or chicken, and what dessert we wanted. I’ve never seen so much meat on a plate in my life! I swear that the steak I got was half a foot long, three inches wide, as many thick, and every bit of it very good. I’ll also have to throw in for my good buddy Alex Cox (wish you could be here man) that we had a course of freshly baked provolone cheese. We pictured it more as an appetizer, but they didn’t serve it until after the main course. Interesting, but I don’t feel as though it cleansed my palate at all, it that was its purpose.
The highlight of the next day was visiting the zoo. I wanted to go to be able to specifically see native South American animals and got what I wanted. We saw capyberras, native wildcats, an Argentine black bear, llamas, and two types of rodents that they let run wild in the zoo: nutria (muskrats) and a strange rabid looking animal that I to this day have no idea what they are called. One funny anecdote: Mark and I walked up to the baboon exhibit and all of a sudden they went nuts! They threw themselves at the front wall of the cage and screamed their heads off! We finally figured out a kid wearing a monkey mask had approached the cage and they were acting out of territorial interest. That kid would have been a gonner had that cage wall not been there.
On the way back to the hotel to gather and head back home, we walked by a huge metal, flower sculpture that is mechanized to open during the day and close at night. I would have really liked to have been there when it opened at sunrise. After that we perused the fine arts museum and saw actually paintings by Monet, Van Gogh, and Rembrant. There wasn’t anything like Starry Night, but it was still cool to actually attend a fine arts museum. I’m becoming so “cultured” on this trip it’s scary!
Later that evening we climbed, exhausted yet enlightened, onto the Buquebus for our return voyage.

I want to be a part of BA, Buenos Aires, Big Apple

2008-02-28T19:10:00.000-08:00

Beware of the city, it's hungry and cold can't be controlled, it is mad.
Those who are fools are swallowed up whole and those who are not become what they should become changed.
In short they go bad.

Bad is good for me. I'm bored so clean and so ignored.
I've only been predictable respectable. Birds fly out of here so why oh why oh why the Hell can't I: I only want variety of society.
I wanna be a part of B.A. Buenos Aires, Big Apple. –Madonna, from Eva Paron

A couple of weeks ago now, since I’m extremely behind on informing you of my adventures, our group traveled to Buenos Aires. And, had an absolute blast! Our trip started at 8:00 in the morning with a walk to the local bus station. We were booked on Buquebus: a bus/boat company that would take us all the way to Buenos Aires. However, we ran into trouble when 30 minutes into the ride, the bus broke down and we had to pull over. Within 5 minutes there was another bus there for us to all climb onto and travel the rest of the way to Colonia to catch the boat to BA. We reflected on how long it would have taken to change busses in the states and how inefficient public transportation is in the US. They don’t stand around because of lack of paper work, they just get stuff done.

At the boat dock we went through customs and got an Argentine stamp in our passports (my second stamp! Can you tell I’m excited?). The boat we got on was very large and very fast and was very enjoyable. If you look on a map, it travels from Colonia, Uruguay to BA, all the way across the widest river in the world the Rio de la Plata, in less than 45 minutes. After arriving, we got bussed to our ritzy hotel, checked in, got our rooms, and figured out were to go for dinner. A group of us decided on a Thai restaurant within walking distance of the hotel. The food was very, very good, especially the beef (which is supposed to be the best in the world coming from Argentina), not to mention that the building was air conditioned… The rest of the afternoon, we walked around a touristy street looking for souvenirs and were accosted by creepy, street salespeople trying to advertise for services of exotic nature. On the way back to the hotel we found 3 different outdoor apparel shops, and as you might guess I had to go inside. The last place was a Patogonia store (pretty cool being in the country where “Patogonia” is) and talking to a girl working there and found some free climbing magazines. I plan on trying to read them as a way to practice Spanish but it hasn’t happened yet.

That evening we went to a Tango dinner and show. We chose three courses from a menu of wonderful food and enjoyed it in pleasant company and in a wonderful atmosphere. I had some more Argentine beef and wasn’t as impressed as I had been in the Thai restaurant, but it was still very good. After dessert, we watched a performance of tango which went through several acts depicting the history of the dance as it developed from being something only dancing by forlorn Spanish men amongst themselves imitating their desires for women to the national dance of Argentina that it is today. I still haven’t had any kind of Tango dance lessons and don’t know if I will be able to fit them in, but I would definitely like to know how to “bailo la Tango”.

The next morning, we got on a bus for a driving tour of the city. We weren’t able to get off much and in all honesty I fell asleep at some point in the second half of the tour, but hopefully I will mention all the highlights. We started with the Avenida de 9 de Julio with is 7 lanes wide in either direction possibly making it the widest city street in the world. In the middle of the avenue stands an Obelisk commemorating Argentine independence. We stopped at the Plaza de Mayo to look around. This is the historical center of the city and the Casa Rosada (instead of a Whitehouse, they have a Pinkhouse) where the president works. Some of us went into a Catholic church on one side of the square and were amazed by all the intricate artwork and tiling and display inside. The Plaza is also historically a place of large public gathering and protest, most notably by women marching in response to people who have gone missing during a dictatorship in the not so distant past. Back aboard our bus, we drove by soccer stadium of one of the neighborhoods and remarked how the Coca Cola sponsorship symbol is in different colors so as to not be in the colors of their rivals! They take soccer seriously down here.

Thus ends the first part of my Buenos Aires Blog. More information and pictures later.

Moonlight Sonata

2008-02-21T10:32:00.000-08:00

It's been fun to do a little stargazing while in the Southern Hemisphere, although somewhat hampered by the lights from the city. This weekend we're going camping with the rock climbing crew from the YMCA and I can't wait to see the stars out in Minas. The stars are different and I keep meaning to look up some of the southern constellations, but haven't taken the time to do so. I think I have been able to see the Southern Cross and Orion, only this mythical hero is upside down with his knife hanging contrary to gravity. In addition Taurus may be visible but I can't say for sure. Again, I'll have to look them up. For those of you out there who happen to be star buffs (yes, I'm talking to you Dad), let me know if you want me to look for anything.
Last night however, we got to see a special treat. As some of you might be aware, referring to you star buffs out there, was a full lunar eclipse. I hope that some of you had a chance to see it because it was visible to both North and South America. We asked to be able to get onto the roof of the church next door at midnight last night and stayed out until one watching the shadow of the earth creep slowly across the face of the moon. I don't remember the last time I may or may not have seen a lunar eclipse but this was really spectacular. To learn about eclipses and various other "space happenings" during school is one thing, but to actually see one of them is a very surreal experience.

El Dia de San Valentine

2008-02-20T14:23:00.000-08:00

friend date [frend deyt] noun- a social engagement between people without romantic interest for the purpose of familiarizing themselves with another person or persons. At Casa ACU, located in Montevideo, Uruguay, the practice is for two friends, who know each other fairly well invite two others out on a “date.” Does not have to specifically be for dinner, movie, or any other stereotypical outing. Example of usage: Mark and Colter took Tina and Marissa on a friend date Thursday night.

Last Thursday, en el Dia de San Valentine, was the actual occurrence of the above mentioned “friend date.” We took the girls out for pizza at a place just around the block and sat and talked until about 8:30. Then we walked to a nearby park, Parque Rodo, where a Filharmonic Concierto was taking place performed by the Symphony of Montevideo. The concert was free and thus there were a lot of people there. Because of that we struggled to find seats and ended up just sitting in the grass, barely able to see over the heads of the people seated in front of us. This was somewhat disappointing seeing as the symphony was playing on a stage projecting out over a picturesque pond and situated in front of an old castle with the lights from the stage creating the perfect atmosphere for listening to the jazz played by the group. Mark seems to think that I’m exaggerating the description of the scenery, but I was really impressed. The only problem was when more people showed up attracted by the sound of the music and stood right in front of us. Oh well, we could still hear and we were still able to talk and have a fun time getting to know one another. The jazz compositions that they chose to play were very good, and I think I even recognized an arrangement of Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm.” I would have to say the only bad thing about the night was when a couple came and stood right in front of us for the sole purpose of practicing their French…as in kissing. It just made looking straight ahead a little awkward for most of the concert. After it was over, we stopped for ice cream on the way back to the house, practiced more Spanish trying to order, and I succeeded in spilling dulce de leche ice cream on my pants. Even being in a foreign country I can’t shake my klutziness.

Minas Tirith, only minus the Tirith

2008-02-19T12:26:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago now, my roommates and I decided to use one of our free weekends to travel to a smaller city northeast of Montevideo called Minas. As you might be able to tell from the name, the city first began as a mining town for gold, silver, and copper (oro, plata y cobre). Now it is a city about the size of Kalispell (30 thousand residents) and has an huge economical range: from tourism to mining and logging (paper industry), from cattle ranching to eucalyptus farming. It is also the home of the bottled water company Salus which is what we usually drink if you order water at a restaurant in MVD. The appeal here is the spring found in the sierra de (small mountain range of) Minas.
It may not seem like much to you sitting at home, but one of the most interesting aspects of the trip was buying bus tickets to the city. We certainly got to practice our Spanish and may have heard a little laughter from the desk worker as we walked away. The actually morning of our trip came the next Saturday with us awaking before 6 am to catch the 7 o’clock bus. Mark ended up feeling sick and ended up not going, so Josh and I had to trudge on without our compañero fiel (faithful friend). The bus trip was uneventful, besides a crazy dream where I thought we forgot to get off the bus and were being taken to some random place, and we arrived at the Minas station around 9:15.
At the station, we first bought return tickets back to MVD and then asked for some information at the tourism office about where some things were that we had researched. After that, we decided to walk around: a lot. The city itself doesn’t have very big blocks so it seemed to us as if we made pretty good time walking around. We saw the little museum they had, which was built in the home of Lavalleja, one of the leaders in Uruguayan independence. We also walked around and saw a cathedral and the Plaza Libertad which stands in the center of the city in memorial to Lavalleja. On our way to a rather large statue we encountered a cemetery. We went inside and I was exposed to something I had not been expecting. The cemetery was enclosed in concrete walls and contained the tombs of various people, some more ornate than others with incredible statues and carvings in the rock. But, stacked on all the walls and all the rock tombs were stone urns holding the ashes of people. There must have been thousands of them! The whole mood of the area was very somber and surreal, aided by the effect of the cloudy sky and the weather threatening to rain. Continuing on, we arrived at the huge statue of José Artigas astride his horse. Supposedly it is the largest horse statue in the world, and I would believe it: it was enormous! After walking all morning, we were ready to take a break, snap some pictures and eat lunch in the shadow of the statue.
We had wanted to visit the abandoned gold mine north of Minas and possibly get a tour of the old shafts, but we found at the station that was no bus that went out that direction. Not to be denied, we hiked the four kilometers to the mine. Along the way we encountered vicious dogs (whose bark was worse than their bite due to the chain that kept them from getting too close) and swear that the grossly exaggerated the seeming closeness of the mine to the city. We hiked a long way…only to find out that the mines were closed for the day! We were able to go into the entrance and cool down after the hike and later found an ant trail about 25 meters long or more beaten down by thousands of ants traveling back and forth between their food source of new leaves and their den. Can you imagine an ant trail about a centimeter and a half wide? Then we began the trudge back to Minas in the hot sun (yes mom, I put on sunscreen). About halfway a car containing a man and what seemed to be his son pulled over and offered us a ride. Although it took Josh and I a while to understand out what they were saying, we gladly accepted the ride after we finally figured it out. They were very helpful and friendly and told us a little more about the surrounding area on the drive home. What’s really funny is that they thought we were French tourists! Too bad I’ve forgotten most of my French from High School...
Safely back in Minas, we decided we deserved to celebrate with some ice cream, which was very good, by the way. I ordered dulce de leche (which is a Latin American version of caramel, but better) and chocolate chips. The clouds finally opened up and poured on us on the way back to the terminal, but it was welcome after that long hike. We were just grateful not to have to slog back to the city in it. For the rest of the day, we had rain off and on, but worry not, my friends: Josh and I were both prepared with rain jackets and Josh’s umbrella.
Next, we caught a bus out to Cerro Verdun, a hill (cerro is Spanish for mountain/hill) were the Virgan Mary is supposed to have appeared. They’ve set up a long, wide path up to the top with monuments at regular intervals depicting the twelve stages of Christ’s crucifixion which may or may not be familiar to some of you. It was very powerful to reflect upon, especially because of the mood we got from the surrounding weather. At the summit, people place plaques on the statue of Mary thanking her for watching over them and their family as well as answering their prayers. Also, many Catholics of Latin America, and maybe beyond that, travel to this place every year in mid-April as a sort of pilgrimage. Last year close to 120,000 people came to pay their respects the Virgan Mary, many of them completing the hike entirely on their knees! There would be a lot of bloody knees on a day like that…
On top of the mountain/hill, we encountered many, crazy juxtapositions. The large statue of Mary stood in contrast to the communication towers situated just behind her. We could see into the valley and see mining and farming in close proximity. And the whole statue itself stands in crazy the middle of a secular society. It is very interesting to think about a country like Uruguay with many non religious people and with a strong separation of Church and state, still with people willing to climb to the top of a mountain on their knees and place plaques thanking Mary for answered prayers.

Barnum and Bailey? No! La Carnaval!

2008-02-14T19:44:00.000-08:00

If you had to sum up La Carnaval in one word (you couldn’t, but if you had to…) it would be: people. Lots of people. Now it’s not even close to the craziness of the Carnival in Sao Paulo or Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. I read a couple of weeks ago that things have gotten so bad in these metropolises that the candombe drum groups have to keep their performance times and places secret and only depend on people hearing the drumming and coming to watch. If they revealed where they would be, the crowds would be disastrous. They’ve had cases of riots breaking out, or on the other side of things, people making love in the streets. Naturally this is due mostly in part to the large amounts of alcohol people consume during this time.
The Uruguayan Carnaval claims to be the longest in the world, supposedly lasting over a month, but I guess we’ve only seen some the bigger events. I think the entire month is a big holiday/vacation time for most people. For what little I know of the history, the tradition has it’s roots in Africa from the many slaves that were brought to South America during the 17^th and 18^th centuries. Their desire the retain their culture, as well as a desire to escape from the hardships of slave labor influenced the beginnings of candombe music and dancing. These traditions are expressed today in the parades, music, and dancing of carnival. (For more in depth, and probably more accurate information, you’ll have to search the internet on your own.)

Some of the events our group attended:

The opening parade to kick off the Carnaval happed the first week we were here and we went to watch it on 18 de Julio (the main drag in Montevideo). I may have mentioned something about it before, but I’ll show more pictures now. The parade was filled with floats of all sizes and shapes and colors representing different organizations and groups. Some dancing and singing groups accompanied the floats down the calle (street) with very comical routines and music. I think these are what they call murgas, or singing groups of the Carnaval. In addition to having extravagant costumes and presentations, if you understood Spanish, their songs are filled with witty social commentary and political satire. Unfortunately I was not one of those able to understand the jokes going on around me.

Also happening within the last couple of weeks was the festival of Iemanja. She is the Lady of the Sea (ironically stated since she came from the widest river in the world: the Rio de la Plata or the River Plate) who supposedly came out of the water at Playa Ramirez (Ramirez beach) to bless the people of Montevideo and now watches over them. I’m still a little confused over what kind of religion this has become because we saw some sort of priests/esses blesses people and brushing their worries or cares off of them. We asked some Uruguayans that we know and they said the tradition is a big mix of Catholicism and pagan religions. This mixing of religions was very common in the colonization of South America as the Spanish attempted to impose the Catholic religion upon the indigenous people of the area. At the festival, people ask Iemanja to bless them by lighting candles on the beach and building foam boats and floating them out on the water with offerings of food and drink on them. In addition to the boats and candles and random priests, we saw some different forms of music: usually drum and vocals. But, on our way back home we saw a group of Native American dancers and musicians. I felt like I was back in Montana again!

Finally, last Thursday and Friday we attended Las Llamadas. To the best of my knowledge it’s a big contest between different llamadas groups which consist of flagmen, dancers, the drummers, and the support crowd (which seemed to be either friends of the group or even carried extra drums if one of them breaks!). The drum music was intense and the rhythm vibrated your whole body. There were a ton of people there too. On Thursday night we went and couldn’t find a spot to see the show so we climbed the back of some stadium seating until we were told to get down by a policeman. Then on Friday, we forced our way onto the sidewalks beside the street where the performance was and got pretty close to the show. Uruguayans definitely have a different sense of personal space than Americans. There is no “bubble” and if you want to squeeze through the crowd, that’s exactly what you do: you push and shove and squeeze through the crowd. After we decided we had seen enough, we started to leave only to be caught in a downpour! We huddled under an overhanging roof until most of it stopped and then pushed on back toward the house.

No navagué por la red...

2008-02-08T08:20:00.000-08:00

Our internet is stupid! The wireless is down and 22 of us are going to have to try and share 4 computers until we can get the network fixed. I'll do my best to respond to emails and continue blogging, it just might be slower than before (and that's saying a lot). Hasta luego, mis amigos.

Get a haircut and get a real job!

2008-02-06T16:08:00.000-08:00

Today I went and got a haircut because I was tired of it being so long. It was a lot of fun and was good practice for speaking Spanish. I still didn’t understand some of the things he said, but it’s okay, I’m understanding more than I would have 3 weeks ago. Growth, I love it! I was able to ask for exactly what I wanted (as in, I printed of a picture and expressed to him that I wanted a haircut like it) and was also able to ask him to cut it shorter. One of the greatest things that I’m learning is how to deal with people. One of the things that I’m most excited about bringing back to the States is a better ability to deal with people better. I imagine having to ask people for things in a foreign language will make it easier in a language that I grew up speaking. Here’ some before and after pictures:

Before:

After:

Compañeros de Cuarto (Casa Tour Part 1)

2008-02-06T15:20:00.000-08:00

So, I gave up on the song title thing already. I'm not really "cultured" in the way song titles. I'll keep thinking about it thought and you might see some in the future. And this way I'll throw some Spanish at y'all (that's Texan by the way).
This the first installment of my house tour, starting with my sanctuary: our dorm room. I share some pretty prime real estate with two other guys, Josh and Mark. I know them through Church back in Abilene and we've become even better friends down here. We definitely have fun! It's really interesting how three guys with completely different backgrounds, study habits, sleep habits, snack habits can have so much in common. It must be a God thing...(*inside joke, sorry*) It does help though, that we all have pretty much the same sense of humor.
For the room itself, we have 3 beds, two of which are bunked. I seem to have drawn the top bunk, something about how I like to climb things...? I don't know. There are three closets for us in the back wall with plenty of space for our stuff. Josh has his own desk and Mark and I work at a long desk along the far wall. The arrangement seems to work out nicely. The best thing about our room is the two fans that keep the air cooler all day long. It's amazing how much moving air can do. Que bueno! Me gustan mis compañeros de cuarto.

I'm leaving on a jetplane, don't know when...

2008-02-05T16:49:00.000-08:00

I had the urge to find out just how far I was away from home and looked up some distances on Google maps:
Distance (in miles) from Montevideo (as the crow, la cuerva, flies) to:
Kalispell-6761
Missoula-6697
Abilene-5452
Houston-5149
Windsor, CA-6632
Yreka, CA-6768
Midland, SD-6151
Cloudcroft, NM-5690
Albuquerque-5834
I think that covers all my faithful readers...Ingrid and Mike win for being the furthest away! Or maybe that's sad. Although, just realize that I won't be walking, riding, or swimming home any time soon.

Clothes Line Saga

2008-02-05T09:23:00.000-08:00

I was challenged to make all my titles have references to songs, so we'll see what I can do. I thought about the nursery rhyme "This is the way we wash our clothes, wash our clothes..." but I felt that Bob Dylan was more precise.
We have to do all our own laundry down here, it’s really a bummer let me tell you. We have to haul all our clothes and sheets and towels to the nearest Laundromat all the way across the city with our pocketful of pesos and run load after load in the small washers.
Actually, I’m just kidding: there is a lavaderia just up the block that we take our clothes to and drop them off. Then, we come by the next day a pick it up, all neatly folded and smelling oh so clean and fresh. They’re folded better than I have ever seen and packed neatly in blue, plastic bags. It costs about 3 dollars a load and I go through about 2 loads a week, as in I bring all my laundry and it comes to about 2 loads. As for the smell: I really can’t describe it, but nonetheless it smells wonderful and is very strong. Seeing as how we are 3 male roommates our room smells poorly sometimes. When we get our clothes back we put it in front of the fan and blow the fragrance around the room. It only lasts for a couple of days, but no worries.

Shots and Stuff

2008-02-03T08:31:00.000-08:00

Hola! Como esta? Estoy fenomenal! Este pais es muy divertido!!
(Hello, how are you all? I am phenomenal. This country is very fun!)
So, some items from the last couple of days. On Friday we woke up early and took a trip to the port to receive Yellow Fever (Fiebre Amarillo) vaccinations. The port itself has very high security, so we had to go through some fancy rig-a-maroll to get into the area itself. Thankfully no one came up on the computer as a terrorist and they lest us through gates. It was very cool to be able to see the port and all the machinery that goes along with shipping. You can really begin to understand how important the port is to the economy of Montevideo. When we arrived at the place to receive our shots, it wasn't all that impressive of a building and didn't give you a relaxing feeling of sanitation, but it was the place that we were taken and we didn't ask any questions...
After the shots (which turned out to be quick and painless) a friend of mine, Mark Foster, and I took a stroll back to the Casa via the Plaza Independencia. In the center of the plaza there in General Jose Artigas' mausoleum and a giant statue of him on a horse. Artigas is very important to the Uruguayan people because of the extent to which he lead the fight for independence from Spain and then Argentina and Brazil. The plaza is also the center of the Ciudad Vieja (Old City) which has a lot of old architecture and other cool things to see. It's also really tourist oriented and there are a lot of shops and markets that we like to see and hang out at.
Friday night, a group of us hooked up with some Uruguayan friends a hung out on the Rambla (which is a running/biking path that runs the length of the Uruguayan coast, along the beaches) practicing Spanish and having a good time. They treated us to a ride on a carnival type spinning-wheel thing at a nearby little amusement park. It is interesting to compare the safety standards of amusement rides here to those in the US...
Saturday was filled with studying, getting caught up in Math and reading stuff for the next week. In the evening we were able to escape to go hang out with our local friends again. We sat and talked at a friends house with his parents and some other of his friends many of which didn't speak english and I think I was the butt of several jokes because I couldn't understand anything that they were saying... Then we went to Ciudad Vieja again and hung out at an Irish pub that had a live band playing English music that we could see along with for a change. Don't worry there wasn't any alcohol involved on my part, so don't get your hackles up. We were hoping to be able to do some dancing, but the party doesn't start down here until about 1:30 in the morning so we had to leave before it got started. We didn't end up getting back until 2, just in time for curfew. Whew, what a crazy couple of days!

Futbol

2008-02-01T16:47:00.000-08:00

If you’ve never experienced a fubol game, you’ve been missing out! We went to the biggest match of the year in Montevideo: the game against Nacional and Penarol, the two biggest teams in Uruguay. It was nuts! We got frisked going in and were overwhelmed by the amount of people there. For you Montana wrestling fans out there, picture the Metra 4 times as big filled with 60,000 screaming and jumping fans shooting fireworks and waving flags and flares from the crowd. 60,000 people…that’s twice the number of people in all of Kalispell, all in one stadium. I enjoyed myself immensely, even though I’ve never really been interested in soccer. I’ll have to say that I am now, those guys are amazing athletes, both of endurance and skill! I’ll have to take up some more crazy European sports like soccer and rugby, break into the international scene…all I need is a good agent. :)

Punta Trip

2008-02-01T06:29:00.000-08:00

This last weekend we took a trip to Punta del Este with our whole group. Places outside of Montevideo, yay! Punta del Este is a town that is built on a point of land on the edge of the Atlantic Ocean and Rio de la Plata. It has lots of beautiful beaches and is a major tourist destination for Argentines and Brazilians. Naturally we were very excited to travel to such an exciting place.

We got on a chartered bus early on Saturday morning and drove to our first destination: Casa Pueblo. This is the house of the famous Uruguayan painter Carlos Paez Villaro. If you’ve ever seen any pictures of a huge white house oddly shaped facing the ocean, that might be Casa Pueblo. We watched a video about his life, and it sounds pretty amazing: painting all over the world with near death experiences. I believe his son was actually in the famous plane crash in the Andes that has received publicity recently with a book (I don’t know much about it, as you can see). The house itself is supposed to be built entirely without sharp right angles, in the Villaro’s “struggle against the straight line.” He also says that the white stands in contrast to the bright colors of his paintings.

After that we traveled to the coast and took ferry to Isla Gorritti, an island in the Atlantic that has a rough history. It is littered with old cannons and batteries of centuries past. We got to hike around the island and swim in the cold ocean water! First time swimming in the Atlantic. Oh, and I put on sunscreen…twice, and didn’t get a sunburn. We had a lot of rosy/red people in the house the next day! There were loads of jellyfish in the water (not where we were swimming, of course) and several sea lions in the cove where we got on the boat. One of them was huge and would just sit and wait until a fisherman would throw him the scrap of some fish or squid he just cut up.

Towards the evening, we took a “picture stop” at Los Dedos (the fingers in the sand). I naturally had to climb to the top of one of the fingers… After that we ate on an amazing restaurant on the top of a hill overlooking Piriapolis. I had my first taste of squid and octopus in a random seafood platter. On the way to the restaurant, our bus blew a tire and we had to wait in Piriapolis to have it fixed. Que bueno! That was our trip.

Forgiveness...

2008-01-31T07:03:00.000-08:00

The past week we have been on a mission to analyze and think theologically about forgiveness. We read The Sunflower, for Christianity in Culture, which is a biography about the Jewish man Simon Wiesenthal and his struggle with forgiving a dying Nazi soldier. The question he poses is very difficult, What would you do in his shoes?
The goal of this blog post has multiple layers: one, I wanted to let you know some of the cool things that we are studying in class, two, I wanted to pose this thought provoking question to all of you. And lastly, I wanted to use the subject to humbly beg your forgiveness for not keeping my blog up to date... :) I'll try to do better, I promise.
I hope everyone is well.

There is a Season, Turn, Turn, Turn...

2008-01-23T15:28:00.000-08:00

Living in Montevideo has gotten me all confused: I went from skiing at Big Mountain in the middle of winter, to overheating in the middle of summer down here. As I'm typing this it is 9:30 at night and it is 80 in my room. And then I here from home that it's been below zero...crazy! It's one of those things that you grow up learning about in school: "The southern hemisphere is summer when the northern hemisphere is winter" but never really hits you until you experience it. Another interesting thing is that December, January, and February is like our June, July, and August and everyone is taking their summer holidays/vacations. Kids are out of school and the atmosphere of the city feels really relaxed. Not to mention all the Argentine and Brazilian tourists on the beaches( or playas in Spanish, for those of you who want to learn some new words ;P ). And then it's going to be weird when we move into fall and winter as we move along in the semester and I come back home to spring and summer. Culture shock...
Along the same lines is the time difference. I am currently 5 hours ahead of Mountain Standard Time and it really makes you think when you try to send a message home or see when someone is online. When I go to bed at 11, my family is probably eating dinner and when I get up at 7 the only person who might be up is mi hermana (Larkin) who should only be up if elle estudia (she is studying)!
All of this makes me stop and think about what make the world tick, what "keeps us spinning at our perfect 23" (from a Chris Rice song). It's incredible to see the amazing power and wisdom of our Creator who spoke everything into existence knowing that the earth would have to be tilted toward the sun and spin at a certain speed and rotate around the sun at a certain speed and at a certain distance. He is AWESOME for what he has done for us...for me. And it's my responsibility and my prayer to live my life for his glory each and every day.

Spanish Frustrations

2008-01-21T10:21:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we went to church at la Iglesia de Christo which is actually right next door to the building in which we live and study. ACU and the church have a working agreement for the ownership of the entire building itself (which I’ve been told is complicated, and I haven’t pushed for more information). “Casa ACU” and the church are actually located in a refurbished coffee and tea (café y té) factory, which I’ll try to impart more information on that later when I give you a picture tour of the place. Stay tuned on CCCC2008 for that…!
But what I really wanted to talk about was some of my Spanish frustrations. It’s been rough not being able to communicate with anyone outside of our little “compound” here at the Casa. Even buying bread and meat is more of a chore. I guess I should have tried harder to study some Spanish before taking the plunge into a 4 month study abroad experience! (Mom, that’s your cue to say “I told you so…”) The grocery is the place that I’ve found is the most frustrating because it’s loud and busy and I feel that if I try to stumble through some Spanish, I’m wasting peoples’ time. Garrrr!
Going back to my first statement though, I had a much better experience with attempting Spanish with the people at church. People there were really understanding and willing to talk slower and repeat themselves. We all had to get up and say who we were and a little about ourselves and I felt like I did okay: Me llamo Colter. Soy de Montana y tengo una hermana. Se llamas Larkin y tiene 17 an(~)os… etc. The biggest question they ask all the girls is: “Tienes uno novio?” (Do you have a boyfriend?) and everyone laughs!
Then we started class today and we went to Spanish. I’m so excited to be in this accelerated learning environment and really picking up a bit of Spanish. I just have to get over my fear of messing up or seeming obtrusive as I develop my Spanish skills.

Money and Food (El Dinero y La Comida)

2008-01-19T17:12:00.000-08:00

So a little interesting tidbit about money: Uruguay is basically a completely cash economy and therefore you don't use checks or plastic cards very much if at all unless you are getting money out of an ATM machine. The currency is the Uruguayan peso and there are about 20 of them in a US dollar. This makes it twice as freaky since your mind plays tricks on you seeing as how you are carrying around as much as 500 pesos around without breaking a sweat...it'll take some getting used to. The payoff is that you can relatively cheap food, which will also take some getting used to, as in finding the best deals and how to be the most economical while still maintaining a bit of healthiness (is that even a word, I definitely don't know what it would be in Spanish)?
The most interesting thing that we are finding out about the cash system is that their smallest coin is 50 centesimos, or half a peso. So, when I go to buy a small item for 9.90 pesos I give her a 10 peso coin and don't get any change back, or when I order a meal for 73.40 pesos I only have to pay 73. For a mathematically, Type-A mind like mine, this whole "give and take" thing gets a little frustrating...
To end, I'll list some of the food that I've had while I have been in Montevideo:
Empanadas (probably more about them later, they're like a meat-filled, folded over crescent roll...maybe)
A Chivito (they say it's just a steak sandwich, but the one I got came stacked with bread and egg and tomato and cheese, not to mention the thin steak cut... it was very tasty to say the least)
Chicken and rice
Corn flakes
Ribs and fries
Ham and cheese sandwich
They say that it's really easy to gain weight while down here, and I believe them!

We're here (Somos Aqui)!

2008-01-18T02:19:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone. This is going to be a quick one just to let everyone know that we all made it safely and I believe everyone got all their luggage. We've all moved into our house and are settling in for the next 4 months. Soooooo exciting! Okay, more about the first couple of days later...

Last Day in the States...

2008-01-15T14:27:00.000-08:00

This day has been pretty crazy, in a way. I really just sat around in more orientation classes but all the emotional activity has been pretty interesting... Plus those last minute trips to Mall-Wart jostling elderly women in the check out lines could qualify as crazy.
So this is a big experiment for me, the whole blog thing, and I don't know if I will be able to consistently stay with it, but I'll do my best.
I hope everyone who is reading this is having a wonderful time at home. Wish me the best as I flee the country tomorrow!