Today was our ISA excursion to El Tigre, a delta area outside of Buenos Aires. I got up at 8:15am and had breakfast at 9 (media lunas and hot chocolate). Fani was going to visit her grandchildren after I left. I left about 9:25am and walked to the train station. I had never been there before, but it was easy to find. There were already two other girls there even though I was 10 minutes early. We stood around and talked while we waited for everyone to arrive. I could not believe the number of people who had stayed out until 4, 5, or even 6am going to bars and clubs. As far as I know, only two other people did not go out and party last night! Some of the things they were telling me were quite shocking to my innocent ears! We got on the train and rode for about 35 minutes to the end of the line. We had to wait for another student who had missed the first train to get there. A few people never showed up. We walked to the Puerto de Frutos de Tigre. There were lots of fun shops and stalls to look at. We had 20 minutes to look around before our boat tour. I walked with Will and we looked at several mates (special cups to drink mate in) because we both wanted to buy one, but neither of us did. We walked to the edge of the river and took pictures and then it was time to go. The boat we went in was nice and we got to sit inside. It was a warm day today, but cool in the wind. I sat by a window so I could see better and, of course, take pictures. I have realized that I have this thing for taking lots of pictures in boats. I guess it is because when I am in a boat, I don’t have to focus on where I am going and the scenery is always changing. When we were in Hong Kong, we went on two different boat rides and both times I took bazillions of pictures. Also when I was in Alaska, we rode in a boat and I took a bunch of pictures. I did the same on this boat ride. Apparently, El Tigre is where the rich people in Buenos Aires have their summer homes and come out here in the summer on the weekends. Everyone gets around by boat and there is even a grocery store in a boat that comes around to the houses! The lady giving the tour was speaking Spanish over an intercom so it was very difficult to understand. Our group was so worn out and hung over from the preceding night’s events that about half of them feel asleep during the boat ride. I took lots of funny pictures… hehe! Sleeping people are just about my favorite thing to photograph, just so you know! We went on five different rivers in one hour! There were signs showing which river was which just like road signs. It made me smile. After the boat ride, we were given two hours to eat and look around. I followed some other people because we were supposed to stay together and we went to a restaurant known for its good meat. I had pasta. The food was fine, but it took us the entire two hours just to eat lunch! It made me long for traveling with Amber and Jenny when we would grab food on the go and enjoy more about new places than just the inside of restaurants! I was disappointed that I did not get to look around more. Will bought some mielcitas (honey candy things). They look like mini flavor freezes and are filled with flavored honey. He didn’t really like it and offered them around. I had a strawberry (or frutilla) flavored one. It was very sweet, but I liked it. I want to buy some to bring home but I have not seen any around here. We left to walk back to the train station for the next part of our tour. We were going to take the Train of the Coast (El tren de la costa), but the workers were on strike and so we could not go. We wanted to go back to the market, but Gustavo, our ISA guide, said that we were going to go somewhere different. We got back on the same train and got off at a different stop, not quite to our Belgrano station. We walked through this town and went to this really nice place with grass (haven’t seen any of that in a long time!) and blue sky on the edge of the river. The river was so big that it looked like an ocean to me. I guess on the other side is Uruguay, but we could not see it. It was really nice there. We stayed there for about a half hour taking pictures and walking around. Then Gustavo took us to a resto-bar (combination bar and restaurant) and paid for us to have any non-alcoholic drink we wanted (he used the money we were supposed to have used to take the train to the coast). I had exprimido de naranja which is fresh-squeezed orange juice. It was delicious. We sat outside there for over an hour. We wanted to go back to Belgrano, but I think he was trying to waste time so we would not arrive back too early. We finally left and rode the train home. We still got home over an hour early even with Gustavo’s time-wasting tactics. On the way home (and at the resto-bar) people were making plans for tomorrow. I plan on going to the Presbyterian church kind of near my apartment. No one invited me to come with them tomorrow but I found out what several people were doing. I figure that I can call someone after church and try to meet up with them, if I want. One group is planning on going to Uruguay for the day but they are leaving early in the morning and even though I was sitting with them when they planned their trip, they said rather pointedly that they were not going to invite anyone else because they just wanted it to be their group of six. I left kind of discouraged because I don’t feel like I fit in with my group at all. I walked home by myself in the dark and I did not get robbed or raped, so that is good. Fani was already home from visiting her grandchildren and she fed me dinner (soup, pizza that she over-microwaved so it was tough to chew, and fruit cocktail). I took a shower and read in my bed for almost two hours.
No comments:
Post a Comment