Tina's wanderings around the world

A muy, muy feliz año nuevo, mis amigos! I was unsure (though had a pretty good idea) of what to expect of my New Year in Buenos Aires--the hostel group headed out to go party and I hid in my corner, watching The Mummy 2, quickly scribbling some New Year´s resolutions. About two minutes before the New Year rang in, I ran to my room, grabbed my recently purchased (and long-desired) dulce de leche drink and coconut cookies to help me ring in my new year. I cheers'ed with the few random hostelers that stayed back, then went outside to watch the bombardment of fireworks (and ducked under the awnings so as not to get in the way of the glass bottles that were flying out from who knows where). The fireworks were of the home variety, though LOUD and close, a few sounding like they might have landed on the roof. So, it would seem, is new year´s in Buenos Aires. Or mine, anyway. But if I can´t spend the holiday with my friends, I would prefer to spend it by myself, and here quite shortly, I´m...

I seem to be revisiting a lot of the same cities. Apparently Lima, Cusco, and Buenos Aires are my cities of choice in the bottom half of the Americas. What can I say, I’m a creature of habit! My habits, however, in terms of Buenos Aires are changing a bit. Since I’ve already done a hefty bit of walking around the center of BA, I am transitioning from the newly arrived sight-seer to the second time around “now what the hell am I doing”-er. Splendid question, there, one that seems to keep popping up again and again. Well, as we already know, the rest of the backpacking community seems to find partying and drinking to be the best thing to do, but that’s just not my thing. I get all kinds of curious stares and I actually feel guilty for not wanting to go out and party, but that’s just all kinds of ridiculous, I shouldn’t feel guilty for not wanting to spend my days in hangover fashion. Though I admit, it is so hot here in Buenos Aires right now that I end up spending a lot of time in the d...

Read that PWF, my friends. Yes, that's right, Pagan Winter Festival, the only holiday to speak of with trolls, ostriches with spaghetti and tin foil on their head, and electable dates. Back in Lima. Yet again. It’s so funny, most travelers hate Lima, because although it’s a big city, there’s really not a whole lot to do here. I mean, I suppose I could do a bit more of experimenting with the live music in Barranco, but I’m not huge into the nightlife scene, especially not by myself. Dorita’s gone now, Vanessa works at night, which basically leaves me at the house at night. BUT. That has left me ample time to experiment with what is quite possibly my most wonderful computer program discovery—Skype. Big snaps for talking to friends and family for free! I know I already mentioned Skype before, but seriously it’s amazing. I’ve had two or three 3-hour long phone calls thus far. They’re the wonderful kinds of calls where I get to catch up with people I haven’t spoken to in a while, and th...

So. Hmm…recap of happenings as of late? As of four days ago, I thought I had the rest of my trip more or less figured out. But then I received two emails in the same day, both pertaining to the previously mentioned “plans”—in a changing fashion. First, I got an email from Mary saying that travel plans for January have changed and that Venezuela will now be the targeted country (and not Colombia). I’m pretty sure I’m the person that brought up the idea of Venezuela in the first place (chocolate tree farms anyone?), but after having been advised repeatedly to not go to Venezuela (mainly by Venezuelans) I decided that I would prefer to not go to Venezuela and perhaps I’ll venture into the jungle of Peru instead to discover my beloved chocolate farms. So. January is all up in the air now. Then I opened up my next email, from a name I didn’t recognize. Well, I’ll give you the back up really quickly. I was browsing around on Craigslist on one of my more languid days in Lima and I decided it ...

La laa la laa la laaaaaaaaa…. Cusco is treating yours truly quite well. I’m still having my bouts of “What the hell am I doing?” but they’re lessening a bit here and there. I’m feeling a bit guilty for not having gotten my act together and done some sort of volunteering, but there’s still some thought organizing going on, self-esteem building, etc. etc. Typical Tina-business, but oh how I love the self-help. : ) It’s funny, amongst my friends here I’m the only one down with the auto-ayuda literature, movies, and other such media. No matter, because I continue in my endeavors, which currently find me amidst a book called “The Cinderella Complex” (oldie, but with some good concepts), an abundance of Paulo Coehlo (my dictionary is a constant accompaniment, as all of these books are in Español!) and sharing Garden State with my two newest Peruvian friends: Nano (my “brother” here in my home stay) and Dany (my two-time Spanish teacher at San Blas). I’m also starting to do a massive repeat o...

Tired. Ever so tired, and I’m not entirely sure why. Shall I justify my lethargy? I think I shall, because many people don’t seem to understand my world that I like to think of as tranquil. They like to think of me as unexciting, but I like to think that I live in a mellow world that doesn’t require lots of excitement to keep it moving. The fact that I’m in Cusco right now is enough for me. I can look out of my window right out onto Inca walls. Granted, they’re not the amazing, perfectly fitted stone walls that are to be found in Machu Picchu and in the Plaza de Armas, but it’s enough. It’s enough to be able to learn Spanish here. It’s enough to walk to school every day on ancient cobble-stone streets. Even if they weren’t ancient, it would still be enough for me to walk on the modern-day cobble stone streets amidst the adobe houses, down the narrow passageways behind and in front of modern-day Incas. I can see beautiful cathedrals with a bloody history attached, can witness the curren...

It’s been a while…Buenos Aires didn’t really allow for a lot of sitting down and writing time, a fact that I would be reintroduced to time and again. For a lot of people, Buenos Aires signifies tango, beef, matè, Evita…for me, Buenos Aires signified endless walking and exploring, finally seeing green inside a city (including grass you could walk on, dare I mention nap on—a dream come true for me!), staying up far too late every night, football/soccer, and the reincarnation of my first year of MDA camp (read that, a pick of the day—whoops, I’m regressing). Let’s go back to the beginning, though… I got to the Lima airport to catch my flight at about 8:00 am. Everything was going fine, although I was tired from staying up super late the night before, having gone to yet another massive national stadium concert with Dorita. The concert started at 7:30 pm and we left around 12:30 pm—and the concert wasn’t even finished yet! Needless to say I was dragging a bit and looking forward to sleeping...

I forgot that I had written anything about the day we went to Macchu Pichu, so I re-wrote about all of it. And now I'm cutting it down again! Our next stop was the train station to catch the train to Aguas Calientes. I managed to squeeze in a cat nap on the way up. :) Then from Aguas Calientes, we took a bus up the famously switchbacked road to Macchu Pichu. And…finally…we made it to see one of the newest members of the seven wonders of the world—and it was absolutely stunning. Its setting up in the greenery-covered mountains is breath taking and I can easily say that it ranks as the top man-made site I’ve ever seen. (Oh look at me, I’m turning into a South American guidebook—it must be ranked as the best something.) I’m struck by how normal climbing around Macchu Pichu seemed. It didn’t even seem like we were doing anything out of the norm by climbing up the terraces (and revising our site-seeing trajectory to allow for a less strenuous route—I can’t even imagine having done the ...