hi there all...and happy new year's eve!!!! i am finally getting the chance to catch up on my blog after a crazy finish to my first semester at the international school of panama.....i am now in the states chillin' with my family and friends and tryin' to catch up on the back log of things...including writing my update....so here is my apology and my hope that the next update comes out sooner, rather than later....i am hopeful that i will do it while i am still in the states this break....but that might be hopin' for a bit too much....
anyway....the second half of the semester flew by...one of the coolest things i did was spend a week in beautiful argentina with two friends of mine from panama....we also hooked up with a friend of mine from ghana who lives and works there now....we spent time in both buenos aires and mendoza (the wine region) and i have found another "b" city in the world i simply love (think budapest, berlin, barcelona, beijing, etc)....let's get on with the adventure and pictures that were....and i hope you enjoy what you see as much as i enjoyed livin' it!!!!
so one of the first stops we made in this amazing town was the cemetery....specifically the recoleta cemetery....which on the day we went was spectacular....this cemetery is all mausoleums....so all crypts above ground...and the artwork of these mausoleums speaks for itself in the pictures....in the shot above you can see the gorgeous day we had (with no humidity!!!! a huge welcome from panama!) and that the red plant in the foreground is actually a poinsettia tree....perfect for the holiday season we are all in at the moment.....
i love this shot....if you zoom in and focus on the black spot in center of this image, you can see that it is a nun in her habit walking through the mausoleums.....she was also with a priest and some other folks....i was hoping to get them both with this backdrop, but to no avail.....however....this is just one row of the cemetery, which has over 6,400 mausoleums and statues and crypts...it is referred to as the labyrinthine city of the dead....freaky, yet cool at the same time....
some of the crypts were falling down and some were in perfect condition....i loved how many had stained glass windows and when the sun shined through them they lit up the inside of the mausoleums....it was stunning.....
the works of art of some of these mausoleums was incredible....and the statues of angels or the people who had died or the religious icons was just incredible.....and with the blue sky, white cloud backdrop....it was a perfect way to spend a wandering afternoon....
of course, one of the most famous mausoleums in the entire cemetery was that of eva perone....known by many as evita....she is considered to be the heart of the argentine people and is still revered by all....
her family mausoleum is the only in the entire cemetery that is allowed to have fresh flowers....no other has any....pretty wild....there was also a line to see her crypt....which was not true for any one else in the cemetery either.....
this is a shot of jess and i, standing in front of a bank.....we have no idea what the people behind us are doing....but we decided that they must love the smell of our hair!!!! hahahahahaha....whatever... it was great to connect with jess....we worked together in ghana....yay team ghana!!!!
the bridge above is a swing-suspension bridge....called the bridge of women...it actually swings open....i loved it...we walked across it later on the trip....but this is a shot as we were passing by it....
this was my favorite sculpture in the entire city....it is called the floralis generica and is a stainless steel flower....huge, as you can see from the comparison of the people in the picture....it is a mobile public sculpture...meaning that it opens at 8am every morning, like a real flower would, and it closes at sunset, like many flowers do...it is controlled by hydraulics and photosensors.....way cool!!!!
buenos aires is the host of the 2018 summer youth olympics.....it is refered to by many as just "BA"....they have started getting the city ready for this honor of hosting these games....should be a great place to host them.....
the building above is called la casa rosada (the pink house)....the balcony on the third floor is the famous balcony that eva perone spoke from as she was in the last stages of cervical cancer....they also say she spoke from here when her soon-to-be husband and president of argetina, juan perone, was in jail....when you do the research though, supposedly this never happened....the park in front of this building is where many protests are held and currently there is a long standing camp to remember the veterans of the war of the falklans....interesting stuff and a beautiful building.....don't cry for me argentina!
here i am on the bridge of women.....the cool one in the shot above....i was soooooo excited to be wearing jeans and closed toed shoes on this spring afternoon.....so much cooler in temperature than panama.....as a matter of fact, i am loving the cold weather we are having in the northeast of the states right now....hats, gloves, scarves, jackets....love it!!!!
one of the must do's in argentina is to go see a tango show....and we went to one of the longest running and most spectacular versions....senor tango.....they even had a live horse in the performance....but my favorite parts were the musicians....they had all of the older musicians who had played with the show, come back and perform....3 violinists, a bass player, a pianist, and three accordion players....we were not allowed to take pictures, but the passion, especially of the accordionists, was amazing and so awesome to watch.....the tango was amazing as well....but the musicians were really phenomenal.....
from buenos aires we flew to mendoza....the wine coutry of argentina (just think malbec)....on our first day we wandered the city of mendoza and found their hometown chocolate factory....mostly by smell we found it.....even in high season, easter, it only employs about 100 people....very tasty....
for our second day in mendoza, we went wine tasting....starting at 9am....lots of wine, so very little time....the first stop was trapiche winery, which actually sells all over the world....it is one of the oldest around and has gone through many changes, but is a beautiful place....the egg looking things are the newest ways they ferment the wine....they are pods made of cement....they say it gives the wine more flavor...we saw them at two of the three wineries we went too....so maybe they have something here....aged in our finest limestone and cement pods....hmmmmmmmmm
the second winery we hit was la casa el enemigo....the house of the enemy....it was started by a guy who actually also is part owner of the trapiche winery....but he wanted to create a small, boutique winery that focused on art, food and tradition....the winery is not really where we were for this tour....however, what they have set up for tours is hell, purgatory and heaven.....you go into a cellar (hell)...where there is amazing art....out into an open area (purgatory) that has more art, and the image you see above was from that part (the virgin mary holding a glass of wine....she is considered the virgin of the wine and is only found in this part of argentina)...and then you walk up steps into the tasting room - labelled as heaven....a very beautiful and hipster oriented place....they have their own organic farm and are really carving out their own niche in this region....it was lovely and the wine was tasty.....
last stop was a five-course paired lunch at the winery called augustino....and this was waaaaaaaaaay over the top....the plates had edible flowers....they let us try four different wines with lunch and a champagne (as much as we wanted).....it was stunning....and in a meat-focused country as this, i have to say the vegetarian meal i was served, was incredible....
this is a shot of us after our lovely wine tour day....literally it was alllllllll day....here you see me with our tour guide extraordinaire sal (his wife runs the company), and my traveling friends shawn and tracy....it was a perfect weather day and a perfect wine day.....
then we headed back to buenos aires.....we flew, but if i did this again, we learned that an overnight bus is a better way to do it....you have dinner with wine on the bus....in completely reclining seats and then go to sleep....when you wake up, you have a few hours to enjoy the argentine scenery and then you are at your destination....one thing i really, really loved about buenos aires (and there are many things i loved), was the street art....this was an entire side of a building that was an image of frida kahlo...if you look in the bottom right corner, you can see a shadow of someone's head....to give you an idea of how big this is.....
while in BA, we stayed in two very different parts of the city....recoleta and palermo....this is a shot from the airbnb we stayed at in the palermo section.....what a view....it was in the hipster and quirky part of town...so cafes and bars and restaurants and art galleries were on every corner.....it was awesome to just walk around....and BA is a very walkable city....
we walked down through the amazing parks and the botanical garden in the city to the planetarium....the galileo planetarium....but unfortunately everything is in spanish.....and although my spanish has improved....it has not improved that much.....but it was a cool structure and lovely day to walk around.....
here is a shot of me with one ot the huge meteors they have found in argentina....loved it....
again....i loved the street art of BA...here is another cool building i took a picture of while walking around in palermo....
and of course the last shot of me having an argentinian beer - ande s- it was actually a tasty dark beer....this toast comes from me to you....and i want to wish you all a very happy new year and all the best to you and yours in 2018!!!! if you have not been to argentina, i would recommend you add it to your list....the capital city and the country are stunning and i really hope i get the chance to return to see some more areas of this enormous and lovely country....
and so i have made it to the end of this update...i am hoping to get another out in the next week and a half, but am not sure that will happen....but i have been exploring parts of panama and would love to share them with you....i hope you enjoyed my tour of argentina...i certainly LOVED visiting this country....again...i hope you all have had a wonderful holiday season and i wish you all the best in 2018!!! thanks as always for reading and feel free to shoot me questions if you ave any....catch ya on the flip side and have a fab day :)
peace out....dani
