feliz navidad!

Happy Holidays Everyone!

I am back "home" in the hostel... feels like just yesterday that I left. I enjoyed a wonderful week in Buenos Aires and La Pampa, full of bar-b-qs, poolside sunbathing, christmas shopping (even here I am not immune), and fun filled outings. From Wednesday evening through Saturday night I stayed with Antonela and her wonderful family at their home in Santa Rosa, a city about the size of Boulder that is about 6 hours east of Buenos Aires. I was at her home two and a half years ago when I was living here for study abroad, so it was wonderul to see her parents again, and to spend Christmas with her extended family.

The traditions surrounding christmas here are just similar enough to be familiar, and just different enough to remind you that you are not in the US. On Christmas eve we enjoyed a "mesa fría" [literally 'cold table'] which consisted of a wide variety of cold salads- from beets and pineapple to tuna and mayo. Some of the combinations were new to me, and some were tried and true. Fortunately, being vegetarian, I was not pressured to try the tounge platter...

In many countries in South America, Santa comes at midnight. Dinners are thus timed either to finish right before he comes, or to start right after... The whole shebang happens in a matter of seconds- one of the adults appears saying they swear they just saw a fat man in a red suit run out the front door, and all the kids run into the living room to find their presents. It is not the usual mountain of gifts that you might see under an American tree- instead each person receives a couple of modest gifts, all of which say from "papa noel" even if your aunt hands you the bag and says "I bought this for you!" The modest gift giving is partially due to the fact that here people celebrate "Reyes Magos" or the day of the 3 kings. On the 6th of January kids leave out food for the three kings who pass by the houses and leave presents in the night.

The most surprisingly different tradition surrounding Christmas here, however, is that christmas eve is a big night out for the young folk. For days beforehand, Anto was texting with friends trying to figure out where we would be going out. You see, once the dinner plates are cleared, the sweet breads and toffees have all been eaten, and the presents are all opened, anyone aged 16 and older hits the town. The "kids" go out to clubs, bars, or enormous fields in the middle of nowhere (like we did). Not to be left out of the fiesta, the parents head out to make the rounds at friends' houses too.

The most impressive part of the whole night was probably the tremendous party we went to after dinner. Imagine going to a huge house with a couple acres of property around it, a DJ in the front yard, a DJ in the backyard, another DJ inside and about 2000 people dancing, drinking, and reuniting all over the place. Now imagine that almost every single one of those people either currently attends or graduated from one of the two high schools in your city! It is like a tremendous reunion of anyone age 16-30 who has decided to go out on christmas eve. We rolled up to the gates at about 3:45am (a very normal time to be arriving, mind you) and the place was packed. We stayed for about 2 hours and scooted out under cover of daylight, just before they shut off the speakers at 6am... The whole time I was there, I just kept thinking "I can't believe it's Christmas eve..."

It was a bit wierd, I must admit, to wake up Christmas morning to a more or less normal day, without the frenzy of present opening and the excitement of it all... Instead we ate a bar-b-q in which literally a whole small pig was roasted. It seemed like just another meat filled grill, until Antonela and her cousin started fighting over the tail of the pig and Anto won and I suddenly found myself watching her chomp away on a thuroughly roasted, very familiar looking corkskrew tail. Shortly thereafter the meat platter passed around again and I looked down to see the unmistakable jaw bone, teeth and all sitting there. Anto's dad cheered with excitment upon discovering it as I passed him the platter, and I just focused on my delicious salad and politely declined offers to try some of the "professionally cooked" piggy...

In all it was a great Christmas and I was greatful to be with Anto on such a family oriented holiday. Though I don't know if I would ever really be able to get used to the summer weather and Christmas eve party traditions, everything else was more or less christmas as usual!

I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful holiday season. On to New Years!!

cate

fading into the sunset

Tomorrow morning I take off for Argentina again for a week. I will be spending 5 days in Buenos Aires and then heading with Antonela to her hometown of Santa Rosa, a city about the size of Boulder that is 6 hours south of BA. I'll be spending Christmas there with her and her family, then returning to Buenos Aires for another day before I catch my ferry back over the river to Uruguay. To say goodbye to Montevideo, my home of the last 3 months, I went for a sunset walk along the boardwalk with Gaby last night. We found ourselves at my favorite viewpoint of downtown right as the sun was sinking down...

The beach was full of people, and the rides at the small amusement park were hopping too!

Gaby and me

A fisherman trying for a late in the day catch.

What is that glowing red thing in Gaby's hand?!

With only three weeks of my trip left, I am feeling satisfied with the way that things have gone so far. I am looking forward to what is left, and I know that it will go by quickly and slowly all at the same time. Thinking of all of my friends and family at home as the holidays approach. I hope you all are well and enjoying getting in that good ol holiday spirit! Christmas trees and lights are popping up around the neighborhood, but it looks a little funny considering that it is far from winter here. The ones with the fake snow on them really crack me up, especially considering the fact that many uruguayans have never seen snow before! Well, unitl Argentina!

Of Escapades and Naps in the Shade

Last week four gals from the US stayed a few days at the hostel. One night they asked me how to get to Minas, a small town about 2 hours inland from Montevideo, where there is a nature reserve. Turns out I had just been talking about going there for a day but didn't want to go by myself... some things are just best shared. Well we got to thinking and decided that the cheapest (and funnest) way to get there was by renting a car between the 5 of us and hitting the road... which is precisely what we did!

Minas and the surrounding park were absolutely picturesque. Rolling hills and rock formations, miles of unocupied space, and winding dirt roads streching on as far as the eye could see. We enjoyed the journey, always taking the scenic route when there was the option, and I reveled in the freedom of traveling by car rather than long distance bus... It was a beautiful day and we rolled the windows down, turned up the random local radio stations, and stopped frequently to do all the stuff your supposed to do on a road trip. Like buy yummy local pasteries. Or ask for directions. Or stop along the highway to take pictures. Or take a killer nap next to a waterfall... It was also interesting to interact with uruguayans from the coutnryside. While I have found Montevideanos to be very well educated (Uruguay has 98% literacy, the US has about 88%), cultured, and curious, I was not sure how people from other regions would compare. I was very plesantly surprised to find that the people I interacted with were equally well informed and very well spoken.

As for the scenery we encountered along the way, I thought pictures would serve as a much better description. Also, Gomez the hostel cat got a little jealous when she saw that I hadn't put a picture of her on the blog, so she snuck one in there too... enjoy!

It's a hard life being the resident hostel cat...

An old truck along the route to Minas.

The "panoramic route" back from the water fall had some great views.

Salto del Penitente- outside of Minas.

The waterfall from above.

An authentic gaucho... like the slip on knee high boots, chaps and a beret to take my horse to the grocery story kind of gaucho...

Horses grazing on someone's front lawn.

A New President

Buenos Dias Gente-

I have been a bad girl, ignoring the existance of my blog for some time now. I have many things to say, but sometimes I just want the entry to write itself. I have also have been feeling a strong resistance towards tecnology of late, which doesn't help... all the same, here I am now, finally catching up on the blog. As with last time, there will probably be a motherload of entries all at once, so thank you for you patience in advance.

As more than one person from home has asked me about it, I think it is necessary that I write a bit about the presidential elections. Uruguayan elections have a round one, and if necessary, a round two as well. Voting is required by law, and from 8pm the night before elections through 8pm on election day, the sale of alcohol is illegal. There are 4 main parties here, one extreme left, one socialist, one slightly right of center, and one conservative party. To win the vote in the first round, your party must have more than 50% of the votes, otherwise the voting goes to second round. In late October the first round of elections determined two leading parties- the socialist party with 48% of the votes, and the "white party" (the conservatives) with just under 30%. The results meant that the final vote would determine the presidency between a former intelectual revolutionary (who was an active rebel during the dictatorship of the 70's and who spent 7 years in jail for speaking out), and a former militant of the dictatorsihp (and known alcoholic accused of stealing money and land during his military years)...

People are very passionate about politics here. Weeks before the election the boardwalk was filled with people every afternoon from 3pm on, waving their party's flags, cruising down the road honking their horns, and passing out flyers and voting pamphlets. The current president is part of the socialist party, but is more conservative than Mujica, the current candidate. Mujica was born and raised in the countryside, and is probably the most viceraly emotional politician I have ever seen. In an interview a couple of weeks ago the reporter asked him about his family and the man literally started crying on national television... Meanwhile a video on youtube was circulating with the other candidate, Lacalle, conducting an interview while uncontestably drunk...

The second round of voting was last Sunday, and within three hours of the polls closing the results were already in (ah, the benefits of living in a country with only 3 million inhabitants!)- Mujica the socialist won 53% of the votes and Lacalle conceeded the elections to him. Oh boy did people celebrate! Mujica gave his heartfelt, and improvised speach in the heart of the old city, and the streets were overflowing with people screaming, waving flags, and dancing. The boardwalk, which wraps all around the city following the coastline, was a steady stream of cars honking and waving banners and people singing. All of this in the pouring rain...

Needless to say, witnessing elections in another country is always an interesting experience. But I was particularly impressed by the passion and genuine interest people took in the elections- especially the youth. Coming from a country where the youth vote is almost a joke, it was refreshing to see people so involved in the politics of their country. It will be interesting to see how Uruguay develops in the next five years under socialist direction!