Thank goodness, my luck changed for the better after the theft/football disappointments! Well, almost - there was a blip (read on). On Thursday morning, I was up early and checked my emails. It turned out that Fiona, bless her, had hoped to surprise me the day before by coming over to my hostel unannounced! However, she didn't take the address with her, so she spent an hour wandering around San Telmo unable to find my hostel! Anyway, she was free that day, if I wanted to meet her, so I scoffed my cornflakes as quickly as possible, got dressed and left in whirlwind to take the subway to Palermo. I didn't want to try to catch her via eMail again, so I was determined to meet up with her, before she went out for that day.
I arrived at her hostel before she was even out of bed! Phew, I would finally be able to see her face to face, even if I had to wait for her to wake up. 15 minutes later, she emerged in her pyjamas and didn't she get a surprise! It was warm hugs and excited yelps all round, as we had not seen each other since February up in Cairns, Australia! I shared breakfast with her, and so began a day of girlie chats and a lot of catching-up! We headed out to the leather shopping area of Palermo, and I helped her to find a new leather jacket to take home with her. She kept apologising for trying so many different ones on, in so many different shops, but I was genuinely having a great time helping her, it was so much fun. We had a lovely lunch in a local café, and once we'd found the perfect jacket, we treated ourselves to another trip to a café, this time a really quaint one in the back of a bookstore.
We cooked dinner together that night in Fiona's hostel and it was a great end to a great day! I really, really enjoyed myself and it was fantastic to see her. What a difference a year makes - 12 months ago we had never even met, and although we have spent most of this trip doing our own things, we now have a connection of shared and similar experiences. She could see how much I have changed on this trip, and I could see the same in her. I'm looking forward to catching up with her again soon in Ireland!
On Friday, the blip occurred - the laundry had lost a t-shirt (that I was going to bin anyway) and the jumper that I had bought in Melbourne in December. I know it was only £5 and I shouldn't take it back to the UK with me, but I'd grown really fond of it... drat, I had never been robbed and I had never had a problem with my clothes until now. Stupid Buenos Aires! Anyway, I told the hostel so they could sort it out and headed off to the Eva Perón museum. It was beautifully done but I didn´t feel it told me as much about her life as I would have expected. Then, I went off in search of blue and white face paint for the football. Although it was potentially all up in the air, I thought it best to be prepared! I eventually found just the right colours and also hairspray as well!
Back at Tango City, the laundry people came to tell me that they didn't have my clothes because I had never sent them in. Well, I knew for a fact that I had as A) the t-shirt stank and had sweat stains on it from the River Plate match and REALLY needed a wash, and B) I'd been wearing the jumper at breakfast and took it off and put it straight into the laundry bag. Should have known it was going to go wrong as it was really cheap! I insisted that I go with them to the laundromat to check there, not sure what I hoped to accomplish in do so, but never mind! Drat, my clothes were gone and a resolution wasn't forthcoming. I put it to the back of my mind though, as Sandy finally confirmed that night that the football was on and there would be nothing extra to pay, RESULT!!!
Match day had arrived! I was up early, off on the subway in search of some cheap footy shirts! Claire and Laura had agreed to a maximum of 30 pesos each - the first shirts I found were reduced, from 200 to 99, obviously not good enough! I changed tack, hoping to find something in the right colours of sky blue and white, but that was a dead end. I then stumbled across some fake shirts, which for one day would be fine, but they were only available in large. I had been given strict instructions to buy skinny fit ones, but when they turned out to be 30 pesos each, I took and executive decision and bought three (and luckily, the girls were chuffed with them)! I then had enough time to head back to my hostel, shower, get dressed and buy some empanadas for the day ahead before we were on our way to Rosario!
We arrived in Rosario late in the afternoon, which gave us time to stop off at a riverside bar for some free beers, and for me to spray blue and white stripes in my hair, to paint Argentinian flags on my cheeks and then to do so for everybody else on the tour who thought it was brilliant! Then it was time to head to the stadium, a few hours before kick-off, to enable us to get in and find a decent place to stand. Security was tight and we were frisked three times, each time more thoroughly, which we actually found really reassuring. As we climbed the steps up to the highest tier, the stadium was throbbing with the sounds of thousands and thousands of Argentina fans.
The view we were greeted with was unbelievable, a sea of celeste and white, with a tiny, tiny smattering of green and yellow tucked away in one corner - I knew that there would have only been a small quotient of tickets allocated to the Brazil fans, but I was shocked at just how small an area they had been given! We made our way up the terraces and found a decent spot to stand, behind the goal, but high up enough not to have an obstructed view (and not to get peed on by the fans above!!!) I'd been a little apprehensive about have a popular ticket, as opposed to the generally safer and less rowdy platea seating area, but it was surprisingly calm and no problems whatsoever.
There was a fair bit of waiting involved then as we had entered the stadium so early, but as it turned out it was for the best as apparently 3,000 fans with tickets had to be turned away from the gates later on as the ground was at full capacity (therefore a lot of people with fake tickets had managed to get in unscathed!) Crikey, I can't imagine what I would have done if I had been turned away with my valid ticket!!! It was great fun to see some of the teams' stars warming up and doing a few walks around the pitch, and of course, we all grabbed our camera, zoomed in as much as possible and snapped away like crazy as soon as Maradona emerged. (He's still a dirty, cheating little twerp who never knows when to keep his trap shut though!!!) Then there was national anthems, balloons, ticker tape and multi-coloured smoke for the opening ceremony and the vibe was amazing!
The match itself was great entertainment, but maybe you know that unfortunately Argentina lost! Shame really, as it would have been even better to have been there supporting the winning team. It seemed that they had more possession and were working harder than Brazil, but they lacked their northern neighbours' flair and panache - and let in all their goals from free kicks. Schoolboy errors really! The Brazil side seemed to be much dirtier players and loved to showboat - Number 9 had real difficulty keeping vertical, I swear he spent most of the match on the turf! After the game was over, without any incidents either, we had to wait for the Brazil fans to leave first. It was very well policed and the opposing supporters were kept away from each other at all time. Once back on the minibus around midnight, we all dozed off pretty quickly, before arriving back in BA at 5am. It was a long, but amazing day!
Yesterday, I was due a day of rest, especially as it was practically daylight before I got to bed! However, true to form, I was up and about reasonably early and decided to visit Recoleta Cemetery, one of Buenos Aires' most famous landmarks. When the guide books describe it as a city, just were all the inhabitants are dead, they're not kidding! There are no traditional graves as in the UK, but rows and rows of family mausoleums and vaults, and some of the stonework is amazing. This is where the elite and rich of Buenos Aires are entombed, and I've never quite seen anything like it before. Of course, a visit to Evita's tomb was a must!
Later, I met up with Claire, Laura and Darren (UK) for lunch in Plaza Dorrego, we wandered around the San Telmo Sunday markets and found a great little ice cream shop that was really cheap and had at least 40 different flavours. I settled for ¼ kilo of cognac with raisins, coconut cream and chocolate with marachino cherries... when I ordered it in Spanish, it wasn't a simple sentence, but a paragraph!!! That night, I packed my bags ready to leave my backpack in the hostel's storage and to just take a daysack to Patagonia. I just about managed to squeeze all my warm clothing into it!
So, now I am at Aeroparque Jorge Newbery, the domestic airport, waiting to board my flight to El Calafate. Today should have been a breeze, as I was super organised upon leaving the hostel this morning and had loads of time to get here. After breakfast, I went to the port to purchase a ferry ticket to Uruguay for Friday, had time to enjoy some empanadas for lunch and then still had eons to make it to the terminal. Of course, despite taxis being very cheap here, I wanted to take the subway to the bus terminal (17p) and then a bus to the airport (20p). Once at the terminal though, I couldn't find the bus I needed to take and there seemed to be a protest going on somewhere (but of course!), so I didn't want to risk a bus in traffic.
So, would you believe it, I couldn't then find a taxi anywhere so I spent a good half an hour, if not more, pacing around Retiro hoping that eventually I would find a taxi and getting stuck in the middle of patches of concrete between really busy lanes of traffic. I did spot a taxi at one point and was about to get in, when a little alarm went off in my head, as some taxis are supposed to be dodgy around the bus station. I don't know why, but my gut made me walk away from the car. T one point, I pocketed a rock, just in case I did and up in a dodgy cab, because by this time, there was no chance of a bus getting me there on time!
Anyway, in the end it all worked out fine, but I'm still of on my crazy capers after all this time away, you'd think I would have learned by now! Once in a taxi, with a lovely reliable driver, I did get there with plenty of time to spare, so now I'm off to the departure lounge to chill out with my book. I'm reading Atlas Shrugged, it is huge and the writing is tine, but I am completely gripped, everyone should read it! Soon, I'll be back in the sky and this evening in a cosy hostel... with Anh!!! Yippee, this is going to be a great week!
0 comments:
Post a Comment