Almost 23-hour journey to Iguazu Falls [YQrtw Day 74 Jun 20]

Location: Puerto Iguazú, Argentina

The headline’s a bit of an exageration because our bus did stop for dinner and to San Ignacio for a bit of sightseeing. Still, it took us about 23 hours to arrive in Puerto Iguazú.

I’m writing this post on the lower bunk bed in a 10-person dorm in a hostel. There is mould on the wall and the ensuite bathroom looks a bit iffy. My complaints stop here.

Yesternight, we boarded the bus at about 7:30pm and off we went. While I was terrified of being on the party bus, there were seats in the lower deck where there was less partying so I enjoyed quite a lot of sleep.

At about midnight, the bus stop at a rest stop for about an hour. It was very very cold outside.

It seemed to me that there were almost 100 people in the rest stop restaurant. It was the beginning of the super long weekend and service at the place seemed really slow.

You first have to queue up at the first line to get a receipt for your food. Then join the super long queue for food and wait for the food to be cooked. Then you find a table.

Thank goodness I bought a ham and cheese sandwich from Buenos Aires so I didn’t have to join the crazy queue.

While waiting to go back on the bus, I enjoyed seeing my breath come out in white wisps although I couldn’t catch it on camera.

Back on the bus, I settled down into my seat, pluggged my ears, covered myself with my Emirates blanket and fell into deep sleep. ZZZZzzz.

The Next Day…

It was about 7:30am when I woke up. The bus was passing by fields dotted with what I first thought were boulders. Later I found more “boulders” and these had legs. Hey, they are cows!

I kept imagining how tasty the cows would be but there was no steak around to pacify my stomach.

Our next stop was a petrol station with its 2 cubicles in the ladies’ and a hot water dispenser for mate lovers of Argentina.

Then it was a long long long bus ride to San Ignacio.

Ruins of San Ignacio Miní

Unfortunately, it was raining when we got to San Ignacio. I changed to my flip flops so I would not end up with wet socks and shoes.

You can read more about San Ignacio Mini on Wikipedia because I didn’t really understand the Spanish-speaking guide. It was the first time I’ve seen a Christian construction built from red earth, a nice change from the usual stone stuff I’ve seen in Europe.

After the guided tour, we walked in the drizzle to a tourist restaurant. Along the way, there were a lot of souvenir stalls.

After lunch, it was a long bus ride to our hostel in Puerto Iguazu. The rain did not stop.

It’s now 8:21pm and my dorm mates are playing Spanish songs loudly. At least the songs are nice. I’m now thinking if I should head out for dinner because I don’t think it’s covered in our tour package.

See you soon!

To the US embassy for my visa [YQrtw Day 73 Jun 19]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

This morning, I woke up at 6:00am to get ready for my appointment at the US embassy for my visa application interview. It was really painful waking up at that hour to brush my teeth in the cold air.

As with yesterday, I took a cab. The driver took a detour but we reached even faster than the cab yesterday.

My appointment slot was the earlier at 7:00am. About 20 people were already queuing outside (and not including those already in), waiting for the multiple checks.

Standing outside in the dark, I could see my breath when I breathe out. It was really really cold.

Anyway, let me tell you more about the different queues and checks at the US embassy:

The first check was outside of the embassy gate. Our passports and a form were checked. Then, we stood in another line next to the first one.

The second line is to queue for the X-ray machine and metal detector. Afterwards, there is a third line before the proper building. Here, we give the fingerprints of four of our fingers, either the left or the right, depending on which the lady behind the counter wants.

Finally, we go to the inside of the building where the air is heated. Here, we are told to sit in chairs to wait for our turn to queue.

When I first reached the room, I noticed that there was only two counters that were open. TWO! There was about 50 people inside the room but only 2 counters?

I decided to stop worrying and begin reading the only book I bought. I actually finished reading Mafalda while I was waiting. Of course I only understood about 20% of the content but I finally finished reading one of the books I’ve bought.

After I finished my book, I read all of the fliers within my eyesight for about 5 times and kept my mind blank.

Then I noticed that there was 3 counters. Later, that turned into 5 and it was my turn to queue.

My counter was 9 and I had a young man who interviewed me. He asked a lot of questions about my travel plans, my previous trip to the US, what my father and mother do for a living and so on.

When the interview ended, the official said he was giving me a 10-year tourist visa for the US. What a great surprise! I was expecting a US$160 transit visa but it turned into a 10-year visa. Woo!

Then I hurried to the bus station to catch the bus. I had a class to catch and I have to check out before I go to class.

I managed to reach the hostel at about 9:05am. Everything I had was about packed so I just stuffed them into the cupboard before telling the receptionist that I was checking out.

I reached class a little late and spent most of my time forcing my eyelids to stay open. The lack of sleep feels like being drunk as I was talking louder than usual.

When class ended, I had a strange feeling in my chest. Was it sadness? Anyway, I couldn’t tell.

Lunch was again empanadas. I headed back to the hostel and like an illegal squatter, used their ameninities and finish writing this post.

Heading to Iguazu Falls

Photo source: CIA (Honestly!)

I’m joining a tour group to Iguazu Falls, up in the north-east of Argentina. It’s supposed to be a really gorgeous place. I’ve packed my mosquito repellent so I think I’ll do fine.

Unfortunately, since my passport is still with the US embassy, I will not be able to go to the Brazil part of Iguazu or even to Paraguay. I’m quite sad about that but you win some, you lose some.

I really hope I have internet all the way so I can complain to update you about the party tour bus.

PS Last night, I cut my hair at the back of my head with a razor because it was growing into a mini mullet. Urgh.

To Recoleta Cemetery, again/ Visa application [YQrtw Day 72 Jun 18]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

In the morning, I woke up at 6:15am to get ready for my visa application to the United States. I need to have 2 visits to the US’s office and embassy.

Today’s visit was only to get my photo and my finger prints taken. I took a cab to the application center because I did not want to get up extra early to take the public transport there.

The process was very quick. I queued with the rest of the people, had my application form stamped and was asked a few questions about my transit.

I was seated at the “special” area because I cannot speak enough Spanish. At the photo taking counter, I was asked a few more questions and was given a bobby pins so I can pin up my hair for the photo.

And it was done. I took the subway back to the hostel because I wasn’t as rich to take a cab both ways.

The subway wasn’t very crowded and I managed to return to the hostel at 8:00am, in time for breakfast.

Classes sped by as we crammed our minds with reflexive verbs and vocabulary for telling the time. Soon it was lunch and I had Chinese food again.

School trip to the cemetery

Our school trip today was to Recoleta, specifically the cemetery. The place is so gorgeous that I do not mind visiting again.

We had some questions which we needed to ask passerbys for answers.

Our teachers stopped one lady in oversized sunglasses who resembled a frazzled Anna Wintour. Wintour was haughty in her answers, saying that for her, the most famous person in the cemetery was her family.

Excuse me.

Another gentleman with his wife were more than helpful with their answers, showering us Level 1.3s with lots and lots of words. Thank you kind sire.

After the CCA, I head back to the hostel to pack my bag. I’m heading to Iguazu Falls tomorrow evening with a tour group. The group will leave on Wednesday evening and reaching Buenos Aires on Monday.

Updates on the blog might be paused if I cannot get good internet or if I am driven mad by the party tour bus. I am deathly afraid of parties.

What are your plans for the weekend?

A coffee at Cafe Tortoni [YQrtw Day 71 Jun 17]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

There is a long weekend this week in Argentina. Our school will also be closed from Thursday to Sunday. To replace our lessons, we were required to come to school one hour earlier.

One hour earlier sounds easy. Just 60 minutes earlier than the usual routine, right?

Well, my usual routine is waking up 2 hours before class and taking my time with my breakfast and reading. However, I couldn’t bear waking up at 7am when the sky was still dark and the air cold so I woke up at 7:30am.

The sky was still dark and the air cold. I was sure I had woken up some of my roommates when I fumbled with taking my things for the shower and for school.

Living right across the street from school has its perks, I arrived with only 10 minutes to spare before class.

We had a new teacher and a new classmate from Holland. Our 4-hour class was great since we got to talk a lot but all the new information needs time to be absorbed. Let me give that 2 years.

Trip to Cafe Tortoni

Our after school activity today was a trip to the oldest cafe in Buenos Aires–Cafe Tortoni. Before heading there, we sat in class and listened to a Tango song about the cafe and the famous people who visited there.

We were supposed to ask the waiters questions about the cafe when we reach there. I managed to ask only for the Wi-Fi password because I’m such a noob. Boo hoo.

Still, we learnt that the cafe’s entrance wasn’t at Avenida de Mayo as the road wasn’t built when the cafe first opened. Instead, the back of the cafe was the entrance.

The cafe is pretty. One part of the ceiling had stained glass while the walls are decorated with donated paintings.

Still, I find a cafe most useful when the coffee is large and I can read for an hour without being disturbed.

After our trip to cafe, it was free time. I headed to Carrefour, where the security guard knows me by sight, to buy something for the night’s dinner.

That something turned out to be a midsized cabbage. All the other leafy greens were either rotting or looking fresh and expensive in a plastic bags.

Unfortunately, the cabbage was really tough. I’ve sliced it into small slices but it tasted like chewing through paper.

The vegetable also lacked the usual sweetness I find in cabbages. Are winter vegetables exceptionally bad?

The night was spent drinking more honey lemon to prevent any cold that might want to visit.

The night has become really cold, my fingers are numb as I type in the kitchen. I hope I am able to find the remote control later so I can turn up the heater in my room.

Oh, I have a bunk mate now. Hope that my climbing in and out of bed won’t wake her up in the middle of the night. (Actually, deep down I hope she moves out sooner than I do.)

Have a good week, folks!

Day trip to Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay [YQrtw Day 70 Jun 16]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina; Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay

I woke up at 6:45am today to prepare for my ferry to Colonia del Sacramento which required me to check in starting 8:00am. I was kind of excited to head to Uruguay because I could get a new stamp in my passport as well as have my Argentinian visa extended.

The hostel receptionist helped with calling a cab while I tried to gobble a medialunas. Medialunas is a Argentinian croissant. Unfortunately, the one served at my hostel is usually slimy and cold so I do not have a very good impression of it.

The taxi fare from the hostel to the port was cheaper than I thought. It was only 37 pesos after the phone booking charge.

The streets were empty at 7:30am and the only taxis I saw were all heading to the port.

The port for Colonia Express was in front of the casino. I’ve seen advertisements for the casino on a large screen in the middle of the city. It showed a rather ridiculous ad of a man winning loads of money and marrying Lady Luck who just happened to walk in while he was gambling.

Quick immigration process

The immigration process at the port was really fast. First you go to a counter where the Argentinian officer stamp your exit stamp. Then the passport is passed to the person in the next cubicle who happens to be an immigration officer from Uruguay.

The Uruguay officer didn’t even asked where I was staying and I was the proud owner of an entry stamp for Uruguay.

Before we were able to head to the immigration counter, we had to scan our luggage. The customs officer had a rather sweet looking golden retriever with him. The dog looked mostly bored with his tongue lolling out.

The dog had to sniff at all sorts of different luggage. My water bottle was repeatedly waved in front of the dog, as if it might contain something dangerous.

Unlike the ferry I was on in Greece, the boat was rather small. All the seats were taken and I sat with a family of three.

During most of the journey, I was napping with my mouth open. Oops.

Pretty little Colonia

The sky was gray and the clouds looked swollen when our ferry arrived at Colonia. Worst thing was that the town was next to the sea so the wind was very cold.

Luckily, the town was so pretty that I didn’t mind being outside.

Abandoned building wasting away gracefully with a veil of vines.

This wall of green and red leaves looked like it popped out of some story book.

There seems to be a lot of unused vintage cars in Colonia.

This car even has a plant growing inside.

Random stuff in Colonia

Most of the shops at Colonia were closed. I couldn’t figure out where the museums were so I walked into random streets.

Even though the place looked deserted, I felt rather safe and was (kind of) sure that no one would pop out of nowhere and mug me.

I love the painting on this Uruguay 200 pesos.

I was lured into a restaurant for an expensive cup of not so good coffee with milk. I sat there for more than an hour reading to take advantage of their heating.

I also tried to se if the ATMs in Colonia could give me US dollars. I seemed to have terrible luck as all of them said U$, and not US$.

I chanced upon the tourist information center, was given a map and walked around in the center to look at the rather small exhbition.

I couldn’t have a nice lunch since the bad coffee ate up about half of my Uruguay money. But I did have a rather good sandwich with a sausage in it.

At about 2pm, the sky looked like it might rain any time so I head back to the port to do what I do best…reading.

The immigration process in Colonia was the same as in Buenos Aires with two immigration officer sitting side-by-side. I read a little more before the ferry was about to leave.

When we got back to Buenos Aires, it was really dark. The guy at the taxi stand recommended those who were heading to the city center to take the bus instead of wait for a taxi that might take about 20 minutes.

Since the port was in the “bad” part of La Boca, I trailed one of the ladies who asked about buses. She led me to the right street and I eventually found the right bus back. I still had to take a short subway ride back since I wasn’t sure of the bus would stop in front of my hostel.

Still, all is well and I was not mugged. Three cheers to that!

Where have you recently been to for a day trip? Share your comments below.

Preparing for my visa run/ Streets of Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 69 Jun 15]

[I wrote this yesterday but forgot to click on Publish. Doh]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

This is the first time during the entire trip that I’m conscious that it is a weekend. Usually everyday jumbles up together since I do not have a routine separating the weekdays from the weekends.

Today, I planned to finish at least 2 days of revision in the morning. Sadly, I had to deal with printing my documents for the US visa application and that took up half of the morning.

I spent another half of the morning reading up on Veelas in the Harry Potter world (I’m now at GoF!) which led to more useless web surfing.

In the morning, I also booked ferry tickets to Colonia del Scaramento, Uruguay, for my very first visa run.

Wait, YQ, you can’t just drop new vocabulary like that into your post and expect us to Google it.That’s just lazy.

Probably not how the Argentina-Uruguay ferry looks like

OK OK, I’ll explain. Long term travellers do visa run to extend the length of their visa. The do this visiting another country and coming back to the country of their choice in a short period of time.

Take me for an example, when I arrived in Argentina, the immigration officer gave me a 30-day visa. (I seriously thought it was 90 days. Damn you VisaHQ.)

That 30 day deadline is coming up in 2 week’s time and I will become an illegal alien if I overstay.

However, since I’m applying for a US visa, I suspect that my passport would be kept with the US embassy for at least a week since next Thursday and Friday are public holidays. If I have terrible luck, I might even overstay.

So to extend my visa, I will visit Uruguay. I will get an exit stamp at the Argentine side and a new entry stamp when I come back in the evening.

Thankfully my visa run is just a ferry ride away. I’ve read horror stories such as Juno from Runaway Juno who had to do a 573km visa run.

After concluding my affairs of the morning, I decided to take a walk and visit the second hand book stores my teacher told us about.

Streets of Buenos Aires

Luckily, Ave Corrientes, where the bookshops are, is very near the hostel. I only had to walk about 3 blocks to get there.

Along the way, I snapped a few photos so you can see how Buenos Aires looks like.

Head's up on Buenos Aires's street — Head’s up on Buenos Aires’s street

I spotted this map of Westeros but I do not think the story universe actually looks this neat.

Poked fun by a jerk

I browsed through one of the second hand bookstores. It didn’t look like the usual second hand bookstores crammed with books from top to bottom shelf. Instead, the books were arranged in stacks on tables.

There were a lot of interesting books around. I was tempted to get a Book of Myths for Children which had Greek legends but 22 pesos wasn’t something I wanted to spare.

At last, I found a Sweet Valley Twin book. I’m more attached to the Sweet Valley High series but that book was only 3 pesos so I bought it.

At the cashier, I made a language mistake by saying, “Good.” when the cashier said, “Good day.” The other person at the cash register was unkind and asked his friend repeatedly if he asked “Good day” and laughed.

I was rather upset about that. When I left the shop, I kept imagining that I knew enough Spanish to retort, “Well, at least I’m learning another language. What about you?”

Alas, I do not know that much Spanish.

On Ave Corrientes, Ave 9 de Julio

Enough complaining, let’s get back to sightseeing Buenos Aires.

Newstand. I'm very scandalized that they display X-rated books publicly here. Mostly they have covers of half naked women with large breasts. — Newstand. I’m very scandalized that they display X-rated books publicly here. Mostly they have covers of half naked women with large breasts.

From the poster, Camila looks like a scandalously good show.

See that big poster of an Argentinine flag and the pope? It's from the city, to celebrate Papa Francesco's new job. — See that big poster of an Argentinine flag and the pope? It’s from the city, to celebrate Papa Francesco’s new job.

Dinner was another nice meal of home cooked steak with mushrooms. It’s strange that the mushrooms were more expensive than my two rather large pieces of beef.

How was your weekend?

School trip to MALBA (Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires) [YQrtw Day 68 Jun 14]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

I finally managed to pass the Candy Crush level that I was stuck for about 2 months. This morning, I was stuck at another level and I left the hostel for school a bit later. In the process, I forgot to put on a jacket and was assaulted by the bitter winter wind.

The last day of class for the week was a bit more relaxed. Even though I do not feel “TGIF!”, it’s great to take a break so I can catch up on my revisions.

[Memo to self, memorize numbers, important verb conjugations and write a few lines of composition during the weekend.]

After school activity today was a visit to the Latin American Art Museum of Buenos Aires. I’ve not visited any museums in Buenos Aires, which is strange since I love museums.

In front of MALBA is a system with lights of three different colors. I thought that it was just some fancy art installation in front of the museums.

Macarena, you know her from previous school trips, explained that the lights show if there are too many cars on the road.

When we were going into the exhibition, there was a bit of confusion at the ticket counter. The museum insisted that all of us needed to have student IDs to pay student price even though there was a school letter. Out of spite, I did use my *wink* student ID *wink* and the price was 16 pesos (32 pesos for full price).

Interestingly, those with “Samsung Smartphones” can get two tickets for the price of one. It’s because Samsung’s one of the sponsors, or something. This was the one of the times I wish I own a Samsung instead of an Apple.

Art Moderno

Since the museum is about Latin American art, all the pieces were modern looking. This contrasted with the museums in Europe where many of the works were around the Renaissance period.

Even though the works were modern, some of them were dated from 1926 so we can’t really call them modern.

Macarena asked us to tell what we thought the paintings were about. I’m glad to report that I was able to talk about the paintings in more words than gestures.

Out of all the works, I was most impressed with Diego Rivera’s Retrato de Ramón Gómez de la Serna (Portrait of Ramón Gómez de la Serna). Even though Ramón Gómez is a good guy, I felt the potrait showed something like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.

Diego Rivera, Retrato de Ramón Gómez de la Serna (Portrait of Ramón Gómez de la Serna),

Diego’s partner Frida is also exhibited.

My most favorite piece was this cheerful work: Rafael Barrada’s Quiosco de Canaletas (Kiosk in Canaletas). There’s something about the blue that catches my attention.

I stayed on to look around at the museum while some of the others left. I was disappointed to find that only the first floor was exhibiting while the rest were closed.

Back to the hostel

Luckily, there was Wi-Fi at the museum and I found the route back to the hostel. I spotted a bus stop with buses going to Plaza Constitution. What I didn’t realize until I got down at Constitution was that I needed to go to Congressio, not Constitution.

When I arrived at the wrong destination, I had to walk back about 20 blocks to get back to the hostel. The sky was almost dark when I reached my elevator at about 6pm.

Dinner was a satisfying porridge of potato soup with spinach. The hostel mate who gave me rice yesterday gave me a whole bowl of leftover rice which I dumped into my soup.

I have a bad photo of my porridge so I’ll leave it to your imagination.

Until next time!

Who is your favorite Latin American painter?

It’s steak time! [YQrtw Day 67 Jun 13]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

After my having steak and champagne mistake, I thought I should stop going out to eat steaks. The problem is, Argentina is famous for steak.

So what’s the next best thing? Cooking my own steak.

Wednesday and Thursdays are cheap meat days at the nearby Carrefour. They gave me a discount coupon with a value 30% of the price of the meat I bought today. I guess this means I’ll have steak again soon with the coupon.

Cooking steak in a hostel kitchen is easy

When I bought the meat, the three pieces in the A$20 (S$5) pack didn’t look that much. But it looked a lot bigger as I seasoned them with salt. A dorm mate even asked, “Are you having all three now?” Indeed, I am.

I cooked them in batches since the frying pan was a little too tiny to host all three of the meat. They turned out medium rare and were bleeding profusely when I sat them for 10 minutes.

Eating steak in a hostel kitchen is even easier

While it was great stuffing my face with steak, the cut that I bought wasn’t that tasty. (Do you think I’ll admit that my cooking is bad. Of course not.)

Next time, I’ll buy a better cut and see how it goes.

Until next meal!

Have you cooked in a hostel before? What’s your best dish?

Chinese food by weight in Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 66 Jun 12]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

Today was one of the most uneventful day of my time in Buenos Aires. The school didn’t have any after school activities and I had to finish my transit visa application for the US.

Even though it was the third day of Spanish class, it felt like I’ve been doing this for a long time. It’s probably because having 3-hour lessons at a go isn’t very healthy but time does fly when we’re in class.

After class, I popped into one of the supposed “All-You-Can-Eat” places. It turned out to be a Chinese place and sold food by weight.

I picked some of the lighter food: chicken parts with less bones, squid and fried rice. This whole plastic bowl of food was for A$22 (~S$5.50).

It’s not that cheap when compared to Chinese food back home. But here in Argentina where a cheap steak meal would set you back A$45, it’s kind of a miracle that you can find something filling at this price.

The side dishes were quite alright and were quite authentic Chinese cooking. However, the fried rice was a little on the tough side. Maybe Argentinians are more used to not fully cooked rice.

After lunch, I continued filling in the online form for my US visa. There were pages and pages of spaces to fill in. My page kept logging itself out, claiming I had not saved the form for 20 minutes. I had to clear my cache before everything went back to normal.

After I had done the online form, there was still payment of my US$160 visa fee. It was either a choice of paying by cash at the branches of two different banks or paying by credit card.

The only catch for the credit card payment was that it required a 20% charge on top of the transaction due to some rule set by the Argentinian government.

So that makes paying by cash the only option for me. By the time I was done, it was past 3:30pm. I hurriedly packed my things, hoping that I could find one of the Rapigogo branches and pay my fee fast.

Off to pay my visa fee

I set the bank on my Google Map and went off to find it. I assumed that it would be a large bank but it turned out to be something that was smaller than a post office.

At that time, I didn’t have the A$880+ on me. I was terrified of being robbed so I didn’t want to withdraw money before I know where the bank was.

Unfortunately, all the ATMs I went to that were near the Rapigogo branch couldn’t give me the money I want. I decided that I would make the payment tomorrow.

On my way back, I got a few groceries from Carrefour, including two cans of cheap corn in cream. The can turned out to be a hell lot more cream than corn.

Dinner was still brocolli soup but with a can of terrible corn. I also learned the hard way that I should not wash pasta before cooking it. (I assumed it was like rice and need a good rinse.)

How was your day? Did you have good soup?

Tango lesson and show in Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 65 Jun 11]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

[This is Part II of Jun 11. In Part I, I went to La Boca.]

The receptionist at the hostel convinced me to go to a tango lesson and show as it was “cheap Tuesday”.

Everything was A$320 (~S$80), including transportation to and from the hostel, one lesson, a 3-course meal, unlimited drinks and a good show.

My heart did bleed a little when I handed over my A$320. That’s one third of the maximum amount I can withdraw from the ATM at a go. This meant that I will probably need to visit the ATM soon.

My classmate C joined the lesson + show as well, signing up with my hostel. She heard that her hostel was selling a similar package but at A$500.

Pick up to Complejo Tango

My receptionist said the shuttle bus would come at 6:45pm to pick us up. It wasn’t until well past 7pm that the bus actually came.

The bus was half full with very excited girls. Where are all the boys?? [I overheard in my dorm the next day that the guys went to a lesson/show with more guys than girls. Maybe I should have signed up for that.]

When we reached Complejo Tango, we were all sheparded onto a narrow staircase and went one floor up to reach the medium-sized dance studio.

It took a while for the rest of the people to come and for the class to start. Our instructor was Alejandro, a name I will never forget because of Lady Gaga.

Since there were more females than males, some girls had to go to the boy’s side to learn their steps. I manage to hide away at the girl’s side because the boy’s supposed to lead.

Our lesson was short and sweet with lots of footwork. In between, we had to find partners to dance and it was rather awkward. Still, it was a nice break from all the sightseeing and Spanish learning.

Food

After our class, it was dinner time. Our tables were set in a hall that had a stage in the center, against the wall.

I shared a table with my classmates, dorm mates and a lady from Sydney. Our table wasn’t very near the stage but it was a nice distance.

For my three-course meal, I chose empanada for appetizer, steak cooked raw for my main and a creme caramel for dessert.

Since it was a all-you-can-drink, the waitress plonked down three bottles of wine to be shared about the five of us.

The meal was good, although my steak could use a bit more searing to get the fat crispy. (Oh, crispy fat on steak…)

The show started after the main and before dessert…

The show must go on

Surprisingly, there were storylines to the show. In the first one, a man–our instructor Alejandro–kept stabbing the wall where his shadow was. Then his pals came out.

The three of them did a “manly” tango that reminded me of a VideoJug instructional video.

The ladies did come out in the end and that’s when the show got exciting. One of the ladies looked very much like Melisandre with the same sexy red dress but hair that is more copper than red.

In between the storylined dances, an elderly man would pop up and sing. He would then disappear and appear in the storyline as The Elderly Gentleman with Great Seduction Skills, or something like that.

The length of the show was great. It didn’t feel too long or too short.

Around the end, some of the girls were drunk on their all-you-can-drink and were very boisterous. They continued being happily loud on the shuttle bus back.

I would recommend going for tango lesson + show as this if you don’t dance. It’s a great way to learn a bit about the dance and you get a certificate at the end.

Category: Argentina

Almost 23-hour journey to Iguazu Falls [YQrtw Day 74 Jun 20]

The Next Day…

Ruins of San Ignacio Miní

To the US embassy for my visa [YQrtw Day 73 Jun 19]

Heading to Iguazu Falls

To Recoleta Cemetery, again/ Visa application [YQrtw Day 72 Jun 18]

School trip to the cemetery

What are your plans for the weekend?

A coffee at Cafe Tortoni [YQrtw Day 71 Jun 17]

Trip to Cafe Tortoni

Day trip to Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay [YQrtw Day 70 Jun 16]

Quick immigration process

Pretty little Colonia

Random stuff in Colonia

Where have you recently been to for a day trip? Share your comments below.

Preparing for my visa run/ Streets of Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 69 Jun 15]

Streets of Buenos Aires

Poked fun by a jerk

On Ave Corrientes, Ave 9 de Julio

How was your weekend?

School trip to MALBA (Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires) [YQrtw Day 68 Jun 14]

Art Moderno

Back to the hostel

Who is your favorite Latin American painter?

It’s steak time! [YQrtw Day 67 Jun 13]

Have you cooked in a hostel before? What’s your best dish?

Chinese food by weight in Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 66 Jun 12]

Off to pay my visa fee

How was your day? Did you have good soup?

Tango lesson and show in Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 65 Jun 11]

Pick up to Complejo Tango

Food

The show must go on

Have you seen a tango show? Which part did you like best?