CouchSurfing

Okay, picture this as a potential travel package:

Lodging at a residence 30 minutes outside of Rosario, Argentina, surrounded with lush gardens and tastefully decorated interior spaces with a minimalist feel. A private bedroom in the corner of the house with personal bath, living room with TV/soundsystem and a wide variety of international movies and music available (with a focus on tango and modern tango). Full kitchen stocked with Argentinean teas and snacks, and an aspiring cook to prepare dinner for you. Chauffer service to Rosario in the morning and from Rosario at night; also, convenient bus service to the downtown area three blocks away.

Price: Free.

This is where I´m at right now. But it´s not a travel package. It´s better. It´s called CouchSurfing. And it comes with one major caveat:

You have to trust a stranger.

Now I´ve been told since I´ve been a kid that ooooooooh, that´s not a good idea. I think we all have been told that. And it´s valid. To an extent. And over the past week I´ve started to realize that the extent to which it´s true is not that expansive, at all. Trust the drunk man on the train staring at me with his eyes on my bag? No. Trust someone who volunteers to make things easier for people travelling through his area? Well, for me, it´s changed my experience for the better to say ¨Yes¨. Maybe trust is something that is too precious and valuable to negate through an all-encompassing axiom (one that implicitly assumes dangerous behavior is normal behavior). Maybe it should lie somewhere more in an honest evaluation and gut-check of each person you meet. Maybe I´m becoming dangerously idealistic.

What I do know is that Sergio - a science professor at the big university in this town - has provided me with all of these amazing things, and keys to his house, because he trusted me right away in the same seemingly-illogical way. My Spanish is improving, I´m living luxoriously, and ´m full, but most importantly (by far) is that I´ve been given the opportunity to get to know a really wonderful guy who is interested in where I come from and the things I believe in as well. Sergio is the first person I´ve spent a lot of time with who speaks Spanish exclusively, which has made staying with him even more valuable for me. (My recent improvements have made me feel better for saying the word ¨diecicinco¨ to a vendor in Buenos Aires a few days ago - which is something like saying ¨twoteen¨ instead of ¨twelve¨ and rightfully provoked an aghast facial expression from the man.)

So CouchSurfing - it´s an incredible way to travel, and incredibly frightening until the precise moment you kiss your next host on the cheek. Before Sergio I stayed with Federico in Buenos Aires, and after Sergio I will certainly seek out others. If I can break the tourist-resident barrier in any way I will try to . . . I´ll try to think of the money I´m saving on lodging and food as little extra rewards for my tiny leaps of faith in humanity.

Buenos Aires

What a crazy city. I think I´ll be back later in my trip, so I´m not sure I´m done with it, but I had a kaleidoscope of experiences and viewpoints of this city. It had so many sides to it, and personalities. The Centro area a bustling mass of businesspeople and antique banks; Recoleta a slice out of ¨Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous¨complete with mansions and lavish malls hawking sleek modernist designs; San Telmo a hodgepodge of old colonial buildings rising up to the sky and an assortment of corner graffitti artwork and thumping nightclubs down at ground level; La Boca a rough-and-tumble working-class neighborhood with crumbling sidewalks and a futbol stadium that´s bright yellow and filled to the brim with passionate fans. And I only really experienced those parts of the city . . . there are dozens of other barrios in the area. I find myself on my way because a) I want the time to see other places and b) It is utterly exhausting to be here. I´ve discovered that, for me, having too much I could potentially do can be just as tiring as actually doing one of those things.

The owner of the Hare Krishna farm I stayed at - Mark - gave me a frank and bleak analysis of Argentinean culture: he said that there are two strong currents within the culture, one of entitlement and one of shame. He says there is entitlement because Argentina used to be one of the richest countries in the world at the first part of the 20th century (there was actually a saying at the time that an immensely wealthy person is ´´rich as an Argentine´´), which was mostly due to its serving as a breadbasket for much of Europe before and during the World Wars. Look at Argentina´s flag and you see two strips of sky blue (celeste) and a sun in the middle . . . the farms and pastures in this country are its main resource. According to Mark, Argentineans today are the heir to this land of plenty . . . it´s just that it has been squandered away over the years, and Argentina is now in a period where some goods have increased in price threefold since 2004. Their economic instability is the cause of their shame. Again, this is all according to him, but he says that these two things explain why Argentineans have the reputation of being haughty and stubborn and all about appearances (I admit that the vast majority of people here wear designer clothing and generally look immaculate) - they want to retain the illusion that they still have a way of life that´s just not there. Like I said, a very bleak analysis.

I like the version that was presented to me by a man named Federico, a 30-year-old college professor I stayed with over this past weekend. It goes something like this: there is no stereotype for Argentinean behavior because they´re all people, and people are different, and it´s best to think of each person you meet in terms of who they are individually instead of connecting them to certain stereotypes. Federico was the one porteño (citizen of BA) that I really got to know well: he is soft-spoken and brilliant in his knowledge of the area´s history, he made maps for me every day so I knew where to go and how to get back, we discussed the differences between our languages amusingly over a couple of Quilmes, and ate empanadas while watching a movie from New Zealand about evil sheep. He let me stay in his house for free for four nights, and was endlessly generous . . . I´m siding with his take of the Argentinean people right now, and I´ll go ahead and say that - in a specific non-specific kind of way - they are wonderful people. And I will miss them, indeed.

Here are some details.

Spent the day outside of the narrow strip of Centro Buenos Aires that I had gotten accustomed to in my previous days here. I took Av. Florída all the way to its end, which led me to a large park-ish area called Plaza San Martín. A sloped grassy hill with a lot of people on top of it (a few of them coupled and making out, which is a common thing to see in parks and sidestreet enclaves here - but not as common as it was in Mexico); a little plaza area with statues featuring your typical BA fare: heroically-posed men with or without horses, or Greek/Christian figures; a recycling bin that had the mulched-up pale-multi-colored look that recycled material itself has, quarter-full with plastic bags; a huge Claro! building (Argentina´s main cell-phone service provider, they even advertise on top of the street signs here) in front of me, and a majestically-built cathedral behind with a homeless man between its gated entrance and some portal that led underground. Took a left and walked down Av. Santa Fe, which led me into the heart of Recoleta - the uppity portion of BA. Immaculate hotel lobbies, rows of private mansions, and ultra-botique clothing stores (as opposed to the standard clothing stores in this city, which are boutique, and the thrift clothing stores, which are used boutique). The street emptied out into a quaint and (thankfully) unpretentious little crafts fair, selling yerba mate cups and Cuban cigars and animals made out of folded-up subway passes. When I found the sidewalk again I walked through gates which said ¨Rest in Peace¨ in Spanish above them, and I was in a cemetary unlike I had never seen before: about two square blocks full of sarcophagi of immense sizes and elaborateness. The paths were paved with tiles and the tombs themselves were made of stone, with sculptures of their inhabitants and Christian iconography abounding. It was simultaneously disgusting and fascinating - never had I thought before that a house of the dead coud feel so much like a shopping mall, what with crowds of people looking through the individual sarcopho-windows at what´s keeping the coffins company (a closed shopping bag here, a painting of an apostle looking upwards there) and taking the occasional chat-break while sitting atop a slab of marble. Evita is buried there, I didn´t see her. I did see a massive bust of an old Argentinean general that was surely once a pure and glistening bronze but now has rusted his face to a pale white, with patches of a sickly-green running down his eyes. The word ´´Argentina´´ comes from the Latin word for ´´silver´´, and the people who named and then conquered this area of the world certainly got what they came for. But I suppose many of those faces from the past haven´t aged as handsomely after death as they might have hoped. At least not in my mind. So then I walked back through what looked like an elementary school getting out (which I think are called ´´collegios´´ here, which is confusing but also pleasantly reminds me of those beautiful, juvenile, ´´oh-god-do-i-have-to?´´ sentiments that bond students of all ages to their institutions, to some degree at least). I took the subway back to the Primera Junta stop in the Caballito barrio, where I´m staying with a immensely kind man named Federico who teaches economics and plays the djembe in an Afro-Brazillian workshop band. A little girl handed out what my friend Amanda said are called´´valentines´´ in Spain, which are cards that ask for a little bit of money to help her eat; she then goes back around and collects the cards, which gives you the choice of either consciously handing her nothing or giving her a few centavos as well. After collecting every card I saw without any coins, she went to the back of the train and watched the subway tunnel fly behind us into the same darkness. She giggled. I was hungry, I got back to Federico´s apartment, I am still hungry, and now I will make myself a cup of tea.

August 19th, Nueva Vrindavana Farm, 4:00 PM

¨How can I see God in all that´s around me when all of it is an illusion? That is your belief, yes?¨ Srayam is stringing metal wire together ten feet away, further down the bamboo fence we have planted. He bends the ends of the wires into loops and locks them together. A simple system.

¨This is also part of the God. Maya, illusion, it also is. It is under the God´s feetsies.¨

Through his Peruvian accent I hear ¨feces¨. I think, The Godhead shits out reality? Well, I bet we all make pretty good compost mixed up together -- but I clarify.

¨His . . . how do you say, foots?¨

¨Ahh, feet. His feet.¨

¨Yes. Come.¨ I walk through grey piles of dead anthill and horse manure to help him hold the wire taught. He strings it through a hole in a metal post and roughly wraps it around; suddenly, the bamboo line is snug against the barbed wire behind. I savor the feeling of order more than the feeling of having aided the plants in their battle against the considerable winds out here - but I pocket them both.

¨God is in everything,¨ the 28-year-old monk continued. ¨When you stop being your own god, you see that. I was a strong atheist for most of my life, but then I saw that people with faith were happier. A friend of mine, his father died of cancer and he was happy - well, not happy, but okay - because of his faith. Happier than me, and I have not suffered much. So, I decided I wanted to believe.¨

His decision had landed him in an orange scarf-bonnet, his bed a concrete floor in a Hare Krishna youth convent with two free-minded bulls and a rock-minded American. I silently watched him link the final expanse of wire.

¨The desire is all it takes . . . it doesn´t matter what God is to you. Jewish, Muslim, Christian . . . when the religions fight, it´s like children arguing over toys. The fight that matters is inside you, and it is one noone else can be part of.¨

The clouds just barely scrape the sky night overhead, but condense to a light grey over yonder. Light wind, but sunny. Won´t rain. Hungry. I´m never full here, not after two full plates of fried pumpkin and breaded tomato-carrot dumplings and sticky peanut rice.

¨What is God for me may not be God for a Jewish man. But it is about belief. I believe, and I must not be concerned whether you or other do or do not.¨

I chanted the first few lines of my Bar Mitzvah portion to him earlier. Oo-Mosheh-eh-eh-eh ha-yah ro-eh-eh-eh-eh . . . He picked out two words: Adonai and Eloheem. I told him what the first meant, and made up what I thought the second meant: ¨we¨. Seemed neutral and vaguely profound.

¨But once you put faith into your God, it is done. And faith is something everyone has. Faith in themself, the things they can do well, a loved one, drugs . . . it´s just where you put it.¨

I looked at the horizon: clumps of stale green grass, small square farmhouses flanking brown beds of hidden plants and rusting machinery. And the dominant sky. I had seen each part before, taken note of it so clearly, but now they began to strangely coalesce. I saw a picture of a place, and I smiled, and when I smiled I became a part of the picture. I haven´t had faith in myself as a Well-Intentioned Lost Object for some time, but I found the first true dot on my travel map when I let myself think - for a moment - that I have a vast collage of worldly visions to put my unadulterated trust in. And that most of these visions are still to come.

I look back, and Srayam is finishing tying the wire around the final pole. Just enough to keep every bamboo plant upright - not an inch of the coil we brought went unused. His face is soft to the sight like a child´s, and the space under his nostrils glistens softly. He smiles.

As we walk back to the farm my eyes slowly unglue until they are turned inwards, into my Godbrain, once again. I sit alone in a monk´s bedroom to write, minutes later, to extoll the greatness of something I refuse to believe. And as I complete my work, I become aware of the fact that each word I write is something of an idol to Myself.

Cows For All My Senses

Well, I´m coming up on a week here in Argentina . . . and I´m lightyears away from being able to explain it.

I spent my first three nights in downtown Buenos Aires - an airy and spacious mixture of tall office buildings crowned with billboards, colonial-style joints with your standard banks and government buildings, and mounds and mounds of boutique clothing stores. I spent a day walking up and down Av. Florida (the main commercial artery of downtown B.A.) and got lost in the army of immaculately-dressed and straight-faced. Adding to it all is the surreal beauty of the average Argentinean (both male and female): pale skin, black hair, black eyes, well-proportioned faces. It felt like I was in some sort of movie where me, the protagonist, had been caught in some twisted version of my dream-word without my knowing - fascinating and gorgeous, but with an unsettling twinge in my gut.

I wrote some angsty poetry while eating chicken empanadas and danced deliriously to intricate hip-hop beats by myself in a club for three hours and got my camera stolen in the B.A. subway (sorry, guess those pictures and video won´t arrive after all). That´s how I kicked off my trip.

Then, I went from a hostel (where I shared a room with three Californians who wanted to score some Mary) to a Hare Krishna farm on the outskirts of the city. From juicy steaks to the constant company of regal bull brothers (and a strictly vegetarian diet, of course). From a relaxing glass of Quilmes to scientific inquiries into physics´ incapability to understand human consciousness (delivered to me by the farm´s owner, a British man named Mark who inhales oxygen and exhales concepts). I´m here until Thursday, doing various jobs in exchange for food and board, and hopefully by then I´ll be able to better understand the bizarrely intricate and passionate world I stumbled upon while trying to save a few pesos.


I´d love to hear from any of you . . . I hear you have to sign up to post, which is a bummer. So e-mail me instead, I would love to hear how you´re doing or answer any questions you have or the like. Take care, I´ll write again later in the week.

Guadalajara

became something of a mirror of the inevitable reality that lurked all along behind my ideas of grandiose world-trekking. Once Dora and her family left the picture (after being unspeakably kind and helpful in setting me up), I was left alone in a city I didn´t really want to be in. Which gave me lots of time to think. I had four long days of facing the music, and this was the chorus - I´m a college graduate, I´m travelling alone through countries that speak a language I don´t know, and I am without solid direction in any physically concrete sense until further notice. Not even when I was in India two years ago did I feel like such a foreigner - both to others and to myself.

I wrote this as I left Mexico on a jetplane yesterday:

For me, and for now, Guadalajara was a city of shadowy glances and impenetrable sunlit corners. Moving like a machine, waiting like an injured vulture. My silences in Guadalajara were fathoms depers than my American pauses, and even my English was mangled by my Spanish´s utter disapproval. I was whipped in the face daily by a vine hanging down from the patio next door, and when it happened at dusk last night I realized how downward my gaze had been all along. I am happy to leave like a turtle is happy to swim back to see after laying its eggs: its functional purpose fulfilled sans climax, and mostly grateful for the shell on its back.

(That last metaphor is ridiculous, but I did see an enormous turtle go back to the ocean after laying its eggs while I was in Puerto Vallarta and I can´t tell you how epic it was. I kept trying to touch it as it entered the sea and it kept jolting away. Those slimy-looking stumps have immense strength.)

Okay, all that is part of the truth. Two other parts of Guadalajara were great - the four days I spent with Dora and her family involved me seeing just about everything Guadalajara had to offer, and undoubtedly eating everything it had to offer. (Try guanavana, a fruit that tastes like manna from heaven; avoid Tehuino, a drink that I guess is made of spoiled corn but is utterly inexplicable to me and my face.) My first-ever Spanish conversation (albeit horribly broken and at least half-English) was had with Dora´s Tío Jorge over some breakfast tacos, and he even helped check me into my hostel after Dora flew back to Colorado. Check out our glamour shot.

The other thing is that I met a guy from Melbourne named Todd while eating delicious chicken molé alone at a birriería near my hostel and had a ton of fun exploring the city and its nightlife with him for three days. Main highlight? Going to a Chivas (Guadalajara´s team) soccer match. I have a video of Chivas scoring a goal on a penalty kick - I don´t have enough time left at the internet café to post it, but I´ll do it next time I´m here.

Also don´t have time for more pics, but I´ll put up one with my favorite faces - the people on the bench at the Guadalajaran Cultural Center are me, Dora, and the newlyweds (Dora´s sister Veronica and her husband Christian). More pictures forthcoming, as well.

So Guadalajara was pretty much as exciting as it was painful, and useful as it was pointless. As it is for a lot of things in my life, it seems, I just needed enough distance from it to realize that.