In Praise of Shirley

If you are a dedicated reader with a good memory, you may recall that I like to name my cars (when I own a car.) I wrote about this just as we were leaving the United States, just over two years ago. But if you are even more dedicated and interested in the minutiae of what is Erich, then you will recall that in addition to naming my cars, I always name my shoes. I mentioned that in this post from Sarajevo, Bosnia.

The Plaza de Congreso, the parliamentary palace.

There is a key difference though. My cars each get their own individual name. My shoes are always Horace (on the right foot) and Shirley (on the left). i don't know when I first named a pair of shoes, but it must be at least thirty years. While on the topic of shoes, I also mentioned in a much more recent post that the shoes I bought in Malaysia were getting pretty out of shape. I have very flat feet, I love walking, and I am rough on shoes. I had been wearing those Malaysian purchased shoes for a year. That's like an eternity to me. And I knew I was pushing my luck.

Hard to see, but this building has a feature that imitates a windmill

Yet, I continued to adventure. And some of those adventures involved long walks. So let me relate my recent explorations and I will comment on shoes as I go.

Between the mustache and the bowtie, this face is amazing

I took a walk to Plaza Mariano Moreno. This is park just across from the Plaza del Congreso, the building where the Argentinian Parliament meets. It was around a one hour walk there and another hour back.

How many copies of Rodin's The Thinker (El Pensador) are there in the world?

The Parliament building is gorgeous. Plus I had some dark clouds forming, making the entire scene imposing, almost threatening. (Only the sky, not the people.) I enjoyed the architecture around the plaza in the dramatic setting.

I think the skies make this picture so much more dramatic

On my way home, I saw a juggler. He had a ladder with only two feet. When the stoplight would turn red, he would take his ladder to the front of the line of cars, climb it and juggle while balancing the ladder. Then he would climb down and walk to a few cars in hopes of some pesos.

I bet he doesn't like the motorcycles inching closer. But he has a hard hat.

The next day, Sunday, Alrica and I went to lunch. We walked, but not too far from home. I have mentioned that we live right beside a big park. On the way home, there was an event going on in the park. So we stopped to watch.

There's a crowd between me and the dancers

There were various dance groups taking turns performing. Most of the dancers were women, primarily older women. But there were a few exceptions. Music was broadcast and the groups would perform. At the end of their songs, each group would crowd up together for a photo in which they held up a banner with the name of one of the city parks or plazas on it. I don't know the significance of having such a banner.

Perhaps a better view?

I have a shoe related story here. We were watching the dance performances underneath the branches of a tree. Take a look at this vicious tree. Yikes!

Buenos Aires, where the trees want your blood!

As I was walking, I stepped on something and felt it sinking into Shirley (my left shoe.) It was a fallen twig with wicked thorns from that tree. Thanks to Shirley, nothing reached my skin. I did have to grip the twig carefully to pull it out without cutting up my hand. Imagine if Shirley hadn't been there to protect me. I might be taking a long convalescence with no more walking adventures.

That's a thorny problem

On Wednesday I went out for another long walk. I walked to the Parque de lost Patricios. The Patricios is the name of Argentina's Infantry Regiment One. It is the oldest regiment in the nation, the core of what would be its armed services. The Patricios serve with distinction and honor. They represent Argentina's honor and willingness to fight for liberty. To serve in the Patricios is considered very special. The park has a monument to celebrate the Patricios.

In honor of the Patricios

It also has something I've seen in several parks in Buenos Aires: a very large, very old tree surrounded by a fence. I'm not sure if the fence is meant to protect the tree from the people or to protect the people from the tree. But it is a huge tree with an impressive wingspan. (I know it's not wings, but is branchspan a word?)

Doesn't it look like the light is radiating from the tree?

It was a beautiful day for a walk and the park is lovely. Buenos Aires has a lot of public art which is fun to see as I explore.

You would almost think I was in Africa, but no, still South America

This walk was again around two hours. I was doing okay for the first hour and a half, maybe even hour forty-five. But the last part of the walk, my shoes were done. Horace and Shirley were like, "Sorry, Erich. We got nothing left to give." My feet were so sore when I got home. Alrica even suggested going out to buy new shoes. But I had no desire to take another unnecessary step that day. It's pretty bad when I shrink away from the idea of walking.

It's like faces on drumheads. Maybe that's why they are drumHEADS.

So instead we went out on Thursday. We walked to a bus stop and took a bus to a neighborhood called Palermo Soho. I find this interesting, because having a neighborhood called Soho is something I am familiar with. My first Soho was the one in New York City where it stands for "South of Houston". (It's the neighborhood bordered on the north by Houston Street. Incidentally, that is pronounced HOW-ston and not HUE-ston. It isn't named for Sam Houston of Texas fame. It is named for William Houston. He was one of the delegates from Georgia to the Continental Congress and to the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Sam Houston came later, but being the more famous of the two, most people think HUE-ston when they see the name.)

But New York didn't start calling that part of town Soho until the 1960s. The, so far as I can tell, original Soho is a section of London. There aren't definitive records for how Soho got its name, but the most accepted idea is that origially it was a very open area of countryside and farming just west of London. Londoners came here to hunt and "So-ho" was some sort of hunting call. Whether or not that is the true origin, London's first written record of the area being called Soho is from 1636, way beating out NYC.

Here in Buenos Aires, one of the nice neighborhoods is Palermo. In the 1990s, marketers started referring to one part of Palermo as Palermo Soho. It was changing from a working class neighborhood into one full of artists studios and nightlife, gentrifying. Soho was specifically chosen as a reference to the neighborhoods in NYC and London, both considered trendy and artistic.

While in Palermo Soho, we ate at a Vietnamese restaurant called Saigon. Probably had I just told you the name of the restaurant you would have guessed it was Vietnamese. If you wouldn't have guessed that, just don't admit it to anyone. The food was great, but most amusing was Alrica's lemonade. It came with slices of cucumber. Needless to say, I didn't take a sip to taste it.

Who puts cucumber slices in lemonade? Not something I ever saw in Vietnam.

But lunch was not our primarily reason for visiting Palermo Soho, nor did we go for nightlife or art. We went to buy shoes. That's how loyal I am. Just days after Shirley saved me from dangerous spikes, I replaced her with a younger, newer model. I wanted to hold out for Santiago, but life had other plans. Still, I did name these new shoes Horace and Shirley, so their legacy lives on.

Montevideo

Do you know the song The Battle of New Orleans? Well, I have my own lyrics to introduce my blog post all about our short adventure.

The last few days I went across the watta
Along with my Alrica on the Rio de la Plata
We took along our passports and I'll gladly tell you why
Cause we left from Argentina and arrived in Uruguay

To cross the bay we hopped upon a ferry.
It landed in Colonia with a lot of way to go.
We caught a bus which drove across the prairie.
A couple hours later we're in Montevideo.

That's José Gervasio Artigas, Uruguay's national hero.

When I was young, I remember in social studies we had to learn capital cities. When I learned Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, it just sounded like a cool name. But at that age, cities across the globe were like an abstract idea to me. Sure, every country had to have a capital city. But did they really exist? Or were they just ideas on paper? At that age, I hadn't yet even been to the capital of my own country, but I knew the USA existed in a tangible form. So I guess I found the existence of Washington to be easier to visualize than Montevideo or Moscow or Muscat.

In Spanish colonial times, Montevideo was a walled city. This is one of the gates to get in. Or out. (You don't need it as much now that the walls are gone.)

Now, I can confirm, it is not just on paper. Well, Montevideo. I can't yet say with first-hand experience anything about Moscow of Muscat. Though I did just have a realization. All those capital cities I named, they start with M but also end in an English word. MosCOW, MusCAT, MonteVIDEO. It works for MadRID too. Though I know it doesn't work for all capital cities beginning with M. Like Manila, which is a kind of envelope, but doesn't end in a separate English word. Or Minsk.

Architects can be so imaginative.

But I am wandering from my point. I wanted to tell you a bit about our two day adventure to Montevideo, Uruguay. It began on Monday morning. We caught a ferry through a company called Colonia Express. It leaves out of Buenos Aires and arrives in Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay. The distance is maybe 30 to 40 miles, and the ferry takes around an hour. It goes at a good speed when you are on the open water, but slows a lot in the harbors of each city.

Alrica on the ferry going toward Uruguay

If you look at a map, you see this dip, like a bay between Buenos Aires and Colonia del Sacramento. It's isn't technically the Atlantic Ocean. It isn't even exactly a bay. It's called Rio de la Plata, the River of the Silver. But it isn't what you think of as a river either. It would probably be most accurate to describe it as an estuary with a mix of fresh water and salt water and the salinity changes with the tides.

Palacio Salvo in the day

Palacio Salvo at night

The ferry ride was great. Getting there was fine too, but there was one annoying aspect. After purchasing the tickets, the ferry company sent Alrica email after email reminding her that we MUST be there two hours before departure! This is an international trip. Failure to be that early could mean you don't get to go. Well we did arrive, in fact, more than two hours before departure. And when we got to the check-in window they told us you can't check-in until 90 minutes before departure. And even after that, they didn't open the boarding gate with customs and immigration until about 45 minutes before departure. So the threats of losing your place on the ferry, it was all a lie!

Mural Across from the Rambla

On the way to Uruguay, it was a pretty full ferry. But the seats were comfy and you had plenty of leg room. In Buenos Aires, you did both your passport control of leaving Argentina and your passport control of arriving in Uruguay. So when the boat landed, you didn't have to get into a line to have your passport stamped. That was already done.

I wonder if those pinnacles can break off

But we had not booked a passage just to Colonia del Sacramento. We booked passage all the way to Montevideo. So at the port, we climbed on to a bus. We rode through a lot of countryside where I saw horses, cows, sheep, and donkeys. The landscape was quite green, not entirely flat, but not mountainous either.

I would say the bus was less than two hours in total. And then we arrived at the Tres Cruces Bus Station in Montevideo. It was a beautiful day outside. So we walked from the station toward Old Town where our hotel was. And there is something odd about the street signs. At the top of the street signs, above the name of the street, you would see some other name. The most common one I saw was Doña Coca. But Acompaña was pretty common too. I thought maybe it was the names of different neighborhoods. But no, I saw the same names all over the city. And sometimes one block would be Doña Coca, then the next Acompaña and then back to Doña the next block after that. So I looked it up. These are advertisements. The city of Montevideo lets corporations sponsor street signs. That way they get their name prominently displayed. What I found particularly strange was that advertisements had more prominence than the street names. And isn't the street name the most important piece of information on a street sign?

Apparently it is a pork company, like the Uruguayan Hormel.

This one is a cable and internet and cell phone company.

It's a healthcare company. I think it has clinics and residential care.

I bet you can guess what SmartFit is.

After checking in and dropping off our stuff, we headed out again. We decided that with only two days, we would see a lot of city using a hop-on/hop-off bus. In Montevideo, that bus system is run by the city, but the same transportation agency that runs the regular city buses. On Monday we did the central loop.

I like the pink, but then the last letter is red. Interesting choice.

One thing I loved about the streets of Montevideo is the trees. There are these tall trees that rise up from the sidewalks and make a canopy over the streets. Lots of places you walk are in shade, under box elders and avocado trees. The bus was one of the double-decker buses where on the top floor you are in the open air. There were periodic reminders that they keep the trees trimmed, but it was possible that some low branches might exist. Don't stand up while the bus is moving. Good news, we never got hit by any branches. It wasn't even close.

Yes, a lovely fountain, but also check out those trees!

There is a downside to the trees though, I mean, aside from the potential to bonk your head. That's pollen. There is plenty of it. And it can get in your eye. Or make you sneeze. Or give you a runny nose. I guess we have to accept that it is spring here.

The Presidential Offices

Much like Buenos Aires, Montevideo has a very intricate, beautiful, and European architectural style. Some of the buildings really are breathtaking. We saw the library, the Legislative Palace where Parliament meets, the Presidential Building where the President works, the Judicial Palace where the Supreme Court is, and we saw amazing buildings that were not part of the governmental structure. There is a mall in Montevideo that was built on the site of a former prison, and they kept the front buildings of the prison as the outer facade of the mall.

The Legislative Palace

A notable building that probably didn't impress us as much as it might have impressed others is Estadio Centenario, or Centennial Stadium. It is named that because it was completed in 1930, exactly one-hundred years after Uruguay became an independent nation. But what would be exciting for the right crowd is what it was built for. This is where the championship games of the very first World Cup occurred, again, in 1930. It is a stadium that is designed specifically for soccer and no other sport is played there. The legend says that one of the best players on the Uruguayan national team got a tour of the stadium when it was completed. He went back to the team and told them that their country had built a stadium so perfect that they had to honor it by winning the World Cup. And they did. Uruguay did win the 1930 World Cup.

The Judicial Palace

On Tuesday, we took the bus that did the Rambla tour. The Rambla is a road that runs along the shore. On one side of the road are beaches or parks and a lighthouse and a few other buildings. There is a long walkway that goes 13.7 miles. On the other side of the street are high rise apartments, shopping, and more parks. Also, both the United States embassy and the Germany embassy are right there beside the Rambla.

The statue is called the Greeting Man. It is a gift from South Korea which is antipodal from Montevideo.

The tour took us out as far as Currasco, a very high-end neighborhood at the east end of the city. It was designed to be a high-end neighborhood before Montevideo stretched out this far. Its founder was inspired by his visit to Oslo and wanted to create a village with luxury and beauty in mind. His palace is today the Currasco Hotel and Casino.

That's the Currasco Hotel and Casino

On the central tour we heard about the legend of the Uruguayan national team. But the Rambla tour has its own legend. Along the Rambla we passed Palacio Pittamiglio. This huge mansion house is, we were told, full of secret passages and hidden rooms. It was built by a man named Pittamiglio who was many things, but primarily an alchemist. The house is designed in all kinds of alchemical symbols. But that's not the legend. It's just the setting.

I could find no label or title for this sculpture. But you're with me, that's gotta be Prometheus, right?

According to the legend, Pittamiglio was a friend to Bishop Eugenio Pacelli when the good bishop served in Uruguay. You probably don't recognize that name, but later he was called Pope Pius XII. In 1944, Pope Pius XII visited Montevideo. Here's the legend part. Supposedly, Pope Pius XII brought the Holy Grail with him. He was afraid that the Nazis, who were always looking for objects of the occult as we know from Indiana Jones movies, would attack the Vatican and steal it. So he brought it to Uruguay and asked Pittamiglio to hide it away in his crazy palace.

If you unzip this building, what do you think you find under?

In 1988, Pope John Paul II came to Uruguay. One of his aides was taken to the second Palacio Pittamiglio and the condition was that he was supposed to be left alone for a few hours. Many believe what that aide was doing was retrieving the hidden Holy Grail so it could be brought back to Rome. So, if you believe the tales, for 44 years, the Holy Grail was in Uruguay. You might argue this isn't a lot of evidence. But think about it. This aide to the Pope was left alone for hours in the palace. Is there any other more plausable explanation?

In case you were worried, no, I didn't forget a hydrant pic. Look at how slender it is!

Montevideo is a bit more expensive than Buenos Aires. (Probably not an issue if you are the Pope.) And already we are finding Buenos Aires a bit pricey. For just two days, it was fine. But it would be harder to live in budget there. Maybe if one were further out from the city center it would be easier. I don't know. But for a quick trip, it was a great time!

The way back was similar to the way there, but in reverse. We did the bus first and then the ferry. Again, we did all of our passport stamping before we got on the ferry, both leaving Uruguay and entering Argentina. In fact, the Argentinian agent asked where we were staying in Argentina. I gave him the address and he said "Ah, Cabazheeto." It took me a minute to understand. The part of Buenos Aires that we are in is Caballito. But I assumed the double l would be more like a y. Cabayeeto. The thing is every country in South America seems to have variations on the pronunciations of certain letters. The double l, the g, and the j are particularly fluid. So I did eventually figure out what he was saying, but I am so not an Argentinian. I'm also not a Uruguayan. But for a couple days I got to imagine I was.

Two In Two

Two days, two adventures. And I am going to make two posts in the same day. Such twoness!

Everyone say hi to Mafalda

On Saturday, Alrica and I headed into San Telmo. This is one of the older districts in Buenos Aires. It has a market and museums and narrow cobbled streets. We were planning to get some lunch at the San Telmo Market, but it was crowded to the point of not being so comfortable. So we headed out.

Historic bells outside the History Museum

We walked south and visited the National History Museum. This is an interesting museum that covers various time periods of Argentinian history. It starts at the time of the revolution, when Argentina fought for independence from Spain. It goes through some of the wars that came after this too. And it is pretty honest about various governments of Argentina that conquered and crushed the indigenous people, or even that oppressed the Argentinian citizens. But it also highlights some of their accomplishments.

Some of the signs were in both Spanish and English. But many of them were only in Spanish. Interestingly, I didn't do as well with the Spanish only signs at this museum compared to at the Natural Sciences Museum a few days ago. But in some ways, that makes sense. The words used in science are often from Latin and so they are very similar in Spanish and English. The words used to describe history aren't quite as similar and matching.

Proof that we were in Caminito

We continued south and entered a neighborhood called Boca. Historically, Boca was also a very early neighborhood. And it was very poor when Buenos Aires was young. Many people built their homes from corrugated metals that they found at the port. (It won't surprise you to learn Boca is near the port.) To combat the stigma of their metal homes, many people started painting them in bright colors. And not just one color, a patchwork of colors. This became a thing. Now when you visit Boca, there are many murals. But if you head to the Caminito, which is a short pedestrian street, you can see the full effect of the patchwork colors. In addition, that neighborhood is dedicated to art. There are artists selling their goods, there are statues and sculptures and reliefs, there are paintings on the walls.

So colorful

I've decided this one is a politician giving a speech

The indigenous people working a loom

One thing I noticed in both Boca and San Telmo, was the prevalence of one image. There is this image of a little girl with black hair that looks like she is from a comic strip. I've actually seen her all over Buenos Aires. But she was big time on display at the markets of San Telmo and in the Caminito region.

Just in case we forgot she was from Argentina

Her name is Mafalda and she did come from a comic strip that ran in the 1960s and 1970s. She is an icon of Argentina. In the comic, she is a six-year old girl with a paralyzing fear of school. She is incredibly passionate about social justice, often clashing with her parents who are just working and living and trying to get by.

Mafalda came to represent the middle class in Argentina, how they were torn between enlightened ideas and the realities of living in society. The comic strip was highly satirical and often commented on the new of the day.

Don't jump Mafalda! Or gray footballer.

The comic hasn't run in fifty years and still Mafalda is everywhere. She's like the Charlie Brown of Argentina. In one image I saw, she is looking straight up, much like a Charlie Brown pose, and screaming "Basta!" That means "Enough!"

The only Argentinian who can rival Mafalda

Mafalda isn't the only popular figure we see all over the place. Lionel Messi, the soccer powerhouse who just retired days ago, he's pretty much everywhere too. And even if you don't see Messi images himself, you see plenty of the Argentina team jersey with the number 10. (That was his number.)

Today, Sunday, we headed to another part of town: Mataderos. Here, each week, there is a fair called Feria de Mataderos. It has lots of craftsman, but also stalls selling traditional Argentinian food. We tried locro, a stew with beef and sausage and beans and I don't know what all was in it. But it was very hearty and quite delicious.

Locro

But the most unique thing about the Feria de Mataderos is the gaucho performances. There is a stage and on the stage, gauchos perform. A gaucho is a cowboy, an Argentinian cowboy. We got to see lots of gaucho dances.

Nearly to the top

Before the dances began, there was a flag raising ceremony. They played the national anthem over the speakers. There was a man slowly (and I mean slowly) raising the flag. You have never seen a man pull a rope with such viscosity. I understood why. He was trying to get the flag raising to last as long as the national anthem (which isn't short.) But I found it amusing what tiny tugs he gave to the rope.

It was like a tap dance in cowboy boots

The dances were vigorous and fun. There were children who are learning the dances who performed along with adult cowboys and adult women in flowing skirts.

Skirts must be flapped

We also bought churros. One had dulce de leche inside (which is a very popular filling here) and the other was chocolate frosted. Nobody doesn't like churros, right?

I am trying to get all up to date on the blog because tomorrow begins another adventure for us. And I don't know when I will be able to blog about it, so I didn't want to get behind.

You will get the deets of the new adventure soon enough. Fear not! (Yes, I recognize you probably weren't afraid.)