as previously blogged, Ingrid and me were in
Argentina to get my cousin Robert married. (note: a wikipedia link is better than a tag, don't trust folksonomies)
ok, the quick link to all photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/leobard/sets/863757/
We started on August 13th and came back Monday, August 29th in the afternoon, spending roughly two weeks (dos semanes) in Argentina. Our flight was with
iberia and we can approva their service: everything worked, thanks. Only our damned VISA card from hell -
the Postbank - failed us and we decided now to close our accounts at this bank: the credit card limit is ~800€ (cough cough, in Austria the word "limit" or "problem to extend it" was not really known). btw: Austria is known as the country where milk and honey flow, Argentina is the country where sugar flows (in all different forms).
Ok, so we reached Buenos Aires on Sunday, 14th August and we were open to everything. Before our travel, Ingrid and me had quite Angst what will happen in Argentine, we did not really know much of the country and we have never been to South-America before. Although we knew they had internet (through inkel) and we had a lot of travel guides, we didn't have time to read the travel guides beforehand and came to the country with open eyes and open mind. Luckily, we already met Georg, Mechtild, and Robert at Madrid and were not alone on our Journey, the three would accompany us the next days (and Robert until the end).
Robert also organized the trip from the Airport to town and the hotel, which relieved us from much hassle: thank you thank you thank you and bless you. Searching for a hotel in buenos aires would have left us in the situation
hotel-envy of:
but the others got a much nicer hotel. Other travellers had experienced
hotel-envy. The taxi trip to Buenos Aires was very nice, we got an instant impression of culture (advertisments), nature (wow, trees we have never seen before) and people (there are joggers on the highway) of Argentina. Our taxi took the Av. 9 Julio to our hotel, which is the main street of Buenos Aires.
The rest of Sunday we visited some nice places of Buenos Aires, I don't want to list all here and we didn't upload all the photos anyhow.
Our first steak was on sunday noon:
On Monday we met Inkel and Daniel,
as desribed before here. Before meeting them, we were in Tigre, a little town where people go on weekends. We took a boat trip there, which was nice the first hour but then got boring.
On Tuesday, we went shopping but didn't find much in the multitude of shops. We also saw the casa rosada and other important sight-seeing spots.
Tuesday evening, our bus to
Santiago Del Estero departed, so we got to Retiro bus terminal in the evening and were astonished by the Argentine bus system. Ok, bus riding is very convenient, you can watch funny horror movies, drink mate or coffee and get something to eat. We used the lines "Del Norte" and "Fletcha" and both were good. (del norte was a little better in details).
In Santiago we spent our time from Wednesday until Monday, with the important wedding being at Saturday. The family where we lived were very nice, but we couldn't talk much with them, as we didn't speak spanish neither they spoke english. But it was ok, we had our Langenscheidt poket dicionary and using the global hand and feet language we came along and could learn much about each other. We did so many things in Santiago, I don't want to go into detail there. The main difference between Santiago and Buenos Aires is the size of town and the more rural culture, family centered, friendly, more music. Also, Santiago uses Siesta time, meaning that shops are open from 8-12am and 5 to 9pm. Schools the same, kids go to bed at about 2-3am.
We ate much dulce de lecce (another form of sugar, very sweet and nice, used like butter).
The wedding was great, the procedure similiar to european weddings. Similar to my own wedding: the bride came in a nice car, accompanied by her father, man waiting in the church, music while entering, catholic procedure (thats exactly the same as everywhere else), music, and joy. We were very happy to be there and to experience it, we also experienced some of the preperations and this was the most interesting part to learn about Argentina. The wedding continued with a banquet at a big club, where they had asada grill ready and local and international music. The couple opened the dancing by a waltz, very stylish, and then the party started. Local folk dances, all people dancing, much more vivid than in europe.
Ingrid and me had to go home at 5am due to tireness, the others (including grandparents and babies) stayed till 7am or so. Party people.
Sunday relaxing and having barbecue with friends, a very nice nice nice idea of Enzo, our host (he asked us: either grilling with friends of eating at home, but it was a kind of rhetorical question, thanks enzo, this was great).
Monday, we went with Lucky and Robert to see the northern provinces of Argentina, Salta and Jujuy. I will blog this tomorrow.
a late text
http://leobard.twoday.net/stories/5078063
a bit late, but I owed it.