La Reina del Baile
Trip Start
Sep 05, 2006
1
20
33
Trip End
Sep 04, 2007
Mendoza,
Argentina
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
dress while her long wavy brown hair swirls consistently with her
skirt. Undoubtedly, the lovely little thing will be breaking boys
hearts when she´s older, but right now she could care less about boys
because the band is playing and bailando is all that she´s interested
in.
The drums are beating and there are some tourists on stage klinking
sticks together to keep the rhythym. The band members, garnished
in the traditional Argentinian gaucho get-up smile and keep the music
playing as they declare the little girl ¨La Reina del Baile.¨
(the dance queen) Others cheer and chant, ¨la reina, la reina.¨
It´s Saturday in Mendoza and the sun in shining while a gentle breeze
is blowing. The pedestrian district seems almost electric with
the sun drenched green leaves glistening overhead. People are
milling about and the the Paseo Peatonal is a bustling hub of coffee
drinking terrace dwellers, busy shoppers and of course, dancing queens.
I think this is what the people have in mind when they say, ¨Disfruta
la vida.¨ (enjoy life) I arrived in Mendoza Friday after another
marathon bus ride. This time, however, I sat by a very excited
and friendly family, a mom, grandmother and son.
When our bus took off from the platform they all squeezed by the window
(which just happened to be my seat) and waved goodbye to the family
members that were waiting outside for the bus to depart. I waved
too, it seemed only natural as we were all packed together like
sardines. The mother took a picture of the family waving from the
bus as we pulled out and thus commenced a scrapbook marathon. I
took a picture for them at the beginning of the bus ride, breakfast and
at the end of the ride. She even took a sneak-shot of me when I
wasn´t looking because she wanted to have a photo of her ¨compañera del
viaje.¨ I just laughed when she showed me the photo and told her
that it was awful.
In Mendoza I tasted wine and hiked around the Andes, drank coffee and
bought a couple gifts for my Chilean family and now I´m hitting the
road again tomorrow back to Santiago to meet up with some
friends. I´ve been looking for work and have a interview in
Concepción sometime next week. When I told my Chilean mom Ruth
that I might be staying in Concepción she got really excited and said,
¨then you can be my daughter again!¨ It was really sweet so I didn´t
have the heart to tell her that the job in Conce is just my safety job
unless nothing else comes through! That, I guess, I´ll deal with
when it gets to me.
next tenative adventure- taking a 3 day barge to patagonia
through fjords and ice fields shared with semis, truck drivers and
cattle. should be awesome!
