Santiago del Estero
Marcinie upuszczajacy niewiasty! Wiedzialam ze do mnie napiszesz bo mi sie sniles! Napisze do Ciebie osobny e-mailik wkrotce - bo mi sie udalo zlokalizowac te adresy e-mailowe ktore mi sie na czas pewien zatracily.
Days in Sam Miguel de Tucuman got cold and rainy but it was really nice to spend time indoors with a really nice crowd of people in the Argentina Norte hostal. Some hostals are just terrible - the ones were people basicaly drink excesively and "party" all the time. And others, like Argentina Norte, are the places which attract people who travel not to party but to experience other cultures. The first crowd has nothing to talk about and plays cards and ping-pong or darts. The second crowd has many interesting stories to tell and it's possible to spend a night talking and drinking beer but not over the limits of endurance... In Argentina Norte I shared the room with an Argentinian student of medicine and a journalist from Australia. We talked at night, lying in our beds. It remainded me the shelter houses in the mountains in Poland and the various sailing and horseback-riding trips on which I went when I was a student. In the evening we watched the movies in the living room. A really great, peaceful and cozy athmosphere. I told them I wanted to go to Termas de Rio Hondo and Santiago and they said "It's dreadful there but go and see for yourself." So I got to Termas, another spa spot, yesterday in the evening. It it true it is not as beautiful as the other cities - it is basicaly a town built around the hot spring and all hotels are connected to the spring - but for me everything is interesting if I haven't seen it before. I want to see it myself and have my own opinion about it. And the place is not just the architecutre - it's the people and dogs and lot's of other things so there's always something interesting about it. In Termas there was a really nice and big outside swimming pool with the water from the spring. I went there in the morning and stayed in the water until my skin got wrinkled... It was wonderful. A pool with such clear water, without a splash of chlorine in it, is the only pool I like. I would love to live close by such a pool. I would be beginning and ending every day with a swim... Later I got to Santiago del Estero which was a first town built by conquistadores in Argentina. As the people in the hostal said, and the guidebook, it is a rather run-down city and not much of its oldness shows but it has a specific climate and people are amazingly warm. It's a different kinds of warmness and hospitality than in Bolivia. In Bolivia I could just feel the spiritual attachment and there was a slow exchange of ideas. Here people quicky and spontaneously hug and kiss me. I have been hugged and kissed here by the people in the tourist office, various woman and men in museums and little stores. In Poland there's a tradition of kissing but not random tourists. It's very nice. When they ask me where I am going and I tell them I hope to Patagonia they tell me to get a warm jacket and take good care of myself as if I was their daughter or a grandaughter. So the museums are not great, the churches are not beautiful (even the San Francisco church is rather ugly), the restaurants don't serve good food but the people make up for all this. I will remember Santiago as a place of very hospitable inhabitants.
At midnight I am going to Cordoba. In Argentina the buses are very comfortable, with WC, tv, great chairs, little bars serving coffee and snacks, but they do not travel as often as buses in Peru and Bolivia and there are virtually no collectivos here. The really great thing in Mexico, Guatemala, Panama, Peru and Bolivia was the fact that one could travel anywhere at any time day or night. Sometimes you have to wait and hour, until the bus or collectivo gets full, but as soon as it gets full you are on your way. Here it's not so easy... And the country is so big and some places are so desolate that it requires a bit more of planning and checking the schedule so that one is not stranded in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night... Good night everyone - I will be in Cordoba at 6 am.
Days in Sam Miguel de Tucuman got cold and rainy but it was really nice to spend time indoors with a really nice crowd of people in the Argentina Norte hostal. Some hostals are just terrible - the ones were people basicaly drink excesively and "party" all the time. And others, like Argentina Norte, are the places which attract people who travel not to party but to experience other cultures. The first crowd has nothing to talk about and plays cards and ping-pong or darts. The second crowd has many interesting stories to tell and it's possible to spend a night talking and drinking beer but not over the limits of endurance... In Argentina Norte I shared the room with an Argentinian student of medicine and a journalist from Australia. We talked at night, lying in our beds. It remainded me the shelter houses in the mountains in Poland and the various sailing and horseback-riding trips on which I went when I was a student. In the evening we watched the movies in the living room. A really great, peaceful and cozy athmosphere. I told them I wanted to go to Termas de Rio Hondo and Santiago and they said "It's dreadful there but go and see for yourself." So I got to Termas, another spa spot, yesterday in the evening. It it true it is not as beautiful as the other cities - it is basicaly a town built around the hot spring and all hotels are connected to the spring - but for me everything is interesting if I haven't seen it before. I want to see it myself and have my own opinion about it. And the place is not just the architecutre - it's the people and dogs and lot's of other things so there's always something interesting about it. In Termas there was a really nice and big outside swimming pool with the water from the spring. I went there in the morning and stayed in the water until my skin got wrinkled... It was wonderful. A pool with such clear water, without a splash of chlorine in it, is the only pool I like. I would love to live close by such a pool. I would be beginning and ending every day with a swim... Later I got to Santiago del Estero which was a first town built by conquistadores in Argentina. As the people in the hostal said, and the guidebook, it is a rather run-down city and not much of its oldness shows but it has a specific climate and people are amazingly warm. It's a different kinds of warmness and hospitality than in Bolivia. In Bolivia I could just feel the spiritual attachment and there was a slow exchange of ideas. Here people quicky and spontaneously hug and kiss me. I have been hugged and kissed here by the people in the tourist office, various woman and men in museums and little stores. In Poland there's a tradition of kissing but not random tourists. It's very nice. When they ask me where I am going and I tell them I hope to Patagonia they tell me to get a warm jacket and take good care of myself as if I was their daughter or a grandaughter. So the museums are not great, the churches are not beautiful (even the San Francisco church is rather ugly), the restaurants don't serve good food but the people make up for all this. I will remember Santiago as a place of very hospitable inhabitants.
At midnight I am going to Cordoba. In Argentina the buses are very comfortable, with WC, tv, great chairs, little bars serving coffee and snacks, but they do not travel as often as buses in Peru and Bolivia and there are virtually no collectivos here. The really great thing in Mexico, Guatemala, Panama, Peru and Bolivia was the fact that one could travel anywhere at any time day or night. Sometimes you have to wait and hour, until the bus or collectivo gets full, but as soon as it gets full you are on your way. Here it's not so easy... And the country is so big and some places are so desolate that it requires a bit more of planning and checking the schedule so that one is not stranded in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night... Good night everyone - I will be in Cordoba at 6 am.
posted by Asia Kabat at 6:38 PM
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