Two Beers and a Pretzel

Last night I was invited to go out with multiple groups, but that soccer game drained all the energy from me.  I overheard a few guys talking about cocaine and figured “Aha!  That’s how they have the energy.”  I slept from about midnight until 1:30 pm this afternoon.  I feel much better.

Aside from blogging and recharging my computer, I’ll probably just catch up on some reading.  I bought Henry Kissinger’s book Diplomacy back in Copan, Honduras, and have been reading it on the long bus trips.  It’s pretty good, but I haven’t gotten to the part where he was actually active in government yet.  I’m up to the Suez crisis right now.

After my previous post about my steak experience, my Uncle scolded me that I did not go to a real Argentine Steakhouse.  So tonight I will try the “real” thing with a couple of Brits.

I did go out for a while looking for new, cheap headphones for my iPod.  No luck there, but I found a pretty cool mall that had an entire level dedicated to an art exhibit.  Some of the art was pretty cool.  A big theme was industrialization destroying the environment.

And, for everyone back at my old job, they have a GAP in Buenos Aires - just a perfume kiosk, but it’s there…

Then, on the way home I finally snapped a pic of the “Open 25 Hrs” shops that are on every block.  Essentially a convenience store that doesn’t really have anything convenient unless you want candy or soda pop.

Tomorrow I fly to Brazil to meet up with my Aunt, Uncle and cousin for the holidays.

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Camera News.

The Olympus 1030SW is holding up very well, minus the paint chipping off.  It’s a little limiting for the artsy photos I like to take, but it’s nearly indestructible and makes a decent weapon in a pinch.  That, and Ingrid & Erinn helped prove the value of a submersible camera to me at Tabacon!!  Those water-slide videos are priceless.

My Canon G9 made it to my Uncle without the $200 tariff I might have had to pay.  Tomorrow I’ll have a manually controllable camera (exposure, shutter speed, aperture, etc) that can capture RAW files, has optical image stabilization, 35-210mm equivalent zoom range (6x), wider aperture (f/2.8-4.8) but still highly portable.  It actually has auxiliary wide and telephoto lenses that you can add on, but I’ll try to resist temptation…  I will need to get a spare battery and a car charger - possibly a spare memory card, but that’s all minor stuff.

The best news is that my monster 15 pound bag of SLR gear made it home without incident.  It was all fully insured, but I  was still dreading the prospect of explaining the loss of $4000 of camera gear to my insurance agent.  I’m very glad that I did not opt for the latest and greatest of everything before I left (Canon 50D with L quality lenses).  It’s way too easy to get into the consumer mindset back home where you want the ‘best’ of everything.  Yes, the SLR takes much nicer photos, and I loved having it in Europe and California, but it’s a whole different atmosphere here in Central and South America.

Every time I see anyone toting all that camera gear, I think “boy am I glad I sent it all back home”.  Aside from looking like an obvious tourist and target, they also seem detached from the moment they’re living in.  Perhaps I’m just realizing that a snapshot and having fun with new friends is more important to me than spending 50% of my time trying to get the perfect photo.  Don’t get me wrong…  I’m not knocking anyone who really enjoys taking pro-quality photos.  It’s just not practical for me on an around the world trip.

I just need to see another active volcano with the G9 to get ‘that’ picture, then I will not regret any of this camera indecision.

I didn’t sleep at all Tuesday night for some reason.  I flew out of San Jose into the Sunset.  We got to altitude, ate a quick, bland meal, and descended into Panama City.

The layover was supposed to be 1 hour.  It was 1 hour in the airport, 1 hour on the plane, 2 more hours in the airport again, then we finally left for Argentina.  I couldn’t sleep on the plane (I never can).

Buenos Aires has been a mixed bag so far…  I was soooo tired after being awake for about 36 hours.  I got to the Hostel Florida (on Florida Ave in the central pedestrian district) at about noon and crashed in the lobby until I could get a room at 2pm.  Then crashed in the room until noon this morning.  I feel much better.  The rest will do me good, since I booked a pub crawl with the hostel tonight, bike tour of the city tomorrow, and semifinal soccer match on Saturday.

The area I’m in kind of reminds me of a cross between anywhere in Rome and the Marienplatz in Munich.  Very cool, lots of street musicians, Tango studios, upscale shops, and nice places to eat.  There’s an intersection of two pedestrian streets that is busy and just fun to people watch.  I am no longer the tallest, or the only blue eyed person.

I had a few hours to spend this afternoon, so I walked all around the pedestrian area.  In the most ironic thing to ever happen to me… I was snapping a photo of a “What would Chuck Norris do?” t-shirt when a guy bumped into my left side, showed me a knife, and pointed to an alley - literally to the immediate right of this picture.

I handed him my wallet with my left hand (the knife was in his right hand).  As soon as he had to fumble with he knife to get the wallet, I hit him with a right jab with my camera (Olympus 1030SW - impact resistant) and hotel key in hand.  He went down.  I picked my wallet back up and walked away.  I think he got $AR60 worth of Pesos (about $12 USD), but I wasn’t going to go back for it - it’s always better to get the hell out of there as fast as possible, just in case the guys really is tough.

NOTE: Kids, don’t try that at home.  I have actually taken 6 months of quasi-legal fighting classes from a guy who trained policemen in Cincinnati, and turned out to be a coke-head (but a brilliant fighter)  - in his basement fighting multiple people at once, as well as disarming people.  These classes were good enough to get me to quit Taekwando at a gym that preferred real sparring to memorized dances just before making brown belt (that’s a whole ‘nother story).  Granted, had this mugger been with a buddy, or had a gun, I obviously would have sacrificed the $200 in my wallet, but this guy looked like a lone punk trying to scare me, and in general, Managua was much more intimidating anyway…

I now had some adrenaline to burn off, so I walked around a bit more - in the middle of the street this time.

After a while I got back to the hostel to see a street band performing outside.

I’m finally calming down.  Hopefully tonight will be fun without incident.