Argentina III Trees and an Elephant.

No need to tell me. I know I've just about reached obsession. These aren't Ombu though. They're other pretty Argentine trees. Yes. 

Argentina II Music Men

September 13-20, 2010

I met some music men this week. 

On Saturday, I was just minding my own business, filming some daily Ombu, and then this guy appears out of a bush. He smelled like peanuts and played pleasant music and was a nice acquaintance for a day in La Recoleta park.

I spent Sunday in the San Telmo antique market where I ate empanadas and looked for keyholes.


 The abundance of Jewish items in the antique stands fascinated me. Among the tarnished spoons, stopped clocks, and aged rosaries, you could almost always find an ancient Star of David or an old medal containing a passage from the Torah. This is due to a massive migration of European Jews before around the Holocaust. Why they chose Argentina, I am not sure. Regardless, the fusion of old Jewish and Catholic cultures in this South American city is brilliant and rich to behold. 

These are not accordions. They are bandoneónes, a key element of tango music. To me, a tango tune begins- singing, violin, piano, whatnot- and I kind of dig it. 


Then the bandoneónes start.


It's the breaths of the instruments. Every huff and sigh accelerates the emotion. Unfortunately for anyone hoping to experience this in the video above, you shan't. A) I got some really awkward parts of the song that didn't flow well in a short clip. B) The recording quality of my camera bombs the magic.

And here's my personal favorite music man from Sunday in San Telmo. I imagine he hasn't felt that creeped out for a long time. Really, I just didn't leave. 

I marveled at his handlove for the treasure. 

Argentina

 It's a crazy place, but I like it. Apart from the crunchy raisins.


I've now lived here about two weeks and have a few things to say. Because I do not often think linearly, which writing requires, visitors to this page will find an absurd amount of bullet points in my posts. They help keep me focused. Acostumbrate.


September 10, 2010~ Friday
- It is a strange city in that on every corner a collision of modern and antiquated culture occurs.

It's a city where a shop that exclusively sells doorknobs survives next to a hardware store.


- Since the airport to this afternoon, the public warmth of Argentines has relentlessly charmed me. Older men greet each other with loud kisses on the cheek. All Argentines I've have texted or emailed sign their letters "besos" or "un beso grande." When you introduce yourself to someone, rather than a handshake, you kiss. Lovely. I've also seen a running hug about once a day since my arrival. I think we should do more of those in the States.


- I have spotted four black people since last Monday. Yes, I have counted. Where is everyone?


Interestingly, two of Buenos Aires' highly honored saints are San Martin de Porres (1579-1639) and San Benedito de Palermo (1526-1589). Images of him, which are in most churches, strike you because it is probably the first black person you've seen all day.

  San Martin de Porres was a Dominican who is revered for his love and care for the sick. He set up various orphanages and hospitals for the poor as well as some animal shelters. He's often depicted with a broom, representing his selfless willingness to work for those in need. 

http://www.itmonline.org/bodytheology/stmartin.htm

San Benedito de Palermo was a slave with his parents in Sicily and then freed on account of the virtue of his parents. He joined some hermits and then a Franciscan order and changed the world one miracle at a time. 

http://www.americancatholic.org/features/saints/saint.aspx?id=1342

- Dulce de Leche is what I imagine the turkish delight in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe must taste like. I scraped my first jar clean yesterday. 


- Apparently it is completely normal to be robbed or kidnapped for a bit in Buenos Aires. The majority of my acquaintances, from the children in the slums to the women of La Recoleta, have experienced such crime at least once. I spoke to a woman at an asado (like a barbecue but more rustic) the other day and she recounted a few of her own happenings. As she finished her chorizo sandwich, she shrugged and asserted with "Pero no tengo miedo. Por que? Porque no lo tengo." These people are BA. Pun intended. *Don't worry parents. St. Martin de Porres and other saints of the city and I have talked.


September 11, 2010~ Saturday
A note worthy experience: A trip to the cemetary en La Recoleta barrio.

Apparently I forgot to bring a date because it is a romantic hotspot of Bs.As. I have about 5 shots of people making out in front of 250 year old graves.

These are some shots of my favorite grave. 

- The StreetArt here is famously magnificent. 

 

The man in the right corner is a "cartonero." A cartonero, or scavenger, collects and searches through waste for recyclable materials for which the government pays them. According to the prestigious Wikipedia, in the year 2000 (right before the enormous economic crisis of 2001) this served as the main income for 100,000 people. You see this everywhere. Unfortunately, it is not safe at all and you find as many children as adults combing through street trash. 

 

- An now I introduce my new obsession. 

   Some people like to call it an Ombú tree. 

 I like to call it my new love affair.

Others a hideaway. 

Others a home.

                      And others a temple. 

This page will probably just end up a 6 week long tribute to God's Sculpture: Ombú. 

- Ariel this is for you: 

In La Iglesia de Nuestra Senora de Pilar (yes indeed, the same Mary from Zaragoza woop woop), an altar was built for you to pray. Since you're not here, I'll do it for you. What are friends for? You've got your three ladies: Mamma Maria, Mamma Theresa, and your girl, St. Therese of Lisieux.

-Sunday, September 12, 2010
I lived a movie on Sunday.


 I accompanied a dear family friend and her 90 year old man friend to church. In a tiny room in the bottom of a recently restored building, a splendidly vivacious priest celebrated the mass. Hearing the liturgy in another language is always so rich. For example, you have to rethink the meaning of each word of the Lord's prayer. Also, sensation of connectedness occasionally takes my breath away. A network of spirits enter the same prayer and meditate on the same words. All over the world. Everyday. Beauty. 


 Afterwards we went to a tiny courtyard behind the chapel for an asado lunch. They have a saying here (ew. that sounded so bloggish.) that Argentinians are a bunch of Italians who speak Spanish while trying to be English yet behave like the French, roughly translated. 

 I tasted all of those cultures at lunch. With my steak sandwhich in one hand and malbec wine in the other, we gathered as a family, extranjera included. We consisted of members of the congregation, the priest, his mother, my family friend, my new 90 year old friend, some teenagers, a puppy, and myself. All of us shared utensils (Father took my fork so some older women threw theirs on my plate which I later lent to an extra hungry gentleman) as well as wine glasses (three others and myself passed our wine glass around during the meal). You get close quickly. Shouting, whispering, passing, bumping, kissing, drinking drinking. People making fun of father,  Father accusing me of a dirty mind, labrador puppy chewing steak bones in the courtyard corner, ancient sweetheart joking with me in Spanish and French and winking at me through green eyeliner. All wonders. Of course I nearly fainted at the romance of it all.  


Nice place, Buenos Aires.

-Monday September 13, 2010 
Our first lesson at el comedor de Dona Leticia


While my main purpose for living here is to teach art to "ninos de bajos recursos," I will not include much of that in this illustration. If you are interested, please visit my other one. I will post that here once it is ready. I will however include some windows in this one. 


  We visited a slum of Buenos Aires Monday afternoon. The members of the slum all eat in a cement room which they call the comedor, which will be our classroom once a week.
  In the chilly rain three children waited in a muddy yard for “los ensenos” to arrive. Before we could get out of the car they were cupping their hands against the window to see who was inside. After kissing each of them on the cheek, as is the customary intruoduction here, we waited in the rain for someone with keys to arrive. 10 year old Jorge , who introduced himself by kissing my hand, held a someone's umbrella over the girls' heads. About 20 minutes more children gathered and “La Gordita” arrived to open the comedor. We entered a leaky dark room and set up. Some of the children grabbed brooms to sweep water puddles out of the teaching area. About 15 gathered around the table ranging from age 3 to age 12. We introduced ourselves with difficulty because the children were chatty. I warned them of my strange accent from Spain as well as my frequent confusion with Italian and then taught a small lesson on Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel. The three Argentinian volunteer teachers described Michelangelo’s manner of painting the ceiling on his back and then taught a lesson on how to use watercolor paint. For the following hour and a half four volunteers and 15 children laid on the floor and painted paper taped to the table-bottoms as Michelangelinos and Michelangelinas.

  Kiddies: They live in tin shacks any big bad wolf could blow away and it had rained all day. They were soaked and had been waiting for us in a muddy yard. They colored that afternoon with a shade of joy I hadn't seen before.

- And I finish with a bit of nonsense. A poster in the window of a libreria (there are book shops about every 100 yards here. delightful):

 

This absurdity not only stopped me in my tracks, I backtracked a good half a block. I would feel selfish keeping this jewel to myself. 

- Tuesday September 15, 2010 

    Today we taught at the Hogar de las Ninas de Pilar, a girls' home in a poor area of Bs.As. We rang the buzzer and were welcomed by the orphanage door-keeper. When we entered the room where the girls were watching a movie, it exploded. A new volunteer was confused because of how enthusiastically they welcomed us, it seemed we had been there before. In the hogar’s study room we pushed small tables together and taught the same lesson as Monday. The girls were more familiar with Michelangelo, given that group there is more educated than those of Dona Leticia. How interesting- the ones in the slum painted aggressively with lots of color and very abstractly where the girls at the orphange painted figurately with lots of open blank space in their work. Many of the girls asked for an image to paint from as well. At the end of 2 hours we had all forms of flowers, landscapes, and some cats. The hogar then invited us to tea where we sat with them and had yerba mate, English tea, and/or pastry with the girls and some nuns. Where am I?

- Wednesday September 15, 2010

The reverence of the people here has now brought me to tears. Literally and several times. 

In various adoration chapels here, which are often packed, all colors of the wheel converge. Balding man in techvest, young mother with grocery bags of eggs and diapers, puberty-stricken gangly boy, Sean Connery's twin in tweed, high school girl journaling, Wall Streetesque types on their lunch break, and of course lots of old Catholic women. My favorite is watching how each of them greet God. Most cross themselves and genuflect. Nearly all kneel for some time. Some touch their lips and places kisses at the base of the tabernacle. So real. And so personal. 

- Friday September 17, 2010

Last night I went to a Tango concert to see a new friend play the violin. Sketchy dark graffiti neighborhood, and then you see some firey light falling out of a window. You enter a dingy yet comforting room of scrappy art and dead vines growing up stone. Some pesos and a turn down an orange hallway and I enter a room lit nearly exclusively by candlelight. After grabbing a glass of Malbec full to the rim, I meet an older pianist man who coincidentally is there to see the same violinist. So Federico and I subir to the balcony and start a small friendship. Within 40 seconds of the first song I am floating. Federico and I whisper about what we like and don't like. I remained enchanted till 2, when we congratulated our tango violinist friend and headed home. Smiles. On my face and down in the stomach.