Valpraiso, Chile

Valpraiso is a magical little city North of Santiago Chile.  I came here with the intention of staying one week and I ended up getting vortexed in for two weeks.  I volunteered at the Mitico Hostel and had a great time.  The city is so colorful and so vibrant with the best street art I have ever seen.  A very bohemian city with lots of hippies.

The street dogs here were very impressive.  They were very tame and nice.  This famous street dog named Beto has been romanticized in the neighborhood.  Little kids run up to him with their parents yelling ¨Beto I love you¨.  He is a very lazy dog that lies in front of the hostel all day long.  Sometimes he gets up to bark at other dogs that encroach on his territory.

Beto even has a mural painted of him and a two full page spread about him in the newspaper.

Beautiful demonstration of the street art in front of an old French Car.

This kid seriously looks a lot like Justin Beiber... but way cooler.  Dustin (or as I call him J-Biebs).  If you are looking to buy subwoofers or lemon meringue pie while in Valpraiso get in touch with him.

My travel sister Lea from France and me ona  beautiful cero overlooking the harbour... yes thats right Valpo has a harbour.

Valpo its a clean city.

Beto making friends with people in the plaza.

If you want to rent bikes in Valpraiso and go for a ride along the pier rent for free from University of Catholic Valpraiso.

At the right time of day you can even see Sea lions.

Up top of the escalator in Cero Blanco.  Here there was a street art performance last year and many beautiful murals.

Dog sleeps on coach with tattered blanket in front of Graffitti in Cero Blanco.

The port is a marvel.  Copper is a big export of Chile and China is buying a lot.

Japanese friends and I made the best suishi ever one night with salmon, shrimp, avocado, and mango.  Apparently in Japan you dont put mango in suishi but she was down.  Suishi is very famous in Valpraiso.  There are many restaurants selling it.  I think it has to do with the trade with Japan and China.

The beach Las Dockas near Laguna Verde.  Its about an hour drive to get here but so worth it.  The most beautiful beach with free camping.  Only problem is the water is cold and there are lots of jelly fish.

Beautiful flowers in bloom.

My French Canadian brother.  One of the only Canadians I met in Chile.  Not many Canadians seem to be travelling to South America.  There were many in Peru but here the number one tourists were French.

Damn... we make these streets look good.  Two friends from Argentina.

Beatiful character home here in Valpraiso.  The spanish first came here in 1536 so you can imagine the colonial architecture here is to die for.

Bohemian man on bicycle rides by on a Sunny Sunday.

A couple of Videos:

 
Every Thursday in Plaza Descansar in Valpraiso there is African Dance.
 
So many good local singers in the streets and other tourists coming through.

Drinking Pisco Sours is one of the most traditional things to do in Chile.  Also in Peru too.  Here is a video I made of how to make a Pisco Sour.  Yes you need to use an egg, but just the White!  Fill the bottle with ice, then juice of three limons.  6 shots of pisco.  egg White, and sugar.  Shake until all the ice is gone and then pour into a cup.  MMMM delicious.  Makes about 3 small cups.

Dancing the Tango and other adventures

Back in Buenos Aires now.  I can tell I am back by the beautiful sidewalk decorations. 

Went to a tango lesson.  Bellow is a picture of my Jedi master and Sensai Patricio.  He teaches me to dance the tango, I have taken three lessons from him.  I am his star beginner pupil. Usually he is very critical of all of his students but he absolutely loves me and the way I dance the tango.

 

Here I am dancing the tango in the above three pictures with the lovely and beautiful Nez.  This girl is truly badass, a true original gypsy in South America if I have ever met one.  Delicately dancing the tango in the boots she has been travelling the world with, you can tell by her style she is an expert at not just the tango, but the original gypsy traveller tango as well. She is from Australia.

The Tango is an amazing dance.  It is very serious and you have to be very focused and maybe even a little sad while dancing it.   My tango Jedi Master Patricio sometimes gets mad because when I make a mistake I will burst out laughing.  "No", He says angrily in Spanish.  "The tango is a very serious dance and you must respect the art, passion and history of this beautiful dance."  I am lucky to have such a good teacher to immerse myself deep in the true culture of this country.

 

If you are in Buenos Aires and you want to have good Italian food you need to go to Pippo.  Its owners have operated it through three generations in true Italian fashion.  It is located within half a block of Montevideo and Corrientes, On Montevideo. 

 

This was my freshly made spaghettie noodles with Bolognese Sauce plus a chorizo sausage on top, fresh parmesan to boot. 

 

I filled up on bread pretty hard before the meal.  _Unlimited bread and this pesto dip with garlic and butter.  Plus a decent sized double coffee.  All in all this meal came to 130 pesos, approximately 9 US dollars using the black market exchange rate. 

 

Buenos Aires is a city of many leaflets and pamphlets.  So far these are all the leaflets I have collected during my stay here. 

 

Apparently Larry David is the coach of the Boca Soccer Team down here in BsAs. 

Amazing Night out in Buenos Aires

 All this for just over 100 pesos.  About 7 dollars US using the black market exchange rate.  The drink on the left is Fernet.  You mix it with the coke cola on the right.  The beers in the middle are Isenbeck, my favorite cheap beer in Argentina.

 This is my buddy Jan, born in Germany but living in France.  Here he is teaching me how to make Spaghettie Bolognese.

 Sunny day, time to have a delicious Alfajores.

 Disgusting McDonalds.  A triple bacon goes for 25 pesos apparently.  I still havent eaten here in Latin America.  I cant remember the last time I ate at McDonalds in Calgary,  not counting McFlurries.

 Here is a shot with some friends in Boca.  The part of town made famous for the recent backpack theft video.  You can see Pia on the left and me on the right bending our knees to look shorter next to the Latino American crowd.  Otherwise this photo might give people other reasons to fear Boca.

Here we are buying some churros from this guy on the bicycle.  He sells three for ten pesos.  Best churros in the city.  I am sure you can find this guy at the Boca Market every weekend.  I was at the hostel not doing anything and Livia on the left asked me if I wanted to go to Boca for a free dance show.  Seeing as I had no money and nothing to do, I was down.  Unfortunately once we waited for all the Argentinos, who run on Buenos Aires time, always soooo late, the dance performance was over.  Still a great afternoon in Boca though.

 Next day went out for dinner in Palermo with this crew.  Palermo is the nice part of town that is very high class.  So safe, nobody will steal your packpack.  Police enforce they area quite well to keep property values high, which they are.  Went to an awesome American style burger place on Borges Avenue.    Didn't have enough money to buy a burger and fries so I told the lady I just wanted fries.  She told me that if I bought a burger I would get free fries because she really thought I had to try their burgers while I was in Buenos Aires.  I took her up on her offer although to be honest it was the second time I had had one of those burgers.

The guy standing on the very right is Daniel.  Funny story.  I hung out with Daniel with another group of completely different friends the week before at a dinner party.  Then I show up to meet these guys for burgers and Daniel is there and he knows my other friends.  Such a small city considering there are 13 million people that live in Buenos Aires.  Daniel is from a small town near Rosarita, Mexico which is a small town near Tiajuana, Mexico.  I visited Rosarita a couple years back.  Another random occurrence.  At this rate I think I may run into Daniel randomly again at some point this trip.

 Fell asleep on the streets of Buenos Aires.  Don't worry it was in Palermo the safe neighborhood.  Woke up and someone had drawn a mural of me on the wall.  But I think whoever painted the mural also stole my Isenbeck.  At least they were nice enough to leave my backpack.  The best street art in this city that I have ever seen, So Next level!

After burgers in Palermo we went to this random little Arabian restaurant to smoke Hookah or Sheesha (dried fruit and tobbaco... not drugs mom).  Julián Álvarez 1272 is the address.

The restaurant was nice on the inside.  It was a Sunday night so it was quiet.  But during our stay a lot of people came and went.

 We got to smoke outside in a beautiful courtyard on a patio table all to ourselves.  The stars were out, all two of them in ever polluted Buenos Aires.  And beautiful plants and flowers growing everywhere.  It was very nice.

 Beautiful elegant Hookah.

Look at some of these luxuirious rose.  They even had a lemon tree too (not in photo).

 Came back home and got one last picture of me in front of my hostel in the theater district of Buenos Aires. Time to go to bed... or is it¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿

Was chilling at the hostel writing some emails ready to go to bed when Augusto came and told me we should go and party.  I didn't know enough Spanish to explain to him that I was tired and had to write emails; so I ended up just walking out of the hostel with him and the beautiful girl he was with.  We walked to a few bars and clubs but everything was closed because it was Sunday.  We hopped in a cab and Augusto instructed me not to talk.  This is always a smart move because if taxi drivers hear a whisper of english they automatically assume you have money and take the longest route possible racking up the meter.  We went to one Boliche (spanish for nightclub) but it had just ended because it was 230am.  Out front people gave us wristbands for another nightclub that was apparently still going.  We went but it was completely dead.  So we went to a chill pub and had a few beers.  After Augusto paid the bill I assumed we were going to walk home because it was 430 am... But no.  Back to the dead Boliche.  This time it was really bumping!!!  Really good party for a Sunday night.

Here I am with Augusto on the left and Vivina on the right.  Augusto is from Usuyayia which is the Southern most city in the world at the bottom of Argentina.  The only place further South is Antarctica.  Vivina is awesome. If all the Women in Argentina were this amazing, beautiful and nice I would be applying for teaching jobs here tomorrow.  I only wish I knew more Spanish so I could get to know her better.

On a side note, a lot of Argentinan's ask me what I think of Argentinian Woman.  I always lie and say that I don't know too many Argentinian woman and that my hostel is full of Europeans, Brazillians, Chileans and Paraguayans; which is true.  However I do know a few Argentinian Woman.  They are very nice and easy to get to know quickly.  They are so friendly and will go out of their way to track you down to hangout.  However I have met a few that are crazy, immature or mooches (they borrow your beer for a sip and they drink half of it). Immaturity makes sense.  Argentina is a very difficult place to transition out of high school or University to finding meaningful employment because the economy is harsh right now.  That transition was even hard for me in Canada.  But here I can understand more why young people don't want to grow up and be adults, because the prospects aren't great.  I have met a lot of other amazing Argentinian Women though that are so nice and friendly.  Are they better than Canadian woman?  That is a loaded question.  I can be in a better position to answer that if I spend another month here at some point and especially once I know Spanish.

Walk home on the streets of Buenos Aires at 6am.  Downtown in San Nicolas.