Espíritu de Argentina

"...then we dance with chains..."

One does not need to travel far, or to a large capital city to experience what makes this country great. From Saturday night pizza gatherings, where all are welcome (just bring some toppings to share), to markets in the park that turn into night time concerts, the sense of community is in the air. It is not forced or false. Open invitations and true hospitality are the norm.
This past Wednesday, we received an invitation for "Argentine folk dancing. Bring chorizo, bread, and wine." The location was outside of our friend Alejandro's house where speakers sat in front of the house and a laptop pumped out Samba and other traditional beats. Across the street was the protest camp, where 13 former employees of a construction company and 2 current employees (in solidarity) had locked themselves inside of the area where the equipment was kept and chained that up as well. Women and children of the workers pitched tents, made food, shared stories, and kept maté cups filled.
Friends of Alejandro and Elsa's, as well as supporters of the strike gathered to feed, feast, and dance. A spry, middle aged stoutly built man with a passion for hiking and climbing every mountain in this area (and there are numerous!) kicked up his heels in a sort of jig and waived a silk scarf romantically in the direction of his dance partner and wife. Such spark for life! It was mostly women besides him that were dancing, each with their own flair. Noelani and I even got pulled into one dance, but the large gravel/ rock road and my flip-flops didn't exactly make me a graceful dancer, not that I might have been anyway.
A police vehicle with it's swirling lights drove down the road...just to check on the festivities. Luckily, no brutal action had been taken, yet. Although a scare occurred a few nights earlier when 15 officers, one for every person inside, arrived with guns drawn. No exact explanations were provided as to why, mostly an intimidation tactic, we surmised. We asked Alejandro if the police would shut it down. He  didn't seem concerned by this. "But what happens if they come," I pressed on.
"Then we dance with chains," he said with gleaming eyes.

A couple days later, while resting up my recently fattened foot, due to an unfortunate run-in with some sort of stinging creature, I was summoned from the house by the sound of drums and chanting. I hobbled down the road to watch nearly 100 people gathered outside the compound. Police cars were all around, but so far, the trend of protest had been peaceful. "Like Gandhi," Noelani noted. "On some much smaller scale," Alejandro replied. But my thought is that the point is the same. Noelani's thoughts for a blog post are, "Small town, Big Politics." Precisely.
I feel extremely humbled by the connections we have made in this small town in Chubut, Argentina. A spark of activism that at times lies dormant outwardly is reignited.

-Briana

Lago Puelo- Chakra y Lago

 Family day at Lago Puelo. The mountain water is icy cold, but it is a beautiful contrast when the temperature reaches the 90s.

 Pastorcita, the sheep guard dog, getting ready for her break.

Ameen venturing out into the bone chilling waters

Amazing sunsets

Gabriel eating some of his findings

Framboises- the main crop on Olga´s chakra

A Day in the Life

For the past two weeks, we have reported to Olga's farm to volunteer, but today I played hookie to take care of some shopping business.  Plus, it's market day so Olga, and recently, Noelani will be there until the evening.

Today, I loaded up on local, raw milk and yogurt, mostly local and organic frutas y verduras, and some snack items while in the larger neighboring town. I stopped by to see Noelani, working Olga's frambuesa stand at the feria, market (literally carnival or fair, but that's how it's referred) to say hello and fetch her a quick snack of empanada frita con cebolla y carne. And munch on some delectable raspberries...

Afterwards, I took the bus from El Bolson back to Lago Puelo, crossing state lines from Rio Negro to Chubut. I noticed the bus doesn't continue on the regular route but turns down a side road to avoid people carrying a large banner down the street. I can't quite make out what it says but I vaguely remember it being painted a few days earlier in the park. I think I catch a glimpse of Elsa, the mother of a family we have become acquainted with around the corner from our house. Her husband, Alejandro, is the cousin of the director of Gabriel's school back in New Jersey. I wonder if the banner and group of people are demonstrating. Our small town seems to have a bit of political action going on. I only caught part of the story at our weekly pizza gathering at Elsa and Alejandro's this past Saturday night, but it seems a few families are upset about being displaced so they have set up a camp outside of a construction area with tents and shade structures. I will have to attempt to find out more information this week.

January, with it's blustery cold winds and piles of snow, often makes me want to hibernate in the kitchen with the oven and stove constantly on full blast. I relish in finding recipes hidden in cookbooks and food magazines, or experimenting with creating dishes I've sampled in restaurants. Such a North American centric idea of what January means from the other side of the equator!! I find myself longing for the creativity of cooking hot foods! Bags sprawled around me in our compact kitchen as I wash, prep, and imagine what I can do with this leftover chicken carcass...
Ameen is the true professional in this department, of course, but I enjoy my hobby cooking just as much, I suspect. He spends at least an hour a day creating tasty treats of all sorts for the family to enjoy. (We had a great time meal planning on the farm in Ecuador where our creativity was further challenged by lack of refrigeration, the nearest store existing no less than an hours journey, and a makeshift kitchen that left much to the imagination.)
Currently, even in 90 degree heat, I am listening to the sizzle of confit potatoes in the oven, and smelling the savory chicken noodle soup on the stove...

I am appreciating the little nuances of my unconventional life for the month. To save money, I wash my clothes by hand in the sink. I think my first load took me nearly an hour. But now that I have it down, a small load is only fifteen minutes or so, except for the time our water was shut off and I had to continuously run to the spring tap to refill. The tap is in the backyard and crisp, mountain cold water runs right to it. Drinking water has never been so good!! There are plenty of reasons I try not to drink bottled water, but this tops them all... Although I suppose that's exactly why some people want bottled water to begin with... Not all water from the ground or a tap could be this Damn good.

Reading Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" and wondering why I haven't read it sooner, and will everyone of my Facebook friends become annoyed with my constant quoting of it, and do I really care??

-Briana

Market Days

One of the most splendid memories I have of New Hampshire is making my way to the Seacoast Farmer's Market. The food alone is enough to set my senses spiraling, but the amazing community vibes that warm the air, even on the most brutal of New England winter mornings is what sticks with me while I'm away.
There is not a proper Farmer's Market here in Chubut/ Rio Negro, Argentina, or in many of the places we have traveled thus far, but farmers are selling their goods everywhere!! With all of the tourism, I can't help but wonder if a more organized effort would be worthwhile. Three evenings a week there are vendors in the small park in Lago Puelo that mostly sell crafts, but some alfajores cookies, and jams are sold too. The larger market in nearby El Bolson is packed with tourists and locals and consists of probably 100 vendors. Here you will find more fruits and vegetables for sale. There are dozens of farms in this area, but we still encountered difficulty when trying to find one to volunteer on in exchange for room and board.
Serendipitously, as often happens for us, we made a connection in an unlikely place. While getting her haircut, Mary learned that Vilma, her stylist, lived on a farm. We setup a date to pay her mother a visit. The main cash crop on the farm this time of year are frambuesas, raspberries. Many farms utilize volunteers through programs like WWOOF, but Vilma's mother, Olga, usually just worked with neighbors who assisted in picking. Olga's mother, whom we only know as Abuela, grandmother, is 90 and although she does not have to work the land, continues to do so everyday. We could sense Olga's uncertainty about having us there the first day. Honestly, why would these Americans travel so far, and for so long to work for free?? Good question! Ameen and I generally would look for a farm with a work exchange option, but since we are staying with my family, it opened up our options. After showing Olga that we would work hard doing anything she asked us to, and explaining that we had the desire to learn her techniques, she warmed up and began expanding our duties outside of raspberrry picking.
My favorite part of this experience is working with Gabriel, my nephew, who just turned six on January 6th. The lessons he is learning on the farm and the work ethic that is being instilled are priceless. There is plenty to keep his little mind busy, and when he tires, there are plenty of animals to watch.
Hot days, into the 90s this week, make lake and river trips very appealing after work and on weekends. Yesterday, we rented kayaks and went across part of Lago Puelo (the lake itself) to a presumably uninhabited island where we discovered between the rocks instead of sand, the earth was clay. We rolled it around in our hands for awhile and then I made stripes on my face with it which led to Ameen covering his entire face....and of course once Gabriel noticed that he wanted in on the fun and we all were practically covered in greenish clay. Ameen was the only one who left it on the entire day, all dried and crumbly, he looked like a zombie Frankenstein. There were plenty of strange looks coming from people at supermarkets. Unfortunately, none of us had a camera handy to capture that debauchery.

Photos of farms and lake attached separately :)

(finally, some photos have surfaced)

At last, without further ado, i come equipped with photo excitement. I've been unnervingly reluctant to share photos as I, myself, have had much difficulty with our Blogger and it's settings via android. Whatever my issues with technology and software mishaps, Briana and I are sorry to have not posted anything much prior. Behold, most of these are from our first organic farm apprenticeship in Ecuador with a fellow named Nurse Mike. 

I've captioned a few things, but most of you will get the idea. Further along we rushed to visit family for the holidays so we skipped out on any photos really of our bus travel. The last stream of photos are of our recent and current stay in Argentina. As we continue over the next few weeks here, i will try to attempt at getting photos of our time well spent here in Lago Puelo. Until then, enjoy!

-A

our view from Nurse Mike's finca and his cabin house for volunteers

thousands of feet up high in the jungles of Ecuador

working hard....

one of Mike's many gardens featuring a flurry of many different crops

he uses corn that is grown in the surrounding jungle to feed his animals

these are peanuts

fennel

a trellis i built for one of Mike's squashes

the squash trellis

some aloe plants and yarrow that Bri planted

These humongous leaves are of a widely popular jungle fruit that makes great juice

KALE!!!

Add caption

Believe it or not, coffee is made at Nurse Mike's farm from nearby coffee trees as well as Panela or Sugar Cane

BUS TRAVEL :(  This is our wait between Peru into Chile

taking a shot of Briana while she captures a shot of the kitchen

Chilean fire sky

Gabriel waiting ever so patient for solstice and xmas in Bariloche

Bariloche coast

holiday street decorations are cool in Argentina