How do we know you're really in BA?

PICTURE TIME!

Here is my propaganda for the People's Farm Collective of the Estancia. ¡Viva la Revolución!

I'm not turning into a communist here in the homeland of Che Guevara, but it is weird to be in a place where "socialist" is not a dirty word. People here aren't as sure as Americans that democracy is a close buddy of capitalism, and there is a firm belief that anyone in power is corrupt. If they have gotten power, they did it through an underhanded way and they, as a representative of the government, are trying to screw you as an individual. It's a very livable kind of mistrust, and by livable, I mean it's a basic assumption about the world that subtly colors everything. It is, of course, is not true for everyone, but it's strong enough to make me pause to remind myself of it when I hear someone comment on politics.

Here I am at La Bombonera, the stadium for the Boca Juniors futbol team, which in BA is one of the two big teams, the other being River Plate.

Yeah, I don't know anything about futbol. Futbol is kind of fun to watch, but I take my dad's view on it: You can watch for 2 hours and have nothing happen and have it all decided by 1 penalty kick. Luckily, I really don't have to be into futbol because it's more of a guy thing, so no one really expects me to know anything. All I have to know is who Maradona is and what he's doing (or not, since he's no longer coaching the Argentina team).

We went on a day trip/pilgrimage to the Cathedral of Lujan, a town outside of the capital where the Virgin, miraculously, wanted to stay. At first, it was kind of boring because a church is a church, and since we didn't feel like taking back gallon jugs of the miraculous Lujan holy water, there wasn't much for us to do. In the late afternoon, however, a cultural festival that was part of the year-long activities sponsored by the government for the bicentennial celebration began in the plaza. They really like drums in BA, and high schools had crazy sequined costumes, giant flags, and drum lines. The guys would play the drums, and the girls would dance behind. The whole procession moved very slowly through the plaza, and it was led by this large man in the picture. All he had was a yellow sign that said "Cultura." We had NO idea what was going on, and it was bizarre, frustrating, fun, bewildering, and a textbook case of culture shock.

(A sequin Goku makes an unexpected appearance in Lujan. The drum groups had a penchant for putting sequined cartoons onto their fringed polyester costumes.)

--Nicole

P.S. > Congratulations, Megan!