23 - Planet of the Asados (Mendoza)

Viña del Mar, CHILE to Mendoza, ARGENTINA - 02 february 2003

I took the day bus to Mendoza because the view across the Andes from Chile to Argentina was reputedly amazing. I sometimes had problems sleeping in night buses. But I apparently had NO PROBLEM sleeping in day buses. Go figure.

So, while I tried my utmost best to keep my eyes open to appreciate the view, I dozed off constantly throughout the ride.

Still, from my vague sporadic memory, I could recall, at first, layers of hazy mountains in various shades of grey, lined up one layer after another against the horizon. Then, the valley narrowed and the mountains rose up all around us, very brown, very dry. In the distance, snow was spotted on the higher continuous Andes mountains. We made a slow climb up one mountain and at one point, I counted at least 20 hair-pin turns down below. It was unnerving looking down the steep mountain and be able to trace the ribbony road.

We soon crossed into Argentina and the spectacular Quebrada de Los Horcones, as this valley is known, continued to amaze us with its colours and peaks. But my eye-lids turned to lead soon after and I could not recall much until we cleared the mountains and passed through plains and plains of vineyards. Mendoza has a reputation for its wine production. We had arrived.

A change of country, a change of currency, a change of ‘language’.

In Chile, to convert Chilean pesos into Singaporean dollars, I had to (more or less) divide everything by 350, which involved a healthy multiplication table of 350, borrowing from here, carrying forward there… a lot of brain cells died in Chile. In Argentina, I simply had to (more or less) divide by two. What a relief.

In Chile, I had to drop my ‘sh’ pronunciation in all the words with ‘y’ and ‘ll’ and changed them to a soft ‘j’ sound.

Also, the Argentinians use ‘vos’ in place of ‘tu’ for ‘YOU’. Apparently, only the Argentinians (and maybe the Uruguayians) use ‘vos’. It does not really exist in any Spanish language books or dictionary.

The conjugation for ‘vos’ is different from ‘tu’ for its present tense. But for the other tenses, like past tense, future tense, etc… they are the same as ‘tu’. It is as if after struggling through the present tense to create something different (just for the sake of it), the inventors of ‘vos’ decided to take a break and enjoy some mate and then, they suffered a major case of the Mañana Syndrome and never got back to figuring out the rest of the tenses for ‘vos’.

And NOW, back in Argentina, I had to ‘sh’ more often and use ‘vos’ and its respective conjugated present tense. I was pausing more often and tongue-twisting over everything again.



Mendoza, ARGENTINA - 03 february 2003

My room-mates, Claudio, from Argentina and Yair, from Israeli, were heading to the bodegas (wine-yards and factories) to see how wine was produced. They asked if I wanted to join them.

Claudio added he had his own wheels. Oh, vamos. ¿Como no? [Oh, let’s go. Why not?] And it was not just any car… it was a 1938 Chevrolet, in regal maroon shade and with its original horn (a deep resounding ‘MOOO’).

We struggled to drive out of Mendoza city. We passed by the same streets a few times as Claudio made wrong turns here and there. Maybe he did it on purpose, for everywhere, nearly everyone’s eyeballs were glued to his car.

Men driving in the opposite direction or at a right angle to us, kept their admiring eyes on the car, risking lives and limbs. Curious cyclists stopped by Claudio’s side and made inquiries about the model. Eager street window-cleaners insisted on the honour of wiping the windscreens although they had just been cleaned at the last junction. Later at the bodegas, tourists wanted to pose for a picture. The car was a chico [guy] magnet.

We visited three bodegas. Bodega GIOL has a long history and a huge ancient wine-yard but only 10% is still functioning. The next was very exclusive, Bodega Artesania, where they claim to do everything as personal as possible, hand-picking the grapes, hand-labelling each bottle. Only two restaurants in Buenos Aires serve their wine. One could only buy their wine from this bodega and nowhere else. The third is very modern, with high-technology and metallic pipes all over. All were different and thanks to Yair’s translation (he spoke superb Spanish) to English for me, rather interesting.

We twirled, sniffed and spread fermented grapes over our taste buds (evenly). Hmmm… looks like wine, smells like wine, tastes like wine… I wonder…

There was an asado at my hostel that night, i.e. we ate barbecued cows. Yes!! How I missed Argentina. The excellent juicy bifes… I had indeed suffered in Chile.

Good meat, good music, good Mendoza wine. This is the life.



Mendoza, ARGENTINA - 04 february 2003

The lady at the tourist office had told Yair there were two buses to Puente del Inca, 6am and 10:15am. But another lady had told me there were five buses, 6am, 10:15am, 1:20pm, 3+pm, etc…

We had, of course, overslept and missed the morning buses totally. Now, confused about the different information we were given, we called the telephone number the lady at the tourist office had given me. We were told there were buses at 6am, 10:15am and 1:20pm. Nothing more.

We thought, how misinformed we were.

Alright. We decided to go together and catch the 1:20pm bus. But upon arrival at the terminal, we were told there were only two buses: 6am and 10:15am. What the…!!!???

We realised, HOW MISINFORMED WE WERE.

We had no choice but to return to the hostel and undo all the ‘goodbyes’ we did earlier.

I thus spent the entire day today exploring Mendoza’s city centre. Mendoza is much smaller, quieter and less polluted than Buenos Aires, with merely 700,000 inhabitants. Despite the more-than-35ºC heat, it could be pleasant to walk around at certain places, for many had trees by the sides that somehow grew in such a way that they meet with those on the opposite sides, forming a wonderful shade under the foliage. They called these the ‘tree-lined avenues’.

The reason why Mendoza was quieter was also due to the ‘siesta time’. Nearly all the shops closed from 1pm to 5pm. How very inconvenient.

I visited a hairdresser to maintain my slick urban look. It was interesting to compare the various experiences I had had with hairdressers in different countries.

In China, before I knew it, the lady massaged my head, chopped my back, wrung my arms ruthlessly as part of the massage package that came with the price. Very good massages. Then, the hairdresser proceeded to do an atrocious haircut.

In Germany, the hairdresser flipped through hair-stylist magazines to look for pictures for me to pick how I wanted my back and sides to be like. After ascertaining them, she fled to a screen behind worriedly. A long pause followed. Later, another lady came to attend to me, her head shaking. Hmmm… apparently, the first hairdresser was so nervous, uptight and traumatised that I spoke no German that she dared not cut my hair.

In Brazil, the hairdresser had looked me up and down and asked, “Fala Português? [Speak Portuguese?]” “Não [No]” Without batting an eyelid, he nonchalantly proceeded entirely in Portuguese to explain how he would cut my hair, his hands rustling my hair (like how they did in Vidal Sassoon ads) and ending with the typical thumbs-up, “Tudo bem? [Everything OK?]” I shrugged, “Tudo bem! [Everything OK!]”. How laid-back Brazilians are.

And now, as my hair was being cut, I got to chatting with the hairdresser and then, the owner of the saloon. By the time the cut was over, the two shampoo girls had joined in and all four wanted me to write my Chinese name for them to see, asked me why we eat rice everyday and how to say ‘kiss’ (so typical of Argentinians!) in Mandarin. Before I left, we exchanged kissies-on-the-right-cheek, hugged and wished one another eternal happiness.



Mendoza to Puente del Inca, ARGENTINA - 05 february 2003

Today, having bought our tickets yesterday, Yair and I managed to drag ourselves out of the bed in the morning. We dragged Claudio along too.

We sat in the first row. So instead of the usual view-by-the-side, we had an amazing view-in-front. This was the same route coming from Chile and as I had guiltily missed out on the scenery earlier, my eyes remained peeled the entire trip this time. It was a gorgeous journey. GORGEOUS (if I may add, with capital G, O, R, G, etc…)!!!!

The Puente del Inca is a natural bridge formed from the calcium, sulphur and other minerals of the underground water. Years ago, a hotel had built thermal baths under the bridge. An earthquake or avalanche (I am not sure) destroyed the hotel and the abandoned thermal baths remained somewhat in ruins now. Underground water still sprouted in the baths. The rocks around were covered in yellow and white.

Someone had once told me the Puente del Inca was not that impressive. Hey, I disagreed. Sure, it was perhaps not as impressive as his ingrown toe-nail, but I loved it here. Claudio was also a photo-buff and we spent a long time exploring the baths and under the natural bridge slowly, snapping away merrily.

Later, we followed the abandoned rail-track towards Chile and murdered many frames with, what we hoped to be, artistic and creative shots of the railway tracks, dilapidated tunnels, using shadow and light. Ahem.

We came upon a bridge. The pedestrian walkway had long eroded away. We decided to walk on the metal tracks slowly to cross it. Stand By Me flashbacks. Halfway through, we yelled, “¡Tren!! ¡Tren! [Train!]” and giggled away. No one would believe we are both in our late twenties.

At midnight, despite the cold wind (altitude of Puente del Inca is 2700+m), we made our way out gingerly to the natural thermal pool near the natural bridge.

OK, with the Andean wind blowing away, we had to be mentally STRONG to strip down quickly to our swimwear and plunge in. There was a pool which had somewhat warm water and a natural ‘jacuzzi’ which was continuously bubbling out warmer water.

Ahhh… what I did not get to do in Villarrica, I got to do it here. And with stars, no… the entire Milky Way in the sky too. This IS the life!

We stayed in there for a long time, dozing off at times, contemplating the Milky Way, wrinkling ourselves into prunes and soaking in the smell of rotten eggs.

We must have been in there for an hour and a half before Yair suggested we should be heading back soon. “Vamos a salir.” [Let’s leave] was repeated for the next 2½ hours. We just COULD NOT make ourselves leave the pool. We had to be mentally MUCH STRONGER. It would be TOO COLD to get up and dry ourselves.

Soon, more people joined us in the pool and it became difficult to leave.

Finally, at 3am or so, I decided to JUST DO IT. I bravely took a deep breath, dashed out, nearly died of hypothermia trying to dry myself and shivered back to the hostel. Brrrr…



Puente del Inca to Mendoza, ARGENTINA - 06 february 2003

As it turned out, Claudio only left the bath at 5am. And Yair, who had been the first to suggest leaving, actually stayed in there with the other late-comers until 7:30am this morning when the sun popped up. He was in the thermal pool for more than 8 hours! He was now a walking, wrinkly, stinky rotten egg.

Claudio took the earlier bus back to Mendoza. Yair had heard there was a laguna nearby and I decided to follow him to try and find it. Just a little further from where Claudio and I had stopped yesterday, we spotted Aconcagua. I was looking for a laguna and instead, I came upon Aconcagua! What a wonderful surprise!

Sheesh, if we had known yesterday, we would have walked further and Claudio would not have left without seeing Aconcagua. You see, Aconcagua is the highest peak in America at 6900+m.

We were joined later by more hostel-mates, one, a Norwegian guy in his 50s. He is a mountaineer, with 18 4000+m peaks under his belt. He had arrived with a climbing team but LANCHILE had lost his bag with his climbing gear. So, his friends left to climb the peak while he remained here, waiting for his luggage to show up. And it did not appear to be showing up at all for no one at LANCHILE seemed to care.