No Future

Apart from electric kettles another thing that Chile has over Argentina is change. I'm not talking profound change, but rather small change. In Argentina you have to constantly be aware of what change you have left, remember to withdraw odd amounts from ATMs and try to get rid of big notes at every opportunity. And it's not just my imagination.

I have to decide soon whether I want to extend my trip, probably for another three months. Since I still have to visit Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela and only have six weeks left it's a bit of a "no brainer", but a few days ago I was feeling a bit jaded about the whole meet new people, make friends, move on, meet new people, make new friends, ad nauseum, thing, which is a bit strange since the last 3-4 weeks in Bariloche and Valparaiso have been some of the best of my trip so far.

I met a really nice girl at a party last night, but I can't help thinking, wtf is the point? She lives in BsAs, I'm leaving the country, blah blah blah. Then I got a lift back with someone who certainly should not have been driving. I would have been scared if I hadn't been so tired and drunk. He spent most of the time on the wrong side of the road overtaking people.

Road Manners

Well I nearly got run over last night. Twice. First I forgot that drivers like to conserve the planet here by using their lights as little as possible, while at the same time forgetting that pedestrians have no right of way, then Kai and I helped a guy jump start his car, in reverse, down hill, in the middle of a one way road and through a junction with on coming cars streaming round us.

We were also persuaded last night to skip the geek BBQ today and instead go trekking, canopying and rappelling, which translates as trecking, abseiling and death sliding. The death sliding was the highlight, although we were a little narked when they took us round the three small ones and then told us that to do the two cool long ones across the river would be an extra 20 pasos. But it was worth it, there's an excellent video of Kai and I crossing together, Kai as superman, but Kai's machine is in for repair, which is making uploading anything much more difficult.

Mendozzza

So, we've finally done a little traveling, coming across the country to Mendoza, which is to the far west, next to Chile. I was pretty sad to leave our hostel, we'd met and made such a nice group of friends. Our final Spanish class was pretty emotional too. Actually I think that was our penultimate class, but we sang Shakira in our final class too. Shakira being Kai's choice after complaining about our teacher's choice of music.

Mendoza is a nice place. Like Worthing, Woodingdean and Sydney. Lots of bungalows (since the earthquake in 1861), wide quiet tree lined streets and a Linux conference. The Lonely Planet describes it thus: "Mendoza would be hell without the trees." I guess they mean during the summer, right now it's a really pleasant temperature. Not really sure what we're doing next, Kai was planning to go to Cordoba and then north and get to Sao Paulo in two weeks for a job, but I mentioned going over to Chile and he seems pretty interested in doing that.

A little while ago Mum said that maybe I need to "relax into my Spanish" at the time I kind of dismissed it, but it is a lot easier for me to speak when I'm relaxed. I just meant to ask someone if they wanted to use this computer, but by accident told them that I wanted to use it. It also depends a lot on who you are talking to, yesterday a couple of people told me that I spoke well and then a few minutes later someone told me that they couldn't understand a word I was saying. But then when I switched to English he still couldn't undecided me.