Halfway is just a polite way of saying nearing the end

Halfway on the way away

We are halfway now, a grueling fact that gives me a stomach flinch when I think about it. How will we have enough time for our ever extending plans? Yes, we've seen lots but now I want more, we both do.

The truth is this only still feels like the beginning, we have yet to explore the more indigenous and unruling corners and landscapes of this continent, those without the patios and malls, sparkling skyscrapers and polished sidewalks. I want to see how the other part lives, how they build and what they listen to.

Before I was still a bit unsure about Peru and Bolivia, since more bad than good news had reached my ears. But time has gone by, birds sung a positive song, curiosity rised enough to almost (but not quite) kill the cat and finally my guts have reached a very sizeable state. I am pumped up now and I really want to get to it and experience the alternative. Safety and common sense aplied all times anyway yes blaablaa, moving on. I'm just getting tired of the common and I wan't to get closer to what this place is about.

(In reality I just want to buy a rainforrest worth of unimaginably comfortable and scruffy wollen shirts and ship them home to wait for my uninevitable return to Deepfrostia. I wont even bother going to the post office, since our mule has flights booked to Lima in January.)


My favourite word is awesome

The problem in having an awesome time almost every day is that the return to the so called normal, aka. responsibilities and lack of money, feels like doomsday. Nope, no fancy words there. Just doomsday. Repeat: Doomsday. However the day of doom is not the only problem with uncontrollable awesomenes, the more serious issue is in fact the more is more -effect. You meet people, people are cool, they tell you about cool places, you want to go, you meet more people, people are cool, tell you about more places, more places you want to go. And at the same time your appetite grows, you become sick of being in the safe spots, the resorts and postcard atractions, you want smaller, warmer and more relaxed; higher, wilder and untouched. So you do the inca trail.

Maybe I'm being a bit too pessimistic. So far we have gained so many memories in a time that feels like a lifetime if I really think about it. One legged wavejumping under the stars in the warm blue waters of Pernambucos white sand beaches feels like something I saw in a movie rather than what I was doing a few months ago. Curling up in the warmth of an old rustic fireplace while drinking mate in a small tranquil valley surrounded by snowcapped mountains ain't a bad memory either.


Keepers can also be creepers

And then there are the untold stories, the resents that are already the past but still so fresh in my mind they feel like the present.

Santiago, city that's only shitty in a way that Buenos Aires also is but still, unlike the Argentinian capital, doesn't boast with a misleading name. Not being able to see the surrounding mountains from under the vail of exhaust only drove us to see the insides and breathe the air of Bellavistas numerous bars. And later other hostels too, if you're Niklas.

Santiago also presented me with an experience hat had me longing for vegetarism. No more completos, and never will I ever step in to a KFC.

The air was mais bueno in Valparaiso. Unfortunately the place is slightly larger now than during the good old days when fighting in the company. So running around the steep and insanely steep slopes didn't go too easy, nor could we find a helicopter, what a bummer. Points for the graffiti though.

Well, thats a rough sketch of our comings and goings and returnings and goings again. I could mention our shuffling back and forth between Santiago and a paradise beyond, but that place I'd rather just keep to my self. Lets just say there's life after Natura.


Staying sane

Well, it's almost christmas now. We hope to spend it at Titicaca, but probably don't have enough time to get there. Too many interesting things tend to pop up on the way, delaying our "plans", but it's certainly not a bad thing.

Its nice to approach christmas in a relaxed attitude: no stress about spending money on presents and going crazy looking for something boring, unimaginative and specific. All I wan't for christmas this year is to have a grand time, nothing else.

(It's a shame that having a grand time also sometimes requires money, but as I am a thankfull and just person, I'll let the dude on the hill decide how a grand time I'll be having and be happy with what ever little help I get with that very grand of a time.)

Location:Santiago de Chile

A tribute to the awesome powers of tectonic plates

I'd like to take some time now to write about the Andes. It will probably end up taking quite a while since all the wine and barbecue from last night has left me in a state of slight brain paralysis and malfunctioning hand-eye coordination. My stomach is also at war against everything trying to sneak in for rescue.




But the Andes! They have turned my love for mountains into an obsession. There is no way I could go on with my life without coming back here one day to explore the wonders of the southern Andes. I must, some day, visit Patagonia, hopefully on a bike via the pan american highway, those interested are welcome to join, but expect stopping at every single quirky rock formation and also be ready to go to awesome lenghts to reach the perfect viewpoints of awe.

What is so special about the Andes then? Thats something I'll try my hardest to explain, but there's really no way to explain the beauty of something unimaginable in words, since words are only hints and when put together will form a picture totally distorted to the unseen eye. So to know for real you should visit, and visit you should.

These so called mountains are not really mountains but giant teeth of rock sticking up from the flat and arid deserts around it. Rather than growing gradually from highlands and hills, they just kind of go up like crubling skyscrapers of wicked heights, or like a sloppy row of dominoes that have been standing there for an eternity, some still standing, resisting to fall, yet crumbling under their own weight.

Naturally, the ride from Mendoza to Santiago left my neck numb from trying to take a peak of the peaks of mountains literally leaning towards the snaking road, I also dislocated my jaw when turning here and there trying to eat in all the colours of rock and sand with a somewhat dumbfound expression on my face. It's amazing, the colours and the rough forms that are all there to see for your eyes. This is due to the fact that the mountains dont actually get much rain where there could otherwise be vegetation so nothing is hiding these masterpieces of green, red, white, blue and every other mineral colour. Vegetation only excists in the gravel that has fallen of to form piles of sand at the roots of these gigantic faces of rock. Not much can grow on the mountains themselves since every face is steeper than the other, so steep in fact that they can't hold snow.

I don't know what I can say. Nature scares the crap out of me now. I got to say young Niklas had it right when he couldn't sleep due to worries conserning the tectonic plates.

Location:Santiago, Chile

Just dance in ghost town you soon to be fossil

Full of gaga

I hate it when people play music in public places via their phones. In addition to the crappy stereos, the music is often something that does not fit in to my category of good music. But there's one thing worse than playing music from your cellphone: Playing music on repeat on your cellphone.

Yesterday we were taking the bus from Mendoza to the ghostly town of San Juan. Next to us on the bus sat a 30 something mama's boy, who had an obvious obsession over Lady Gaga. I respect Lady Gaga for writing her own songs, but not as much to enjoy her lyrics over and over and over again. The guy kept playing Just Dance on his cellphone speaker and also had a very loud conversation with his mother via the same hellish invention.

While he played the song for the fifth time in a row, I was manicly looking for some headphones I got on the plane to give him. Unfortunately I had stuffed them in my backpack that lie out of reach in the luggage compartment, so when the song started playing again I was close to ripping his head of, ramming the phone into his brain and duct taping his head back in its place again. That way he would know the pain of Gaga I was going through.

Needles to say my day hadn't been too good before the busride either.

Out of town

San Juan turned out to be a bit of a bore. It's off season, so we're the only residents in our quiet hostel. Also everything here smells strange. Like kerosene and sewer. We weren't supposed to stop here, we were on our way to San Augustin de valle fertil, but the last bus of the day was full booked and we were forced to spend the night here. The room wasn't too pricy, but the bed kept me awake all night with springs pushing painfully against my skin and bones. By the time the pain had turned into a numb beat the sun was up it was too hot to sleep.

But today we continue to the valley. It only has 4000 inhabitants and that's a good thing since all this riding the bus has been way to stressful and in a place with no people, there's a good chance nobody will be playing Lady Gaga on their cellphone right next to me. But if that were to happen, some new strange dinosaur fossils might appear in Ichigualasto National Park.

Short stories

I'm a lazy person and to be honest this blog busines is a pain in the ass. Literally. Because my ass is broken. So here are some short stories from here and there that I don't feel like writing down into some ''interesting and bewildering reading experience''.

I said I'd write about El Bolson and all that it some point, but I really don't feel like it, so lets just say it was a cool and picturesque place but in a serious need of some Cartman hippie control because of all the ''natural contsruction'' and ''living in peace with the earth'' wanna be intellectual folk. Sure they had some good ideas, but I'm not interested in having a lecture on them, I mean, I went to Kallio.

Oh and we got a ride in a police car in Mendoza. The cop was speeding like hell, honking at families running across the street on a road that had a limit of 40km/h. Also the guy offered us a chance to lie in our police report in order to make the process quicker, but we didn't since we wanted Break Point hostel to get what it deserves.

The manager of Break Point should learn a lesson about how to run a hostel. Sunbathing is not good managing. Helping, or at least caring for, people who got their money stolen from your hostel would be, but i don't think anyone told her that. I mean, she could have at least called the locksmith, who was ''fixing the lock'' of a broken locker in our room during the time the money dissappeared, and even if not blaming him then at least asking him if he had seen anyone else ''fixing a lock'' during that time. But no. She didn't even lift a finger when it happened again the next night to another guy.

But at least we didn't have to do a trek with an about-to-burst gangrenous appendix.

Now my ass hurts, so bye.

Oh, and if you want to go oohmar and aah looking at strange and distorted images of our trip, check out Niklas' way more finnish blog including better grammar: cihkal.blogspot.com

Just a small town girl

BLAU!

Livin in a lonely world
Tittiidii

She took the midnight train
Shazaam!

going anywheree!


Do you find this post a disappointment?
Were you looking for juicy details about the life and struggles of Tessa Dean?
Here's an interesting fact: You can go llama trekking here in Mendoza. That's cool.

Today is a lazy day. Like yesterday. And the day before.

Lazy is good.
Good is ice cream.
Ice crean is tummyache.
Ice cream is still good.
Especially mint.
With chocolate chips.
Mmmm...
Chocolatechipminticecream.
Gotta have some.
Gonna get some.
No moneyy.
Should go to the ATM.
Don't feel like walking.
But if I had a llama..

Tomorrow we're going llama trekking. Yes. And then we're getting ice cream.
On llamas.
Ice cream.
Creamy ice.
Mint cream with chunks of chocolate turned into an icy dream land of deliciousness.

Tomorrow begin our last 100 days of traveling.
Last 100. Thats like 50 days times two. Or 20 days times five. It's not much.
Eww Finland in the winter.
No deliciousness there.
Just winter coats.
No llamas either.
They would die.
From all the ice cream.

Eww.
Dead llamas.
All icy and lifeless.
Eww.

Finland.
Llama killer.
Destroyer of creatures.

Yeah.

Tomorrow I'll write proper, I promise.
Really.
Not.
Not really.
Maybe.
Probably.
Unless we go llama trekking.
That would be cool.

K bye.

Buenos And Balls

Argentina, argentina... It's not as wacked up as Brazil, but somehow we have experienced far more crooked events here than in Brazil. Brazil didn't take our camerabag, and it gave us fresh new bills straight out of moneyland, not fake ones to whipe your ass with.













Our first night started well with juicy and cheap steaks the size of our heads, but what we didn't know is that when you gain a kilo, you lose at least two, and apparently from your luggage. So off we went to Buenos Aires to search for a replacement camera, bag, lenses and a flash. Due to this and the battery of the iPhone running out, we only have three pictures from the Argentinian side of the falls.















Unfortunately we also lost our Brazilian portuguese hand book, so there's no going back into the arms of Brazil and Hostel Natura. At least there we could throw our stuff around and nobody would take it, not from next to our beds.




Like Brazil, Argentina is HUGE so our bussride from Porto de Iguazù to Buenos Aires took about 20h. It was an overnight buss, but I couldn't sleep since the sky was full of stars that I personally can never get enough of. While Niklas snored off in his fully reclined cama suite chair-bed-spaceshuttle, I took my time trying to figure out if there was anything familiar to spot in the glittery sky. The moon perhaps, but even that was upsidedown.
Sooner than we thought, the lights of Buenos Aires redded the sky, stars disappeared into the haze of co2 and other shit shat by the millions after millions of porteños and the time came to pick up our gear and go hunting.








Buenos Aires was a pleasant surprise, another surprise was that the ex-president/current presidents husband had just died, so Buenos Aires was in a state of confusion. What confused the confusion was the census being counted on the day of our arrival, so basicly when we entered the city it was very ghostly and empty, nothing was open and nobody was out, except señora Taxi Driver of course. But luckily our driver didn't distort the calculations too much since me and Niklas filled in like heroes. Now we are finally part of something: the population of Buenos Aires.




But the bueno in Buenos Aires doesn't end in being part of the population, it is the design of the city, the vibe it gives out and the weird way it feels so European but has details that scream Latin America. I loved how street music, even the worst, sounded awesome. The subway ride back from the delicious Vegan take-away went by fast as two random guys displayed their talent of singing and drumming weird objects.




Restaurants are also a bueno. In the land of sweet Pablo the cow it's hard to imagine such a wide range of good vegan and vegetarian restaurants, maybe some people here just understand what makes Pablo so perfecto and have decided they'd rather perfect themselves by eating Pablos food.





We are bound to go back to Buenos Aires in some point, to check out stuff we didn't have time to do on this visit. Halloween threw us out from the city for now, but we'll be back, even if it's just to get our non-fake money back from the deceiving taximan. Thanks for the fake ones though, made a nice origami. (I must say he was a very talented scam artist though, points for that.)




We are now on the way to El Bolson. This time we're traveling in cama, and they don't even offer us water. Our surroundings are a mixture of red dead redemption and mars. Very red, dead, dry and monotone. Roads are a standard straight, cars passing every 10 minutes or so. My question is, how long do we have to go?














... Been in el Bolsón a few days now

:)))

Location:El Bolsón, Rio Negro, Argentina

Good times

Wow. I think I just had one of the greatest weeks in a long time. I don't really know what to say about it, because there's so much to say and I can't really put my head around it. How can I explain something when there are no words for that magnitude of awesomenes?







I wish I still was in awesomeland, the awesomest place I know so far. We had everything there: Cheap and delicious home made food, a garden with endless opportunities for relaxing, the singing of birds or any artist on your iPod, frogs and fireflies to spice up the nightlife and so so so much more. We had pool, people, playstation and pineapple. We had everything and more. We came for the falls but instead we fell in love with this awesomeland of a hostel. I will miss chatting at the bar what ever time of a day it happened to be or running away from rolo de bolo, the insane leg biting dogbert. I will miss Shivas, the attention-loving cat, who kept my tummy warm and was a friend when all other friends decided to dump us and go to El Bolson. But mostly I will miss the people, because they made me feel like I was finally in the right place at the right time doing the right thing.










Oh, and the falls were great too!

















I guess we can't stay in paradise forever, it would no longer be paradise then would it? We are only at the beginning and there lie more paradises and people ahead, no point wondering in the past when there's so much going on in the now, not the future, but at this precise moment.

So much crazy stuff fit into less than a week. I really don't even wan't to start telling about it. If you wan't to know, come see it for your selves, but beware of the dragoman!



This bus-truck-thingy as Niklas put it, rummaged to our hostel on Friday. According to one of the passengers (a british guy who ordered a drink of everything since he had ''been through so much, you get me?'') they had toured Argentina in a week. Basicly the annoyingly pompous tour guide of the strange orange bus-truck-vehicle took care of everything so that the people on board didn't have to do much anything else than go along. They stayed in their group the whole time, did everything by the schedule, didn't talk to any locals and the guide even held motivational speeches during lunch that ended with forced clapping. I bet they had to sing group songs when on the move. But the rest of us, AKA. The cool kids, got a good laugh out of those people. The british guy, who ended up throwing up on somebodys backpack, said his girlfriend booked it. I bet he'll enjoy his next two weeks even more...
For those who thought this sounded totally awesome, check out: www.dragoman.com

P.S Argentina is also awesome. Life is good guys, 27€ for two half a kilo steaks from the land of deliciousness + a bottle of malbec from Mendoza, water, pepsi, two espressos of perfect taste, fruity cheesecake of 5 star quality, tips included. Did I mention the free shots? All for 27€ per person. I can not not say this: HAJOTKAA PAKKASEEN!! Ahhahhahhahaa!!!




P.p.s during the last three days Niklas has experimented with the local liquor to an extent of bewilderment. By the time he gets to Finland he will no doubt be an expert when it comes to enjoying cachaça.

Location:Hostel Natura, Foz do Iguaçu

(A) Better stay on budget

Lately me and my travelbud have been having an incy bincy bit of trouble with staying on budget. Brazil turned out to be a bit more expensive than we originally expected, still, most of the money has gone to a good cause called food, not alcohol, if that's what you're thinking. Luckily we are still on budget, at least if today is as cheap as yesterday, and let me say: Yesterday was cheap.


Yesterday
(well, last friday actually)

Breakfast in Pousada Alto Astral is by far the biggest we have enjoyed during this trip. In the morning we munched up the fruit, bread, pudding and other wonders preparing our selves for the bus ride to Olinda. The ticket to ride cost around a euro per person, take that HSL!







In Recife we enjoyed a meal with Tulios family before his parents would hit the road to João Pessoa. There was going to be a wedding in Pessoa and we were also invited by Tulios parents, if we chose to go. For our surprise, Tulios mother had already gone through the trouble of finding me and Niklas something to wear, since it was going to be a fancy occasion.







We drove to João Pessoa through trafic that make the mornings on Kehä 1 look like childs play. Seriously. But we made it in time, at least for the reception.


The reception

In my life I've only been to one wedding, a small and simple wedding with little fuss, so this thing took me by surprise.













There we were, standing in this huge room with flower decorations in each table, wall and corner. The room was lit by chandeliers and coloured spotlights. On the sides lay long glass tables filled with every kind of cheese, meat and chocolate.







We ate, drank and laughed all night. If your glass was empty, a waiter would fill it. If you wanted whisky, a guy would make it for you on the spot. The band played all the cheesiest classics while people went for their second, third or fourth plate. New food kept arriving all the time, teasing us to eat more and more and more.













But all meals have an ending: Dessert. I have no idea how many desserts they had to offer besides the cake. At that point we felt like rolling balls, a fact that had nothing to do with the chocolate covered strawberries and fondue we found at the, yet to be discovered by others, coffee table. I dare say the smartest people took the tables next to the bathroom, and may I mention that the womens bathroom was stacked with everything to make a girls life easier. I felt like looting the cutely wrapped pain relievers, perfume and other "necessities".



















Desserts came and went, literarely. Desserts were there and gone in a matter of minutes, stuffed into every bra, jacket, bag, shoe or napkin. According to Tulio, this looting business is totally normal, happens at every wedding, the looters, surprise surprise, being the woman (or the manslaves too afraid to fight back their munchillaz). In our party, I was the one who had to sneak out the loot, the box of treasures that had been pinned into my hands. Now I knew why they invited me: nobody dares to say no to the foreign girl.







So I'd say this wedding was ok. Not my style perhaps, but
a steady good. Most importantly, we didn't spend a dime. One euro, one day, there's budget for you.




Now feast on these:





















































The end.

Location:Somewhere near João Pessoa, Paraiba, Brazil