A Quicky from La Matanza

I´m sitting in Sylvia´s house now, just hanging out on the internet while the people who live here are doing normal night-time things. Sylvia is the one in charge of the cooperative I´m volunteering at. We´ll eat dinner soon-ish, I guess, then I´ll go to the bakery for my last time. As much as I want to say I won´t miss those overnight shifts, I kind of will! The stories told by Alejandra that hurt my brain, heart, and soul, the smells wafting from the oven, buttery dough between my fingers, the delirium that tightens its grip around 5.30, the sunrise and the knowledge that sleep is soon to follow, and the euphoria that comes with that realization....drinking mate, smoking cigarettes, trying not to fall down. It´s been really fun, and a crazy experience. I don´t mean to be a baby or a martyr about it, it was just definitely more intense than what I had anticipated! But I came here for experience, and that´s what I got, and I would have had it no other way. These hours have worked out perfectly because I´ve been able to hustle a few things at the market between English classes and bakery shifts. K Gotta run.... later
------
OK, now here I go to finish that. I had to go buy some dinner stuff last night, so that's why I got cut off. I just had a great last day at the coop, it was so much fun. I slept 3 hours in Alejandra's bed this morning, as usual, and I'm about to go to my going-away party in a couple hours, but I'm really energized! I'm always a little excited to be leaving or arriving somewhere, and this time that is going to have to get me through a few days w/ no sleep... because when you go out with Argentinians, you can't even think about getting home before sun-up. That's for bitches!

Anyway, last week I told my regular students that this would be my last week so they brought money today para tomar gaseosa y comprar facturas, to get some soda and pastries from the bakery where I work. They're between 10 and 12, I was blown away! Then I hung out with Nico, the 18 yr old kid that works at the bakery during the day to sell the stuff we make all night. When we sit around, there are usually just a few guys and we drink mate and they blow kisses and whistle at almost every single girl that walks past. Nico kissed at this one girl earlier, and this older lady came back and asked who kissed at her, joking, laughing her ass off. Then he said te amo, blanco to this girl (he was referring to the white sweater she was wearing) but I am also blanco because I'm white, so this other older lady made fun of him because she said it was like he was telling me he loved me. I ended up selling a few things (a couple CDs I took from the apartment, a can of tomato paste, a couple pairs of pants) and made a few pesos, then did my last round of goodbyes and thankyous to everyone. I was saying bye to Sylvia and Alejandra (Sylvia is Ale's aunt) and she was really sweet. First off, she's just an awesome lady - determined to make the coop a success, and in doing so, she does amazing things. It was me, Sylvia, and Ale holding her baby. Sylvia told me that whenever I come back, the doors to the coop are open to me. Then she added, the door to my house too, of course! And Alejandra-And to my bed too, haha (nothing scandalous, obviously) then her baby said y la teta! Saying that Ale's tit is always open to me... everyone was offering me something, and I guess his thought process was that he should offer me his mom's breast. It was hysterical.

So now I'm basically packed up to go. I'm going with almost nothing this time! Not that I have a lot after the first night in BA kicked my ass, but I got rid of a few things anyway just because I don't need a lot. So now I look like I'm going to the gym. I met this really awesome chick yesterday, Amanda from Canada, who's 33 and teacher, and is volunteering at La Juanita. She's helping them out with the Kindergarten that just started. An amazing feat actually, which I can't type about because it's too long a story. Anyway, she's one of those people that I think I blogged about before-you know them for an instant, but they give you a little idea that you carry for the rest of your life. We just talked for the almost-hour bus ride but she left a big impression! I don't know how to explain without sound a little crazy, but we talked about following feelings and staying focused on a goal while trusting that the directions you are pulled in are drawing you for some purposeful reason. Then we talked about The Alchemist, one of my favorite books, a gift from my bro Nick one xmas, and one of the better presents I've ever gotten. Read it if you're into somewhat sappy, transcendental, follow your dreams shit, but if you're not, you'll hate it. We talked about the game monopoly, in relation to the coop vs. business set-up, and it was such an interesting conversation! OK so here's the summary-take the game monopoly but instead of playing for yourself, play with the goal of everyone ending with the same amount of money. The closer you get to having the same amount of property and cash, the closer you all are to winning. Once the board is filled with houses and hotels, and you can't develop any more, the game is over, and everyone is good. From an urban planning standpoint, it's an exciting way to think about this game that I hate-fill that board up! But it's a great metaphor also-play the same game under a different set of rules (or ideology) and it's totally different, and everyone wins! So duh, normally the game ends because one person, with enough money to do so, buys everyone else out and once you have no more capital, you're S-O-L. But this way, every time someone cashes in on something, all the players conspire for the next player to cash in as well, so the cash at hand grows and grows, in the hands of everyone, rather than one person being the fat cat and everyone else being miserable. Hmmm the metaphor could go really far but due to the diverse readership (hopefully) of this blog, I'll cut it there. Interesting thought anyway. It's all mostly to say the point of a coop is that it functions like that. That's why I loved working there, and during money-talks it was really amazing to see people not being greedy. Solidarity...if only it was so easy.

Alright, I'm going to make some rice with this butternut squash I snagged from the farm, then get ready to go to my going-away party! Last night in BA, it's going to be crazy!
----------------------
Oh yeah! Uruguay was nice! It was Labor Day May 1, and nothing was open at all, not even buses! So we got there at 6am and passed out on the beach for a few hours. Amazing. Then we walked across almost the entire city and found a hostel. It was really calm, just like a vacation from vacation should be. We met a couple kids from BA and had a good time, then took the boat back on Sunday night with one of the girls from the hostel. That was after I left my book, with all of our return tickets in it, on the bus that took us from Montevideo to Colonia. I'm an idiot, and I told Kendra to get ready for plenty more of that on the trip we have ahead of us. It was a good warm-up. I bought some wool socks at this huge market there, and caught this guy in the middle of opening my backpack to rob me. He was really charming about it, actually. Today, walking to the convi from La Juanita, I caught a girl opening up my friend's bag. On the way back to the apartment the other night, there was a massive bloody mess, CSI style, on the sidewalk leading away from the ATM I used to go to when I had money in the bank. Like, a carnal bloody mess, really, you could even smell the blood. I don't know if it's a sign to watch my ass for the rest of the trip, which I'd be doing anyway, or a sign that I will continue to miss out on the bad things like that. If I get robbed again, no one will be impressed.

This post has taken a total of about 38 hours because it's now 5 am and after my goodbye party. I had planned on doing something crazy but we didn't end up leaving Piola. The guys at the bar sent us a bottle of champagne for a goodbye gift, and that made me reeallllly happy. Then Lorena came back w/ Kenj and I to drink that, and we watched Brazil carnaval videos on YouTube for about an hour, which made me REALLY happy. That was really the best week ever, I hope I can do it again sometime really soon. So tomorrow we go. We both have a lot of things to get together for the trip, but don't have to leave this apt. til 6 at night, so I can see myself sleeping until around then. I'm not sure how I'm still awake right now, but I'm even more impressed that my companions at the bakery pull the same hours every night. Raul has a 2 hour commute to this job, and Ale has a baby. Neither of them ever sleep, and I'm on autopilot on a joy-ride thru delirium just from working one night like that. Buenos Aires has kicked my ass, but I could have used a good ass-kicking before I came.