Mo’z Thinkz

By Corine

Ofcourse! For who´s interested in pictures of our hostel, some excellent pictures and even a movie at http://www.hostelaleph.com/

By Corine (who continues the former blog on a different computer, because of sudden virus-attacks)

Ok, were where we? Ah, the remembrance of the dictatorship on march 24! Well it was announced with some street ´parties´ the night before. Movies, a festival, demonstrations. We saw all sorts of posters on walls with sentences like ´never again. People handed out special papers. On the day itself, a lot of streets in the center were blocked by the police for the demonstrators. They marched for a couple of hours through the streets and ended up in the famous Plaza de Mayo. This is so close to our hostel, that we heard all the noise. Unfortunately we didn´t find time to go there because, for some unclear reason, we had an appointment with two families right at THAT time, to have a look at the car. While we were selling the car, the ´mothers´ did their speeches to thousands of people on the square. The president promised them to find out what happened to their children. We some of this on tv. When we were finally off to go, pouring rain started and everybody went home.
Before, I said that the Argentinians really like Maxima (though she was a nobody here before she married our prince, according to some taxidrivers…). But they definitely don´t like her father. Last week, when I talked with our Argentinian friend Carlos about this he told us that Zorreguitea lives right around his corner!! His mother even bumped into Maxima once in the supermarket, ha ha. We went to have a look. Thanks to a friend of Carlos (¨… my friends are big fans of the royal family, it really means a lot to them if they know where the parents of their princes lives …¨), the dumb guard of the apartment complex told us the exact number of the flat where Zorreguieta lives. The funny thing is that his street, Uruburu or something, is named after a former dictator …. We felt like ringing the bell and have tea. But we left, feeling surprised that the guy lives in a flat, instead of a big villa.

By Corine

Yesterday we went kayaking in the Tigre, a real cool river-area (sort of a Delta) with a jungle atmosphere. It smelled like a rainforest, you could hear crickets, and from the water you can see beautiful roots, big waterplants, little houses, palmtreas, etc. The river itself though, was not so cool: plastic bottles, dead fish, oil, the occasional sewing tube ending in the river. So Maurice felt pretty unhappy when his canoe tipped over … And if this wasn´t enough, it happened when we crossed a wide river with a lot of boattraffic. Maurice couldn´t manage to get back in the boat (and the kid that was guiding us, didn´t really know what to do), so he had to swim all the way to the shore. I think we have great pictures of this trip. But if the pictures DID survive the Tigre-water, we can only show them when we are home. The camera is dead for sure, so no more pictures from now on.
The homefront asked us if we heard anything about the Queens visit, and about the remembrance of the dictatorship. Well, we didn´t see the queen. But I feel petty for her. She is visiting Argentina. But the Argentinans decorated a whole theater for her with … tulips. Then she is going to visit … the Anne Frank museum. And then she is going to visit … a Dutch colony in the north of Argentina. According to taxidrivers the Argentinians really love Maxima and they think Willem Alexander is very beautiful :)

Yup, the cash is in the moneybelt :)
We got paid in full in bills of hundred, straight from the old sock under the bed :P We started spending immediately, for who wants to be a walking target with all that money on her/him? We couldnt put in on the bank without a hassle, so we´ll have to keep it with us…or leave it at the hostel…where somebody actually just broke into a room of a guest and took her stuff :( So we said no way jose, and split it to spread the risk.
I just left Corine with some hairdressers which were recommended by two really nice gay guys from some fashion boutique here in San Telmo. They were working on some fairly old women tho, making em look really young again…hope its not the other way around with Corine :-P
By the way, I put a lot of new photo´s online, so chek em out!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28978646@N00/sets/72057594068271758

We did it! We sold the car for 8000 pesos!! We finally had 3 interested parties, of which one wanted to pay at the spot :) They told us thats the argentinian way, but we are dutch so….we told them that Christian, the guy who was first to get in touch with us, would have first choice. It was a hectic meeting in that last evening of car showing. A family of 5 people were there to evaluate the car. Some far away uncle came for a test drive and that was it! No need for mechanics or second opinions, great! Same with a vegetarian mother and vegetarian daughter (Maria y Maria) who raised horses for polo on a farm just outside BA. They loved the car straight away. Even after we did 2 testdrives :P In which one I couldnt pay attention at all to the driver, because one of the family girls was talking in poor english to me all the time. She kept telling me how nice it was to be able to talk to a nice person in english, after she just flunked her first exam since the holidays :-P Anyway, they all figured out how the car worked ofcourse….
We just finished our last round of paperwork. Ofcourse we were going in and out of buildings again (stamp here, pay there, come back). Now we will call everybody and collect the money, which is not yet in our pocket :P

Extra, extra: We just got mail from the first guy that he cannot go along with it, so now we can tell that nice family that they may buy it! They will be so glad, and for us its nice too, since we know the family through Dana. And Dana works behind the bar of our hostels restaurant. Pffff….its all about knowing people here…haha