Around again, again

I'm tired. I{m very, very tired. As you can see, one function of my tiredness is that I will not be altering my keystrokes to hit the new location of the apostophe key on a teclado en español. {{{{{{{{ deal with it.

Asados morphed into returning to a forced entry and ravaged belongings, with nothing, miraculously, missing save a television and vcr. That led to hitchhiking through desert cum wine country with truckers and locals alike. That turned into biking through sandstone canyons crawling with cacti and skinny dipping in mountain streams. That evolved somewhat into hitchhiking northwards into Argentina's poorest province of Jujuy, and into the Quebrada de Humahuaca (canyon of Huma...). There, the cultural and physical morph of humans that had slowly manifested since departure from Buenos Aires made its last alterations as eyes became smaller, people became darker (and smaller), and modern cities turned to adobe villages. Altitudes exploded, vegetation dissipated, and the brown earth signaled a significant change.

As we crossed the border to Bolivia, colorful dress exploded as beggars and trash, alongside streetstalls of everything from packaging tape to Choripanes lined the streets once again. An hour of our day was gained as politicians dictated the location of the sun to differ despite a journey directly northwards, and the dusty air brought a chugging locomotive, which we gladly climbed aboard.

The journey was spent in variant styles - oscillating between marvelling at sandstone formations towering above fields plowed by oxen and lone andean villagers marvelling at our passage, and marvelling at the contrasts of cultures as the indigenous peoples aboard our car, dressed in flambouyant colors of dyed alpaca wool and donning the classic andean way-too-small tap hat, watched the television screen as it broadcast hollywood movies with plots revolving around surfers-cum-treasure-hunters and zebras-cum-racing-champions, as well as covers of Simon and Garfunkel and the Eagles a-la-Andean-folklore style. Perhaps this is the true face of successful cultural globalization - not outright rejection or embrace, but rather creative intermingling. Perhaps.

Uyuni thrust upon us remuses of Jaisalmer in India as streets lined with tour operators whose focus is the semi-rich backpacker community poured their touts upon us upon arrival at midnight. If you sign up now, we{ll pay for your hostel!! Go to hell, I{m going to sleep.

But, of course, we wanted what they were offering; so come morning we embraced hassle and signed consents. By noon, we were riding high in a white toyota landcruiser ready for entry to a land very, very, very well known prior - but not by us.

We crossed desert to desert, and brown turned to the white of snow, as the perfectly flat expanse of tierra sent senses blazing, sent ideas of what should be into chaotic spirals, sent perceptions ablaze. 12,000 square kilometers explodes into a flurry of white as the Uyuni Salt Flat beams NaCl from every one of its niches, nooks, and crannies. An expanse of the pure to match a crystal clear morning after a snowy night in the heart of a mountain meadow in the rockies - but with salt for snow, blazing sun for cool crisp air, and silence iterrupted only by passing land cruisers instead of chirping birds.

Nevertheless, on that first day my fears of utter and complete desert destruction at the face of speedy internal combustion were aleviated somewhat as a single worn track through the salt saved the dry honeycomb pattern of the pristine wild from human destruction. Or, maybe, two worn tracks: for as I peer out the window, I see an all too large landcruiser, distorted by the mirage of desert waves and particles, flying effortlessly over a white cloud of perfetion. It floats at exactly our speed, and to peer across the expanse of pristine, one would not realize we were moving, driving, cruising, flying.

Hours later, salt flat morphed to salt building as blogs dug from nature's resources turn to full-fledged hotel, tables, beds, seats, decorations. All salt. Jenny licked the table to test reality, and as she cringed with salt tongue, I took to more meditative wanderings. As my feet crunched against the loose rock salt covering the floor, I could not help but marvel at perceptions blasted once again. I could not help but marvel at how truly wonderful my life right now is, and how with the wrong eyes one might truly miss the magnificence through indifference.

A sunrise over white expanse led to a drive past enless brown rolling mountains of the Andes, until we arrived at Flamingo infested lagunas - they themselves with banks of borax fields, with deceptively glaciated appearances. As the next two days unfolded, we rolled past the twig-legged pink wonders as they feasted on microorganisms in mineral-rich waters. We rolled past stunning scenery to lagoons poised to once again destroy what I thought the world should be. Water turned red, white, and green with the winds. As wind churned lakes' surfaces, they beamed their chosen color skyward to announce their minerals, algae, or both. The lakes came alive with deep blood reds and turquoise greens beneath the onlooking face of at least one 6000 meter volcano. Their banks crawled with almost translucent insects amidst bizzarre foam and weaving algaes of brown, red, green, black...

We continue our drive up and up to a geyser field at 5000 feet - this one sans the boardwalks, warning signs, or easy access provided by asphalt parking lots in Yellowstone. Eight of us, solitary, standing in middle of nowhere southwestern Bolivia walking on hot ground, and edging way too close to bubbling mud pots to see from where the booming pop sound stems. We stick our hands in steam to try to understand, and in my mind I see park rangers everywhere cringing. This is not Rotorua, not yellowstone, not hold-your-hand west. This is Bolivia.

This is Bolivia where after four days and five hundred miles, we saw only very sporadic small towns scraping livings from collecting salt or borax, or scratching the dry earth to plant limited crops and raise skinny llamas. This is Bolivia where every hour or so, a new geological wonder thrust under our noses causes eruptions of the most basic questions of existence as assumptions and lessons turn to fallibility. Yesterday, I sat on the banks of a bright green lake unaltered by the hands of man and I wondered how it could be. Yesterday, I sat on the banks of a blood red lake miles and miles from anywhere, and I pondered flamingos{ existences. Yesterday, I was in endless non-understanding awe, aching for deeper digs. But we adapt, don[t we? And we move on.

Today, my understanding of the world includes sporadic geysers 16,000 feet above the sea; even as we sit back in the town full of backpackers unaware of the potential destruction of paradigm on offer by ominous tour operators lining the streets.

Baffling Implications

Resume, Michael Lane

Experience:

Entrepreneur of a bakery operation in Buenos Aires, Argentina specializing in Brownies. Oversaw all aspects of business from loan application, material acquisition, product development, production, sales, marketing, and bookkeeping. Guided growth of the company from start up status to profit generating enterprise.


Yup. Profit generating. I skipped out on another miserable trip to the opera, and instead taught the receptionist at the hostel how to play backgammon while simultaneously re-starting the business operations with a little brownie magic. That's right, I baked more brownies.

And Jenny took her post-graduation break from Spanish class to head off with me to the parque de palermo, where piles of porteños found their way to relaxation at the banks of a man-made canal beneath the brilliant sun. Merchants nonchalantly lined the sidewalks, and the unstoppable duo developed new marketing strategies.

Singing.

Singing at the top of our lungs in opera, falsetto, flamenco styles. BROOOOOWWWWWWWNIEEEEEESS!! QUIEN QUIERE EL BROWNIEEEEEEEEE! AQUI TE LO TRAIGO!! RIQUISIMOOOOOOOOSSS! And they came. The flocked. They bought.

Why is this a big move, you ask? I thought you were already selling brownies no problem, you ask? Well, my friend, because those little over-simplified completely unrealistic supply and demand graphs from microeconomics swooped in and marginal utilities meant a 100 percent price increase to two pesos. And they paid. They all paid.

Swimming in money, we nevertheless decided to swing out of town (I packed the baking pans and flour, don't worry.) toward Cordoba. Of course, bus tickets would put the start-up back into the start-up status with debt piling up; so thumbs did the work.

Three truck drivers later, and plenty of mate gourds full of the mildly narcotic delicacy brought us at 3 am to the shell station on the outskirts of Cordoba city. As we pitched our tent in the parking lot, we felt for the first time (perhaps) just how ridiculous our endeavor had become. Dirty, smelly, etc. And now not in the presence of many others who are likewise dirty and smelly, but instead in a tent in a shell station parking lot sleeping the night away in the shadow of capitalistic luxury. The shame of it all. But alas, sleeping in a parking lot is cheap.

The morning brought us to Adriano´s - a man who entered my life 11 years ago with a stint as an exchange student in my cousin's house. Feelings that we may have invited ourselves to his home when one truck driver insisted he call him to find out just where in the hell in Cordoba province we were supposed to be headed supsided with smiling faces as the whole family greeted us.

A few days of church-seeing, spanish teaching-learning, and shoe shopping to finally fix the problem in my knee most likely exacerbated by second-hand shoes from Kenya lead us to today. Another gorgeous blue-sky paradise, with predictions of delicious asados in the evening.

How to make a peso

The big silver tube fell from the sky like a few hundred thousand pounds of steel. Which, all at once, disrupts basic assumptions even if you thought you didn´t have them. Which is, of course, because it is a few hundred thousand pounds of steel, and yet doesn't fall out of the sky like a few hundred thousand pounds of steel at all. I digress. You didn't come here for this crap.

Before I forget, let's play a little game. The game is titled "If you read this post then send me an email that says 'I read this post.'" After all, while Google will tell me exactly how many times this page was seen every single day, it does not go so far as to reveal your identity. For all I know, my parents might be hitting refresh 27 times a day. Even if I have never met you, just throw me a once-sentence line.

Onwards.

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The big mass of steel dropped us out of the sky and as we fell, we were occupied mostly with thoughts of when the hell the pounding headaches the acres of booze we'd comsumed on our last night in Cape Town would dissipate. Plans to delve into my journal and forge meaningful reflections on time in africa suddenly collapsed into previously self-prohibited viewings of hollywoods greatest aboard a Malaysia Airlines flight nowhere near Hollywood. But, perhaps such is a fitting tribute to Africa. Four or five months on the continent, depending on where you begin, and some zillion countries (if you count countries) and some zillion zillion cultures (if you count cultures) and some zillion zillion zillion languages (if you count languages) and one humanity (if you count humanities). We checked off all the prerequisite boxes in the traveler community: from visa fiascos to long-haul bus rides with sacks on our heads, and we left with a more profound understanding of Africa than we ever would have imagined. It is not, necessarily, the correct understanding. But it is an understanding. And it is profound.

And through all that. Through the little tiny corners of the continent that the pictures on coffee table books would have you believe still dominate the depths of the darkest continent, and through the regularly bland cities and wildlife usually secluded to designated parks that really do dominate the continent, we left with one overarching conclusion. Africa left us with a hangover.

And we dropped from the sky to a land where I speak the language. A land where everyone speaks THE language. ONE language. As opposed, that is, to South Africa where there are somewhere around 10 OFFICIAL languages, so no one speaks THE language. Here, where we now find ourselves, we have been swirled into a more homogenous culture. Here, Spanish is the end all. And I'm stunned at how much I still speak.

We were prepared this time, though, for the wright brother's unnatural invention to swing its aluminum bat across our temples this time around. While the Turkish version of culture shock still shook to the very foundation, we were ready. We relaxed. We took deliberate days to accostom to urbanization and latinization - albeit the Argentinian version of Latinization which is about as Latin as Cape Town is African. We took deliberate nights to remove the jet lag - which, it turns out, is not a myth. Jet lag does indeed exist, but requires the appropriate ingredients:

Transatlantic flight.
Scotch.
Wine.
Beer.

Mix well.

And now we´re here. Fully, truly here. The New World, with its whole new meaning after the first visit to the very, very, very old world. The guidebooks have shifted now in their numerical data and years are now in the thousands from the millions. That is, "Evidence of human habitation dates back ... years. Asia - millions. Africa - millions. America...thousands. Low thousands. And it feels downright wonderful to be back on our home turf, where ancient roots turn to immigrant indifference and Indians no longer have anything to do with India. (It took an extraordinarily long time for me to figure out why there would be an "Indian Market" in Bolivia. Turns out, calling Native Americans Indians isn't wrong due to politcal incorrectness. It's wrong because to do so is simply idiotic.)

Anyhow, we settled in to Buenos Aires, which bears more resemblance to New York City or Chicago than to the San Jose or Quito that I know of Latin America. Culture here does not take the form of new ways of thinking. It does not take the form of Indian Train rides or African masks or various ways of dealing with poverty. Instead, Argentinian culture is in coffee shops, empanada stands, quality wines, fine dining, theaters, movies, and music.

But that's all fairly expensive. I need a few extra bucks.

And within three days of arriving on New World soil, I had a job. A waiting job in a restaurant where my rusty spanish didn't seem too big of a hindrance. Before I showed up for the interview, I was hired. And within three days of arriving on New World soil, we also had an apartment rented out.

Within four days of arriving on New World soil, I'd lost the job as the manager on day four decided legal status in the country was, after all, a prerequisite for work. And within four days of arriving on New World soil, the apartment fell through as the owner/roommate had cats to which I am allergic. "But they're not allowed in your room" she says as they continuously claw at the door to get into our room and take any momentary lapse in disciplined door-closing to nest in our bed. We packed up my scratchy throat and moved back into a nice privacy-less dorm in the city center.

I believe Bill Gates once wrote, "It is NOT below you to flip burgers." Mr. Gates, is it below me to sell brownies on the streets of Buenos Aires tax evasively, illegally, and for mere pennies?

From my first sale I was forbidden by a lack of appropriate change. From my next three posts, removed by the authorities. My mind wandered between thoughts of my own ridiculousness, my balance sheets (yup, balance sheets.), the value of my assets (two baking pans and some flour) and just how large a loss I'd probably make by the end of the day.

But the unimaginable happened - on the corner of Florida y Tucuman I befriended the billetilleros passing out fliers, and they went perserk. The flywheel moved a bit as one purchased a delicious treat. He spread the word, and others followed suit to the deliciousness. Girls came back for seconds. A man runs up, "I've been looking for you for hours!"

Thoughts morph from desolation to enjoyment. From daily losses to visions of profit. From quitting the ludicrous endeavor to how I'll change my ratty brown paper bag sighn to market myself better. To brand-building exercises. I could be "that brownie guy." "What do you want for desert?" "Let's wait for that brownie guy to come by." Hedgehogs, flywheels, clock-building.. is it possible that I learned more about business in one day selling brownies ont he streets of Buenos Aires than most do in a semester at Wharton?

Maybe.

Sobering stil is the thought that, with 50% return on investment, I still only made small change. Because, alas, 50% of one peso is only 15 US cents. I needed to make more brownies.

My newfound riches of day 1 were plunged into brownie materials, with costs now exceetding revenues, and plunging me back into debt. A seemingly prudent business move to bake two pans at once turned to a glitch of sorts as the lower oven rack proved unlevel - yielding burnt thin brownies on one end and thick under-cooked brownies on the other. Luckily, I learned from day one on entrepreneurship that if I tell people a brownie is burned, somebody will still want it, AND I get honesty points. Negative to positive. WHIZAM!

I set out for day two, and the slump hit. Maybe my sign was too nice (now on a cardboard box instead of ratty paper) and ruined the homemade alure. The big spenders of the day before had had their sugar fix for the week. So I did the unimaginable and left my Tucuman y Florida post for a slow stroll along the pedestrian mall. This, it seems, served me well in non-monetary terms. I saw tangos, the requisite robot-imitators, flamenco guitarists... And I sparked conversations with everyone who didn't know what a brownie was. Among other things, I discovered that all the people handing out flyers look darker and more lating because they ARE. Dubai's Pakistanis and Texas' Mexicans turn to Argentina's Peruians and Bolivians. They make between 1 and 5 pesos an hour, which makes my brownie operation seem like microsoft.

So I suppose day two was a success after all, even though I only sold 30 brownies. And so was day three, even though I only sold thirty more. Day four was less so, when I left the damn tin on top of my dorm-room locker to punish it for not marketing itself more effectively, and took the day to wander brownieless instead. So far day five isn't looking much more promising - especially since I released the secret and thus disappointed thoroughly the receptionist at the hostel, formerly a star customer. The secret: I am decidedly not a cook. I got the recipe on google.

And as if that isn't enough, of the profits I did make I spent a majority on a ticket last night to La Bohéme. Turns out, it's an opera....

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Remember - please send me an email! (mikemlane at gmail.com)