Catch up time!

Saturday - More or less nothing as I didn´t feel to well. May have been (well I know it was) Friday night that caused it! Spent some time in the centre of town midday to get some stuff...a ghost town during the siesta, everything closed. I fel alone and at risk on the streets. Yet when I met up with some people at about 7.30ish in the evening, just getting dark...ALL the shapes are open, the restaurants packed, the streets like Bromley highstreeton a Saturday near Xmas, it´s insane! I just don´t know where everyone goes between 1-5pm, they tell me they sleep, but I honestly don´t believe it! By the evning watched a film, in Spanish with neither English nor Spanish subtitles (& I understood most of it)on perhaps one of the most Argentines of all time (along side Evita and Maradonna) Che Guevara. It was good...but a pretty quiet day....

...In contrast to Sunday...Hang Gliding! WOW! So, before hand spent the morning taking some exercise with a friend (an ARgentine) around the MASSIVE park, Parque de General San Martin, and it was packed with other people who had the same idea (between 8am-1pm, and 5pm-8pm on weekends his pace is packed with people walking, jogging, playing football, rowing, what ever). Then the afternoon, up to Cerro del Arco, a small mountain at the start of Andes cordillera. So, I was picked up at 3pm and we (me and the Mexicans and one Brasilian) got taken to the "base camp", and our nerves were pretty much all over the place...I was excited, but also a bit nervous as well. I´m flying thousands of feet above mountains, and HandS standards in this country is quite what I´m used to in the UK...But anyway, after a half wait at base camp a truck came to pick up, and we met our "pilots" and we were driven to the top of this mountain, and yeh Hand S here...the road was non existent...it was a stoney track, at times very steep, with even steeper drops at the side of it...They don´t do seatbelts in this country either, so it´s a case of just holding on, and I fell all over the place with the others in the back of this war truck! Yeh the drive was terrorfying to be honest, I seriously thought we´d be thrown over the side before we got the top.

So we got to the top...WOW, the views were just amazing...tyical Andes scenery, as you´d imagine it, with stunning, almost birds eye views over the city. So, my pilot got me ready in all my gear, Helmet, knee pads, as they´d protect my knees if I fell thousands of feet of course (?!) and a backpack. After that, I was strapped up to my pilot. I then had to run of a mountain, literally. Which was the scariest thing...For about 2 seconds we were falling as we ran off, which is normal. As you can imagine this 2 seconds felt like a life time, but then suddenly we went flying upwards, and then I releaxed. It was amazing, we kept getting higher, and I got the see the amazing montains from a whole different perspective (literally below my feet). I cant really describe it, the only thing I can see is that I had these massive, rugged mountains below my feet, and the clear blue sky level and above me, and a nice soothing breeze. I don´t think I´ve ever felt that free before...so we flew around above the mountains and then my pilot started to do some tricks, which were pretty awesome! Drops, spins etc... each time faster...Again I cant describe it, all I can say is you get the queesy falling in your stomach like you sometimes get when your driving fast over a slight dip in the road, and lots and lots of wind. But I had my camera up with me in the air, so pictures are to come hopefully tomorrow! Then the land, which was tricky and rough...followed by everyone feel slightly queesy, followed by asados (Amazing BBQ´d cuts of meat)!

Monday - Standard day really, I´m afriad to say. But then, standard days are pretty great here! Wake up, without evening opening my shutters I know it´s billiant sunshine outside...wake up, stroll down the road, get a paper, relax for the monring (perhaps meet a friend or go out with one my flat mates to have breakfast and a coffee in the town)...Typical breakfast here varies, like it does at home I guess. They have ´Medialunas´, which is Spanish for half moons, which are literally small, sugar glazed croissants (Ugh!), and then toastados y mermelada (Toast and jam)! Cooked breakfast is much less common, but Peninis of Jamon y Queso (Ham and cheese), just like everything else here, are sometimes eaten. Then in the afternoon to the school, and then to my other place of work, Intercultural, langauge learning centre downtown, for a spanish lesson. Even spent at home, studying (bits and pieces), dining with flatmates (Dinner? Meat, of course!).

Will update on more, but in the meantime checkout the below

Virtual tour of Mendoza: http://www.ciudaddemendoza.gov.ar/la-ciudad/ciudad-virtual#titulo

Food and Drink: http://www.kwintessential.co.uk/articles/article/Argentina/Food-and-Drink-in-Argentina/32

Mendoza: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/argentina/central-argentina/mendoza

Argentina: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/argentina

Everything those sites say is true, but it´s even more exagerated in real life (You cant really describe this country in words, you have to live it, it seems to me)