Yoga

About a month ago I began "pre-yoga" classes for a form called SwaSthya. For those of you who have some concept of yoga, I guarantee you aren't imagining SwaSthya. A Brazilian Yogi developed this style, the DeRose Method, in the 60s or 70s, based completely from ancient Yoga. SwaSthya has a performative aspect, practitioners develop a "choreografia" which they perfect over a long period of time. It looks like a slow, athletic, yogic dance. If you're interested, you can youtube SwaSthya Yoga and find lots of examples. Buenos Aires has five or so DeRose "sedes", but all more or less exist as one entity I think. Young people pretty much run the whole operation, and they run it quite well. The director of my Sede, Sol, is in her early 30s. She treats me like I'm already a member of the DeRose family. The place is gorgeous and connects to a delicious vegetarian health food restaurant which offers some of the best food I've had in Buenos Aires. The first time I came to class, I brought along my trusty yoga mat, but I didn't need it. The floor of the practice room is entirely padded so you can move about freely. Classes are always kept intimate, maybe 7 students when it's packed, but 4 on an average day. Each student basically sticks with one teacher who leads him/her through the various steps of pre-yoga and SwaSthya. My teacher, Mariana, an excited 21-year-old newbie has tons of energy to devote to my Yogic development. Between the two of us, she certainly seems the more invested in my ascent through the SwaSthya process. Everyday after class students stick around to have a delicious hot spicy chai and chat a bit before going on with their respective days. It's quite a "buena onda" (good vibe), the whole thing.
I bring this up now because last night I witnessed a very special SwaSthya tradition, a Sat Chakra (or something like that). On Monday, Mariana asked me if I would come to this thing, and I said, "no sorry, I have a class." She proceeded to tell me, "OH NO! This is a once a year event. You really should try to come! Cancel your class! it's incredible!!" So I said to myself, "Self, this is a once a year event! It's incredible! And if I don't go on Wednesday I might miss my only chance! You must be freed from class!" So I called up my student to see if we could reschedule Wednesday night's appointment. She said no problem, so Wednesday afternoon after my usual pre-yoga class I announced to Marina that I would make it after all. She looked at me a bit askew and explained, (this is a loose translation), "Wellllll, this is really only for advanced SwaSthya students (I have not yet graduated to SwaSthya)." Let me just stop for a moment and note this perfect example of Argenine-ism. Monday she tells me I HAVE to go, and Wednesday she's telling me that, actually, I can't really go. So I said, "but I canceled a class to come." "Ok then, great, come on. Stick with me and I'll make sure you know what's going on," Mariana told me.
So last night as I headed out the door and my roommate inquired as to where I was going, I answered, "I haven't the first clue." I showed up at the Sede to find oodles and oodles of young, exceedingly friendly (mostly beautiful) Argentines. I still had no idea what we were doing there. I saw Marina, but she just gave me the customary kiss on the cheek and went about her preparations with the other instructors. I followed the crowd piling into yoga studio where everyone else seemed to know to sit encircling a blanket covered with flowers, candles, fruit and brownies. I looked around the circle for Marina, who had promised to keep me under her watch, but she seemed completely occupied. Just as I'd accepted that I'd have to fend for myself, Will, an American from Chicago grabbed my hand and pulled me down next to him. Will and I had met on a few occasions between classes. At some point while traveling in Buenos Aires he discovered, and subsequently fell in love with, SwaSthya, and is currently studying to be an instructor. He looks like an American basketball player--not a dude you'd take for a yogi. "Yo!" he said as he pulled me over to sit next to him. "Dude, this shit is ca-razzzzy, right! Don't worry, you stick with me, I'll show you what to do! I'm psyched to show this shit to another American. When I first went to one of these things I was like, YO, this would never happen in the states! All this hippy dippy shit! HaHA! But man, here it's dope! Don't worry girl, I got cho back! Just follow me." And with that, "the dope shit" commenced. The SwaSthya Maestro of Argentina led the ceremony which involved clapping and chanting in Hindi or Sanskrit...or something...come to think of it, I don't know which. Now and then Will would elbow me, beam a huge smile and shake his head as if to say, "yeah I know, right!" After the clapping and chanting, we did some sort of energy/meditation circle, then everyone dug on into the fruit and sweets and we watched a couple of choreografias. These people can certainly move beautifully!
And so, in the end, I have no regrets about rescheduling my class! The Sat Chakra (?), whatever it was, was CA-RAZZZZY!

What I Think I've Learned About Argentina:
- People live with their families until they are 27, 28, 29...35 years old! A lot of people just live in their parents' house until they get married. I suppose this is the reason why there's lots of smoochin' in the streets!
- Apparently the Argentine solution to "decaf" coffee is to serve a mixture of hot water and milk with a hint of coffee flavoring.
- Human labor is very very cheap here. Anyone with any money has a maid. Many of these maids live with the family, and they actually dress is maids' uniforms--a collared black dress with stockings and a smock! More than one of my students has one. In these homes, the maid is the one to let me into the house when I arrive, and then she attends to the needs of my student and myself, bringing us drinks or a snack or whatever. Very strange for me indeed!

A Friendly Face Arrives!

I’m not even going to try to start re-counting what happened back in mid-May after my last update. So I will begin on May 25^th with the arrival of Scott Goldstein!

Scott came to Buenos Aires early on a Sunday morning, and I promptly whisked him off to our first activity for the week, “breakfast” with my student Mariano. There was a window of a few short hours between Scott’s arrival and Mariano’s departure for Washington D.C. (what are the odds?). Mariano lives for politics and knows way more than the average American about what’s going on in our government, so I thought he would enjoy speaking to a real live dude who works on Capital Hill! So just moments after Scott showed up at my door after his near 24 hours of traveling, I pushed him back out again. Things to do! People to see! We went with Mariano to a chic Palermo bar where the waiter knew his name. We stayed for two Café Cortado Americanos and a small plate of cookies—all of which were ordered for us by Mariano. I think Scott was surprised to learn that this is what he would be having for breakfast. Scott also learned all about Mariano’s quirky band friends, the elite conservative Argentine politicians. We discovered that Mariano’s close personal buddy Menem, the President of Argentina for all of the 90s, doesn’t speak a word of English. “But”, Mariano told me, “I will introduce you to him anyway.” So the promise has been made; the English teacher will get an audience with the controversial former-Prez, worshipped by some for his reign over the days of plenty in Argentina, and despised by others as the cause of the economic crash that took place immediately following his term. Mariano has also promised me a meeting with a two time ambassador to the US, and Archie, the flamboyantly gay former ambassador to France whose exploits have been re-counted to me on many occasions. I guess I should keep practicing that Spanish.

Scott and I kept busy all week—I saved a lot of the more touristy Buenos Aires must-dos for his visit, and we ploughed through those as well as a variety of other activities I wanted him to experience. We went the beautiful urban cemetery where Evita and many other prominent Argentines are buried, the MALBA modern art museum, Tigre (remember when Antoniette and I missed the boat? Well Scott and I made it! Those islands are lovely), drank mate with Maria, ate nachos at Nachos, saw a great modern Tango band, danced at a boliche (dance club), walked through the parks of Palermo, shopped at the market in San Telmo and the chi-chi shops of Plaza Serrano, and ate at some of the most delicious spots in town. And now of course Scott doesn’t believe me that the food is boring. He sampled all the succulent steaks and the tasty pastries, the best of what Argentine cuisine has to offer. We even had a party on Friday night, so he got to meet all my new friends. On Thursday we visited Plaza de Mayo, the square in front of the Casa Rosada, the Pink House, home to the executive branch of government. Plaza de Mayo essentially serves as the protest center of Buenos Aires. Every day you can find people out there with signs promoting one cause or another. On Thursday afternoons, you can see the iconic Madres de Plaza de Mayo. The Madres, now grandmothers, have had sons or daughters disappeared during the military dictatorship of the 70s. This group of women has walked the circle of Plaza de Mayo every Thursday since that time, but now they also run an organization which serves as a sort of NGO fighting social injustice. They have their own school and their own bookstore/coffee shop where like-minded folks can go spread their ideas. Though they still march for the memory of their lost children, the Madres now play an active role in fighting other injustices in today’s society. The Thursday Scott and I visited the Madres’ famous walk, we also stumbled upon another giant protest in Plaza de Mayo. Like I’ve said in previous blogs, protests pop up here all the time, but I was glad Scott got to witness one in action.

the Recoleta Cemetary

protest in front of Casa Rosada
The Madres march, the banners says "distribution of the wealth already!"
Luverly Tigre
Goldstein enjoys his first mate

Scott left Saturday night, and Sunday I had plans with Antoinette to go to Uruguay to renew our visas! Pooped though I was, I roused myself at 6:30 Sunday morning and dragged my bottom to the boat station. Luckily, Antoinette and I had the same goal for the day—doing as little as possible. We got on the luxurious ferry, had some breakfast, and promptly went back to sleep. Upon arrival in city of Colonia, Uruguay we walked around for all of, oh, 10 minutes and then plopped ourselves down at a lovely spot by the water. Luckily it was a crisp but delightful fall day and we were able sit ourselves there for a long while and chat. Hunger set in and we made our way to a restaurant where we shared a couple of salads, in the name of eating healthfully. Halfway through the salads we noticed our waitress walking to another table with a giant sundae, like nothing we’d ever seen in Argentina, smothered in whipped cream and other goodies. We looked at each other and knew we must have one of our own. And we did. And it was heavenly. So that’s how we spent the rest of our day in Uruguay, gorging ourselves on three kinds of ice cream, whipped cream and fruit. We made our way back to the boat and, in our food comas, went back to sleep. This time I was awakened by the suave sounds of a Spanish rendition of Wonderful Tonight. If you thought the Clapton version was sugary-sweet, you gotta hear “Te ves heeeermosa estaaaa nocheeeee.” Just when I thought I might develop diabetes, he launched into Whitney Houston’s “One Moment In Time,” “Dame un momennnnto en tiempo…” I will say, he got the crowd goin.

Our picturesque spot in Uruguay
Anto and The Sundae!!!

So now I can say I’ve been to Uruguay.

So that pretty much brings us up to date.

What I Think I’ve Learned About Argentina:

1. Whenever someone writes you a text message, it must include all kinds of useless verbage such as, “Hola Danielle! (Hello Danielle!) Como andas?? (How are you doing?) … then finally the meat of the message, like maybe “What time should we meet?”, followed by an equally extensive sign off like, “Te mando un besito!” (I send you a little kiss!) “Nos vemos!” (we’ll be seeing each other!) Each text message has to be about 4 pages long.

2. Along those same lines, people really like to thank each other. For example, if I walk into a store and promptly leave again, I will say, “Ciao, gracias.” The clerk will probably then respond, “Nooooo, por favor! Gracias a vosssss! Muy amable! Hasta luego!” Which approximately translates to, “Noooo! Thank yooooouuuuu! You’re very nice! See you later!” Keep in mind that I’ve done nothing but walk in, and then promptly out, of the store.

3. During the economic crash of 2000, most Argentines had the rug thoroughly ripped out from under them. As a result, there seems to be a constant awareness of instability. I think this is the reason for the incessant discussion of politics, the prevalence of protests, and maybe even the abundance of psychologists.