Castle Competition 2010

Sarah and I are getting a few things in our lives sorted out before our return to New Zealand. The biggest area to be tidied up is pressing, to say the least. Today we have taken steps to ameliorate this part of our relationship that has, for so long, held us back. The issue at hand, “who is the better sand castle technician?”

We are now harnessing the power of social networking sites and calling on you to clear this up for us. Let democracy and the voices of the masses reign. I think it is pretty obvious whose castle is better but for the sake of objectivity we have not provided you with the creator of each edifice.

If you could please take the time to have a look at photos of The City of Sand (top photo) and The Grand Castle of Punta del Diablo (bottom photo) and then vote via the poll in the top right of the widget column we would be most grateful.

To the victor the spoils and, to Sarah and Bevan, a happy-ever-after.

Much later (out of Bolivia)

Bolivia

We finally got out of Bolivia and since then my experience has been surprisingly similar to when we first arrived in South America. Now on the road there seems to be saturation of experiences and amongst all that what is to say? Life is really fun but also becomes a big list; meeting those people, going there, drinking that and eating this, “notice that different use of Spanish?” and, “the ethnicities of the city?”

Blah blah.

When I started travelling I thought my response was due to a lack of experience but now I actually think it is just an intrinsic part of travelling. Perhaps the real reason you travel instead just reading travel books your whole life.

As it was we left Cochabamba with a swag of generous goodbyes and dinners and left for Santa Cruz. In some ways Santa Cruz was the perfect place to exit though we did not know it at the time. Santa Cruz is very mestizo in comparison to the rest of Bolivia and, generally, a lot more modern. This was a good ‘climate’ to transition into the southern countries of this continent.

In Santa Cruz we drank beer, swam in the pool, commented on the humidity, met some really cool backpackers, watched the sunset and went to the Mariposario (which was so bizarre in its size and Club Med type styling, was I really in Bolivia?) as well as seeing a very excellent art exhibition that was put on for the 200 anniversary of the city. The art exhibition was made of a lot artists working in a lot of different mediums and they were well executed.

The most interesting was an installation called Estacion de Lluvia by Ricardo Lanzarini. He had painted a high ceilinged roof white and then drawn tiny grotesqueries in lead pencil all around the room. To observe the pieces better the artist included two magnifying glasses.

After all this we said our final farewells and tried to leave Bolivia through Paraguay. This did not work out. This is a long story which I will not bore anyone with but involved getting ripped off and put on a very uncomfortable bus to Asuncion which we eventually exited before we got ourselves into an unwanted situation. Later we, somehow, got our money back from the bus company and decided to go to Buenos Aires instead of seeing a new country.

Argentina

Getting out of Argentina was a hassle at first but a total pleasure in the end. After the Bolivian border we were stopped three times within half an hour to have our bags and bus searched. I was getting pretty wound up by the third stop but after that it was clean sailing and we had a really relaxing 42 hour ride which I just loved; we had full-cama and I was reading The Ninja. I almost did not want to get off at the other end.

Overall BA was a total breeze and almost felt too easy. And massive. After being in Bolivia for ten months it was almost like being in the city for the first time again. Only better. I could not believe how big and modern it seemed and how Caucasian everything [sic] seemed. It was a big surprise to be seeing things this way to both Sarah and I.

We stayed here for a few days, checked Malba and drank in the afternoons in Plaza Dorrego. At this stage we had totally embraced the tourist lifestyle and after our “attempt to go to Paraguay” loved feeling at ease. In fact, we had a few laughs going through the city and seeing what parts of the city we had thought looked dangerous before Bolivia.

Uruguay

Getting to Uruguay was a lot of fun. It was a day that included a subway, a bus, a train, a taxi and a boat. The border crossing was almost perfunctory and everyone in Uruguay was polite. The first thing I saw when we landed in Carmelo was an alfajoreres advertisement with Diego Forlán. I am not sure what a better introduction to this country could be.

Since then we have been to Montevideo. I have listen to Up on the Catwalk by Simple Minds, walked around the city, watched working class football teams play on a field next to the sea, stayed at a nice hostel and been charmed by the locals (one of which stopped us in the supermarket, had a chat to us and then invited us to dinner!). I also have to say that though the accent here is the same as in Argentina - thankfully - the Uruguayan Spanish is much easier to understand, “¡¡¡SiiiiIIIIIIIIII!!!”

Now we are in Punta del Diablo staying in a beach side cottage which is ridiculously nice. We are having a great time taking on a ‘vacation’ type mentality and having the sound of the sea wakes us up in the mornings.

Handmade

Some people might try and tell you that they volunteer to make a difference in people’s lives and make the world a better place. That might sound nice but the real reason you do it is so that you can do fun stuff that you would not usually get to do in your "real" career.

At Performing Life I have had the opportunity to use my professional skills to create some content for their website and write two grants; I once again found myself sitting in front of a computer typing away in Word. It would be disingenuous for me to say that it was not fun to do this. It did actually feel like I was doing something of worth. At the same time I was still just sitting in front of computer trying to meet a deadline and a set of guidelines. It was work that got a tick in both the productive and boring columns.

Well luckily for me I am working with John. One day he came in and was talking about possible performance ideas for the group and the next day I was reviewing an online guide for building stilts and sketching out a basic design. We bought some wood, debated what other materials to use and where we could find them, got stuck on the shin-guard but eventually came up with a solution.

Once we had those matters taken care of we made a prototype which was structurally sound but had two right feet instead of one of each. A small oversight and easily fixed in proceeding sets. The stilt project is a perfect example of why I have enjoyed volunteering. This work was a perfect mix of craftsmanship and invention. The creative aspect of researching and designing stilts and then getting splinters in my hands and the smell of burning wood up my nose from the power drill was the most refreshing working experience I have had in long time.

And then yesterday we finished the last pair and took them to the afternoon class. Did I mention that we ignored conventional wisdom and made the stilts really high? I was skeptical of whether or not the kids would use them or not in the first place. But adding the peril of height to mix made my expectations very low. How wrong I was. The kids were really into them and were used the entire time that afternoon. Making something with my hands, making something that actually worked and having the kids use them has been very satisfying.

This morning

My coffee is black

Outside the day is quite hot

and I need to work