buenos aires BUENOS AIRES

YAY

we made it to buenos aires...i think it means... fresh good air... a breath of fresh air.
its really REALLY different to bolivia. its like fucken europe or someshit. heaps bougie....

i remember emilys good advice and looked up some vegetarian restaurants on happycow.com and we went to this AMAZIN vegetarian all you can eat place last night, for 6 australian dollars, and heaps of it was vegan, they had stuff like brown rice, and stuffed capsicums, its was soooo good and special and amazing.
um, yeah so only been here one day, we arrived yesterday after a really really REALLY long bus...um..two nights and three days... i dunno how long htat is?? but long
and what happend was our orginal bus left without us from Santa cruz so the the guy we boguht the tickets off, just put us on some other bus... that was like 2 hours late and we were standing in this massive sandpit, which was the bus stop...waitng and watiing and and when it came i was like oh no cuz it looked like a fucken piece of shit bus,
but we were so out of it we just wanted to get on it, cuz earlier in the day we were hanging out making bracelets with some crazy guy we*d met the day before. so we sitting tehre making hte bracelets and im thinking, this guys a fucken tree wizard i dont wanna be around him anymore and then !!
some cool punx showed up and just started talking to us, and were like all covered in anti fa tatts and anarchist garden tatts and i was like whoo hooo and i was so stoked cuz i was like shit i really really dont look like a punk but these guys arent being fucken fucked like australian punx how if you dont dress like a "PUNK" then your not "PUNK" what bullshit.
anyway we started talking about all sorts of stuf and got really excited and i was sooo stoked and they were traveelling thru south america and they were from colombia nad venuzuala and they were so REAL and FUN and it was awesome. they invited us back to there house and we hung out and got reallllllllllly drunk on cahmpagne that just tasted like fucken apple juice?? and stoned and listened to music and they showd us cool tricks they could do and amzing wood carvings they made, and then we were like OH SHIT the bus, but we werent too worried cuz every bus so far ..... hasnt even SHOWN Up for like 1 hour at least, and then taken like 2 hours to leave
but when we got tehre to the bus station it had left!!!
anyway the bus was fucken hot. no air con
windows didnt open.
was like 37 degrees outside.
the whole bus was like a sauna it felt really like, discusting, to be so sweaty with so many other grose sweaty ppl for so long.
the only time ppl got a chance to cool down was once when we stopped to go to the "toilet" and the building wasnt a tiolet just some wierd locked shed so everyone lied on the ground under this one tap and got sprayed by it like a lieing down shower, and then got back on the bus.
no movies, or music. just lots of near crashes. oh and a flood. and a few breakdowns. and we had to stand in the full sun at the border for 7 hours...
its was pretty fucked.
funny.
full on.
hahahaha.

it didnt fuck with me the way the other buses have tho cuz i was just really used it and prepared for total shit storm annihilations you know?

now in buenos aires but its like intense peak times cuz its like holidays and news yers so there is like NO hostels free!!!! we were almost completely stranded !!!!!!!
finally this guy helped us and called like every place in BA and now we are staying in this hostel that is so expensieve and bougie, the TIOLET HAS A BIDDAY!!!! haahahah what the fuck.,
and there is a fuckhead in our room he came home at 4am and kept trying to put his arm around shelagh and i woke up and he was touching my legs!!!! so fucked!!!!!
i have contacted HEAPs of ppl on couch surfing, hopefully we can stay with someone from there soon cuz i cant afford to fucken be here hahahaa

oh yeah so we left the farm, i was really sad i thougth i was gonna cry, i mean it was REALLY REALLY hard there sometimes, and i dont think it was exactly shelaghs cup of tea, but it was a really beautiful place and i really am gonna miss Nova.
also in the last week a cool girl called Julia from uk came and she was like the third muscateer, the first traveller i met in south america who wasnt a fuckhead!! and really onto it and cool, and had been thru alot so far in south america, held prisoner by the peruvian army in the amazon, and then later stayed in the major of the armies house!! and fucken robbed at gun point in guatelmala. lots of stuff like that,....but yeah a really cool girl, had lived in Namibia for 8 months and was so cool to meet an foriegtner who was not a shithead, and we talked alot and laughed alot, we talked about the racism in tourism, and she told me alot of stories about fuckheads and asked alot of questions of indigenous oppression in australia.

when i lefft, NOva gave me a painting he did, it was really cool and he took me to his house (he lives seperately to the rest of the family) it was so cool it was RIGHHHHT on the river, you could hear the water crashing over the rocks really loud, but not too loud........and one wall was just a giant window (well....a hole, covered in fly mesh) so the air was fresh and amazing. and inside there was just a bed. some paintings, a fkn awesome collection of animals bones, the harry potter books, and a MASSIVE upside down pentagram sculpure, in 3D !!!! it was soo oooo cool !!!
and it had a holder inside for a candle.

we made chocolate pancakes for everyone on xmas day (xmas is one day earlier in bolivia) and the boys set off like, millions of fireworks. that day we went into that village to use the internet i bought a massive bag of fireworks for them and HOLY SHIT, no wonder fireworks are illegal in australia, they are so full on and dangerous.
but reallllly pretty and there are so many that do so many different cool things!!!!!

on our last night we got our tarot cards read, my reading was pretty boring ahahha its was pretty funny tho cuz im so.....i dunno worried person i guess, so my question was like, what bad things are gonna happen next year that i should be ready for, what should i look out for, ...something like that.
and my reading was like, next year all that will matter to you is school and the only thing you should look out for is a relationship that will be a person trying to get in the way!! ahahhahahahahahahaahaha
if THATS the worst thing. i cant even imagine having a life like that.......
hahahahahahahahahaha
seriously tho, i hope next year is really really good. for me, and for everyone.

when we walked over the indiana jones bridge back to the mainland i was so sad i was thinking shit....am i ever gonna come here again. i really want to.....its such an amazing place. there are some things that are so fucked but overall i really liked it.


i thought i would learn heaps there, but i didnt really at all,
it was sometimes a weird environment where i was just...i dunno its hard to explain but basically, i wish i had never ever ever said i studied permaculture cuz then like, i was like under this pressure ...like i was a threat, or an intimidation, or some wierd bullshit....

and would be put on the spot with questions that i had no idea about, like "you know this plant XXX" and i would be like, "..um no i dont think so" and they would like scoff and be like, ugh you study permaculture and you dont even know it and just walk off and ignore me for the rest of the day, like a punishment or something,
and lots of stuff like that.......it was really hard, at first i would just feel such a sting, like hot eyes you know, feeling so stupid.....and trapped its like, even if your a student and WANT to learn, you are still meant to already know everything and be so fucking smart and if your not then why should anyone waste there time teaching you anything.......

once he asked me about growing ...this plant.....i cant remember what it was....but it was really really tropical.. in melbourne and i was like, no i dont think that would grow in melbourne its not the right climate, and he was like, you should make it grow there and i was like, well....i dont think that is the best way to use my energy ...focussing on growing something like that...when i could grow things that will do well there... and he was like NO its a waste to not develop a breed that can survive there!!! and wouldnt talk to me again after that.....
and that kind of thing happend all the time, just like, heaps of shutting down... but there was heaps of stuff i wanted to ask about and felt really unsafe to talk about, like, there was no NO zoning at all, the food was all growing about 12-15minute walk away, so when your cooking and you realise you forgot the parsely...... its really shit.
and there is no mulch, on anything.....
i dont mean that to sound critical it was just an observation and i really wanted to ask about it but i got so intensely shut down, i just ended up not engaging in anything like critical thought or talking about anything to do with gardens, plants, insects, water, etc etc cuz it would always just end in me being an idiot and it wasnt worth it.
once i mentioned something about peak oil and he was like, Do you mean PETROL ??? oil is the word for cooking.
and i was like....ummm...sure...yeah, petrol
and he was like petrol and coal are good things to use and its better then nuclear power.
and i was like, totally, but like, there running out, and theres better options then both of them, and he was like, there is no better options.
it was raelly hard place, in that sense, you know?? its like ...the place is this amazing dream, but you have to work really, really fucking hard every day, and you have to be really subordinate. and i am happy to not be in charge, but it can be confusing when ppl tell you things that are the opposite of what other teachers have told you.

by the end i was just like, you know what, no body knows anything.
its all just bullshit theorys and ideas, and no one is right.
fuck all these intense permaculture men and this intimidation bullshit.
no matter what i do, its fucked in someones eyes hahahhaah

so im just choose what i rekon is the "right" course of action for each seperate situation.....and ignore the fucken firing squad cuz in the end, your still gonna get shot ....

yeah.
if that makes sense.

i learnt heaps from hanging out with nova tho, we dug HEAPS of swales of swales togehter, like..... 3 really really long ones per day, on top of our other jobs, and he showed me heaps of irragtion stuff he had developed by himself. his dad would argue him and say it wouldnt work but they all did. we had levels or anything.........but it still all worked..... once when we were digging something level he was like, we^ll see waht the water has to say about this, water talks!!
and i was like.... wowwwww you are so cool.
water talks!!! such a cool thing to say.
and he has NO permaculture knowlege, never read any books, didnt even know what a swale was. (the word)
all the field were irrigated by a spring halfway up one of the mountains. to direct the water we would have to go up and wade into the muddy spring past knee depth and dig up clay and fill sand bags, it was HARD WORK but really fun too !! lots of jokes and sotries to pass the time .... hahaha

also i learnt how to make REAL TAMALES!!!! im really stoked and i cant wait to get back to australia to make them!!!
also i made handmade peanut butter, tofu, harvested shit loads of honey and went out at midnight CAUGHT native bees (i think i put some photos up of it already) and made heaps of other crap like dream catchers etc

santa cruz, is where we went afterward, it was so amzing, like a tropical town in bolivia really really chilled out, hot and stick but not too bad cuz there was allways a breeze. we were staying at a place that had all like parrots and BABY TOUCANS that fucken are so cute and amazing and look like plastic toys hahaha like sooo not real.
also we found an italian restaurent that made the BEST BEST spicy vegetarian pasta, lots of halepenos, it was sooo good !!!!!

ugh im still covered in the most intense like cross section of insect bites ever, and still have ticks that i havent been able to get rid of yet... i think i wanna try to go to the doctor tomoro or something cuz having ticks this long isnt good!!!!!! me abnd shelagh took photos of our legs, when or IF we ever see computers in internet cafes that are capable of putting photos onto, we will upload. so far ALL the computers here are so old they dont even have cd drives. only floppy disc. so... no usb you know... and they are reaaaaaally slow and its really expeno to use tha net......


i was sad to leave santa cruz, but we wanted to get to beunos aires before new years so we had to leave. if anyone is goign to bolivia i really really reccomend it, its so chilled out, and much better then cochabamba!!!! (but maybe not as cheap??)
also it was the first place i have been to that has women cops.

ok now buenos aires....
today i went to the post office and sent this massive bag of wool that has been fucken pissing me off. i didnt wanna carry it anymore!!!! im so glad its sent. buenos aires post offfice is so much cheaper then bolivia!! but it took three hours to be served.
thats a looooong time to wait. i seriously thought i was gonna piss and shit my pants hahahaha

but everything takes a fucken long time in south america...im almost used to it i think.....
like when we were leaving the jungle farm, and we were standing out on the road to hitch a ride into the city, i saw someone inthe distance, RUNNING and i was like, shit man, wtf...shelagh look at that, that person is fucken running man.......i havent seen anyone run the whole time in south america and she was like....yeah...wierd... and then they just dissapeared into the jungle!"!!! ahhahahaahhahhahaa

PEACE and happy new years!!!!!!

i miss sooooo many people right now, its so sad, please everyone if you have time please right me an email teling me what your doing and some gossip or anything !!!!!!!!!

xoxoxxoxoxoxooxxooxx
oxoxoxoxxoxoxoox

kati