Friday March 12, 2010
Capilla de Monte, Cordoba, Argentina
Well here we are at one of the destinations of which we heard might be a good spot, but I have to tell you that although this place has very much going for it or once did, it has been ruined. Devastated by more than just the emergency state of the water, which has disappeared but also by a value system of consumerism, greed to accumulate wealth at any cost, too many people and lack of awareness. This is my first impression and I wish to God I am wrong, but I fear that I am not.
Leaving Buenos Aires with the destination of arriving in Cordoba, we were assaulted by the lack of fresh air to breathe, horrendous traffic, way too many police monitoring people’s movements and a desperate feeling of wanting to get to a sane place again where we could breathe fresh air, just for starters. It seems that people who live in these crowded polluted cities have ceased to notice the state they’re in. For us coming from Alto Paraiso where the dominant feature is the unspoiled nature and before with our most recent roots in Vermont, another unspoiled piece of the planet, the cities have been unbearable, the highways equally as unpleasant.
Miles of flat farmland growing soybeans separate the city and province of Buenos Aires from Cordoba where everyone from the city goes to vacation in the rivers and tourist towns in the mountains of this once very beautiful province. The most startling and alarming factor for us is the drying up of the rivers which were full and wide and the very thing that drew the tourists to begin with, as well as the beauty of the mountains. The towns are so full of people and so overdeveloped that the pollution seems more extreme than southern California and the mountains only serve to capture and prevent the smog from dissipating. So much about Cordoba is reminiscent of California. There is great wealth, fancy homes and cars, chic restaurants and fashionable stores. It is a world of privilege and consumerism. But driving along the winding mountain roads from city or village to village, there is no escaping the toxic air from the exhaust of the bumper to bumper traffic until one has passed through several ranges of mountains heading northwest where at last after a week of not breathing we have finally found a place to get some fresh air.
It’s depressing really. Uta who has traveled to this place since she was a child on road trips with her parents is overcome with sadness at what has become of this beautiful place with the water drying up. People in this town which the lonely planet tour guide reports as a place where more hippies come than you can shake an incense stick at, have told us that the town is in a state of emergency because there was no rain for 4 months and the use of water has been restricted to one hour per day. The saddest thing is to walk along the river bed where there remains a small trickle and look across a dry river bed which once would have been well over our heads and wider than a twelve lane highway not so long ago.
The town reminds me of a really cool Boulder or Aspen, Colorado about 20 years ago. It has internet cafes, chic restaurants, mystical bookstores and even a health food store which I haven’t seen since arriving in South America. But it is not a town filled with hippies. Yuppies maybe? Paul noticed a man in the café this morning wearing a $200 cashmere sweater, not your typical hippie who by our definition is a freedom seeker, looking to live outside of the system of consumerism. His anger is so great that he has lost all compassion for those still so trapped in the system that any awareness is absolutely missing. The thing that angers and saddens me is the water, our very source of all life, without which we can not survive! Not only have the rivers dried up and gone away, (or been dammed and drained to fill plastic bottles for profit) but you can not purchase a bottle of drinking water that does not contain fluoride now. And if you haven’t been paying attention to what I’ve been saying for months before now, is simply a poison (rat poison to be specific – read a label on rat poisoning next time you’re in the store) which makes you fat, stupid and sterile! So even though this town which is very charming, quaint, full of everything we thought we wanted, there is no future here anymore without water.
We camped last night, our first night of camping since we arrived in South America, hoping to enjoy a more relaxed time in nature and save a little money during this exploration. It was a really pleasant evening, fresh cool air and the first time we hadn’t been so hot we could barely function. I was beginning to feel hopeful that we could do this more often now that we finally arrived in the mountains and left the cities behind us. But the reality of economic camping without some of the extra comfort items like a thick air mattress and a rain tarp had us up most of the night with aching hips and backs from the hard ground and a partially leaky tent when the skies opened up and a deluge of rain descended. It is still raining now at 5pm the next day. The people here are quite happy after so much dryness but I’ve yet to see any kind of collection device like a rain barrel to capture the rain. And just our luck that our belongings are now mostly very wet and we need to find a laundry to dry them. We are waiting for the afternoon siesta (from 1 to 5) to end in a lovely old hotel so we can do that.
Sunday March 14, 2010
Capilla del Monte, Cordoba, Argentina
First impressions aren’t always right. With a plan to leave the next morning to continue our search, we stopped at the supermarket after dropping the wet clothes off at the laundry. There we encountered two people with whom we made an instant connection. Inviting us to join them we returned to their house in the foothills with a view across the immense river bed to the mountain range beyond where there are regular sightings of lights. Allow me to explain…. This is an area well known for UFO sightings. It is also the place of another of the three planetary centers that Triguerino speaks about called Erks. We recently visited another of these centers in the Serra do Roncodor which is said to be the center for healing. I can not remember the focus of this one at the moment. As we stood looking across at the three distinct mountains with the third at the rear having an unusual shape at the top like the top half of a star of David, Dodo described what he and his friend Mo see quite regularly when the moon has reached the end of it’s cycle and is dark before the new moon cycle begins again. A light emerges from the ground, gets increasingly brighter as it rises, forms an oblong saucer-like shape as long as the three mountains but centered from top to bottom and then rapidly vanishes like a shooting star across to the other side of the mountain in the direction of which is another community of Triguerino. This was only one story of which we heard confirmation from other people including the 80 year old woman who owns the cabanas where we are now staying. Dodo also told us a story reminiscent of the one we were told in the Roncodor of a special miraculous healing. Dodo works in construction building houses. On one occasion he had a serious accident with a very heavy object falling on his foot and injuring his toe. The night while he slept he awoke to see a black shadow-like figure hovering over his injured toe, performing a healing. In the morning his injury was gone. Two days later while climbing the mountain with a friend, she took a photograph of Dodo with the mountains behind him. Later when they viewed the photograph they could see this very same shadow-like black figure standing behind Dodo.
As well as the lights which I just described, there are balls of light which some refer to as positive energy balls which are most often seen in photographs, especially around children, but here seen quite often with the naked eye. Olga, the proprietor of the cabanas where we are staying agrees that she too sees these. She just told us about a couple who stayed here last year who took photos around the pool. In the photos the people had columns of light with a round ball of light at their heads imposed over them. She said that many people believe there is too much energy here in the mountain because it is filled with quartz crystal. She didn’t once mention the words UFO or intra or extra-terrestrials, she simply spoke of energy. This mountain range is strangely similar to the Serra do Roncodor in its unique shape which has it jut quite high above the surrounding hills and be fairly narrow from side to side. I can see why these mountains might be perfect for underground communities of beings from some other dimension. They look like they might house whole cities inside them.
So these are the stories we are hearing about first hand and reading about briefly in the tour books…. After our first impressions, we all agree we really like this place. The town is actually quite great, nestled here in the mountains with interesting architecture and plenty of shops filled with artsy things, good restaurants and coffee shops. It’s a nice change from the sparse atmosphere of Brazil. And like Alto Paraiso, the little streets of the town lead out to dirt roads that wind into the mountain, dotted with cool houses and small shops. They have something here called dispensaries which are like little supermarkets in the neighborhoods. They remind me of the commissaries at summer camp….
We’ve not encountered many people yet who speak English so we are becoming ever more dependant on Uta to translate for us. Today we are headed off to explore another community about 20 kilometers north where we are told there exist a more international community. This has become a real draw of appeal to us. It’s also said that further north there is still plenty of water….
I’ve almost forgotten to mention one other story which is even more intriguing and delightful. On several occasions, always on the dark of the moon, our friends have encountered a group of five tall black women giggling, while out walking at night. By the way, here in Argentina we have yet to see any people of African descent with black skin and very few indigenous people. Mostly it would seem that Argentina was settled by white Europeans. There is a heavy influence of French, especially here in Capilla del Monte and Italian around Buenos Aires. Germany is also heavily represented. Paul especially likes this more European nature because it reminds him of happier times, years ago visiting Europe and feels more familiar. Growing up with a German mother and Slavic father, his roots in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania were more European than mine as well. There seems to be a greater attention to cleanliness and tidiness, manicured lawns, paved streets, things of this nature which he appreciates, especially in contrast to Brazil’s open aired ceilings with access to all the creepy crawly things that like to share the house. And he is simply over being too hot, so the cool weather of a four season climate is very appealing.
Night time here in March is sweater and jacket weather. Olga says this mountain with its special energy attracts the high winds which I’ve been experiencing here since we arrived. I haven’t yet made up my mind about how much I appreciate the winds. I used to think I wasn’t particularly fond of windy places. But I’m withholding judgment on that right now, especially after being far too hot for so long!
So we like this place. I think we’ve decided it’s the best place so far and if we don’t encounter a place we like better we will return here. But we will likely not stop looking until after we visit Bariloche in Patagonia first with a stop in San Luis and Mendoza along the way.
Later the same day….
Our trip to San Marcos Serra was delayed by a day when we stopped to ask directions and learned that the route there is closed for some kind of bicycle or motorcycle rally, I’m not sure which. This brings me to a point I thought I’d share with you. Our dear friend and new family member Uta really speaks next to no English, other than the few words she has learned from us. What she speaks with us is a mixture of Spanish, Portuguese and a very little English. My Portuguese isn’t bad, though I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s any good, although I do get compliments on it from Brazilians who are surprised it’s as good as it is. I’m not exactly sure how we communicate as well as we do to be honest with you. So here we are relying on her ability to communicate in Spanish and then translate to us in Portuguese to understand what’s going on. At times it works out just fine, but there are those other times when we haven’t got a clue. We simply have to rely on the fact that she always has our best interest at heart and trust that she will make the right decisions and we give up any need to be in control of a given situation. It’s fine but there are those few times when Paul looks at me to question what’s happening and I have to shrug my shoulders and admit that I have no literally exact idea only a general concept.
Today we made the decision not to risk a road block, sitting in traffic waiting out the rally and instead have a good resting day of which we are in desperate need after all this driving. Last night was a late night out as we awaited the 10pm starting time to attend the birthday party of our new friend. Paul opted out and even though both Uta and I were too tired to go as well, our sense of propriety and gratitude for their friendship won out. Dinner here in South America as well begins very late. Like Europe, most people do not even begin to think about the evening meal until 9pm or later. The restaurant we ate at last night at 9:30 was empty until just before we finished when it quickly filled with people. Perhaps the custom of the siesta plays a large part with everything closing between 1 and 5pm. Perhaps the work day extends well into the early evening and people take the time to rest up, clean up and desire a longer time to chill out before resuming the next work day…. I can’t say for sure but it’s often an adjustment we’d prefer not to make or simply have a hard time making at 55 and 65 when our beginnings had us at the dinner table at 5 and 6 o’clock respectively. I’d actually love to make the adjustment because the nights here are so magical. The stars in the night time sky are more magnificent than any I’ve ever seen. I’d love to stay up late and sit under the stars, hoping for a glimpse of the laughing women or the bright lights that whoosh by. As it is I’m too tired to stay up so late.
So instead of driving to San Marcos today with a picnic lunch as planned, we walking again through downtown, window shopping and found a restaurant where we enjoyed a great vegetarian meal. The art on the walls was fashioned from twigs and seeds and found objects and very similar to the things we have been making which of course I quite like. One had the words Erks on it which is the name of this inter-planetary center that Triguerino speaks of. I was surprised as I assumed this was more of an esoteric thing that wouldn’t be common knowledge. On either side of the word were two masks fashioned out of palm fronds with likenesses of Jesus with a kind of extra-terrestrial feel to them…. Someone said, and I don’t know who it was, that people are flocking here because of the ET activity. I don’t like that term anymore so much because I don’t think these beings are actually from other planets but live right here with us either in another dimension or perhaps inside the earth and are rather inter-terrestrial. Sounds so strange, doesn’t it? After all these years of being told that these were a figment of imagination or simply fiction from movies and books. Anyone who ever admitted seeing a UFO was deemed crazy and discounted as a lunatic which perhaps you are doing right now reading this? I’ve never actually seen one myself but I know people who have. In fact when Paul was in college in Edinborough Pennsylvania they had to close down school and suspend classes for a few days while the military flooded the campus and several UFO’s surrounded the place.
Monday March 15, 2010
Since I have a connection today and may not again for a while, I’ll send this off. Just back from a visit to the 2 neighboring towns about 20 and 30 kilometers respectively which I can hardly wait to tell you about as I don’t believe I’ve been anywhere as strangely bizarre in all my travels. But more later as I have to run now….
Kisses….