"Caracas, Gromit?" "No thanks, Wallace; it's s**t."

The trip has left the beaten track behind. Gone are the tossers with their silly tea-towel scarves and their seemingly endless bracelets. The world I have moved into is populated by real people, people who know how to sew on a button or cook an edible tomato/pasta-based dish. Sadly, I can do neither of those things, but I'm here anyway...

Caracas then: capital and largest city of South America's most politically dangerous country: Venezuela. Caracas is also widely believed to be the most dangerous city in South America, and as we all know, that's up against some pretty stiff competition. The thing with Venezuela is that it's all about the politics - even my flatmate where I was staying had political reasons for being there, on which more in a bit- of which the three main pillars are the following (in ascending order):

1) Socialism and how great it is.
2) Hugo Chavez
3) Simon Bolivar

Venezuela shocked me slightly when I first arrived. Even in the immigration hall - where I had to queue for a good hour and a half - had huge posters advertising the benefits of Chavez's socialism. We were told how "over a million Venezuelans had benefited from the government's education programme" and how "40,000 children had moved above the poverty line" thanks to socialism. Going from the airport to the centre of Caracas provided me with an endless stream of political propaganda. Everywhere I looked there was a billboard proclaiming how wonderful various things were, ranging from Simon Bolivar to the percentage by which milk production has increased (1220% in case you were wondering). The propaganda highlight was an enormous billboard which must have been more than 100 metres in length simply saying "Let's work!". Brilliant, Chavez, just brilliant.

Airport propaganda

I'm aware that for people who have visited countries which don't have similar styles of government to our own, this may not seem that extraordinary, but for me it was rather intriguing.

At the risk of sending some readers to sleep, I'm going to continue on the political path by talking about Hugo Chavez, the slightly insane Venezuelan president. He seems to have built up a slight cult of personality, similar to that of Stalin, albeit not on the same scale. Many people see him as a great leader and the man to turn Venezuela into a world force. Others dislike him immensely and completely disagree with his policies. This latter group, however, will very rarely criticise Chavez publicly. According to a Venezuelan university professor to whom I spoke, the fear of expropriation is a constant threat. One wrong word against Chavez, and you lose your land quicker than you can say "socialist c***". For this reason, many choose to let Chavez know how he isn't wrong, it's his ministers who have given him bad advice and they should be blamed. Not him, not Chavez.

Sadly, he hasn't really justified his methods or the near-fanatical support of many of his followers. Peru, which was widely perceived as a joke country, run by 'indians', has overtaken Venezuela in terms of GDP. Where Venezuela was near the top of this particular South American league table, it now languishes behind many of its competitors and inflation is relatively rampant, hovering at around 30%.

In an attempt to combat said inflation, Venezuela has an official exchange rate for its currency. This rate is 2.15 Bolivares for every U.S. Dollar. There is also a whole black market of currency exchanging, with rates offered being between 3 and 9 Bolivares to the Dollar. Now not being a complete moron, I opted for some slightly illegal and sexually arousing black market exchange action, netting me rate of 7 Bolivares to the Dollar. 7, compared to 2.15. No wonder the country's economy would be buggered without its oil reserves. Venezuelan people are forced to pay more than three times as much for things as foreigners using the black market (when relative value in Dollars is calculated).

And this shows on the women. Venezuela has produced more beauty queens than any other country in the world (even more than Uruguay!) and you can see why. However, the often stunning beauty of female Venezuelans is very much undermined by their seeming inability to wear clothes that fit them or look at all good. Further hampering my shallow interests was the fact that 9 out of 10 Venezuelans seem to be wearing dental braces. Imagine a gorgeous, dark-skinned, hispanic girl with lovely hair and everything. Now add some baby pink braces. Now dress her in a boy's tracksuit which is unwashed. That's a Venezuelan woman. I honestly believe Venezuelans would rank higher than Uruguayans if it weren't for these drawbacks, but drawbacks they were.

Venezuelan potential.

I must say, however, that Venezuelans have rhythm. I went to a salsa bar with my flatmate one evening and it was a great sight. No, not in that way. I was immensely cheered to see how everyone was dancing, all in pairs as well: anyone standing near the dancefloor was immediately invited to a dance. It was impossible not to feel like a loser in this place (insert joke about me being a loser here). It wasn't drunken dancing either: it was just through the sheer enjoyment of dancing and music that people were in there; not to get drunk like we would in the UK. Imagine a place in Britain where alcohol is served and people go to dance, without feeling at all self-conscious. No? Me neither.

Salsa a la Venezolana

The flatmate in question was a fellow from New Zealand. He was a huge conspiracy theorist (that's not to say he was fat, I just meant he was convinced by various conspi... oh it doesn't matter, let's get back to the blog), who remains certain that there will be a huge global period of hyperinflation and that corporations are taking over the world. He has a point I suppose... He was in Venezuela as a political refugee, having fled with his family - who temporarily reside in California - following various trials at which he refused to accept the court's authority. For a similar case in the British arena, Google "Birkenhead judge arrest". He actually had his original arrest on video, which he showed me, and let's just say I can see why he might have fled New Zealand, a country which is supposed to be liberal and safe. On the video, he seen being beaten rather savagely by 2 'Crown Constables', or policeman to the layperson, for no apparent reason other than he was being a bit difficult to arrest. He was very adamant about his political beliefs, and actually aims to establish a political party in New Zealand and has grand plans about meeting Chavez and getting his support. I'm aware none of this has anything to do with Venezuela, but it was an interesting experience I wished to share, alright?

So back to Caracas. The city itself is only remarkable for its total unremarkability. It has no well-known landmarks, or even much to do. There's a mountain overlooking the city, but even the views from there are fairly mundane. There's no real pleasant architecture to of which to speak either. Caracas does hold the honour of being the birthplace of one Simon Bolivar.

Simon Bolivar is a South American hero. In fact, in Venezuela, he occupies a position in people's estimation just below God. He is the man responsible for liberating vast swathes of South America from the Spanish in the early 19th century. Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Bolivia (named after him) and Venezuela all owe their existence directly to Bolivar. Everywhere you look in Caracas are pictures of the great man. Hugo Chavez actually changed the name of the country to incorporate his great love for Bolivar. Venezuela is officially known as La Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela, and the government seems to stick the adjective Bolivariano in at every opportunity. 

One of the many monuments to Bolivar. The text reads " If nature is against us, we shall fight it, and make it obey." Inspiring stuff... for someone... probably.

So having diced with politics and the differences between Common Law and Admiralty Law, a topic I still don't remotely understand, I decided to leave South America. I haven't gone far though, I've just nipped across the Caribbean to Trinidad and Tobago. Let's just say that the words "incredibly different" are insufficient for the next chapter in my voyage...

Until next time, and please, don't have nightmares.

Co-lame-bia

So I’d left the delights of Peru behind me and headed on up to Colombia, a country famed for its excitement and general hijinks. As it turned out, this excitement and hijinks weren’t as innocent as they sounded. But there again I probably should have guessed that things weren’t going to be a pleasant Sunday afternoon in the park, what with Colombia being the country that gave rise to the man who would go on to become the 7^th richest man in the world in 1989… due entirely to dealing cocaine.

Even the flight to Bogota, a city of some 9 million people and a self-proclaimed ‘Megacity  of South America’ (along with Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires and Lima), was exciting, but with a heavy dose of vice. You see, when I’d sat down on the plane, I happened to glance to either side of me and notice that both of my neighbours were rather buxom and generally largely constructed of plastic it seemed.

Rather unsurprisingly, it turned out they were Colombian porn stars. As I said, exciting, but you know your mother wouldn’t approve.

So with that particularly bizarre journey behind me, I thought I’d penetrate Bogota itself and I must say, I was unimpressed with what I saw. Bogota did not look like a city of its size. Not by a long chalk. It made Machu Picchu look like a bustling metropolis. The city centre felt tiny, as did the rest of the city.

The people were friendly though. Whilst seeking out somewhere to have lunch one day, I came across an affordable-looking restaurant, so I quickly wiped it off and apologised before entering the premises. This restaurant was jam-packed with Colombian soldiers in dress uniform, with not a spare table in the house. I must have looked devastated, as, before I knew what was happening, I was invited to sit and dine with some of the aforementioned soldiers. In the whole travelling spirit of things, I duly accepted and sat amongst Colombia’s finest. Even though I speak barely enough Spanish to order food in a restaurant, let alone make casual conversation with Colombian squaddies, I had a very enjoyable lunch despite the dire quality of food. The soldiers were incredibly friendly and made me feel welcome and I’d recommend having lunch with the armed forces to anyone.

On the job though, these soldiers were a completely different type of person. Gone was the amiable, talkative geezer, and in his place was the hard-nosed, merciless oppressor, as I found out (very nearly) the hard way. After lunch, I decided to investigate the city’s colonial architecture, which was pleasant and Hispanic enough, despite the best efforts of an American Evangelical missionary group trying to convert people through the medium of new-age dance and football demonstrations. One of said sights was the vast presidential palace, which was heavily fortified. If one covered one’s ears for a moment, it would have appeared a lot like Colonel Gadaffi was cowering there. I was innocently walking along the pavement looking slightly confused one minute, and the next I was confronted by 3 heavily-armed presidential guards, all with assault rifles pointed directly at me. My heinous crime? Walking on the pavement next to the palace. Paranoia? Probably. Unnecessary? Most certainly. Even outside the White House in Washington, tourists are allowed to gawp and take photos all they like without the notoriously oppressive American security forces coming down on them like a ton of bricks. Not in Bogota.

The Evos do their thing in Bogota.

And it isn’t just tourists that the authorities scared. The street vendors peddling their counterfeit DVDs immediately shut up shop and ran for their lives as soon as there was mention of some sort of authority figure approaching.

Bogota, I decided, was not the place for me, so like any self-respecting individual, I left and went to the Caribbean coast and the architecturally famous colonial town of Cartagena.

Cartagena was, in a word, hot. Very, very, very hot. Now I enjoy heat as much as the next man, but this was too much. It is supposedly the playground of Colombia’s elite, and thus has all the typical upper-class trappings: there were big yachts moored in the harbour; attractive, rich people everywhere; a Hard Rock Café. Yet I wasn’t all that entertained. The Cartageneans just didn’t seem like they cared all that much about their town and so there was a constant feeling that it could be so much better, so much cleaner and prettier. And then there were all of the more illegal and unpleasant trappings that accompany money and glamour. Outside the hostel in which I was staying, there was the constant presence, day and night, of the friendly local drug dealer. Every time I exited the hostel, he would immediately approach me, ask me where I was from (I actually played a little game with myself, telling him increasingly unusual home countries. The best I came up with was Mongolia) and proceed to offer me “the finest cocaine in Cartagena”. Goodness knows that was against some stiff competition.

Then there were the prostitutes. They were like bats, unseen during the day, but swarming the streets at night. The most popular ‘pick-up’ line seemed to be “Amigo, f**k me, f**k me, f**k me.” It was all beginning to sound a lot like Newcastle on a Friday nights… except the prostitutes were dressed more tastefully.

Tourists were also, unsurprisingly, a common feature of Cartagena. This helped support the local underground economy and all the thousands of street vendors this involved. There was all sorts being sold: handicrafts, jewellery, DVDs, musical instruments and food. I even saw one thin-looking lady with an equally undernourished child in her arms, sitting on the pavement trying to sell passers-by an old plastic cup with a few coins in it. She didn’t manage to sell the cup as far as I could tell, but several people did seemingly augment the value of the cup by adding their own coins to it.

Tourists come to Cartagena for good reason as well. The town is actually Colombia’s main port, so any boats coming in from the Caribbean will dock in Cartagena, unloading their haggard-looking cargo there. Then there is also the rather wonderful colonial architecture. The old, walled city has lost only a little of its colonial charm, with pleasant balconies and cobbled streets in abundance, as well as the imposing hillside fortress, built to keep Brits like me out of the town. Finally, there is the weather, which, as previously mentioned is mightily warm.

Cartagena by night

The fortress, or castle (I believe both are acceptable in Cartagena) was started in 1639 with the specific aim of protecting the town from French and British invaders. Thus, it was with a slight sense of irony that I opted for a guided tour of this previous bastion of defiance against Britannia’s dominance of the seas. The castle itself was very impressive, with a maze of underground tunnels, some nice views of the city and what looked like Colombia’s biggest flag. What made the tour for me, however, was the tour guide. This was a little Colombian fellow called Umberto who had the social skills of someone with autism and a stammer which could have been the basis for an Oscar-winning British film about a monarch and wartime speeches. Either way, I learned a lot, although I do suspect some of the things I was told about in the castle were made-up.

Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas, complete with enormous flag

After several days of sun, I left Colombia with a great sense of disappointment and headed to what most South Americans consider to be the most dangerous city on the continent: Caracas, Venezuela. But you’ll find out if I survived the crime and the insane, socialist dictator next time.

Until then, please, don’t have nightmares.

Peru-sing South America's most unexpected gem...

With the poverty and scenery of Bolivia behind me, I was anticipating good times and great experiences to be had in Peru, South America's 3rd largest country by area. I was flying from La Paz to Cusco, the traditional jumping-off point for people going to the world-famous Machu Picchu. This may not sound remarkable in itself, but on my flight there, I was accompanied by only 14 other people on the plane (an Airbus A319 painted to look like a crocodile - a plane that can supposedly carry around 134 passengers). This made me feel especially guilty about my carbon footprint, which is more of a 'carbon trench' being carved out in South America's lovely landscape.

This wasn't the only air travel-related incident of note. On arrival in Cusco 'International' Airport, all 15 passengers were forced to wait while the immigration official ambled slowly to his desk from goodness knows where. When he had finally arrived, he had a look on his face as though the passengers had asked him to wipe their arses one by one.

Once I had finally made it into Peru, the patriotism was almost tangible. Every single Peruvian with whom I came in contact informed me of the great joys of Peru and how much of a wondrous place it is. A typical line was "Peruvian women are fantastic". This turned out to be mostly codswallop. Despite their false promises, I was made to feel very welcome in Peru. One incident that springs to mind is my first lunch in Lima, when a local chap, having spotted my map of Lima, shook my hand and said "welcome to Peru, amigo". I was touched. But my sexual assault case is a story for another day, Peruvians were simply incredibly welcoming.

I must say, I wouldn't remain quite so friendly if my home had been overrun by 'gringos' (a South American term for backpackers). Cusco was full of them. And this was the low season allegedly. This in itself wasn't a major issue for me, it was more the general ignorance of all of these gringos. Whilst sitting in a café (named Inka-fé - geddit?) enjoying a cup of maté, a group of 4 English gap year girls sat on the table next to me. When they ordered, not once did they attempt a word in Spanish. Surely everyone knows at least the words 'gracias' or 'por favor'? Alas, no. The English had managed to embarrass a whole nation once again just through sheer ignorance and laziness.

So from Cusco, off I went to arguably South America's best-known tourist attraction. Machu Picchu. For those ignoramuses (ignoramus of course being derived from a latin verb form, not a noun, thus rendering the pluralisation 'ignorami' ironically incorrect. But I digress.) who don't know, Machu Picchu is basically a city of ruins high up in the Peruvian mountains. I must say, the whole day was a pleasure, right down to the transportation to and from the site. Getting there involved a train. Not any old train though: this was train travel as it should be. The carriages were large and spacious with plenty of light and just before departure, the whole platform was a chaotic scene of passengers, conductors and catering staff. It was the most enjoyable chaos I've seen in a while. When we finally got under way, there was a trolley service with delicious and thoughtful meals provided. I was indeed a happy bunny.

When I had finally reached the site itself, my first thought (other than 'wow' of course) was "why the Dickens did someone decide to build a town here?". To put this in perspective, it took us 25 minutes in a bus to get up the mountain. That was in modern times, how did they manage it in the 15th century? Either way, the journey was worth it. Despite being riddled with tourists and the driving rain, I had a thoroughly interesting time at Machu Picchu, and would recommend it to anyone.

Back to Cusco. A fairly unremarkable colonial town with a pleasant central plaza and some nice architecture. The city itself has more-or-less 400,000 inhabitants, which puts it on a par with Liverpool. "This all sounds wonderful" you may be saying, "but why the hell should I care?". I'll tell you why: every night at 10 p.m., the city of Cusco turns off the water supply. No running water. At all. Until 5 a.m. In a city the size of Liverpool. Insane.

So I left Cusco (smelling terrible) and headed to the capital, Lima. A city of some 9 million people and one of the former capitals of the Spanish South American Empire. Yet sadly, Lima seems to be omitted from most people's itineraries. I must say I was surprised by Lima: many people had warned me I'd be bored and that there was nothing to do there. With this in mind, I turned up with low expectations.

I was staying in 'Gringo Central', an area of the city called Miraflores. This just so happened to be the wealthiest part of the city, and thus was filled with shops, pleasant parks and fewer homeless people than elsewhere in Lima. In fact, Miraflores was the richest place I had been to on my trip so far. I saw people driving around in Hummers, Mercedeseseseseses, BMWs and a host of other luxury cars. All of which seemed rather pointless. I'm not going to criticise the capitalist system at this point, merely point out how Limeños are the worst drivers I have ever seen. They made Romans look like careful, considerate motorists. Lanes were painted on the roads, but the local government may as well have painted pictures of frogs spinning plates whilst playing billiards with a seahorse. This probably would have made more sense than trying to persuade Limeños to stay in their respective lanes.

And for those of you wondering if the standards of the women had improved since Bolivia, they certainly had in Miraflores. This was Peruvian rah central. I hadn't seen so many Ugg boots since my time at Durham. This was truly a beautiful place filled with beautiful people.

The city centre was a different proposition, however. On my one day (it'll become clear why I didn't go back) in the town centre exploring the sights, I was accosted by a German. Now, being British and a bit of a Germanophone, I was too polite to simply ignore the man, so I humoured him and engaged him in conversation. He fed me some cock-and-bull story about how he was attacked and mugged, and how the German Embassy had told him he needed to travel to another one of their consulates to get hold of a new passport. At first I refused because I clearly didn't believe his story, but in order just to get him away from me, I offered to give him 2 Soles (about 50 Pence). As I was rummaging around in the coin section of my wallet, he somehow managed to take a 100 Soles note out without me noticing at the time. He left me alone, seemingly content with the 2 Soles and I was happy to escape. Only later did I discover the missing monies and curse myself for my naiveté. I felt like the Allies in 1939: completely betrayed by the Germans following various unkept promises.

This German wasn't the only unpleasant person I encountered in Lima: the service in restaurants was almost as bad as the driving on the roads to get to the restaurants. Staff were slow, inattentive and rude. The worst part was when they had the audacity to ask for a tip at the end. No chance. I nearly spat out my Inca Kola. But Peruvian dining wasn't all bad: they have both the aforementioned Inca Kola - a new favourite soft drink of mine - and Pisco sour - a new favourite alcoholic drink of mine. Inca Kola is a bubblegum-flavoured fizzy drink, occupying the same market as Coca-Cola or Sprite. Except Inca Kola is a lot more popular than these two pretenders. A lot more popular. In fact, Coca-Cola was so worried about its dominance on the Peruvian market, that instead of trying to compete, it just bought the Inca Kola company.

Pisco sour is an alcoholic cocktail made from lime juice, egg whites and a local spirit called Pisco, a sort of grape-derived brandy. Again, this was delicious and certainly did the trick.

Besides its drinks, Lima is home to a great number of surfers' beaches. However, these are all named after other famous beaches: there was a Redondo Beach and a Waikiki Beach, all of which led me to think: do they really want to name parts of their country afters places traditionally filled with Americans..?

So after a few days enjoying the hidden delights of Lima, I was off to Colombia. But that's a story for another day.

So long for now, and remember: never trust an injured German.

It's unboliviable Jeff!

When I left you last time out I was gasping for breath in La Paz, the world's highest capital city, at over 4,000 metres above sea level in parts. The sad thing is, I wasn't even joking about being constantly out of breath: just sitting down makes you pant like a dog in a hot car after a particularly strenuous walk (I exercised considerable restraint with that analogy). The locals advise getting through this by drinking vast amounts of Maté de coca (Spot test: which country was especially keen on Maté? The answer will be at the bottom of the page.), which I gleefully took part in and soon developed an alarming coca habit.

The second thing to hit me (well the third if you count that Bolivian woman with the enormous hand luggage that bashed me in the face) was just how comparatively poor La Paz is. Having previously been to Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina and Chile, all countries in the top 5 richest of South America, Bolivia was a shock to the system: houses were half-built yet still lived in; the public buses had had their heyday in the US... in the 50s; children apparently paying homage to Oliver Twist swarmed on the pavements in abundance and everywhere I went there was someone trying to sell me something, be it an Incan charm, a pickled llama foetus or even bits of chewing gum. One thing I found particularly cruel and unnecessary was the ubiquitous Samsung billboards advertising products most of these people would never get close to owning through legal avenues: what the hell is a homeless Bolivian street child selling chewing gum to tourists going to do with a 3D television? The guy didn't even have any shoes on, let alone a reliable source of electricity or the means to subscribe to a very generous and good value satellite service, offering all the sports, movies and documentaries one could wish for, all available in stunning 3D and high definition.

 Yet all this poverty is a blessing in an horrendous disguise for idiot tourists like me: Bolivia is ridiculously cheap. A typical lunch from a set menu comes in at less than a Pound. A Pound. For 3 courses and a drink. Sure, the food was average at best and I considered myself lucky every time I woke up the next day with my vision relatively intact, but Bolivian food does represent excellent value.

The food wasn't the only health risk I encountered. La Paz is extremely polluted. The ancient buses and similarly aged cars made Chinese heavy industry look like a Greenpeace oxygen, environment and happiness factory. If each cigarette takes 8 minutes off your life, then 8 minutes in La Paz must take at least a week off your lifespan.

Now call me a speculator (if that's the worst I get called by the readers of this blog I'd be very surprised), but I suspect all of this pollution may contribute a tiny bit to one of Bolivia's most remarkable aspects: Bolivians are ugly. Seriously, I didn't see one attractive Bolivian (male or female) during my entire time there. Maybe I was just unlucky, or maybe I have a very bizarre taste in women, but I can safely say I did not glance twice at any one Bolivian female.

Bolivia's not all bad though. Far from it in fact. La Paz now has the great honour of being home to my third favourite museum in the world: El Museo de Instrumentos Musicales in La Paz. I felt like I was 5 again, as I was surrounded by all these weird and whacky instruments, a lot of which I was allowed to have a go on! If I felt like this aged 23, how would I have felt aged 5... I can't remember the last time I had so much fun bashing, plucking and tinkling...

Having offended the hearing of everyone within 2 miles of the museum with my overenthusiastic musical efforts, I decided to escape town for a while lest I be lynched by angry La Pazians. My destination of choice was the hilariously-named Lake Titicaca. Now to say it was pretty would be plain wrong. Beautiful would still undersell it substantially. I can honestly say that Lake Titicaca is in the top 10 most stunning Bolivian bodies of water I have ever been to. But seriously, it was incredible. Just amazing. The scenery was breathtaking, the sapphire-coloured water complementing the dramatic surrounding mountains perfectly, all fittingly wrapped in an envelope of sunshine. If you only have time to visit one place in Bolivia, this should be it. This wondrous place was only made better by my accommodation, which was an enormous room with 4 beds, 2 hammocks and a kitchenette. This may sound quite good in itself, but the icing on the cake was the view from my window. Just outstanding.

Titicaca (giggle) is only 1 of the 2 recommendations I have for anyone headed to the La Paz area. The other is to go for a bike ride on the so-called 'World's Most Dangerous Road' (about 300 people died on it every year until a safer replacement road was built). This takes you along a 40 mile route along a narrow, rocky road with some fantastic scenery. If I wasn't concentrating so hard on staying on the road I could describe it far better to you. 40 miles may sound like a lot, but the whole route is basically downhill, meaning the only thing that gets tired is your fingers from all the braking.

Bolivia is truly eye-opening then, both in a bad and a good way. Poverty and daily struggles are happening in front of one of the most glorious backdrops in the world. The landscape and the prices (but not the women) have left me wanting to return to Bolivia one day, although next time I'll have to pack my thesaurus to help me adequately describe Bolivia's natural beauty.

Until next time, when I'll be discussing the delights of my current location, Peru. And please, don't have nightmares.

Red hot Chile's better

What does anyone actually know about Chile other than it being the basis for a lot of awful 'Chilli/chilly'-related jokes?

Well, it's one of South America's richer countries, has a long and proud history involving both European immigrants and indigenous peoples, it has a population of nearly 17 million (of which 4 million live in Santiago, the capital) and they're good at getting trapped miners out of the ground.

Chileans are also tremendously friendly. The hardcore followers amongst you will remember my ranting about the friendliness shown by Montevideans. Chileans come close, with everyone out and about ready to help ignorant, lost little tourists like myself.

I only had a chance to visit Santiago, which is relatively boring on the face of it, but scratch beneath the surface and you find a population ready and willing to engage in some serious fun. One of Santiago's stand-out traits is its apparent peculiarities. Santiago seems to have more stray dogs than the rest of the world put together. What surprised me though was that these dogs didn't look mangy or flea-ridden or anything; they just looked like someone owned and indeed looked after them and had forgotten to put a collar on them. I saw huskies, German shepherds, sausage dogs and poodles. It was truly bizarre. Furthermore, they seemed to have better road-crossing skills than most Brits I know.

Something the Brits can do, however, is drink. The Chileans less so. The police in Santiago insist all nightclubs shut at 5 a.m., meaning there is a host of illegal clubs behind locked doors. These have all sorts of peculiar customs, such as look-outs informing revellers when the coast was clear to leave and a range of secret knocks to gain access to said venues.

Apart from illegal clubs, Santiagons have another vice: 'Café con Piernas', or 'Coffee with legs' to the non-hispanophone. These are cafés where the waitresses (and they are all waitresses) all wear very short skirts. The strange thing is that they don't normally serve alcoholic drinks, which begs the question of 'why bother?'. Well, the coffee served there is no more expensive than in most other places, and I have been reliably informed that the quality of coffee there is actually superior to most other places. I think this is an idea that could be exported to the UK. Although they'd have to apply it to things that aren't coffee, seeing as most Brits are about as sophisticated as sack full of dog turds. 'McDonald's with legs'? 'Jobcentre with legs'? The options are plentiful...

Moving on now... Having met and grown friendly with a large group of people at my hostel, we decided to take in a Chilean League football match featuring Chile's largest team, Colo Colo. The atmosphere wasn't as good as the one I experienced in Brazil and the standard of football was insulting to many in the crowd, but the ride home on the Metro was something else. Really one of the most fun times I've ever had on public transportation with my trousers still on. We were in a packed carriage with lots of victorious Colo Colo fans, who were all singing and clapping very loudly and generally being happy at the result. Then they started jumping up and and down. This wasn't just a few people, this was a carriage full of about 200 people, all jumping simultaneously. This made the carriage move around more than the north-east coast of Japan. I was genuinely concerned we would derail whilst going round a corner. Things got so shakey that the train had to stop at a station for an extra 5 minutes or so whilst everyone calmed down a bit... and then continued once we started moving again.

Unfortunately, the people of Chile are used to the ground shaking a lot, seeing as they suffer from a lot of tectonic activity. In early 2010, they suffered and earthquake and resulting tsunami which killed over 500 people. Speaking to a Chilean about this particular earthquake really opened my eyes. He told me it happened at around 3 a.m. on a Friday night, meaning a lot of people were enjoying a night out. When the earthquake struck, they are alleged to have gone out to the streets quickly and cheered, apparently ignorant of the scale of this fatal 8.8 magnitude tremor. The Chilean attitude to earthquakes seems to be one of only mild annoyance. They perceive earthquakes occurring with the same mild irritation we do when the sky's slightly cloudy when we're trying to have a barbecue.

Now I'm sure you've all been religiously reading these posts and have been blown away by their quality and insightful. If you'd like to read more on the topic of travelling, with an emphasis on South America, I'd recommend the following, each with a slightly different twist on the travelling theme:

http://www.oxfordtoday.ox.ac.uk/Blogs/Oliver_Kerr.html  A serious and intelligently-written blog on the uncertainty of the post-degree gap year.

www.listentome23.blogspot.com A light-hearted, more personal take on all things Gap Year written by one the most qualified people I know.

For now, I'm in La Paz, a city so high above sea level, breathing is constantly difficult. Hopefully you're also now feeling slightly breathless after reading this. Farewell. 

BA's Maracas

The problem with France is that it's full of French people. Sure, there are some nice ones, but the majority of the French manage to offend nearly all 5 senses. If this fact puts you off going to the traditional Paris - you know, the one in France - you can always do what I did and hop on a plane and take a trip to the self-proclaimed 'Paris of the South': Buenos Aires.

Buenos Aires is a curious place: it has elegant baroque architecture in abundance, but when the local government were planning where to put all of their 60s tower blocks, someone must have sneezed on the blueprints. This is only explanation I could come with for why every pleasant colonial-era building seems to have a hideous great hunk of concrete next to, in front or on top of it. This is a crying shame, because Buenos Aires' buildings (the nice ones at least) really surprised me with their splendour. The Palacio de Congreso for example was supposedly based upon Washington's Capitol building, but in execution there was one crucial difference: they actually thought about it, rendering it tasteful and not garish.

Buenos Aires is indeed a proper big city, with all walks of life represented and all sorts of locales in which they live and work, so a lot like Rio really in this respect. Where it differs - and it differs hugely - is the sense that all Porteños (as residents of Buenos Aires are known) know that work also has to be done and that there is a time to be serious as well as a time to have fun.


And fun they do have: on my first night in Buenos Aires, I decided to check out the local cuisine and so headed to my nearest Parilla, or steakhouse to you and me. I was sat down and immediately given a shot of Jerez for no obvious reason. Not wishing to offend my beaming waitress, I obliged and drunk it. Following this I ordered a steak with chips, expecting a relatively standard steak-based affair. How wrong was I. The cow from which the steak seemed to have been cut must have been 40 feet tall and had a rump the size of Sunderland. It was humongous. It was also delicious.


When I finally finished this gargantuan pile of protein, I was offered more complimentary alcohol, which I gleefully accepted (Limoncello in case you were wondering). The greatest surprise came with the bill. All of 
this excellent food and alcohol and it amounted to less than £10. What a place this was turning out to be.

What every good Porteño does after their nightly steak (it is estimated that Argentinians each eat on average 70kg of beef a year) is let the meal digest until about two o'clock in the morning and then head out on the town. The Argentinians like to leave it late. And I mean late. In one nightclub we visited the doors opened at midnight and the dancefloor didn't open until 3 a.m. They all enjoy it as well. I was hard-pressed to find a miserable-looking clubber, although that may have had something to do with the 'clubbing aids' readily available in the lavatories. 


Not even I could dampen their spirits with my horribly broken Spanish: I managed to sort-of converse with an Argentinian financial analyst for nearly an hour and she humoured me throughout, not once pretending to go to the bar or the toilet. I would say she was just more desperate than other women to whom I've spoken in the past, but I like to think it's just the Argentinian way.


The undoubted highlight for me was going to see a percussion group called 'La Bomba del Tiempo'. This was a group consisting of drummers, bongo players and even a Bez impersonator on the maracas, all of whom were expertly led by a conductor who seemed to be frantically trying to communicate with the group through what looked like some primitive sign language. Either way, it worked.


So if you're looking for somewhere with lovely architecture, great food and a cracking nightlife, go to Paris. If you want all of the above, but with fewer Frenchmen and bigger steaks, head to Buenos Aires.

Montevideo grilled the 'acado' star

Author's note: You may have seen that I've located the image-insertion function, so expect more visual accompaniments to my ramblings.

Terrible. Awful. Horrendous. The worst place I've ever been to. A pointless globule of pigeon turd spoiling what would otherwise be a fine continent.

None of the above describe Montevideo, city of some one and a half million people and capital of the bovine powerhouse of Uruguay. It's actually a really nice place to be. It has the same sort of endearing quality as your favourite grandparent who used to take you on all sorts of exciting trips but is now senile, incontinent and can't remember who you are or why you're hugging them. Montevideo is akin to a faded Spanish seaside resort: all the ingredients are there for litoral perfection, but they lack polish and care.

You see, Montevideo is on the surface very well run and maintained, with seemingly little poverty and few negatives. Then you start noticing more and more little things that detract from the whole; large chunks of pavement missing, tramps hidden cunningly behind signs and bins so they aren't moved on by the police and the fact that most of the public buses seem to be older than than Uruguay itself.

Despite all of these shortcomings, Montevideo is without doubt one of the friendliest places to which I have ever been. The tramps mentioned above greet everyone with a cheery 'hola' and people will try and start conversations with you wherever you are and even though they might as well be trying to communicate through interpretive dance for all the Spanish I know. One excellent example of this willingness to not let anything get in the way of a good natter was when I was on a bus one day. We were stopped at some traffic lights and another bus pulled up beside us. The two bus drivers then proceeded to discuss seemingly everything that's ever happened in the world ever, not even hinting at moving. This continued even though the lights had long since changed to green. It was only after one more cycle of traffic lights that they decided the time was right to continue with their jobs. The strangest thing about this whole episode was that noone in the cars behind honked their horn. I don't even think they noticed, such is the chilled-out vibe of the place. People in the UK may complain about infrequent rubbish collections, but in Montevideo the pace of life means they use a horse and cart to collect people's rubbish. It's utterly bizarre and confusing.

The friendliness aspect of the residents of Montevideo can once again be illustrated by buses. Each bus has 2 types of horn: one normal horn to make pedestrians move off the road when necessary, and a second, quieter horn which emits a whistling noise. They use this second horn to 'whistle' at other bus drivers, nothing more. 

As mentioned above, the Uruguayans are really quite keen on their meat. Their two national dishes involve meat as much as they can. There are acados, which are basically huge barbecues with as many different types of beef thrown on top as possible, and there are chivitos. A chivito makes a burger from a US branch of McDonald's look like a snack. For a mouse. Who's just eaten a large roast dinner. In short, they are enormous burgers, with all sorts of unhealthy and hilarious extra ingredients. Initially, it looks like a regular burger, just a lot larger. Then comes the shovelling on of extras: ham, cheese, eggs, artichoke hearts, chicken, more beef, more cheese, pickled onions, pickled carrots (seriously), more cheese and about a gallon of generic pink chivito sauce. These things could keep even the most stereotypical of Americans full, for a few hours at least. 

Then there's Maté, a drink similar to tea to which Uruguayans seem to be addicted. You will often see people out for a stroll, Maté mug in one hand and a Thermos flask in the other to top up the hot water (see image below). Maté is made of bitter herbs brewed in hot water. It is then drunk through a special straw with an inbuilt strainer. 

This fantastic friendliness and feeling of welcome is only one of Montevideo's fine attributes. The women there were generally extremely attractive, a feature enhanced by their seeming self-deprecation. If these women were in the UK, they would be eternally dressed in bikinis and trousers so tight you'd think their backsides were doing their best impression of Vanessa Feltz taking part in a lasagne eating contest. This, and the pleasantly warm weather make it really not hard to see why so many Nazi war criminals chose to come here. 

Montevideo effortlessly exudes bonhomie and never feels like a city with 1.5 million residents. This quietness is further emphasised on Sundays, when the entire city centre is eerily empty, and again on week nights, when most bars seem to shut at half past 8 in the evening. Nightlife during the week in Montevideo is a lot like the clitoris: it may take hours of searching and several moments of doubting its existence, but when you do find it, it will bring hours of enjoyment.

"Montevideo is your home, as is this square"