Silicon Fly Interview

Brazil, here we come!

Some of you readers might know that I am heading to Rio de Janeiro on the 4th of July for a little over a week for an absolutely incredible photo project, where I will be shadowing a collective of Favela graffiti artists. In order to enter the country as a US citizen, it is required to have a tourist Visa, a direct reciprocal action for the Visa requirements we impose on them. In order to get the Visa, you need roundtrip airfare, application form, bank statements, passport photo, credit card, and most importantly, the fee ($147US). I was under the impression the process would be kind of difficult, or at least take a long time, inside the consulate, but it went very smoothly. Where it got tricky was making the payment. It was one of those TIA moments (This Is Argentina). You can only go to two banks, both of which are mere blocks from the consulate. I arrived thinking it would take 5 minutes. Nope! The place was absolutely PACKED, no seats at all. You had to pull a number to see a teller, I got number 69. They were on 45. Well whatever, I'll wait. The problem was that at about 52, the machine went all haywire and began going out of order, thus creating the problem of the person with the correct "number" going to the window, even if it meant they were skipping 8 people who should have gone before them. After about 45 minutes I finally got my turn, and paid the fee, 30 second transaction. So now, with Visa in hand, I will be setting foot in Brazil in a mere few weeks. YES!!!!!

Viva Argentina, Che!: Tranxgo

Most people know that Argentina's greatest contribution to the world of music is Tango. To this day you can wander around any of Buenos Aires' neighborhoods and find milongas, where people of all ages dance to the classic music. What has happened in recent years however is the world of electronic music that is also beloved by the Argentines, has been introduced and mixed with the old, traditional style. Mixing violins, bandoneon, piano and old vocal samples with hard drubbing, heavy-bass laced tracks produces an amazing, original sound. Three main groups that have taken this new genre (sometimes referred to as tranxgo), Bajofondo, Tanghetto and Gotan Project, have come out with countless amazing tracks. I was fortunate enough to see Bajofondo play live in a free festival to celebrate 200 years of independence in Argentina a few weeks ago, and goddamn, they are sick! Here are a few tracks to download, enjoy and let me know your thoughts!

Gotan Project-Santa Maria.mp3
Gotan Project-Epoca.mp3
Gotan Project-El Capitalismo.mp3
Gotan Project-Mi Confesion.mp3
Bajofondo Tango Club-Grand Guignol.mp3
Bajofondo Tango Club-Naranjo en Flor.mp3
Bajofondo Tango Club-Exodo II.mp3
Bajofondo Tango Club-Duro y Parejo.mp3
Tanghetto-Enjoy the Silence (Depeche Mode Tango Remix).mp3

Young Squondra Comes to Town: BA and Colonia

The plan when Sondra got here was to make at least two trips to places within the country. Iguazu down, we were going to try to make it to the western wine-country city of Mendoza but it was just asking too much. Decided not to do it for various reasons, one of them being that if we went, she wouldn't get to experience a full weekend in this madness that we call a city. We did make it to Uruguay for a day though, to the city of Colonia. We decided to do this because it's a nice day trip and also because I was at the time an illegal alien and wanted to get that feeling off my chest. Fortunately, the rules are a bit more lax here than they are in the States. Consequences for overstaying your tourist visa is now about $80US, up from the $18 that it used to be a month ago. You get a slap on the wrist and then you're given a pass and another 3 months in this wonderful country. Here are some photos, with captions, of our day in Uruguay...
The view over Rio de la Plata from Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires before getting on the ferry

Street scene

Sondra showing off her wad of "play" money that is the Uruguayan peso on her hog...we couldn't rent mopeds as originally planned since we didn't have our driver's licenses with us...

Just some of the many many street dogs around the town

That's me sneaking into the grounds of an abandoned bullring; interior of the bullring

The rest of Sondra's time here consisted of shopping in ferias, pubcrawling and fortunately, on her very last night, the Grand Opening of Fusion, our very own nightclub/restaurant. Well, it's not technically mine but Dustin, my good friend who started the pubcrawl company, put together this place with some other friends. Will be doing a blog update about this new spot. It's so cool! All in all had a great time with her here, and sounds like she had a good time too because she's hoping to come back in the summer (winter for you Northerners).

3 Videos from the Bicentennial Celebration

There will be a longer post coming but for the time being here are three videos from the Bicentennial Celebration Free Concert at the Obelisco in the middle of the city. La Bomba de Tiempo and Bajofondo performed, it was amazing. La Bomba is an incredible percussion orchestra and Bajofondo is one of the most well known bands to have incorporated Argentina's beloved Tango music with electronic and dance music. EPIC!







This video is of a couple that broke into an impromptu Tango dance during Bajofondo's set. Love that this kind of thing just happens...

Whoa...she's eating STEAK??

For those of you who have known Sondra for a while, you know she has been a pretty staunch vegetarian. Well, while in the land of the best steaks on Earth, she decided to cross to the other side, if but for a moment (and wouldn't you know it, she thought it tasted GOOD) Thankfully there is video proof.

Iguazu Videos

El Tigre y Sus Manchas feat. German Varela

This is a great video Sondra shot of my roommate Tigre's band, El Tigre y Sus Manchas (The Tiger and His Spots) featuring our other roommate German Varela of the pretty well known rock band, Silicon Fly. German absolutely rips it up! This is performed at L'O Bar in San Telmo, Buenos Aires.

HYPE!

This is a promotional video for a party I work at. All the still images were taken by me...it's pretty cool!

http://blip.tv/file/2175126/

OH SNAP! Barrios: Puerto Madero

Located between San Telmo/La Boca and the Rio de La Plata, Puerto Madero is easily one of Buenos Aires' most aesthetically pleasing and unique neighborhoods. Whether you want to go shopping, hit the clubs, eat the most amazing churrasquitos or choripan, ride bikes in an ecological reserve or even go to Hooters, Puerto Madero is the place to be.
Here is a collection of some of my favorite shots of the old wherehouse district:

OH SNAP! Jardin Japones

Located in the middle of Palermo, near the Bosques de Palermo, lies the Jardin Japones. Donated to the city by the country of Japan many years back, the park is a beautiful, tranquil place to spend an hour. There's a big pond with lots and lots of massive koi, a Japanese restaurant, and a greenhouse where you can buy plants and Bonzai trees. It costs $5 to get in, but it's worth it. It's located at Av. Figueroa Alcorta and Av. Casares, not terribly far from the D line subte.

The Last Seven and a Half Months in Photographs

This is a compilation of my favorite shots since I've been down South America way...

http://www.pbase.com/afirestein/saafaves

Young Squondra Comes to Town: Iguazu

In the 7 months I've been in Argentina, I've had plenty of visitors come through. The month of May marked for the first time, however, that someone of the family came down. Sondra arrived at about 6:30 am on the 10th of May, as opposed to the 4 am time that was originally thought. It was fine though since I work in the nightlife industry (sounds weird when I put it that way) and I was up anyways. I got to the airport at about 3:45 and was actually able to sleep on a bench until her delayed flight landed. Next stop was the hostel, the Milhouse, which is located on a street unpronounceable by anyone who is just visiting. The street is Hipolito Yrigoyen, pronounced EE-PO-LEE-TOE EERIE-GO-SHEN. Anyways, this just meant that anytime Sondra needed to get back to the hostel, I had to go to the cabbie and tell him. The first few days in BA were spent pubcrawling, eating, and basically lounging around watching TV since the weather was pretty crappy. This was all good though as we decided to bus up north about 2000+ kilometers to Las Cataratas de Iguazu, or in English, Iguazu Falls with my good friend Freddy.

Getting to and from Puerto Iguazu (the actual town) is fairly easy, as is most travel in Argentina. The only issue is that distances are so deceptively big here, that most bus trips to anywhere of interest are between 15-20 hours from Buenos Aires. We hopped on a 6 pm bus on Friday the 15th and got in at about 11 am on the 16th. It's always good to take buses that take as long as this as an overnight option. That way, you aren't losing time and you don't have to pay for a hostel. Sondra managed to sleep like 15 hours or something ridiculous. The buses are THAT comfortable. So we arrived, checked into our hostel, and planned our first day. Unfortunately because we arrived a couple hours before check in time, we missed out on being able to go to the falls that day. So instead we ended up walking across the street to an animal rehabilitation center that ended up being really interesting. It is mostly full of birds, but there are monkeys, coatis, and other strange animals that have been injured in some way. It ended up being that most of them were taken illegaly from the Brazilian rainforest to be sold around the world and were injured in the transit process. Some had been rescued from as far as Madrid. After doing the tour of the center we headed back to the hostel for a big asado and Brazilian dance show (which would later prove to be HILARIOUS).

The asado was good, not great. Either way it was a fun night. We met some really nice Canadian girls and a really obnoxious guy from New Jersey (who we later found out used to be a pimp, or at least claimed to have been one). Now onto the Brazilian dance show. The town of Puerto Iguazu is on the "Triple Border" between Brazil and Paraguay. The show was put on by dancers from Foz do Iguacu (the Brazilian side) who came over to Argentina to do this weekly show at the hostel. The guy was dressed in perhaps the most sparkly shirt I've ever seen and the "women" might not have been women after all. Good thing they get all the guests liquored up on caipirinhas before the show, otherwise no one would stick around for the embarassment that would ensue. This "show" is more of a ploy to get drunk tourists to get up and look stupid. Fun right? It's the kind of thing where they pick you out of the crowd to samba with the dancers. Fortunately
almost everyone had to go
through it so it's not so bad. I came in second in the guy's samba competition (woohoo!) which was fortunate because the winner got a very weird, nasty lapdance from the "women". After the show, everyone ended up outside at the hostel's poolside bar. Yes, there was a big pool, complete with volleyball net. One of the most unhostelly hostels I've ever been to. The dance party was pretty uneventful but a funny thing did happen. There is an outdoor individual bathroom by the pool. At about 3 am, I ended up going in to go to the bathroom. Unfortunately I didn't realize that on the other side of the door, the handle was missing. So after about 20 minutes (no lie) of trying to figure out how to either get someone's attention or get out of the bathroom, I used my drunken strength to wedge it open. It would have looked pretty funny because there was a tiny, little window facing the bar outside and every time the music would stop I would flail my arm out of the window and scream for someone to open the door. I really thought it was going to be my bedroom for a moment.

Image: Sondra sitting at the triple border. Left is Argentina, middle is Paraguay and the right is Brazil.

Sunday was the day of the falls. All I can say is WOW! You see pictures, you hear stories, but until you see them with your own eyes, you can't full understand just how amazing they really are. We also didn't realize it was such a big park. You really need at least one full day to explore the whole thing. Some of the main highlights:

1. Butterflies.
Never in my whole life have I seen so many butterflies and so many different kinds. Amazing!



2. Boatride.
One of the main attractions of the waterfalls are the speedboats you can take UNDERNEATH the massive falls. Terrifying but so thrilling.

3. Garganta de Diablo (Devil's Throat). The biggest fall in the park. The viewing platform overlooking it is amazing. Apparently a lot of people commit sucide there...

4. Giant bug. Not so much a highlight, but a funny story. The way you get around the park is with this little tram thing. As we were walking to go to the Devil's Throat, Sondra noticed this gnarly ass monster of a bug on this woman's neck. She obviously had no idea it was there. I felt the obligation to let her know, being the concerned citizen. Her friend upon seeing it reacted instantly and flicked it off her neck, RIGHT AT ME! Some grateful people they were...

After the day at the falls, Freddy treated us to an amazing meal in town. Being that we were still in Argentina (if not barely) we had to get some bife de lomo. We did also get some amazing river fish, the name of which is escaping me. The three countries are separated by rivers so there is a lot of good river fish. We were pooped after the full day in the sun at the falls and a big meal that I think we ended up passing out at about 9 pm.

The next day we contemplated going to Ciudad del Este in Paraguay for well, no real reason. Apparently it's a seedy, Tijuana-like border town, known most for having a physical black market where you can buy anything from guns to cheap electronics. Unfortunately, to get there, you have to pass through Brazil, for which we didn't have Visas. We ended up just taking a walk around the dinky little town and catching an earlier bus back to BA. This busride had some moments on it that made me feel quite anxious. Because of the unmonitored border between Brazil and Paraguay, there is a lot of drug trafficking. A lot of which ends up in BA. This meant that there are frequent police checkpoints. Within an hour we had been stopped 3 times. Each time, a new policeman would come on board to check our passports. The first two guys were very nice and quick. The 3rd guy however had a real chip on his shoulder. He must have looked over my stamps about 3 or 4 times. This would have been fine, but I was illegal at the time, having overstayed my 3 month visa by about 3 months! I was sweating a little bit. Apparently he didn't notice. Fhew! In any case we made it back in one piece, even though the return bus took about 20 hours...

OH SNAP! Protests

This is a segment I've recently started on the Buenos Aires Pubcrawl blog (pubcrawlba.blogspot.com), so I thought I'd do it in my own as well. Every week (or more than one time a week) I will be showcasing photos I've taken that correlate to a specific theme, idea, or neighborhood. Enjoy!

Anyone who's spent any time in this city has certainly witnessed at least one protest. This week's edition of OH SNAP! is a compilation of some of my favorite shots taken of various protests and demonstrations in Buenos Aires.

Mustafa Yoda - El Nino

The hip hop scene is pretty small but Mustufa Yoda, one of Argentina´s most recognized rappers, is pretty good. Here´s a cool video of his song "El Nino" with english subtitles.