Helsinki, Finland

Work has given me another great opportunity to travel, and this time it's Helsinki for 4 of the next 8 months. I've been here 4 weeks so far, and enjoying the loooonng summer days (almost 19 hours when I arrived). The first challenge to face = sticker shock. Everything costs about 2x that of Austin in this socialist country, and the tax rate is 23%! Employment taxes are approx. 50%! Do we really want government provided healthcare? :)

Helsinki is north. I'm talking Anchorage, Alaska north. You can really feel the earth turning up here! The sunset has changed from 12 midnight to 9p in 4 weeks. With such cold, dark winters the summer months are full of activity. The parks are full of skateboarders, basketball games, and soccer practice and the city is full of outdoor concerts, food markets, and flea markets. Most Finns enjoy the long evenings with a picnic blanket and a bottle of wine. My apartment is just a few blocks from the southern coast, and I have a beautiful view of the water on my walk to work every day. This picture is taken from Kaivopuisto Park. I'm off to Tallinn, Estonia for a day trip on Saturday, so more pictures to come soon.

hei nyt, Chris

Mexico City Recap

I'm sorry to say that I didn't post one entry while I was in Mexico! I'll list a few highlights of my 4 months here, as a brief summary, and for a reference for anyone who may visit for a short while.

Mexico City is one of the largest cities in the world, with 24 million in the greater metro area. Behind the scenes of this crowded, polluted, bustling place are some wonderful people, food, and

culture.

Most Chilangos (locals) leave the city limits on the weekend to enjoy the temperate local climate. I visited the cities of Puebla, Valle de Bravo, and Acapulco during my weekends. All are cheaply

accessible via Mexico's extensive bus system. Taxis are very cheap as well, with a full 8 hour day trip in a personal car available for $100

USD. I was fortunate enough to see the Monarch butterfly migration near Valle de Bravo, and plenty of old beautiful churches like this one located in Valle de Bravo's Zocalo.

Inside the city, there is also lots to see. Bordering the Zocalo in el Centro Historico, is one of the finest collections of murals painted by the fa

mous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. He adorned the interior of the constitutional palace. From a historical perspective, it's interesting to trace the history of the city before, during, and after Spanish rule. Mexico City was formally an island surrounded by a huge lake. The Spaniards helped route the water away from, and under the city to create the modern day landscape. Most of the city is built on a dried lake bed, and the city continues to sink as more and more water is pumped from the ground.

Growing up in Texas, my love for Mexican food is strong. There's nothing like a plate of rich, cheesy enchiladas, a chili relleno, or a bowl of queso with chorizo. However, us Texans have truly been missing out on some simple, delicious flavors in nearby Mexico.

1. fresh made corn tortillas

2. fresh pork, chorizo, or beef tacos wrapped with #1, and served

with onion, cilantro, and lime

3. soups! traditional tortilla or pozole (hominy stew)

4. tamales (they are infinitely better here. Pork, Tomato,

Chocolate, Green Chile, and the list goes on.)

5. The flan, tres leches cake, and many other sugary treats

That's all for now. SO many other things to share, so please ask if you have questions! :)

~Chris

Ciao for now South America

After a whirlwind of traveling through the Andes by bus from Mendoza to Santiago, then flying from Santiago to Lima, stay in Lima for 12 hours, then flying back to Austin, I am exhausted but happy. It is good to be home after being away for so long.

On my last day in South America, I am happy to report that I survived touring the city ON MY OWN and speaking Spanish to cab drivers. Granted, I am sure they only understood like half of what I said at best. But, hey, at lest I tried and lived to tell the tale ;). I even negotiated fare to downtown Lima to see Iglesia de San Francisco and the catacombs underneath it. The catacomb is one freaky place. Because I arrived basically right before they closed and was the only English speaker, I totally got a private tour! It is pretty awesome. Seeing tons and tons of bones and skulls can be slightly creepy but they have arranged them in very interesting ways so as to remove the creepiness a little bit (at least for me) They have no idea how many levels of catacombs there are as they have stopped extracating due to fear of the church tombling down. The catacombs are basically the foundation of the church. The church and museum itself is pretty cool as well. Too bad there are wayyyy too many pigeons in front of the church and I do not like rats with wings. EWW.

Lima downtown is pretty neat with lots of cool architecture/buildings. Too bad it is so far from where I stayed (Miraflores). On the way back to Miraflores I was impressed (scared to death) by the way people drive in Lima. Two cars in one lane on a free way. One of the cars was the one I was in. The other car? was right next to my door. Wow.

After a quick and LARGE dinner at Makoto which was located at the mall near the beach, my hotel called a car for me and back to the US I go!!

I biked and I wined

After a few mishap in the morning, cab driver tried to scam us by not running a meter and telling us our fare is $40 (we had a shouting match...in Spanish, which consisted of me repeating 20, 25 in Spanish. ha.) and realizing that we were at the wrong airport, we arrived in Mendoza. The city is NOT what I had imagined in my head at all. I was thinking...similar to Sonoma where there is this beautiful plaza (there is a plaza) surrounded by cute little restaurants and cafes. It is much more a city than I imagined. After orienting ourselves, eating $15 peso pastas (about usd $4), we set off to figure out how to do some wine tasting tomorrow.

The next day, armed with information in hand, Paige and I set off to find the bus that will take us to Lujan where the big wineries are. After about 30-45 min of walking back and forth between bus stops trying to find the bus and enlisting the help of various locals, we decided to change our plans and go to Maipu instead. One of the locals who was helping us works for Bikes and Wine but he didn't push the tour at all on us while he was trying to help us get to Lujan. So, as a thank you, we decided to go with Bikes and Wine to rent our bikes once we get to Maipu. These guys are great! Two guys hopped on the bus a few stops earlier to make sure we'd get off on the right stop. Nice.

After we received the map and picked out our bikes, Paige and I set off on our little adventure. First stop, the wine museum, it is ok. Next, we went to this small olive oil, chocolate, and liquor store next to the wine museum to learn about olive oils. Did you know olive trees can produce up until they are 600 years old?!? WOW. We got to taste some interesting liquors, they even made absinthe with wormwood (the kind that makes you hallucinate). Considering my low tolerance to alcohol and more bike riding in the immediate future to more wineries, I decided to not taste it.

We stopped for lunch at Di Tommaso, one of the oldest wineries in the region. It is really cute and is exactly what I'd imagined a Mendoza winery would be like. Since the original winery is a historical site, they can not make changes to the buildings. Instead they use their old ferment tanks as a place to store wines since the tanks are made of bricks and cement shipped from England and Germany (uber expensive back in the day!). Paige and I learned that for every year the wine is aged in the barrel, you can store it for 3 years in the bottle. Interesting...

After a leisurely lunch, tasting, and tour, we only had enough time to stop at one more winery before needing to head back and return our bikes. We decided to stop at Tempus Alba. Really contemporary building, totally different than Di Tommaso. We tasted all but one of their wine between the 2 of us. It was fabulous!

With lots of wine in my blood, I paddled back to the bike shop with more energy than before. Along the way, I even had energy to shout back at the whistlers and the hollers. If Paige and I had a dollar for every time we were hollered at on our bike ride, we'd be able to pay for a nice room at the Park Hyatt in town. Once we got back to the bike store, they gave us MORE wine! So we sat and chatted with other fellow wine bikers before heading back into town.

It was FUN! Seeing as how I don't exercise much normally and am usually a couch potato by choice, I had a LOT of fun riding bikes. Something about it just give you a carry free feeling. Or it might have been the fabulous wine we drank all afternoon.

A great way to end my month long trip through South America. Tomorrow I head back to Santiago via a bus through the Andes and then fly to Lima for one day before I leave for the good ole Texas.

Ciao!

Flood, Bio Weapons, and Sushi = I am officially a puma!

AH civilization...sophistication...mosquito attack...BUENOS AIRES!!

Paige and I arrived in Buenos Aires and was glad to be in a warmer climate. Though I could have done without the humidity, thank you very much. A short cab ride to our hostel, dumped our stuff and out we go to explore the neighborhood, Palermo Soho. We walked by a couple of places that Chris and I went on our last trip through South America 2 years ago. Then I realized...we stayed not too far from Paige and I's current hostel 2 years ago. A HA! For dinner, we went for sushi at Tenkuu in Palermo Viejo (I think...). YUM!!! After a little over 6 weeks of NOT much variety, I was in heaven! Hello asian food, I have missed you.

The next day we decided to do the tourist thing and went to see the cemetary in Recoleta. Beautiful blue sky, sunny, HOTT, and definitely make the cemetary less creepy. We also walked by and saw the Floralis Generica by Eduardo Catalano. I actually remembered how to get there from the cemetary. YES! After being out in the hot sun...we decided, it is time to explore the finer side of Buenos Aires, ie shopping!! Off we go to Peatonal Florida, an avenue only for pedestrians and LOTS of shops. This is where things started to go a little downhill. First, came the near robbing experience where Paige felt someone tried to lift her purse out of her backpack. Luckily, Ms Pagina here is an excelent packer and packed VERY smartly. Despite BOTH zippers on her backpack being COMPLETELY UNZIPPED, all the culprit got was a tourist map. The map that was to point us to delicious Thai food near by Plaza San Martin. BOO! And then, as we walked around trying to remember exactly which street the delicious spicy food is on, she got pooped on by a bird. FAB. So we decided to duck into this rather nice Japanese restaurant and have our lunch (and so she can clean up). What can go wrong here? well...how about the waiter forgetting to tell me that they are OUT of curry katsu until they brought out Paige's food? So I watched Paige eat and then she watched me eat. Damn you Irifune! The food was good though. I'd give them another chance. As we sat at lunch, the weather forecast slowly went from sunny to cloudy to chance of rain...to rain. Well, deciding that we must see the Obelisk since it is close by. We hauled butt to get there ONLY to be stopped by a torrential downpour. Luckily, there are lots of cafes with wifi nearby. It rained so hard parts of BA flooded and I learned the word 'hail' in Spanish (Granizo). We took the subway home because there was NO free cabs anywhere and they were letting everyone ride for free due to the weather. Back at the hostel, we plunked down in front of the tv and I learned the beauty that is Curling. It is like shuffle board but with bigger 'puck' thing. And the guys scrub at the ice frantically. Hilarious.

Next day, 2/20/2010, the day known as the last day of my fabulous 20s was spent dining and shopping. YES! I bought a cute pair of shoes and a dress to wear to dinner that night. My birthday present to myself is my justification for shopping and buying more stuff when I have to sit on my pack to zip it up. Dinner though, was the highlight of the day. Paige had schemed and schemed for the last couple of weeks to set up this amazing dinner at this closed door restaurant called Salt Shaker (http://www.saltshaker.net/ or http://www.casasaltshaker.com/indexen.htm check them out if you are ever in BA). It was super delicious, especially the pea gazpacho with a dollop of gelatined watermelon mixed with fresh crab. HEAVENLY! It was the perfect way to send off my 20s and welcome me to the 30s in style.

For our last day in BA, we decided to do some more sightseeing. We went to San Telmo where they were having the weekly antique fair at plaza Dorrego and arts and crafts stands all down Defensa. It was just as I remembered but with a LOT more people. Maybe it was because Chris and I came during BA's winter that we didn't see as many people when we went sightseeing. We got to see some tango dancing in the streets, not to mention a choripan and bifepan stand (awesome!). After a leisurely lunch at Territorio (where Chris and I ate at on our previous trip), we went to check out La Boca. It was hopping with people and just as vibrant with the colors as I remembered. On the way back, our taxi driving, upon learning that we understand some spanish, decides to give us an impromptu guided tour of the city as he sees it on the way to our hostel. Fab.

Bioweapon, this deserves its own little paragraph. So, Paige needed to mail back some stuff back to the states (all the winter/trekking gear) and off we go to the post office. Paige explained to the woman behind the counter that she needed a box to put the clothes/shoes in to mail it to the states. The woman responded with basically, you can't mail used clothing. After double checking our hearing, which prommpted the woman to write on a piece of paper 'ropa usado, no'. We asked her why. Her explanation is that it might make people sick. New clothes you can mail but used cloth that is yours and that you want to mail to yourself? NO. Incredulous! Who'd have known used clothes is counted as bio weapons!? Hello defense department, are you getting this? A lot of taxpayer dollars can be saved here...I think Argentina is on to something. LOL.

Next up, WINE!!!! Hello Mendoza...here we come!