Where's the beef? In Argentina!!!

Between my Rotary hosts, my adopted mendocinan family, my karate team, and university friends, I have had many opportunities to dive into the Argentine/Mendocina culture as well as give them a taste of mine.

All across the country, Argentinians love their asado (which literally means slow roast over a wood-fired BBQ) and I got to feast on this sumptuous carnage so many times that I am now carrying several pounds of it in my thighs! This is a very popular thing to do on Sunday afternoons, not unlike our northamerican Sunday BBQ tradition. But their version includes a lot more, and a lot better, beef.
Tipically they roast long, thick cuts of beef slowly over the wood coals for a long time and then at the end throw on a few sausages (chorizo) and maybe some other cuts of pork and even blood sauces (morcilla).

Acompanying the meat is a very basic salad of lettuce and tomato with olive oil and vinagre. Although they are amazing with their meats, Argentina is lagging behind when it comes to salad, which hardly ever has more than 2 vegetables included and they don't even have a word for salad dressing as they only ever use oil and vinagre. They have never even heard of "ranch" or "honey mustard" or "thousand island". So when I brought a favorite salad of mine to an asado, made of lettuce, tomatoes, onion, and pears in a balsamic honey mustard dressing, they went wild and from then on ever time I was invited to a dinner, I was asked to bring my exotic "Hawaiian Salad". Besides salad, they also normally have french bread and lots of desserts......AND lots of delicious Malbec.....

A Toast! To That Mouthwatering Mendoza Malbec!

Mendoza is famous for its excellent Malbec wine. The Malbec variety of grape is actually originally from the southwest of France, but it was only until it was introduced to the Argentinian winemakers that it came into its own. The climate for this grape is ideal in Mendoza, with its dry soil, more than 300 days of sun per year, and wide thermal amplitude (difference between daily temperatures) and even though it is not native to Argentina, the Argentine malbecs are known to be the best in the world. It is a red wine, normally aged in huge oak barrels for 6-18 months, with lots of structure and body, yet fruity and flavorful at the same time. (I learned how to identify and properly taste wines during the many wine tours I did every time I had a visitor) After a year of living in this place where the wine is cheaper and better than the water...I have definitely become a big fan. And...I don't know how I got so lucky, but the host family stork happened to drop me into a famila mendocina that has their own winery and orchards of peaches, apricots, cherries, plums and of course grapes in a beautiful pueblito about 2 hours south of the city at the foot of the Andes. Thus, my husband and I have had many wonderful weekends out at the finca relaxing in front of the incredible view, tasting excellent home-made wine, and even helping out with the harvest!

Coffee or Maté?

Besides Malbec, the other national drink is maté. This is an herbal tea, made from the leaves and stems of a large bush called Yerba Maté (literally “maté herb”), and grown at a large scale in Argentina’s Missiones province. It is a digestive tea and has a similar chemical to caffeine, which enhances one’s energy. The loose leaves are typically poured into a maté gourd, made out of wood or a dried squash, up to an inch below the brim. Hot water is then poured in and drank from a bombilla (straw) with a filter on the end so as not to get the leaves in your mouth.

Drinking maté is always a social affair and the cebador (the person who prepares the maté) always takes the first and most bitter drink, sipping it until there is no more water left, then refills it for the next person to drink until the gourd is dry again. And the gourd is passed to each person in the group, who in turn sips on it for a couple minutes, drinking the entire thing, when it is refilled for the next person.

Drinking maté is most popular when out and about in the countryside, whether it be going for a drive into the mountains, hiking, or horseback riding, as an excuse to stop and rest, enjoying the scenery every so often. However, some people never go out without their maté set, always including a thermos of hot water, the gourd, bombilla, and a Tupperware of herb and/or sugar. They even make fancy leather bags specially designed to carry the maté set, but most locals just use an old paper gift bag.

The flavor is a bit grassy or earthy, and thus reminds me a bit of the Hawaiian Kava root drink, except that the 2 have totally opposite effects. It takes some getting used to, and although I didn’t turn into one of those people with their maté kit attached to the hip, I do enjoy a maté once in a while and have a kit, including the herb, gourd and bombilla, at home.

Living Aloha

Not only has it been fun and delicious participating in Argentine culture, but it has also been a real kick to introduce these Latinos to the unique traditions we have at home. Being from the U.S. state of Hawaii, I have had the pleasure to grow up with not only all the traditions that we share across the country as Americans, but also the myriad of “exotic (and extremely crowd-pleasing) traditions of the islands.

HAWAIIAN HULA GIRL
Everywhere I go, people have the same reaction when I tell them where I’m from. “Hawaii??? (Big sigh) Ohhh wow. It’s my dream to go there! Why would you leave that tropical paradise and come to our desert?” And I respond, “Because I wanted to experience something totally new and different.” “Well in that case,” they propose, “let’s do an exchange!” They then begin barraging me with questions, first about the weather (“summer all year, right”), then the temperature of the sea, what do we eat in there, what kinds of people live in Hawaii, and why don’t I have dark skin and dark hair like the Polynesians they see in the movies, and suddenly they remember seeing the Hula in one of these movies and they excitedly ask me if I can dance the “ula ula”, as they call it, accompanying the question with the typical hand movements famous around the world.
Luckily, for my wedding, I finally learned a real hula (apart from the Hukilau that everyone learns in grade school) the year before I arrived in Argentina. Thus, I don’t have to let their many requests to see a dance go unsatisfied. In fact, my hula performances at Rotary events were such a big hit that word spread around and I was even asked to dance as the entertainment at an elegant garden birthday party for one of the club’s presidents!

One night I held a “Hawaiian Night” at my house for my host family and neighbors. That night, my host mom and sister brought over three ‘Hawaiian skirts’ they had made out of tissue paper and I taught them my hula! My husband and I also made Hawaiian Lava Flows to drink, Japanese sushi, Okinawan sweet potato dumplings, and Hawaiian fish lu’au (thank goodness for the Ethnic Foods of Hawaii cookbook I brought!) that we ate amidst the music of Ho’okena, Izrael Kamakawiwaole, Keali’i Raichel, the Makaha Sons of Niihau, and Hapa. It was so much fun for everybody and I think will remin in all our memories as a truly special night.

Giving Thanks, Argentina style!

I had long accepted the fact that I probably wouldn’t get to celebrate Thanksgiving during my year in Argentina, as this holiday to give thanks to the Native Americans in the U.S. for teaching our pilgrims how to cultivate the local crops and thereby avoid starving to death, is obviously totally unique to North America and is not celebrated in Argentina. But as the 28th of November drew near, and Thanksgiving e-cards from family and friends began to bombard my in-box, thoughts of stuffing and cranberry sauce and turkey and pumpkin pie began to bombard my brain and I began looking for recipes on-line.

Although I couldn’t find turkey, cranberries, or even pumpkin in this far off land, I managed to make delicious alternatives that more than quenched my craving for Thanksgiving dinner. Instead of turkey, I baked a chicken, stuffed with beer instead of stuffing (ever heard of “Beer in the Rear Chicken”?) that came out succulent and bursting with flavor. I did actually make stuff, but instead of with the mix most people buy at the store in the U.S., I made it completely from scratch, even drying out the cubes of bread myself and adding local touches such as dried figs and walnuts to the concoction. Instead of cranberry sauce (which is my favorite part), I used fresh cherries, de-stemming and de-seeding them in big splatters my self, before adding a bit of brown sugar and cinnamon and simmering it over low hit. And this cherry sauce was truly out-of-this world. For dessert, instead of pumpkin pie I baked an “un-pumpkin” pie with a local squash and sweet potatoes – again delicious.

In the end, I was so glad I decided to do Thanksgiving, as I had recently missed my host mom’s birthday while traveling with my in-laws, and my host sister was about to move to Europe, and this gave me a chance not only to celebrate Mari’s birthday and say farewell to Lula, but also a wonderful opportunity for me to give thanks to them for making me a part of their wonderful family.

Halloween Hits Mendoza!

Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays. Why? Because it’s all about fun with none of the obligations or solemnity that comes with most of the others. And it gives us an excuse to escape the bars constructed by our everyday identity and be someone else for an evening. Halloween is a blast – and they don’t celebrate it in Argentina!! So rather than lose out on my favorite holiday, I decided to turn it into a win-win situation by throwing a Halloween costume party at my apartment, thus giving myself an opportunity to celebrate my favorite holiday and give the Argentines a chane to get to know this great American festivity.

I made the house as scary as I could with fake blood (marinara sauce) splattered all over the sliding glass doors, red lights, jack-o-lanterns and a sign on the front door welcoming the guests to the “house of the dead”! I also made a variety of scary snacks, such as Jell-O “eyeballs” and “brains”, “cowpie cookies”, and even “vampire’s blood” to drink.

I was afraid that dressing up might be such a foreign concept for these people that they might be too embarrassed to do it, so I made invitations advertising that there would be a costume contest and I even included photos of our costumes from previous Halloweens to inspire them to really go for it. AND THEY SURE DID!!! It was as if their desires to dress up or let their identities go, express the artist within them, had been repressed all their lives and this party just opened the floodgates. We had a monk, a Mozart, a sexy nurse and her patient/victim, four out-of-this-world transvestites, two vampires (who were disguised so well that I didn’t even recognize that they were my two host sisters!) , and even a Dracula’s wife. We had monsters, Chinamen, Spiderwoman, and bellydancers. But the winners of the contest, with the best costume by far, were three boys, with whom I practice karate. They dressed as the Powder Puff Girls, or “Chicas Poderosas” in Spanish, from the kids’ TV cartoon of the same name and made their costumes completely from scratch, using cut, stapled and painted pillowcases for the superhero dresses, pompoms for wigs, and makeuparound their eyes for the superhero masks.

I was a great party filled with laughter, dancing and new friends and I think a truly unforgettable night for everyone.

Rotary District 4860 Annual Conference

The Rotary District 4860 is composed of the clubs in 2 provinces: Mendoza and its northern neighbor, San Juan. They had their 2006 district conference May 12-14 in the small town of San Rafael in the southern part of Mendoza Province. The town supports a lot of adventure tourism in a nearby canyon with a great river for rafting.
The conference itself was located in downtown at the Belgrano Club. From the presentations, I learned about a few of their current projects, including medical teams to repair cleft pallets in disadvantaged countries, wheel chair donations, and water cleaning and access projects.
They also presented all the incoming ambassadorial scholars, including myself, a GSE Team from Australia, and a YEP group composed of high school students from the U.S. and Europe.

Bienvenidos from Rotary Mendoza!

Since meeting my Host Rotary Counselors, Alberto & Elena Diaz from Rotary Mendoza Barraquero, I seem to have been on a rollercoaster of Rotary Events. When we first met, I was taken to an elaborate Rotary dinner almost every night for a week! Below are photos taken at one of these dinners, located on the outskirts of town at a finca (vineyard), the upper one of Alberto and Elena.

Immersing Myself in Spanish

For the whole month of February I dove into a spanish immersion program in Mendoza. I stayed with an incredible host family and took language classes every morning at the Instituto Intercultural, in downtown. It was a great experience. Below is my spanish class, with my profesor, Enrique in the center.


My host family was composed of two absolutely amazing women, my host mom (or mama mendocina) Maria del Carmen, and her 19-year-old daughter Lula (my hermanita mendocina), who are both now my best friends here. The photo below was taken on my very first day in Mendoza, when my new family took me sightseeing around town, including the Cerro de Gloria where there is a giant monument to Argentina's national hero, General San Martin, who led the army who won Argentina's independence from Spain in 1816.

Mendoza - Argentina's Most Livable City

They say the Mendoza is the most pleasant city in Argentina. And it really is a beautiful little oasis in the desert. If it weren't for the crazy drivers, plethora of stray dogs, and mate (pronounced mah-tay) tea everywhere, one would think they were in Europe. The city is organized around several central plazas, complete with lots of fountains and street performers, and the sidewalks are wide and filled with outdoor seating and huge leafy trees, which are fed by a complex system of ancient aqueducts.

Its a great place for walking, not so good for driving or riding a bike as an average of 300 people a year in Mendoza die from car accidents, many of which involving bikers. It has a great pedestrian street, called Sarmiento (above with the red fountain) busy with locals and tourists alike enjoying the pleasant weather. The city of Mendoza has the definite feel of a college town with around 5 different universities and tons of language institutes. There are about a 100,000 residents and a gazillion restaurants, specializing in steaks, pastas, pizzas and a more ham sandwiches than one could ever want.

Aloha & Bienvenidos!

2005 was a busy year. In addition to completing a master's thesis, starting a new job, and having the most amazing (and complicated) wedding I could have imagined, I was also awarded a 2006 Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship to study Geography at the Universidad Nacional de Cuyo in Mendoza, Argentina. Now that I am am starting to get my bearings here in the southern hemisphere, I have started a little blog to keep you updated on my experiences during my year as an Ambassadorial Scholar.

The Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship Program started as a vision of Rotary's founder, Paul Harris. He dreamed of a program that sponsored graduate students to study in foreign nations, acting as ambassadors between their home and host countries, promoting international understanding and friendly relations. His vision became a reality, and the Ambassadorial Scholarship Program is currently the largest privately funded scholarship program in the world. Since 1947, approximately 37,000 men and women have studied in more than 70 different countries as Rotary Ambassadorial scholars.

This year, there are over 850 ambassadorial scholars studying around the world, 89 scholars in Latin America, and 13 in Argentina. I certainly feel lucky to be one of them. There are a number of scholars in Buenos Aires, but so far, I have been alone here in Mendoza. However, starting in July, I will have a bit of company as another scholar will be coming to Mendoza all the way from Japan. And I thought I came a long way!