From Buenos Aires to Italy

We slept in after a late arrival back on the ship.  We walked all over the ship to discover all the different places and the beauty of this wonderful ship, along with all its amenities.

We then headed off on our second shore excursion to investigate Buenos Aires.  A city which is an eclectic combination of Latin and European influences, where we saw tree-lined streets and post-colonial architecture that reminds you of the city’s Spanish, French and Italian heritage.  

We stopped in Boca, with cobblestone streets, at a small cafe in a small colorful  neighborhood. As mom was getting off the bus, she caught her foot on one of the cobblestones and went down and there were about 6 of us helping her up.  She didn’t hurt herself…except for her ego.  But in the process, we met a couple, Michael & Luke, from Basel Switzerland, with whom we’ve become fast friends…joining them for dinners & tours, with a lot of laughing going on! Great times!

Our tour guide took us to Plaza de Madres de Mayo where mothers gathered to protest the abduction of their children by the dictatorship on April 30, 1977 and marched in circles around the May Pyramid every Thursday, wearing white headscarves embroidered with their children’s names to demand the return of their children “disappeared” by the 1976–1983 military dictatorship. Now, even 50 years later, they still continue to march every Thursday to demand justice for their disappeared children. While many original members have passed away or became too frail, the group maintains a presence, marching into the 2020s.

After this, she took us to a special event in San Telmo. A house that was originally bought to be converted into a restaurant.  But then the new owner, while in the process of renovation, found a number of secrets underneath the building and decided, without any government interference, to restore the building and create a museum to the history of Uruguay.

We went into where the river went below the buildings and now shows how the two rivers joined together before the combined river went on to the ocean.  It’s now all dry and very beautiful. This was a wonderful event and we learned much and appreciated the owner for his concern and gift back to Uruguay to keep the history of the city.

By the end of the day when we returned from our shore adventure, Mom was pooped and so when our scheduled Cooking Class came, she bowed out and I joined around 8 other people to cook a marvelous dinner of Ceviche Pescado (fish, cilantro, & avocado), Tortilla Soup, and Pan de Elote (Sweet Mexican corn cake with ice cream & dulce de leche).  My cooking partner, whom mom met while asking to not go, was a woman from Victoria Island who had been a chemist and biologist and knew a ton about cooking and why what ingredient, does what. She also tried to teach me…again…how to cut veggies without looking…I understand the principle but actually making my fingers work is much harder. My hands were dry after cutting jalapenos, and doing a couple of other things, but not washed…my bad! Yes, I did indeed have jalapeno oil still on them when I gently touched my face near my eyes…oops! I spent the next 10 minutes washing my eyes with water and milk. Eventually, it was ok enough to finish the class, but a hard lesson learned. 

Before the catastrophe of my eye, I met a couple, Scott & Robin, in the class. He is quite the individual, when younger he traveled the world and stayed in multiple places for months at a time: Nepal (where he trekked up to Mt Everest base camp), Recife, the Yukon where he fell into a river, and much more.  He’s also an avid birder.  Now I play cribbage every other day or so. Robin is into crafting & painting and Mom has tried a couple of times to meet his wife to do crafts but they have yet to connect.