Mendoza Wine Festival

Hola Chicos,

I know its been a while and I apologise for the length of this entry.
Last Wednesday I had my first "social" in a reggae bar with the rest of the Projects Abroad volunteers. Was great to meet some other people who can speak English and I think I'm going to have a lot of fun over the next month with them all. None of the locals here can speak any English so my Spanish skills are coming on very fast.

The only slight problem I am having with the Argentinian culture is their meal times. Breakfast here consists of next to nothing. I'm having to get by with biscuits every morning, at the moment I would die for a bacon sandwich of some fried eggs. Also, the Argentinians eat their dinner very late, often not until 10.30 in the evening. I currently have a hidden stash of food in my room, which I pick from at about 7 o'clock to get me through to dinner time. One aspect of the Argentinian culture which I am starting to love is their obsession with a tea-like drink called mate (pronounced mah-te).

As I mentioned in my last post, this weekend I went to a wine festival in a city called Mendoza. I went with 5 other people volunteering with Projects Abroad. We went on a wine tasting tour around Mendoza. I wish I could say I am now an expert wine taster. However, the hints of chocolate, berries and almonds that I should be tasting in the wine elude me completely!

We were very fortunate with our trip to Mendoza as it occurred at the same time as the Vendimia (the first week of grape-picking in the year). There is a show held to celebrate with two parts to it. The first two hours is long dance about the history of Argentina. The next section is a Miss Mendoza competition. You can guess which part I was looking forward to. However, I never made it far enough through the show. The event was held in the Andes mountains. To most sensible people that would mean wearing a jumper and jeans. I was dressed in flip flops, shorts and a thin t shirt in 5 degree weather. I had been warned it would be cold but I told my host family not to worry, I'm British. I left the show 2 hours early to search out the comforts of a warm bar.

I know I moaned in my last post about how poor the buses are here. Well I had to take a coach to Mendoza.... I was dreading it. You can imagine how pleased I was when we had seats which reclined to 180 degrees and were as soft as beds. It was like a first class cabin in an aeroplane.

This week I start working full time with the young offenders, so I should have some interesting stories to tell next time I blog. Pictures will be up tomorrow after I've had a chance to use the faster wifi at the office.