Right now we are staying in the little hippie mountain town of El Bolson. This is supposed to be a "energy center", maybe something like a Patagonian Taos, New Mexico. Like that and other Southwestern cities, there are a lot of hippies here, plus dogs, a big outdoor market in the town square, and beautiful natural surroundings just outside of the town center. Stark, silent mountain faces make a surreal backdrop to the north and south for the roaming dogs and the hippies in the market selling jewelry and.. I don't know, dreamcatchers? I try not to look.
Soon after we arrived we went to a "Trance Festival" in the woods near town at a campground next to the Rio Azul. It was a three day event, but we only went one night to check it out. There were lots of florecscent geometric scupltures, jugglers and fire spinners, pounding psychadelic trance music and trance hippies, mostly Argentines with a few Isrealis and Germans thrown in, dancing and flopping around, with the full moon hanging abovehead and reflecting on the broad river. At first G was at least partially game, asking "What is this all about?" and I tried to explain as best I could guess. Eventually she got bored and went to sleep in a hammock while I stayed up with the American kids we had come with. We laughed at how rediculous it all was until I recognized the trap: eventually you get too cold standing there and laughing at everyone and have to dance just to keep warm.
When I went to get G up it was near dawn. During one DJ´s set he had played a typical psych trance song with a vocal smaple from some nature show about Shamanism where the narrator intones some thing like "They took us to a different dimension, a primitive dimension." When I got G out of her Hammock she was like "Did you hear what that song said? It went 'I want to take you to a very special dimension. A vaginal dimension'." As I led her through the crowd of tweakers she kept on, "I don't want to go to a vaginal dimension! Look, these people are already there!"
We've been around in El Bolson for close to a week. We like the quiet, inobtrusive atmosphere here, especially on the back streets, which are sunbaked and lined with modest houses with impressive flower gardens. Everyone here is pretty chill and keeps to themselves, except for the owner of our first hosteria, who was a nosy, noisy little woman who treated all her tenants like her children. She would constantly be talking to everyone, despite whether they spoke Spanish or not. At first we were sure she hated us, but then we gave her some chocolate and attention and won her over.
In the morning I woke up and saw, strangely enough, Iggy Scam (now Eric Lyle) from Scam Zine outside our door. I seems he was trying to check in and finding our hotelier just as surly as we did on arrival. We assured him that she could be sweet once she got to know you. In fact, by the time we checked out she was hugging and kissing us like her own wayward children.
Now we're staying at an Organic Farm on a hillside just outside of town where you can stay for 10 pesos (3.33 dollars) a night. If you work, it's even less but we haven't gotten there yet. Too busy playing with the kittens, bunnies, dogs, and 3-year-old human that lives there. It's a funky, DIY place where you need to start a fire to take a hot shower and the dirt covers you as soon as you step out of it. But the food is good and is 10 pesos for a meal and the chef and owner is bug burly bearded argentine tatoo artist who listens to Agent Orange while he cooks and is father to the 3-year-old human.
Georgia just arrived in time for the Feria Del Lupulo (Hops Festival). You know what that means. Don't expect coherent writing until the festival is over.