The girls arrived in Mendoza early Friday morning, and I flew in later that night to meet them. I cannot tell you how comforting it was to see them at our place, waiting for me, with a glass of wine ready for me on the table. We spent the evening catching up a bit, with wine, and then headed out on the town for more wine and empanadas. It was then that the girls became acquainted with the very, very long mealtimes here in Argentina. For a full-blown dinner, you usually need to allot around 4 hours, but for a snack of empanadas and wine, we were only there for, oh, about 3. Dinner also rarely starts before 10 pm unless you are a n00b, so needless to say, we have some pretty late nights here!
Mendoza is well-known, obviously, for the incredible wine, and also has a killer culinary scene. For this reason, most of our trip to Mendoza focused around the unbridled consumption of meats and wine. We spent two days in the downtown Mendoza, relaxing in equally massive and gorgeous Parque General San Martín, having a delicious lunch at Maria Antonieta, and taking plenty of siestas. The siesta is something that we in the States would not normally incorporate into vacation plans, especially when traveling to a foreign country, because we feel the need to maximize our time out and about seeing the sights. That being said, when your dinners don't start until 10 or 11 pm and last for 4-5 hours, naps become an essential part of your life. We also found that we had more time (and energy) to do what we wanted to do because of our midday naps. In summary, I am sold on siestas and I think my friends are, too. I think this will go over super well when they return to New York and let their managers know that they now require midday naps.
Naps and lying prostrate are also necessary when you eat steaks like this one, that fed FOUR PEOPLE at Francis Mallman 1184.
Before:
After:
Way after:
After our stay in downtown Mendoza, we moved to a new local, closer to the vineyards in an area known as Chacras de Coria. We had planned for one of our days out in wine country a bike tour of two different vineyards in the Luján de Cuyo region. Call me crazy, but before this tour, I had envisioned myself on a beach cruiser, in a sundress, giggling and swerving with a glass of wine in hand. This was not the case. When our tour guide (and Arie's future husband) Sergio came to pick us up for the tour, he had four intense mountain bikes in tow. It turned out to be QUITE the workout, but totally worth it. We definitely earned our wine!
Luckily for us (read: me), after the five-course lunch with wine pairings at the second vineyard, Sergio drives his customers back to their destination. Here we are, at lunch with Sergio. We all sort of look like meth junkies with rotting teeth, because we have consumed lots of red wine by this point:
Little did we know how much fun the ride home would be. It turns out, Sergio had a CD he had burned in the car (respect) with high-quality selections including, but not limited to, "Call Me, Maybe" and "Sexy Bitch." This is the moment in which I realized that language barriers, are in reality, not a thing. Language barriers are man-made. If you think about it, language barriers only come up in times of conflict, when we are frustrated and can't (or rather, choose not to) understand someone. People will chalk uncomfortable situations or confrontations up to a language barrier and move on. In reality, guys, we all just want to have a drunken afternoon dance party in a car. I find it important to note that Sergio was not drunk. He just has the best job ever and gets to drive pretty drunk girls around for money.
As if this wasn't already the "best day ever," we had plans that evening to have dinner at the home of a dear friend of mine, Pedro, that I met here in Bahía Blanca. He invited us over to try a typical Argentine dish, pollo al disco. Upon arrival, the language barrier demon started haunting me again, and I became worried that my friends would not be able to talk to anyone, since only one of them could speak some Spanish, and Pedro and his roommates did not speak much English. I quickly realized (like, within the first two minutes) that this was not going to be a problem. Everyone immediately started mingling and talking, with the help of our BFF, wine.
After the delicious meal, Pedro explained the rule of his household: every guest that entered was required to play a musical instrument. He handed instruments to each of us, and we began what was one of our favorite nights of the trip (and ever). Pedro and his friends put on a full-blown musical perfomance, complete with guitars, piano, trumpet, and flute, playing everything from tradtional Chilean folk tunes to the Backstreet Boys and Blink-182. As I sat back in my chair and watched my three friends learning a traditional Argentine dance, la zamba, I honestly could not help but smile. Despite the fact that we couldn't speak the same language, we had all come together to laugh, drink, dance, and sing. As I said before, language barriers are some bullshit.
Ok... except for the time when I tried to call a cab for us and got hung up on three times. And the time when the guy at the ice cream store didn't understand that my friend just wanted chocolate crunchies on her ice cream cone, and I said "fuck." I still feel kinda bad about that. I'm telling you, people, ONLY IN TIMES OF CONFLICT.
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