On the Rio Parana, in Argentina, across from Paraguay
Happy times
Last weekend we made a quick trip to Argentina. Kevin booked a room in Posadas on Thursday night and decided to take the afternoon off on Friday. Totally a last-minute trip! We had been thinking it was time to get away so the timing was perfect. It was an uneventful trip to the border and through Argentina. It took us about four hours total to get to Posadas, but driving time was about three hours. Crossing the river always takes some time.
We arrived in Posadas and drove around to get a feel for the city. Not too big, not too small. Our hotel was just three blocks from one of the major shopping streets, so we checked into our hotel and went out for an evening stroll. There really wasn't anything incredibly special about the city; it was just nice to explore a new place with Kevin and Emma. After an hour and a half of walking around, we chose a little pizzeria for dinner. Little did we know the excitement that awaited us!! We ordered a fruit smoothie, water, salads and a Napolitana pizza. Spanish is the language in Argentina, but it's enough like Portuguese that we can get by. They speak soooo fast there and I really had to concentrate to understand what the waiter was saying. Well, the fruit smoothie was amazing! I could have had two more!! The waiter even poured some into a small glass for Emma. She was pretty excited! We finished our smoothie and the salads arrived. Ahh, cut-up lettuce!! I was thrilled! To this day, I have never seen lettuce cut up in Brazil. It's always served as giant leaves and I have to cut it up myself. It sounds so whiny, but it's amazing how much better lettuce tastes when it's already cut up into bite-sized pieces!! As we were enjoying our salads, the waiter brought our pizza and set it on a small stool next to our table. My mouth was watering!! I took another bite of salad, eager to dig into the pizza. Just as I was swallowing, Kevin swatted something on his neck and said, "Ughh!" really loud. I looked down and saw a small moth just under his plate. The fact that it was a moth and the way he looked so disgusted didn't quite match up. I mean, it's just a moth, good grief, I thought. Things are always flying around in the summer time here. He was making some other comment about how disgusted he was when I saw the "moth" start to crawl. Oh, not just doo-do-doo-meander-across-the-table-crawl, I mean, speed-of-lightening-crawl!!!! That's when I realized the reason for his disgust: the "moth" wasn't a moth. . . it was a massive COCKROACH!!! Just under three inches!! I jumped out of my chair and grabbed Emma, who had been sitting next to me. It all happened so fast!! We watched the critter scurry across the table. Then the waiter behind Kevin swatted it to the floor with his trusty menu. Another waiter was already moving our pizza to another table and Kevin was following him. I was holding Emma and looked down to see the crazy critter following Kevin!! The waiter tried to reach around Kevin to step on him, but it crawled around a chair, under another little table and then headed back toward me. Without thinking, I squashed him with my heavy-duty-right-footed-Chaco. The waiter looked at me in surprise and I laughed a little nervous laugh. He quickly brushed the cockroach (with his menu) to the back of the restaurant and out of sight. Now, all that is shocking and gross and totally wrong, but what happened next takes the cake: We sat down at our new table and finished our salads. Then we ate the entire pizza!! I'm still more shocked by the fact that we stayed there than I am at our little visitor. In our defense, the roach never touched our food (at least while it was sitting on our table. What happened before our food came to us is still in question). I was laughing a lot. I never saw Kevin even crack a smile. Then again, he's the one who had a cockroach on his neck, not me. As we ate, we wondered if the waiters would give us our food for free. The more I thought about it, the more I knew they wouldn't. My suspicions were confirmed when the waiter brought us a water and said it was "on the house". Oh, gee, thanks:) The funny thing is that we really didn't expect to get our food for free. I mean, in the States, yes, but Argentina or Brazil?? Unlikely. Things like that just happen. It's not anybody's fault. Maybe it was an older restaurant? Who knows? We have cockroaches in our house sometimes and our house is almost spotless most days!! (That wasn't a vain comment - my maid just does a good job of cleaning every day). Anyway, it was disgusting and really not cool, but it's part of life here and it really wasn't worth making a big fuss over. I have a feeling there aren't health inspection services here, or if there are, their standards aren't quite the same as in the U.S.
So that was the excitement of our evening in Posadas. We walked around for another half hour and then decided to share an ice cream cone. When we sat down to eat it, Emma said, "Mommy, what is this??" I realized she's never had an ice cream cone before. We don't keep ice cream in our home and I guess we've just never made it a priority to go get a cone! Man, she's deprived, huh! We went back to our room and Emma went to bed while Kevin and I stayed up talking in the dark for another few hours. It was one of those nights I want to hold in my memory forever (just the staying up late talking, not the roach part).
The next morning, we checked out and drove to the edge of the city and found Libertad, my new favorite store!! It was the size of the biggest WalMart I've ever been in and loaded with goodies!! I think Argentina must allow more goods to be imported from the U.S. than Brazil because there were several familiar brands. Toothpaste, shampoo, soap, deodorant, facial products, kids' stuff, toys - so many familiar brands. We didn't even need any of that stuff; it was just fun to see it. We bought Emma a puzzle and then stocked up on wheat pasta and cleaning supplies and wine. The wine was on sale for about $4 a bottle. Argentina is famous for it's wines and the Mendoza region produces some incredible grapes! We loaded our car up and then headed back towards downtown and the river. The Parana River is the border between Argentina and Paraguay. The riverfront has been nicely landscaped and is lined with restaurants and playgrounds. We randomly chose a restaurant and entered. We sat on the second level, looking out over the river. The view was beautiful and again, it was just so nice to get out of town and see something new. We ordered fish from the river and enjoyed some garlic fries and fried mandioca, too. Because we had to make the last barge, we left town shortly after lunch and headed back to Horizontina. We made it home before dark and had a relaxing evening at home, happy to have had a day away!!
