Line of Duty was the only TV that any of our family was able to watch. Dad and Ethan watched it—with Spanish subtitles—after supper. The internet is down, so you won’t be reading this until at least the fifteenth of January.
Today we woke up about an hour earlier than usual to have breakfast (egg, orange, cereal, toast, milk) before catching the subte from San Juan on Line C to Retiro, also on Line C. We walked for about fifteen minutes from there to where the Sturla ferries leave for Tigre. Dad bought the tickets for the ten o’clock departure and we sat in the chairs and waited until about 9:55, at which point we boarded the boat.
We sat in the back, on benches in the shade, with an English-speaking mother who looked way too old to be wearing short shorts and her daughters, an older Latin American couple, and some others. Right inside the door were the galley and the toilets, and after that were the rows of seats. The female narrator of our tour was defended her status very strongly: “I am not a porteña. That is what people think when I go overseas: they say, ‘Where are you from?’ I say, ‘Argentina.’ They say, ‘Oh, you are an arrogant porteña.’ When I travel in Argentine, people say, ‘Where are you from?’ ‘Buenos Aires.’ ‘Oh, you are an arrogant porteña.’ That is not true. I live in Buenos Aires province, not Buenos Aires city.”
We rode through the delta, munching on cookies and declining the offer of coffee. We saw the supermercado boat, and the taxi boats, and the boats with water-skiers behind them. After two hours (more or less), we arrived in Tigre. Ethan really wanted to go canoeing and to the amusement park, but instead we crossed the water and began the search for a restaurant. We finally stopped at Marie Lujan, where Dad ordered a Mediterranean salad, Mom chose a chicken Caesar salad, Ethan chose a Caprese salad, and I asked for a salad with cucumber, tomatoes, and, most importantly, lechuga.
At least I thought lettuce was pretty important. Apparently the cook didn’t, as I originally got a bowl with cucumber and tomato and nothing else in it. Dad originally received a salad with shrimp. Everything was straightened out, though, and I enjoyed my food and the slice of palm heart Dad gave to me. I especially liked the sauce for the bread. Delicioso.
To get home, we rode the tourist bus, two trains, and the subte. For supper we had pasta, fruit, cherry tomatoes, and ice cream (peach, Swiss chocolate, and Sumo chocolate) that Dad and I had gotten from Sumo while Mom and Ethan ogled the giant motorized skateboard.
Delicioso.
Ciao!
