This is Anibal and Norma who we stayed with the first two weeks in Cordoba. The small silver cup with what looks like a spoon in it is a mate, the national drink. The spoon like thing is actually a type of straw/filter you drink through called bombilla. It is kind of a ritual, you fill the cup with hot water and mate (some kind of herb, related to holly, which tastes like a very bitter tea) and share it with friends. You see people carrying thermoses for hot water and drinking mate all over. We had just seen Argentina win in the first round of the world cup finals. Miriam appears to already be saturated with 'futbol'.
Here is a view of our apartment for the rest of our stay in Cordoba. Living/dining room, bedroom and bath on the left.
Kitchen and entrance hall on the right (opposite direction of above photo).
View off the porch (towards the city park). The building is a museum which is closed for renovation.
View off the porch towards the town center. Yes we are on the 11th floor.
Vagrant in outdoor cafe, downtown Cordoba.
Church in the main square (plaza San Martin) of Cordoba.
Pedestrian/shopping area of Cordoba.
We went into the countryside and did a horseback ride one weekend.
An asado (Argentine barbeque- very good!) was included. We were with a group from Minnesota, Jan and Carla are seated across from me. There were four adults and about 8 college kids in their group. We were in classes with them for four weeks.
Art photo of the estancia.
We also took a day trip by collectivo (bus) to a nearby town (80km away) called La Cumbre and hiked up a little bit above Jesus (7 meters tall in the background) in the Sierras.
Defunct train station in La Cumbre. This part of Argentina feels a lot like southern Italy.
The last few days we were in Cordoba they had the Mercosur summit with 8 South American Presidents and Fidel Castro. Our apartment was a block away from the place where they held part of the talks. We didn't see Fidel or anyone else famous but we did see the motorcades go by.
