Me gustan los filmes de Schwarzenegger

If you are a backpacker in Montevideo, you are most likely headed east to Brasil or west to Buenos Aires. I am no exception, and I make my way toward Argentina along with a large caravan of people from all parts of the world: Germany, England, Brasil, Scotland, Canada and the U.S. My new friend Malin, from Sweden, and I are decidedly slower, and watch the hordes race to BA while we sit back in the historic Uruguayan town of Colonia. We ate sausage and drink $3 wine. I tried the local whiskey Dunbar. We said hello and goodbye to what will be our last beach.

The common route to Argentina is a ferry from Colonia, but a more interesting route is to ride north to Carmelo and take a launch down the Rio Plata to Tigre, Argentina. I was stoked on the latter, and Malin tagged along. But as traveling goes, you lose things, you get had, you miss buses. Well, we missed the boat, one of only two that leave daily for Argentina. So we spent the next 12 hours in the tiny, but shockingly noisy, town of Carmelo. We ate sausages and drank $4 wine.

A graying security man of roughly 80 sat outside our lovely boatdock-cum-hotel and drank mate. He chatted with a younger man who seemed to be passing through. The latter asked where we were from.

"Suecia," said Malin.
"California," I said, and the young man cackled.
"Arnold Schwarzenegger! Hahahaha," he responded. I laughed too, because, well, it´s funny.

Later the elderly guard and I shared some words, and he told me how much he loves the Schwarzenegger movies. I told him that Schwarzy wasn´t the worst governor the state has ever seen.

"He´s your governor?!," he asked, apparently not understanding that fact from the previous conversation. "And you have a black president? Things are changing," he exclaimed and let out a loud, gutteral laugh.

Sleeping on plastic chairs in a cement enclosure is not conducive to good rest, believe it or not. We finally boarded the boat at 4am, and I fell fast asleep as did the rest of my fellow patrons. And since the sun didn´t rise until we arrived in Tigre, I didn´t see a damn thing. Why? I am too tired to care.