The Road to Hell

The travelling band of two Swiss, two Kiwi's, an American and I have crossed the border by way of ferry across the Rio Uruguay. Argentinan customs were only interested in declaration of live animals, while Uruguay's customs had very few interests at all.

It's mid-afternoon in Concordia and we've set up a camp that we've contructed from the bags containing all our worldly posseions and a park bench. As with any camp or any park bench at mid-afternoon, we set about swigging a litre of beer, trying to pass time until our 1900 overnight bus.

Argentina has a policy, at supermarkets I visited, at least, whereby you can only buy the litre bottles of beer with the exchange of an empty bottle. I cannot find the logic in this. It seems the only way to get started is to buy a bottle in the hostal or a restaurant. Then, you're commited to storage and defense of that empty bottle until you want to buy another. What was wrong with charging a bottle deposit, as is the case elsewhere?

As we make our single file jaunt across town, I'm looking for a McDonalds. I wouldn't normally, but in here in Argentina, I'm given to understand that the Big Mac is held at the fixed price of some years ago. Apparently, it's a piece of government intervention to disguise inflation, as measured by the Big Mac Index. Back at the bank, something like that would need a "workaround" - a term we often used for turning real numbers into the numbers we needed for some arbritrary purpose - and that would irritate me. Out here, I want my deflated Big Mac.

I would admit that the Falklands gave me a determined dislike for Argentina, but they don't do themselves any favours. Given the way the country is run by that mad banshee, I expect it's economy will implode in the next year or two. Then, it'll be cheap, and ripe for the picking.

After that great deal of time eventually passes, we're on the road. The bus is otherwise almost empty. It's perfectly comfortable, until the movie starts. It's an absolutely diabolical chick flick starring Katherine Heigl. I try to escape into sleep, but the whiny, self-righteous voice of this pointless blonde harlet won't let me. In desperation, using a piece of paper with the Thermal Spa advert on it, I scrunch and roll up a pair of ear plugs. Thankfully, sleeping on buses is a speciality of mine.