Cinco Meses

These days I stockpile all the beans, rice and canned tomatoes that will fit on the cupboard shelf. My cereal is poured out of plastic bags and portrays a mascot that my inner child reviles as being the wrong one, a friendly enough looking but strange wide eyed animal that has no relation to the usual gang that has sat on my breakfast table for the last umpteen years. It feels a bit like contortion. I’m stretching and turning rituals on their head to save a few more bucks. But at the same time it is a cleansing process. It must be amongst the reason the priesthood survives and the Amish carry on and Budhist monks are so happy. As I simplify and organize my life in order to save, my mind both absorbs and reflects this change and I gradually shed anxiety.



I’ve managed to cut my food bill in half, almost instantly, and I thought that would be the hardest thing to save on. I’ve budgeted between $2500-$3000 for this trip and I’ve already saved half of that with barely a month of serious savings. As soon as I receive payment for my travel book work, I will immediately spend a good portion of that money for a plane ticket and all but seal the deal. As it stands now, a 7k mile bus trip around the whole of Argentina, through the pampas, into the tropical Iguaza Falls region, across the north into the desert, then following the spine of the Andes into wine country, Mendoza, to the highest peak in the Western Hemisphere, Aconcagua, continuing to the Lake District, Bariloche, across into the famous Fitz Roy peaks, hiking the Torres Del Paine in the Chilean Patagonia, witnessing the calving of the Moreno Glacier, standing on the southern tip of the continent, Tierra Del Fuego, turning back north, looking for right whales in the South Atlantic, bumming on the beach in Mar del Plata, and absorbing the culture of Buenos Aires. Written 5/1/06