Mar del Plata

I felt like I was lying in a pillow-coated, oven paradise. Lying on a small, white towel, I stole from the hostel, I put my head back on the soft, grainy sand, and listened to the sound of the rocking waves. I took in a deep breathe of the clean beach air, and closed my eyes, falling asleep to the sound of seagulls and men yelling “Churros!”

I awoke not too much later with redder skin, and a calmer sense of the world. I was in Mar del Plata, a wonderful beach town to the South of Buenos Aires, and I was starting to get accustomed to the pleasant lifestyle.

I left Buenos Aires at 2:00 a.m. on the Saturday of the long weekend, and didn’t look back. Five hours, three Alfajores (Argentine cookies), and one drunken passenger later, I was at Mar del Plata, and I was excited to get to the beach.

First I had to drop my bag off at the hostel. This temporary home, the Quercus Hostel, was a quaint little building in a quiet, suburban part of the town. Owned by a lovely elderly woman and her son, the hostel was home to countless international students at the nearby university, who hailed from countries like Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia.

Nobody spoke English. Travelling alone, I was forced to communicate entirely in Spanish, and I liked it. Despite being tripped up by the occasional Mexican slang-word, or the rapid paced jabbering of the Colombians, I found my self fully capable of speaking to them, and it felt good to know I could interact with someone from another part of the world.

After a couple cups of coffee, I then jumped on a bus for the beach. Looking around on the packed bus, I realized something. I was surrounded entirely by college students and the elderly. These two groups, almost exclusively dominated the population of Mar del Plata. After thinking about it, the two seemingly different groups, actually have a relatively similar goal in life. Separated from the real stresses of life, the fortunate college student and the retired old people have relaxation and enjoyment as their top priorities. With this in mind, it suddenly made sense why these two populated such a peaceful, wonderful place.

When I got off the bus at the beach, the first thing I noticed was the elephant. Standing tall and large, the elephant was next to a giraffe, three monkeys, two cavemen, and a man on a computer. Together they made up a large ceramic statue in the center of the town. What I didn’t know was that they would later be engulfed in a blazing bonfire. More on that later.

The second thing I noticed was the large casino that stood in the center of the Miami-like boulevard that sat in front of the beautiful ocean. It would be the next day that I would enter that building to play a little roulette. Standing by my table, 100 pesos of chips in hand, I was surrounded by an interesting group of Argentines. To my left was a little old lady, who was aggressively pushing me out of the way so that she could get to the number, that she just knew would win. To my right was a tall man in a suit who was using the “place chips on every single spot technique.”

As for me, I did the same thing every single round. I would place one chip on 13 (my favorite number) and one on 31.  Each time, the ball spun around the circling wheel of fate, the entire group would watch with suspense and hope. “No más,” the man would say, and the bets would stop as the ball came to a tumbling finish. The first spin landed. “29, negro,” he yelled. The majority of the people gave out a frustrated sigh. One mischievous little old lady let out a shout, and collected her winnings, as everyone glared at her angrily.

A few rounds later though, that ball did land on 31, and I collected my first round of winnings. A few more rounds later, it hit 13. Two after that, it hit 13 again. And then 13 a third time. Soon enough, I reached in my pocket, and found 500 pesos of profit. Holding my money in hand, I felt the old ladies staring at me with resentment and anger. I collected my winnings and celebrated with an expensive bottle of wine.

Outside the casino was a large skate park where Argentines from ages 4 to 40 were skating around, doing spins off large ramps and grinding down poles. Beyond that park, was a market that lined the side of the beach. This traditional market had everything you could imagine from maté glasses to shot glasses to scarves. On the beach itself, red, leathery old ladies could be seen relaxing on beach chairs with oversized glasses over their eyes. Children could be seen running through the freezing cold ocean waves as young couples quietly laid together reading or talking. Shouts for “agua” or “Churros” could be heard from all directions as men walked through the beach with food that smelled amazing. Every where you turned, African men would jump in front of you with boxes full of crappy jewelry as shiny as they were fake. 

For three days my life was nothing but sitting on the beach and visiting the casino. On the final night, there was a holiday, dedicated to the memory of the war for the Malvinas Islands, the disputed land by Argentina, currently owned by the British. This island has been the source of a lot of anger from Argentines, who are upset with England’s possession of the oil-strong island close to the Argentine coastline. In Mar del Plata this holiday coincided with another one, which celebrated the end of all that is bad in life. This is where the elephant comes in.

To celebrate this transition away from all that is negative in life, the city gathers in the center square to join together in a unified bonfire. After watching an impressive show of fireworks, a man with a torch lit some firecrackers that headed for the statue of the before mentioned animals. Each of these statues represented something wrong with society, and as each of these symbolic manifestations of evil crumbled, people cheered in joy and sang out the Argentine national anthem. Red smoke sifted through the sky, and the bright fire filled up camera rolls from all directions. I took a picture and felt connected to the country more than I had ever felt before.

As I got onto the bus to go back to Buenos Aires the next day, I felt renewed. Calm and relaxed from my trip, I lied down on the comfy bus seat, and closed my eyes. Thoughts of that burning statue filled my mind, and I felt sure that I too would have all the bad things in my life disappear as well. With thicker pockets, a fuller stomach, and a calmer soul I drifted to sleep.