Going to Arkansas

Before even thinking about going to Arkansas, I played a couple of shows with Seba as a guest musician. I sang on a tune called Antequedas, which is about a place of the same name where people go to eat, fish and relax near the Paraná River.

It was a big deal because it was Seba's release party for his second CD, Palimay. I haven't gotten nervous in a few years before performing but my first show with Seba I did get nervous. So in addition to a lot of yoga, I said a little prayer before going on stage that my singing would help bring about a world of social justice and peace.

Keeping my eye on the prize helped a lot, and I just had a blast. Friday in the newspaper, the review of the overall concert was positive, but it said, "le puso un toque de simpatía Stephen Coger," and I wasn't sure if it meant that it was sympathy that brought me to the stage or if I brought a sort of charisma/friendliness to the stage. Fortunately it was a compliment, as my sister Lorena and my brother Kevin later confirmed. Ha!

We played a show again on Friday, a bar show, intimate and small, compared to the Wednesday arts center, 200+ people show. We got home after 2am that night and then on Saturday morning I headed alone to teach music at Vilelas. Fortunately the literature teacher showed up and then Seba and Lorena came once their son (my nephew) Yamil finished a gymnastics show at his elementary school.

On this night in Vilelas we were holding a concert for the students' parents, and so after rehearsing all of our tunes we decided to end the music workshop early. Upon informing the students that we were ending a half hour early, one of them pulled out a cell phone, checked the time, and said, "No, profe, son las 11 y treinta. Ustedes están acá hasta las doce." "No, professor, it's 11:30. Ya'll are here until twelve." And so it was, and so we were. He wasn't combative; he just said the truth, and that was all it took. Ha! So they held a sort of drum circle for thirty minutes more and I was moved to join them on the trumpet. It's a humbling and joyous feeling to share music with people and see how drastic of an improvement can be made over just four months. Without any direction these kids changed rhythms, gelling in and out, transitioning clean and transitioning together like the fine brustles of two combs passing just next to each other, amongst and between each other in perfect synchronicity. I was totally impressed, and joyous to be playing music with them.

But how can I share with you the fun, good work that we did that day? We taught music in the morning, played a children's music show in the afternoon, and then put on a show for the parents of the music workshop kids in the evening. It was beautiful. I shared with them their fortune at living next to one of the world's most important rivers, of having successfully struggled for universal health care, and of having successfully struggled for universal education. I told them that 45,000 people die in my country every year for lack of health care, and we talked about music and I thanked them... and after the show and during the good-byes, just as we were about to pull away, Facundo, one of the older kids, started to tear up, and I thought, "If we don't leave now, this is it! I'm gonna cry!" And so it was. ha! It was a beautiful goodbye, sitting in the back part of a pick-up bouncing away down the gravel from Vilelas, thanking Seba for inviting me all those Saturdays ago and crying.

In India they talk about "rising in love" as opposed to "falling in love," and I think it applies not only to romantic love, but also to friendships like those my friends and I made in Argentina. A sort of constructive love that sets free and isn't codependent but rather interdependent towards mutual growth. That's what all of my Argentina friends and most of my students and I did. We had just a little bit of time, and yet we really formed strong bonds in that short time.

And because the musicians that play with Seba had been here all week from Buenos Aires, we'd spent every night awake until 2 or 3am eating, visiting, swimming, and playing music... tonight I slept.

Sunday I played with my Taiwanese friends while the rain poured outside, and then that night played with Seba, Lorena, and Yamil in the park. Yamil learned to skate tonight (Nov. 15, 2009). I began to pack.

Monday I practiced yoga with Seba and recorded a video journal while cooking dhal. Tuesday was my last day at San Fernando Rey, the college whereat I teach, and I printed off four certificates for my two most improved students and my two best speakers. Wednesday was another love-filled goodbye; it was my last day at Escuela Normal Sarmiento, my high school. You know what? I'm just going to include my journal entry from this day. It was a big day.

This morning I got nearly EVERYTHING for our Thanksgiving dinner at my beloved butcher shop (which has everything one could need hidden amongst its few shelves), then hunted down the last few ingredients in the centro. Lorena (my sister) beat me home and we cooked together, and Nico (my brother) came over and helped. We had lunch together outside the oven-heated sauna of my casita (little house), then went together to my favorite class. We ate ice cream, visited, and shared about things beyond English. I asked them not to smoke, and they shared their thoughts, danced, and Lorena and Claudia (the professor and my dear friend) spoke, too. I reminded them that they live in a beautiful place and that they are fortunate to live here. I reminded them that Claudia is a great English teacher that speaks English perfectly, that we have a choice when it comes to our emotions and when it comes to what we enjoy, and that it’s better to hang out solo than be mal acompañado, than to hang out with bad company.

Nico and Lorena told them about San Fernando Rey. Then we took a picture together, Nico helped me prepare envelopes for Kevin (my youngest brother), then my Argentine family--Lorena, Nico, and Kevin--and I took a picture together, then one with Claudia.

Lorena wrote her contact info down for Kevin, then I wrote a quick note telling his parents that another adoptive sibling (Lorena) had agreed to get him up to speed on his English free of charge. I also invited them to my Thanksgiving dinner tonight.

Then Lorena and I walked back home, crying a little, and then I helped her with her English homework and we went to swimming lessons! Yamil and Nahuel can swim wonderfully, and while Magalí and Lara know HOW to swim, they haven't let me let go of them, and when I do they sink like a stone. So today I didn’t let go of them at all though at one point Magalí was swimming with such speed that I wasn’t supporting her at all. Ha!

Then I came home and practiced yoga, and my 9:15 dinner started when Seba and Lorena showed up at that time, though we didn’t begin to eat until Steven Washington (a former Harlem Globetrotter from Chicago, he now resides in Resistencia and teaches basketball at the university where I taught swimming) showed up around 10, and the party got started really when Kevin and his family showed up shortly thereafter, and it was a total blast when Vanessa (whom I met meandering around Resistencia) and her son, Segundo, showed up shortly thereafter. I think everyone had gone home by 2am, after empanadas, sweet potato pie, chocolate cake, pizza, and ice cream. haha! Empanadas and sweet potato pie…

The sort of running joke of the day was that I had to get back after the ice cream at high school and “brush the sugar off my teeth.” It’s funny because it’s mostly not a joke. ha!

On Thursday, I had my final swimming lesson. AND I'M SO HAPPY!! MAGALI SWAM! She swam and she swam and she swam! This is my favorite Going to Arkansas Present. Then we had pizza at my friend David's house. He's a great sculptor. And maker of pizza.

On Friday, I said goodbye to some friends from Taiwan, said goodbye to the Britoses, and they took home the stuff that they had loaned me all those months ago: a sauce pan, forks, etc. Seba came over and helped me finish up, and then we called a remise. I headed to Seba, Lorena and Yamil's while Seba rode that way on his bike. We shared one more afternoon of playing and tereré, that wonderful, yummy, cold version of yerba maté that Argentinians, Paraguayans, and some Brazilians drink in the summer.

My friend Luis and I performed Ben Harper's Waiting on an Angel for Seba, Lorena, Yamil, and a couple of friends of theirs, and then Seba and I played a few of the tunes we'd played together over the months. After that Yamil skated a bit.

Then the remise, which as far as I can tell is the same thing as a taxi, came to get us and take us to the bus terminal. We had to get dropped off before the terminal actually because of a demonstration that had blocked the road. I remember walking toward the terminal, flanked by and following my friends who were helping carry and roll my things, thinking, "SWEET! The buses can't run! One more night in Resistencia!"

As it happened, the buses were running, just behind schedule. And so my friends from Taiwan managed to make their way to the terminal, too, and we all visited. Seba and I visited about the benefits of our friendship, and Yamil and I performed a version of the "I'm Bad" Michael Jackson music video. If you can come over to my house I'll show this to you because it is hilarious and Seba videotaped the whole 1.5 minute show. ha! Also, the Calvin and Hobbes vibe of me and Yamil's friendship is crystal clear and tangible in the video.

Here is Seba and the musicians that helped present his new album.
They are, from left to right: Guido, Mauro, Seba, Esteban (the producer;
he's playing the drums), and then a lovely, lovely guy
(muy buena onda) on the
accordion, Bistolfi.

Lorena, Myrian, Seba, and I in one of the classrooms
at Vilelas.

Here we are playing for children. Someone had the
not-so-bright idea of bringing the food out just as we began to
play, so after this picture was taken nearly
all of our audience disappeared. ha!

Of all the classes at the Instituto Terciario San Fernando Rey,
the university where I worked and played, I spent the most time
with this class of sophomores. Teresa is a great teacher,
always listening to her students; she's in
white to my left, and she is also a Fulbright scholar. She worked
as a Spanish teacher in Washington on her Fulbright scholarship,
and she encourages her students to think critically while
learning English. I really like that, and I suspect that
the context it provides helps what they learn stick.

Chaco is beautiful.

David made everything from the crust to the fire.
And it was delicious. This was another late night, after
a farewell get together in Laguna Argüello, the same
place I had my wonderful birthday party. In the park, I had my
last torta parrilla (flat bread, al estilo Argentino) for a while.

My truly beloved siblings: Lorena, Kevin, and Nico.
They started out as students, then became friends, and then
sister and brothers.

That's all, ya'll. Some how or another the eight plus months of my Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship have ended. I made great friends, and they made me. And I achieved my goal--mentioned in my second blog entry--of verifying that no automatic trajectory is mine. My path is mine and is not determined by society, by my beloved parents, by where I'm from... but by all of these things and by me and by more. Mmm-hmm.

I learned to cook well on a fairly consistent basis! I played Kilómetro 11 with my great friends, ate queso cremoso, taught swimming lessons, helped teach a music workshop, taught English, played pool with my high school students, ate pizza and danced with my college students... I became a vegetarian and began to develop in other ways that facilitate the social justice that I want to see in the world. And I resolved never to drive in Danville again; if Seba and Lorena can bicycle around Resistencia, a city of 400,000 folks, I can ride my bike all up and down Danville, my hometown of 2,000 folks. ha!

Aright friends and family. Thank you again for following my blog. As we wade through life's water together may we relax and leave behind the unnecessary and hurtful: the Coca-Cola, house decorations, lawn watering, and more. And as some of us changing see some of us not changing, may we remember that honey attracts more bees than vinegar and be genuinely human. May our art accelerate and make efficient the process of our slow, simple discovery of our common humanness.

See you!

Peace!
Stephen

PS On the flight home, the plane ride included the super interesting screen that tells things like the altitude and speed and other stuff. Here are a few screen shots, followed by one of me at home in my back yard in front of the bradford pear tree.

This is my favorite because we can see where
the sun has risen, where it's setting, where
night is falling, and where the sun is rising.

And I know McDonald's to be a place of poison, so I got my food elsewhere so that Dad and I could continue the tradition of eating and reading. Y yo sé que McDonald's es un lugar de veneno, por eso yo compré mi comida en otro parte para que Papá y yo podríamos seguir con la tradición de comer y leer.





And here is a video that I made for my beloved Argentine family, the Ibarras. They took me to so many of their sacred places that I wanted to show them mine; and so this is the first of several videos which will certainly include Spring Lake--at sunset--and Long Pool.

A big huge thanks to Krishna at Espacio Thai in Buenos Aires for allowing me to feel so welcome there. My final two nights in Argentina were passed there, even though no one else was there. Another big huge thanks to all my friends and family and teachers that stayed in touch while I was in Argentina, those that are physically with us and those that aren't.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Días de la Memoria

--“¿Hola?”
--“Soy Stephen, de cuarto dos, cama siete.”
Name, room, and bed: that’s how one enters the Palermo House Hostel.
And now that we are on the same page about getting into the hostel, how did I come to be in Argentina, and how did Argentina get where it is?

I’m here because the Fulbright Commission awarded me an English Teaching Assistantship. Thanks is due U.S. Senator Fulbright, an Arkansas native, who initiated the Fulbright Program to facilitate peace through education. (A note for my college buddies: At the earliest, one applies in the early fall of their last year of college for a specific country and then if you are accepted, off you go with a hearty stipend and all your travel covered.)

I came here to travel more and approach confirmation of my suspicion that the whole world is without borders and that we can live as one. Oh, and grow and study for the LSAT. That’s the Law School Admissions Test, and it’s on December 5, just a couple of weeks after I return to Fayetteville/Danville, Arkansas. Ahh... Fayetteville/Danville...

Another reason to travel is the general fun of exploration. And another couple of reasons would be to come up for air and deny the automatic; traveling provides me time and space to check in and make sure that I’m moving intentionally, to verify that perpetual motion isn’t what propels me. Also, there's time to teach English and be a cultural ambassador (in fact, those activities constitute my job description), to play music with new Argentine friends, to Skype with old non-Argentine ones, and finally apply for law school and scholarships and other such things.

So that’s how I got here.

“How did Argentina get where it is?” By golly, though it may seem disjointed, the first thing that comes to mind is the US' lean toward facism under President George W. Bush. Though we did not have any U.S. citizens “disappeared” under President Bush as far as I know (though there was Jose Padilla, whom Bush declared an “enemy combatant” and so was jailed for years without a trial. Eek!), Argentina had plenty during what they call “La Dictadura.” The country went all the way to a fascist police state. Some who tried to steer the country another way were kidnapped, tortured and killed. Plenty of people including teenagers were among the 30,000+ “desaparecidos,” the disappeared, some of whom were flown over the ocean and tossed out of an airplane. (The Bush-era practice of extraordinary rendition comes to mind, but is admittedly dissimilar.)

Tuesday the 24th was quite a big day as far as remembering La Dictadura. In fact, it was “Día de la Memoria.” I visited the site of a massacre, and there met the governor of Chaco. That night, I met more great, socially conscious folks at a lecture/community art/concert event.

To continue meandering around the topic of Argentine history, here’s some less serious information, courtesy of my “LonelyPlanet: Argentina” tourist guidebook: The country “gave birth to the tango, Evita Perón, and Che Guevara… and the public bus, the coronary bypass and the ballpoint pen…”

Argentina’s history is similar to the US’ in that before the Europeans “discovered” it there were Indigenous folks living here. A genocide similar to the US’ ensued, and now there are not as many Native American folks. The newly Spanish territory was given the Latin name for silver, argentum. “But the mineral riches that the Spanish found in the Inca Empire of Peru never panned out in this misnamed land.” Take that, Colónizers. So then came typical colonizing: gather the Native folks into settlements, take their riches and read them the Bible (it was the Jesuits in Argentina).

Whew, you know what, I’ll stop there with history. Let’s get to me.

I arrived in Buenos Aires on Friday the 13th, and hung out in the capital for five days, practicing yoga, meeting other Fulbrighters, standing in line to get a visa, and eating at great restaurants. These Fulbrighters are really in a class of their own, without judgment, without hurry, and really, really well traveled (One of us has been to 26 countries! She’s 23!). They are new, intelligent, and kind friends. And at least two of them are talented with a Frisbee.

On Wednesday evening around 11 or midnight I flew into Resistencia, where I’ll be working for the next eight months. A conversation with a stranger and it turns out he’s an attorney and a friend of Emilio, the guy in charge of looking after me. Exiting baggage claim, I saw a man with a sign reading, “M. Coger.” It was Emilio!

On the ride home we had a blast talking about music and culture and joking about my name and how the driver didn’t have the guts to go in and hold the sign with my name himself. Ha! For those of you as yet unaware, “coger” means something fairly suggestive in Mexican and Argentine Spanish. It has quite a strong connotation. Let’s leave it at that.

Describing his life and himself, Emilio said “I have a ponytail, two cats, and no television.” He’s non-religious and well traveled in a place where that’s largely not the case. He has a vast CD collection and is interested especially in Jewish music; he identifies as culturally Jewish.

So to jump around a little bit...

Nearly everyday has a stranger of the day. On the 13th it was the psychiatrist (Nancy) I sat next to on the plane and with whom I shared a taxi. On the 14th, it was a student of Swami Satchiananda Maharaj from India, my yoga teacher’s teacher and one of my teachers. On the 15th it was a taxi cab driver who played for me a tape of his own recordings, and who was elated when I got my trumpet out and played along on the way to the hotel.

So that’s it for now, almost.

This is the website of the place I practiced Ashtanga Yoga on the 14th:
www.valletierra.com/

And the Stranger of the Day Award Winner of the same day runs this place: http://espaciothai.com/

On Tuesday, March 17, 2009, I made a video from an organic restaurant in Buenos Aires for my friend Rachel Moore who happens to be the most talented cook I know, and said video is online at http://www.youtube.com/user/smcoger
(If you’d like to be alerted every time I post a video, you can subscribe to my youtube thingamajig. I think.)

Whatever the case is regarding YouTube subscription, this is what I had for dinner that night:

pan integral con crema de zanahoria, limón, y ajo encima
wheat bread with a carrot, limon, garlic cream to put on top

curry fresco de seitán con verduras y bolitas de arroz motti a la crema de coco
fresh seitan (wheat gluten) curry with vegetables and motti rice balls topped with coconut cream – 35 pesos

flan de coco con dulce de leche
flan with coconut shreds and puddin’! (This was not the most yogic desert, but I don’t mind.)

And this is the website for Bio Restaurant: http://www.biorestaurant.com.ar/

Now it is Thursday, March 26, 2009, and I have practiced yoga, studied for the LSAT, and worked on Geshe Goes to Arkansas, which I’m writing about Geshe Dorjee, my Tibetan teacher. Who out there knows a publisher of children’s books? I’m nearly ready. And I am ready for dinner, sooo, jehl yong! (That’s “see you!” in Tibetan)

This is the touristy-in-the-day-rob-you-at-night part of Buenos Aires. We left before sunset.

In a capital city of 14 million people like unto Buenos Aires it must have been unlikely to meet a disciple of Gurudev on my first full day there. Indeed, it must have been unlikely that my hostel would be on the self-same street as the disciple.

It was a heavy ceremony, remembering the 20+ young people massacred when they spoke up for freedom. Afterwards though I got to meet the governor of Chaco, Jorge Milton Capitanich. That is Emilio on the left and Gov. Capitanich in the middle.

A sign outside the door of The Museum of Memory: "A clandestine center of detention and torture was run here from 1976 through 1980. Victims of Repression. March 24, 2005

Photos of some of those disappeared are on the walls at the now museum of memory.
Another desaparecida.

To keep things light, my friend Donna and I headed to the square and I posed next to this lovely tree, a Polvo Borracho in Spanish or samuhú in a local Indegnous language, the legend of which has something to do with the tree drinking too much wine.

Back to the site of the massacre, musicians and a stenciled image of Che Guevarra.

The statues represent the victims of "The Massacre at Margarita Belén."
It was a heavy day for Argentines; I wonder what this guy was thinking as he watched young artists commemorate Día de la Memoria in and along the street.

To end on a lighter note, here I am in the center of Buenos Aires on the 15th!

That's all for now, family and friends. Drop me a line if you like at smcoger@gmail.com