La Boca and Iguazú Falls

Well, it’s been two and a half months since our last post. It’s not because we haven’t been doing anything. In fact, quite the opposite. Too often, we are just exhausted when we get home in the evening from the office or after church on Sundays, and it’s just too easy to say “We’ll catch the blog up next week.” Unfortunately, next week has now turned into months later. So, we’ll do some catching up.

Today is Sunday and again, Danielle came to church. She has really struggled with her health in the last 2 months, with multiple trips to the hospital, and even more falls and blackouts. She lives all alone, so it is actually quite dangerous for her. She frequently doesn’t feel well, so she doesn’t eat well, and it has turned into a vicious cycle. We have been praying so hard for her that her health will improve and that she can find a way to have someone live with her to take care of her. Well, today, she came to church with a young woman, Agatha, who is 18 years old, who is now living with her. Agatha is from Brazil and speaks Portuguese, like Danielle. We also understand that Danielle is making plans to move to a different location. Both of these changes should help her.

Also, we got a new bishopric in the Villa Crespo ward today. Bishop Cascallares and his family are moving to a new apartment, which is only 5 blocks from his present home, but it is outside of our ward boundaries and in a different stake. He has been bishop for nearly 5 years, so it is time. We have come to really love him and his family. He has been an excellent bishop. His first counselor, Alejandro Rossi, was called as bishop. He is the husband of our good friend, Yamilla, who is the secretary to President Packer and President Bragg, of the area presidency. 

Bishop Rossi with Yamilla and their 2 sons, and Ariel and Blanca Cascallares with their 4 daughters

Last post, we said we would be going to La Boca with the other senior couples. We had a great time. Although we went together, we decided to all split up and explore on our own. Caminito Street, in La Boca, is a big tourist attraction, with lots of restaurants, street vendors, artists, and souvenir shops. La Boca means “the mouth”. It is by the mouth of where the Matanza River flows into the La Plata River. It is a port area and is very colorful. The tradition is that it is so colorful because people would make houses out of shipping crates (true) and would just paint them with whatever color of paint was available (probably true). The result was strangely attractive to tourists, so locals started to go there to sell their crafts and art work, and it grew from there. It is also home to what is probably the most famous, and popular, soccer team, La Boca Jr., and their stadium is located there. It is a fun place in the day time but not a place to be at night. Here are some pictures:

 

A colorful cobblestone sidewalk in La Boca

A side street in La Boca

A singer at a restaurant in La Boca

Tango dancers in La Boca

The senior missionary couples who visited La Boca

In La Boca, there are a lot of venues where they dance the tango. In August, the senior couples had a fun opportunity to have a tango lesson from the bishop of the Juncal Ward, who used to be a professional tango dancer and instructor. So, on a Saturday night, we went to get a fast food fix at KFC, and then to the Juncal building for our lesson. All of the senior couples, and a few extras, were there. Bishop Lima also invited his former partner, and current professional tango dancer and instructor, to come and help him. After our lesson, they gave us a demonstration of a tango and a milonga and they were really good. We have a video but it is too big to upload. We went home tired but exhilarated.

Bishop Lima and Natalia Puccioni

The senior couples who are assigned here get an opportunity to take a couple of trips during our missions to see other parts of the country. One of the places everyone wants to go is Iguazú Falls. Iguazú is one of the seven modern wonders of the world, and it is spectacular. In late August, we had been working hard and were ready for a couple of days of relaxation. We were fortunate enough to get reservations at the Iguazú Sheraton, which is located right in Iguazú National Park, so we didn’t have to travel back and forth, a half-hour each way, from Puerto Iguazú. Our room was on the falls side of the hotel, so we could see the falls from our balcony. 

The border of Brazil and Argentina goes right down the middle of the largest of the water falls and the Iguazú river, and each country has established a national park to preserve the area around the falls. It is mostly jungle and is home to jaguars, monkeys, coati, capybara, deer, and other wildlife, as well as all kinds of parrots, toucans, and dozens of varieties of other birds. The morning after we arrived, as we ate breakfast, we saw people outside staring up at the rooms above us and taking photos. We were curious so we went out and saw about a dozen monkeys on the balconies of the rooms. They were working their way along, trying the patio doors of each room to see if they were locked. If the doors are unlocked, the monkeys can go into the rooms looking for food, including the candy and snacks in the mini-bar. However, during check-in to the hotel, there are strict instructions about keeping the balcony doors locked, and the reason. Apparently, this day, everything was secure.

Later in the morning, we met up with our Paraguayan guide for the day, Mario Duré, who is a member of the Church, and we headed off to the Brazil side of the falls, a visit to the Bird Park, and to a Brazilian churrazquería for dinner. We also drove to where we could see across the river to Ciudad del Este, Paraguay, but we didn’t have time to go into Paraguay. Lastly, we visited the place on the Argentina side that marks the common border of the three countries, Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina. It was a full day and very enjoyable.

Entering Brazil

Our hotel from the Brazil side

Lots of rainbows

Bird Park, Brazil

Bird Park, Brazil

Bird Park, Brazil

Bird Park, Brazil

Three Borders

Mario at the three borders monument

Mario dropped us back at the hotel, where we ordered dinner and met a nice young couple, with their 2-year-old daughter, at the next table. As we got to talking, we found out that they live just 2 blocks from us in Buenos Aires. We had a nice visit and then gave them a pass-along card and Elder Love’s business card before they had to go feed their little girl.

The next day we spent the entire day visiting the beautiful falls on the Argentina side. Iguazú Falls is higher than Niagara and, at 1.7 miles wide, it is the largest waterfall system in the world, with 275 discrete water falls, most of which are in Argentina. It has been featured in such movies as Moonraker, The Mission, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Captain America: Civil War, and many others. From our hotel room, we could see the Garganta del Diablo (Devil’s Throat), with the giant spray it creates, and from the Brazilian side we had been down at river level and up rather close to it. This day, we started by taking a little train to the upper part of the falls, and walking about a mile on catwalks across the river, to the very top, next to the Garganta, where we could see and feel the power of all that water and all the spray it generates.

By the Garganta del Diablo

The top of the Garganta del Diable

Catwalks across the water

 

We then took a lovely, quiet, floating boat ride through the upper system of water ways to near where we had gotten the train, earlier. We saw toucans and lots of other birds, and just enjoyed relaxing for the half-hour ride. The only other couple on the boat was a young Brazilian couple and we got to know them and the boat skipper as we floated.

The rest of the morning and early afternoon, we walked along the catwalks of the middle and lower falls, viewing each of the falls and stopping for lunch at a Subway for sandwiches. The Coatis are everywhere, and are quite aggressive. We watched one steal a sack of food from a lady and run off with it, and they wanted to come into the Subway but they were afraid. They, and the monkeys, can be pretty dangerous if they get it into their minds to take your food.

The last thing we did this day was take a ride in a power boat that takes you right into some of the falls. We expected to get wet but it was like having a firehose pointed down directly on you. We were totally drenched, but certainly refreshed in the 90-degree heat, when we got done.

One of the falls they took us under

Two drowned rats

After returning to the hotel and changing, we enjoyed another dinner. We became almost addicted to the milkshake-like fruit drinks they serve, called liquados. During dinner, ran into our friends from Buenos Aires again. We also met people from Spain, Germany, England, the United States, and elsewhere during our stay.

On Saturday, our flight was not scheduled to leave until about 6 pm, so we took advantage of the time to visit the visitors’ center and gift shops. We learned a great deal about the ecosystem, wildlife, and history of the falls and the Guaraní Indians who live in Southern Paraguay and Brazil and Northern Argentina. Iguazú is a Guaraní word that means “big water” and the official language of Paraguay is Guaraní, although they speak Spanish there. Unfortunately, many factors have caused the jungle that is the home of the historical Guaraní people to shrink to only a fraction of what it was formerly. The governments of the three countries are taking major steps to keep it from shrinking further. After buying a few trinkets, we headed back for lunch and preparations to catch our flight. We arrived in Buenos Aires to chilly weather and rain. However, we had a very relaxing and enjoyable few days.

Well, a lot more has happened since August, and we will do our best to catch this up soon. One thing we should mention is that we have been called as the district leaders of the senior couples in the area office. Our former district leaders, the Hulings, will be leaving in mid-December. They have been serving a district leaders for 14 months, so there are some big shoes to fill for the short time remaining in our mission – did we mention that we hit our one-year mark last month? Anyway, we will be a little busier, but we have such great couples here, who are mostly pretty self-sufficient, so we don’t anticipate any serious problems.

We have also been busy at work. Elder Love has been doing a deep analysis of old cases to see if there are some that should be settled to get them off our books. In addition, our Area Legal Counsel has been gone again quite a bit, so we stay busy at work, but we like being busy. We continue to see Heaven’s hand in our work every day.

Until next time.