Salta

April 28, 2009
We took afternoon bus that left the main bus terminal at 3:45 pm and costs U$R200 each one way. It was not the first class bus with the sleeper beds, but one that stopped in many places along a route we have no idea, but it was comfortable and we were able to recline. We were given on boarding some kind of a package with bread and meat that was very flat, squashed to be exact, and some kind of cookie. About midnight we stopped for 20 minutes at some hotel where numerous other buses pulled up too and it looks like the local haunt of the cops. Other than that one stop for food, there was none other than loading and off loading passengers that took less than a minute. The journey took some 21 hrs and some of the most desolate countryside was passed.
Somewhere along the way a 22 year old Israeli kid got onto the bus and we got talking. He had completed his 3 years in the Israeli army as a journalist covering the West Bank, explaining that there were many names to call the West Bank, or Occupied Territories based on your political affiliation. As a teenager he belonged to a Jewish youth movement that toured 32 US states visiting Synagogues building support for the Zionist movement and ensuring unlimited political support of the US. This was a major program continuously being run to the US and other sympathetic countries. I believe that Israel gets about $30b of support from the US per year, and if you are Jewish and can prove that both parents are Jews either by birth certificate or marriage certificate, you automatically can apply for some special term which gives your permanent residence of Israel and the right to live there irrespectively where or not you were born there. The Israelis’ sees it as the right to return to their biblical lands. Hence the Palestinian issue of loosing their lands and a conflict that may never have a solution.
In the bus station in Salta, we were greeted by young people wearing a badge giving their name and guest house/B$B/hostel that they represented. About 10 gathered around showing us booklets with photos of the rooms, grounds and common areas, wanting to take us to their place. They offered free transportation to their location and hawked what each place had to offer from tours to free internet in some. Some spoke fair to good English. One woman pulled me aside to offer a special rate. She took me to the bus counter as I needed to know about the bus schedule to Iquazu, promising to take care of us. Her place was were many young people gathered and I figured out that it would be noisy as it had a bar there too. Unfortunately for her, that ruled her place out. It came down to two places, one of which was in the guidebook. Vanessa quoted a rate but had to have all her info communicated through another hawker called Santiago who spoke almost perfect English. He quoted us A$R60 per night plus breakfast. Vanessa called her owner to ask if he would match the rate. We wanted to see the two place and then decide.
Santiago agreed to drive us to show us Vanessa’s place first, and then his. He was willing to help his competitor who was quite an attractive young Argentinean with Inca blood. At Vanessa’s place Darlene went in to look while I remained chatting to Santiago. It was nice but the neighbor did have a barking dog which Darlene asked about. Then it was off to Santiago’s place. It was just as nice and it was decision time. What it really came down to was language. Santiago spoke English and could easily help us and was most willing and accommodating. He was such a gentleman that after we had chosen to stay at his hostel, he told Vanessa to wait and he would drive her back to the bus terminal. He heart was of gold and it continued to shine the entire time we were at his hostel.
After dropping Vanessa back at the bus terminal he returned to help us sort out our plans. We wanted to rent a car for a week. His father, who owned the hostel, also owned a travel agency and Santiago was a professional guide who worked for his father. Divorced and the father of a 3 year old, he was a hustler to carry his share. He lived with his parents at the hostel.
Santiago took us to Hertz with whom his father’s travel agency had a deal and they represented. The original quote for a compact car, a Chevelotte, was A$R 1,124 for the week with 2,000 km free miles and an A$R8,000 deposit for security in case the car was stolen, damaged or totaled. It was more than I really wanted to pay, about US$375 total. I asked Santiago if there was another company that we could get a quote from, but he told me that even though there were other companies, he could not recommend any other due to their agreement with Hertz. So I asked him if he could talk to them to get a better price and he was able to get us a 10% discount. He agreed to bring us back in the morning to pick up the car and get us on our way out of town. He truly understood customer service.
From my time with Santiago I learnt about the impact that the financial crises was having on their business, plus the impact of Dengue Fever. For January through March his business had struggled as few people came to the region for one of the two reasons. Now that winter has come, the mosquito population that causes Dengue Fever was decreasing and for the winter the threat was over till the spring rains came. Our understanding is like malaria and some of the other tropical diseases, people who live in poverty and hence are malnourished and have lower immune systems are more prone to the illness.