One last video

I made one more HD video of Iguazu Falls, this one with footage from both the Brazil & Argentina sides of the falls. Enjoy!

http://vimeo.com/4200761

April 6 "Banged Up, Burned, Brusied, Exhausted and Couldn't Be Happier!"

To Roselinda & Wimon, Shelly & Nathan, Kara, Jessalyn, Stefanie, Stephanie, Sarah, Sarah, Sarah, Sara, Halie, Rachel, Kortney, Dot, Morgan, Ashley, Zanessa, Carolyn, Sam, Ben, Grady & Lawson - Thanks for letting Ronnie, Scott and Myself invade your lives for a week and share a piece of the amazing experience you all are living. You guys were a blessing to me in so many ways and I pray God's blessing on you all and pray you get more out of Studying Abroad than you could ever imagine you would. I have seen God in you. You are no longer just "the Study Abroad students I'm filming." Whether you like it or not, you are now my friends! ;)

Tomorrow morning at 9am, after some last minute souvenir shopping, Ronnie, Scott, Stephen and I leave Brazil and make the 24 hour trip home. Brazil to Argentina, Argentina to Miami, Miami to Dallas and finally Dallas to Abilene. Hopefully we'll arrive in Abilene around 11am Wednesday morning.

Today we drove to Argentina and viewed the splendor of Iguazu falls from that side. The view is much different, you're on top of the falls, instead of at the bottom, and while the view is grander and more panoramic from the Brazil side, on the Argentina side you can see and experience the rivers Piranha and Iguazu that come together to make the falls. Funny thought it may sound, when we got to Argentina, it was SUCH a relief to find people that spoke Spanish again! After 2 days in Brazil, where Portuguese is the norm, it was almost comforting to be able to understand and communicate with people again. My Spanish isn't that great, but it's 100x's better than my Portuguese!

We walked several miles over different parts of the river on perforated metal bridges getting to see the wildlife and plants that are much different from the other side of the falls. One thing that really stood out to me were the fish. There were a ton of catfish looking fish feeding on the rocks that I didn't recognize until it hit me. They were Plecosimus! You know, the "algae eaters" or "sucker fish" found in most home aquariums? I always wondered why a fish would evolve to spend it's entire life suctioned to a rock, chewing on algae until I was able to see them in the wild. They're literally hanging on for survival! If they were a normal fish they'd be swept over the edge of the falls! God has a plan for everything! During our walk we saw many tropical birds, a few skittish lizards, the ever present Coati's, a Spectacled Caiman, and the highlight of the trip for most, a troop of Brown Tufted Capuchin monkeys feeding in the trees above.

After the falls we got cleaned up and went to one last dinner at a traditional Brazilian steak house and, once again, I ate way too much!! After dinner Scott and I shot a few more interviews and now I'm writing this blog and packing to leave in the morning.

I'm sunburned, sporting a ballcap tan, a sunglasses tan, a farmers tan, a shorts tan, the one-side-of-my-face-is-more-burned-than-the-other tan, my back aches, my ankle is swollen and on fire, I'm so exhausted I can't see straight and I was out of clean clothes 2 days ago, but I've had the time of my life. Every minute has been worth it. This trip, these people and the places I've been will not soon be forgotten. Every time I sip Mate in the morning I'll think back to the experiences I've shared with some amazing people in some amazing places. Thanks again ACU for sending me on this assignment, Scott for assisting me and being my sanity/memory, Ronnie, for inspiring me to be creative, Stephen, for finding the best food in the 3 countries, and Study Abroad Students, Faculty and Staff for being part of a life-changing experience for me.

Until next time!

April 5 "Best Day of My Life"

At 7am this morning I awoke to what I thought was someone using my shower. It was kind of alarming and I didn't know what to do. I soon realized it was raining outside...HARD! Oh yea, this is a rainforest! The view out my balcony was beautiful and the rain brought some much appreciated cooler temperatures outside. After a quick breakfast I met up with everyone in the lobby and we boarded the bus for the falls.

Our tour guide, David, was a super nice, knowledgeable guy, but his accent was EXACTLY like Borat's. I just kept wanting to say "High Five," but I resisted. After a quick history/biology lesson about the flora/fauna of the region and how the falls formed, we boarded the bus to the entrance. The first view we got was from several miles out, but was still spectacular! As we started our decent into the jungle, at various points, the trees would spread and you'd get the most beautiful views of the falls and the surrounding jungle. The farther we walked, the more beautiful it got. Words really can't describe the beauty and awesomeness of what we were witnessing. God's power and might can truly be felt in this place. The water roars, the ground rumbles, and the falls are so powerful they create their own wind. For someone like me, who had, unfortunately, forgotten how awesome God is, the falls are a GREAT wakeup call!

I shot so much footage of the falls, and I'm excited we get to go back tomorrow and shoot more! See my video at the end of this blog for just a fraction of the footage!

When we got done at the falls, we headed to eat some lunch on a deck that overlooked the falls, but on the way there, I saw a group of Coatimundi's foraging for food! These cute little mammals are cousins of the raccoon and are very cute. I was able to get some "Discovery Channel" style shots of them digging grubs out of a rotten log and munching away.

After lunch came the most amazing part of the trip. Those of us who were brave enough took a half-mile hike through the jungle to a boat dock and boarded power boats bound for the falls. The purpose of this journey was to actually ride UNDER the falls in the boats. The driver repeatedly pushed us under the falls and it was an incredible experience to feel the power of the falls firsthand. Much more mighty than you would imagine.

After the falls we headed to a nearby bird park/aviary to see some tropical birds and animals. That was a fun experience! Apparently birds don't like seeing their reflection in the camera lens because 2 different birds (a toucan and a macaw) attacked the camera! It wasn't a big park, but it was a nice walk through the jungle again with a large collection of very beautiful birds.

After the bird park we headed home to clean up and eat dinner. As we stepped off the bus a watch dealer was waiting in the hotel parking lot so I bought a Rolex for $12 American! Hahaha! After dinner we had a devotional and time of communion in the hotel dining room next to the public dining room. We sang,prayed and discussed a scripture passage for the better part of an hour and a half and it was a great time. God is definitely in this place!

After the devo, Scott and I interviewed students for the better part of 2 hours. Around midnight I finally rolled into my room and here I've sat for the past 3 hours charging batteries, cataloging footage, cleaning equipment, editing video and getting stuff ready for tomorrow. It's now 3am and I'm headed to bed. Check out the video below to see the amazing footage I was able to capture at the falls! Also, DEFINITELY check out Ronnie's Blog for some AMAZING photography from today. And for the record, that's my finger that the butterfly is on.

Tomorrow we're headed to Argentina to see their side of the falls!

Until tomorrow!

April 4 "Don't cry for me, Argentina, but I like Brazil better"

I am LOVING Brazil. I want to live here someday, even if it's only for a few months. And for the record, some people are giving me a hard time for loosing my iPhone, but I wanted to show you just SOME of what I'm having to keep up with on this trip. Batteries, Chargers, Hard Drives, Cameras, Microphones, Receivers, Cables, etc! So cut me some slack about the phone ;-)!


This morning Ronnie, Scott, Stephen and I flew from of Buenos Aires and into Puerto Iguazu, Argentina. It was a smooth, uneventful flight (that's a good thing, I HATE flying). I started getting excited before we landed because it was jungle as far as you could see. The airport is literally a small section carved out of the jungle. When we stepped out of the airport it was obvious we were in a different climate. HOT and MUGGY. I'm from Houston and used to humidity but it's MUGGY here. I like it though! We drove from the airport to the Argentina/Brazil border where we passed through customs/immigration with no problem and made our way to the hotel. Until we got until Puerto Iguazu in Brazil, we were literally driving on a paved road through the jungle and it was beautiful. I've got some footage of the drive in the video at the end of this blog.

After unpacking at the hotel, we headed out to find some lunch. It was 4pm and we still hadn't eaten anything. We ended up going to a Brazilian steak house where they bring the skewer of meat to your table. I ate some interesting stuff, but it was all amazing. Chicken hearts and fried plantaes were some of the more interesting things I ate, and I think by the end of the night, they had brought us an offering of every single part of the cow that's edible! Ribs, Ribeye, Rump, Shoulder, Sirloin, it just kept coming and man was it good!

After lunch we walked off the meal and explored a street market for a bit before finding a store to sell us some water. You shouldn't drink the water in this part of Brazil so we needed to get some both for drinking, and for simple things like brushing our teeth. After that we headed back to the hotel and waited for the students to arrive.

At 8:30 we boarded a bus with the students to Dinner and a show at yet another Brazilian steak house (yes, I've gotten fatter on this trip!). The food was decent and the show was fantastic. It was a musical/dance show highlighting cultural music and dances from all over Central and South America. It was loud, colorful, and crazy! I filmed a lot of the dancers and you can see them in today's video, but others didn't adhere to ACU's dress code, so I didn't shoot them! Ha!

One cool thing that happened was one of the acts was a lady who swung metal balls on the end of 2 ropes and she'd use them to slap the floor to create a rhythm that she danced to. She came out into the crowd and picked one of the ACU students to stand on stage while she danced around him and swung them all around him. At one point she was spinning them above his head and coming so close that it was knocking his hair all around. Check out the video to see it, it was crazy!

Tomorrow we head to spend the whole day at Iguazu Falls! Look for some breathtaking footage tomorrow for sure (I hope I succeed at that)!

Here's a video summary of my first day in Brazil


And here's a sunset I shot over the jungle from the balcony of my hotel window.

April 3 "Kilmer Told the Cab Driver He Likes Men..."

Oh man oh man. Today was an adventure. Buenos Aires, while interesting, is just not somewhere I'll feel the need to visit again.

Ronnie, Stephen, Scott and I started the day out with a bus tour of Buenos Aires. We drove around town while a girl told us a few facts about the city and occasionally we stopped to look around. The only problem was we didn't stop in any of the interesting historical parts, we stopped at various shopping centers and tourist traps. I did learn a lot about Buenos Aires on the tour, but I would have liked the opportunity to video more historic and famous places in the city. On a positive note, I continued my streak of catching a pigeon by hand in every country I visit. Not sure why I feel the need, but I did. There's a clip of it in the video at the end of today's blog.

After the bus tour, we grabbed lunch at a little bistro and I learned that a Chicken Cesar Salad in Buenos Aires consists of cicken, romaine lettuce, and chunks of bread. No Caesar dressing! It was interesting, to say the least. After lunch, I convinced Ronnie and Scott to catch a bus to the Zoo in Lujan with me. I wrote about it in an earlier post, it's the zoo whwere you can enter the cages w/ the Lions, Tigers, Bears and Monkeys and pet them and such. The 1-hour bus ride to Lujan was definitely an adventure. First of all, once all the seats were full, people packed in the aisle like sardines. There wasn't any room to spare on that bus, or so I thought. Once we got started we soon learned it wasn't a non-stop bus to Lujan, but rather, it made multiple stops along the way. Each stop, MORE people got on the bus! I honestly don't understand how they all fit!! Well, now we're on a packed, hot, bus that really didn't smell all that well when we realize, even though the sign said the trip takes an hour, there is no way we'll be there in an hour. It ended up taking 2 hours. Then came the bad news. Zoo Lujan closed early today!!! I felt horrible for dragging Scott and Ronnie along for nothing but they were good sports about it. We returned to the bus station in Lujan and ate some ice cream and drank some cokes while we waited for the next bus back to Buenos Aires.

While waiting at the bus stop, one of the many stray dogs came up to our table, so I reached out and pet it. Apparently these dogs don't get much affection because 3 more showed up as soon as they saw me petting the first. One of the dogs didn't come to me for affection, but rather, for a pillow. He walked up to me and promptly laid down and rested his head on my foot. Here's a photo I snapped of him relaxing on my shoe.


Yes, I am the Dog Whisperer. Cesar Millan has nothing on me!

The bus ride back to Buenos Aires was uneventful and, thankfully, much less crowded. We discovered when had a problem when we got back to the city though. None of us had the address of our hotel to tell the cab driver. What to do? OH, that's right, I'm a genius. I pulled out the camera and showed him video of the Plaza I had shot earlier in the day and he immediately knew where we needed to go. Now the title of my blog comes in. I've got to give Scott Kilmer credit, his Spanish has gone from none at the beginning of the trip, to much better now. However, in his attempts to talk to the cab driver, he didn't know that the cabbie asked him if he liked men. Scott enthusiastically responded "Si, Si!" We all had a good laugh for a few minutes before telling Kilmer what he said!

We got out of the cab and walked through an open market on the way back to the hotel where I finally got to shoot some Tango dancers. As far as our tour this morning was concerned, the only things going for Buenos Aires are banks, shopping, a floating casino and the Tango, but I had yet to see anyone doing the Tango. Several street performers were dancing and I got quite a bit of footage that.

Tomorrow morning we leave for Iguazu and I'm excited. If you've never heard of Iguazu falls, fire up Google image search and type it in. It's beautiful.

Until tomorrow....

April 2 "I left my heart in Uruguay, and my iPhone in a cab in Buenos Aires"

Today has been an interesting day, to say the least. Ronnie, Scott, Stephen and I left Montevideo, Uruguay this morning and caught a flight to Buenos Aires, Argentina. We have 2 days before the students catch up to us so today is a day of rest and tomorrow we're going to film and photograph the sites.

We landed in a rainy, Buenos Aires around 10:30am and caught a taxi to the hotel. After checking in we walked down to an italian restaurant that Stephen knew of that overlooked the shipyard. The food was simply amazing. I had a lasagna bolognese and it was probably the best meal I've had on this trip so far. After lunch we walked back to the hotel to pass out and get some rest. We're all coming down with a cold, most likely from exhaustion as the average time we were getting back to our Hotel in Montevideo after filming students was after 2am. While getting ready to sleep I learned of a slight problem at the hotel. While it has free wireless, it seems the entire hotel is sharing the 1 DSL line coming into the building. SLOWWWWWWWW and sketchy. I get bounced out of the connection about every 5 minutes or so. But it's free, can't complain too much!

Around 6 we headed out again for dinner and to tour the markets a bit. I bought a few souvenirs and we all had a good time experiencing the cultural differences between here and Montevideo (I prefer Montevideo). After walking around we caught a cab to a steakhouse where I discovered I no longer had my iPhone. Scott happened to remember the name of our cab driver so the next cab I saw I ran out, showed him the name and asked if he could call him. The only problem was, they don't really teach you "I left my iPhone in a cab, can you hop on the radio and ask him?" in Spanish class or at the car dealership where I learned most of my Spanish. So after a few minutes of my broken Spanish and his inability understand any english, I remembered hearing English from the table behind us. I ran back and a group of recent college grads from the states were there and one of them was fluent in Spanish. He asked the driver again and the driver said "you can call the company, but good luck getting the phone back."

When we got back to the hotel I asked the guy at the front desk if he could help me call the cab company and give them the driver's name and see about my phone and he very politely said, "there's thousands of cabs in this city, and hundreds of companies. Without knowing the drivers' company, you wont' find your phone." :/

On a brighter note, after our city tour and filming tomorrow, I've convinced the guys to go with me to Zoo Lujan. It's just outside of BA and it's sketchy enough that they let you go in the cages and pet the lions, tigers, bears, elephants, etc and encourage you to do so and take photos and video. So this may be my last post ever, lol, but I'm excited to go.

Until tomorrow.

APRIL 1 "Oh, Dear...Christian College?"

Today has been an awesome day. I have several videos to post, however all are from the beach trip. I'm too tired to edit more tonight, but we'll see if I have time later on the trip.

Today was Jessalyn's birthday celebration so we ate Fajitas and Cake for lunch. I did a lot of "Food Network" style filming while Raquel and Mariela made REAL refried beans and cooked the chicken & vegetables. After eating the DELICIOUS meal, Raquel and Mariela lit the candles and sparkler/roman candle things (yes, there were freaking FIREWORKS on the cake!!) and we all sang Happy Birthday to Jessalyn. Afterwards, all the students broke out into chorus singing the theme song to "Fresh Prince of Bel Aire." Yes, I was very confused but it was entertaining to watch and film!

After lunch Ronnie and I wanted to go buy Mates so we walked a few blocks over with Scott, Nathan and Lawson. We found an old man selling a TON of Mates from a little card table. Poor Lawson acted as translator for Ronnie and me as we asked a ton of questions about the quality and how to clean it, etc. The guy was getting tired of us by the end but he was very gracious and answered all of our questions and ended up giving us a discount to boot!

After shopping we grabbed some students and headed to a local beach, Playa Malvin. This is where the fun began. Not long after arriving one of the students found a dead fish. And she picked it up and chased people around with it. Soon after another girl found yet another dead fish and before long, "Oh, Dear Christian College" was being sung with dead fish as puppets. As the sun went down I got some GREAT shots of the sunset with the students silhouetted against the sunset. A few time-lapses and a pizza dinner on the beach later, we headed home.

On the way home I had another awesome cab driver that again, didn't speak a word of English, but really wanted to carry on a conversation so we talked about Uruguayen women, the people that drive a horse-drawn cart to collect trash in the city, how my roommate's father raises cows, how my father is fluent but my mother doesn't speak a word of Spanish, how the traffic is CRAZY in Montevideo and about the ACU Study Abroad program and why I'm here filming. REALLY nice guy!

When we got back to the house, I sipped Mate and edited in the dining room while the students watched a soccer game on TV with some local kids. Based on how loud they yelled for almost every play, I'm guessing they had a lot of fun. After the game, Scott and I finished up the last of the shots we needed of the students in the house and headed up to the loft to catch some of more musically inclined students showing off their talents. 2 guitars, a wooden flute and a rainstick formed the bed for several students to sing. Some songs serious, some ridiculous, some in Spanish, some in English, but one thing was for sure, these kids are talented! We left the house around 1:45am and I'm typing this fast as we're leaving for the airport at 7am!

Tomorrow we leave for a few days in Buenos Aires, Argentina before heading to Brazil.

Until then!

I'm currently uploading 3 videos of the beach trip, I'll get them up here soon.

Dead Fish Hammer Throw:


Oh, Dear Christian College


Beach Fun

MARCH 31 "Seis Nueve Cinco....Uno Uno Ocho Uno!"

This morning started with a fantastic breakfast cooked by Roquelle and Mariella. Eggs, bacon, fruit and pancakes w/ peanut butter & jelly. Wimen gave me my first cup of Mate and I'm hooked. Mate, pronounced "Mah-tay," is similar to hot green tea but you use a plant called yerba, pack it into a hollowed out gourd, pour on boiling water and sip it through a silver straw called a bombilla. Mate is the national drink of Uruguay, Argentina, and a few other countries and I have yet to find a group of people without at least one person carrying their Mate & a thermos of hot water to re-fill it with. It was excellent and tomorrow I'll be buying my own for sure.

After breakfast the students headed upstairs for a devo. After the devo was Elementary Spanish but it was the exact same this morning so I shot very little because I got a lot of great footage yesterday. So I got in touch with my boss and co-workers back home to find out what was going on and do a little long-distance work. About this time jet-lag and 20+ hours of solid travel hit so I headed upstairs to the loft to "write and rest my eyes." Haha, I woke up to students coming in to eat lunch.

Lunch was fried fish and it was GOOD. It was accompanied by rice, fruit, vegetables and some bread. I spent most of lunch talking with Rosalinda Walker about her travels to Africa as a missionary and the wildlife she encountered there. While we talked I also sat back and observed the community between the students themselves and with the professors. This is less of a group of people and more of a big family here. I'm sure they have their problems and drama, but there is a strong bond here and it's evident.

After lunch Ronnie, Scott and I walked with the students to University Catolica where several students are taking Intermediate Spanish. Today they had class in the student center so Spanish class was offset by people playing ping pong, studying and drinking Mate. It was interesting to see that in Uruguay, as well as the States, you can generally look at someone and tell whether or not they are a college student. Except for the Spanish being spoken, the scene could have easily taken place in the Bean Sprout at ACU. AFter the students were done with class, Scott and I made them pretend to enter the school building several times so I could get a few establishing shots for when we decided to tell the story of the students studying at University Catolica.

Due to several requests, I was going to attempt to film a cab ride home so people could see just how scary...er...entertaining Uruguayan traffic can be. I hailed a cab home and 2 students caught a ride with me. My cab driver was exceptionally friendly and as soon as I explained I didn't know much Spanish, he immediately slowed down his speech and made sure to use easy words (he didn't speak any English). People here are so friendly! I explained to him I was here filming students from Texas. He immediately said "You are lucky to get to film pretty girls for your job!" Then I explained they were here studying abroad and I was filming them for university advertising, I wasn't just here to film college girls! Once we started back to Casa ACU, I realized this filming was a waste. All the video-game style driving I talked about in yesterday's blog went out the window. I guess it was because I had a camera going but he drove like he was in America! Tomorrow I'll try to film inconspicuously from the back seat and maybe the driver won't notice and behave.

After getting to Casa ACU it was time for Wimen's Christianity in Culture class in the courtyard. In the university setting with 100 kids in class who didn't know me this was a tough class, as you tackle real-life issues, so it was very intense to be discussing these issues and questions with a group of 10 kids you live with.

After Christianity in Culture, I filmed Shelly Sander's Literature class at a local coffee shop (coffe here, by the way, is AWESOME). That film location was a learning experience for me as the lighting was a mix of fluorescent and incandescent and white-balancing and keeping the iris at a comfortable level took a lot of experimentation.

After filming, Ronnie, Wimen, Scott, Stephen, Nathan and I took a 30 minute walk to get some dinner at Don Peperone. Once again, great food, great conversation, great fun. Tomorrow's going to be a long day of filming around the house and at a few beaches, look forward to that summary video as it should be beautiful.

Until then.

MARCH 30 "I'm on a ... roof?"

After a quick breakfast, Ronnie, Scott, Stephen and I headed to Casa ACU. I started the day filming the Advanced Spanish class. The professor is a local Uruguayan and she is a mirror image of the seamstress in the movie, "The Incredibles." When I first walked in to film she asked me (in spanish), "Are you here to film the pretty girls? You are? OK, I'll leave," and she proceeded to hide behind the marker board. Funny lady!

Advanced Spanish was followed by lunch cooked by Roquelle and Mariella. They made a traditional Uruguayan end-of-the-month meal called gnocchi. You eat it at the end of the month because by then you're supposed to be low on funds and need to eat something cheap, yet filling. It was great!

After Lunch I went upstairs to shoot Dr. Shelly Sanders' Literature class. It was a rather un-eventful, typical Study Abroad class until one of the students fell asleep. While it's bad enough to fall asleep in a small class, it's even worse when you're sitting right next to your teacher! That's right, one of the students fell asleep sitting right next to Dr. Sanders. Needless to say she was woken up and a fun laugh was shared by all.

After filming Dr. Sanders' class, Ronnie, Scott, Stephen and I caught a bus to the "old town." The bus ride cost a mere 75 cents each! When we got to the old town we wandered through a few markets selling street art and Mates (more on Matas in a later blog). Stephen was a fantastic tour guide explaining the history of the town and the different buildings and monuments we saw. The most memorable was a HUGE monument erected to mark the tomb of Artigas. Above ground all there is is a large marble statue of a man on a horse, but follow the stairs underground and you walk into a dimly lit room roughly 100' x 100' with nothing in it but an Urn, highlighted by a single beam of light from the ceiling. On either side is an armed guard, a la the guys with the big fuzzy hats in England. No movement, no facial expressions, nothing. Talk about a boring job!

After walking around town we caught a cab back to Casa ACU to film some of Wimon Walker's class. It's the only class that every student is enrolled in so it was a good filming opportunity to catch all the students in one place. Back to the cab ride, though. After riding in several taxi's in Uruguay, all I can really say is video games like Grand Theft Auto, where you speed around a city with no regard for laws or other traffic, are quite about accurate. In Uruguay, green lights don't mean go. The light for the cross traffic turning Yellow means "go ahead and go." Lanes? What are lanes? There's no stripes painted in the road, apparently you just guess how many cars can fit across the road and figure it out from there. I grabbed the door grip more than one time on a few of today's rides! Definitely an experience I won't soon forget! I'll try to video a cab ride before we leave.

After Wimon's class I went to the roof with Ronnie, and Scott to get some scenic shots of Montevideo. While Ronnie shot various students conversing on the roof, I set up a time-lapse of the sunset over the city for about an hour. During that hour I had a lengthy conversation with a Basset Hound down below (lots of howling back and forth!), and I learned that when bored, an empty, plastic 20oz Coke bottle actually makes a very comfortable pillow. I'll upload the time-lapse video at the end of today's blog.

Dinner was a great experience! Ronnie, Scott, Stephen, the Sanders, the Walkers and I went across town to a restaurant called Teracotta. However, Terractta was closed on Mondays so we walked a little ways down the street and found a small restaurant called "Taco Muñoz." The host/waiter/cook (only one person owned and ran the place) was named Ruben "Taco" Muñoz and he was a riot! He kept making jokes and definitely made the meal entertaining as well as delicious. He told us about his life, how he spent 30 years in Argentina learning to cook before coming to Uruguay and how he's had this restaurant for a little over 4 years. The food was excellent and the service was even better. Definitely one of the best dining experiences of my life. On top of that, it was CHEAP! I hope to make a return visit before we leave for Buenos Aires later in the week.

I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot of what went on today (it was BUSY), but hopefully this is enough for those of you who care to know what I'm getting to experience!

Until tomorrow!

Oh, here's that sunset I told you about...

Here's a summary of what I shot on Day 2.

MARCH 29 "Shoulda gone Left"

Despite the ridiculous wind in Abilene when we took off, our flight to Dallas was relatively smooth (for that flight, anyway). The only time the flight got scary was right before we began our decent the pilot got on the P.A. to let us know that it might be really bumpy on the way into Dallas. As he's making his announcement, an imminent bad-tv-movie-style alarm beings beeping ominously behind him. He seemed concerned as he started to converse with his co-pilot as he got off the P.A. Despite the alarm and pilot warning, the flight was good and not too bumpy at all.

Dallas to Miami was pretty uneventful, though Abilene Regional is Buckingham Palace compared to Miami Intl. The gate area was lined every few feet with yellow trash-cans marked "NO TRASH" collecting all the leaks from the ceiling. Did I mention it wasn't raining? But the ceiling was still leaking.

We boarded a 777 bound for Buenos Aires at about 10pm Texas time. The flight was smooth and I was lucky enough to have an empty seat next to me. The lady just on the other side of that seat kept waving her daughter from farther back in the plane to come sit by her, but I had a plan. Every time I heard her walking up or caught her reflection in the in-seat monitor (I watched "Yes-Man"...good flick), I would close my eyes, hang my mouth open a little bit and breathe loud. Ya know, the old "sleeping passenger" trick. It worked every time and I got to have an empty seat to lean on when I finally got tired enough to sleep. After catching about 3 hours of sleep, some moron in the row by the window realized it was light outside and flipped up both of his window shades. The cabin went from a nice pitch-black to noonday sun. Not cool. That was the end of my sleep.

My adventure began soon after landing in Buenos Aires. We had a connecting flight to Montevideo, and thank goodness it was a 2 hour layover. As I exited the plane you I a choice to go left, or right. However there were no signs that I could see, so I followed the flow of traffic to the right. Not too long after that I saw the photographer, Ronnie Ruiz, coming my way so I figured I was on the right track. We got downstairs to Immagration and began the tedious caddle-herding back and forth through the ropes until we got up to the window. We never did see Scott Kilmer or Stephen Shumaker (the other half of our party) but we figured they must have gone a different way. Turns out, we weren't supposed to go through Immigration yet. After getting turned away from several helpful airport employees who flat out said "no" when I asked for help, we finally found our way back to the gate where our next flight was boarding. The only problem was, we had been admitted into the country of Argentina. So we had to pay a $8 exit fee to get back out! That's right. Ronnie and I visited Argentina for a grand total of 3 minutes and have the entrance/exit stamps in our passports to prove it!

Soon after we got to the gate we found Kilmer and Shumaker and had a good laugh of it. Then the 12 people going to Montevideo (it's a 30-minute, dallas to Abilene type trip), boarded the huge 767. That's right. The same plane I flew to Europe on was being used to transport a handfull of people 150 miles to Montevideo. I can't complain though. I had an entire row to stretch out.

After landing in Montevideo we were greated by Wimon and Rosalinda Walker who drove us straight to the Feria. The Feria is an outdoor market, similar to what I filmed in Spain, that only happens on Sunday. Lots of tables of fresh produce, clothing, pirated DVDs, and random crap. One table was even selling dental equipment! We met up with Shelly and Nathan Sanders and 3 students and filmed them shopping and talking to locals for an hour or so before meeting up at a restaurant to eat lunch. Great food. I had some kind of sandwich called a "chivo" something or other. It was just a cut of steak, egg, tomato, and lettuce on a bun, but it was great.

After a quick shower and unpack at the hotel, we headed off to Casa ACU to meet up with the students. It is a huge building that used to be a coffee processing factory. It butts right up to a church that the program seems to be able to utilize whenever necessary.

Immediately we met up with some folks on the roof cooking our amazing dinner and slowly but surely the students came up and introduced themselves. Let me say that my Spanish is NOWHERE near where I thought it was!

Dinner consisted of Steak, Chorizo, Ribs, Chicken, Bread & Salad with no dressing
and Dolce de Leche Ice Cream. Yes, I ate all of that. They don't take too kindly if you turn down food! It was definitely a memorable meal.

After dinner we returned to the rooftop for a devo. My camera light died so the McGuiver in me had the brilliant idea to open up a blank page in Microsoft Word and use the laptop as ambient light. It worked! Yet another use for Office! It was an amazing experience singing praises to the Lord in both English and Spanish on a rooftop overlooking Montevideo. There was a party going on a few rooftops over and they weren't much of a distraction due to the amazing praises being sung.

I can't wait for tomorrow.

Oh yea, I have no internt in the hotel (refuse to pay $6/hour) so I'll update as I can from the Casa ACU. I'll try to get some videos up each day.

Here's a summary of what I shot on Day 1.