David is a delightful young man with the voice of a very Mancunian, 14 year old Alan Carr. He is a firm believer that all problems can be solved with a nap and Whitney Houston’s greatest hits. Aside from using his year in Buenos Aires to become Julia Roberts in Eat Pray Love, David hopes to finally get a decent sun tan, and the 6’2″ Latino Adonis of his dreams. Improving his Spanish would be good too.
Welcome to part two of my blog, designed to do nothing more than spark jealousy in all of you poor students freezing to death in your questioningly habitable accommodation. So I guess we’ve missed a few pinnacle national holidays together! Such as Halloween, which I spent as a zombie pirate in a five star hotel, and then sat in a jacuzzi until 3pm the next day watching the Manchester vs Derby and being an absolute goddess. A month on, still in immense debt, still a Kardashian. Another nationally adored holiday was, of course, my 21st birthday, which was a drunken haze of fun, and an attempt to hide a shindig which got immensely out of hand from my landlord. I failed.
As I lay typing this in a sultry ‘Babestation’ pose, dying from sleep depravity from a weekend at Creamfields (yes, it exists here too!), which I will narcissistically rant on about another day, I thought I’d tell you all about the first trip I took here. One of the Seven Natural Wonders of the world: Las Cataratas del Iguazú.
For those of you who don’t speak Spanish (shame on you), Las Cataratas del Iguazú are a giant group of waterfalls on the border of Argentina and Brazil, where it’s dead hot and there’s a Brazilian buffet 10 minutes away (priorities, David). I could probably go as far to say it’s the greatest thing I’ve ever done; seeing something as incredible Iguazú falls honestly creates about as much internal existential inferiority as having a brew and a chat with Albert Camus.
So the journey started off innocently enough with a coach trip to the hotel, essentially an excuse to be the living, breathing stereotype of the British by getting smashed and making absolute tits out of ourselves to numb the pain of a 20-hour journey. A bottle of Fernet, a hellish black substance which sort of tastes like Jaeger mixed with shame and regret, and a re-decoration of the coach toilets with black vomit later and we were there! We stayed in gorgeous wooden cabins in the middle of a forest, over the road from the main hotel, which had an amazing party area consisting of a DJ area, a sort of wooden-hulu-tiki-bar-kind-of-thing (a bar), and a GIANT SWIMMING POOL. Only the best for Moston’s hottest socialite, darling. The highlight of this was without a doubt the fancy dress party, because I won best outfit, gallivanting away with an Argentinean football shirt which I obviously deserved to win because I looked FIERCE.
Brits abroad aside, it’s impossible to express how incredible it was seeing these waterfalls in all their beautiful, water-y glory. The only thing that could have improved the experience would be to jump on a speedboat and drive into them, so we did! We even went on a little safari ride through a jungle, where we had to sit and watch a single bird for about five minutes because it was the only sign of wildlife we were fortunate enough to find. Apologies for the photo below by the way, this is me on two hours sleep with a drag queen’s worth of eyeliner permanently stained on my face. It took all the strength in the world to lift up that arm and smile.
As one of those people, which some of you may be too, who normally has to frequent the seventh circle of hell known as Ryan Air for their holidays, being fortunate enough to see something as awe-inspiring as Iguazú really emphasises the point of making the most of your year abroad. Yes I have about 20p in my bank account (only joking, I’ve got £15.59), but adopting that sort of “eehh f**k it” attitude means you get to make your friends at home extra jealous when they see your new profile picture on Facebook.
Well this concludes yet another post in a day in the life of me, and I love that we’re getting to know each other oh so very well. Upon finishing this blog post a few weeks later, I’ve now completed the treacherous 24 hour journey back to England for the Christmas holidays. I’d have loved to have travelled but, as you’re very much aware, I’m extremely poor.
Speak soon!
David xoxo
P.S. an enormous thank you to Lucia Barreiro and Lucas Cumberlege for robbing your photos. You both give me LIFE, and it was a pleasure getting to know you both.
P.P.S make friends with somebody who has a selfie stick, avoid the shame by never actually holding it in photos.
David Robinson
Images courtesy of David Robinson