Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is happening now! Follow us as Greg, Nick, and Stephen compete to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines before November 23rd. Who will complete the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
During this Party of 5 challenge, (which you can read all about here) each team planned activities to highlight specific team members. When Stephen and I were in charge, we were calling these special events “Easter eggs”. Nick and Tim claimed they didn’t copy our idea for these inspired activities, but I’m skeptical 😜.
Our first morning in Buenos Aires, it was finally my Easter egg day. We took advantage of the ANA long sleeve pajama shirts to prepare for the Argentinian winter weather and hopped in a taxi to a random street, all feeling very confused about what we were doing until we rounded the corner and spotted a beautiful mural by local artist “Luxor”. The piece was perfectly demonstrative of the artistic style I like, (both in my own art dabblings and otherwise), and the neighborhood had a number of other impressive murals to explore as well.
We took a moment for a mini arts lecture as I explained to the fellas how Luxor’s bird mural looked like it was inspired by wood-block print stylings – a look I love. The signature even resembled the old Japanese wood-block prints which I’d learned about in my University art classes. They asked me to interpret what the red dot in the bird’s center meant, and I pontificated about how it might represent the bird’s heart. (What do you think?)
At this point I was already very impressed that team SFO had paid attention to my own travels enough to know that I enjoy photographing the street art in Mexico City – a place I visit often. Or maybe they remembered that I did my first real, large scale mural last year. More likely, they were just very lucky with their guesses.
But little did I know, there was more to come.
We hopped in another taxi for – I assumed – more murals in another part of town, or maybe a hike of some kind, (since the fellas had instructed us to dress in clothes we could get “muddy”). Stephen suspected paintballing.
Instead, we approached a cluster of 3 people standing in front of a blank patch of wall along the street, a collection of aerosol cans at their feet. In the center of this cluster was none other than Luxor, the artist whose murals we’d just seen. Thus began an incredibly fun and immersive mural workshop led by Luxor, and assisted by the folks at Buenos Aires Street Art.
Luxor taught us how to use spray paint for background details and coloring, shading, and line work. Incredibly, he made it just as fun an experience for the members of the group who aren’t particularly interested in painting as he did for those of us who are.
And I’d like to add…my art lecture turned out to be pretty on the money: Luxor has a woodblock print background. (And he instructed us to put something meaningful inside our birds, for example, the red dot heart.) I was quite proud of myself for sensing all of that, though I suppose that’s more a testament to Luxor’s work and how clearly it speaks.
Getting this activity organized was a little more complicated than the other activities we’ve experienced so far (though apparently not more complicated than getting to the VR park in Macau 😛 ). Chatting with Nick and Tim about how they pulled this off, apparently it started with an email to the folks at Buenos Aires Street Art and evolved into a custom experience organized by that group. While it might be hard for others to replicate…it also may not be, and at the very least, it’s always good to be reminded of what thinking outside the box can do in travel. With services like Trip Advisor, Viator, Airbnb Experiences, and more, it’s easy to forget that you can operate outside of those tools too. Sometimes it’s worth just sending an email.
While I’m certain Steven and I created a compelling (and win-worthy!) trip which really highlighted what a family of 5 could do to experience both charm and luxury, I have to hand it to team SFO for picking a perfect Carrie-themed activity: probably more on the nose than they even realized.
And of course, I’d like to give a huge thank you to Buenos Aires Street Art and the talented Luxor as well for an incredible experience I’ll remember forever.
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My favorite of all the experiences in the challenge. Though I would’ve loved to have seen you guys Tango!
Wow!!!! What a great experience. The art looks professional..Did you do the birds yourselves or did the artist do an outline?
LUXOR started us out with the outline (in yellow so that we could get practice doing the bold black outline overtop ourselves.) It was the perfect combination of assistance and room to get creative!
Nice job Nick & Tim – I love that they nailed what Carrie would love. I like Luxor’s bird mural style too.
Que interesante
I’m sure the Argentines were impressed with your ANA long sleeve pajama shirts, knowing the cost of your business or first class flight to get that pajama shirt is probably the equivalent to one of their annual salaries.
and? that’s on them for voting themselves into peronismo. Same as my fellow Venezuelans who voted for Chavez and made almost 8MM of us flee the country.. you know, something called accountabilityl, locus de control interno. Nevermind, you leftists don’t know anything about that. It’s always ‘the other ppls fault’.
Huh? The pajama shirts look like regular gray shirts to keep you warm. I’d never know they’re only available for ANA first-class travelers unless the back is emblazoned with “ANA FIRST-CLASS,” which I still wouldn’t associate with the airline anyway because I would’ve thought it’s referencing a person named Ana.
I was in Argentina while y’all were here. I was Mountain Biking though. I hope you had a great time.