The wine region.
Typical landscape: a flat country, save for the mountains in the background. A white chalky earth, normally rather dry, but the Mendocinos have built a vast array of irrigation canals, which also serve to flush the gullies in every street of Mendoza city. If you sleep in Mendoza city, you may be awaken at around 4AM by what sounds like a sudden hurricane-like wind. This is the sound of what I believe is irrigation water being released through the gulllies in the streets of Mendoza. Water is released from the local river which flows from the Andes. I suppose irrigation happens at night, so that the sun doesn't boil the water and destroy the vines.
Wine-making is nothing new to Argentina, as it is believed to have started in earnest at the start of the 19th century. It has evolved into a national industry....
... and a somewhat lavish lifestyle. This sculptured barrel is at least 4 meters in diameter. It's no longer used, but the new ones are plenty and just as big. Smaller barrels are still made out a special wood, which helps give added taste and optimal maturation. These are replaced after a few years when they can't contribute to the vinification any more.
This is in the Bodega Escorihuela Gascon in Mendoza. (http://www.escorihuela.com.ar)
Shopping malls are actually just as lavish as our own, and as John would confirm, relatively pricey for the country.
A beggar less than 100 m from the shopping mall, on the way to the bodega. Not a bad positionning. Geographically speaking. You see the same scenes in France. Disenfranchisement/disempowerment seems to make such practices more common, especially in latin countries, me thinks.
We enjoyed a free visit at the Bodega Escorihuela Gascon (bodega=winery), in the charming company of Jessica Tolin, PR (I wish I had a pic of her). She taught us the basics of wine tasting, and now I can at last pretend to know something about wines. At least in front of an ignorant public. Other people's ignorance is always my bliss!