We spent the long holiday weekend in the coastal resort town of Miramar, which is about 50 km west of Mar del Plata. We went with a group of friends, one of whom - celebrating a birthday this weekend - has a summer home in Miramar.

While there was a record number of people traveling around the country this weekend, 2.3 million is the latest figure I read, you would never know that in Miramar. From the looks of it, Miramar appeared to be at only about 20% occupancy, which was fine by us. We really enjoyed the quiet nature of being away from Buenos Aires.

Miramar is a typical oceanfront town with high-rise apartment buildings on the coast. We stayed in one of those buildings and it was a remarkably nice apartment. Strong waves pound the coast and there were a number of surfers. The drive from Mar del Plata to Miramar offers some very nice scenery. I wanted to visit neighboring Mar del Sud, just 15 km from Miramar, but didn’t have the opportunity. Miramar has a nice walkway along the beach for enjoying the ocean views. I actually gotten to the point where I now prefer the beach on a cold, blustery day rather than warm, sunny ones. (I lived too long in Miami).

Miramar has a number of stores, if you’re into shopping. The place looks like it gets quite busy during the summer but the off-season is very tranquil. The nicest aspect of Miramar are the charming stone houses. While Miramar isn’t my favorite place on the coast (I actually prefer even smaller, more woodsy places), Miramar is a nice small, family-oriented town with good beaches and there is a forested area on the western edge of town. Also, there’s the unusual Bosque Energetico, which I will blog about in a future posting. I’ll also try to put up some photos from Miramar later.

The drive back on the autopista from Mar del Plata was incredibly congested. At one point the two-lane road north became four lanes as people drove on both shoulders of the road. But those impatient drivers got a surprise when they ran into the police blockade issuing citations.

We finally got home about 1 am after leaving Miramar at 5pm. We were in two cars following each other. At one point we got separated and had to wait at a Shell station for our friends to catch up. It was fortunate that we waited for them. Later, just as we went through the final toll booth before Buenos Aires, the car with our other friends broke down. So that was another long wait.

I slept late this morning, only to be awaken by a group of drum banging piqueteros marching down my street, welcoming me back to life in Buenos Aires.

National Geographic is getting a lot of publicity for its research on the Gospel of Judas, a heresy just in time for Holy Week. It’s actually quite interesting. But, in this age of the Da Vinci Code, I’m sure someone will soon be writing a bestselling novel about how modern-day descendants of Judas extract some rare, truth revealing, document from the Vatican library, or perhaps they will just sue the Vatican for defamation of character. Dan Brown or John Grisham, take your pick.

Jorge Luis Borges wrote two stories revolving around the tale of Judas, long before this new gospel was discovered. Both stories take the typical route in which Borges writes fiction about supposedly (and sometimes) real scholarly works. (If Borges were alive today, he probably would be up to all sorts of mischief inserting believable falsehoods into Wikipedia).

The first published in 1944 is Tres versiones de Judas, Three Versions of Judas about a gnostic scholar Nils Runeberg who published a study titled “Kristus och Judas”, which follows the premise that the “betrayal” by Judas was actually a sacrifice of Judas, one equivalent to the sacrifice of Jesus. Borges wrote “Judas refleja de algún modo a Jesús”, “Judas is somehow a reflection of Jesus”.

Thirty years later, in 1975, Borges published another story on the Judas theme, La Secta de los Treinta, The Sect of Thirty about a fourth century AD Latin manuscript in the library of the University of Leyden. Borges adds that Gibbon mentions the manuscript in a footnote to the 15th chapter of The Decline and Fall. (I don’t have a copy of Gibbon handy but I assume that it’s a false reference). The first paragraph of the story sets the context and the rest purports to be a translation of the ancient text, except for the final sentence which is one of Borges’ usual twists.

The manuscript is about a cult that worships both Jesus and Judas equally. The betrayal by Judas, thereby condemning himself to hell, was a premeditated act by Judas so that the divinity of Jesus could be demonstrated by the resurrection.

Find and read both stories this Holy Week, then ponder the actions of Judas.

I’ve been away from the blog for almost a month even though a lot happened this past month. There was the 30 year anniversary of the beginnings of the dictatorship, my own anniversary of living in Buenos Aires, the President’s campaign against buying beef, and other assorted items.

But I only have a limited capacity for writing and I’ve spent March working on another writing project: the completion of the first draft of a novel that I started last year. If you’re wondering, the novel is about a man in Buenos Aires who becomes obsessed with the mysterious death of his neighbor.

I will try to blog more often now that the first draft is completed. But, now I’m working on the second draft and probably will be spending even more time writing than blogging, particularly since the novel is getting closer and closer to completion. But somehow I will try to fit the blog into my writing schedule.

I’ve also am now spending very little time online, sometimes not logging in for several days at at time. And when I do, only for a few minutes to check email and a few other things. I started using the Internet in 1990 and this is the first time in 16 years that I’ve been away from it for a significant amount of time. And, I’m actually enjoying not being online!