Alas, my time among you has come to an end.
You Brazilians, you with your eternally green hills and all-night parties and spontaneous drumming in the streets and biblical downpours of rain and vast sugar cane fields and coconut trees aplenty and beautiful, smiling faces and overfished seas and grimy children and poor schools and unassailable helpfulness and motorcycle taxis and lobster feasts;
You Argentines, you with your decaying, opulent capital city and big passions and sparkling long-distance buses and worship of the cow and psychotic driving habits and fertile soil and dusty, high-desert villages and opulent feasts and goat farms and dry riverbeds for hiking and economic woes and lack of road signs and unswerving hospitality and love of a good yarn;
You Bolivians, you with your political clashes and marvelous, wind-scoured lunar landscapes and road blockades and wariness of outsiders and love of mayonaise and tectonic upheavals and interminable jeep rides and funny hats and freezing nights and undiscovered archaeolgical sites and lakes red and green and white;
You Chileans, you with your emotional austerity and deep, deep mines and eternal deserts and love of breakfast and jagged coastline and worship of 80s pop music and unfathomable mineral wealth and long, unpopulated stretches of highway and delicious seafood feasts;
I bid you all, each and every one of you, a fond farewell.
