**your subhead has to be changed. there are no mountains in that part of patagonia.

its a totally flat plain. also, its not the eyes of the guanaco that cast the spell, as you
have written it, but the guanaco herself. your line is awkwardly constructed and
using a possessive apostrophe (“guanaco’s eyes”) doesnt look good aesthetically.
some better options i have written below. “never look” is the stronger one bc it
avoids using a gerund. also after the story has been read my subhead still works: by
not looking into her eyes you avoid both having a spell put on you and/or being spit
on. having “spell” in the subhead as you do invalidates the subhead midway through
the story when the reader learns its “spit” not spell. also “never look a guanaco in
the eyes” is mysterious. what’s a guanaco? why not look one in the eyes? those
questions make a reader want to find out. ​ my subhead is also a ​
warning ​ of sorts,
just as the story itself is a warning for Argentina.

**In addition, I have made a couple of very minor changes in the text. Not to
anything you edited, but to my own words. Your edits I will let stand knowing how it
bolsters your ego to edit my work.

In Patagonia
On the windswept plains of southern Argentina, never look a guanaco in the
eye(s)​
/<singular or plural? i kind of prefer singular “eye”; perhaps because of
“plains” being plural//

avoid looking a guanaco in the eye(s)​

OPTION 2: ​ //not sure I like “looking” though,
gerunds should be avoided

Text and photography by Peter Dahlstrand

It was tree-less, grey-green thornscrub for as far as you could see. There was no
shade and the wind was relentless. The gusts blew the bike out into the road. I had
ridden all day into it in my lowest gear. In twelve hours, I had ridden 80 kilometers.

I passed a shrine to Gauchito Gil and then a sign for “Agro Tourism,” and I turned off
estancia​
onto a one-track dirt road that led back to an ​ . In front of a white farmhouse
shielded by poplars a man sat at a table drinking mate. I had not seen anyone in
three days.

¿Qué tal?​
“​ ”

"The wind is strong. The wind has defeated me today," I said.

"This wind is nothing," said the man. "In the Land of Fire is the strong wind. ​
La
Escoba de Dios​. The Broom of God, they call it."

His name was Guido and I asked about food and water and a place to put up my tent.
Did I also want to go horseback-riding, or to fish at the coast? Did I want to hunt
guanaco? I told him I was too fatigued for those activities and we came to an
agreement that for 100 pesos I would put up my tent and have an ​ asado​of mutton
and breakfast in the morning.

Guido showed me a place along the poplars to put the tent, and as I started to put it
up, he whistled and called for "Samantha." A guanaco came trotting out from the
corral. Two sheepdogs barked and nipped at her legs. I had only seen guanaco from
pampas​
a distance on the ​ . They were like deer with bulging black eyes. As the
guanaco neared, Guido quickly turned his back to it. The guanaco sniffed at his hair
and his neck, and then it rubbed its nose on his back.

"You must not look at the eyes of Samantha,” Guido warned me. “If you look at the
something​
eyes, she will [​ ] on you."

I looked away. But I did not understand the verb. I asked Guido to repeat it, but I still
didn't understand.

Guido tried in English, "You look at the eyes, she put a spell on you."

“A spell?”

“A spell. Yes.”

Whether or not I respected the dark power of certain animals to cast spells, I saw
the seriousness with which Guido turned his back to the creature, and so when she
came for me I quickly turned away. I felt her at my back and then her breathing
upon my neck. I reached behind and touched her fur. I wanted to be friendly. I didn't
want her practicing any witchcraft upon me. She pulled out a mouthful of hair from
the back of my head and I jumped forward.

Guido laughed. "​Cuidate​ something​

. If she [​ ] on you, it will take four baths to remove
the smell. The saliva is dark and very terrible."

I realized Guido had been trying to say that Samantha would spit at you if looked
directly in the eyes. There was no sorcery involved. He had confused the English
words “spell” and “spit.”

I went back to putting up the tent, but Samantha continued to harass me. Being
unable to turn and face her, she would sneak up behind me and pluck out my hair. It
was all very funny for Guido.

When the tent was up, we went behind the farmhouse where the peon was
butchering a sheep for the ​asado​
. He stretched the carcass on an iron spit and staked
it above the fire. A dog chewed on a purpled bunch of intestines in the dust. Guido
and I drank cups of rainwater from a barrel.

"Do you not fear camping?"

"What is to fear?"

Mapuche​
"Do you not fear the ​ ?"

Mapuche​
"What is the ​ ?"

Indígenas​
"​ Chorros​
. They come with a knife in the night. ​ . Thieves. I do not hire
Mapuche​ Mapuche​
. No one hires ​ ." He nodded at the peon. “That one is Tehuelche.
Only a half-breed.”

Inside the farmhouse, we sat at the dinner table drinking Fernet and cola. It was
dark outside and the generator hummed loudly. Samantha looked in through the
farmhouse window, her nostrils pressed against the glass. “She looks for you,” said
Guido. I thought so too. His wife brought out the heaping plates of mutton-chops
with mashed potatoes and a salad of greens and tomatoes. The meat was delicious.

gringos​
"Do you think more ​ will come here?" Guido asked.

"Maybe. But it is far."

"In Patagonia everything is far. But there are penguins here."

"There are penguins in other places too."

The lights flickered and went out. The generator had stopped. It was quiet and his
wife lit the candles and we finished eating by candlelight.

"If only they brought us electricity. If only the government brought us running water
and telephone lines. More ​gringos​ would come then."

"Maybe."

"She destroys Argentina, this Kirchner. This one destroys it worse than the husband.
Esos chorros se roban Patagonia​. These thieves steal from Patagonia."

His wife touched his arm.

"They argue always for who has the true ​Peronismo​ chorros​
. But all are ​ . Thieves.
What they do not steal for themselves, they give to the poor. That is the true
Peronismo​
."
"He is a little drunk."

chorros​
"And what if I am drunk? Are they not ​ ? Do they not steal from Patagonia?"

"Yes, Guido," she said gently.

"These thieves steal from Patagonia because it is where there is money. But soon
they take all the money. Soon there is no more money!" Guido slammed his fist on
Putos chorros!​
the table, his glass bouncing off and shattering on the floor. "​ " He
looked as though about to cry. He stood from the table and left the room. His wife
picked up the pieces of broken glass.

“I am tired,” I said finally.

“Yes,” she said. “The wind was strong today.”

I did not see Samantha at the window. I went to the door and opened it carefully and
started towards the tent. Then I heard the guanaco behind me in the darkness—and
I ran. I heard her stumble on something and I quickly unzipped the rain-fly and
crawled inside. I heard her outside. I heard her nibbling on the tent poles.

In the morning, I packed up and loaded the bike. Guido prepared mate for us and he
apologized for the night before. After all, it has happened before, he said. First the
army will remove her. Then the generals will name the towns and streets after
themselves. It has happened before many times. Argentina will have more towns
and streets named for generals.

He was resigned to it.