La Venganza Será Terrible (oficial) · Alejandro Dolina

LVST 8 de abril de 2026

·1 hr 11 min·5 clips
On the island of Tracoda, the inhabitants did not speak — they whistled; and at its center sat a lake formed from the tears of Adam and Eve, where none of the world's crying is ever lost.
1. La Venganza Será Terrible, April 8 episode, presents a comic essay on the collapse of summer romance when confronted with urban reality, followed by readings from Sir John Mandeville's 14th-century travel writing. 2. Host Alejandro Dolina is joined by co-host Barton; production by Maike Iglesias, Eugenia Gorostiza; historical research by Cora Barengo; sound by Miguel Vincent. 3. The episode's opening thesis is that summer routines are exceptional, not representative — people mistake beach compatibility (shared swimming, same ice cream preference) for deep compatibility. 4. Barton recounts having gone to Valeria del Mar with the fixed intention of finding a girlfriend; Dolina argues this works because everyone there shares the same intention, creating a mutual signal of availability. 5. The essay lists hazards of summer romance returning to real life: the boyfriend's actual clothing reveals class markers hidden by beach attire ('mallas, túnicas, calzado mínimo uniforms the social classes'). 6. Geographic distance is identified as a structural romance-killer: the summer love may live in La Carlota, Córdoba, transforming 'the return of reality' into 'una empresa logística agotadora e impracticable.' 7. Hotel rooms, cleaned daily by staff, hide the true state of the summer partner's domestic hygiene — a reality revealed when visiting their actual apartment. 8. The holiday diet of fried food, ice cream, and midday alcohol cannot continue in civil life: boiled rice and warm meat 'eliminate the pleasure component associated with the other.' 9. Urban humor differs from vacation humor: certain jokes that work under vacation distension are unbearable in formal urban contexts — Dolina notes he finds 'sand in the face' jokes unbearable on all occasions, not just in the city. 10. A live phone-in segment canvasses callers about the difficulty of meeting people: Rafael from Burlingame says he has had no success in six months; Fernando from Morón says there are girls everywhere but profundizar is difficult; Er from San Fernando blames elevated expectations set by television models. 11. Dolina connects Gabriela from Luján — who blames boys for playing pool and not committing — with Nico from San Miguel, citing western zone solidarity as an initial positive sign. 12. The connection collapses when Nico reveals he is 16 and Gabriela that she is 39; Dolina offers to send Nico back to San Miguel with a sandwich for the trip. 13. Barton reveals he recently had his baptism flight in a small two-seater biplane with his son Félix, who has obtained his pilot's license. 14. Dolina reads from 'The Book of the Wonders of the World' by Sir John Mandeville — an English gentleman supposedly born in 1300 who traveled for 20 years — whose authorship was disputed and whose existence some scholars deny entirely. 15. The island of Tracoda, supposedly in the Pacific Ocean, had inhabitants who whistled instead of speaking; at its center was a lake formed from the tears of Adam and Eve when expelled from Eden, into which all human tears flow and are preserved — 'none of the crying is lost.' 16. Dolina pauses on 'None of the crying is lost' to declare it the opening line of a great poem — one of the episode's most quoted moments. 17. The lake contained pearls and precious stones; once a year the king allowed the poor to dive for them, but over time it became difficult to find poor people because they all grew rich selling the jewels. 18. On the island of Saba in Ethiopia — home of the Queen of Saba and Solomon's crystal-and-gold tomb — apple trees grew babies in summer; the island of Kaura worshipped the first thing its inhabitants saw each morning; the island of Cavalier had snails so large people lived in their shells. 19. The episode's tone oscillates between comic deflation of romantic expectation and genuine poetic appreciation — Dolina treats Mandeville's invented geography with the same seriousness as any literary text. 20. Listeners interested in Argentine radio humor, philosophical-comic meditations on love and disappointment, and literary curiosities will enjoy this episode; those seeking structured analysis or factual content will not.
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