An Argentine Thanksgiving

This past week was an abnormal week for me. I only volunteered once because I had a bunch of other things going on. My friend and I decided last minute that we are going to go to Brazil in December for a week. All day Monday and part of Tuesday we organized for the trip. All we have left to do is go get our visas, then we will officially be going to Brazil. I’m so excited!

My Spanish teacher got pink eye last week so we had class over skype instead, since it’s really contagious. It took her eye a little longer to get better because she’s pregnant and can’t take the medicine to make it go away. I was a little nervous to have class over skype, but it actually went pretty well. Plus, it was nice to be able to roll right out of bed and have class in my pj’s ☺

They are making a film in the villa where I volunteer, and one of the most famous Argentine actors is in the movie, Ricardo Darín. I just assumed I wouldn't know who he was because I've only seen one Argentine movie (the one I saw while I was down here, The Secret in Their Eyes - El Secret de Sus Ojos). But he was the main character in that movie, so I do know who he is, AND we all (the volunteers) got a picture with him. I thought that that was kind of neat. I somehow ended up standing right next to him too!

Wednesday, my program took us to the oldest cafe here in Buenos Aires, Cafe Tortoni. It's really pretty and classy inside. There is a lot of stained glass windows. We were a big group, so we got our own little private room. I normally do not drink coffee. When I have had coffee, I fill the mug halfway with coffee and then put caramel or vanilla creamer in the other half. The coffee taste is just too strong for me, I only like to taste a hint of coffee. They brought us out the smallest cups of coffee, and I put 3 packets of sugar and milk in it, and actually liked it. I just need a whole lot of cream and sugar in my coffee. It was a nice little break in the day.

Thursday, I went and watched the mothers and grandmothers walk around Plaza de Mayo for their lost children. I wasn’t really looking forward to it that much because I figured it would be really boring, but it was actually pretty interesting. It was also really really sad too. While they walked, with their signs and pictures of loved one, they sang and clapped which lightened the mood and made everything seem as though they were celebrating the lives of their loved ones, rather than mourning.

Thursday night a group of friends and I celebrated Thanksgiving. There was no way I was not going to celebrate my favorite food holiday! We had people from London, Germany, and Holland there, along with us lovely Americans. We didn’t really have the most typical Thanksgiving foods, but all the food turned out great! We had begets with different flavored cheeses, salad, a Russian salad (which is a type of potato salad), mashed potatoes, mac & cheese, a chicken, chorizo empenadas (sausages), medialunas, sangria, and apple emenadas (the closes thing we could make to apple pie). It was all so delicious! I made the mac and cheese, and it actually turned out really good. I’ve never made mac and cheese from scratch before, so I was a little nervous. I tried finding the simplest recipe (ingredient wise) online. All I needed was milk, an egg, butter, and cheese. I added some ham and onions for some flavor, and both were a delicious touch. Everyone told me that my mac and cheese was the best dish of the night, that made me very happy ☺

After we ate, we went around the table saying what we were all thankful for…things got a little sentimental. All of us feel so blessed to be able to have the opportunity to be able to be down here in Argentina. Without being here, none of us would have met or had the opportunity to become friends. My friends here are my family down here. We are all each other have while we are so far away from home. I was a little home sick earlier in the day because I’ve never been away from my family during Thanksgiving, and this time of year is the time you’re suppose to be surrounded by your family, but I’m so far away from everyone. But dinner that night made me so happy, and just made me feel so blessed to have so many great people in my life (my whole family, my friends back home, the new friends I have made here, my boyfriend and his family). I don’t know how I got to be so lucky, I’m just really blessed.

One of my friends said she was thankful for my mac and cheese ha, and another one of my friends said that she was so thankful that I say the word ya’ll haha. I’m the only Southern here. And then everyone else chimed in saying that they agreed. One of my friends said, “You even say it when you type (in messages on facebook). Every time I read ya’ll, I just hear your voice in my head and love it!” Ha I just thought that that was funny. I’m glad that word can bring joy to other people’s lives.

Several of my friends are leaving this week, so Saturday we all went out to our favorite club for one last big girls night out. It was so fun! We always have a blast there. We stayed out till the sun came up again…what a strange feeling. I’ve never gone to a club back home before, so I have no idea what they are like, but I’m pretty sure they can’t be as good as this one. I love the music it plays and I love the way the people dance. I get spun around a lot…what girl doesn’t like that?! I wish I could bring this club home with me. Once the night ended, we all said our goodbyes (three of my friends left today to go travel around South America). It was a bittersweet night for sure. I have one more friend leaving this Wednesday, and then the next one won’t leave for another two weeks. It’s hard saying goodbye to so many people, so often, but I’m glad that I have been able to meet some amazing people since I’ve been down here.

Until Next Time,
Liz

See the sunlight, we ain’t stoppin’ Keep on dancing till the world ends

I started my Spanish lessons last week! I really really like them so far. My teacher is really nice and I like how she runs our class. All we do is talk the whole time. When I say a phrase that has errors in it, she writes it down, tells me how many errors are in it, and has me correct it myself. I like that. She also writes down all the words I don’t know and for homework has me pick 5 words and write sentences with them. She has me do a lot of work outside of our class too, which is really great, but this past week I was finalizing all my applications for graduate school, so I didn’t have as much time as I would have liked to do some extra work. I look forward to going each time, so that’s great! Hopefully I’ll be able to study more this week.

I sent in my graduate school applications! Feels good not to have to worry about those. Now all I have to do is wait for February to come, and I’ll find out if I’m officially a Dawg or not.

One of my friends left Wednesday morning, so a group of us went out to dinner Tuesday night. We went to this small to-go restaurant where the pizza costs 7 pesos ($1.75 for a whole pizza…yes please!) and went to the park near by and ate our pizza there. It was a lot of fun, but sad to see my first friend leave.

On Wednesday, a couple friends and I went and looked at a church that is right next to the Casa Rosada. From the outside, the church looks like it’s a Greek temple. It looks nothing like a church from the outside. The inside was pretty nice. It has a really big tomb on the side of it with a huge Argentine flag draping over it. I’m terrible with names, but the guy in the tomb was a very important figure here in Argentina, he did a lot for the country a long time ago. He may have been a president, but I’m not sure (ha sorry, this is terrible). Anyways, when he died the people wanted to have his tomb in the church, but he wasn’t catholic so the church didn’t think it was right for him to be there. However, the church ended up allowing it, but built a separate part within the church for his tomb to be kept. It’s an interesting story, sorry I don’t have all of my facts straight.

After the church we went on a tour of congress. It was free, so I figured I’d tag along. Surprisingly, it was actually pretty interesting. The tour was all in Spanish, but the woman spoke slowly and was easy to understand. I was pretty excited that I understood most of what she said (I got the picture, just not all the details).

Thursday night my program organized a tango night. We went to this restaurant/dance place to have a free lesson. I remembered that I really enjoyed my first tango lesson, but forgot how much I really loved it. The second class was sooo much fun! I really enjoyed it, and I think I did really well. I was a lot more comfortable dancing with people I didn’t know, and I was comfortable with them leading. I didn’t try and fight being led like I did my first lesson. I’m a little sad that this was only my second time tangoing. I really wanted to go tango more, but I have been surprisingly busy on my weekends. Plus none of my friends want to go tango, so that doesn’t help. Like I said, after my first lesson, I really hope I take some classes once I get home. So many people have hidden creative talents; like they can draw/paint, sing, speak five languages, take really good pictures with a camera (cough cough my sister cough), or etc. I don’t really have any talents like that. I just think it would be really fun to take dance classes. I really like to tango and think it would be really cool to learn how to salsa too, but those dances and others similar to it are sexy dances (ha). I think it would be so fun to take swing dance classes. I love that kind of music and I like how fast pace it is. It’s more of a good time, a not so serious type of dance. You don’t have to look sexy while you swing dance, you just have a really good time. I don’t really watch dancing with the stars, but I think I would rock that show ha…too bad I’m not famous in any way, shape, or form.

I had a little reality check on Friday while I was at work, it was really sad. The kids that I work with are really great kids, but the environment they live in is just terrible. The road ahead of them is going to be really rough. Kids can be really cruel to each other. That’s the truth anywhere you go in the world, but it just seems worse here. The older girls (11-13) bully the younger girls (8-10). When the older girls are away, the younger girls turn into the bullies because then they are finally the “top dogs.” It makes me sad when the younger girls become the bullies, because they are really sweet girls when they don’t try to appear so tough. I don’t understand what the girls say to each other because they use slang and other words that I obviously don’t know, but it’s pretty obvious when someone is being mean to someone else. Also, some of the time my friend tells me later what the girls were saying. It’s sad.

The boys are a whole different story. I don’t get too many chances to interact with the boys because not a lot of them come. Normally when the boys play with each other they are a little rougher and will push each other around every now and then. That’s pretty normal, and it’s pretty easy to calm them down and move on. This Friday two boys started pushing each other and were rough housing around, nothing abnormal, and then something changed in a split second. One of the boys wrestled the other boy down to the ground and then started kicking him in the stomach and face. All this happened with in 5 seconds. One moment the kids were jump roping and then all of a sudden this craziness happened. I intervened and pulled the kid who was kicking the other kid away and my friend went inside to go tell one of the mother’s what happened. Once I felt like the kicking kid was done I focused on the boy on the ground. He was crying and was curled up in a ball, but got up fine. The other kid ended up just running away. The mother inside didn’t really react to the situation, which was kind of surprising. Five minutes later the kid who had been crying was running around playing tag, so he didn’t get too badly hurt. My friend and I have never seen anything like that. These kids were younger than 10. That day of work was a big reality check, and it makes me really sad.

Another one of my friends went home Saturday, so Friday night we went out for one last big bang, and we also celebrated another friend’s birthday. One of the dance clubs that we can get in for free (through our program) had a free dinner that night, so we went to that. I wasn’t really expecting the food to be that great since it was free, but it was actually pretty tasty. The appetizers were a little strange, but still good. There was an eggplant dip (I actually really liked that. It was pretty similar to salsa), some wraps that had ham and some cream in it, and then smoked salmon on a cheesy cracker (I’ve never had smoked salmon before and I really liked it). For the main course, there was pizza (which was really good!) and a plate with an assortment of different kinds of chicken (crunchy chicken fingers and chicken nuggets), meatballs on a stick, and a fried carne empenada (I love it when emenadas are fried, the flaky crust is really good). For dessert we had a plate full of mini brownies and a few shot glasses filled with different flavors of this mousse/pudding/yogurt thing. Not too bad for a free meal!

On Saturday, I took a day trip to Tigre with my friend Tamara. I’ve been to Tigre a few times, but I never went into the heart of the city. It was pretty cool. It’s a very relaxing city compared to BA. It’s right on the river, and being by the water gives the town a nice vibe. We had lunch there, walked around the market place, got ice cream, and explored the town for a bit. The market there is different than the other markets I’ve gone to. There was a lot of furniture and bigger things you could buy. A lot of the stuff was actually pretty interesting, but not practical to buy if you’re flying somewhere. It’s a cool town. I’m looking forward to the delta tour when my family gets here.

Naturally there was a Mate museum...check out the giant mate cup!

Sunday was a pretty big day. I went to the Britany Spears concert with my friend Talia. Brit has definitely seen better days, but the concert was pretty fun. I knew about half the songs. This band called Teen Angel opened up for her. They are an Argentine band and were pretty terrible. After Teen Angel, Howie D. (ex-backstreet boy) came on. That was a surprise. He was pretty terrible too ha. But he totally redeemed himself when he sang the most classic Backstreet Boys song ever…I Want It That Way. The crowd, myself included, went nuts. In true Buenos Aires style, of course there was a stray dog inside the arena just hanging out. It was a little crazy to see this dog fun up and down the stadium. Only in BA…

Until Next Time,
Liz

Observations Thus Far

I can’t believe I have been here for 6 weeks already. The time has gone by soo quickly, it’s crazy! I’m really looking forward to the rest of my time here. Here are most of the things that I have noticed while I have been down here so far that are different than back home:

You know how the light turns yellow during a green light to warn people that the light is about to turn red. They have that here too, but they also have the light turn yellow during a red light to let you know that the light is about to change to green.

The stars that you see in the sky here are different than the stars you see back home.

Here is what their pedestrian signs look like. I can’t help but smile when I see them.

Dogs Dogs Dogs!

There are dogs everywhere here in Buenos Aires. It seems like everyone owns a dog.
Being a dog walker is a serious profession here. It’s not unusual to see someone walking 10-15 dogs at once. The profession is called paseadores de perros (essentially that means dog walker).
You also need to watch your step on the sidewalks, because a lot of people do not pick up their dog’s poop, so it’s everywhere. Also, a lot of the male dogs still have their manhood.

People stay out in the parks once it’s dark, it’s not illegal like it is back home. I won’t be doing that, but the parks are still pretty full at night.

Whenever I travel to a different country and I introduce myself as Liz, no one has ever heard of that name. I usually tell them it’s short for Elizabeth and I always get the response, “Oh! Like the Queen.” So I figured I would just go by Elizabeth while I was down here. They do know the name Elizabeth, but for short, they call me Eli (pronounced like Ellie). I thought that that was interesting. My host mom calls me Eli and introduces me to her friends as Eli, and the kids I work with call me Eli, and my Spanish teachers call me Eli.

For the first week I was here, my host mom was telling me a lot about everything. Some of the time, she would point to her eye while telling me something. I had no clue why she was doing it. I just thought she just really wanted me to hear what she was saying. In class I asked my teacher, and she said it’s a gesture that means to be extra careful. I’ve seen a few other people make that gesture too.

This is a loud city. Everyone seems to honk at everything, all the time. The morning is the loudest. It’s been lovely waking up to honk after honk after honk. Even when you are on the highway, and the traffic isn’t moving, people just lay on their horns. It’s pointless.

Their shops look a little different here too, especially their shoe and bra/underwear shops. It looks as if they put all of their merchandise in their windows on display. So when you look at their shop from the outside, you’re just overwhelmed with shoes or bras. I think the bra shops are the funniest.

The trash gets picked up really late here. The first pick up is at around 10:30 pm, and it’s so loud! If I am skyping with someone when the trash is picked up, I can’t hear the other person. The second round is at 12:00 am.

In the hallways in apartment buildings there are timed light switches. The light stays on for about a minute or two. It’s a nice way to save energy. They have those in Europe too. I guess in America we just love to waste a lot…oops.

The mayonnaise, ketchup, and other condiments can come in bags instead of containers. I was told it’s cheaper to package them in bags compared to plastic containers. I was also told that they started putting them in bags in 2001, when money became tight for everyone.

These aren’t particularly about Argentina, but just something I found out about the rest of the world. When people go to college, they refer to it as their Uni years (that’s what all the Ausies call it, and a girl I met from Germany). I thought that was interesting. It’s also very common to take a year off before you go to college. There are a lot of kids here who are 19, who are taking the year off before they go off to Uni. There are also a lot of people who are in their late 20s early 30s here volunteering. They said they needed a break from work; they were already burnt out. That makes me a little nervous about the real world!

When it’s really nice out, it’s more common to find older men shirtless laying out getting their tan on than women tanning.

Hard-boiled eggs are a common side dish for lunch and/or dinner.

Eggs, in general, are not for breakfast.

If you hear drums and/or whistles, there is a protest going on. It seems like there is a protest about something almost everyday.

English is everywhere. A lot of the tv channels play American shows that are in English with Spanish subtitles. American music is everywhere! My host mom doesn’t really understand that much English and she only listens to music that is in English.

There is this terrible row of restaurants near a mall here that has McDondalds, Starbucks, Benihana’s, and TGIFridays (of all the chain restaurants in America, I do not understand why TGIFridays is here). There are a lot of Burger Kings around as well. Starbucks is really big here just like it is back home, no surprise there. It’s the same with McDonalds.

At most restaurants and cafes, the napkins are really small and plastic. I don’t really like them. I need big sturdy napkins!

They write the date differently. If we were to write May 13, 2011 it looks like this: 5/13/11 but when they write the date it looks like this: 13/5/11

There are these shoes that are made by Nike and Sketchers that separates your big toe from your other toes and everyone here wears them. They look a little odd to me. (Sorry for the giant image)

People wear a lot of Converse shoes and Ray Bands. Those are really popular brands here.

There is no daylight savings time in Argentina.

When you really like something you are eat, you don’t say that it’s really good. Instead, you say that it’s really rich (muy rico).

The school buses here are orange.

The pipes for the plumbing here are really old, so at a lot of places you are not suppose to put toilet paper in the toilet. It’s supposed to go in the trash. At my apartment, I can put toilet paper in the toilet, so when I’m at other places I often forget, even with the signs to remind you. It’s a hard habit to break.

The public transportation is really good here. They have several subway lines and so many buses. In total, they have 749 buses that take different routes. It’s really overwhelming to try and figure out the buses. I’ve taken them often, but I am still a little intimidated by it. However, there is this pocket size book called the Guia T, that is probably the most important thing you could carry around with you. In the front it has every single street in BA, in the back it has all 749 buses with a picture of what the bus looks like and what their routes are, and in between are grids of the city. The subway closes around 10:30; whereas, the buses run 24 hours a day. However, I prefer the subway because you don't have to sit through traffic.

Young couples here have to problem with showing their affection in public. I see a couple making out on the street almost every day.

Here in Argentina, they pronounce their y’s and ll’s differently than they do in Spain and other countries. In Spain, they are pronounced the same way ‘y’ is pronounced in ‘yellow.’ In Argentina, they are pronounced the same way ‘j’ is pronounced in ‘just.’ The first couple weeks I was here, the difference pronunciation was difficult for me to adjust to. I’ve gotten use to it now and it doesn’t cause any problems; however, now when I try to think of how to pronounce words with those letters in them with the Spain accent, I struggle a bit. I think it’s interesting how the brain (well at least mine) adjusts to things. I’ve been really nervous about going to Chile because I’ve heard the Chilean Spanish is really difficult to understand, but I think I’ll only struggle for a few weeks and will eventually adjust. Then when I come home, I’ll have to adjust again to Mexican/Central American Spanish.

That's all the things I have noticed that are different so far. If I notice anything else, I'll let ya'll know.

Until Next Time,
Liz

Ooooleee Ole Ole Ole, Olee Oleee

This past week was full of fun activities. On Monday I went to this outside bar called Konex. Every Monday night at that bar there is this music event called La Bomba. It’s a bunch of guys (one girl) on drums, bongos, and other similar instruments, and they just play for two hours. It was really fun to listen to, and you couldn’t help but move your hips. It’s the same group each time, but they have different special guests. This week they had this “jolly” man who played some beats on his chest and belly, did some form of beat boxing I have never heard before, and he rapped a little ha. He was really fun to watch. The other guest was a guy who played the keyboard. I really enjoyed that night. I would go every Monday night if I could, but I wouldn't be able to volunteer and then go because I would be too wiped out. I will definitely be going back though.

Wednesday:

I took a free city tour with my friend Tamara. It lasted for about three hours. It wasn’t the best thing I have done while I’ve been down here, but it was good to learn about some of the older buildings and to be able to learn some more of Buenos Aires’ history. There are a lot of really pretty buildings here in BA, so I really enjoyed seeing those. We started at the Congress building.

These purple tress are all over the city. I think they are so pretty.

On the side of a building there is a monument of Evita giving one of her famous speeches. We drive past this building everyday for volunteering and I have never seen this, so I’m really glad I got the chance to see it.

Someone said they thought this looked like a man eating a sandwich ha.

After the tour, Tamara and I went and got empenadas. We stopped in the first restaurant that was cheap, and the empenadas were the best empenadas I have had here in BA. The carne and pollo (chicken) ones were full of flavor and were so yummy! I was still hungry and was in the mood for some ice cream so I went to Mcdonald’s to try their vanilla and dulce de leche swirl. It was DELICIOUS! They really need to bring that flavor to the states. I would eat it everyday. The dulce de leche tasted like a very creamy caramel. I am going to make my family try it when they come down here to visit me after Christmas. I normally have a rule of never going to an American food place (especially Mcdonald’s) while I’m abroad, but I made an exception for this because we don’t have this flavor back home. The ice cream here is really good, but a little pricey (20 pesos = $5 so not that bad), but the Mcdonald’s swirl cone is only 4 pesos ($1), so I’ll be able to save a little money and be able to get cheap ice cream when I have a craving. Now that it’s getting hotter down here, I’ll be eating ice cream more often. Luckily for me, I have great ice cream places near my apartment ☺

After the tour and ice cream, we went to the modern art museum (it’s free for students on Wednesdays). I don’t really like modern art because I don’t really get a lot of it, but there were some interesting things in the museum. Here are some of things I saw that I liked (or thought were interesting):

Friday:

I went to a futbol game! It was so much fun and very last minute. Argentina played Bolivia; it was a qualifying game for the world cup that’s in 2014. I didn’t think I would actually go to one while I was down here because all the games that my program organizes for us are really expensive. They included the ticket, transportations, and a tour guide (just someone to take us to our seats safely I guess, I’m not really sure why that’s necessary). All the games they have organized so far have been local club teams, and I didn’t really want to go to one of those anyways. I only wanted to go to a game where Argentina played as a country, so this opportunity was hard to pass up. The game went by really quickly too, which really surprised me because whenever I watch a futbol game on tv, it feels like it drags on and on. I was talking to my friend Marco (he’s from Italy), and he said he went to an American football game while he was studying abroad in Ohio (of all the states he could choose from, I don’t know why he went to Ohio ha), and he was saying that that was really boring because it’s so long. He has a good point (when comparing football to futbol). I really enjoyed watching the game in person though. It’s so much better (I feel that way about all sporting events though). The crowd’s energy was so great (it wasn’t as crazy as I was anticipating it to be), and I really enjoyed listening to the people yelling in Spanish. I heard them yell “iBien!” and “iPor favor!” a lot, and they called the refs some bad names too.

One of my friends is living in a hostel, and she’s the one who told us about the game. My friends and I went with her and a big group of people who were staying at the hostel. The majority of the group were guys from Israel. I’ve never met anyone from Israel before, so it was cool to meet them. They were all really nice guys, and were really fun to hang out with. Most of them are just traveling around and are only staying here in BA for a week or so. Whenever you travel somewhere, people always tell you “Don’t be a typical loud, drunk, American. It makes you an easy target.” Well, I think that needs to be changed from American to Israelite(?). Before we left for the game, the guys took some shots and drank some beer, to get in a good mood for the game (as they said). In order to get to the stadium we had to take the subway. It was one of the many rush hours, so the subway was packed. The subway is a really common place to get pick pocketed, so I’m always extra careful when I ride it, and try not to speak English (if I do, I try to be quiet). These guys pretty much did the complete opposite. They were yelling to each other in Hebrew and passing around a big bottle of beer to drink. Natually, one of the guys ended up getting his camera and futbol ticket stolen, during the first 5 minutes of being in the subway. I’m not trying to blame him, but there are some different, more cautious, choices he could have chosen. I felt really bad for him, but he was fine.

After the game, we all went back to the hostel and the boys cooked an Estonsia for us (this is pretty much a BBQ, but the grill you use to cook the meat is different and there’s a certain way to do the cooking). Hands down, it was the best steak I have had since I’ve been down here, and probably one of the best steaks I have ever eaten in general. I don’t know what those boys did, but it was delicious!

After dinner, we all just sat around listening to music. At first the music came from an iPod, but then people started bringing out their guitars and a keyboard. That was really fun, just sitting around and singing. It was interesting to listen to people sing American songs. Since English wasn’t their first language, every now and then they would sing the wrong words or just mumble through a part. It was pretty great.

I have really been enjoying talking to people from other countries. I’m just fascinated with the different cultures and life styles. I found out that in Israel, more guys go straight into the army right out of high school, then after the army it’s common to travel for a bit, and then go to college. The average age for starting college in Israel is around 24/25 years old. I also had the pleasure of hearing what this one guy thought of grinding (the lovely way a lot of Americans dance). Apparently, it’s not very common in other parts of the world. The guy was telling me how he was really surprised when a girl started dancing like that with him while he was in California. He went through several phrases. At first he was shocked and confused. Then he thought it was awesome and was really enjoying it. But then he did not like it at all because afterwards the girl would just leave. I thought that that was really funny to hear his point of view.

Saturday:

I went to the Palermo market place with my friend Tamara. It’s one of the smaller market places, and nothing really repeats itself, so I like it. I ended up buying that piece of art I talked about a few weeks ago. The guy that had a series of drawings that had to do with how people are a slave to time.

I know art is subjective, but this is how I interpret this drawing. The guys on the right are trying to go back in time, while the guys on the left are trying to go forward in time. People are always thinking about the past or worrying about the future, but rarely do we fully embrace the moments that are happening in the present. I am definitely guilty of this, so I bought this drawing to remind myself to enjoy life as it happens and not be so preoccupied with what happened in the past or with what is going to happen in the future. I know that that sounds really cheesy, but I feel like it’s a good reminder to have in my life. The drawing is pretty simple, but I really like it.

After the market place, we met up with some other friends and had a free tour of the Casa Rosada (The Pink House). It’s where the president lives. The tour didn’t last that long, but it was really interesting to see some of the rooms. I thought the art work was the most interesting part of the tour. There were a few classic looking pieces of art, but I was really surprised with the amount of modern art that was there.

This night was my first girls night out, and it was absolutely amazing. Before we went out, my friend Tamara and I went over to her friend’s (Marion, from Germany) apartment. She lives on the 17th floor and has an awesome view! We sat on her balcony, drank a little wine, ate some snacks, and just talked. It was a good time. Later we met up with the rest of the girls (there were 7 of us total) at the club. The club was a lot of fun. It’s really big, and has many different rooms, and in each room they play different music. We mainly only stayed in two of the rooms. The room I liked the best had music like Rhianna, Offspring, Joan Jet, Shania Twain, Shaggy, Rolling Stones, and other random music like that. I always enjoy myself when I know all the music, and here they play a lot of older American songs, so it’s great for me.

The guys here were actually a lot better than the guys from the last time I went out. They were almost normal…almost. At some point during the conversation while talking with the guys he they ask if you have a boyfriend, and I say I do, and then they follow it with is he here, and I say no back home, and then they seem not to care and are just like oh ok that’s really far away. About half of the guys say they have a girlfriend, but that it’s ok to be hitting on me because she’s not here. Just awful. However, I experienced something pretty refreshing. So two guys came up to my friend and I, and one of them really wanted to talk to my friend and the other one just said hey to me. After I said hey, he told me right away that he had a girlfriend and I was just like cool I have a boyfriend too. And then he went off telling me how much he loves her and what not. That’s rare to hear from any guy, but it was very refreshing to hear that from an Argentine. He was fun to talk to.

There’s an outside part to the club so we went out there, and it was easy to talk to people because the music wasn’t as loud. I’m actually a little surprised to how many younger people can’t speak English. I just kind of assumed everyone would be able to speak at least a little. It’s really fun to practice speaking with people while you’re out. A good amount I can’t understand (since I don’t know a whole lot and on top of that the loud music doesn’t help), but it’s fun meeting new people and talking. We ended up staying out till about 7 in the morning. Ridiculous! It was so much fun though and really need to watch the sun rise on the coast.

Until Next Time,
Liz

So Many New Experiences

This past Wednesday, my host mom invited me to go to Tigre with her to have lunch with her brother and some friends. The organization I am here with in Buenos Aires organizes several activities each month for everyone, and this past Wednesday, they were going to go to the modern art museum. I was planning on going to that, so I told my host mom I would love to come to lunch, as long as we were back by 6:00 (when the museum tour started). She said that would work out, and that we would definitely be back before then. Having been living here in Buenos Aires for about a month, I knew not to take that statement as a sure thing, but I still decided to go anyways because how often would an opportunity like that come up. Plus, I can go to that museum whenever. We took the bus to the train station, took a train to Tigre, took a car to go to the port (we were eating on an island), and then took a small boat to the island. The lunch consisted of crackers with cheese and salami, salad, a variety of meat, and a whole lot of vino. Everything was so delicious, and I really enjoyed it! My host mom’s brother’s friend lives on a sail boat and said he was planning to sail to Colonia, Uruguay that weekend or the next weekend and invited my host mom, another girl, and me to join. I thought that that was really nice of him, considering I just met him. I told him I’d love to go and to just let me know when. In true Argentine manor, the lunch did not end for hours. We didn’t get back to Buenos Aires until 8:30. Longest lunch ever!

As soon as we returned to Buenos Aires, I met up with a couple friends and we went out to dinner at a sushi place, called Wasabi’s. It was soooo delicious, and pretty inexpensive for sushi too! I normally do not eat just plain fish because it’s too slimy for me, but one of the salmon dishes there was so good. It was just a piece of salmon laid over some rice, and I absolutely loved it! The girls I went to dinner with have been living here in Buenos Aires since July, so they pointed out some other really good restaurants near by. I can’t wait to try them!

Friday was my last day of Spanish classes. I am so relieved that that class is over. I did learn a lot and did enjoy it over all, but I feel like I could have learned a lot more. I’m planning on taking this week off and doing some studying (with my lovely flashcards) on my own. Then next week I will start private lessons; however, I’m still in the process of working out the details with the teacher. I’m really looking forward to the private lessons!

This past weekend was a very interesting experience. I ended up going sailing with that man I met on Wednesday. However, my host mom and the other girl did not want to come, which I was greatly disappointed in because that meant I wouldn’t really know anyone on the sailing trip. Before I said yes to the trip, I asked my host mom if it was safe to go sailing with these, to me, strangers. She said of course it would be safe and thought I would really enjoy it. She was right, I did enjoy the trip. I have never gone sailing before, so I thought this was a great opportunity that I couldn’t say no to. In the boat was the Captain, Ernie, another man, Pepe, and another woman, Cris. They were all around the age of 60 years old. There were definitely some awkward moments, but over all, the trip was great. They were all very friendly, and drank wine like it was water (the way of life here).

We all met up Friday night and slept on the boat. The first night we ate dinner on the boat and had calamari with rice and some kind of sauce. Normally, the only fish I eat is sushi. I am not a fan of seafood because most of it has a fishy taste that I am not a fan of at all. But I tried this dish and absolutely loved it! The calamari didn’t even really have that much of a taste. The sauce was what made the dish so good. Something I have noticed while I’ve been living here in Buenos Aires, is that they don’t really have spicy dishes. I found out (during the sushi dinner the other night) that Argentines don’t really like spicy foods, and what they think is spicy isn’t really spicy. When Ernie handed me my bowl he said to be careful with it, it’s spicy. I can handle a little spicy, but nothing too hot, and I didn’t think this dish was spicy at all. I thought it was just really flavorful. I love being in a country where I can handle the spicy foods; where as, when I’m with my boyfriend and his family, anything they considered “mild” is too spicy for me to handle.

Sailing all day Saturday was pretty enjoyable. It’s really relaxing, and was a nice break from the noisy city. Unfortunately, a bolt on one of the sails broke a couple hours into the trip, so we had to use the motor the rest of the trip. That slowed us down by about three hours. I enjoyed more time on the boat though. Also, I hardly ever get to enjoy sunsets, so I really enjoyed watching the sunset Saturday night.

That night, we went to a restaurant that they were familiar with, and it was so good! That was one of my favorite parts about the whole trip. I love going out to dinner with people from here because they know where to go and what to order. We ended up getting this cheese dish that had a bunch of different seasonings in it, and I wish we had ordered three plates of it. I loved it! Ernie had ordered the variety meat plate for all of us to share, and that was pretty good too. There were a few things in the mixture that I had never tried before, so I tried most of them. I ended up trying cow intestines, and it was disgusting. They waited till after I tried it to tell me what it was, but I didn’t like it before they told me what it actually was. Making Ms. Manners and Emily Post proud, I spit it out (discretely) in to my napkin.

Pepe had been drinking wine all day long, and was pretty drunk. He thought that it would be a great idea to speak English the whole time to the waiters at the restaurant. He knows less English than I know Spanish. His thought process was, if I speak English, everyone who works at the restaurant will treat me nicely because they will think I’m a tourist. Nonetheless, it was quite entertaining to watch.

On the way to Colonia, I sat in the back corner of the boat the whole time. On the way back to Buenos Aires I sat in the same place. However, that was a bad decision. Like I said, this was my first time sailing, and the only thing I know about sailing is from watching movies. The one thing that the movies taught me about sailing is that you make sure to stay clear of that long piece of wood that holds the mail sail that can swing back and forth. Usually, in the movies, someone almost always ends up being knocked overboard by that piece. I knew to stay clear of that, but I had no idea that I needed to stay clear of the cords that control that big piece of wood. The wind changed like that, and the next moment I get smacked in the face by the cables, and I watch my sunglasses sink in the water. I had no idea what had happened to me; I was in shock ha. It didn’t really hurt that much, but man were my eye watering. It’s like when you get smacked in the nose, and tears automatically start coming out. I just have a little mark where I got hit, so no big harm was done, and my glasses weren’t expensive so no big loss there either. Needless to say, I stayed clear of those cables the rest of the trip home, and learned a valuable lesson.

When I came back to the apartment, my host mom told me she really missed me this weekend. How cute! I missed her too though, and it was good to be back.

I’m really grateful that I got to experience such an unique weekend here in Argentina.

Until Next Time,
Liz

Graffiti Tour

For some reason, the picture quality messed up on a few of the pictures, but you still get the idea. Enjoy!

This piece is an example of graffiti artists using stencils. It was really big and I couldn’t get a picture of it as a whole, but here are bits and pieces of it.

This piece was done by my favorite artists Jaz. It has life (on the left) and death (on the right) in it and shows that they are both connected with the three lines in the middle.

This artist’s name is Nerf. I thought that this piece was really cool because he did this free hand, without using rulers. The lines are all perfect!

This piece is done by a woman, who is the only well known woman graffiti artist here. She tries not to be too cutesy, but can’t help it. Whenever you see her work, you just can’t help but smile.

This piece is also done by Jaz. It’s a lot cooler to see in person because it’s so big! If you look at my previous post, I’m standing in between the two bears, for a better perspective of the size.

This piece is actually a memorial that is a political piece. It shows that the law is as slow as a snail and a turtle, is full of rats, and that the law is blind and sleeping. We drove by it, so I didn’t hear the whole story about why it was put there. I thought it was a really interesting piece though.

This is the last piece we saw that day. It’s a memorial piece that is referring to the dark time period when the country was ruled by a dictatorship (during the "Dirty War"). This young man was abducted and murdered by the dictatorship, he was 22 years old when this happened, one year younger than me. During the dictatorship, thousands of people “disappeared” (either abducted or murdered). Many of the younger children were given to other people to be raised. The grandmothers and the mothers (if they were not murdered) would gather together in Plaza de Mayo (where the president’s house is) and search for their missing children. They couldn’t stand still because it would be to obvious that they were organizing something that was against the dictatorship, so they would walk, circling and circling, around Plaza de Mayo. If a woman was searching for her missing child(ren), she would wear a scarf a certain way. Today, their symbol is a scarf and they still meet every Thursday at Plaza de Mayo. (All of this is from memory from the tour, forgive me if some of the details are not perfect). Lost children are still being found today. As little as 3 weeks ago, a grandmother found one of the missing children. After the dictatorship, there was a free blood test offered for children to test and see if their parents were their real parents, but many people refused to take it because they didn’t want to find out the truth, if their parents were not truly their parents. I kind of understand that, but that would just be really crazy if the people in your life you thought were your parents were not. (One of my friends told me this, so take it as you may. I just think the whole thing is just nuts).

Anyways, back to the picture. Each individual square was painted by a different family member or friend of Cristian. On the bottom right, the messy one, was painted by his three year old niece (so precious!). As you can see, someone had spay painted a few tags over this memorial. The graffiti “artist” who did this was very upset because the people who did this mural put it on top of something he did, so to get them back he vandalized this piece. He had no idea who this guy was, why he was so important, and what it represented. The community was very upset (rightfully so) and tracked him down. They asked him why he did it, and then they told him what it represented. It’s not there to only represent this one injustice, but all of the injustices that occurred during the dictatorship. The boy felt terrible, and apologized to the family, friends, and artist profusely. Everything is ok today, but it’s still sad to look at this piece, with all it’s meaning, and it be vandalized.

Until Next Time,
Liz