En la Tierra del Vino

Thursday night, on the 6th of October, I left with two friends for La Tierra del Vino (or the land of wine) AKA Mendoza, Argentina. We were taking an overnight bus to the city so that we could optimize our time in the wine capital of Argentina. The ride there was actually the most comfortable bus ride of my entire abroad travelings. The bus was pretty empty, so we each ended up getting a row of seats to ourselves. Also, to start the journey off, we shared a bottle of Cuban rum, which gave us sweet dreams and a deep sleep.

DAY 1

When we finally arrived to our hostel on Friday, I go to the front desk to check-in since I had made all the reservations. The woman working there was taking a little long to pull up our info, and we all took a couple of nervous looks around. Then we find out, that (in true "Nora" style) that I had made the reservations for the following week! Luckily they had one room available for that night, but we'd have to find a different place for the rest of our trip. Too bad, because that hostel was really nice, and the people were super friendly. This first day, we just walked around the city of Mendoza, bought groceries, and grilled out at the hostel. This was the very first night I tried Argentine steak... it was okay. Steak, as it turns out, just really isn't my thing.

DAY 2

First thing Saturday, we moved to our new hostel, which turned out to only be a convenient block away. Then we took a bus out to the wine district, which so happened to be called Maipu (pronounced "My poo") so you can only imagine the fun we had with that. When we got to Maipu, it was freeeezing cold and really windy. To make matters worse, the bike shop that we were told to rent bikes from was closed. Since we had made it all the way out there, we were determined to at least see one vineyard. Finally we found a wine museum/bodega (bodega is where wine is made). We got a brief explanation (in Spanish) of how the wine is produced, and then finally got to taste authentic Argentine wine. It was delicious.

After the museum, we found a little shop where you could sample a bunch of different homemade dips, jams, cheeses, and olive oils as well as delicious liquors. After some sampling and purchasing, we headed back outside. We were pleasantly surprised by the beautiful weather that had developed while we were inside! Perfect for riding bikes! So we decided that we'd eat first, and then find someplace to rent bikes and continue exploring the vineyards.

Lunch was awful. But after that we found a cute bike rental place owned by this nice old lady. My friend Dan and I fulfilled my lifelong dream of riding a tandem bike!! It was the most laughing I'd done in a looong time. Pretty tricky to get the hang of at first, but afterwards we just cruised along. We spent the rest of the day biking around the vineyards and stopped by a glorious establishment named the Beer Gardens. They only served three different home-brewed beers, but they were delicious and the place itself was so quirky and adorable. I could have spent hours there in the sunshine. Aside from the places we stopped, the scenery itself was absolutely amazing. The contrast of the bright green vineyards with the blue sky, and then topped off with the backdrop of the Andes mountains, it was just unreal.

We eventually left Maipu, and had a quiet night in the hostel, where I got my first opportunity to cook since I had been in South America. I made pasta, it was just okay (I blame the available ingredients) but finally being able to cook my own meal was very enjoyable.

DAY3

Sunday was our first day of adventure. We got picked up early to go white water rafting in the Andes. The car ride there alone resulted in an excessive number of mountain pictures. I couldn't help it though; I never get to see mountains! When we got to the river, we find out that they scheduled too many people for the time slot, so they told us that we would have to wait about 2 hours... but on the bright side, they would take us on a hike and let us go zip-lining for free. The zip-line was pretty weak, but better than just sitting around. The hike wasn't too incredible either, but we got some exercise and great photo ops. Then it was finally time to raft. They gave us “waterproof” outfits to wear, and off we went to learn the commands (in Spanish mind you). The rafting was fun, the water was frigid, and the views were fantastic.

DAY4

Monday was our last day there (and no we didn’t miss school, it was a holiday). We decided to go paragliding. I was super excited since it was another adventure to check off of my to-dos. We took the drive back out to the edge of the Andes to the base camp for the paragliders. It was a neat place, middle of nowhere, abandoned building… if it wasn’t such an exciting atmosphere, it would probably be the great setting for a horror movie. We then took a ride up the side of a mountain on this zigzagged trail in a rickety truck. The ride up was almost as exciting as the glide down haha. Skip to take off: we were attached to another (professional) glider. As the wind caught the parachute (or kite… whatever you call it) they yell for you to run. You literally run straight off the side of the mountain… super fun! From there on out we just floated along, every once in a while catching a fast burst of wind. The most exhilarating part was the landing. We did this downward spiral thing and the force of our wind speed was so strong I couldn’t really feel my face anymore haha. After I landed I took a tiger snooze in the sun while I waited for my friends to land. This resulted in the notorious shin tan (I was wearing cropped pants) that lasted through the rest of my trip.

We spent the rest of the day wandering around Mendoza, seeing the parks, eating ice cream, and doing some last minute shopping. We then caught an over-night bus out of the city to make it back to Buenos Aires just in time to catch our Tuesday morning classes.

Well until next time, (which is hopefully soon since I’m totally slacking on my catch-up blogs)… Chau!

Another City: Rosario, Argentina

Rosario was my first time outside of Capital Federal Buenos Aires, so I was super excited to see a different aspect of Argentina. Rosario is the second largest city in Argentina, the birthplace of Messi (one of the greatest fútbolers of this time), and the location of Argentina's flag monument (which we got to watch a 10 minute tourist/advertisement video on).

Our entire group of ISA students rode to Rosario in two Semi-cama Omnibuses (nice tour buses that are common for distance traveling in Argentina). We all stayed in the same hotel, and within the first ten minutes of check-in we all were sticking our heads out of the windows of the building and yelling to our friends in the different rooms all over the hotel... we weren't used to being surrounded by all of our friends, so the close proximities were a nice change.

We were only in Rosario for two days, so our first day we spent just walking around and exploring. We saw some of the city, the main shopping areas, the overly-advertised flag monument (which was admittedly pretty impressive), and some ferias near the water.

On our walk home, we were walking back through the heavily crowded shopping area and we saw a street performer beginning an act, so we decided to stop and watch for a little bit. Guess who got selected from the crowd to participate in a Spanish-spoken magic show??? THIS GIRL. So I nervously join him, in front of the crowd. He starts talking to me and asking me questions, after having him repeat a question he realized I wasn't a native speaker... but fortunately I answered his questions accurately and followed his directions for the first part of the trick. He then selects another girl from the crowd, she was an Argentine. He gave her instructions for the second part of the trick, unfortunately for her, she didn't do it the right way. He called her out on it and made fun of her in a way that didn't seem like it was that funny to the crowd. When she didn't laugh at his joke at her expense, he accused her of having "malas ondas" (literally bad waves, but it means she didn't give off a good vibe). He then lectured the crowd that they had to be having a good time and have "buenas ondas" in order to stay and watch his show. Everyone started to get uncomfortable, and people started to leave since this guy wasn't in the least bit enjoyable to watch and he had basically brought one of his assistants to tears. I sooo badly wanted to get out of this, and I could tell that my on-looking friends did too. So I asked him if he wanted to start the trick over. He did. So I returned the cards I'd been given and at the first opportunity, my group and I ran for it. I guess I'll never know how that magic trick turned out... good thing I don't care. Meanest street performer I've ever seen. Actually, the only mean street performer I've ever seen.

After our nightly entertainment, we went to dinner (nothing special), had some drinks, and went out to this club that we'd heard about all day. There were only a few places to go out to in Rosario, so everyone had been buzzing about this club... we heard that it had something like 11 different stories, an indoor pool, etc... Turns out it only had like 4 stories, maybe 11 rooms, but only a few were open since it was off-season, and I never saw a pool... Besides all of that, we had a blast. The club was really fun, good music, and to top it all off we were with all of our friends.

The next day, we all went to the beach. Well it was technically a beach. It was the sandy coast off of the river Paraná. Way different from any beach I've ever known, but after about 3 months of winter in the city, I'd embrace it with open arms. The water was freezing, I didn't have a towel or blanket to lay on (so I strategically laid on my sun dress), and the sand was weird, but the sun was warm and the friends were there, so I enjoyed it. We spent the entire day out in the sun before heading back to Buenos Aires, a little bit happier and a lot more sunburnt than when we had left.

...More catch-up posts to come pronto!

Chau!

The Great Cell Phone Adventure

On Sunday, September 11th, I lost my second phone in Buenos Aires. I had just sent a text message before collectivo 15 pulled up right outside of Barrio Chino, slipped my phone into my pocket so I could pay the toll, and got on the jam-packed bus. With no room to move, I wedged myself into the crowd, and didn't pay much notice to the others bumping right into me and squeezing by. When my 20 min ride was finally over and I released myself from the sardine tin of a bus, I look for my phone and realize its gone. Not much to be done at that point.

Electronics in Buenos Aires are expensive, the pay-as-you-go mobile phones are no exception. It costs $50 USD to get the cheapest Nokia phones at the stores. I was not about to shell out another $50 dollars of my (parents') money to get another phone, that has a pretty good chance of being stollen, so I decided to check out the Argentine e-bay, called Mercado Libre. I found a guy selling a pay-as-you-go samsung phone for about 75 pesos, I bid on it for about a week and ended up winning it at about 90 pesos. Saving $40+ USD was a pretty exciting feat for me, but little did I know of they journey ahead.

I researched online how to get to this guy's business because it was in an area that I didn't know. Then that Friday I set out with my friend Kaylen to find the bus we needed. We searched all day for a stupid bus stop but could never find the bus going in the right direction!!! We are both really directionally challenged, so looking back its not too surprising, but I was on the brink of full-on rage that day.

The next day I set out on my own and finally found the bus I needed, pulled out the handy bus Guia and followed the route of my bus as we went along. Everything was going swimmingly, until (just like the bus 111 incident) my bus took a turn off of the said route. I decided to sit it though since I had no idea where I was going/where I currently was. I rode yet another bus to the absolute end of it's route, in the middle of nowhere, past slums, past countryside, to the end. I then bought a return ticket, hopped back on the same bus but going back in the other direction. I followed the Guia until I got to what I thought was relatively close to my phone's whereabouts, got off the bus, hailed a taxi, and made the rest of the trek the easy way, getting dropped off right at the doorstep.

I get to Juan's (owner of the phone) apartment building buzz his apartment number, and............. no answer. SERIOUSLY?!?! I then avoided a major break-down, turned around, and headed toward the subte that the taxi driver told me about. As I'm walking down Juan's street, guess what I see... THE BUS THAT I HAD TAKEN TO THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. It obviously wasn't the same bus, but apparently only some of that bus number actually stay true to the route that the Guia says it follows. At that point I could do nothing but chuckle at my ridiculous life.

The next week was parciales (midterms) so I had to wait until Friday until I could re-try the phone journey. I took the newly discovered subte route (required taking two different subway lines until the very end of their routes) to Juan's place. I go back to the apartment building, buzz up, and........... no response. So I show the address I had written down to a maintenance worker and asked for some help. He explained to me that there were other apartment complexes behind this building that had the same exact address. So I ventured into the complex, buzzed on a few apartments, and had no luck finding Juan. I reluctantly continued wandering around the complex, until I finally tried one last building. IT WAS JUAN'S!!!! I finally made a decision that resulted in success.

With phone finally in-hand, I go to the nearest corner store, to buy a SIM card. The woman working there inserts the card, goes to activate it, and......... apparently there is something called a SIM block, that doesn't allow you to activate a new SIM card without a certain password (probably to avoid making whoever stole your phone's life easier). I then make my way back to Juan's. I wait as Juan finishes selling two (yes TWO) laptops for 500 pesos a piece... that is two laptops for about $250 USD... I never said Juan's "establishment" was very legit. He then brings me and my phone into his office, looks up online how to de-activate the SIM password, does some crazy trick with the phone battery and a piece of paper, and voila! My new phone is ready for action.

That was the most satisfying subte ride home.

I blissfully enjoyed life with a phone for about a week and a half. My new phone died. No longer accepting a charge, I accepted defeat.

The good news is, though at times it is inconvenient, I've been enjoying the last month even without my phone. With only a few more weeks in South America ahead of me, I know I can make it without a phone.

Chau!

Its Been a While...

So I accidentally skipped blogging the entire month of September, and yes, I feel terrible about it... BUT I will slowly, yet surely catch up with with the blog. My last post was August 27th, so I'm going to start off with the 3rd of September, because thats the next cool thing I did with my life.

• On the 3rd of Sept. I finally re-visited La Boca with a group of friends. (And when I say I visited La Boca, that really means I visited El Caminito --literally the small walk-way-- since that is the only "tourist friendly" part of La boca... or at least so I'm told). For me, La Boca is the coolest barrio of Buenos Aires. The streets are narrow, the brightly colored buildings clash and complement one another, and it is a place proud of it's history. La Boca is the birthplace of the tango and also of the fútbol team, Boca Juniors. Throughout El Caminito you can find homages to Evita, Carlos Gardel (father of tango), and Maradona (debatably one of the greatest fútbolistas of all time). The only downfall is how touristy El Caminito has become. Its somewhat of a paradox; the one place that you're supposed to experience the "real" Buenos Aires, has become very un-real, and sort of like an attraction. So in order to really get a taste of La Boca, one would have to venture outside of El Caminito, but it isn't highly recommended... especially not for foreigners, not to mention gringos. Nonetheless, I had a good time taking pictures of the bright buildings, watching all the tango dancers, and my over-priced pasta dish at a tango show restaurant.
• The following week (on the 9th to be precise) I visited the Museo Nacional de Bella Artes. I never know how to talk about museums (especially art ones)... but there were tons of extremely old and beautiful paintings. The names I remember seeing/recognizing include: Monet, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Rembrant, Rodin, and El Greco. I don't know too much about art, but it was very cool to see works by names that I've heard of and seen in various classes. I also got a mini history lesson from one of the security guards: after viewing a huge painting for a good minute, he explained to me that it was a portrait of General Juan Manuel de Rosas and his daughter. He then showed me how that is the exact same portrait that appears on the Argentine 20 peso bill. And that's the extent of my applicable knowledge of Argentine art.
• The next day I went to Zoo Lujan. Lujan is about 2 hours outside of the city of Buenos Aires, and has a zoo in which you are able to pet animals otherwise known as dangerous man-eaters. Here I got a chance to pet and bottle-feed lion cubs (and lion pre-teens), pet full grown tigers, ride a camel, and hand-feed an elephant. I also thoroughly enjoyed the children's area where I played on a seesaw for an age-inappropriate amount of time, held a little duckling and a baby goat, and survived a crazy old goat's attempt to eat my hair. Also the zoo had piggies!!! They were not the cutest of pigs, but I loved them all the same. Another priceless memory to note, is that our two hour return home turned into a 4+ hour return home when our bus literally took over 2 hours to stop at the bus stop... gotta love that reliable public transportation system. Argentina wouldn't have it any other way.
• The next day (Sunday the 11th) I went to the first annual Harvest Moon Festival in Barrio Chino. I love every chance I get to go to China Town, so I obviously enjoyed this day. We saw traditional dragon dancing and Chinese drumming (all humorously performed by Argentines and not a single Chinese person), ate a delicious Chinese meal, were discriminated against because we weren't Chinese (a store owner was only letting in people of Asian descent into the grocery store--- not necessarily fun, but I found it funny in a way), and tried a moon cookie (or cake, or pie... I don't remember the technical term, but whatever it was, it was over-rated). This is also the day that my second phone was stollen on the bus ride home... but that process will be receiving it's own blog post, so stay tuned.
• The next two weeks of September were dull. This was the time period of my parciales (midterm exams) so I'm going to use my responsible dedication to my studies as an excuse... During this time period I also bought my first pair of Argentine-style boots, a very exciting occurrence for me, and I also visited the San Telmo feria, which is practically a giant outdoor market that runs for blocks and blocks and blocks of people selling crafts and touristy gifts. Didn't even make it all the way through the first time, so I'll probably be re-visiting before my time is up here. During this time I also missed an excursion with ISA due to my lack of phone, and hence lack of reliable alarm clock. It was the Día del Campo, which was meant to be my first official Argentine meat tasting, but don't worry, in the meat capital of the world, other opportunities have presented themselves... but more on that later.

Aside from my cellphone ordeal (which will be elaborated upon in the next post), that pretty much sums up my month of September. A catch-up on the month of October, will be following very, VERY, shortly.

Chau!

Bubamara

It's kinda been a while since my last post, but day to day life is becoming more routine, so I generally feel like nothing new is really going on... but here are some of the highlights of mi vida in the past couple of weeks. I promise I'm still doing cool stuff.

Last week I got sick of being lazy, so I joined the volleyball intramural team for the University of Belgrano. We practice twice a week and then have games on Fridays. Practices are interesting, because its mostly girls from the US who are studying abroad that show up. So far there are two Argentine girls who are 'regulars.' There are also these two Argentine guys that show up, which is cool because they help us deal with stronger serves/hits/whatevers. We had our first actual game last night against the University of Palermo... and WE WON!! Additionally, yours truly (all 5ft 2 inches of me) got two kills, awwwwyaaaaa.

Last night I also had a brief tango performance in front of all the other international students (and locals too) as a part of my tango class. It wasn't fantastic because we were soooo limited on space, and us newbies have a lot of trouble if we can't rely on enough room to do our basic steps. Regardless, my partner and I killed it! haha Another funny side note is that we may or may not have had a couple of pre-performance drinks (just to calm the nerves, of course)... and then maaaaybe a few more post-performance drinks (only to celebrate how awesome we were) which resulted in me being sufficiently tipsy for the volleyball game. Not necessarily a bad thing, seeing as we won and played pretty well in general :)

Some other things I've done (to prove that I am still experiencing the Argentine culture, and not just the bars) are:

• Tango Festival: the world tango competition is being held in Argentina currently, and as a result, Buenos Aires has put on a huge tango festival with free music and dancing events and shows, as well as some historical displays of Carlos Gardel (the king of tango). When I went it was to hear a tango musical group perform, but also there was an open dance floor with some pretty impressive veterans getting their groove on. The dance floor was literally jam-packed with people, but they all somehow managed to still look amazing. It makes me realize how much more I have to/want to learn about the dance. Its this fantastic mixture of being intimate and sexy while also being light and fun. Next personal goal: to go hit up a milonga (tango club) or two... maybe after a few more classes.
• MALBA: (el Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires) here there was a lot of modern artwork, not only from our time period, but from a number of decades back as well. I personally liked the more recent stuff better, and I'm not going to lie... some of the "art" was a little questionable to me haha. Can a bunch of outlet adapters hooked up to each other really be considered art??? Well at MALBA they sure are. Some other cool stuff was an original self portrait by Frida Kahlo and a room dedicated to Ricardo Garabito, who I'm proud to say I somehow recognized as being famous... I guess I shouldn't give myself too much credit since I didn't know who he was, I only recognized his paintings as being notable. There was also this pretty cool bench that starts on the top floor and then unravels into swirls of wood to the next floor down where it re-forms into another bench, and so on down the building.
• National Library: I went here yesterday to do some research for an upcoming project, even though we weren't too successful, I'm glad I made it over there just to see it. They system was soo weird. There was tons of security throughout the building, with guards that had to check an ID card at each floor. Also you don't search for your own books/resources. You have to know exactly what you're looking for and then you put in a request with a librarian and they go retrieve it for you while you wait. It was a bit complicated.
• Evita Museum: Just kidding!!!! I was supposed to go (and still really want to go) but I lost track of time at the library and then missed the group tour I signed up for as a result. I still plan on going eventually though!!

Now for some nightlife! I recently made friends with this girl who has been living here for a while now and she invited myself and Kaylen out to a huuuuuge club (Pancha) with her and some of her friends. I was super excited to a) go out to a legit Argentine club, and b) go with a bunch of Argentines! Even though her friends ended up not going, we still had a fun/crazy night. We didn't even get to the club until around 3!!! We paid a ridiculous cover to get in, and then were immediately swarmed by Argentine guys... After making our escape (not an easy task) we just did our own thing and danced. When we left, we ran into some British guys, and an Irish one and split a cab with them... lucky for them because they couldn't speak a word of Spanish. Also found out that my name is indeed very Irish... I can honestly say I have an authentic source to site. We didn't get home until around 6, so needless to say it was a true Buenos Aires experience. However, I'm still waiting to stay out all night and end with breakfast :)

Are you wondering what the title of the blog post means??? Welllll Bubamara is this my new favorite thing to do in Buenos Aires! It is this music party/event that is put on once a month at various venues. It is described as a "Balkan, Gypsy, music festival." When I went it was held at this old building that was once (and maybe still is) used as a theatre. All the music was live and folksy and perfect for dancing! The crowd was super high energy too, everyone was jumping around and cheering. The other cool thing was that besides the person I went with, I felt like I was the only Yankee there (a rarity). I cannot wait for the next one!

Thats about it for now... until next time,

Chau!

Never Take Bus 111

Before getting into the meaning of the title of this post, I'll share what I did this week:

Mon-Thurs = classes!! On Wednesday night I got to hang out with a new friend, Adriana, we met only once before and it was about a year ago, we have a mutual friend back in Florida, so that's how we connected. Through Adriana, I met 6 other Argentine girls and we hung out at one of their (Augustine's) apartment. We drank beer, ate empanadas, chatted (in my case mainly listened to others chatting), and looked at a bunch of underwear. Yes underwear. A couple of the girls sell it as a job so they just pulled out a duffle bag filled with undies, pretty amusing.

To stay with Thursday tradition, I went out to Pub Crawl, and we can just say that it was a pretty crazy night and leave it at that.

Friday was recuperation/lay around and do nothing day.

Saturday I got my culture fix and took a tour of the Casa Rosada, the Argentine government building. It's painted pink as a symbol of the harmony of the two primary political parties (federals which are Red, and the unitarians which are White). I now fully support the US's adoption of a Purple house, how sick would that be??? After our nice little history lesson we headed over to the famous Café Tortoni (the oldest café in Argentina) to have some coffee and dulces. I got a torta (cake) called Bonbon Suiza, it was amazing. Afterwards we strolled down Calle Florida where there are a lot of touristy and cheap vendors. Here I bought a Boca fútbol team soccer ball :)

Today, we went to the park, where I got to try out said soccer ball and laze around in the sun for the afternoon. Just a teensy bit warmer and it would've been perfect, but regardless, it was a beautiful day and it felt great to be outside and mess around with a soccer ball.

Think I forgot about last night??? WRONG I absolutely did not, just saving the entertaining story for last. So last night I was going to meet some friends at a park to drink a little and hang out (it was yet another election day eve, hence no bars/clubs were serving alcohol). We've been to this park before, I know exactly where it is, and so I look up in my Guia (guide book with all the bus routes that ISA gave us) which buses traveled from my part of town to this park, wrote about five options down on my hand, and head off. The first bus from my list that showed up was the 111, so I hop right on. Very shortly afterwards it turns to the left, which I knew was in the opposite direction of where this park is. So I pull out my Guia and double check to make sure the bus in fact does end up at the park, it said it did, so I figured I'd be patient. After about 20 minutes of patiently sitting on the bus, I really regretted not getting off and turning around, but the area the bus was in was too sketchy to turn back now, so I continued to go along for the ride. My friends call me to make sure I'm still coming, and I explain my bad choice of bus and let them know I'll be a little late. Maybe about 20 more minutes later I'm getting really nervous, so I start following the bus route street for street in my Guia. Even though I have no idea where I am, the streets are matching up, so I figure it will end fine. Then the bus takes a couple of streets that are not listed in the Guia, I figure I better address this situation head on. I ask the bus driver when we are going to get to the park, "Park off of Maria de Campos?? We don't go there, thats in a completely different province!!" (in Spanish). I proceed to have a mini mind freak out and try to talk with him about how to fix this. Apparently the all-knowing Guia is capable of making errors. I'm at a bus stop, in a different province, I'm having a really hard time understanding the nice bus drivers, and all I could gather was that I need to take the 140 back and I'd have to wait 40 minutes for the next one. I may or may not have shed a tear or two at this point... I was pretty freaked out. The nice old bus driver saw this, and graciously escorted me to a different bus stop, spoke to the driver of that bus, explained my sitch, and got me going in the right direction. (I LOVE this man). Then I sit on this bus for 20-30 minutes, endure some creepy guy saying "wow" to me, the 8 screaming babies/children/terrors that rode with us for a good 15 minutes, and the cute, yet rather loud gum-smacking old man. Finally bus driver number 2 tells me to get off here, and to take bus 114. Here I wait with a drunk man leaning on the telephone wire for 10 min, then hop on 114. Luckily, this was a short and easy bus ride and within 10 minutes I FINALLY met up with my friends. Such an incredibly stressful night, but everything worked out, and I really enjoyed just hanging in the park. I thought I was done getting THAT lost, but I now know to not assume such things. Lessons learned:

1. ALWAYS ask the bus driver if they in fact are going to your destination, or say where you want to go as you enter.
2. NEVER, EVER TAKE COLECTIVO 111!!!!!

Off to other things,

Chau!

Classes and Such

So just when I get settled in, have a week off of just wandering around and going out, its back to reality where I'm reminded 'oh yeah, this is a study abroad program, isn't it?' Last week was my first week of classes, and going on week numero dos I'm still not in "school mode." In fact, I'm using this blog post as another method of procrastinating my homework... some things never change I guess. Overall, I'm very pleased with my class choices and I'm looking forward to the semester. Here's a rough look at my schedule:

• Grammar: Advanced B to be precise... it sounds great and all, but my grammatical knowledge does not correspond with my speaking knowledge. The real kicker is when I mess up when telling someone I'm in "advanzado b," its such an oxymoron haha. But thats why I'm taking....
• Oral Production! It only meets once a week, but its sole purpose is to become more comfortable talking and enhance the fluidity of speech. Its also cool because we have a guy from Denmark, a guy from Italy, a girl from Turkey, and a girl from Japan in the class as well. Kind of depressing when you know they have three languages down (they all know English as well as Spanish) and I'm still struggling with the second, but its still cool to have different cultures represented... plus we get some pretty funny cross-cultural discussions going in class too.
• Latin American Film: I love movies! So I'm obviously looking forward to the rest of this class. We've watched two Argentine films so far: El Tiempo de los Valientes, and Los Paranoicos. They were both funny and entertaining, but Los Paranoicos appealed to me the most, it was quirky, humorous, and had a great ending, I definitely plan on re-watching it. Its so refreshing to watch quality films that don't come from the US, it makes you realize how many great films we Yankees miss out on... entertainment actually exists outside of Hollywood!!! I'm also looking forward to El Secreto de Tus Ojos, which won best foreign film at the Oscars in 2010, and one of my favorite movies, Cidade de Deus (City of God).
• Argentina: An Open Society: I chose this class as a personal goal to be more well rounded... I thought it would be important/valuable to learn about the history and politics of Argentina and their social effects on the nation. It will probably be my most challenging class, but also potentially the most interesting. I'm excited to branch out from literature/grammar classes. And last, but not least...
• Tango!!! This is my favorite so far, pretty much because one out of the two days of classes is devoted to learning the dance! I'm sure it will be at least semi-intersting to learn about the history of the dance, it has such a huge meaning for Argentina after all, but the dancing is fun! However, I also found out that my class will be doing a group performance at International Student night... This means that I have to dance a dance that I do not yet know in front of all the foreign exchange students (including all my friends I've made).... should be interesting, and by that I mean hysterical.

All of my classes are taught in Spanish, so hopefully I'll just keep on slowly (but surely) improving my Spanish skillz. Also, classes are only Mondays-Thursdays so I'll be able to keep up my perfect attendance at the free Pub Crawls on Thursdays :)

Other noteworthy things I did last week:

- Went to this really awesome drumming performance by a group called La Bomba. They had about 15 different people working percussion instruments and it was soooo good!! They would just make up songs right there through hand motions and just keep building up the beats. I went with a bunch of my girl friends and we all ended up jumping around in this ridiculous mosh pit... good times. Definitely plan on going back.

- Managed to lose my phone, I think/want to think that it was pick-pocketed. Its actually pretty likely that it was since I heard about five other girls that got pick-pocketed at the same place on the same night.

- Went to Chinatown again, ordered what I thought would be a delicious bowl of vegetables with shrimp, but turns out vegetables just means a shit ton of boiled cabbage sprinkled with shrimp haha. Next time I'll just stick to fried rice...

I guess thats all for now, maybe I'll actually start studying seeing as I literally have no more excuses to procrastinate...

Chau!