Hello all! I'm writing this from my new couch, my
second couch ever! I'll start from where I left off last time... So I
have had Spanish classes for 2 weeks now. This week will be my last week
in BA. The classes are going really well; I have learned some verbs and
a bit of vocabulary. Spanish is hard, but also lots of fun! I stayed in
the hostel for my first week of classes, chatted lots with the staff
and the other people. I met lots of cool, fun and interesting people. It
was a good experience and I got to practice my Spanish a bit! I went to
a transvestite, gay and lesbian disco the Friday before last with 5 of
my friends, it was great! I danced the night away to rock music and a
live tranny band. I spent Saturday recovering and on Sunday, Alex and I
went to Uruguay for the day to a little town called Colonia. We got the
45 minute ferry early in the morning. It was a gorgeous day and the town
was just so beautiful! It was so nice wandering around the quiet,
cobbled streets. It was a pleasant change to the hustle and bustle of
the city that never sleeps. We got impressive views from the top of the
lighthouse, ate ice cream and went to the most rubbish museums you can
imagine. The museums were so rubbish that it was actually hilarious. You
paid 2 pound to go to all 5 museums and they got progressively worse!
One contained lots of plates; next one lots of small, round, grey rocks;
then what looked liked a 60s hotel room; one with horse's saddles and
the last consisted of one pathetic ceramic on the wall! I couldn't
believe it, I felt cheated! Needless to say they were not the highlight
of the trip, but I had a really lovely day. The second week of Spanish
we switched teachers and gained a lot more students. The new teacher has
been really brilliant and I look forward to going to class every day.
It reminds me of being at primary school again and I really like having
homework to do and going over it at the beginning of class. I think I'm
meant to be an eternal student! Last Tuesday I couchsurfed for the first
time! I stayed with Maria, the girl I met for coffee the week before,
in a nice area of the city called Caballito. She had a small, cute flat
with a very comfortable mattress for me to sleep on. It was so weird to
begin with, being in strangers flat with a key and then being left to
make myself at home. I quickly got used to it and it was nice to have a
house to stay in. I did really like the hostel, but you can't beat a
nice flat with all the luxuries like privacy and space! We had lots of
nice chats and it was really lovely. On Thursday evening Maria and I
arranged a "Language Exchange" at a bar in the centre of town. It didn't
go according to plan, because we didn't get as many people as we were
expecting and we ended up talking English for most of it! It was a great
night though. On Friday I went along with Maria to Samba class. Samba is
awesome and extremely crazy! I will need to have some Tango lessons here at some point, otherwise
it's a crime I'm told! On Saturday I went to Palermo, which is a nice area of
town with big parks and monuments. It is where a lot of the richer
people live. I went to the botanic gardens, the Evita museum and the
Japanese gardens. It was a lovely relaxing day! I came back to hear that
Maria has a family emergency and had to go to Cordoba on Sunday so I
basically had to leave the couch a week early (she was going to host me
for a whole two weeks originally!). So I spent Saturday evening looking
for an "emergency couch". A guy called Augustin got back to me almost
straight away saying I could stay with him. I didn't want to stay with
guys, but he had millions of positive references and looked really fun
and nice. I went out to meet some couchsurfers that I'd never met before
in San Telmo on Saturday night. I got there by bus and had to walk down
some streets that were pretty shady, but I was ok and ended up having
an amazing night! When I first got to the shisha bar, it was only Andrej
there, a German guy who was walking around the globe for 2 years who then
decided to stay in BA to study for a couple of years before finishing
his walking, which he estimates will take another 10 years. It such a
cool story! Then two really cool girls from Canada came along. I told
Juanito and Alex (from my hostel) that I would meet them on a corner not
far from where I was with the couchsurfers so Andrej and the Canadian girls came with me to meet
them. We then all went to a club with British indie music! It was a
great night and I had lots of interesting chats with cool people. On
Sunday, I had to leave Maria's so I found out where Augustin lived and
set about finding my way there. It turned out his flat is actually right
next door to the hostel I was staying in for 2 weeks!! So random!! It
is a nice little flat and Augustin is really easy going and cool. We
chatted for a long time all evening, had a few drinks and I attempted to
do my Spanish homework. That brings me up to today! I'm off to class
soon so I'd better finish my homework in time! I don't know how long I
will stay here, but if it doesn't work out I can always go next door to
the hostel! I need to start planning my onward travels this week as the
plan is to leave BA on Sunday and head south to Patagonia to the
glaciers! Then up to Bolivia and Peru to meet Chris (yay!). I'm so glad I
get to talk to him (or you, if you are reading this Chris!) every day.
It makes things much easier... thank you Skype! I've
changed my flights now so I'll be home more than a month early... 23rd
July, so see you all then! I start my PhD on the 4th October so I'll
probably look for a job for a wee while when I get back! | 