Mi Querida Sudamerica

on my way home already

gringura — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 06:30:00 GMT

A lot has happened since the last entry, classes have long been over and ended well. I had a few fun parties, one included carolina´s 21 birthday. I taught everyone flip cup and it was a big hit. One night I went to alamo and ended up inviting my friend´s ¨boy friend¨ and his friend to 100 pesos of tequila shots, oops. I said i would invite one of the guys to a drink for editing a paper for me, but i went a bit overboard.

Last weekend I made thanksgiving dinner for some friends just for the fun of it. I was out an hour and a half looking for a turkey and finally setteled on buying 2 chickens. Everything turned out surprisingly good despite all the improvising due to the lack of ingredients. It was almost everyones first time trying gravy, candied yams, and stuffing and it all went over well. The next night (my very last saturday night in Bs. As.) Erika and I went out with a group of mexican fiends of hers and I finally found my favorite boliche, Roxy.

Erika got a new roommate because her current british roomie is moving to the states in august. the new girl is from Rio de Janiero, Brazil and is a real character. She talks really fast and uses words in portuguese now and then so sometimes we dont really understand. And once in awhile she throws a word in english in if she doest know it in spanish because she lived in New York for two months and picked up some english. She is super friendly and i think everything will go well.

Today at 4:30 am the senate voted against the retentions (the 40% tax ag products that producers have to pay). That means the farmers strike should be over, but you never know here.

Tonight is my last night and Im going to alamo, one of my favorite bars. Im kinda sad, but i want to visit my family. I´ll miss my friends here and all the free time i have. But im ready to quit bumming around i think, and I cant wait to eat pancakes with maple syrup!

Weekend Madness

gringura — Sun, 8 Jun 2008 12:09:00 GMT

This weekend I made up for the boring weekend Im going to have next weekend because my exams are right after. Thursday, fairly normal went out dancing to the only club that plays hip hop. Every gangster type in the city was there, which was strange sight to see here.

Friday, started out a small gathering at Erikas, Erika me and two Americans. We took a cab to plaza cerrano and Erika got sick in the cab and we ended up in the middle of the street with getting yelled at by an irrate taxi driver negotiating the price of the damages. Then two cartonero street children starting laughing about the scene and ended up hitting my American friend in the back of the head. So we take Erika back to her apartment, she gives us the keys to get out of the apartment. Turns out they were not the right keys and we couldnt get out, she didn’t hear us ringing the doorbell to get the right keys, and so we were stuck and ended up ringing random doorbells hoping someone would let us out until we found some guys taking the elevator and they saved our lives. From there we went to an apartment of some other friends and we all crashed there and went to china town the next day to buy mass quantities of sushi.

Saturday: went straight from afternoon sushi to Erika’s were I got ready for the night and we cooked our usual Saturday night dinner with Carolina. We ended up having a great party after with 15 Bolivianos, a Mexican, 4 Americans, 5 Argentinos, and I’m not sure who else. The two guys that let us out of the apartment on Friday heard the party and also showed up. One of the neighbors ended up calling the cops and Erika told him this elaborate story through the building intercom. She said that she was 17 year old colombian and her parents wouldn’t let her go down to let people in to the apartment. She went on to say that she invited all her Colombian friends to a dinner party for her birthday and that she cant help it that Colombians have a loud accent and being that it was her birthday, she was drunk and with her boyfriend who stayed after all the others let. The cops bought the story or just got sick of listening to it and left. They later came back and showed up at the door, we all had to hide and someone went to the door with Erika pretending to be her Colombian boyfriend. The cops really couldn’t do much about it and ended up just leaving. Everyone was laughing their asses off about the whole scene. I left for my house at around 5, and got in a minor fight on the car ride with an Argentine friend that was acting like a real child and ended p just getting out of the car and storming off, luckily I was 6 blocks from my apartment.

Sunday: basically just layed around and ate pizza, tomorrow ive got to ponerme las pilas and study!!!!

recent news

gringura — Sun, 1 Jun 2008 06:46:00 GMT

Im starting to get lazy about this blog, but your not missing much. Here's some of the recent highlights:

My history class went to a bar to watch a soccer game for an hour during our usual break thats supposed to be 20 minutes. The Professor ordered the beer so it was legit. We had about 45 minutes of class afterward, not much was learned.

As for the bad news, I had the worst date of my entire life the other day, I figured he'd just take me out for coffee, since it was a sunday afternoon, but he ended up taking me to a crappy shopping center and ordered me a coca-cola since i didn't want a beer. Then when it was finally over, he started driving around aimlessly in a park where there are about 1,000 transvestite prostitutes, apparently he was looking for a bar. Just when i thought i was home free since he couldn't find it, he pulls up to a bar that is completely closed and waits, and tells me that is going to open. At this point I'm confused as hell, then i get even more confused when a waiter comes up to the car with two random drinks. The guy buys them and I guess the point of the "bar" is just to sit in the car and drink. Im not at all cool with that, and leave my seatbelt on, ready to get the hell out of there. I think he finally got the hint and drove me home.

I'm about ready to throw my cell phone in el rio de la plata since i barely answer it anyway. Anyhow, I've still been going out and having the ususal fun. One of my favorite bars was shut down for sanitation issues, so its trowing me off a little.

As far as school goes, I've been preparing for my examps a papers already on the 6th floor of the national library. Im starting the recongnize the same people. Its common place for evertone to bring a bag of cookies there and to finish the entire thing. I can't believe everyone is still skinny. i've almost jumped on the bandwagon, but I can't bring myself to be son unhealthy.

The farmers are protesting again, the've been blocking one of the highways with tractors and spreading grain all over the road. I think im noticing the effect on the food prices. Certain things (empanandas en specific) have doubled in price since I got here.

Colonia, Uruguay

gringura — Sat, 17 May 2008 06:23:00 GMT

Last weekend (Sunday – Monday) I went to Colonia Uruguay. It was a pre-planned trip with the exchange program, so nothing exciting. The town is tiny but nice; half the buildings are old Portuguese style and old Spanish style. All I did was eat and sleep.

I got my whole weekend in on Friday. Erika had a party with her friends from class, Carolina, me, an American friend of mine, plus her friends which included: 4 Africans, 4 Argentines, and 2 Russians. We almost had every continent covered. The plan was to go out, but before you know it, it was 4 am. We still went out to a place that was in walking distance, but Erika practically had to kick everyone out. There were two strange romances: two Argentine girls and two of the Africans, the language barrier didn’t seem to matter.

Overall, not a normal night, but fun. This weekend we went to see an Argentine movie called Yo Soy Sola, I would definitely recommend it. It really played up the Porteño stereotype, which was genuinely funny. Today, Saturday, I went to see a photography exhibit featuring Cuba, it was awesome. There were a couple pictures with Fidel and Ernst Hemingway that caught me by surprise. I’ve had a strange fascination with Cuba lately, mostly because the topic is very avoided in the states and here Cuba is respected and Che is a hero, and not just for hippie college kids.

I don’t exactly have a plan for the night, but my phone is ringing off the hook. I feel like everyone I’ve met in the last two months just decided to start calling me yesterday, and unfortunately its no one interesting.

Rosario

gringura — Mon, 5 May 2008 00:25:00 GMT

I went to Rosario two weekends ago. Rosario is just a smaller city slightly north of Buenos Aires. It was fun, but nothing spectacular. Is where El Che was born, so I can now say I’ve been to the cities where Che was born and died (in Santa Cruz, Bolivia) Rosario is also where there’s a giant monument to the flag that looks like the coliseum that I didn’t even know was there. There’s also the stock market where they trade all commodities. I went out both nights I was there and ended up sleeping so late that I actually never saw the city during the day. Getting back to Bs. As. was a little complicated because the road that we were supposed to take was closed due to low visibility caused by all the smoke from the fires in the farm fields. The bus took a different, longer route that was also covered in smoke. At about midnight the bus driver pulled over at a gas station and told everyone that we were going to have to stay the night. After about an hour he changed his mind and we kept going, but had do drive at a snail’s pase. Instead of getting back at 8pm we got back at 2am.

I went out a couple of nights ago (in Bs. As.), the night before a holiday here, and it ended up being one of the craziest nights. It started normal, had a drink at a bar. Then two friends of a friend showed up and it turns out they are practically millionaires. One of them paid the $100 bill for all the drinks (which here is a small fortune) and refused to let anyone contribute. Then that same guy took us all to a party in Recoleta in his brand new Mercedes that was so new that it still smelt like crayons (like all new cars do). Everyone at the party was rich; I got to talking to a guy that owns a vineyard in Mendoza. It was insane. I woke up the next day at 2:30 pm and had a “is this really my life” moment. I spent the rest of my holiday with Carolina. We ate pastry in the plaza and went to the book fair, which is a huge event here.

I almost wish I could stay here another semester. I ended up doing embarrassingly well on my exam, and I now realize that no one is really trying hard in class, except for me. There is absolutely no sense of competition like in the US. The professor called out the grades out loud and no one was ashamed of not doing well. In some ways I do look forward to getting back to my real life, where I can identify with everyone, and where I just can live on automatic pilot instead of having to investigate how to go about the most mundane tasks. But I know as soon as I get back I’m going to miss it here.

Moving to Recoleta

gringura — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 06:15:00 GMT

I moved to Recoleta a week ago. I basically ran away from the other house because they kept talking to me like I couln´t understand them and it got really annoying. I didn´t tell anyone I was leaving until I was about to go to the taxi. I love my new place. The apartment is extremely old and really bohemian looking. The women I live with is friendly and has a really interesting life. She was married to a professional polo player and lived in Europe for awhile. She also wrote a book that just got published. Her granddaughter is 12 and she lives at the apartment part of the time. She´s pretty good company. The one thing that I´m not used to yet is the very small portions of food designated for dinner and breakfast. I feel like Im at fat camp, but at least I don´t have to eat mass quantities of steak like at the other house.

Buenos Aires right now is a bit hazy and it smells like burning leaves which coincides perfectly with the fall like weather lately. The smoke is from fires in the fields in provincia. I haven´t read about it at all but some people tell me its to renew the fields and other people think it has something to to with the protests.

Time is flying here, I´ve got my first midterm tuesday, so I haven´t had much time to go out and have fun. I´m alredy looking forwad to next weeked and its only Sunday.

Stressed Out

gringura — Tue, 1 Apr 2008 11:10:00 GMT

I’ve had a couple of minor freak out moments. Number one: I almost got kidnapped by a taxi driver. I was coming home from my class about AIDS at 9 pm. The class is in a pretty rough area of the city and I had to walk about three blocks to the bus stop. I got mixed up and had to turn around, then a creepy person noticed and wanted to give me directions, which I ignored but it freaked me out enough to not want to walk alone to the bus stop. I’m walking along when a cab driver rolls up and asks me where I need to go, I tell him three blocks and he tells me he’s going my direction and that he’ll take me without charging. I knew it was a bad idea, but I got in because I was also freaked out about walking alone. The cab driver immediately starts being creepy he tells me I’m pretty and invites me to get a drink, when I turn him down he offers his number and asks for mine, and keeps trying to convince me to let him take me all the way to my apartment for free (which should be a 30 peso cab ride, which is expensive) I keep insisting that I don’t want his number and that I need to get out and take the bus, but he doesn’t want to stop until he sees the bus stop. Finally we go around a corner and I see my bus stopped at a light, he pulls up next to it and I run out, cut across traffic, and knock on the bus door so the driver lets me in even though he’s not at stop. I find a place to stand and start feeling so frustrated that I can’t just blend in and be treated like everyone else in the city which is definitely what I miss most about being in the states. I let myself cry a little, it had been a stressful day to begin with and I definitely did not need to be freaked out to top it off.

Freak out moment number two: today in class, I realized that I am really behind on reading in plant pathology and getting the photocopies is so frustrating because I make the order on Tuesday, the only day I have class and cant pick it up until the next week because I only make the journey to Pilar once a week for class. I have two of the five packets that I need to read by next week and I don’t know how I will get to Pilar to pick up the other three. It’s stressful enough that I don’t know a lot of the vocabulary and I cannot find a dictionary online or in print that has the translations. I was so stressed at the photocopier I practically yelled at the photocopy girl because she was having trouble understanding me and after I drastically raised my voice level and unnecessarily repeated myself three times I realized that she got it and thought I was a little nuts. My other classes also have a lot of reading, but it’s a lot more manageable and it seems like a lot less information. I still have yet to start one of my classes, History of America I, which I will begin on Thursday. If that class is very challenging I might have another meltdown.

At least my class about AIDS is pretty easy, it’s amazing how little the students know about AIDS and they are about to graduate from a 5 year program in social work. Sometimes I feel like I’m in high school health class all over again except with a more philosophical approach.

I think last weekend was the last stress free one. I went to an American Bar where there was tons of Wisconsin students watching the basketball game. I think the bar was 100% Americans, it was a trip. It was exactly like home. Then after, we went to a really fun reggae club. I’m so glad I’ve found places that don’t play techno. Saturday morning I started my salsa classes, its awesome, I’m one of two students and the guy that teaches it is a really flamboyant Cuban. I feel like I’ve already learned a lot. Saturday night I went with the Chilenos to a 70’s club, which was also awesome. It even had the light up multicolored square floor like in the movie “Saturday Night Fever.” The next morning I went to the botanical garden to collect sick leaves for plant pathology. The place is amazing, there have crazy plants from all over the world and there are tons of people laying around with all the millions of friendly stray cats. People here are totally cool with petting the cats and picking them up, its crazy.

Farmers Strike

gringura — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 14:38:00 GMT

The president increased the taxes that farmers have to pay to the government. I think its up to 45% now, everyone is banging pots in the streets, the farmers are striking and blocking the roads so they can't transport food. Its been going on for 2 weeks now and some say there will be food shortages. I haven't noticed any shortages, and I doubt the strike will be so successful that the supply will be completely cut off.

I havent met anyone that agrees with the president. The taxes go to government officials instead of public institutions, roads, etc. The tax is also based on amount of production instead of profit so the smaller local farmers that are less efficient will be affected worse than the large companies. People are also expecting inflation, which they are terrified of because there have been problems in the past. The government also falsified data not to long ago to deny that inflation is occuring.

The political news is the only thing exciting going on here. I've been doing the usual, going out etc. Last weekend I went to an amusment park called parque de la costa with Carolina, Erika, and two new friends of carolina, one from Bolivia, one from the US. We were all together almost the entire weekend and it was a great time, the Chilean's boyfriend was visiting and they joined us Saturday to go out to a club called salon pueyrredon that plays classic rock. It was so fun to recognize songs for a change and it was a fun crowd.

Next week I'm going to have all my classes (except one because wednesday is a holiday) and hopefully I will have all my photocopies. Its frustrates me that I know that I have things to read, but I have to wait for the text. I'm starting to miss being productive.

Classes....finally

gringura — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 16:36:00 GMT

Friday morning I had my first real class, Latinamerican Political Systems compared. It turned out to be boring so I’ve decided not to take it. Monday I had my first class, Social History of Argentina and Latinamerica at the Public University. I’ve also decided not to take the class mainly because I have no background in Latinamerican history or Politics and the Professors are extremely hard to understand. The class was about 60 students (I think I was the only American) led by a very old professor that mumbled and talked of the topic is a very obscure and philosophical way. After the 3 hour lecture I had a 2 hour discussion led by a younger and slightly easier to understand professor, but the discussion was really just another smaller lecture. The class seems really interesting, mainly because the old professor seems very liberal/borderline socialist. He explained that revolutions are an unavoidable and natural and he mentioned something about how the US government used the media to convince the public that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction when in reality he didn’t. The assigned reading also referred to George Bush as a parasitic bat. Keep in mind the lecture is taking place in a lecture hall full of stencil graffiti of Che Guevara and a billboard announcing the next protest sponsored by a student group named “leftist socialist”. If my knowledge of Latinamerican or world history was somewhere above zero I would probably take the class.

The next class I had was also in the public university. The class is called Aids, social and political aspects. It’s a class for social work majors in their final year. The class was about 50 women and one man. It turned out to be interesting and easy to understand with a lot of group discussion that I could actually participate in. We all had to introduce ourselves and explain why we are taking the class. Then after a short lecture, we arranged ourselves in a circle and did a group activity where we each received cards picturing different situations and we had to decide if there was a risk of spreading AIDS for each one. It sounds basic, but it ended up starting a pretty interesting discussion. I’m definitely going to keep the class.

Today I finally started my plant pathology class, it was a great time. I got to class about 45 minutes late because I was waiting to meet with the secretary of agronomy who was planning on showing me to class, but his kid was sick and was going to arrive late. Someone else from the office ended up showing me to class, being late was no problem because the professor hadn’t even arrived. All the students were hanging out in the hall smoking, talking, and drinking mate. I was standing by the door less than 30 seconds when someone started talking to me and began to immediately introduce me to all the others. I had never seen anything like it in my life, a hallway of students, 95% male, everyone friends with everyone and smoking is permitted. The professor showed up a couple minutes later and started giving a powerpoint slide, everything was pretty easy to understand. The class is about 30 students, small enough to where people can just shout out questions whenever. About two and a half hours after the start of class a few students start shouting out “descanso” (break) and the professor gives us a 15 minute break which I used to get my photocopies straightened out. (Here instead of textbooks they use photocopies because it is cheaper.) I won’t be able to pick up my photocopies for another 2 weeks since we don’t have class next week for semana santa, but one of the other students told me not to worry about it.

After the break we break up into groups to fill out a worksheet based on the reading. It turns out to be a bit of a waste of time since most of us don’t have the photocopies and have therefore not read and do not have the worksheet. Nevertheless, a group invites me in and we attempt. No one seems to mind that I’m not helping out too much; no one is too stressed about anything. After about a half hour the professor goes to the photocopier and doesn’t return for awhile. Most of the students decide that she’s not coming back and that its time to leave, but about 6 of us stay. (I don’t have much choice because I have to wait for the bus to take me back to Capital Federal.) We gave up on the worksheet and just hang out talking and drinking mate until the professor comes back. When she comes back she doesn’t seem to care that most of the class left and she unofficially ends class. I ended up getting a ride since most of the students drive from Capital Federal to Pilar. I asked one of the students about the lack of work the class seems to involve, and he tells me that after semana santa the class gets more serious. I still think it will be manageable since the final grade is based on two exams based on the in class worksheets, a paper with a PowerPoint presentation, and a diseased plant collection of 10 leaves or fruits. We shall see in a few weeks.

I now have an entire week of vacation and I’m unfortunately not going anywhere. I was invited by a friend from the US that I made in the exchange program to go to a town near Rio Cuarto where he has a bunch of friends that he made while he lived there for a year in high school. I went to the bus terminal Retiro on Sunday to try to find a bus ticked and they were all sold out. It’s definitely a little late to look for bus tickets to travel during one of busiest holidays. I should still have a good time here, Erika and Carolina are also staying so I’m not going to be bored.

(By the way, this past Saturday I went to the Bob Dylan concert here. It was a fun show because of the crowd, but poor Bob Dylan can barley force the words out from his throat. It’s kind of sad.)

My Pilar Express Experience

gringura — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 13:27:00 GMT

Tuesday, I wanted so badly to go to class but my attempts to arrive failed. It was supposed to be my first class, fitopathologia (plant pathology). I planned far in advance how to get there since the class is in Pilar, a town in the provincia about an hour from me. I left the apartment at 7 am to take a bus to the "Pilar Express" bus stop at Puente Savedra which is the the border between capital federal and the provincia. I end up getting to Puente Savedra extremely early, which was not the best idea since its an ugly place with sketchy people. It was also still dark, the weather was cold, and I suffered constant bombardment of bus exhaust since there are a billion bus stops there. There were a ton of Pilar Express busses stopping but the one that goes directly to the university never came. I became frustrated enough to give up about 45 minutes after the bus was supposed to arrive and called the secretary of the agromomy department from a locutorio to figure out what the hell I need to do to get to class. Turns out that next week when I go I need to take the bus where the route begins, in el centro, which means I need to leave the house even earlier. I'm not going to be happy if I wake up that early and miss the bus again.

Wednesday I also tried to go to a class without success. I showed up at the time and place where the class will be next semester. Turns out the department, and that department only, puts up the class schedule for the first and second semester toghter. So tomorrow, Friday morning, I have my first class of the week, if all goes well.

This week I did no going out, but spent pleanty of time out of the house shopping, taking a tan, etc. I did go out to eat with a friend (so I thought) yesterday, but turns out the creep drove me directly to his apartment afterward. To make a long story short, I got the hell out of there and I don't think he'll attempt to speak to me ever again.

Im looking forward to the weekend, I'm going to the Bob Dylan concert with Carolina (erikas chilean roommate) and I may be starting salsa lessons.

Drama Weekend

gringura — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 12:47:00 GMT

Friday was relatively calm compared to Saturday. I got to sleep in before going to the Public University to enroll. Getting to the university from my house involved a lot of walking, the subway, and a bus. Getting enrolled was another fiasco. I asked the information desk 3 times where I needed to go and every time the same old woman told me something different and wrong. Finally another exchange student called a friend already inside the correct room to figure out where to go. I get in the room and there are tons of people and a bunch of different forms scattered everywhere without any instruction. I ask around and realize that they are out of one of the forms I needed. I improvised and got everything figured out in the end but the whole process really discouraged me from taking a class there. What’s even more discouraging is that the class I am interested in taking there, Social Geography of Argentina, meets from 5-9 Friday nights. Once that was over I was in a happy mood because a couple people asked me for directions and I actually knew the answer and there was also an excellent musician in the subway. After dinner I had plans to go to a movie with Carolina (my friend from Santa Cruz, Bo). The hour bus from my house to Recoleta was pleasant because there was a fairly talented musician playing chacarrara. Carolina and I ended up not making it in time to see the movie so we went to Plaza Cerrano where we shared a few chelas with some American friends I’ve met through my exchange program.

Saturday I woke up in the afternoon (I’m starting the get good at that) and went to Carolinas place for awhile and then headed over to Erika’s. From there the drama began. I began my usual texting frenzy to see who wanted to go out with us (here calling from cell to cell is just as expensive as calling the US, so texting here is how business is done). I got a variety of responses that all in some way denied the invitation. One suggested a sketchy alternative and another sincerely frightened me. My friend from Quilmes wrote me something to the effect of “my life is a mess I’m going to end it, good buy forever, take care of yourself” I immediately called and got no answer, but got a response from a text message telling me to call back in an hour. Luckily when I called back in an hour there was an answer it turns out the desperation stems from money issues and not finding a job. I’ve been slightly tormented by this, but there’s nothing I can do. Meanwhile I’m dealing with this, Erika’s ex boyfriend (el gordo) begins to call non-stop, extremely drunk, and with no reasoning ability. The phone is ringing off the hook and before too long he’s at the front door of the apartment building ringing the bell non-stop, then he begins to call my cell phone because we disconnected the home phone. Erika’s roommate goes down to talk to him, but cannot talk any sense into him. After awhile I was ready to call the cops, but Erika was afraid of causing more drama. We turn the music up to drown out all the ringing phones and doorbells and finally he leaves. With all that behind us, we begin the night sharing a couple drinks before we go to the discoteca. The discoteca we went to, Sunset, was extremely far away but was fun because it actually played reggaeton instead of techno. The night ended earlier than expected (Erika was dying for a hamburger) but I still slept until 1:00pm the next day and accomplished nothing. I visited my friends in recoleta and was back in time for dinner.

A special note about dinner in Argentina: Beef is always what’s for dinner. So far I have only had two home cooked dinners that did not include beef. I think the lady I live with must be a good cook, because usually I hate steak and I think its pretty good here.

Back to School

gringura — Fri, 7 Mar 2008 23:36:00 GMT

This is my last weekend before I start classes, but I think I already had the end of the summer party on Tuesday night when leah came. We had a party in Erika's apartment with 3 other Bolivianas, and Erika's new Chilean roommate. (Many of you reading this may already know.) I think we left the apartment around 1 or 2 am and went to a ton of different places. I ended up losing my wallet, probably in one of the taxis and I accidently locked Erika out of her apartment, but in the end everything worked out.

Getting everything organized for school is impossible. The days and times on half the classes in the University of San Salvador I want to take are not online and the facultad is not responding to my emails. The agronomy department is responding to me however and I got approval to take plant pathology, but the one problem is that the class is held in a small town in the provincia of Buenos Aires and I have to take a coach bus to and from class. The class is held once a week from 9:00 am to 2:00 pm. I guess 80% of the students have to commute from Capital Federal on the bus, so hopfully the commute is reasonable. I do want to get out of Capital Federal to see the Provincia because I feel like it would be a better representation of the entire country. Spending all my time in the city, I forget that I'm in latin america. I went to china town (about 15 blocks from my house)yesterday with my friend from Quilmes. It wasn't quite what I was expecting, it's just one or two blocks of mostly sketchy chinese resturants and some fish markets. There was also no one around on the street and almost all the resturants were complety empty. We didn't stay too long. I really want to go see Liners which is the barrio boliviano, I'm hoping I can do volunteer work there once I get my classes organized.

Bariloche, Patagonia

gringura — Tue, 4 Mar 2008 23:51:00 GMT

This weekend I took a trip with my exchange program to San Carlos de Bariloche, Patagonia. Everything was nice and pre-organized so there were no life risks that usually make my vacactions interesting to read about. Bariloche is a small town in the mountains near the border of Chile. Its pretty unique in that most of the original settlers were from switzerland, ireland, and northern europe in general. All the houses look like they should be in switzerland and the town is well known for its chocolate. The town is mostly popular for its skiing in the winter, but since now isnt skiing season we did a lot of hiking and sightseeing. The mountains remind me of the colorado rockies, but surrounded by a lot more lakes.

The weather was good enough for us to go swimming in one of the lakes and it was probably the clearest lake I've ever been in.

The exchange program spoiled all of us by giving us a hotel with a beautiful view, guides that spent whole days with us, and fancy resturant dinners with wine and dessert included. I felt like a major tourist, especially since I was always with a large group of Americans. The town of Bariloche reminded me of any typical small town in many ways, one of the bars we wandered into at night was full of locals that all knew eachother playing pool and aukwardly dancing. I definately didn't spend much time discovering the night life though since my days started early and I thought it a bit illogical to leave Buenos Aires (where the night life is amazing) to go out to some small town bars and clubs and spend my days hiking hung over. It was a nice break from going out, although there was never a day without wine.

Gallery: Bariloche, Patagonia

gringura — Mon, 3 Mar 2008 23:31:00 GMT

Loving My New Vida

gringura — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 00:24:00 GMT

Im having no trouble at all getting used to living in this city. Im getting spoiled by the nice weather, good shopping, empanadas, and being able to buy soda and candy any time I want at a the kiosks that are at just about every corner. Im drinking more coca-cola here than any other time of my life. So far the biggest challenges has been getting from place to place using the public transportation and doing a lot a walking. Neither of which are difficult. The subway system here is extremely easy to understand. The bus system is a little more complicated, but since the busses dont have set times there is no need to worry about being late and missing the bus.

I stated orientation for my exchange program last week, and I'm already a bit tired of it. So far about 50% of the information is definately common sense and the people that run the orientation speak really slow so everyone can understand. I start to go nuts after the first hour. I have learned a lot about the city, the demographics, the architechture, some history. I've also met a lot of cool people in my program. A lot of them have done a lot of traveling so its fun to compare stories. One of them was in Santa Cruz, Bolivia a couple weeks before I was there. The downside of making friends with the other northamericans is that we speak english with eachother and I feel like im losing time to practice Spanish. I also don't like being in a big group of foreigners because everyone immediately knows that we are foreign and we get treated like idiots.

This weekend was the best weekend I've had here. Friday I went to Erika's apartment where Erika, on of here friends and I shared some wine and then we met up with some friends we made in Punta del Este and went to a bar and then a club. Saturday one of Erika's friends invited us to a party all the way in the barrio floresta, which is in the south of the city. We took the subway, a bus, and two taxis to get there. The south is a bit different from the north. During orientation they told us that the south is more dangerous and that we shouldn't go. To me it seems less rich, but not quite the danger they made it out to be. The party was a great time, it was in a backyard of a house with bar and a grill. The people were all really friendly and it turns out that quite a few live in the provincia of buenos aires and not capital federal. I've come to realize that meeting new people is one of best parts about traveling.

My New Hogar

gringura — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 11:17:00 GMT

I passed my last weekend of real vacation shopping in Alto Palermo (theres a mall there), and going out at night first to a Bar called la Roca and then to Plaza Serrano in Palermo. La Roca was cool because it was far from any tourist neighborhod and there was a cover band for popular Argentinian Rock music that everyone was singing along to except me. I definately will go back to Plaza Serrano some night, it kinda reminded me of state street, but with more people, more bars, and nice weather.

Sunday night I finally talked to my host "family" to set a time to move in. My program has not given me any details about anything except my phone number and address so i just had to wing it. I moved in 12pm on Monday. My apartment is in huge and consists of an older women, her husband, two other exchange students (from a different program), and a cat. We are on the 18th floor and have a balcony with an amazing view of the city It feels so amazing to have my own place to stay here and meals cooked for me after living out of a suitcase and eating whatever I can scrouge up for almost two months.

In the afternoon I had a program meeting pretty far from the apartment. The meeting lasted maybe 15 minutes and accomplished nothing, which was a little frustrating since getting to and from the program office from here is not a short trip. Erika's apartment is in walking distance so I visited her and went with her to run some errands. From there I took the subway home, the first time I've taken in alone. It turns out it is neither scary, dangerous, nor complicated.

Ive got a busier day of orientation tomorrow, we are spending 2 hours learning how to use the public transportation guide (Guia T). I think Erika gave me a pretty good lesson already and her's lasted 5 minutes, so I'm interested to see what they have to say.

Dia de San Valentin

gringura — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 05:47:00 GMT

The day before Valentines Day we were supposed to run errands, but the only thing we could cross off the list was going to the fruit store and getting my hair cut. I was a little frightened to get my hair cut here because about 75% of men and women have a mullet. We walked about 20 blocks to get to Erika’s salon where I had the whole works done to my hair mainly because I couldn’t understand the shampoo girl too well and all I could do is agree to whatever she suggested. She then handed me off to the stylist, a guy that could pass for Vin Diesel. I explained very clearly that I didn’t want a mullet and it was surprisingly one of the best haircuts that I’ve had for a price I would pay in the US for a haircut in a cheap salon.

We went out that night with a couple of Erika’s friends to a pub for a couple hours and were planning on going somewhere else from there, but once we got back to the apartment and finished off the nachos from Hard Rock Café from earlier, sleeping was much more appealing.

Valentines Day was another day of errands, this time more productive. Erika enrolled herself in cosmetology school, and the one of the guys that runs the school gave her a modeling job and supposedly here face will end up on a hair color box. They guy also gave her a hair appointment at one of the best salons in the city. On the way to the salon, I stopped to get a pre-paid cell phone service here. It was an exciting moment for me, it would be even more exciting if the phone rang once in awhile. I spend my Valentines Day evening in the apartment (Erika had a meal to go to with her ex) trying to put a meal together for myself which was a challenge because we bought our groceries at a fruit store and not a supermarket. Could have ordered a pizza, but was afraid there would be a miscommunication. (There’s also something sad about ordering a whole pizza for one person). We had plans on going out later, but that fell through. Its now Feb. 15th in the afternoon, and I’m still here alone trying to kill time any way possible, I even walked around the city for almost two hours. I need to go out today, or I may go crazy. I’ve almost got the music from the music video channels memorized.

Back to Bs. As.

gringura — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 10:13:00 GMT

We left Santa Cruz Sunday 8pm and arrived at Buenos Aires Tuesday 1pm. Hopefully that is the last bus ride for awhile. We got pretty lucky crossing the border, I didn’t have to pay a fine for losing my green card and we only had to go through inspections two times. I’d say that the bus company that we took, Trans Veloz, was probably the best I have had. They kept the inside temperature reasonable and gave us 3 restaurant meals a day (mostly chicken). We did break down about an hour and a half away from Buenos Aires, but another bus came fairly quickly to take us the rest of the way.

Going Buenos Aires from Bolivia feels like going back to the US. Except now I have another accent to get used to right when I finally got used to the accent from Santa Cruz. Here any Y and LL and pronounced as SH, it’s a pretty huge difference.

Gallery: Santa Cruz

gringura — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 10:36:00 GMT

Celebrating my 21st in Santa Cruz

gringura — Wed, 6 Feb 2008 06:07:00 GMT

I was glad to pass my 21st while traveling, but here 21 is not quite the monumental age it is in the US. We, (erika, carolina, and carolina´s primo) tried to go out late on Feb 5th to celebrate, but almost everything was closed since it was the last day of carnaval and nobody is up for going out to party in establishments. The only place open was the casino, which was completely empty. We sat around a table, ate fried calamari, I had a couple of ciparinas (which i didn't have to wait until midnight to order), and we were headed home around 1 am.

The next morning Carolina and her mom surprised me with a cake and a necklace with the Bolivianita, a gem that is only found here. The rest of the day was spent going out for lunch and then beside the pool until we went out, this time 6 of us, to watch some live music. This birthday was the most relaxing I've had in a while since im not in classes and the temperature is not below freezing. Im also growing fond of my new friends here.

We leave for Buenos Aires Sunday night. Another neverending journey of 36 hours. This time we found a bus that goes direct so we wont have the same border crisis as the arrival trip. We almost bought a plane ticket, the the more affordable airline, LAB, has suspended their flights because of a recent emergency crash landing that luckily everyone survived. Im excited to finally get to know Buenos Aires, although I finally feel comfortable here in Bolivia. After beight here 3 cumulative months over the past three years and almost nothing surprises or frustrates me anymore. (I've even finally learned how to pretend to dance and how to eat continental style with the fork in the left hand and the knife in the right).