Hey everyone, so I'm still trying to catch up a bit, but I think it might actually happen this weekend! Hopefully everyone is doing well. My suggestion for the week, find something you love (and that you haven't done in awhile) and put it on your to-do list! Everyone needs a fun break to look forward too!
Monday was relatively unexciting here in Mendoza. I had history class in the morning as usual and rather than having a lesson prepared for us, the professor read (yes just read) from a lecture written by Bolivar for an hour! Our job was to listen and take notes on the main points. I could've done this at home on my own time! While it was rather frustrating to sit and listen to this, it was also difficult to pick up main points when I couldn't see the lecture. Especially in a different language, it helps me to be able to see it infront of me. Not to mention if there was a word I didn't recognize I had no time to look it up. Oh well, we turned in our notes at the end of class and headed off to Spanish. Most of my friends have made a tradition of stopping at this vegetarian place for food on the way since spanish is from 1-3 and many of them have class after. I tried the food once and its pretty good, but I usually wait until after class to eat at home. Anyway, we all stopped to get food and then started the walk to class. Its a good 45 minutes, but with friends not bad at all. However this day we decided that it was too hot to walk, so we took the bus. As a result we arrived about 30 minutes early for class and I sat down with the intent to read more sociology. I had just printed off the 4th module (finally in the copier) and was planning to read the beginning of it and the remainder of #3 by the end of the day. Class went as usual. No surprises or anything special. We're now working on a grammar tense called the subjunctive and its pretty difficult. Hopefully I'll figure it out soon. I think that's one of the hardest parts of spanish is all the verb tenses. I'm easily mixing them up all the time.... After class I walked home and enjoyed a nice lunch waiting for me. Then I decided that a nap would be necessary before I could study. Otherwise it was just studying all afternoon. I studied up until dinner and by that point I had nearly finished the material! With a little bit of time after dinner I was done with the part of module #4 I needed and nearly done with all of #3. The reading for this exam alone easily hit over 200 pages (all in spanish) and I had nearly completed it!
My first class Tuesday wasn't until 1pm, so I got up a little early and continued reading. I finished the material before class and checked my mail to see if there were any announcements about the exam (please be cancelled, please be cancelled - which in Argentina wouldn't be all that rare). Unfortunately the exam wasn't cancelled, but there was a crossword puzzle for us to do to practice with some of the vocabulary. I saved it to my flash drive and printed it out at the office to work on before class. We were supposed to have 'interviews' this week about how classes are going etc, but they were running nearly an hour behind. As a result, 5 of us filled out the paperwork together at the beginning of our development class and didn't really get an interview. In class our professor told us that all of us had passed the exam from last week and that if we wanted to see the grades he would have the exams with him the next day at the office. After class I walked back home and ate quickly before locking myself in my room to study and finish the crossword. I am DETERMINED to do better on this test than I did the last one. Its mostly about the original thinkers of sociology and I usually get their points mixed up, so I'm trying really hard to sort them all out. When I arrived in class, there were already a few others there, but not many everyone seemed to be pouring over notes and getting those last few minutes of study time in. At about 6pm, a woman I didn't recognize walked into the room and called for the attention of the class. She started explaining that the professor would be there in a bit, but that in the meantime we would be working on an exercise of how to make a proper conceptual map of a lecture. Everyone must have been looking at her like she was crazy. Finally someone put their hand in the air and asked, "What about our partial?" "Oh, you have an exam today?", she asked, seeming rather perplexed. "YES!", we all nearly shouted back at her. About the time our professor came in and they organized the project for the coming week. Good thing too! We couldn't afford to take and hour of our class time on a project when we had an exam to complete. Before we started the exam our professor went over the crossword with us to help review the vocabulary. The exam didn't seem that bad to be honest. I worked hard on it for a long time. Just like the first exam there was matching, definitions, fill in the blank, short answer, and true or false. One of the matching sections was putting the concepts of the thinkers in a box with their name. I know mine wasn't perfect, but I think it went alright. I was one of the last people there, but I felt pretty good about it when I turned it in to leave. I went home to a nice dinner and an early bedtime in preparation for my "día de diablo" or devil day of a Wednesday.
Wednesday morning found me up at 6:30 as usual... Luckily as it gets to be spring the sun is coming up earlier so I'm not in complete darkness anymore. I headed off to class, food in hand and managed to catch the trolley right on time. It was a little chilly but not too bad, and with the weather prediction in the 80's I had decided to brave the streets in a dress. Class went smoothly and then I sat down to work on reading for my history class. I still haven't made up the partial from when I was sick and from what the teachers have mentioned I have a sneaking suspicion it will be soon... When it was time to leave for spanish, I headed off with a group of friends. We've all gotten so accustomed to walking here and its really nice to at least have that exercise to count on. Most of the time its faster and more trustworthy than the busses as well.... In spanish class our professor informed us that we would be having a 'birthday celebration' next Monday to celebrate everyone's birthday. Each person was in charge of bringing a snack/drink to share and we were going to play 'amigo invisible' = invisible friend (ie the Spanish version of secret Santa). Of all the names to draw from the hat, I probably drew the one I knew the least about.... This will be interesting... After class it was the usual rush home before tango. I actually caught a bus part way, so that was a nice change. After a quick bite to eat and a change of clothes (I did not plan to dance in my dress) I met up with some friends to walk to class. Lately there has been a lot of construction in the city that has changed all the bus routes. As a result, we've found it simpler to simply walk in the nice weather than to look for a bus stop. We got to class with time to spare and almost started on time! Usually we're waiting at least 30 minutes for the professor to show up. All through class we practiced the dance over and over, trying to work out all the timing details before the show on SUNDAY!!! Our professor also said that we as a group needed to either decide on Thursday or Friday when we could all come together for another practice. Everyone picked Friday (I was surprised). After class we all filed into a classroom to get our costumes. It had taken a good 10 minutes to decide who was black and who was white. When they handed me the outfit I thought they had to be kidding. I had imagined a pretty, sparkly tango dress or at least something feminine, but what I was handed were what looked like white marching band pants with a black stripe down the side and a 'jacket' of satin material that reminded me of a tuxedo jacket with tails! Not only were the outfits awful! but they said our professor didn't like the black strip and that we had to buy fabric to cover it or sew over it before Friday! I was just a little upset... Back home with my family I explained the situation and we all laughed over the absurdity of the costume. I'm really enjoying having my abuelos here. They're super sweet and lots of fun to talk to. Then it was right to be for me.
Thursday morning brought another history class... This one pretty much sums up Argentina. Exams were handed back and notes announced to the class (not like they hadn't already been sent out in an e-mail with names and everything). My friend Caroline had earned the top score and the teacher called for an applause for her. I've never seen her face so red, poor thing was SO embarrassed. At the end of class the teacher took time to go over the exam and was clearly frustrated with people for getting such low scores. Caroline was the only 7.... By the time she had finished, class was 20 minutes LATE getting out. Then I went to talk to her about a date for my make-up exam. However, there was a more pressing topic from the class. We were scheduled to have presentations next week on Wednesday (not a regular class day) from 8am to 6pm! The class knew they were Wednesday, but had not counted on being there 10 hours! Most of the students had work or other commitments in the afternoon and were asking for a change. Also there was an exam on Thursday that they wanted time to study for. Long story short and 25 minutes of arguing later, the presentations were unofficially cancelled and moved (along with our second partial and recuperatory exam) to the week after classes are supposed to be over.... GRRRR!!! This also meant that should we not have presentations my exam was Wednesday and if we did have them it would be Thursday. Oh the frustration and uncertainty!!! Needless to say I arrived home very upset. Sole and my abuela just shook their heads. "Welcome to Argentina." After a rushed lunch, it was off to volunteering, which went well as usual. When I got back to the house, I started working on some homework. I left before dinner to meet up with some friends to celebrate yet another birthday! This one being my friend Sarah's 21st. We had a great meal at a different restaurant in the center and then the girls walked me back before heading out to go dancing (I simply didn't have the energy). On the way back, as we walked down my street, a group of older men (40's probably) started making comments and cat calls to us as we walked by. This wasn't unusual (being that we were 4 blonde's and a red head) and so we kept walking. What was unusual, was what a younger guy, who appeared to be about our age, said as we walked by. Head down and putting tables away from outside he said in perfect English, "Sorry ladies." I was SHOCKED! He was apologizing for the comments of the other men! I could've hugged him! When I got home it was straight to bed for me.
Friday I didn't have any plans in the morning, so I just worked on hw and lazed around the house. After lunch and a short nap, I left to meet up with my history group. We had decided to work on our project anyway so that we weren't saving everything until the last minute. However when Deven, Caroline, and I met up at Congreso, the other members weren't there....not even 30 minutes later. So we sent them a message and headed down the street for ice cream! When we got back, they still weren't there. At this point we ran into more friends from our program and all went back to the ice cream shop so that they could get ice cream. In a span of 5 minutes the sky turned dark and the wind seriously picked up...another zonda. There was dirt EVERYWHERE from the wind and I decided to go home. Not to mention that my abuelos were leaving in an hour and I wanted to say goodbye. Deven walked me home and I got to spend a few minutes talking to abuelo before we took some 'family photos' and they left for the bus station. It was back to homework for me and then off to my tango rehearsal. The rehearsal was pretty quick (only about an hour). We all walked back to town together and I split off to go to my friend Nico's house. We had made plans last week to work on the project and then have dinner together, but when the group hadn't shown up earlier, I thought dinner was off. Caroline and I received messages though through facebook that they were already at the house cooking and looking forward to seeing us. I arrived slightly ahead of Caroline and was sitting and talking with Nico (who's actually our TA of sorts) and Augusto (who's in our group) when she got there. We enjoyed an amazing meal prepared by the guys of corn tart (kinda like corn pudding in a pie crust), and steak with a white cream sauce. There was also herbed bread and wine with dinner. Of course ice cream was for dessert and after we'd cleared the table, we sat down for a movie. Neither Caroline nor I had ever seen Schindler's list, so the boys had rented it for us. Nico made coffee, and we sat down for the first half. At the intermission Nico made us martinis with a bit of melon liquor, because they're his favorite and I'd never tried one. Then it was back to the movie. By the time it was over at 3, I was exhausted and ready for bed. Augusto's dad picked us up and took us home so that we didn't have to walk or call a cab. I lay in bed for a long time thinking before I could go to sleep. Nothing like Schindler's list to put your life in perspective...
Saturday I worked on hw a bit in the morning before meeting up with Deven to go shopping. Neither of us had been to the 'Plaza Shopping' (yes that's exactly what its called) and so we decided to make an afternoon of it. We had a good time looking around and it was the first time I'd been in a US style mall in months. When we got back we met up with a friend Madeline in the main plaza and walked to get ice cream with her. It was her 21st birthday, and she was having a really good day. After eating ice cream and walking around a bit, we split up to go home and change before her dinner. She picked a great restaurant! The food was delicious and the atmosphere was really fun. There were about 10-15 of us there and we ordered a bunch of sparkly wine to split with the food. Then we just sat and talked for hours! By the end of it, we were all sitting around the table playing Never Have I Ever and hearing great stories about everyone's lives. Everyone was pretty tired by the time it hit 3 and we all split our separate ways to go home. What a fun and relaxing night! I hope my 21st is just like that. Dinner with friends and family, with stories and fun times to remember.
Sunday was dedicated to homework in the morning before Tango rehearsal started at 4. With help from my abuela and Sole my pants had been sewn so that the black stripes didn't show and with that costume, along with all my personal black and white, I set off for the theater. Our prof had told us on Friday to bring clothes we had in black and white and she would see about letting us wear them. I didn't have white pants, but she let me borrow some from her dance company and with Audrey's white tights underneath, it was perfect! Hooray for wearing normal clothes. All dressed and ready, we waited until nearly 6 before the rehearsal even started. When the run-through was completed at 8 we only had half an hour before we had to be back in preparation for the show. My friend Sarah and I took off for the nearest fast food we knew of...a restaurant called Mr Dog 2 blocks from my house. Disgustingly, we managed to run there and eat in a matter of 15 minutes without spilling anything on our all white outfits... I don't plan on repeating that process ever again! With full bellies we walked back to the theater. The show went great and I haven't had that much fun in a long time. It reminded me a lot of the dance recitals I used to be in and brought back all those fun memories. I really miss that... After the show, we got to see our friends that had come to watch us. Practically everyone who wasn't in the show had been there watching. What fun! Unfortunately Sole couldn't make it cause she had been called into work. I was disappointed, but understood and still had a great time. Exhausted I crawled into bed before midnight in preparation for another busy week. Oh the adventures I'm having here. How many people can say they danced a tango performance in one of the most important theaters in the city?!
It was a pretty good week followed by an even better weekend and I can't wait to see what next week brings. Hopefully more adventures and good times with friends. Its so hard for me to believe how close I'm coming to being done here! It seems almost like yesterday that I arrived and yet I'm so comfortable here it feels like I've been here forever. What an amazing opportunity and experience!
Missing everyone bunches,
All my love!
Friday, October 30, 2009
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Ooh this has been a long time...
Hey everyone! So I first want to apologize, because I know that I have gotten AWFUL with these posts over the last few weeks. To be honest, I have had an exam every week! And the studying has gotten pretty intense. However, I promise to catch up soon and to be better about posting on time...
SO, this week began with an exam on Tuesday morning in my development class. I had studied over the weekend, using the power points from class and my notes. To be honest, I wasn't all that concerned about the difficulty of the test, but I still wanted to do well. The test went completely fine and I'm looking forward to getting it back. After class I took the trolle back home with some of my friends from class. Usually I walk, but seeing as how I'm still slightly under the weather, I decided to take the easier way. I had a quick bite to eat and then took a short nap before getting ready for class. I grabbed a cookie as I walked out the door (one of the homemade ones from Deven and my adventure) and was still enjoying it when I got out of the elevator. Of course just my luck...who should I run into but Ruben...the man who cleans our building. He made a sign of me eating and when I seemed to be confused, he advised me "No debes comer tanto. Hay que guardar la silueta." I was completely taken aback and left quickly without saying anything. Translated, that phrase means "You shouldn't eat so much. You have to watch your figure." Needless to say I was more than upset. Who was he to tell me that I needed to watch my figure? He's no where near handsome or attractive and for the 10 seconds a week he sees me, if I'm eating a snack how is it any of his business. By the time I got to class I was still flustered and told Krista about it. She just shook her hear. Oh the culture of Argentina. Have I mentioned that being politically correct and having a verbal filter simply don't exist here? Well its the truth in many situations. People are just direct and say exactly what they are thinking. Anyway, class went as usual until my professor mentioned that our second exam would be the following week! WHAT?! The entire class was in an uproar, shouting over one another about how could it be so soon and that we didn't have time to study etc. We were just getting out first exams back in class and in a week we would take our second one over all of unit 3 (which we attempted to finish in class) and the beginning of unit 4 (which we wouldn't discuss in class and which wasn't even in the photocopier yet for us to get the information). Oh Argentina... I left class understandably stressed, but also with my first partial in hand! Not only had I passed, but I'd earned a 7 (73%) which translates to a B+ in our standards!!! I was super excited. At home I had dinner with the family and then went to bed, since Wednesdays are always early.
Wednesday morning I was up early as usual and off to class in the office. Class went as usual and I worked on hw and studying until it was time to go to Spanish. Nothing exciting happened in that class either and then it was home to eat a quick lunch before I had to go to Tango class. Everyone is getting pretty excited, because our show is in a few weeks on the 25th! I can't believe its coming up so soon!!! In class we finally finished the dance and practiced the finale. Over and over we practiced the whole thing trying to get timing right and figure out what poses to do. After class it was back to the house to relax and unwind from the week. I only had one more class to go the next day, so Wednesday nights always feel like the end for me. I also made an attempt to clean my room and make sure everything is organized. Sole's parents are coming to visit tomorrow and I wanted to make sure my room didn't look like a tornado had blown through!
Thursday morning I was up and off to class before anyone else was awake (as usual) and came back for a quick lunch. No one was home, so I heated up some leftovers and headed off to volunteering. It was interesting as usual to work with the kids and just talk to the people there. Louisa and I ended up talking to a woman who is from Argentina but lived in the US for nearly 25 years! It was great to hear about her life and she speaks perfect English! We talked a lot about things she misses from there and she told us how lucky she is that she got to live by the beach in FL and now lives so close to the mountains. Its the best of both worlds. What a positive outlook on life! When I got home, everyone was relaxing and waiting on my abuelos to get here. Their bus didn't arrive for a few hours, so I worked on a bit of homework and made plans to go out that evening. It was my friend Pat's birthday, so they were all meeting up for dinner. I elected to eat with the family and meet up with them later. My abuelos arrived on time and after everyone had gotten settled, we sat down to a nice dinner. I felt like I was back at the beginning of the program again, afraid to say anything that I might make a stupid grammar mistake or something. After dinner I messaged my friends and met up with them at a bar on the main street. The birthday boy had decided he wanted to go dancing, so we all piled into taxis and set off for the club. It was free for ladies, so that was a nice surprise and when we got inside there was still a live band playing. ALL the musicians were wearing satin shirts, and they were super shiny in the stage lighting of the club. For their final song they played YMCA, and we ALL sang along. Then the DJ took over and everyone started dancing. Looking around there must have been nearly 30 or 40 disco balls hanging from the ceiling! The music was pretty good. A mix of songs we knew from the US and songs from here in spanish. About 8 of us had gone dancing, and after a few hours, most of them were ready to go back. Pat and I, on the other hand, were still having a great time, so we stayed until the club closed. :) It was a blast!
Friday I didn't have any many plans for the day, so I worked on hw a bit and relaxed. I also spent some time talking with the abuelos. Early in the afternoon I met up with a project group from my history class to work on our upcoming project. We had lunch together at a café before going to Augusto's house to work out the details of the project. Later that afternoon Sole had to work and Paola had gone to Gustavo's for the evening. When I realized it was only going to be me and my 'grandparents' for dinner I started to get a little uncomfortable. I didn't want to be the intruder in their evening, and I certainly wasn't planning on talking much...it just seemed awkward. So, I made plans to eat with a friend. However, as I was grabbing my keys to walk out the door, when abuelo asked what I was doing and that dinner would be ready shortly? I tried to explain that I didn't want to interrupt their evening and that I could just eat out. "How could you interrupt the evening? We're happy to have you here!" was his response...So not knowing at all how to explain my way out of this one, I thanked him and hung my keys back up... Poor David was so disappointed. I sat in the kitchen on my favorite stool and watched abuelo make dinner and even talked to him a bit. Dinner was delicious though and I even made the salad. After dinner I met up with Louisa to catch up a bit and have ice cream. Then, to make up for dinner, I met up with David and some others at a bar to hang out for a bit. I was pretty tired from the night before, so I called it a rather early night and took a taxi home.
Saturday I really had nothing going on, so I spent the ENTIRE day in my room studying sociology. I was absolutely determined to get all my reading done and study very hard for this second exam. I studied up until lunch and then after as well. Although I did take time for a short nap. I seem to be losing my voice, and I don't want to get sick again, so sleep is important! After the nap it was back to studying. David and I had made plans to go out for dinner in light of the confusion the other night, so we met up at 9 and walked around for nearly an hour trying to decide where we wanted to eat. We finally ended up on the main street with the bars and restaurants and decided to go to a restaurant that someone's host mom had mentioned. It was AMAZING! The night was nice enough to sit outside, and when the waitress found out we spoke english, that was all she spoke to us...we of course responded in Spanish. :) After a delicious dinner of chicken wok, we decided that dessert was absolutely necessary and ordered a tower of chocolate mousse to split. It was DELICIOUS! there were strawberries and pastry pieces in between the chocolate sections. It was SO good! After dinner we walked down to meet up with some other friends. This is going to sound very sketchy, but we all met up at a gas station where we could buy beer and sit outside at tables to drink it. Its actually a nice place and it just makes for a good place to meet up. After a bit we all decided to wander to a different bar and ended up playing pool at a new location on the same street! I hadn't played pool since South Africa, so my skills were awful, but it was fun to try again. Then we wandered to another favorite bar farther up the street and sat outside for a bit. After awhile it got too cold to sit outside and the remaining 5 of us moved inside. For some reason Pat and I decided we wanted to go dancing again, so we headed to a bar called Por Acá which also has a dance floor. We stayed until it closed and this made my 3rd evening with friends in one weekend. I crashed immediately into bed when I got home.
Sunday was spent again dedicated to home work and studying for sociology. The amazing food cooked by my abuelo continued and we had a wonderful white fish for lunch that just fell apart with your fork. It was really delicious. Honestly there were no adventures at all during the day. I was dedicated and determined to finish the reading. I also headed to bed early so that I wouldn't get sick and could get as much sleep as possible. Tomorrow brings another week of adventures and experiences. I can't believe that I've almost been here 3 months already and that I'll be coming home in slightly less than 2! My how the time flies!
I hope everyone is doing well and I hope you all know how much it means to hear from you about your lives as well. Missing you bunches!
All my love!
SO, this week began with an exam on Tuesday morning in my development class. I had studied over the weekend, using the power points from class and my notes. To be honest, I wasn't all that concerned about the difficulty of the test, but I still wanted to do well. The test went completely fine and I'm looking forward to getting it back. After class I took the trolle back home with some of my friends from class. Usually I walk, but seeing as how I'm still slightly under the weather, I decided to take the easier way. I had a quick bite to eat and then took a short nap before getting ready for class. I grabbed a cookie as I walked out the door (one of the homemade ones from Deven and my adventure) and was still enjoying it when I got out of the elevator. Of course just my luck...who should I run into but Ruben...the man who cleans our building. He made a sign of me eating and when I seemed to be confused, he advised me "No debes comer tanto. Hay que guardar la silueta." I was completely taken aback and left quickly without saying anything. Translated, that phrase means "You shouldn't eat so much. You have to watch your figure." Needless to say I was more than upset. Who was he to tell me that I needed to watch my figure? He's no where near handsome or attractive and for the 10 seconds a week he sees me, if I'm eating a snack how is it any of his business. By the time I got to class I was still flustered and told Krista about it. She just shook her hear. Oh the culture of Argentina. Have I mentioned that being politically correct and having a verbal filter simply don't exist here? Well its the truth in many situations. People are just direct and say exactly what they are thinking. Anyway, class went as usual until my professor mentioned that our second exam would be the following week! WHAT?! The entire class was in an uproar, shouting over one another about how could it be so soon and that we didn't have time to study etc. We were just getting out first exams back in class and in a week we would take our second one over all of unit 3 (which we attempted to finish in class) and the beginning of unit 4 (which we wouldn't discuss in class and which wasn't even in the photocopier yet for us to get the information). Oh Argentina... I left class understandably stressed, but also with my first partial in hand! Not only had I passed, but I'd earned a 7 (73%) which translates to a B+ in our standards!!! I was super excited. At home I had dinner with the family and then went to bed, since Wednesdays are always early.
Wednesday morning I was up early as usual and off to class in the office. Class went as usual and I worked on hw and studying until it was time to go to Spanish. Nothing exciting happened in that class either and then it was home to eat a quick lunch before I had to go to Tango class. Everyone is getting pretty excited, because our show is in a few weeks on the 25th! I can't believe its coming up so soon!!! In class we finally finished the dance and practiced the finale. Over and over we practiced the whole thing trying to get timing right and figure out what poses to do. After class it was back to the house to relax and unwind from the week. I only had one more class to go the next day, so Wednesday nights always feel like the end for me. I also made an attempt to clean my room and make sure everything is organized. Sole's parents are coming to visit tomorrow and I wanted to make sure my room didn't look like a tornado had blown through!
Thursday morning I was up and off to class before anyone else was awake (as usual) and came back for a quick lunch. No one was home, so I heated up some leftovers and headed off to volunteering. It was interesting as usual to work with the kids and just talk to the people there. Louisa and I ended up talking to a woman who is from Argentina but lived in the US for nearly 25 years! It was great to hear about her life and she speaks perfect English! We talked a lot about things she misses from there and she told us how lucky she is that she got to live by the beach in FL and now lives so close to the mountains. Its the best of both worlds. What a positive outlook on life! When I got home, everyone was relaxing and waiting on my abuelos to get here. Their bus didn't arrive for a few hours, so I worked on a bit of homework and made plans to go out that evening. It was my friend Pat's birthday, so they were all meeting up for dinner. I elected to eat with the family and meet up with them later. My abuelos arrived on time and after everyone had gotten settled, we sat down to a nice dinner. I felt like I was back at the beginning of the program again, afraid to say anything that I might make a stupid grammar mistake or something. After dinner I messaged my friends and met up with them at a bar on the main street. The birthday boy had decided he wanted to go dancing, so we all piled into taxis and set off for the club. It was free for ladies, so that was a nice surprise and when we got inside there was still a live band playing. ALL the musicians were wearing satin shirts, and they were super shiny in the stage lighting of the club. For their final song they played YMCA, and we ALL sang along. Then the DJ took over and everyone started dancing. Looking around there must have been nearly 30 or 40 disco balls hanging from the ceiling! The music was pretty good. A mix of songs we knew from the US and songs from here in spanish. About 8 of us had gone dancing, and after a few hours, most of them were ready to go back. Pat and I, on the other hand, were still having a great time, so we stayed until the club closed. :) It was a blast!
Friday I didn't have any many plans for the day, so I worked on hw a bit and relaxed. I also spent some time talking with the abuelos. Early in the afternoon I met up with a project group from my history class to work on our upcoming project. We had lunch together at a café before going to Augusto's house to work out the details of the project. Later that afternoon Sole had to work and Paola had gone to Gustavo's for the evening. When I realized it was only going to be me and my 'grandparents' for dinner I started to get a little uncomfortable. I didn't want to be the intruder in their evening, and I certainly wasn't planning on talking much...it just seemed awkward. So, I made plans to eat with a friend. However, as I was grabbing my keys to walk out the door, when abuelo asked what I was doing and that dinner would be ready shortly? I tried to explain that I didn't want to interrupt their evening and that I could just eat out. "How could you interrupt the evening? We're happy to have you here!" was his response...So not knowing at all how to explain my way out of this one, I thanked him and hung my keys back up... Poor David was so disappointed. I sat in the kitchen on my favorite stool and watched abuelo make dinner and even talked to him a bit. Dinner was delicious though and I even made the salad. After dinner I met up with Louisa to catch up a bit and have ice cream. Then, to make up for dinner, I met up with David and some others at a bar to hang out for a bit. I was pretty tired from the night before, so I called it a rather early night and took a taxi home.
Saturday I really had nothing going on, so I spent the ENTIRE day in my room studying sociology. I was absolutely determined to get all my reading done and study very hard for this second exam. I studied up until lunch and then after as well. Although I did take time for a short nap. I seem to be losing my voice, and I don't want to get sick again, so sleep is important! After the nap it was back to studying. David and I had made plans to go out for dinner in light of the confusion the other night, so we met up at 9 and walked around for nearly an hour trying to decide where we wanted to eat. We finally ended up on the main street with the bars and restaurants and decided to go to a restaurant that someone's host mom had mentioned. It was AMAZING! The night was nice enough to sit outside, and when the waitress found out we spoke english, that was all she spoke to us...we of course responded in Spanish. :) After a delicious dinner of chicken wok, we decided that dessert was absolutely necessary and ordered a tower of chocolate mousse to split. It was DELICIOUS! there were strawberries and pastry pieces in between the chocolate sections. It was SO good! After dinner we walked down to meet up with some other friends. This is going to sound very sketchy, but we all met up at a gas station where we could buy beer and sit outside at tables to drink it. Its actually a nice place and it just makes for a good place to meet up. After a bit we all decided to wander to a different bar and ended up playing pool at a new location on the same street! I hadn't played pool since South Africa, so my skills were awful, but it was fun to try again. Then we wandered to another favorite bar farther up the street and sat outside for a bit. After awhile it got too cold to sit outside and the remaining 5 of us moved inside. For some reason Pat and I decided we wanted to go dancing again, so we headed to a bar called Por Acá which also has a dance floor. We stayed until it closed and this made my 3rd evening with friends in one weekend. I crashed immediately into bed when I got home.
Sunday was spent again dedicated to home work and studying for sociology. The amazing food cooked by my abuelo continued and we had a wonderful white fish for lunch that just fell apart with your fork. It was really delicious. Honestly there were no adventures at all during the day. I was dedicated and determined to finish the reading. I also headed to bed early so that I wouldn't get sick and could get as much sleep as possible. Tomorrow brings another week of adventures and experiences. I can't believe that I've almost been here 3 months already and that I'll be coming home in slightly less than 2! My how the time flies!
I hope everyone is doing well and I hope you all know how much it means to hear from you about your lives as well. Missing you bunches!
All my love!
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Unfortunate Events and Blessings in Disguise - THE COMPLETE VERSION
Hey everyone! I hope that you all are healthy, enjoying life, and had wonderful weekends!
The second week back from break started out with a bang! Monday classes went as usual. No surprises and nothing special. It was back the the grind with spanish class again so I had the 2 usual classes in the morning and then came home for lunch and a quick nap. Usually I would've gone to the gym, but I was studying for my Thursday history exam and also had an extra Tango rehearsal to attend. I left the house and walked to practice since it was so nice outside. The weather seems to finally be warming up a bit, which is really nice. It hit me all of a sudden walking past 2 of the plazas how green everything has gotten all of a sudden! Its like a fairy waved a wand over everything while we were gone and in the last week. Poof its green and spring in Mendoza! When I got to Tango, no one else was there and I was afraid I was going to be the only one! Luckily 3 others showed up. The 'rehearsal' didn't start until well after 8pm and it wasn't until 9:15 that we finally had a chance to practice our dance. Being that there were only 4 of us there and 3 of us had the girl's part, this was extremely difficult. Did I mention that the professor wasn't there either? Long story short, we ran through the dance 3 times (without music) and then left.... Beneficial expenditure of my time? I think not. When I arrived back home, Sole had dinner ready and we sat down to eat and watch our usual series.
At 11ish after the series had finished and we'd cleared the table, I pulled out my computer to check my mail and encountered a VERY unfortunate and frenzied message in facebook. One of my friends here, Dylan, had apparently had an awful evening. According to his mom, who was on his facebook for him, his computer, local cell, iPod, and backpack had been stolen from his house and he was VERY upset. After talking to her for a few minutes and asking Sole's permission, I hailed a taxi and went directly to his house to find him, see what I could do, and offer to let him sleep at our apartment for the evening. It wasn't until I got to the neighborhood that I realized I had no idea what house was his. So, I called Sole from my cell and asked her (in spanish) if she could talk to Dylan's mom through facebook for me. She did (all in english) and relayed the information to me in spanish so I could find the house. I knocked on the door and as I did, an older woman came up behind me and asked what I wanted. I told her who I was looking for and she let me in (apparently she was Dylan's mom). I asked the people in the living room where Dylan was and headed up the stairs to find him. A very upset, and unsettled Dylan met me halfway up the stairs. He explained to me that he had come down to eat dinner, washed his plates, and returned to his room to find that all of his things had been robbed directly from his room while he was eating! Obviously this was not only frustrating, but scary as well! It appears that the robbers had broken in by way of his balcony (on the second story) using each other to stand on or a car outside. To make this happen, they obviously had to have been watching the house as well! Needless to say the whole situation was very upsetting especially for Dylan's mom, who was just returning from the grocery store when I arrived and heard the story at the same time I did. I feel I need to emphasize here that Dylan lives in a VERY good neighborhood only 1 or 2 blocks from where the program office is. Its not like he lives in an unsafe part of town. After much discussion between the directors, his mom, and Sole, he decided to stay at my house at least until things got figured out. So he packed up some stuff and we hailed a taxi back to my house. Neither of us slept well.
Tuesday morning Dylan left early to go back to his house for a bit before class. I worked on hw and studying until I had to leave. After class, I returned for lunch and to talk to Sole. It appeared that Dylan would be staying with us for a few days until he could change families. Understandably he did not feel comfortable or safe staying in his house anymore. I headed off to my second class and received news that Dylan would be coming back to our place sometime that evening after dinner. Class went as usual. I really am enjoying this sociology class. We didn't get our partials back, but the professor told us we would have the grades by next week at the latest. I'm still crossing my fingers it went ok. Part way through class, we had our usual break "recreo" which the students had been calling for since 15 minutes into class... Our class goes until 8:30 and at five til 8, the prof paused for a minute to ask what time it was. One guy behind me (who had been bothering me all period talking, bouncing his feet on my chair etc) shouted that it was time to go. I just shook my head and the prof asked again if it was really 8:30, I told her no, that it wasn't quite 8 yet. The kid behind me asked why I'd done that and I turned around and snapped at him that I cared about the class and was here to learn the material. All of this of course took place in spanish and he was quite taken aback (yes obnoxious boy the gringa DOES speak spanish). He actually got up and left the class and didn't show up again until the very end. I was honestly proud of myself! My first retort in spanish! After class I went home and helped Sole a bit in the kitchen and tried to catch up on the hw I hadn't done in the midst of last night's excitement. We still hadn't eaten at 10:30 when Dylan showed up, so he joined us for a second dinner. Between Sole, tia Paola, her bf Gustavo, and me, it was quite the full house. We spent most of the meal laughing about one thing or another and Dylan even seemed to lighten up a bit (although it was also clear he was a little overwhelmed). After dinner I worked on more hw and prepared everything for the next day in the living room. Seeing as I had a class the next morning at 8:15 and had to leave by 7:30, I wanted to make as little noise as possible and disturb no one if possible. So, I put everything in the living room so I would only have to go back into my room (which is where Dylan was sleeping in the extra bed) as few times as possible.
Wednesday morning dawned WAY too early for me and I was not feeling great when I rolled out of bed. By the time I got to class I was a little better, but by the end of class it was clear I was coming down with something. I obviously had a cold (stuffy/runny nose, sore throat, etc) but my stomach was also bothering me! It hadn't felt like this since the first few days here when I was still becoming accustomed to the water/food etc. I barely made it through class and was working on more hw in an extra room when the new girl working at the office asked me if I was ok. I told her I wasn't feeling well but it was fine. She seemed concerned, but let me be. A few minutes later Carlos (one of our program coordinators) appeared at the door and he was not so convinced. Long story short, they called a doctor who arrived in 10 minutes to take a look at me. After a quick exam, he determined that I was in no state for classes and sent me home with notes for Sole on what types of food I was allowed and what to take for pain/fever (which he was convinced I had) and notes for my teachers explaining why I would not be in class. I took the trolley home (with no desire to walk) and walked in with the notes for Sole. She read them and sent me directly to bed. The doctor had prescribed bed rest for 3 days, and simple foods (essentially the Argentinean version of the BRAT diet - bananas, rice, applesauce, toast). Immediately I found myself in my pjs and confined to bed. That afternoon Dylan stopped by to get his stuff and give me my hw. He had found a new family and was moving that afternoon! Lucky for him that something worked out so quickly. I spent the rest of the day in bed, sleeping, watching movies, and eating the food that Sole brought to me.
By Thursday morning I was feeling slightly better, but still under the weather and was still confined to bed. I did absolutely nothing the entire day and only left my bed to use the bathroom. In all fairness, I was not deathly sick or even more than under the weather. Had I been at DU, I still would've been in my classes and living life as usual. The most unfortunate thing about the timing, is that not only did I miss my first parcial = midterm in my History of Political Ideas class today, this is also a long weekend with no class on Monday and it is very clear that my plans to go to Iguazu are completely out of the question. The good news, is that I sent an e-mail Wednesday and the professor said not to worry about it that we would work it all out when I was better, and everyone else bailed on Iguazu too. So, I spent the entire day sleeping, eating, and watching more movies!
Friday morning I was feeling much better and was even permitted to bounce into the kitchen for my own glasses of water! However once I had my water, it was back to bed for me! I couldn't believe how seriously Sole was taking this and I was still eating very simple food. However, the rice that she kept making me was really good and mixed with some type of cheese, which I really enjoyed. I spent the day thinking and watching more movies... Hoping that soon I would be allowed back outside or at least into the living room for extended periods of time. I am seriously out of movies to watch on my computer and the internet is not all that stable in my room...so it makes life interesting. As frustrating as these few days have been to miss classes, activities, and time with friends, I am really counting it as a blessing. I clearly needed the time to rest and relax with no obligations. What better/more efficient way to clear out an entire weekend than doctor's orders?! I'm convinced that no matter how much sleep I get here I am just going to continue being exhausted 24/7 and I fully intend to blame it on the mental exertion of learning a new language and/or the viento zonda whenever possible.
Saturday I actually saw the outside for the first time in days! Granted it was only to meet my friend Audrey and trade movies with her, but it was a breath of fresh(ish) air. We even got to talk for a bit before she and Caitlin (another friend) headed off to ice cream. Then it was back to bed for me ... with new movies!!! On the bright side, I did eat lunch and dinner at the dining table with Paola and Sole. :)
Sunday I actually escaped from the house! Bundled up of course under Sole's orders with scarf and fleece jacket (in 70º weather) I headed to the grocery store to meet Deven. His family was out of town for the weekend and he wanted to do something nice for them, so we decided to make chocolate chip cookies! I helped him get the ingredients and then we went back to his house to make and bake them. He lives in an amazing house and from the outside it doesn't look like much, but the inside is BEAUTIFUL! Its so colorful and its HUGE! The house is really long and skinny with 2 small courtyards. The architecture here just astounds me. The cookies turned out amazing and we had a great time making them. It was honestly just nice to be out of the house and have a change of scenery.
Monday was a holiday (Columbus day) and so we had no classes and I just spent the day relaxing at the house again and slowly starting to work on hw for the week so that I would be ready for classes and not start the new week behind. I also took some time in the afternoon to walk around the park with a friend. We had discussed meeting there at 4, but right as I was about to send her a message to confirm, my cell phone ran out of credit... Being that it was a holiday, NOTHING was open, so I just decided to walk to the park and hope that she would meet me there. When I got there, I had missed a call from her and had another text saying she was still at her house waiting for confirmation from me... I tried charging my phone with a credit card, but apparently my card is not authorized for these measures... As I sat on the grass trying to come up with a plan, I finally decided that I could just ask to borrow someone else's phone to send a message... Oh great, gotta ask a complete stranger, in spanish, to borrow their phone. I finally decided on a group of girls who looked to be about 13-15 years old. They could immediately tell I wasn't from there, and asked if I was from the US. I told them yes, and they started trying to speak phrases of english to me. It was pretty fun to hear and to try to help them with the translations. One of the girls let me borrow their phone and I sent Lisa a message to come meet me. 5 minutes later the girl squealed in delight! "Tengo un mensaje en ingles!" (I have a message in english)! Long story short Lisa and I finally met up to walk around the lake and talk. The girls were absolutely delighted to talk with me until Lisa got there and we had a really good time. It just amazes me how much I've changed since I came here. I NEVER would've done that at the beginning! Hooray for improving confidence.
Overall I'd say the weekend was a success. My stomach is basically back to normal (although Sole still won't let me eat yogurt or anything with dairy besides the cheese in the rice) and I just have a stuffy nose from my cold. I also had a lot of time to relax, catch up on things around the apartment, and more importantly: sleep. Sometimes events are just a blessing in disguise and I'm super happy I had this one. :)
I hope everyone is doing well and that this message finds you enjoying life. My advice for the weekend, take some time to relax with no plans and just enjoy life. Honestly we don't do enough of that anymore and it can be truly beneficial for the body, mind, and soul.
All my love!
The second week back from break started out with a bang! Monday classes went as usual. No surprises and nothing special. It was back the the grind with spanish class again so I had the 2 usual classes in the morning and then came home for lunch and a quick nap. Usually I would've gone to the gym, but I was studying for my Thursday history exam and also had an extra Tango rehearsal to attend. I left the house and walked to practice since it was so nice outside. The weather seems to finally be warming up a bit, which is really nice. It hit me all of a sudden walking past 2 of the plazas how green everything has gotten all of a sudden! Its like a fairy waved a wand over everything while we were gone and in the last week. Poof its green and spring in Mendoza! When I got to Tango, no one else was there and I was afraid I was going to be the only one! Luckily 3 others showed up. The 'rehearsal' didn't start until well after 8pm and it wasn't until 9:15 that we finally had a chance to practice our dance. Being that there were only 4 of us there and 3 of us had the girl's part, this was extremely difficult. Did I mention that the professor wasn't there either? Long story short, we ran through the dance 3 times (without music) and then left.... Beneficial expenditure of my time? I think not. When I arrived back home, Sole had dinner ready and we sat down to eat and watch our usual series.
At 11ish after the series had finished and we'd cleared the table, I pulled out my computer to check my mail and encountered a VERY unfortunate and frenzied message in facebook. One of my friends here, Dylan, had apparently had an awful evening. According to his mom, who was on his facebook for him, his computer, local cell, iPod, and backpack had been stolen from his house and he was VERY upset. After talking to her for a few minutes and asking Sole's permission, I hailed a taxi and went directly to his house to find him, see what I could do, and offer to let him sleep at our apartment for the evening. It wasn't until I got to the neighborhood that I realized I had no idea what house was his. So, I called Sole from my cell and asked her (in spanish) if she could talk to Dylan's mom through facebook for me. She did (all in english) and relayed the information to me in spanish so I could find the house. I knocked on the door and as I did, an older woman came up behind me and asked what I wanted. I told her who I was looking for and she let me in (apparently she was Dylan's mom). I asked the people in the living room where Dylan was and headed up the stairs to find him. A very upset, and unsettled Dylan met me halfway up the stairs. He explained to me that he had come down to eat dinner, washed his plates, and returned to his room to find that all of his things had been robbed directly from his room while he was eating! Obviously this was not only frustrating, but scary as well! It appears that the robbers had broken in by way of his balcony (on the second story) using each other to stand on or a car outside. To make this happen, they obviously had to have been watching the house as well! Needless to say the whole situation was very upsetting especially for Dylan's mom, who was just returning from the grocery store when I arrived and heard the story at the same time I did. I feel I need to emphasize here that Dylan lives in a VERY good neighborhood only 1 or 2 blocks from where the program office is. Its not like he lives in an unsafe part of town. After much discussion between the directors, his mom, and Sole, he decided to stay at my house at least until things got figured out. So he packed up some stuff and we hailed a taxi back to my house. Neither of us slept well.
Tuesday morning Dylan left early to go back to his house for a bit before class. I worked on hw and studying until I had to leave. After class, I returned for lunch and to talk to Sole. It appeared that Dylan would be staying with us for a few days until he could change families. Understandably he did not feel comfortable or safe staying in his house anymore. I headed off to my second class and received news that Dylan would be coming back to our place sometime that evening after dinner. Class went as usual. I really am enjoying this sociology class. We didn't get our partials back, but the professor told us we would have the grades by next week at the latest. I'm still crossing my fingers it went ok. Part way through class, we had our usual break "recreo" which the students had been calling for since 15 minutes into class... Our class goes until 8:30 and at five til 8, the prof paused for a minute to ask what time it was. One guy behind me (who had been bothering me all period talking, bouncing his feet on my chair etc) shouted that it was time to go. I just shook my head and the prof asked again if it was really 8:30, I told her no, that it wasn't quite 8 yet. The kid behind me asked why I'd done that and I turned around and snapped at him that I cared about the class and was here to learn the material. All of this of course took place in spanish and he was quite taken aback (yes obnoxious boy the gringa DOES speak spanish). He actually got up and left the class and didn't show up again until the very end. I was honestly proud of myself! My first retort in spanish! After class I went home and helped Sole a bit in the kitchen and tried to catch up on the hw I hadn't done in the midst of last night's excitement. We still hadn't eaten at 10:30 when Dylan showed up, so he joined us for a second dinner. Between Sole, tia Paola, her bf Gustavo, and me, it was quite the full house. We spent most of the meal laughing about one thing or another and Dylan even seemed to lighten up a bit (although it was also clear he was a little overwhelmed). After dinner I worked on more hw and prepared everything for the next day in the living room. Seeing as I had a class the next morning at 8:15 and had to leave by 7:30, I wanted to make as little noise as possible and disturb no one if possible. So, I put everything in the living room so I would only have to go back into my room (which is where Dylan was sleeping in the extra bed) as few times as possible.
Wednesday morning dawned WAY too early for me and I was not feeling great when I rolled out of bed. By the time I got to class I was a little better, but by the end of class it was clear I was coming down with something. I obviously had a cold (stuffy/runny nose, sore throat, etc) but my stomach was also bothering me! It hadn't felt like this since the first few days here when I was still becoming accustomed to the water/food etc. I barely made it through class and was working on more hw in an extra room when the new girl working at the office asked me if I was ok. I told her I wasn't feeling well but it was fine. She seemed concerned, but let me be. A few minutes later Carlos (one of our program coordinators) appeared at the door and he was not so convinced. Long story short, they called a doctor who arrived in 10 minutes to take a look at me. After a quick exam, he determined that I was in no state for classes and sent me home with notes for Sole on what types of food I was allowed and what to take for pain/fever (which he was convinced I had) and notes for my teachers explaining why I would not be in class. I took the trolley home (with no desire to walk) and walked in with the notes for Sole. She read them and sent me directly to bed. The doctor had prescribed bed rest for 3 days, and simple foods (essentially the Argentinean version of the BRAT diet - bananas, rice, applesauce, toast). Immediately I found myself in my pjs and confined to bed. That afternoon Dylan stopped by to get his stuff and give me my hw. He had found a new family and was moving that afternoon! Lucky for him that something worked out so quickly. I spent the rest of the day in bed, sleeping, watching movies, and eating the food that Sole brought to me.
By Thursday morning I was feeling slightly better, but still under the weather and was still confined to bed. I did absolutely nothing the entire day and only left my bed to use the bathroom. In all fairness, I was not deathly sick or even more than under the weather. Had I been at DU, I still would've been in my classes and living life as usual. The most unfortunate thing about the timing, is that not only did I miss my first parcial = midterm in my History of Political Ideas class today, this is also a long weekend with no class on Monday and it is very clear that my plans to go to Iguazu are completely out of the question. The good news, is that I sent an e-mail Wednesday and the professor said not to worry about it that we would work it all out when I was better, and everyone else bailed on Iguazu too. So, I spent the entire day sleeping, eating, and watching more movies!
Friday morning I was feeling much better and was even permitted to bounce into the kitchen for my own glasses of water! However once I had my water, it was back to bed for me! I couldn't believe how seriously Sole was taking this and I was still eating very simple food. However, the rice that she kept making me was really good and mixed with some type of cheese, which I really enjoyed. I spent the day thinking and watching more movies... Hoping that soon I would be allowed back outside or at least into the living room for extended periods of time. I am seriously out of movies to watch on my computer and the internet is not all that stable in my room...so it makes life interesting. As frustrating as these few days have been to miss classes, activities, and time with friends, I am really counting it as a blessing. I clearly needed the time to rest and relax with no obligations. What better/more efficient way to clear out an entire weekend than doctor's orders?! I'm convinced that no matter how much sleep I get here I am just going to continue being exhausted 24/7 and I fully intend to blame it on the mental exertion of learning a new language and/or the viento zonda whenever possible.
Saturday I actually saw the outside for the first time in days! Granted it was only to meet my friend Audrey and trade movies with her, but it was a breath of fresh(ish) air. We even got to talk for a bit before she and Caitlin (another friend) headed off to ice cream. Then it was back to bed for me ... with new movies!!! On the bright side, I did eat lunch and dinner at the dining table with Paola and Sole. :)
Sunday I actually escaped from the house! Bundled up of course under Sole's orders with scarf and fleece jacket (in 70º weather) I headed to the grocery store to meet Deven. His family was out of town for the weekend and he wanted to do something nice for them, so we decided to make chocolate chip cookies! I helped him get the ingredients and then we went back to his house to make and bake them. He lives in an amazing house and from the outside it doesn't look like much, but the inside is BEAUTIFUL! Its so colorful and its HUGE! The house is really long and skinny with 2 small courtyards. The architecture here just astounds me. The cookies turned out amazing and we had a great time making them. It was honestly just nice to be out of the house and have a change of scenery.
Monday was a holiday (Columbus day) and so we had no classes and I just spent the day relaxing at the house again and slowly starting to work on hw for the week so that I would be ready for classes and not start the new week behind. I also took some time in the afternoon to walk around the park with a friend. We had discussed meeting there at 4, but right as I was about to send her a message to confirm, my cell phone ran out of credit... Being that it was a holiday, NOTHING was open, so I just decided to walk to the park and hope that she would meet me there. When I got there, I had missed a call from her and had another text saying she was still at her house waiting for confirmation from me... I tried charging my phone with a credit card, but apparently my card is not authorized for these measures... As I sat on the grass trying to come up with a plan, I finally decided that I could just ask to borrow someone else's phone to send a message... Oh great, gotta ask a complete stranger, in spanish, to borrow their phone. I finally decided on a group of girls who looked to be about 13-15 years old. They could immediately tell I wasn't from there, and asked if I was from the US. I told them yes, and they started trying to speak phrases of english to me. It was pretty fun to hear and to try to help them with the translations. One of the girls let me borrow their phone and I sent Lisa a message to come meet me. 5 minutes later the girl squealed in delight! "Tengo un mensaje en ingles!" (I have a message in english)! Long story short Lisa and I finally met up to walk around the lake and talk. The girls were absolutely delighted to talk with me until Lisa got there and we had a really good time. It just amazes me how much I've changed since I came here. I NEVER would've done that at the beginning! Hooray for improving confidence.
Overall I'd say the weekend was a success. My stomach is basically back to normal (although Sole still won't let me eat yogurt or anything with dairy besides the cheese in the rice) and I just have a stuffy nose from my cold. I also had a lot of time to relax, catch up on things around the apartment, and more importantly: sleep. Sometimes events are just a blessing in disguise and I'm super happy I had this one. :)
I hope everyone is doing well and that this message finds you enjoying life. My advice for the weekend, take some time to relax with no plans and just enjoy life. Honestly we don't do enough of that anymore and it can be truly beneficial for the body, mind, and soul.
All my love!
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Back to School
Hey Everyone! I hope you're all doing well and enjoying the pics/posts from break. After Deven and I left in such a rush, I was literally in and out of my apartment in 20 minutes before going to class. History at 9:30am after an overnight bus ride is not exactly what I would call fun...but we made it on-time, so that was a start. Of course the class didn't start until shortly after 10, so we all had time to catch up. It amazes me that in such a short period of time here we have become such close friends. Not just within the program, but with the students from this class too. They really are a blast to hang out with and I know I'm going to miss them when I go home.
Luckily Monday was a very short day. After history I was commitment free. Spanish class had been cancelled for the week to give us a slightly longer break in that class, so at 11:30 I was done for the day. Honestly the first thing on my mind was a nap! So after walking back home, catching up with Sole and Paola, and enjoying a lovely homecooked lunch (man have I missed the food), I spent most of the afternoon napping. I was supposed to go to the gym, but that just didn't happen. So I relaxed, unpacked a bit and started studying for my first parcial (mid-term). Of course we watched our weekly series as well. Lie to Me is becoming a favorite that I'll track in the US when I get back. Then it was off to bed. I was still exhausted from the trip and needed to study the next morning for Sociology.
Tuesday came way too early and I ended up sleeping through more of the morning than I had planned, but I still got some studying in before walking to class. I'm really enjoying being able to walk places here. Its nice to have that exercise built in to my schedule and it honestly takes just as much time to take the trolley home as it does to walk, so I may as well walk. Development went fine. No big surprises and just a bit more new material. Our parcial is in 2 weeks for this class, but the other group took it yesterday and said it was just fine. After class it was back home for lunch and a study session before class. I was nervous about the exam, but I felt like I knew the material, so going into class I was pretty confident. Looking over the test after our teacher handed them out it didn't look too bad. There was one part I hadn't looked over in awhile and a true/false section about the famous sociologists. After turning it in, I knew it wasn't perfect, but for my first exam I felt like it went pretty well. I'm still not exactly sure how the whole system here works with exams/grades etc, but I'm trying to be very Argentine and just go with the flow... We'll see what happens.
Wednesday is usually a very busy day for me, but with no spanish class and childhood moved to Friday I had absolutely nothing to do until 5:30pm Tango class. I slept in and spent a vast majority of the day relaxing, reading, studying, and of course taking a very nice siesta. It still amazes me that after 2 1/2 months here I can't seem to get my energy back. Most of the time we just blame it on the Zonda (that crazy weather phenomenon) but honestly I think its that our brains are working so hard all the time to translate words and think in 2 languages that we are just in a constant state of mental exhaustion. I did manage to make it to the gym though, which definitely felt good. As per usual, a bunch of us girls met in the plaza to take the bus to class, but with all the construction that's going on, all the bus stops have been moved. So instead of waiting on the bus, we decided to just walk. It was a nice day (hooray for spring) so none of us minded. At Tango we learned a bunch of new choreography. The teacher goes over it so fast and without counts or steps that its more of ... and step, step, step, kick, turn, and pose. Got it? Moving on ... So we hardly have time to catch what she is doing at all. Its still lots of fun though and I'm getting excited for the actual performance at the end of October! After class we all decided to walk back to the town center too. As its starting to turn to spring here we have more light in the evenings and just don't feel like taking the bus unless its absolutely necessary. This also could be that we just feel safer navigating on foot than trying to judge which bus will actually take us where we want (especially with the construction). Once I got back, it was time to relax and study until dinner. We found out on Monday that we have to have 2 books read (in spanish of course) for class this coming Monday... Needless to say I have hardly any hope of getting it done, but I'm certainly trying to do it in spanish. Fernando (a friend of Sole's) was scheduled to come over for dinner - partially so that he could see all my spring break photos, so we didn't eat dinner until midnight! In all fairness he did work until 10 and then had to run home and change etc, but it was SUPER late for dinner (even by their standards). None the less we enjoyed a lovely meal, looked at the pictures, and then I crashed.
Thursday morning and class hit like a load of bricks after being up so late the night before. But it was off to class anyway. We took the whole first half asking questions to clarify issues for the exam (which is in a week) and then learned a slight bit of new material before class let out. Amazingly enough unit 2 is not FINALLY at the copier, so we will be able to read it before the exam. I left class for home and had a nice lunch with my aunt before hurrying out of the house for volunteer work. Unfortunately....I got lost along the way and couldn't remember what street to take. Of course it was also the one day I left the house without a map. I found a street nearby with loads of stops and found one for the bus I needed. What luck! A few stops down I encountered Louisa (who had told me not to wait on her because she was going to be late). So we arrived again together and spent the afternoon helping the students with their hw. The girls mostly had math to work on, so we helped them finish that. Then I ended up finger painting a sign (because there were no brushes) for the gate that read "Dogs can not enter". It was entertaining...I cannot remember the last time I finger painted! Then Louisa and I taught a group of girls the alphabet in english. It was fun to watch them practice and see what fast learners they are. Some of them had it nearly perfect after 5 or 6 tries. Then they taught us some hand games like the ones I used to play with friends in elementary and middle school. Its just so much fun to hang out with them and learn from them. They're very patient even when our spanish isn't perfect and they're just happy to sit and talk with us. I'm really enjoying working there. Later that evening Deven stopped by the apartment to look at bus tickets with me. We have another long weekend coming up and the current plan is to go to Iguazu falls. I don't know how to describe it, so if you don't know what I'm talking about, google some pictures. :) He ended up staying for dinner and afterwards managed to talk me into going out for the evening. So we both changes clothes and met up a few blocks from the apartment to walk to the bar and meet up with some other friends. We sat outside for nearly 4 hours just talking, catching up about trips, sharing stories etc. Eventually we decided it was too cold to just sit anymore, so we headed to another bar that is more of a club. Its called Por Acá, which in spanish means roughly "over here". I'd never been, so we decided to check it out. At this point most of the kids had gone home and so it ended up being me and 3 of my guy friends. We had a really good time just dancing for the next few hours. There were strobe lights, fog machines, disco balls, and all kinds of other light effects going on. To be honest it was kinda overwhelming! We stayed until the club closed and I didn't get home until 6am!
Needless to say I slept in Friday and didn't make any plans Friday night. I actually finished my first book (although I am definitely cheating now by reading them online and in english). I simply did not have enough time to complete the reading in spanish. New goal: read the entire 3rd book in Spanish and start early! So I spent the entirety of Friday relaxing and studying. However! I did go to the gym again! The whole exercising on purpose thing has never been a big part of my life, but I'm determined to actually start going here! Its kinda nice actually to have that time to myself to just think and relax. I also made it to the gym Saturday as well! Then I met up with a friend from class and we attempted to study in the plaza (after first getting some ice cream). This history class just has us both confused. The good news is that the local students seem about as confused as we are... the bad news is that we all have to take the test anyway... I'm sure it'll be fine, I just need some serious study time in the next few days to re-read the material and organize all my thoughts on the topics and time periods. After we gave up studying, we ended up shopping our way back to my apartment. I found some wonderful deals on some really cute tops! The clothes (like almost everything else here) are really cheap if you know where to look. By Sunday afternoon I had finished the second book (also read online and in english) and felt completely prepared for our discussion Monday morning. I can't believe another week has flown by so quickly! Time here either goes very fast or very slow... Before you all know it I'll be home!
I hope everyone is doing well! Please take care of yourself and DON'T GET SICK!!! All I keep hearing from the US direction is that swine flu is taking over and everyone is sick! Keep in touch and I hope to talk to you all soon! Also, if you want a postcard/letter etc, shoot me your address at my e-mail: Laurel.Story@du.edu and don't forget to look at the pictures! Missing everyone bunches!
All my love!
Luckily Monday was a very short day. After history I was commitment free. Spanish class had been cancelled for the week to give us a slightly longer break in that class, so at 11:30 I was done for the day. Honestly the first thing on my mind was a nap! So after walking back home, catching up with Sole and Paola, and enjoying a lovely homecooked lunch (man have I missed the food), I spent most of the afternoon napping. I was supposed to go to the gym, but that just didn't happen. So I relaxed, unpacked a bit and started studying for my first parcial (mid-term). Of course we watched our weekly series as well. Lie to Me is becoming a favorite that I'll track in the US when I get back. Then it was off to bed. I was still exhausted from the trip and needed to study the next morning for Sociology.
Tuesday came way too early and I ended up sleeping through more of the morning than I had planned, but I still got some studying in before walking to class. I'm really enjoying being able to walk places here. Its nice to have that exercise built in to my schedule and it honestly takes just as much time to take the trolley home as it does to walk, so I may as well walk. Development went fine. No big surprises and just a bit more new material. Our parcial is in 2 weeks for this class, but the other group took it yesterday and said it was just fine. After class it was back home for lunch and a study session before class. I was nervous about the exam, but I felt like I knew the material, so going into class I was pretty confident. Looking over the test after our teacher handed them out it didn't look too bad. There was one part I hadn't looked over in awhile and a true/false section about the famous sociologists. After turning it in, I knew it wasn't perfect, but for my first exam I felt like it went pretty well. I'm still not exactly sure how the whole system here works with exams/grades etc, but I'm trying to be very Argentine and just go with the flow... We'll see what happens.
Wednesday is usually a very busy day for me, but with no spanish class and childhood moved to Friday I had absolutely nothing to do until 5:30pm Tango class. I slept in and spent a vast majority of the day relaxing, reading, studying, and of course taking a very nice siesta. It still amazes me that after 2 1/2 months here I can't seem to get my energy back. Most of the time we just blame it on the Zonda (that crazy weather phenomenon) but honestly I think its that our brains are working so hard all the time to translate words and think in 2 languages that we are just in a constant state of mental exhaustion. I did manage to make it to the gym though, which definitely felt good. As per usual, a bunch of us girls met in the plaza to take the bus to class, but with all the construction that's going on, all the bus stops have been moved. So instead of waiting on the bus, we decided to just walk. It was a nice day (hooray for spring) so none of us minded. At Tango we learned a bunch of new choreography. The teacher goes over it so fast and without counts or steps that its more of ... and step, step, step, kick, turn, and pose. Got it? Moving on ... So we hardly have time to catch what she is doing at all. Its still lots of fun though and I'm getting excited for the actual performance at the end of October! After class we all decided to walk back to the town center too. As its starting to turn to spring here we have more light in the evenings and just don't feel like taking the bus unless its absolutely necessary. This also could be that we just feel safer navigating on foot than trying to judge which bus will actually take us where we want (especially with the construction). Once I got back, it was time to relax and study until dinner. We found out on Monday that we have to have 2 books read (in spanish of course) for class this coming Monday... Needless to say I have hardly any hope of getting it done, but I'm certainly trying to do it in spanish. Fernando (a friend of Sole's) was scheduled to come over for dinner - partially so that he could see all my spring break photos, so we didn't eat dinner until midnight! In all fairness he did work until 10 and then had to run home and change etc, but it was SUPER late for dinner (even by their standards). None the less we enjoyed a lovely meal, looked at the pictures, and then I crashed.
Thursday morning and class hit like a load of bricks after being up so late the night before. But it was off to class anyway. We took the whole first half asking questions to clarify issues for the exam (which is in a week) and then learned a slight bit of new material before class let out. Amazingly enough unit 2 is not FINALLY at the copier, so we will be able to read it before the exam. I left class for home and had a nice lunch with my aunt before hurrying out of the house for volunteer work. Unfortunately....I got lost along the way and couldn't remember what street to take. Of course it was also the one day I left the house without a map. I found a street nearby with loads of stops and found one for the bus I needed. What luck! A few stops down I encountered Louisa (who had told me not to wait on her because she was going to be late). So we arrived again together and spent the afternoon helping the students with their hw. The girls mostly had math to work on, so we helped them finish that. Then I ended up finger painting a sign (because there were no brushes) for the gate that read "Dogs can not enter". It was entertaining...I cannot remember the last time I finger painted! Then Louisa and I taught a group of girls the alphabet in english. It was fun to watch them practice and see what fast learners they are. Some of them had it nearly perfect after 5 or 6 tries. Then they taught us some hand games like the ones I used to play with friends in elementary and middle school. Its just so much fun to hang out with them and learn from them. They're very patient even when our spanish isn't perfect and they're just happy to sit and talk with us. I'm really enjoying working there. Later that evening Deven stopped by the apartment to look at bus tickets with me. We have another long weekend coming up and the current plan is to go to Iguazu falls. I don't know how to describe it, so if you don't know what I'm talking about, google some pictures. :) He ended up staying for dinner and afterwards managed to talk me into going out for the evening. So we both changes clothes and met up a few blocks from the apartment to walk to the bar and meet up with some other friends. We sat outside for nearly 4 hours just talking, catching up about trips, sharing stories etc. Eventually we decided it was too cold to just sit anymore, so we headed to another bar that is more of a club. Its called Por Acá, which in spanish means roughly "over here". I'd never been, so we decided to check it out. At this point most of the kids had gone home and so it ended up being me and 3 of my guy friends. We had a really good time just dancing for the next few hours. There were strobe lights, fog machines, disco balls, and all kinds of other light effects going on. To be honest it was kinda overwhelming! We stayed until the club closed and I didn't get home until 6am!
Needless to say I slept in Friday and didn't make any plans Friday night. I actually finished my first book (although I am definitely cheating now by reading them online and in english). I simply did not have enough time to complete the reading in spanish. New goal: read the entire 3rd book in Spanish and start early! So I spent the entirety of Friday relaxing and studying. However! I did go to the gym again! The whole exercising on purpose thing has never been a big part of my life, but I'm determined to actually start going here! Its kinda nice actually to have that time to myself to just think and relax. I also made it to the gym Saturday as well! Then I met up with a friend from class and we attempted to study in the plaza (after first getting some ice cream). This history class just has us both confused. The good news is that the local students seem about as confused as we are... the bad news is that we all have to take the test anyway... I'm sure it'll be fine, I just need some serious study time in the next few days to re-read the material and organize all my thoughts on the topics and time periods. After we gave up studying, we ended up shopping our way back to my apartment. I found some wonderful deals on some really cute tops! The clothes (like almost everything else here) are really cheap if you know where to look. By Sunday afternoon I had finished the second book (also read online and in english) and felt completely prepared for our discussion Monday morning. I can't believe another week has flown by so quickly! Time here either goes very fast or very slow... Before you all know it I'll be home!
I hope everyone is doing well! Please take care of yourself and DON'T GET SICK!!! All I keep hearing from the US direction is that swine flu is taking over and everyone is sick! Keep in touch and I hope to talk to you all soon! Also, if you want a postcard/letter etc, shoot me your address at my e-mail: Laurel.Story@du.edu and don't forget to look at the pictures! Missing everyone bunches!
All my love!
Friday, October 9, 2009
Beautiful Bariloche! ~ Dreaming of CO
Hey Everyone! So another week...epic fail to get caught up on these posts... I'm still trying I promise. :) So...we continue with the last leg of the spring break adventure.
We decided to have lunch our final day in Calafate at an AMAZING pizza restaurant in town before living. The thought was that if we ate a big lunch and packed some snacks we wouldn't be as hungry at dinner. So Louisa and I split an AMAZING pizza that was essentially the equivalent of a hawaiian pizza in the US. It was DELICIOUS! Everyone was really excited about their lunch and we made it to the bus station with happy bellies and time to spare... The bus was actually late getting to the terminal, so we didn't even come close to leaving on time and it wasn't actually the bus that had been advertised either... Instead of being semi-cama (half-bed) seats on the top level it was all full bed. As a result, there were seats "missing" cause only 3 would fit across instead of 4. I certainly was fine with that! They were super comfy! Everyone settled out into their own space and the homework/studying began again. This bus will be nominated the bus of AWFUL and unnecessarily violent movies... We started with a Jackie Chan kung-fu movie (looking back this one was actually the best, although stupid). The next was a Wild Wild West movie with some sort of conspiracy over land....the final scene was a giant shootout as well. Third was a movie called the Silent Assassin...about some sort of bio-terrorism. A man gets infected and then ends up killing everyone he touches... Finally, as everyone was trying to go to sleep, was about the Aztec Empire and how it got destroyed. There were people dying every 2 minutes as tribes fought each other etc. What a weird sequence to watch!
Everyone slept relatively well (thanks to the big comfy seats) and the next morning we all enjoyed the short stop in the middle of nowhere to stretch our legs. Only ... 10 more hours to go! When we finally pulled into the terminal in Bariloche at 7pm EVERYONE was ready to be off the bus. 29hours....it was our longest one. We quickly found taxis and went to the hostel to settle in. Our other friends and long lost companions were staying at the same hostel and we couldn't wait to see them. After arriving and checking in, we started to think about plans for the evening... a walk? Tour the town? Dinner? Eventually we decided to walk to town in search of the world famous chocolate! Bariloche is rumored to have the best chocolate in Argentina, so of course we couldn't miss out on that! The ice cream is also rumored to be REALLY good, so that was also on the list. As we walked into the center, we easily spotted one of the larger chocolate shops called Tourista (tourist...how fitting) and decided to stop to see about hours. We also encountered ice cream...and it was the BEST ice cream I think I have ever had! Usually I'm not a huge fan of strawberry, but it looked too good to turn down and I still dream about that ice cream! It was like heaven! With ice cream in hand, we wandered down the street and eventually encountered Mamuska - the most famous chocolate shop (and the one that Sole had recommended to me). So we spent a good 20 minutes just looking around. I decided to wait before buying anything in order to think about what exactly I wanted and what I could bring back to Sole and Paola. There were just entirely too many options! After everyone was ready, we headed back to the hostel. Our long lost friends had arrived and were happily relaxing in the living room. We all exchanged excited hellos and sat down to a lovely dinner of soup and leftover stew from the night before. It was so exciting to see everyone again. We all contemplated going out for a bit since it was our last night on vacation, but in the end everyone was far too tired and we crashed on the dorm floor with the last of the peanut butter and some sweet bread. It was nice to just relax and talk for a bit. As we were getting ready to turn the lights out, Louisa practically screamed and we all jumped wondering what was wrong! She had found 2 ticks on her pillow... we had thought the one earlier was just a fluke, but when she found 2 more, everyone was frantically searching their beds as well... No one else found anything, but everyone had that icky creepy crawly feeling on their skin...
The next morning Louisa and I had made plans to head out early back to the chocolate shops to buy our presents and to get ice cream before we left. However things did not go as planned.... When we were all eating, people started asking what everyone had planned and pretty soon 3 more friends wanted to tag along with us into town... However, when we were all ready, we ended up waiting another 25 minutes on other people! It wasn't that we minded waiting, but when our bus is leaving at 1pm and its already 9:30, we don't have time to waste! So we started to leave and at that point everyone caught up. This of course caused tension because people felt like they were being left behind. I felt like our group had separation anxiety or something! Like if one person goes somewhere all 9 of us have to go or feelings get hurt. All of us had spent so much time with each other in such close quarters that we were starting to have passive aggressive issues. It was definitely time to go home. None the less, we started out for town and Louisa and I headed to the chocolate store. Then it was off to the chocolate museum! We had heard great things about it from our friends since they went the day before and we wanted to check it out! However, by the time it opened at 11am, the first tour wasn't until 11:20 and at an hour/tour, we didn't have time to go and make our bus. So we decided to walk back to town for ice cream. Louisa and I had planned on eating ice cream for lunch and I was looking forward to more strawberry cream! However we met others on the way and decided to try another different store. This one is more famous than Tourista, and slightly more expensive, but not nearly as good! I was slightly disappointed, but at the same time excited because they had peanut butter ice cream!!! That DOES NOT happen here! So I had peanut butter and dark chocolate. Reeses anyone?! Walking back with very little time left, Louisa and I were still hungry! So we quickly grabbed our stuff, called a taxi and asked him to take us to a restaurant where we could grab a quick lunch. We decided to split an order and I almost forgot when we ordered! Lucky Louisa reminded me, cause when we got the food, it was HUGE!!! I could have easily fed 3 people! Happily we grabbed our food and rode to the terminal. On the bus with food we were quite content and ready to be going home.
I was bummed we couldn't spend more time in Bariloche! It was hands down my favorite location, possibly because it reminded me so much of CO! The hostel was right on the edge of a lake and looking over the water to the hills and mountains of the side we could've been in Summit county around Lake Dillon (without the beetle kill). It was absolutely gorgeous! Hopefully I'll get another chance to go back there. I wouldn't stay at the same hostel again, but I would LOVE to go back.
Everyone settled in for the ride. Louisa and I slowly ate through our gigantic meal and then both started on hw again. She is such a wonderful influence for me. All throughout the trip when we weren't busy she was studiously working on reading or studying or other assignments. We've also gotten some good time to talk over the last week and I'm super excited that she only lives an hour away in the states, so we'll see each other all the time! A short 2 hours into the drive I had finished all my reading that I had brought with me. 40 pages of sociology and more than 100 pages of political theory (mostly a critique of Plato and Socrates) all in spanish of course. I was pretty proud of myself! I spent the rest of the ride relaxing with music and a book for fun! When I woke to someone tapping my head the next morning it took a minute for me to figure out what was going on! Deven was waking me up to tell me we were back! and 10 minutes early! We quickly grabbed our bags and hurried out to grab a cab. We only had an hour before class, so time was of the essence. As much as I just wanted to go home and sleep, I didn't have time for a nap. I rushed up to the door, snuck to my room, changed clothes, grabbed a granola bar for breakfast, and was off to class. Spring break over in a flash!
I still can't believe all the travel we did in a simple 10 days. 3 cities, 3 amazing excursions, 64 hours of transportation, and amazing time with friends. It was certainly the whirlwind tour of Patagonia, but I absolutely fell in love! Especially with Bariloche! Now its back to the grind: classes, hw, partials (mid-term exams), and studying. What an experience! I'm certainly happy to be 'home', but I'll never forget the amazing sights from break. I still find myself without the adequate words to describe the places we went. However, thanks to yesterday's discovery you can now see all the pictures! They are linked the blog over on the left under Argentine Albums. :) Hope you enjoy them!
All my love!
We decided to have lunch our final day in Calafate at an AMAZING pizza restaurant in town before living. The thought was that if we ate a big lunch and packed some snacks we wouldn't be as hungry at dinner. So Louisa and I split an AMAZING pizza that was essentially the equivalent of a hawaiian pizza in the US. It was DELICIOUS! Everyone was really excited about their lunch and we made it to the bus station with happy bellies and time to spare... The bus was actually late getting to the terminal, so we didn't even come close to leaving on time and it wasn't actually the bus that had been advertised either... Instead of being semi-cama (half-bed) seats on the top level it was all full bed. As a result, there were seats "missing" cause only 3 would fit across instead of 4. I certainly was fine with that! They were super comfy! Everyone settled out into their own space and the homework/studying began again. This bus will be nominated the bus of AWFUL and unnecessarily violent movies... We started with a Jackie Chan kung-fu movie (looking back this one was actually the best, although stupid). The next was a Wild Wild West movie with some sort of conspiracy over land....the final scene was a giant shootout as well. Third was a movie called the Silent Assassin...about some sort of bio-terrorism. A man gets infected and then ends up killing everyone he touches... Finally, as everyone was trying to go to sleep, was about the Aztec Empire and how it got destroyed. There were people dying every 2 minutes as tribes fought each other etc. What a weird sequence to watch!
Everyone slept relatively well (thanks to the big comfy seats) and the next morning we all enjoyed the short stop in the middle of nowhere to stretch our legs. Only ... 10 more hours to go! When we finally pulled into the terminal in Bariloche at 7pm EVERYONE was ready to be off the bus. 29hours....it was our longest one. We quickly found taxis and went to the hostel to settle in. Our other friends and long lost companions were staying at the same hostel and we couldn't wait to see them. After arriving and checking in, we started to think about plans for the evening... a walk? Tour the town? Dinner? Eventually we decided to walk to town in search of the world famous chocolate! Bariloche is rumored to have the best chocolate in Argentina, so of course we couldn't miss out on that! The ice cream is also rumored to be REALLY good, so that was also on the list. As we walked into the center, we easily spotted one of the larger chocolate shops called Tourista (tourist...how fitting) and decided to stop to see about hours. We also encountered ice cream...and it was the BEST ice cream I think I have ever had! Usually I'm not a huge fan of strawberry, but it looked too good to turn down and I still dream about that ice cream! It was like heaven! With ice cream in hand, we wandered down the street and eventually encountered Mamuska - the most famous chocolate shop (and the one that Sole had recommended to me). So we spent a good 20 minutes just looking around. I decided to wait before buying anything in order to think about what exactly I wanted and what I could bring back to Sole and Paola. There were just entirely too many options! After everyone was ready, we headed back to the hostel. Our long lost friends had arrived and were happily relaxing in the living room. We all exchanged excited hellos and sat down to a lovely dinner of soup and leftover stew from the night before. It was so exciting to see everyone again. We all contemplated going out for a bit since it was our last night on vacation, but in the end everyone was far too tired and we crashed on the dorm floor with the last of the peanut butter and some sweet bread. It was nice to just relax and talk for a bit. As we were getting ready to turn the lights out, Louisa practically screamed and we all jumped wondering what was wrong! She had found 2 ticks on her pillow... we had thought the one earlier was just a fluke, but when she found 2 more, everyone was frantically searching their beds as well... No one else found anything, but everyone had that icky creepy crawly feeling on their skin...
The next morning Louisa and I had made plans to head out early back to the chocolate shops to buy our presents and to get ice cream before we left. However things did not go as planned.... When we were all eating, people started asking what everyone had planned and pretty soon 3 more friends wanted to tag along with us into town... However, when we were all ready, we ended up waiting another 25 minutes on other people! It wasn't that we minded waiting, but when our bus is leaving at 1pm and its already 9:30, we don't have time to waste! So we started to leave and at that point everyone caught up. This of course caused tension because people felt like they were being left behind. I felt like our group had separation anxiety or something! Like if one person goes somewhere all 9 of us have to go or feelings get hurt. All of us had spent so much time with each other in such close quarters that we were starting to have passive aggressive issues. It was definitely time to go home. None the less, we started out for town and Louisa and I headed to the chocolate store. Then it was off to the chocolate museum! We had heard great things about it from our friends since they went the day before and we wanted to check it out! However, by the time it opened at 11am, the first tour wasn't until 11:20 and at an hour/tour, we didn't have time to go and make our bus. So we decided to walk back to town for ice cream. Louisa and I had planned on eating ice cream for lunch and I was looking forward to more strawberry cream! However we met others on the way and decided to try another different store. This one is more famous than Tourista, and slightly more expensive, but not nearly as good! I was slightly disappointed, but at the same time excited because they had peanut butter ice cream!!! That DOES NOT happen here! So I had peanut butter and dark chocolate. Reeses anyone?! Walking back with very little time left, Louisa and I were still hungry! So we quickly grabbed our stuff, called a taxi and asked him to take us to a restaurant where we could grab a quick lunch. We decided to split an order and I almost forgot when we ordered! Lucky Louisa reminded me, cause when we got the food, it was HUGE!!! I could have easily fed 3 people! Happily we grabbed our food and rode to the terminal. On the bus with food we were quite content and ready to be going home.
I was bummed we couldn't spend more time in Bariloche! It was hands down my favorite location, possibly because it reminded me so much of CO! The hostel was right on the edge of a lake and looking over the water to the hills and mountains of the side we could've been in Summit county around Lake Dillon (without the beetle kill). It was absolutely gorgeous! Hopefully I'll get another chance to go back there. I wouldn't stay at the same hostel again, but I would LOVE to go back.
Everyone settled in for the ride. Louisa and I slowly ate through our gigantic meal and then both started on hw again. She is such a wonderful influence for me. All throughout the trip when we weren't busy she was studiously working on reading or studying or other assignments. We've also gotten some good time to talk over the last week and I'm super excited that she only lives an hour away in the states, so we'll see each other all the time! A short 2 hours into the drive I had finished all my reading that I had brought with me. 40 pages of sociology and more than 100 pages of political theory (mostly a critique of Plato and Socrates) all in spanish of course. I was pretty proud of myself! I spent the rest of the ride relaxing with music and a book for fun! When I woke to someone tapping my head the next morning it took a minute for me to figure out what was going on! Deven was waking me up to tell me we were back! and 10 minutes early! We quickly grabbed our bags and hurried out to grab a cab. We only had an hour before class, so time was of the essence. As much as I just wanted to go home and sleep, I didn't have time for a nap. I rushed up to the door, snuck to my room, changed clothes, grabbed a granola bar for breakfast, and was off to class. Spring break over in a flash!
I still can't believe all the travel we did in a simple 10 days. 3 cities, 3 amazing excursions, 64 hours of transportation, and amazing time with friends. It was certainly the whirlwind tour of Patagonia, but I absolutely fell in love! Especially with Bariloche! Now its back to the grind: classes, hw, partials (mid-term exams), and studying. What an experience! I'm certainly happy to be 'home', but I'll never forget the amazing sights from break. I still find myself without the adequate words to describe the places we went. However, thanks to yesterday's discovery you can now see all the pictures! They are linked the blog over on the left under Argentine Albums. :) Hope you enjoy them!
All my love!
Thursday, October 8, 2009
PHOTOS!!!
Hey everyone!!! So I have found myself with some unexpected extra time in the next few days and found a way to upload and connect all my photos to my blog! They are in links to the left of the posts under Argentina Photos. Feel free to browse! I hope you enjoy them! All my love!
Sunday, October 4, 2009
El Calafate - The real world Narnia
Hey everyone! I know I'm getting WAY behind on these posts, so I'm going to do my best to catch up fast so that I don't forget anything! At the end of my last post we (and by that I mean 6 of the 9) had arrived in El Calafate and quickly crashed to sleep. The next morning found us waking up just in time to eat breakfast before it was put away. In typical Argentine fashion, breakfast was large white rolls with jam, dulce de leche, or butter. There was also coffe, tea, juice, and milk. After enjoying a roll, we briefly discussed what we wanted to do with the day. Still hopeful that our friends would be joining us shortly, we didn't make any extensive plans and instead resolved to relax, explore the town, and maybe go on a hike. I personally was still exhausted and went back to bed after breakfast. 3 hours later, at 1 in the afternoon I decided that it was far past time to get up. After a shower, and a quick check of my mail, I met up with the others in the 'living room' and checked my phone for messages... Much to my dismay, I had received a few texts from our long lost friends detailing their mess of transportation and current plans. Unfortunately they were not able to find any decent flights to El Calafate so had instead arranged to fly from Ushuaia to Bariloche and meet us there in a few days. This obviously meant that they were going to miss the wonderful adventures that we had planned and I was SUPER bummed! El Calafate was the place that most of them had been looking forward to the most and now they were going to miss it! Everyone was pretty bummed, but there wasn't anything we could do. So we settled in to planning our own activities. The rest of the afternoon was spent touring the town, walking to Lago Argentino (Argentinean Lake), and relaxing at the hostel. The views are absolutely spectacular since the hostel sits on a hill and I was quite content to sit in front of a large window working on my hw and reading for classes. The owners of the hostel had informed us that they would be preparing an asado that night and we were more than welcome to join them if we liked. We of course agreed and waited patiently as the absurd amount of meat cooked on the coals. While waiting we played a game of Clue - in Spanish! When dinner was ready, we all sat down together (like one giant family) and enjoyed a delicious meal! There was salad, bread, a "salsa" made from tomatoes and onions, and of course lots of different types/cuts of meat. My personal favorite is definitely the sausage. Its delicious! Especially as a sandwich with bread and the tomato/onion sauce. After dinner everyone split off to their own activities. I spent some time sitting on the couch with Louisa doing hw until I decided it was time to catch some zz's.
The next morning everyone was up early and full of excitement! This was the day we had all been waiting for: mini-trekking on Perito Moreno Glacier! By 9am it was slush/snowing outside and everyone was dressed (in multiple layers) ready to go. We'd made lunches to take and hopefully had everything we needed (extra batteries, memory cards, student Id's, etc). The bus finally arrive Argentine style 35 minutes late and by 11:30 we had arrived in the park! Our previous research had indicated that admittance for non-residents was a steep 60 pesos, but a friend at the hostel had said we should use our student Id's and get a discount, so we gave it a shot. Thanks Katie for the advice! Instead of 60, we only paid 6 pesos each! Once the bus had parked and given us instructions on what time to be back, we bundled up and piled out. It wasn't miserably cold, but the snow was coming down pretty thick in large bunches rather than flakes. The glacier was hardly visible down the hill and you could almost see the sinking enthusiasm. But we set out anyway down the path to the various viewing platforms. Everyone was trying to get a shot where you could see the glacier through the snow but at the same time we were all being cautious of taking pictures cause no one wanted to ruin their camera. About 45 minutes later when we had reached the halfway mark of our walk, the snow tapered off and we were able to see an AMAZING sight in front of us. There are hardly words to describe the beauty and majesty of Perito Moreno. Its vast expanse covers the entire valley to the mountains on either side and as it spills into the sea its towering white walls are more than imposing. It also gives off a very distinct and surreal blue glow that is unlike anything I have ever seen in my entire life. I was completely in awe. We all snapped photo after photo and walked slowly back along the landings to get different views of this amazing monstrosity. It truly is "impresionante" roughly the spanish equivalent of impressive...but better.
Cold and wet from the snow, we walked back to the parking lot and hid (illegally) under the roof of the gift shop/cafeteria to eat our lunch. Since we brought our own we weren't supposed to even eat outside under the eves, but it was snowing again and we couldn't eat on the bus. Everyone took a quick tour of the gift shop (more to warm up than to actually buy anything). Then it was back to the bus to go ice trekking!!! I honestly fell asleep on the drive and when we finally arrived at the shore it had almost stopped snowing. We bundled up again, piled out, and piled into a boat that would ferry us across to the other shore where we would climb the glacier! The ride went without incident and we heard some of the history and facts of the glacier (first in spanish, then in english). This being a very touristy place, there were guides who spoke both. When we got to the other side, we all elected to follow the spanish guide and marched to the refuge to leave any unnecessary belongings. Then it was off along the shore to the equipment station to put on the crampons. They felt pretty weird on my feet and I had to be careful to keep my feet farther apart than usual lest I crampon my foot instead of the ground... We began hiking up towards the glacier. Remembering the view I had of it earlier with huge spikes and cracks it seemed so imposing and unwelcoming. However up close it didn't seem quite as bad. Especially covered in a fresh layer of snow (which actually makes it slightly more dangerous since you can't always see the cracks). We hiked up onto the glacier and followed our guides over the hills and down into the valleys. It was amazing and still almost seems like a dream to me. Our guide showed us pools of clear blue water reaching down into the depths where the river beneath had melted the snow all the way up. The tunnels just go down and down so that you can't see the bottom as the blue becomes navy and then black. At one pool we actually drank the glacier water. Cold, crisp, and VERY fresh! Yum. We hiked on for about 1 1/2 hours before coming near to the end. Around the corner and down the hill we encountered a table covered with glasses and a bottle of whiskey. The guides served it up and along with an alfajor of course we all had whiskey on GLACIER rocks. Fun detail: whiskey is what the Argentineans say instead of cheese when you're taking pictures. As we climbed off the glacier it began to snow again. Everyone took off the crampons (man did my feet feel light) and hiked towards the woods.
Everyone was freezing and ready to be in a warmer, drier location, but when we got to the edge of the woods there were 2 bulls blocking our way...Our guide had to spend the better part of 15 minutes throwing rocks at them and trying to scare them away so that we could pass. After a short camina (walk) through the woods we were back to the refuge and most of us took advantage of a hot cup of cafe con leche to warm us up. Then when everyone was ready is was back to the boats and back to the bus. After a long (and not exceptionally warm) ride back into town, we were finally at the hostel once again. At this point everyone was exhausted, cold, wet, probably dehydrated, and some were possibly in the very early stages of hypothermia. I was completely down to just participate in the hostel dinner once again (which was salad, bread, mashed potatoes, and milenesa - essentially thin breaded and fried chicken), but some in the group had other thoughts, so 2 of us marched off to the store to procure vegetables and chicken for a stirfry. When we got back (having cheated and bought a bagged version - just add water) the others were starting to thaw. I hopped in the shower, super excited for the warm water and probably spent longer than necessary warming up under the spray. Dinner started without me, so I joined when I was dressed. Part way through dinner I could not seem to get my legs to stop shaking (dehydration likely) but finished dinner and went to get a big glass of water. Then I spent nearly an hour sitting in front of the fire to warm up and dry my hair. Wet hair + cold weather + exhausting day = not good on the system. It was nice to just sit and relax. I also got to talk more with our new friend Katie who is from Australia. I went to bed pretty early and was happy for the sleep.
The next morning we all started packing. Everyone had to be out of the rooms by 10am, but we could store our stuff at the hostel and hang out there all day until our bus left at 2:30. Some of us went back to the grocery store (apparently our 29 hour bus ride to Bariloche does not come with food) and bought fruit and cereals to snack on. We also bought some things to make our own version of granola/trail mix, because the pre-packaged kind was a little expensive. Then we relaxed at the hostel until it was time to transport everything to the bus station. El Calafate was amazing! I'm definitely enjoying the trip and learning a lot about myself and my friends along the way. Next stop...and final stop...Bariloche - home to famous chocolate and world renown views.
I hope everyone is doing well and I look forward to hearing what's going on in your lives.
All my love!
The next morning everyone was up early and full of excitement! This was the day we had all been waiting for: mini-trekking on Perito Moreno Glacier! By 9am it was slush/snowing outside and everyone was dressed (in multiple layers) ready to go. We'd made lunches to take and hopefully had everything we needed (extra batteries, memory cards, student Id's, etc). The bus finally arrive Argentine style 35 minutes late and by 11:30 we had arrived in the park! Our previous research had indicated that admittance for non-residents was a steep 60 pesos, but a friend at the hostel had said we should use our student Id's and get a discount, so we gave it a shot. Thanks Katie for the advice! Instead of 60, we only paid 6 pesos each! Once the bus had parked and given us instructions on what time to be back, we bundled up and piled out. It wasn't miserably cold, but the snow was coming down pretty thick in large bunches rather than flakes. The glacier was hardly visible down the hill and you could almost see the sinking enthusiasm. But we set out anyway down the path to the various viewing platforms. Everyone was trying to get a shot where you could see the glacier through the snow but at the same time we were all being cautious of taking pictures cause no one wanted to ruin their camera. About 45 minutes later when we had reached the halfway mark of our walk, the snow tapered off and we were able to see an AMAZING sight in front of us. There are hardly words to describe the beauty and majesty of Perito Moreno. Its vast expanse covers the entire valley to the mountains on either side and as it spills into the sea its towering white walls are more than imposing. It also gives off a very distinct and surreal blue glow that is unlike anything I have ever seen in my entire life. I was completely in awe. We all snapped photo after photo and walked slowly back along the landings to get different views of this amazing monstrosity. It truly is "impresionante" roughly the spanish equivalent of impressive...but better.
Cold and wet from the snow, we walked back to the parking lot and hid (illegally) under the roof of the gift shop/cafeteria to eat our lunch. Since we brought our own we weren't supposed to even eat outside under the eves, but it was snowing again and we couldn't eat on the bus. Everyone took a quick tour of the gift shop (more to warm up than to actually buy anything). Then it was back to the bus to go ice trekking!!! I honestly fell asleep on the drive and when we finally arrived at the shore it had almost stopped snowing. We bundled up again, piled out, and piled into a boat that would ferry us across to the other shore where we would climb the glacier! The ride went without incident and we heard some of the history and facts of the glacier (first in spanish, then in english). This being a very touristy place, there were guides who spoke both. When we got to the other side, we all elected to follow the spanish guide and marched to the refuge to leave any unnecessary belongings. Then it was off along the shore to the equipment station to put on the crampons. They felt pretty weird on my feet and I had to be careful to keep my feet farther apart than usual lest I crampon my foot instead of the ground... We began hiking up towards the glacier. Remembering the view I had of it earlier with huge spikes and cracks it seemed so imposing and unwelcoming. However up close it didn't seem quite as bad. Especially covered in a fresh layer of snow (which actually makes it slightly more dangerous since you can't always see the cracks). We hiked up onto the glacier and followed our guides over the hills and down into the valleys. It was amazing and still almost seems like a dream to me. Our guide showed us pools of clear blue water reaching down into the depths where the river beneath had melted the snow all the way up. The tunnels just go down and down so that you can't see the bottom as the blue becomes navy and then black. At one pool we actually drank the glacier water. Cold, crisp, and VERY fresh! Yum. We hiked on for about 1 1/2 hours before coming near to the end. Around the corner and down the hill we encountered a table covered with glasses and a bottle of whiskey. The guides served it up and along with an alfajor of course we all had whiskey on GLACIER rocks. Fun detail: whiskey is what the Argentineans say instead of cheese when you're taking pictures. As we climbed off the glacier it began to snow again. Everyone took off the crampons (man did my feet feel light) and hiked towards the woods.
Everyone was freezing and ready to be in a warmer, drier location, but when we got to the edge of the woods there were 2 bulls blocking our way...Our guide had to spend the better part of 15 minutes throwing rocks at them and trying to scare them away so that we could pass. After a short camina (walk) through the woods we were back to the refuge and most of us took advantage of a hot cup of cafe con leche to warm us up. Then when everyone was ready is was back to the boats and back to the bus. After a long (and not exceptionally warm) ride back into town, we were finally at the hostel once again. At this point everyone was exhausted, cold, wet, probably dehydrated, and some were possibly in the very early stages of hypothermia. I was completely down to just participate in the hostel dinner once again (which was salad, bread, mashed potatoes, and milenesa - essentially thin breaded and fried chicken), but some in the group had other thoughts, so 2 of us marched off to the store to procure vegetables and chicken for a stirfry. When we got back (having cheated and bought a bagged version - just add water) the others were starting to thaw. I hopped in the shower, super excited for the warm water and probably spent longer than necessary warming up under the spray. Dinner started without me, so I joined when I was dressed. Part way through dinner I could not seem to get my legs to stop shaking (dehydration likely) but finished dinner and went to get a big glass of water. Then I spent nearly an hour sitting in front of the fire to warm up and dry my hair. Wet hair + cold weather + exhausting day = not good on the system. It was nice to just sit and relax. I also got to talk more with our new friend Katie who is from Australia. I went to bed pretty early and was happy for the sleep.
The next morning we all started packing. Everyone had to be out of the rooms by 10am, but we could store our stuff at the hostel and hang out there all day until our bus left at 2:30. Some of us went back to the grocery store (apparently our 29 hour bus ride to Bariloche does not come with food) and bought fruit and cereals to snack on. We also bought some things to make our own version of granola/trail mix, because the pre-packaged kind was a little expensive. Then we relaxed at the hostel until it was time to transport everything to the bus station. El Calafate was amazing! I'm definitely enjoying the trip and learning a lot about myself and my friends along the way. Next stop...and final stop...Bariloche - home to famous chocolate and world renown views.
I hope everyone is doing well and I look forward to hearing what's going on in your lives.
All my love!
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Spring Break at the End of the World Part #2 - Transport through Chile
Hello Everyone! When we last left our wonderful group of travelers, it was 4am and they were headed to the bus terminal in Ushuaia.... We shall continue from there. :) We arrived at the terminal without issue and realized that this terminal is nothing more than a large parking lot ... with no where to stand inside. So the 9 of us waited on the sidewalk together still talking excitedly. When our bus arrived at 5am it was not exactly what we expected. It was more of a large van than a bus. None the less, we all piled in for what turned out to be a very bumpy ride into the mountains and through towns in the middle of no where. I was absolutely freezing and wishing for more than the winter coat I was wearing, but seeing as how it was all packed under the bus, I did my best to curl up and sleep. Later in the morning we stopped at ... the border? None of us were even aware that we would be "leaving the country" (although looking at a map now it is very obvious that passing through Chile was the only option going North). This was where all the troubles began...
We all had to unload from the "bus" and go through customs indoors. The extra yogurt and fruit we had with us had to be trashed because it couldn't be taken across the border. Inside we filed through the lines getting forms filled out and stamped by officials. However something was clearly wrong with 3 of our companions. Unfortunately they had not brought their real passports with them and only had copies along with student id's credit cards etc. The guards turned them away and told them there was no way they were crossing the border without proper identification because a copy serves for nothing. We tried everything showing other id's, calling our advisor. Nothing worked. In the end the 3 amigos (friends) had to return to Ushuaia to find a flight out of the city so that they wouldn't have to cross any international borders. We unfortunately had to leave without them and it was back to the bus for us... The driver (who for some reason was convinced that only my friend Whitney could speak Castellano (spanish) wouldn't give any of the rest of us the time of day when we tried to talk to him and we all piled back into the bus frustrated and upset. The mother nature in me felt like I had lost 3 of my children... I was not a happy camper (cold, tired, slept funny and got a crick in my neck, and now lost 1/3 of our party). The drive was slow and often very bumpy over the lonely and open Chilean terrain. Eventually we reached our "lunch break" and piled out of the van to use the restrooms before getting the sandwiches given by the driver. Of course it came complete with an Alfajor. This pause also happened to be at the Strait of Magellan! We had to wait on the ferry, so we ate lunch in the van. As I was looking around, up the hill to the right of the van was a barbed wire fence along the top of the hill that appeared to go for a long distance behind us and up to the shore as well. There was a sign posted that read in spanish, "Peligro Campo Minado" aka Danger Mine Field! Hmm...leftover from the war I suppose, but I found it rather interesting.
After about 30 minutes the ferry arrived and we escaped out of the van to the VERY windy deck to watch the water as we crossed. At one point we were lucky enough to even see a small dolphin frolicking in the water and seaweed. The crossing went without incident and we piled back into the van (still in Chilean territory). After another hour or so, we arrived at the border again... and repeated the same process as before (scanning passports, scanning bags, unloading the van, etc). When it was finally done, I walked back to the van and along the way was semi-accosted by a military official guarding the door. He spoke to me in spanish asking what language I spoke? Spanish, Portuguese, English? I responded that I could speak english or spanish and he just kind of stared at me. Then as I walked on by he made some comment about me being a "muñeca" which means doll in spanish. I said nothing, didn't look back, and simply got on the bus. As much as I'm becoming accustomed to comments from the general population on the streets, its still VERY uncomfortable and disconcerting to receive the same looks or comments from uniformed police, army, guard officials etc. Culturally in the US they are supposed to be professional and in positions of power and protection, and here its the same, but culturally the comments are still 'acceptable'. An army man actually joined our van for a ride somewhere and we set off again (back in Argentina).
As we drove through the flats, I enjoyed watching the scenery. It still amazes me how "parecido" (similar) the views can be between here and CO. After a few more hours, we finally arrived in Rio Gallegos (our transfer to bus #2). Everyone piled out and I set off with one of the girls to the terminal. When we had waited for about 10 minutes and seen no sign of the others, I went back out to search for them. I found 2 of the girls but the other 2 had disappeared...leaving their stuff behind. We had no idea where they were, and the bus had left, so we gathered their belongings to take inside when they appeared around the corner a block away! When they reached us, they explained how they had been on the bus searching under the seats for a missing class ring (obviously with great sentimental value) when the driver had asked them what they were doing. They responded and the driver then said, "Oh" and proceeded to start the bus and drive away...with them on it! A few blocks later, infront of his hotel for the night, he parked the van and began asking them questions about the ring. What its value is? Why is it important? What does it look like? The girls were a little weirded out, so they quickly answered the questions and left. For me this completely confirmed my belief that this was a very sketchy driver. I personally, was not a fan.
Waiting in the terminal, we split in different directions to buy dinner or coffee for the next bus and then loaded on our final leg to Calafate. This bus was much more comfortable; big with comfy seats, and WARM! I spent a majority of the time talking with my friend Louisa (whom I absolutely adore) and then we settled in to work on more homework. She's a great influence in that respect. The bus also showed (most of) Angels and Demons, which I enjoyed watching. We actually arrived in El Calafate early... and proceeded to ask for directions to our hostel (which was only a few blocks from the terminal). Tired, and a half cup grumpy, we gathered our belongings and walked the 4 blocks uphill to a wonderful house and our home for the next three days. No one had any desire but to sleep and after checking in, settling rooms, explaining what had happened to our other 3 companions, and getting paperwork taken care of, we all went right to sleep.
Great adventures were to ensue in the following days, and we wanted to be ready for them! Tune in next time for the El Calafate edition! I hope you are all doing well!
Miss you bunches, All my love!
We all had to unload from the "bus" and go through customs indoors. The extra yogurt and fruit we had with us had to be trashed because it couldn't be taken across the border. Inside we filed through the lines getting forms filled out and stamped by officials. However something was clearly wrong with 3 of our companions. Unfortunately they had not brought their real passports with them and only had copies along with student id's credit cards etc. The guards turned them away and told them there was no way they were crossing the border without proper identification because a copy serves for nothing. We tried everything showing other id's, calling our advisor. Nothing worked. In the end the 3 amigos (friends) had to return to Ushuaia to find a flight out of the city so that they wouldn't have to cross any international borders. We unfortunately had to leave without them and it was back to the bus for us... The driver (who for some reason was convinced that only my friend Whitney could speak Castellano (spanish) wouldn't give any of the rest of us the time of day when we tried to talk to him and we all piled back into the bus frustrated and upset. The mother nature in me felt like I had lost 3 of my children... I was not a happy camper (cold, tired, slept funny and got a crick in my neck, and now lost 1/3 of our party). The drive was slow and often very bumpy over the lonely and open Chilean terrain. Eventually we reached our "lunch break" and piled out of the van to use the restrooms before getting the sandwiches given by the driver. Of course it came complete with an Alfajor. This pause also happened to be at the Strait of Magellan! We had to wait on the ferry, so we ate lunch in the van. As I was looking around, up the hill to the right of the van was a barbed wire fence along the top of the hill that appeared to go for a long distance behind us and up to the shore as well. There was a sign posted that read in spanish, "Peligro Campo Minado" aka Danger Mine Field! Hmm...leftover from the war I suppose, but I found it rather interesting.
After about 30 minutes the ferry arrived and we escaped out of the van to the VERY windy deck to watch the water as we crossed. At one point we were lucky enough to even see a small dolphin frolicking in the water and seaweed. The crossing went without incident and we piled back into the van (still in Chilean territory). After another hour or so, we arrived at the border again... and repeated the same process as before (scanning passports, scanning bags, unloading the van, etc). When it was finally done, I walked back to the van and along the way was semi-accosted by a military official guarding the door. He spoke to me in spanish asking what language I spoke? Spanish, Portuguese, English? I responded that I could speak english or spanish and he just kind of stared at me. Then as I walked on by he made some comment about me being a "muñeca" which means doll in spanish. I said nothing, didn't look back, and simply got on the bus. As much as I'm becoming accustomed to comments from the general population on the streets, its still VERY uncomfortable and disconcerting to receive the same looks or comments from uniformed police, army, guard officials etc. Culturally in the US they are supposed to be professional and in positions of power and protection, and here its the same, but culturally the comments are still 'acceptable'. An army man actually joined our van for a ride somewhere and we set off again (back in Argentina).
As we drove through the flats, I enjoyed watching the scenery. It still amazes me how "parecido" (similar) the views can be between here and CO. After a few more hours, we finally arrived in Rio Gallegos (our transfer to bus #2). Everyone piled out and I set off with one of the girls to the terminal. When we had waited for about 10 minutes and seen no sign of the others, I went back out to search for them. I found 2 of the girls but the other 2 had disappeared...leaving their stuff behind. We had no idea where they were, and the bus had left, so we gathered their belongings to take inside when they appeared around the corner a block away! When they reached us, they explained how they had been on the bus searching under the seats for a missing class ring (obviously with great sentimental value) when the driver had asked them what they were doing. They responded and the driver then said, "Oh" and proceeded to start the bus and drive away...with them on it! A few blocks later, infront of his hotel for the night, he parked the van and began asking them questions about the ring. What its value is? Why is it important? What does it look like? The girls were a little weirded out, so they quickly answered the questions and left. For me this completely confirmed my belief that this was a very sketchy driver. I personally, was not a fan.
Waiting in the terminal, we split in different directions to buy dinner or coffee for the next bus and then loaded on our final leg to Calafate. This bus was much more comfortable; big with comfy seats, and WARM! I spent a majority of the time talking with my friend Louisa (whom I absolutely adore) and then we settled in to work on more homework. She's a great influence in that respect. The bus also showed (most of) Angels and Demons, which I enjoyed watching. We actually arrived in El Calafate early... and proceeded to ask for directions to our hostel (which was only a few blocks from the terminal). Tired, and a half cup grumpy, we gathered our belongings and walked the 4 blocks uphill to a wonderful house and our home for the next three days. No one had any desire but to sleep and after checking in, settling rooms, explaining what had happened to our other 3 companions, and getting paperwork taken care of, we all went right to sleep.
Great adventures were to ensue in the following days, and we wanted to be ready for them! Tune in next time for the El Calafate edition! I hope you are all doing well!
Miss you bunches, All my love!
Spring Break at the End of the World Part #1 - Ushuaia
Hey everyone! I'm so sorry that it has taken me so long to put this up. We had a very busy (and amazing time) on break and weren't always surrounded with internet. Then when I got back I had a partial (mid-term) exam on Tuesday... BOO! So, here, (better late than never) is the first installment of my spring break in Southern Patagonia:
Friday was spent running around frantically packing and gathering everything needed for the vacation. This of course included a trip to the famous Wal-Mart for more peanut butter (which of course is an essential food item). By the time 5pm rolled around, I was somehow packed with 20 minutes to spare before I had to catch a taxi to the bus station. We all met up without issue and boarded the first of MANY busses to come. This first one was about 15 hours and would take us to Buenos Aires. All 8 of us were super excited and could hardly sit still. After playing a round of bingo and eating merienda (afternoon snack) we all settled down to reading or studying. The unfortunate thing about this break is that many of us are missing classes and most of us have exams the week (or even the day) we get back. As a result, 6 of us were studiously reading or preparing assignments to mail to professors. Dinner was served around 10pm and we quickly settled in to sleep. It still amazes me the service we receive on these bussed: food, movies, comfy chairs. Its almost better than airplanes and usually cheaper too.
The dawn of Saturday morning found us nearly in Buenos Aires. Once there, we grabbed a couple of taxis and headed to the airport. I was vividly reminded of how happy I am to be in Mendoza instead of in BA. Although Mendoza is a pretty big city, its nothing compared to the size of Buenos Aires. I was discussing this with my friend Whitney the other day and we realized that there are two main reasons Mendoza doesn't feel quite like a city. First, there are trees EVERYWHERE! On every street! Second, none of the buildings are much over 6 or 7 stories because there are still laws against tall buildings for fear of earthquakes. As a result, you can usually see over the buildings and also lots of blue sky, making it feel much smaller and more open. Anywho, we arrived at the airport and checked in with minor issues. For a few minutes we thought we were going to have to pay more for our tickets because the prices we received online were for Argentinean residents (and the tickets are more expensive for foreigners). However, when I presented my provisional visa and was able to explain that we are all studying and living here for 5 months, we were ushered through checkin. Since we had nearly 4 hours until our plane was supposed to leave, we grabbed a quick bite to eat in the food court. Everyone wanted something more substantial than the alfajor that was "breakfast" on the bus. Then we explored the shops as an excuse to walk around after so much sitting on the bus and finally settled in the sun to read/study/sleep for a bit before grabbing lunch. After a quick lunch we waited in the long lines of security and then spent a fair amount of time waiting on the plane. Go figure it left late... and we were on our way to Ushuaia! When we landed you could CERTAINLY tell we were farther south. It was cold and raining slightly. All 8 of us were tired but excited to make it! Taxis took us to the hostel and we all got settled in. The hostel was AMAZING! Like 5 star quality for hostels: with heated floors, a large kitchen, wifi, and breakfast included. We decided that instead of cooking we would eat out the first night so after everyone had showers we went in search of a restaurant that the Lonely Planet guidebook named best in the town with great seafood. The menu looked a little pricey, but we decided to go for it anyway and most of us split entrees. The food was DELICIOUS! I split a salmon filled pasta with smoked salmon and shrimp in a cream sauce. It was really good! When we got back to the hostel everyone crashed pretty quickly. I unfortunately had an awful time trying to sleep. The window was open and so I was freezing! I spent the whole night curled up in a ball trying to stay warm and rolling over when one hip started to hurt...
The next morning dawned far too early for me, but I was still happy to be on vacation. We had our first excursion all lined up and the guides were coming to pick us up at 9:15. We drove about 20 minutes into the mountains and found ourselves in the middle of a beautiful glacial valley. The excursion was dogsledding and snowshoeing with hot cocoa in the middle. We started by putting on snowshoes and hiking out into the valley and up the mountain on the other side to a GORGEOUS view of all the surroundings. In the upper meadow we built snowmen and had a snowball fight. It was a ton of fun! Then we hiked back down into the valley (sometimes backwards when the hills were super steep). While waiting on the dog sleds we enjoyed hot cocoa and cookies in an old Wood Cutter's Refuge in the forest. Then we finally got to load the sleds! I was SUPER excited! Dog sledding with real Alaskan Huskies! Our driver's name was Federico and my friend Whitney took a liking to him immediately. It was a blast riding back to the starting point. Unfortunately the conditions weren't the best with slushy snow and warm weather, so it made it hard on the dogs and they couldn't pull the sled as fast. All in all it was a GREAT time! We got back to the hostel and started thinking about what to do for lunch. Due to the cold, soup seemed like a great idea and we all sat down to a hot mug of soup before a much needed siesta. I spent the evening relaxing and working on some hw. When we finally decided it was time for dinner, we realized that we couldn't have the dinner we planned because the black beans we had to eat require an entire night soaking in water first...first time cooks have to lean by experience right? So Louisa, Audrey, and I decided on plan B: PIZZA! We knew the bakery one block over sold pizzas, so we walked up to buy pizza for 8. Complete with crust, cheese, and sauce we arrived back at the hostel to realize that although there were stovetops, there was no oven to cook the pizzas... As a result, we got creative! Creating a double boiler (here called a baño María) out of pans in the kitchen, we placed the crust in the top pan to cook and then added cheese and another pan to cover the ensemble. It was pretty entertaining to attempt and definitely took a bit of practice to get it right but by the time we baked the last pizza, it was delicious! No one had any desire to go out for the evening, so we relaxed in one of the rooms talking and watching episodes of Friends on someone's computer.
The next morning we decided to adventure down to the bay and inquire about another excursion. WIth the help of our friend Deven, we found a company that would take us on an adventure of the nearby islands to see the animals and the most southern point of Argentina. We all left together and took a small boat out into the bay and then the channel. Beagle Channel separates Argentina from Chile and is split in the middle between the 2 countries. Our first stop was the sea lion island or "Lobos Marenos" (sea wolves). There were tons of them scattered all over the rocky island sleeping in the sun or barking up a storm. There were 2 huge ones, "machos", that are the dominant males. We went around the island taking photos and listening to the history from our guide. Then it was off to Isla H or Island H (the southern most property of Argentina). On the way we saw 2 rogue penguins who apparently have arrived early to the area. My friend Audrey was SUPER excited since that was the one thing on the top of her list. When we arrived at Island H, we left the boat and climbing the rocky shore to walk around the island. We got to hear all about the history of the indigenous people who lived there and how they lived. Then we climbed the hill to see the view of Beagle Channel and Chile! It was absolutely beautiful! Then we hopped back into the boat to go back to the mainland. Tea/coffee and alfajors were on the snack menu and we all enjoyed them. When we got back we headed to a local chocolate shop for a free hot cocoa and then walked the town for a bit enjoying the scenery. Eventually we got hungry, so it was off to the store for lunch/dinner items. We decided to get creative, so lunch was rice, black beans (soaked overnight), corn, peas, and sausage all mixed together with rolls and juice on the side. It was great! I think everything tastes good when you cook it yourself. Its the pride element... It was nearly 4 by the time we ate lunch, so a siesta was shortly after along with more hw and reading. In the evening we met up at a local bar for free beers (courtesy again of the boat company) before heading back to pack. Our bus was set to leave at 5am, so we had all decided to just not got to bed and stay up talking instead. At 12am we finally decided to make dinner (there was finally kitchen space at this point too) and got to work on Breakfast for Dinner: scrambled eggs (not a common item), dulce de leche, bananas, pancakes (also not common here), and the rest of the black beans. It was delicious! After we cleaned the kitchen, we sat in a circle playing a game of questions to get to know each other better. It was a ton of fun and before we knew it, it was time to head to the bus stop. We met up with Deven, and the 9 of us headed into the night to the "terminal" and our next adventure in El Calafate!
Look for the next installment soon! I hope everything is well with you all. Keep in touch and know that I am thinking about all of you!
All my love!
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