Awkward/Hysterical Occurrences in BsAs

1. Concept of Space.
Latinos in genral are known for having smaller spacial boundaries than Americans. However, besides the constant cheek kissing, I hadn´t really noticed this at all. Until I decided to go to the gym at 8:30 pm. I was sitting on a weight machine waiting to start my second set, and not one person, but 2 people, decided they would like to use the machine I was on. I´m not exaggerating - both of them also decided to wait within centimeters of me. Their sweat was dripping on me. Unfortunately, "Could you please back up, I´m already sweating enough because there´s no air conditioning in this gym, it´s 100 degress outside, and I have two more sets to go" is not something I can just spurt out in Spanish yet (but I´m going to learn, don´t you worry) - so I just got up and let them fight over who would get to sweat on who next.

2. Coin Shortage.
Yep. Argentina has a shortage of coins. The smallest bill is the $2 peso, and the buses only take coins (they will kick you off if you don´t have them). So, everyone tries to hoard their change so they can take the bus. About half of the time, when you buy something that´s $1.50 or $1.75 they will round up and keep the change just because they don´t want to give up their coins. Seriously? Why would you be short of coins? It´s the easiest solution ever - make more. I still don´t understand what the buses do with all their coins...

3. Fake bills.
Argentina also has a huge problem with counterfeit money. If a porteno gets a fake bill, his solution is to deceptively get someone else to take it off his hands. Even the banks are in on it. ATMS occasionally spit out fake bills too. The banks´response "We have no proof that you got those fake bills from our ATM." Oh, really? Then who put them in the machine? Maybe it was the same person who stole all of your country´s coins?!

4. Beautiful People in Dangerous Places.
A couple of days ago I was running on the treadmill at the gym, and there was a quite large woman (yes, they exist in Argentina, even though it´s the anorexic/plastic surgery capital of the world) running on the one next to me. There´s also a beautiful Argentine man that mans the gym floor every day, and every girl that walks in goes up and gives him a kiss on the cheek. So this woman is running next to me, and all of the sudden she trips and lands on the moving belt. The belt shoots her off the treadmill, and she smacks into the wall behind us. EVERYONE in the gym stopped what they were doing and stared, incluiding all the judgmental plastic women. The beautiful man ran over to help this woman up, and at that low point in my life, I actually glanced down at my treadmill´s belt and contemplated how badly it would hurt to "trip."

5. Bomb threats.
Hmmm...just saying bomb in an airport in the US would get you locked in a detention cell for a couple hours of obnoxious interrogation. Not in Argentina. Apparently, bomb threats are a frequent tactic that Argentine students use to get out of exams they aren´t ready for. Atleast, that was my teacher´s explanation when someone stormed into our classroom and told everyone to get out of the building. Her reaction was "Ugh, otra vez..." ("Not again..."). According to her, this happens atleast once a semester.
One of my friends´teachers was new and didn´t know that the threat was a fluke. A guy came in her classroom and spurted out something about bombs in really fast Spanish, but none of the students understood what he was saying. They got the hint when their teacher RAN out of the classroom without a word, leaving them all there to be blown up. After the entire class evacuated the building she tried assigning them homework before they went home - they just laughed at her and said there was no way they were getting homework after she left them to die.

6. Words on the street.
- An "emo" kid = a Flogger (because they have foto blogs of dramatic pictures of themselves)
- A gothic person = a Darkie
- A rock n´roll fanatic = a Rolinga (from Rolling Stones)
- Gangs = tribus urbanas (urban tribes)

Ivonne´s artwork!

I promised I would post pictures of the piece Ivonne (my housemom in BsAs) was working on this past weekend. She had been working on it the entire month I´ve been here. It ia a part of an international project where 200 artists were invited to create a square piece. All 200 pieces will be connected together in a gallery in Belgrano. Here is Ivonne´s piece....She spent so much time on it, every piece was done by hand, the pictures really don´t do it justice.

Colonia, Uruguay

It´s hard to believe I´ve only been in Buenos Aires for 3 weeks - it feels so much longer than that. Today I had my first "I don´t want to leave" feeling. My housemom Ivonne and I get along great. Our conversations have gotten so much more interesting now that my Spanish is improving. She was rushing to finish an art piece today so she was home all day, and since it´s a Sunday so was I!

My Spanish is now at the point where I can actually make and understand jokes (and humor is something that´s very hard to learn when speaking another language, at least I think so). So today, it was really rewarding when we started joking about things that were happening around the apartment or in our lives and we both actually laughed (instead of that fake nervous laugh that you do when you think you understand a joke in another language, but you´re not sure if you translated it correctly in your head, so you half laugh just in case you need to retract the laugh because it actually wasn´t a joke at all - obviously, this has happened a lot to me). Also, at dinner tonight, Ivonne told me it made her really sad that I was leaving in 4 weeks because she felt like we got along really well and we had a great connection. :)

Yesterday, I went on an excursion to Colonia, Uruguay with ISA! We took a 3 hour ferry there and back, and it was the coolest ferry I´ve ever seen in my life. My friend Correy and I walked on and actually debated whether it was the ferry or we had to find the entrance by walking through this mall-like structure. The ferry had tons of seating, 3 floors, clothing shops, cafes, an arcade, and an upper deck. On the way home there was a dance lesson in the lobby...I´m not kidding. A dance lesson. It was absurd.

Colonia is an adorable, "colonial," portugese town with winding cobblestone streets, beaches, cute outdoor cafes and art shops. It was picturesque to say the least, and so relaxing in comparison to Buenos Aires. We ate a long 3 hour lunch - the food was incredible, I had teriyaki chicken and vegetables! Then, my friend Melissa and I went on a jewelry hunt and I bought a really unique necklace and earrings (Liv, you are going to want to steal all the jewelry I´m buying...don´t worry I will bring you back some!)

As for my future travel plans.....South America is teaching me to be patient and spontaneous. This weekend Liz and I were planning to go to Rio de Janiero, but the visas are expensive, take 2 weeks to get, and the Brazilian embassy is only open 3 hours a day. Then, we planned to go to Iguazu, but Aerolineas Argentinas charges US citizens almost double the amount they charge Argentines for each flight. Our flight would have been $400, so we decided to wait for a longer weekend to suffer the 20 hour bus ride there and back. After 2 depressing hours of complaining about our failing travel plans, we came across $200 flights to Santiago, Chile!!!!! We glanced at each other, screamed, and pulled out our credit cards. Friday morning (5 days from now) we will be on a flight to Santiago. Saturday we´ll head to the beach town of Valparaiso, and then Sunday back to Santiago. Good things come to those who wait... ;)

Here are some photos from Colonia and other photos that I got from my friends´cameras.....click here.

Mendoza, Argentina

This weekend 3 of my ISA friends and I took a weekend trip to Mendoza! We took an overnight bus on Friday (15 hours! Dramamine may be the best invention ever-I slept for 10 of them.) and arrived on Saturday morning.

First thing we did was sign up for a wine tour on bicycles! Despite the complications of wearing a dress while riding a bicycle and it being over 90 degrees outside, it was sooo much fun! The landscape was unbelievably picturesque. Tree canopy lined streets, flat miles of vineyards with purple and green grapes, and the Andes mountain range as the backdrop. We visited a chocolate and liquor factory first. It was actually just a cute little house with a shed, BUT everything was delicious! We tried 4 liquors (they had over 40 to choose from): chocolate and dulce de leche, chocolate and cafe, coconut and rum, and a spicy green liquor. They were so good! Along with those, we got to sample coconut, spicy, almond, and berry chocolates. Then we headed to two other wineries where we got tours of their vineyards and got to sample 3 or 4 of their wines. The wine was incredibly tasty and incredibly cheap! Even at restaurants you could order a moderate glass for about US$1.50.

After spending the entire day under the hot sun, pedaling and drinking, we were exhausted (but very content ;) ) so we went to Mendoza´s main plaza, Plaza Independencia. It was full of people and there were tons of vendors and musicians. We found a grassy spot in front of a big fountain and laid down for an hour. It was a great people watching experience, and I wish this tradition of spending Saturday afternoon in the plaza was something that happened in the United States. The leisurely attitude that most Argentines seem live by is definitely a stark contrast to the fast paced life I´m accustomed to. Also, I´ve heard so much about the Italian influence in Argentina, and I could really see it in Mendoza.

We headed to Avenida Colon to have dinner at around 1030 pm. We ate at a typical Argentine restaurant that was chicly decorated with rustic wood tables. The dinner was incredible and it was so fun to just sit there for 3 hours and talk to each other. Correy bought the 3 of us a bottle of wine for Valentine´s day, and we finished it before our food even came! The wine was out of this world in Mendoza! The street was lined with restaurants and bars, all with outdoor seating. When we left the restaurant (at around 2 am) it was completely full, every restaurant on the street was full, and some people were just being seated to have dinner! I seriously will never get used to this. I dont understand how the Argentines do it. At 2 am there were still parents with infants walking around in the plaza!!!! It´s craziness, but I love it!

On Sunday, we went venturing for some breakfast, and it took us 45 minutes to even find something that was open! It was an Italian cafe, packed with people, and obviously the only place open in this area on Sunday mornings. After some cafe con leche, medialunas, and fruit we headed to El Parque San Martin. This may have been the largest recreational park I´ve ever been to! It took us an hour just to get to the other side. We climbed to the top of a hill and got a panoramic view of the Andes mountain range. I was speechless. All I could do was snap tons of pictures with my jaw dropped. In Buenos Aires and even in Mendoza´s town I haven´t really felt like I am in South America, but some American or European city where they only speak Spanish. Thinking about my location on a globe, and how far it is from home, is just strange. Seeing the Andes really made me think "Wow. I´m in South America for the next 4 months. I can´t believe how lucky I am to be able see all of this."

Here are some more photos from the weekend...click here

Liz is here!!!!!

For those of you who know Liz (used to go to Vanderbilt, now goes to NYU) she finally made it to Buenos Aires!!! She´s going to be studying with NYU here for the whole semester which means we get to spend the next 6 weeks together!!! Last night we met in Recolta and had a fantastic dinner and then went to Volta to get ice-cream. It was honestly the best ice-cream I´ve ever had (I´m pretty sure it was better than Spain´s, which is saying something!). If you didn´t know this already, Argentines LOVE dulce de leche. So of course, it´s incorporated into every flavor of ice cream available. I had capuccino dulce de leche flavored ice cream and Liz had coconut dulce de leche. It was INCREIBLE!


Now that I´ve been here for two weeks, I´m starting to plan trips to other cities in Argentina and nearby countries. Here´s my tentative schedule (click the cities to see photos!):


Feb 13-15 Mendoza, Argentina
This is wine-country, basically the Napa Valley of Argentina. I´m going with 3 people from my ISA group and we´re going on an all-day wine tour on bicycles! Im not really sure that drinking wine all day and trying to balance on something with two wheels is smart, but whatever!

Feb 26-Mar 1 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil!!!!
I´m so excited to go here! Brazil has a bad safety reputation but we´re staying in Ipanema which is the safest part of town. It´s Carnival season so it should be an amazing experience! The beaches are beautiful here and so are the people. Also, they speak Portuguese, so hopefully I will learn some while I´m there.

Mar 2-Mar 6 Calafate and Perito Moreno, Argentina
This is southern Argentina (Patagonia) which is very close to Antarctica. Perito Moreno is a HUGE glacier (over 5 km wide and around 200 ft high above the water). This trip is organized by ISA and my whole group is going.

Partying like the Argentines do.

Last night I had my first true experience with the Argentine nightlife. My friends and I went to Puerto Madero to have dinner. It´s the most modern part of Buenos Aires and has a bunch of restaurants along a river. We ate outside and a great restaurant and my friend Melissa and I drank a whole bottle of wine together. :) The food was amazing and it was probably 3x cheaper than it would have cost in the US. After dinner, at around 2 am we met up with some people from our group at a club called Asia de Cuba. It was an awesome club and was really crowded. We danced until 6:30 am, yes 6:30 am - and it was SO MUCH FUN!!! The portenos really know how to party. When we left there still a bunch of people in the club. I got home around 7 am, ate some breakfast, took a shower, and then crashed at 7:30 am and woke up at 2pm. Somewhere during the night I must have gotten a second wind because I wasn´t that tired when I got home. I really don´t understand how they do it here. Maybe it´s because they eat dinner so late? I dont know. All I know is that when I woke up at 2 pm my housemom just gave me coffee and asked me what I did last night. I told her I got home at 7 am and she didnt even flinch. Then she said she got home at 4:30 am and woke up at 7 am. (Keep in mind this woman is 57 years old) She partied til 4:30 and then only got two and half hours of sleep. Seriously, Argentineans must have something in their genetic makeup that allows them to do that. I have no plans for tonight yet, but I love that. I feel so free here. Everyone´s schedules are so relaxed, it´s a very liberating lifestyle.

Here are some photos to show you parts of the city that I visit everyday...

This is the University of Belgrano, where I have my classes everyday. The inside is very modern and a great environment. The building is really tall. I think it has around 20 floors. My class is on the 10th floor and the window gives you a great view of the city.

These next few pictures are of Cabildo, which is the huge avenue that runs through Belgrano. I walk on this street everyday. There are TONS of stores and restaurants and gyms.

One week down...

I've been here for exactly one week now, and it feels like a month. I'm definitely starting to feel like I have a routine. I had my fourth Spanish class today and it was really fun. I'm in a classroom on the 10th floor that looks over the city so sometimes it is really hard to concentrate especially when you know you're going to be in that room for 5 hours. Today I learned a really useful phrase....'el piensa que ser el ombligo del mundo" which literally translates to..."He thinks he is the bellybutton of the world"and perfectly describes the arrogant kid in my class. He thinks he's the center of everything BUT the bellybutton is a completely unuseful part of our bodies, and he is a completely unuseful part of our world! I LOVE Spanish!!

On Wednesday Ivonne (my housemom) invited me and my friend Hannah to an art exhibit opening. It was such a great cultural experience! The art was very contemporary and Hannah took pictures that I will put up later. Also, all the people were very fashionably dressed - it was the first time I really noticed how amazing the style is in Buenos Aires. The exhibit was in a cultural center in Recoleta (which for those of you who know Liz, is where she will be living) and after Hannah and I found a cafe and talked til about 10 pm. Then, I went home for dinner and was surprised to find Ivonne's friend there. The three of us had dinner and talked (all in Spanish of course) til 12:30pm, then I did my homework, and then I passed out around 2 am! I'm so unbelievably exhausted from all the Spanish absorption I'm doing, but as Maggie says "i can sleep when I'm dead..." ;).

Yesterday I joined a gym called Sports Club that's close to my apartment with my friend Correy. Compared to Bergen County it was cheap ($60 a month) and it's an awesome gym! It has 4 floors!! They made us get a physical examination by their doctor before letting us join. It was really strange. He was very nice, but I guess his technology wasn't that advanced because in order to test my body fat he clamped these huge metal things on my ankles and wrist and around my waist. I asked him what it was doing and if it would hurt (thank god it didn't) and all he said was that they had been doing this "for about 100 years." Oh, really? 100 years? How about you update your equipment so that I don't think I'm about to get electricuted by your ancient body fat tester.

My favorite thing about Argentina is that everyone kisses ALL THE TIME! My house mom gives me a kiss on the cheek EVERY time I see her! Even my teacher does it! Every time you meet someone new or see someone you know you kiss on the cheek! It's so cute and so friendly! I may attempt to bring this tradition to New Jersey, I think the cranky northeasterners could use some "besitos"!

Los Argentinos

The internet I was hijacking is no longer working. Thank god the ISA office has internet, but this may mean that my emails and blogs are less frequent. Send me emails though! I LOVE reading them, even if I don't respond right away.

My homesickness is starting to wear off. I started classes yesterday, and was placed into the Advanced Intensive Speaking class. About a third of the people in my class are either from Mexico or have Spanish speaking parents. The class is really interesting, but it's from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. The university is actually very modern and in a very nice area. My only complaint is that there is a really arrogant, over-achieving, fluent kid in my class that laughs and writes notes to the girl that sits next to him when other people are trying to speak Spanish. I want to punch him in the face. I'm restraining myself right now, but 5 days a week, 5 hours a day, may be an issue. My house mom is really funny and told me (in Spanish of course) that people like that kid "do not deserve to be born." She's hysterical.

Here are some things I've learned about los Argentinos:

1. The LOVE meat and medialunas. Medialunas are basically croissants, but better. "Media luna" literally translates to "half moon" which is exactly what they look like!!

2. There are A LOT of dog walkers here called "pasaperros" and they are dragged by 15 giant dogs at once. These dogs also poop all over the sidewalks. There are no rules against it. On the way to school there are lots of fresh ones on the ground, and on my way home they are all flattened to the ground. Not trying to be gross, but it's the truth.

3. Los portenos (Buenos Aires residents) are actually very friendly when you speak Spanish to them. Even if you stutter or mix up your words they will smile and try to help you out.

4. They WILL RUN YOU OVER. I thought NYC had crazy drivers. The drivers here will literally aim to hit you if you are in the street when you aren't supposed to be. There's no mercy.

Right now, part of my group is thinking about planning a trip to Mendoza for next weekend! It's the wine country of Argentina!

I put up photos of the inside of my apartment. Just go to this link and the photos are at the end of the album!

First days in Buenos Aires

I finally made it to Buenos Aires! I arrived on Friday morning and I have been really busy. As some of you already know I had a hard time adjusting at first. I think I was a little overwhelmed, culture-shocked, and having serious withdrawal from my American cell phone and wireless internet. Luckily, I learned how to hijack the wireless from a cafe down the street and use it in my apartment. Thanks to the godliness of Skype I'm not as homesick as I was. Today, I feel much more adjusted, and I'm really excited to have the next two months in this city.

Buenos Aires is amazing. It's HUGE, but very European, I love it. I'm living in the barrio of Belgrano with a single woman names Ivonne. She's in her fifties and she's an artist. Her apartment is covered in her paintings and works - it's like living in an art gallery. The apartment is minimal compared to what Americans are accustomed to, but I already feel at home. Ivonne is a fantastic cook (and she doesn't eat red meat!!!) which makes her even more of a dream housemom for me. She's been cooking vegetables, chicken, and interesting Argentinean dishes. Most importantly, she makes really good strong coffee in the mornings ;). It's just me and her in the apartment (she has two children that live in Barcelona), so at meal times we talk a lot (all in Spanish, of course). I've never spoken so much Spanish in a 3 day period in my life. I better be fluent by the time I come home! (PS the last photos in the album link at the botton of the page are of my street and the front of my apartment. Photos of the inside are coming soon! I tried to load the photos onto thhe blog but the internet connection is too slow, sorry!)

Our ISA group has 15 students from the US in it. Everyone's really different so it should be fun getting to know each other. We all get along pretty well, and we've take a couple of excursions together already. Yesterday we went to El Tigre, which is a large delta about 30 minutes outside of Buenos Aires. We hung out on a fake beach and got some color (all of us were nice and pasty white due to our winter hibernations in America) - it's been in the 80's and sunny here almost every day. In El Tigre we went to a fruit market where they made delicious, fresh fruit shakes with every kind of fruit you could imagine! We also ate lunch at a place where they tried to feed us the intestines of a cow...all of us took a small piece, chewed for about 1.5 seconds, and then spit it out onto our plates. I'm all about trying new foods, but that was a failure, it was disgusting.

Today we took a tour of the city. It's much larger than I expected. There are a bunch of different neighborhoods (barrios) that have developed over the years. I live and go to school in Belgrano. Just to give you an idea of how big the city is, it takes me 30 minutes to walk from one end of my barrio to the other, and there are about 15 different barrios! Of course you can take buses (colectivos), the subway (el supte), trains, and taxis all over town. On our city tour we visited Recoleta and its famous cemetery, La Plaza de Mayo, San Telmo, La Boca and Puerto Madero. I have tons of pictures that you can look at on Snapfish (the link's at the bottom).

Another interesting thing about Buenos Aires that I think is really hard to comprehend until you visit (so you all should come!!) is that it is ALIVE at night. At 2 a.m. last night I was leaving a cafe with 5 other girls, and families with little kids were still being seated! The streets were still full of people and we were going home! The clubs don't open here until 2:30 a.m. and it's embarrassing if you show up at that time. So if you think staying out til 3 or 4 a.m. in the US is late, that's just when things are getting started here. Clubs are full until in the morning!!!

I still have SO much to say, but this is getting long so I will leave more for next time. I miss everyone at home A LOT! Once things slow down, I'll be able to email more often.

Photos: Snapfish