I skyped with my best friend today. And while it was great
to see her lovely face, I had to interrupt our conversation for a solid minute
while my head exploded. Obviously not literally, but it was a very dramatic
moment. Why? Because she told me that the quarter just ended in school at home.
Do you know what that means? That means my time here is almost a quarter gone,
too.
And that is ridiculous. Honestly I can’t even wrap my head
around it, but it’s scaring the crap out of me anyways.
I keep looking forward to all of the great things that are
to come: Rotary trips, learning about their holiday traditions and sharing
mine, finally being fluent. I guess I forgot to look back at everything I’ve
accomplished already. It’s still weird that I’ve reached a point in the year
where I can label the amount of time in something besides months. And I don’t
dig it.
Anyways. I don’t really have a way to tie that in to
anything I’d already written. Just know that you, future exchange students,
will reach a day as I have when you realize how fast time is moving. Try not to
let it sneak up on you too much.
Moving on.
Moving on.
Sadly, there are
no more week- long celebrations to tell you about. So… I guess we’ll stick to a
normal update type thing.
I’ve settled into a routine here, which is nice. School from
7 to 12: 30, walk home and pick up food with my host brother, eat, siesta, run
(sometimes), eat (sometimes with friends, sometimes with Friends. Ya know, on
Netflix), continue to watch Friends, or read, or write, or whatever else, eat
again, go to bed. Pepper in some Volleyball practice or PE class, and that’s
what I do on the average weekday. It’s pretty chill, if you didn’t pick that up
from all of sleeping and eating. But since I’ve been here, 7 or so weeks now,
there hasn’t been one weekend where I’ve repeated an activity or been bored.
I wanted to do these in chronological order, but honestly
this was way too long ago. So I’m just gonna have to toss out some stuff I’ve done.
The weekend following Orientation, I stayed in Chivilcoy.
There are two students there, and I stayed with the one from Canada. As
exchange students, we share a common bond of not only language (as of right now
that language is English), but perpetual exhaustion and a deep love for food.
It’s always a grand time when we get together. Featured activities include
going to ice cream shops, co- napping, and Netflix marathons (Lindsay and I
share a common adoration for comparing the Spanish subtitles to what’s actually
being said).
For some reason I’d forgotten that Canada’s Thanksgiving is
even a thing that exists, despite having a friend who lives there part time.
But Lindsay forgave me for that and invited me and Baptiste, the other kid from
her town, to have an Argentine Thanksgiving a few weeks ago. I say Argentine
for a few reasons: Turkeys don’t exist here, so we had milanesa, pumpkins don’t
exist here either so we had squash pie, and gravy is hard to make without
either a turkey or a packet, of which we had neither, so we had some white
sauce for our potatoes. But it was still delicious, and I give major kudos to
her host mom for taking on that task.
That same weekend, Lindsay and I went to Bragado, which is a
town near here that’s the horse center of Argentina, or something along those
lines. They had a horse festival for the entire province of Buenos Aires, and
we went to see the parade. We only stayed for an hour- I think it was about 4
hours total- but in that time we got to see so much Argentine culture. There
were quite a few styles that the gauchos (think American cowboys) wore. A
typical shoe worn by gauchos is very similar to Toms- pretty much exactly,
actually. I fully intend to buy a pair (or two or three) and when people at
home ask where I bought them, I can pull a hipster on them. Ha. It’ll be
great.
I also had the chance to go to Buenos Aires for a weekend
with my host mom. We met up with my host sister, who goes to university there,
and rented a hotel room for the night. On Saturday, we spent a solid 6 hours
shopping (this was officially the day that I fell in love with platforms), and
I got to ride the subway for the first time. Bless my host sister for knowing
how that works because if not we would’ve been so lost. That night we walked to
the theater to see a show called Extravaganza: Water in Art. It was so crazy
awesome to watch. All of the acrobats/ singers/ actors were from Argentina,
besides one from Cuba. There were parts that I didn’t understand because they
talked really quickly about pop- culture things- even if I could’ve kept up it
wouldn’t have made sense. But for the most part it was these crazy talented
acrobats doing insane stuff.
We had dinner afterwards at a pizzeria, and even near
midnight the place was packed- and it wasn’t just theater- goers like
ourselves; there was a toddler at the table next to us. Late dinners are normal
here, but weekends in Buenos Aires? I think New York needs to give up its
title.
As we walked back to the hotel, I stopped caring about how
nice it would be to look like a native, and shamelessly took pictures with
everything- the Obelisco, a street performer, and a sculpture of some famous
dudes, I guess. And once we got back, I spent way too long with my head hanging
out the 6th floor window, staring at the Obelisco and the bustling
traffic around it in awe. But it’s okay, no one saw that bit but my host mom. We happened to choose a great weekend to go to the city; on Saturday, the Obelisco was pointless (some sort of art statement that you should definitely look up), but when we woke up on Sunday, it was there again. So I have pictures with both!
The next day we took the city bus to a tour bus company, and
spent probably 6 hours checking out the sights. We got off in Caminito, where I
bought a pair of super cozy pants that are common here and I’m currently
wearing. Caminito is known for its brightly colored buildings, painted by early
immigrants with leftover paint from the docks. It’s gorgeous, and so full of
personality. But my favorite stop was in Puerto Madero, the most modern part of
the city. I think I liked it because it had so much open space- as much as I
loved the city, I love openness more. After the tour, we walked to Plaza de
Mayo and got to go into the Casa Rosada (Like the White House, but better), and
the cathedral.
We drove back to Alberti that night, within normal time
parameters (basically, I could’ve slept plenty), but I skipped school the next
day anyways (hey, it was my host mom’s idea, I’m not gonna turn that down), and
spent the day relaxing and baking my favorite type of cookies- peanut butter
oatmeal chocolate chip. People here cannot understand the concept of peanut
butter, by the way. My host brother and his friends wouldn’t even try it- they
all just kind of stared at me in disgust when I ate it with an apple. Which I’m
honestly super ok with, because now there’s more for me!
Some street performer, and incidentally, the restaurant where we ate dinner across the street.
There was a photo where you could actually tell the point was missing, but it was blurry, so you'll just have to believe me.
Extravanganza!
Caminito
Casa Rosada with my host sister
Inside the Casa Rosada, with a spiffy lookin' guard. I only had this picture taken because someone else did before me.
And the Obelisco with its point, on Sunday morning
Last weekend was my birthday weekend, and it was so perfect.
I loved experiencing their traditions, and explaining mine to them.
On Thursday at school (my birthday fell on a Friday), the
sexto girls said “Tell your host mom we’re coming over for dinner today.” I did
ask her, but on the inside I was really, really confused.
Turns out that’s just the first part of their traditions- to
celebrate as soon as midnight hits. It’s really convenient, considering that
dinner happens so late.
So on Thursday night, a group of us ordered pizza at 10, and
spent 2 hours talking and listening to music and taking selfies. Once it got
near midnight, my host mom and brother joined us. Since we planned it so last
minute, there wasn’t a cake. But I didn’t know that there should’ve been one,
and honestly I didn’t care anyways. So as they sang to me, I blew out the
candle that we stuck into an alfajor. It was perfect. I did have a bit of a
misstep with the candle though. It was kind of a fiasco that I don’t want to
explain, but I’ll tell you that I ended up with a bit of charred hair. And I
lost my patience a bit since it kept re- lighting (I swear, this thing was a
re- lighting candle the height of a small sparkler. Three blows is enough.), so
the candle ended up in someone’s coke. I don’t feel bad about their ruined coke
but apparently there’s some aspect of their traditions that requires more
patience than I had. Guess my three (yeah, you heard me) wishes won’t come
true. Oh well.
At school the next day, the class broke out into the
birthday song at least 5 times, spontaneously and without warning. Sometimes
English, sometimes Spanish- but always accompanied by boisterous clapping and/
or slamming their hands onto a desk. They also do a thing here with pulling
your earlobes the amount of years you are old. I think I made it to 4 before
putting a stop to that. I did consider telling them about the spanking thing
that they do with kids in the U.S., but I didn’t want to give anyone any ideas.
After school I got my usual siesta, and afterwards a few of
the girls came over again. We walked to a bakery to get some facturas, and they
gave me a present on behalf of all the sextos- which I absolutely love.
By 10, I was at my host grandma’s quincho (a separate
building where people host parties, conveniently enough), but my host brother
and dad had been there for a few hours making the chorizo for choripan. This
party was basically the same as the night before; listening to music, eating,
and talking. Just before midnight, I got to blow out the candles of 2 more
cakes (this time keeping my hair safely out of the way).
At almost 1, we all left again. The sextos, who just got
back from their graduation trip to Bariloche, wanted to meet up with another
group of students they’d met. So we headed a town over. We got to the club
early- about 1: 30. That’s not at all relevant but if you ever find yourself in
Argentina, don’t go to a club until 2: 30 at the earliest. Unless you want to
sit around like us.
Anyways. A few hours of dancing later, and we walked to the
Plaza, where we watched the sunrise and ate hamburgers from the only place that
was open at that ungodly hour. I fed mine to the dogs, because it was way too
early to eat, and because I have to uphold my reputation (obviously).
I think I finally fell into bed at 7:30, in case you were
wondering. I hadn't been so tired in a long time, but I also hadn't had so much fun in a long time. It was better than anything I could have hoped for, and definitely tops the best- birthday- ever list. If I could use emojis on my laptop, there would be a lot of hearts right here.
My two cakes (to make up for the lack of one the night before), and the shirt that the girls bought for me! Also featured: the two bracelets I got, one from my host mom and one from Lindsay.
Party #1
I also had the chance to go to the campo last weekend. Which
I was super pumped about, because campo translates to a bunch of words in
English (field, country, farm, ranch, etc), so for the past 7 weeks I hadn’t
been able to figure out which campo
my family was talking about. Turns out my host dad owns a ranch. There’s all
the basic farm animals, of course, and also some emus. I don’t know if that’s
normal for Argentina or if our family is just cool like that. Also, I got to
ride a horse, but it was a little bit of a disaster. I honestly felt bad for
the horse. I’ve ridden before, so I thought I’d be fine. Turns out, to direct a
horse here, you pull the reigns the opposite way that you would in the U.S. So
every time I wanted to go right, the horse went left. Until I figured out what
was happening. It was a bit embarrassing.
It’s entirely possible that I missed some stuff, but hey,
that’s alright. Maybe next time I’ll get my life together and blog before I
forget everything that’s happened. Maybe.
Hasta luego!
