Lolas and Kisses and More!

I arrived to South America three weeks from today!  And I leave in 5 months from yesterday.  AHH!  I'm trying to make the most of each day. 

I recently realized that I haven't updated about who I'm living with here!  In my apartment, it is just me and my host mom, Silivia, 46.  She is reeally sweet.  She gives me dulce de leche literally EVERY morning for breakfast!  Emily (the other girl here from Michigan) lives on the same floor (6th) of the same apartment building!  Her mom is the mother of my mom. 

This lady, Nelly (the grandma) is quite the hoot.  My nickname here is Lola.  Lola is the word for "boob".  She calls me it and giggles and even introduces me as Lola to all of her friends!  She is quite the social butterfly.  I think she knows practically everyone in the building.  She always dances around the kitchen singing "Lola tiene lolas, Lola tiene lolas" (Lola has boobs. Lola has boobs.)  She only does it becasue I get all embarrassed and she thinks it's funny.  Or she's shove a melon at my chest and say "melon" and start laughing.  She's taught me a plethera of naughty words and what girls and guys call each body part.  Now and then, she'll grab my shirt in the front and pull it down, saying I need to show more! The first time she did it, I yelled "hokey toots!" It totally caught me off guard because I couldn't understand her and I didn't know why she was trying to undress me!  She is just hilarious :) At the same time, she's very confident and very set in her ways.  You don't mess with her! haha Also, she tells her friends that someday, they'll see me on the TV because I was born to be a star.  (I really like this lady =D) And she's an excellent cook! 

For dinner each night, which we begin at around 9 or 10, we eat as one big happy family.  It's always at least Me, Silvia, Nelly, and Emily.  Sometimes, Nelly's son will join, or Silvia's (my host mom's) daughters.  Her daughters are 30 and 28 years old.  One sometimes comes with her boyfriend.  The two daughters have never come on the same night, I don't understand why.  A niece also joins us sometimes!  She's a teenager and really nice.  One of Silvia's daughters, Cicilia, is super dee dooper nice.  I was having a day last week when I was very frustrated with the language and really getting down on myself.  She spent the whole evening talking with me and giving me practice and the opportunity to ask random questions. 

Oh! one random culture difference, is that fact that we kiss each other on the right cheek every time we say hello or goodbye.  It doesn't matter gender, or strangers, or what.  Not gonna lie, the first time a guy professor walked into my classroom and kissed the other guy professor, I was a little caught of guard!  At first I was super awkward and would hesitate or just run to the next room, not knowing how to greet people, I am so much better! I love it!  It's such a lovey happy thing!  Sometimes I leave and come back just so I have the excuse to get kisses on the cheek!  Okay that's a lie.  I probably still don't do it as much as I should, because my name's Karen and I'm awkward, but I'm getting better! 

Caution: When I return to the states, y'all better get your pucker faces ready, cuz I'ma gonna kiss you all!!! Prepare yourself.  Also, I went to a Catholic church last week and instead of hand-shaking and saying "may peace be with you", they all kiss on the cheek and say it! 

Mar del Plata soon!  I bought a 2AM bus ticket so I'm leaving soon.  Swim suit packed and soon I'm off!

Holy South America! . . . What a weekend...

Holy crap! What a weekend… hahaha.  Caution:  This weekend deserves a long post J

***********************BOLICHE****************

Friday night, right after dinner (so of course not before 11:30 because we eat so stinkin late here) I went out with my friends Jay and Brianna.  We had plans to go to a boliche (club) with this guy that we had met at a bar last week from Argentina.  All night he practiced his Spanish and we practiced our English and it twas great!  First, we just went to a bar to meet up, then we took a bus and met up with the guy.  One thing I found crazy was that when we stopped at an ice cream parlor at 1:30 a.m. so I could pee, it was filled with families and little kids.  In the U.S, those kids would have been in bed 5 hours ago!  Jay showed up wearing shorts, and apparently you’re not allowed to enter the club as a guy without long pants, so he had to borrow from Alejandro's friend.  But, Weird!  I guess it’s like a formality thing, because it was a really elite club.  And the guy we went with was friends with the DJ (who we also met playing pool last week).  I was super impressed!  To be the DJ at a huge club like that must make him like really well-known in Buenos Aires, I’m assuming?  Because of him, we got to go in the VIP seccion of the club.  Anywhoo, I’m still trying to figure out how guy’s can’t wear shorts, yet girls can go wearing practically nothing.  Just doesn’t make sense to me!  The girls all dressed super 80’s fashion with the high pony-tails, giganomic earrings, denim jackets, and mini-skirts.

Random fact:  Here it’s socially acceptable for guys to wear little short shorts.  Not always a pleasant thing. 

The club was sort of similar to a club in the U.S., (I’m assuming, although I’ve never been to a club like this in the U.S.  Never anything this huge.)  I wasn’t lovin how they were playing Spice Girls and Lady Gaga and every American song in the books.  I'm not going to lie, I felt cool for once being one of the only people to actually know the words to the songs and what they meant!  Everyone else knew just to sing the “oooooohs” and the “hey heys”.  Later in the night they played the Spanish music, a mixture of techno and reggae.  I put my basic level tango skills to the test! 

Another difference from America is the fact that people here seriously never sleep.  And this is coming from the girl who almost died after last semester because I killed my body never ever sleeping.  We got to the club at maybe 3 in the morning, and nobody was there yet because I guess we were lame and showed up early(?!)  Then, all the people came.  We left at 5 a.m. and had to apologize for being “lame” and leaving early, but we knew we had a HUGE day the next day.  Apparently the crowd stays until at least 9.a.m., sometimes as late as 5 p.m. the next day.  Do these people not have jobs? Seriously?!

Oh! And I forgot the coolest part!!!!!!  We made a friend, and he seriously has the COOLEST accent.  He grew up here in Argentina so of course speaks Spanish, but he learned English in school and decided to watch movies and pick it up in a BRITISH ACCENT!  It was the most fantastic mixture.  I can’t even do a British accent like that, I've known the language for years!  Unfair.

***********LA CARNIVAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After getting home in the morning, I tried to sleep for like an hour, but people kept texting me about plans for the next day, so that didn’t really happen.  Then I just got out of bed and headed to meet up with 9 friends to go LA CARNIVAL DEL PAIS in Gualyguachu!!!!!!!!!!! 

I took the subte to the bus station, then it was a 3 hour bus ride to Gualyguachu.  It felt so good to leave Buenos Aires!  When I looked out the window and saw the cornfields and hills and bright blue skies, I could not have been happier.  The culture, architecture, and everything is like a whole different world when you leave the city.  We spent the day at the park and watched the people at the beach.  I played on the playground and met a friend at the teeter-totter.  He was a really nice friend.  He is 8 years old and is named Juan. 

Then, we took a taxi to La Carnival!!!  I had no idea even what it was.  It was a crowd of 200,000 people, wearing crazy wigs, face paint, and make-up, and sitting in 2 long rows of bleachers that were facing each other, down both sides of a long pathway.  It was a show that lasted from 10 p.m. until I think maybe 5 a.m.  It was like a parade of dancers, wearing either pretty much nothing but an inch of sparkly material, or HUGE headsets of feathers and diamonds.  The costumes were unbelievable!  Each one must cost a fortune and there were thousands.  And the floats were giganormous.  Everything was so elaborate!!!  They have nothing like this in the U.S.  It was like Mardi Gras on steroids.  I wanted to badly to be one of the dancers!  I of course got my jiggy on in the stands.  They spend all year preparing for the show.  There are 4 acts and each one has a different theme.  We had to leave at 3:15 a.m. to catch our 3 hr bus ride home, so we didn’t see the last two acts, but the theme that we saw was “Nightmare”.  There was dancing/acting/drama including beds, monsters, and just crazy creatures.  I'm not sure what the theme of the first act we saw was... I was just so overwhelmed trying to take it all in, I didn't even know that there were themes.  They played probably 3 songs the whole night (live bands would be on the floats) but the music just never got old!!!!  The whole crowd was singing. . . it was a hoot!  Quite the party!  I wish we had culture like that in the U.S! 

When I went to the bathroom, we were with a crowd that was super riled up and pushed the gate of the tunnel until the whole tunnel moved about 50 ft. and blocked the path of the parade.  Eventually the police had to let us back through.

When I got off the bus, in Buenos Aires, it was 7:00 a.m. and had been daylight for a couple hours already.  The train and subte were closed, so I took a bus home.  It is Sunday afternoon and I have not really slept since Thursday night.  On the bus, I was trying to read the street signs to know when to get off, and they were all just blurring together.  Then walking the rest of the way, I was literally counting each block hoping that I could make it home before my body just collapsed and I would fall asleep on the sidewalk.  I don’t think I’ve ever been so tired! 

Now I’ve napped and I’m feelin fabulous.  It’s 6:00.  Only 4 more hours till dinner! J   (…. Ridiculous.)

hey y'all!

So I'm going to try to update this shindig, although I'm already having trouble focusing on what I'm typing because it's so flippin hottt!  I am like a bundle of sweat right now.  A bundle of sweat sitting in a bucket.  But really the bucket is my bed. . . . Anyways,

This week, I don't really remember what I've been doing.  It's been HOT.  I have no idea how hot becuase I can't convert C to F.  (something about subtract 32, divide by a third, and .... then eat a lollypop?)

Class each day from 9:30 until 2:30.  All about Spanish grammar.  That's FIVE hours I'm talking bout!!!  I feel like I'm back in middle school.  They expect me to sit in the same chair, in the same room, and look at the same wall, for FIVE HOURS STRAIGHT.  True fact.  I sit and doodle and day dream.  She calls on people when they're spaced out.  She calls on me a lot. 

I checked out another gym.  It was pretty sketchy, up these jankity stairs and I guess the equipment they use there is so old school, it's illegal in the U.S. for safety reasons haha

One day I sat at a park and read/studied!  That was nice.  There was an adorable little boy who sat on the bench next to me.  He started talking to me and I just smiled like a creep, forgetting how to talk back.  Then he chucked 2 handfuls of corn in my face and it landed on my lap.  Hence, the pigeons flocked.  Evil boy.  I ran away and left the park.

I took a tango class last night!!!!!!!!!!!!! I should have planned it earlier, but after school I looked it up online of a place to go, by the time I figured out the time and such, we had to book it to get there on time.  I was so proud of my skill!  Not my dancing skill, but the fact that I looked in my Guia-T (little map book with every street in Buenos Aires and the hundres of bus routes) and figured out which bus went from a road that I recognized as being around me to the part of the city where the tango place was at.  The class was fun, but I really need more friends that are guys here.  Me and my friend Brianna shared our friend Jay for a partner.  Or, maybe next time I'll just dress up as a man so I'm guaranteed a partner.

K I'm bored of writing.  Maybe I should go shower.  I mean, I'd hate to smell!

A Whole New World (please sing to the proper tune).

I cannot believe that I’ve been here over a week already!  It feels like a month.  I am SO much better and finding my way around the city and knowing where the different subway and train stops are and where they connect, and which buses go where.

I took a placement exam at the University on Monday to find out what level I should be in.  I am in intermedio 2 which I think is perfect for me.  It’s a good review of all the grammar and is a chance for me to learn more vocab and ask tons of questions.  I’m probably “that girl” that everyone hates who always raises her hand to ask questions, but hey!  I’m learning!  We have class for 5 hours straight of non-stop Spanish grammar every day – 5 days a week.   9:30 to 2:30.  And I lied;  It’s at least a 20 minute walk to school, which isn’t bad I guess.  At least I can walk and don’t have to ride a bus or the subway every morning! 

I hardly even remember what I did each day here.  One day after class I went to La Plaza de Mayo again and La Casa Rosada.  I’ve tried a lot of different little cafes and joints.  The food is super different.  Empenadas almost every day for lunch.  Most salads come without lettuce.  I’ve eaten pumpkin everything, (calabeza) empanadas, pumpkin salad, etc.  Dulce de Leche is probably the best thing in the world.  Better than any chocolate I’ve had.  I’ve made the mistake of ordering “agua” at a restaurant, which comes carbonated, unless you specify “sin gas”.  I’ve eaten more meat than ever in my life.  Beef and steak almost every day.  Meatballs are deep-fried in breading, without sauce. Pizza is also big here.  (50% of the population is from Italy and the other 50& is from Spain.  It’s a super European city).  However on the pizza, its all cheese and almost without sauce.  I’ve had some crazy vegetables that I don’t even think exist in the U.S.  It’s really easy to just run to a fruit vendor on the streets – there’s about one every block it seems.  It’s so different how in vending machines, you can get soda, beer, or a mate (the nasty hot tea that everyone drinks here). 

The night life is crazy.  I’ve gone out a few times this week.  I met some Argentineans at a bar playing pool which was fun because I got to practice my Spanish with them.  I made friends with a girl in the bathroom who is from Argentina and apparently instead of the boring “necesito usar el bano”, the impolite way is “neceito hacer pis”!  She also said that my Spanish-speaking skills are really good! (I am just going to tell myself that she’s right and that it wasn’t because she had drank too much)… haha But nights here are crazy.  Another Argentinean that I met at a bar said that he is a DJ at a club and the clubs pretty much don’t open until 2am.  I guess if anyone goes before then, it’s lame.  Normally his shift ends at 9 a.m. but sometimes people are still dancing at 5 p.m. the next day.  Even my host moms (well, mom (Silvia) and grandma (Nelly) don’t go to bed until like 2 or 3:00 a.m. sometimes. 

One of the biggest differences for me is that they don’t eat dinner until usually 9 or 10 at night!!! Every day.  I don’t even bother coming home before 8:30 at night because I know we’re not going to eat until later.  And the process of eating while chatting, then fruit each night for desert can take hours.  The night before last we were still working on our icecream at 12:30 a.m.  I feel like I’ve gained 5 lbs already and it’s only been a week!  … Maybe the scale just rounds up a couple kilos. J

I found a gym to work out at Friday for free. That was nice.  I can go once more for free – probably tomorrow. 

Yesterday I went with a group to Tigre.  We took a train for about an hour.  It was a fun place on the water to walk around all the little shops and the fruit market.  It’s like 90 degrees and sunny.  I got sun burnt! 

Today we took a bus for about an hour to La Boca.  This is quite the tourist place.  Many bright colored buildings, tango dancers in the streets, people selling trinkets, paintings, and mates, everywhere.  It was a fun environment though!  

Then I just got back from San Telmo.  On each Sunday, there are huge ferias.  These fairs are like flea-markets where hundreds of sellers lay out blankets on the sidewalks and sell the most random of things.  I bought an Argentinean futbol jersey because apparently soccer is a religion here.

Even though sometimes I get super overwhelmed and frustrated when I don’t understand the language or when my host moms are talking to me, I am taking it one day at a time.  Each day I learn more words and am more comfortable speaking to the people who live here on the streets, whether it’s to ask for directions, to buy things, or to ask what certain foods are on a menu.  Today I bartered a wallet down to 26 pesos!  Go me.

The only two bad things about being here is that I am frequently confused with the language, and worst of all, THERE IS NO RANCH DRESSING HERE!   If someone wants to fly down here with a suitcase full, you will eternally be my hero. 

<3

From SNOWSTORMS to SUNSHINE!!!!

Thanks for all the prayers everybody, but I made it!!!

Even though thousands of flights were cancelled from Chicago, ours left on time!  And Lauren Curtis showed up to the airport to send me off which totally made my day!  Arriving to O'Hare, I was told that Houston's airport was shutting down at 3:00pm due to an ice storm (Can you believe it! In TEXAS?!).  I was warned that our flight from Chicago was the last one they were letting land there and we might be stranded for a couple days and all expenses were on us.  We, (me and Emily, the other girl from CMU going... my travel buddy!) flew anyways and thank goodness we did! Out of all the flights leaving from Houston, ours was 1 of 12 that were not cancelled!  Hundreds were cancelled.  Thank you Jesus! 

Random story:  On the flight to Houston, we sat by a woman who was telling us how much she loves to run - a full marathon every couple weeks!  It turns out last year she was in the Olympic trials!  She's young so I won't be surprised if she's famous someday.  Should have gotten her autograph! Her name was Camille Herron.  I googled her.  She’s crazy good.

The flight to Buenos Aires was 10 or 11 hours long.  Confusing working with 3 different time zones.  We arrived safely.  Thank Goodness Emily and I were together!  We were nervous to put our Spanish speaking skills to the test to even go through immigration and customs, as well as exchange our money and and get a remise (taxi) across the city. 

It turns out that Emily and I live in the same apartment building, in apartments side-by-side.  Her host mom is the mother of my lady.  Both ladies are super nice.  Well, I’m assuming they’re nice.  Their tones of voice seem happy and nice, but I don’t understand about 90% of the words that are coming out J We eat meals the four of us together.  Our first meal was empanadas which were absolutely fantasticas.  I love my room.  It's small and simple and organized. 

Did I mention it’s 90 DEGREES FERENHEIT HERE?!  Me gusta mucho J

Honestly, the first couple days here were super rough.  People were nice, but at first I felt so overwhelmed with the language and very frustrated because I couldn’t understand anything and on the first day, I’m sure that my host mom told me a lot of important things and tips and rules, but I just smiled and nodded and said a lot of “si” “gracias” “no se” y “no entiendo”.  I felt very much in over my head, although already after just a couple days I think my speaking and listening skills have improved tremendously. 

Emily understands more than twice as much as I do so I am very grateful to have her so close.  We are practically living together.  I meander back and forth from her apt to mine.  Her host mom (the mother of mine) even pulled out a bed underneath hers and said that we could have sleepovers!  She’s a really fun lady.    Emily helps me a lot with the language.  (For example, I thought we were talking about cows and apparently we were talking about religion.)

Yesterday, I was extremely proud of Emily and I.  We ventured across the city, figured out how to buy passes for the subte (subway) and went to el Centro (La Plaza de Mayo).  We found our way across the city and to the Congreso Nacional (Congress building) and La Casa Rosada (their White House). 

The city is HUGE.  14 million people here in the city of Buenos Aires.  The driving seems crazier than it is in NY.  There are no lanes on the streets, cars just swerving everywhere.  Crossing streets is about impossible.  There usually aren’t lights and pedestrians don’t have the right-away.  (Yet I have trouble walking through Mt. Pleasant) J

The city reminds me of a mixture of California and Spain. 

To celebrate China’s New Year’s (the year of the rabbit?), which is today, I walked to China town which is close-by.  Tons of people! The venders knew Chinese, Tiwanese, and Spanish as a secondary language.  That was fun communicating haha.

I live maybe only a 10 minute walk from the University. 

Tomorrow I will go take a test to see what level I will be placed.  Classes start Tuesday.

This post is longer than I thought it would be.  Hopefully they will become shorter!  There is just so much that has happened already I can’t even describe half of it.  More than anything, it has been an emotional rollercoaster.  I am adjusting and trying to take it one day at a time, one word at a time. 

Enjoy the snow, y’all!