Welcome to the past month of life... Palm trees and winter jackets...

So I have not updated since Easter.  WHOOPSIE DAISIES!  Now there is so much to say, I apologize again for the length.  If you have a life, feel free to go live it.  If not and you’re sitting on facebook or stumbleupon, feel free to read on - - -enjoy! 

After spraining my ankle, I was told to “take it easy” for a while.  Unfortunately, my personality .doesn‘t allow myself to do that without anxiety.  I can never sit still.  True, I opted to not run a marathon afterwards (I didn’t do that when I felt fine either), but I didn’t exactly sit on my butt with my foot in the air.  I started doing stuff.  This blog post will summarize my month of doing stuff. 

Ankle:   Living in a city this huge when you can’t walk is a challenge.  Lie.  It’s impossible.  Transportation is impossible.  I couldn’t take the subway because it requires going down a flight of stairs to enter and up a flight to exit.  I tried taking colectivos a few times, but in order to get off you have to jump down about 2 feet.  This jump is no problem to any normal person, but for me, clearly I forgot my foot was the size of Texas and I leaped off in a hurry as the colectivo started to take off again.  Let’s just say I didn’t help the healing process.  So, eventually I gave in and sat on my couch eating dulce de leche.  J It’s a rough life we live.

It’s autumn here, it has been for the past month.  I find it rather odd and mis-fitting to watch the leaves turn yellow, then orange, and fall to the ground.  Fall here lacks pumpkins, apple cider, doughnuts, and Halloween.  It’s just a weird/unexplainable feeling.  I’m walking, crunching on the leaves, underneath a palm tree.  Bizarre!

Nelly, my host Grandma who lives next door on my floor (we have dinner at her apartment every night) went to Australia for 3 weeks.  During this time, I spent more time getting to know Silvia (my host mom) and her daughters which was great.  I am feeling more and more comfortable living here and I love it.

I spend less time trying to cram in as much as I can.  Now, it’s more of just living here like a normal person, rather than a tourist.  I’m just living in the city and getting to know people of the city, rather than just getting to know the city itself.  Enjoying spending time with my host family too!  And I could be wrong, but I feel like my Spanish is getting much better.  :D

My random Observations:

·    Water is so expensive!  I’m used to it being free at restaurants in the U.S.  Here, ordering water at restaurants is often more expensive than beer.  And it’s never from a pitcher.  Or bottled water.  It’s in the green glass bottles.  Gosh sometimes I just want a swig, don’t get all fancy on me now! 

·    Carbonated water.  Is sick.  But they drink it.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve made that mistake.  I’ll be parched and dying of thirst so I go to a kiosko or supermarcado to buy a big nice cold fresh bottle of nature’s finest.  Then, the bubbles hit and start eating my esophagus.  I’m not a fan.

·    PDA (Public Display of Affection) is brought to a whole new level here.  No one cares.  Make-out sha-bangs goin on all over.

·    I have a confession.  I am often SO tempted to eat off people’s plates while walking on the sidewalk by cafes or restaurants that have outdoor seating.  For example, people will order a café con leche and it is served with a cookie.  They drink their coffee but leave the cookie and leave.  Then I come along and you have NO idea how hard it is to resist the temptation to eat their left-over cookie… I mean I know that it’s 100% socially unacceptable to eat leftovers off the plates of strangers, but at the same time, this city is HUGE.  Nobody knows me.  Nobody will ever see me again.  You know what;  I probably won’t even get caught if I’m quick enough!  Yes.  These thoughts punch each other in my mind every day while I walk down Cabildo on my way to class. 

·    True fact: I bet if you totaled it up, there are more square feet of dog poop in this city than grass.

·    Going to the doctor is freakishly more common here.  After I sprained my ankle, of course I wasn’t going to go to the doctor.  It was a sprain.  I wasn’t dying.  However my host family, history professor, friends here, people at church…everyone told me that I’m an idiot for not going to the hospital.  Now, I realize that hospitals here are free!!!  (Public Universities too).  Crazy.

·    I’m getting better at using Celcius and kilos.  I am definitely coming home with a few extra kilos cushioning my belly.

·    Dogs.  There’s a ridiculously unreal amount of dogs in this city.  Streets are flooding with them.  Both strays and with owners.  But dog-walkers= a concept that I just don’t understand.  Each dog-walker has sometimes over 10 dogs to one walker!  What kind of ratio is that!  There’s hardly enough room for the dogs to fit just standing within leash span, let alone walk or move!  I LOVE dogs, but that’s a job I don’t think I could ever do.  They fight with the stray dogs, pee on your feet, run,… it’s all a bit overwhelming to me.  I get stressed out watching.

·    One thing I have definitely taken note of here is how it seems everyone values family so much.  It seems like it's moreso than in the states.  When meeting someone new, that is always one of the first questions they ask me – If I have any siblings.  Also, for example, Silvia lives right next door (practically with) her mom.  Her daughters are older and don’t live here, but they come over maybe 5 nights out of the week to visit and have dinner or just mate or tea or coffee during the day.  Her brother and niece come over and join us for dinner often as well.  I have been blessed with a family here that is really close (and really welcoming).  I am guessing that part of this reason that families here are so close is because most "kids" live at home until they are much older.  In the U.S., most kids move out at 18 to go to college because the University is a campus rather than a building of classes.  Just different.

·    Once in a while people finally mistake me for an Argentine!  People always talk to me, assuming I’m from here.  If I stay silent for a while they don’t even know!...until I utter a sound haha.  However do do feel pretty cool when people who are from here ask me for directions and I actually know how to give them!
    

Things I’ve been up to:

After a looooooooong and horrible process, I FINALLY HAVE MY STUDENT VISA!!!!!!!!!!!! That means that eventually I can come home J and go to Spain J.

I have joined 2 groups at a Catholic Church here, San Benito, which is about a 30 minute walk away.  One group is called Grupo Universitarios and the other is Jovenes en Accion [young people in action].  I am so blessed and have met some really great and fun people! 

Uruguay!!!!!!!!!!!  Oh yea, I went to Uruguay.  It was only a one-day trip, but it was superb and wonderful and an escape from the busy city which was exactly what I needed.  Transportation round trip cost $50 U.S!!  Awesome.  We took Boquebus – a bus on the water.  I don’t remember exactly, but it was maybe a 3 hour trip across the Rio de La Plata.  Paranoid that of course there wouldn’t be a bathroom on the boat, I made sure to go ahead of time.  HA!  I entered the boat to find that it literally had a mall!, shops, food, live music, etc.  So yes, it had a bathroom.  I loved getting to see the city of Buenos Aires from a distance too as we were pulling away.  Enormous.  Our destination was Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay.  It is a quaint and historical little pueblo right on the water.  A perfect day spent on the little quiet streets.  I went to play at a park in the morning [which was the coolest park of my life with play things that don’t exist in the U.S!  there was a giant maze, Mario-like tunnels, and these construction barrels to run through!  Actually, I can guarantee that this park would fail any safety regulations test.  Still fun!]  Then, I ran down to the beach to put my feet in the river- Ocean water!  That was a moment I remember just trying to absorb and wishing I had a camera here.  [I was reminded how huge and small the world is at the same time and how crazy it is that God controls it all!]  There were a couple small artisan street fairs with hand-made crafts.  Then, we climbed to the top of a light house with an incredible view of the pueblo and the water.   The whole day, I felt a little at home.  It was a small town and autumn so with yellow leaves – I felt like I was in Mount Pleasant with a Latin American twist. 

Friends from Peru – This month, I have hung out a few times with a group of 3 friends from Peru that I have met here.  They don’t know a single word of English.  They are the friends who invited me to their place for lunch on Easter!  Then, two of them had Birthdays the same week, so I was invited over again for more Peruvian food and cake!  Then, another time for a pijamada (sleepover!) with a few other friends from here as well.  We played Charadas (charades) and watched movies and ate cake!  One of the girls (who is 27, mind you) brought paint and a brush for the face of whoever fell asleep first.  I seriously haven’t done that in like 6 years, but I was loving it =D 

Then, there are the many people I have met from the Catholic Church.  A couple girls have invited me over for mate and I went to a surprise Birthday party too.  Everyone is super friendly and welcoming. 

Last Sunday, I spent the day with another girl I met there.  We walked with her dog to a BEAUTIFUL park (Bosque de Palermo) to sit on a blanket and drink mate talking.  Then we walked through the city for a few hours to a part I had never been.  Then, at her apartment she insisted that I try on her wedding dress!  So much fun.  However, I’m not gonna lie, when looked in the mirror, the thought of myself married terrified me!  Haha.  But I spent the whole day with this friend – she knows not a single word of English.

Cine!!! Since I have been here, I have gone to the movies 3 times.  It is only 20 pesos (5 bucks).  All cartoons in Spanish.  First I saw Hop.  It started at 11pm.  We were literally the only 3 people in the theatre.  At first I figured it was because all the kids who would normally see a movie such as Hop were in bed.  Then I remembered that I am in Argentina and they are probably all at home eating dinner still.  The movie was fabulous.  In English, the movie might have sucked, but from what I got of the jokes, it was a hoot.  The best part was being the only ones and getting to dance up on the stage in front of the screen during the credits.  I think we gave the guy up in the projection window a show.  Then, I saw Rio.  That was cool to see, just because it takes place here in South America.  After going to the Carnival in Gualyguachu I could relate a tiny bit, even though the movie had the real deal Carnival from Brasil.  Today, I just saw Winnie the Pooh en Castellano [Castellano is the dialect of Spanish spoken here in Argentina].  I had invited a friend from here to join and she brought a guy friend as well.  When she found out we were seeing Winnie the Pooh, she said she wanted to kill me.  I thought it was a joy.

I’ve seen a little bit more of the night life.  I went to Plaza Serrano with some friends – a little plaza surrounded with a bunch of bars and cute lights and such.  I think there’s something wrong with me;  I enjoyed the peanuts that they serve probably more than my drink.

Mini Concerts:  One night I went with 2 girls from my University to a tiny little hole-in-the-wall place (bar) with seating for about 8 people, yet 2 live bands.  People were packed in this tiny little room and there was art all over the walls.  Really cool place.  And people were sitting up on the roof drinking too.

General thoughts of my life here:

Living in the city is getting SO MUCH easier.  Many prayers have been answered.  Not only is my Spanish a lot better, but I know how to get around the city alone to wherever I might need to go.  That makes life SO much less stressful.  I know there’s still a million things that I still don’t know and I do wrong, but not gonna lie, sometimes I just look in the mirror and give myself a pat on the back.  I came here having zero knowledge of how to live in an enormous city and I’m managing pretty alright.  Each day has its own challenges and adventures.  Literally.  As much as I miss the cornfields some days, I wonder if once I return, if I will be soon bored of life there and will miss the challenges.  With each challenge each day, I learn loads.

As much as I love my friends here who are also exchange students, I am so blessed to have Porteno friends (from BsAs).  I get to practice my Spanish and see how people really live here, learning more about the culture.  I like how so many people here are so proud of their city/country.  The first half of my time here was spent getting to know the city.  Now, it’s more getting to know people in their normal, everyday life.  For example, I love even little things like the man who does maintenance in the building who sings in the stairwell while taking out the trash.  Or the lady at the laundry place who knows me because for the first 2 months I made her think that she lost the match of every single pair of socks I have.  And then there’s the friendly old ladies at the gym.  I feel like the city isn’t quite so big anymore.  I mean, it’s still huge, but I’m so much less overwhelmed.

Being in awkward situations.  I’m learning to not have anxiety and to not make a big deal dwelling over little things – mistakes.  If I wasn't an expert at looking stupid before, I sure am pro now! When I am confused and have no idea what's going on, I've learned to embrace it.

These weeks are seriously FLYING by!  I only have 2 MONTHS LEFT HERE IN ARGENTINA!  I probably wouldn't notice how fast these weeks just fly, but I am obliged to give that credit to Rebecca Black.  It's serioulsy how I keep tabs on the number of weeks that pass, I take note of the rush of facebook statuses screaming her name every seven days...

I have learned that EVERYTHING in life is based on perspective.  This can be taken a million different ways and I’m starting to learn all of them.  Anything that you think is “normal” or “socially acceptable” may only be true where you currently are and who you’re with.  Going to different places, your views on what is “normal” may change 180 degrees.  Same with Attitude.  It’s all about perspective.  The world will be exactly how you want to see it.  It all just depends on what you’re comparing it to.  For example, when I feel like I’m having a bad day, I compare it to the man who sleeps outside our building every night on the sidewalk.  Then I am reminded how blessed I am again.

“Travel often. Getting lost will help you find yourself.”

Okay, and I am stopping.  I have yet to write about this past week which has been ABSOLUTELY AMAZING and I have done crazy awesome things.  I will save those fun stories for my next entry because I have no time or energy to write about it now, so….

TUNE IN NEXT TIME TO HEAR LARRY SING……………. “Don’t cry for me Argentina…”  =D 

Wow.  If you actually read all that, you must reeeally love me! ;) Thanks.

Livin the Vida Loca! (Semana Santa. Things up until Easter)

Some cultural differences that I have observed:

(***Disclaimer:  I haven’t been here forever and these are just things that I have observed.  I don’t want to group the whole culture into categories and I could be way off.  Que se yo!  Haha what do I know!)

Lateness:  If you’re told that something is at 10:30, that means just any time before noon.  For example, the first week of classes, I arrived very early to my classes, with fear of being late.  After sitting there for 45 minutes being the only one in the room, I assumed I had the wrong floor, room, day, or year.  Then, one by one the classmates casually trickle on in.  After an hour sitting there like a nervous dork for over an hour, the professor finally meandered into the classroom and asked, “Are we missing people?”  “Oh they’re downstairs smoking still?”  “No big deal.  We’ll just wait.”  Crazy!   

This exact situation has happened in every one of my classes.  My classes with Argentines are the most ridiculous.  I don’t even see the need of showing up within the first hour, except to swipe my ID card for attendance.  Some days, I swipe my card for attendance and then go and grab myself some lunch and show up when I feel like it, knowing that class hasn’t started yet anyways.  I realize that part of the reason that they are just so laid back with time is because you pretty much have to be.  Some days you wait 50 minutes for a colectivo (bus) and some days you can just hop on.  Some days (many days) the subway and train stations are shut down because the people here apparently love to have strikes, demonstrations, and protests.  Churches for example, I was told that if it says it starts at 9, that means sometime within an hour and a half of the said time.  

The whole classroom dynamic is so different!  Literally every one of my professors have talked on their cell phone during class on several occasions.  In the middle of a lecture, a student will just say “I want coffee” and will get up and leave and come back 15 minutes later with café con leche.  And some students are just flat out rude to the professors.  I’m not used to seeing that in the U.S.  Not only disrespectful with the eye-rolling, but sometimes they just straight up argue with the profs and don’t hold back!  It’s hilarious.  Just today, a woman to the prof said, “I’m not even gonna tell you what I think about you” and he replied, “Well that’s fine I won’t speak of you either.  Instead, I will talk of Marx” and then continued on lecturing about Sociology. 

·         Crazy how expensive anything to do with technology is here!  I have a very very crappy phone here and I’m surprised how many argentines have the same one.  One argentine told me that it’s because it’s so likely to have your phone stolen that it’s best if it’s cheap.  Welp, seeing how after 3 months here I’m already on my phone #2, I can totally understand! 

·         You can buy illegal movies almost anywhere on the street.  Usually they just have like 80 movies in paper sleeves lying out on a blanket on the sidewalk every couple blocks.  If you go to a magazine stand and ask, they’ll whip out a cardboard box where you can purchase pretty much any movie (including ones before they’re in theaters) for $2.50 (U.S). 

·         The mate (pronounced “mah-te”) is a HUGE part of life here.  If you don’t know, it is a drink/event.  It’s in a cup made of what I always thought was wood, sometimes metal, but really I now think it’s a hollowed out gourd type thing(?) filled to the top with green herb shreddings inside that look like weed.  Also inside is a straw (usually metal, sometimes with fun designs) called a bombilla (“bom-bi-sha”).  It is filled with hot water.  They try to make the water as close to boiling as they can without it actually be boiling.  There are actually social rules to drinking mate.  It is passed around the group in a circle and between each person, is given back to the distributer to refill.  You are never supposed to touch the bombilla(straw).  When you don’t want any more, you say “gracias” when you hand it back to them.  I don't know, there are so many rules, I feel like I probably do it wrong, if that's possible.  Drinking mate is done all day.  Every Day.  In every location.  Seriously.  I have seen people in class, on the street, on buses, on the train, in their office, at the park, while driving, and of course at home.  Instead of a pop machine at the university or a junk food machine, there is a mate machine.  People always walk around with thermos in hand.  Even on hot summer days!  I really don’t understand it.  It’s even more popular en Uruguay.  When I went there, my friend described it as “the people had an indent in their hip where they always walked with their thermos under their arm”.  When someone invites you to share a mate, it means that you’re “in” or accepted.  A friend of mine even shared a mate with her bus driver!  Inviting someone over for mate is a really common social thing to do.  Almost every morning my host mom goes over to her mom’s to “tomar mate” with her mom and sometimes her daughters.  It tastes like tea.  Really bitter.  Most North Americans don’t like it unless it’s with sugar.  I love it!  One thing funny I heard is that if you don’t really like someone, you can offer them mate, but you make the water boiling and then they have to drink it to be polite J  Mate poop is everywhere.  This is what I call the left over herbs when you’re done re-filling and re-filling with water.  It is a common thing to find in bathroom sinks and trash cans.

·         I feel like smoking is 20x more common here.  I don’t know many people here at all who don’t smoke.  Everyone.  Sometimes, I feel like it’s a social disadvantage to not be a smoker here.  I stand awkwardly outside and am the only one that doesn’t have something to do with their hands.  [This is when I whip out my ancient phone which doesn’t text and pretend to text so the world doesn’t know I’m just standing with nothing better to do…].  Smoking is also part of the reasons why professors start class late and give us breaks half-way through.  Walking down the streets, I feel like half the people I pass are smoking.  This doesn’t come from a legit source, but my friend gave me her theory.  I was told that Argentina is the #1 place in the world for eating disorders.  I haven’t seen the statistic, but I would believe it.  Women everywhere are tall, tan, and stick thin.  My friend’s theory was that maybe instead of doing what I do and buy a bag of Oreos and/or Cheetos and eat my feelings when I’m stressed, here it’s more common to smoke to relieve your stress.  With the skinniness: I was also told that a big contributor to that is the fact that it is super hard to find clothes in larger sized here.  If you can’t fit into what they sell at all the little personally owned businesses, it’s much harder and more expensive to find clothes.  I really don’t understand how people are so skinny.  They have alfajores (2 soft cookies with dulce de leche in the middle dipped in chocolate) at kiosks every half a block!  At the rate I’m goin, they’re gonna have to roll me onto the plane and give me a whole row to myself when July comes around!  Part of the reason they stay so thin though, is because of the mate.  They drink it all day every day.  When their stomach is full of hot water, they’re less likely to snack on alfajores and empenandas like me. 

Many Many things I won’t miss about public transportation:   

·         When the subte is so packed that it takes longer at each stop to wait for the doors to shut because people’s body parts are always hanging out.  When you are squished from all sides between countless sweaty and smelly old men who are eyeing your purse.  When it’s really really hot.  When it’s really really hot and you can’t breathe.  Then, when the train is a little bit less full but you can’t reach the germ-filled metal bars so instead are just falling over and toppling into people.

·         When you have the exact amount of change to take a colectivo and the machine eats your monedas without registering it and you’re awkwardly standing there, short 10 centavos. 

·         When you accidentally get off the colectivos 15 blocks to early late at night.  (Or… when you are telling a friend stories about your favorite campers from Camp Huntington and get too into it and miss your stop… and then comes the many more blocks of walking…at night…on a sprained ankle.  [yea lesson learned]).

Many many things I won’t miss about public bathrooms: 

·         The fact that in many public places, toilet paper doesn’t exist. 

·         The fact that where toilet paper does exist (wax paper), it is accompanied with a woman sitting there, staring at you and expecting you to pay her.  Even if you don’t need paper towels, she makes you feel guilty for drying your hands on your pants. 

·         The fact that you’re not supposed to flush toilet paper down the toilet.  I feel like a heap on the floor next to the toilet isn’t the most sanitary thing…

While walking down the street:

·         I won’t miss being whistled at on the streets every day by creepy old men.

·         I was going to say that I can’t wait to actually be able to wear my backpack on my back, however the new style of it on my belly is starting to grow on me. 

·         About 1/6 of the tiles that make up the sidewalks are missing, broken, or wobbly.  Normally no big deal, but you have a sprained ankle, it becomes quite the concern. 

One bummer is that it’s hard to hang out with friends without spending money and without eating.  We can’t always just go to someone’s apartment to hang out and talk or watch movies like back at home.  Now that it’s getting too cold to go to parks, we have to go to places like restaurants or cafes.

Now for things I’ve been doing here in the city!

A few weeks ago (the week before Easter) is called Semana Santa [Holy Week]:  this is a Catholic country, so we had a 5 day weekend from school to celebrate Easter!  A couple weeks ago I went to museum called La MALBA .  I saw artwork from Pablo Picasso, Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, etc..  Awesome!

That week on Thursday at 15:00 I went to the Plaza de Mayo.  I saw Las Madres y Abuelas marching around the plaza circle.  History of course always has many sides to any story.  I have been told many different things and as of right now don't know what to believe exactly.  It's all really complicated and senstive for a lot of people to talk about.  It has been 35 years since the dictatorship which is pretty recent.  Some say that 30,000 people have “disappeared” or been taken by the government for their communist ideas.  Many of the women who were taken were pregnant.  The babies of the women were given to other adoptive families (usually military families).  Now, those babies are about 30 yrs old and are now doing DNA tests and discovering that they were adopted and their real parents were “disappeared”.  Also, I was corrected and should add that there is another side of the history.  I still didn't understand completely and don't want to mis-inform on a subject so important, but just know that many don't believe that the statistic is 30,000 and instead that the government did what it had to do to protect itself from Communism.  However, the moms and now grandmothers of many of the desaparecidos(disappeared) have marched in the Plaza de Mayo in front of the Casa Rosada [Pink House = equivilant to our White House] every Thursday at 3 for all these years.  I hope I understood the history right… it was explained to me in Spanish and so perhaps don’t take me word for word.  The Thursday that I went was I think a little bigger than most Thursdays too because of Semana Santa.  The crowd was holding pictures of their loved ones and all yelling.  It was really powerful to witness.  There are two groups.  I was told that one is still demanding for an answer of what happened and where their family members are.  The other group just marches to bring awareness in memory of their loved ones. 

Then, we took a free tour of the Casa Rosada or the “Pink House”.  (equivalent of the White House).  It was AWESOME.  We went in Cristina Kirchner’s office and everything!

Then, right there in the plaza we checked out the main Cathedral of the Capital.  It was huge and beautiful and busy because it was Holy Thursday.  This is where San Martin’s body is buried.

Then, we went to check out the International Book Fair (La Feria de Libros Internacional) in Plaza Italia.  The line was super long so I came home instead.  As I walked in the door, Silvia (my host mom) was sitting in the living room watching Vargas Llosa speaking live on TV from the book fair that I had just been at.  No wonder the line was so long!

A few nights later, I returned to the Feria de Libros and toughed out the line.  To my surprise, it was absolutely HUGE event.  I was shocked at the amount of young people there on a Friday night. 

Later that night, I went to one of the thousands of Catholic Churches within a mile of my block.  It is called San Benito.  For Good Friday, the group of Jovenes (college age ppl) did sort of a drama in the church.  There were loads of people.  They literally acted out the story of the Passion and it was actually really cool.  I'm not used to people yelling and shouting in church (pretending to be the crowd and such).  Really powerful! 

SATURDAY:  I went to Tigre!!!!  I went with my friend Megan and another girl from here in BsAs that we met in one of our classes with Argentines.  It is an hour train ride, so across the city.  There was sunshine, the fruit port, the river, we checked out the casino (so I could use the bathroom, of course!), and finally we took a boat ride down the river to a place where we laid on the dock together in the sunshine.  Train back to Belgrano.  Perfect day. 

One night, I met three people from Peru through my friend Megan and a church.  They are seriously some of the nicest people I have ever met!  I was super excited to finally have friends that don’t know English!  They had their first ever taco and then we walked super far to go ice-skating.  This place seriously made me laugh out loud when we entered and I first saw it.  There were 50 people skating in a square about the size of my living room.  Instead of a wall all the way around, there was just a railing, so people constantly kept sliding into the bar and sliding underneath.  It was possibly one of the funniest things I’ve seen in my life.  I was loving it.  Never seen so many grown tall men fall.  Unreal.  Like a movie.  I would laugh and clap and they looked at me like I was mean or something.  But it was probably because instead of ice, it was pretty much snow.  You could hardly see the ice under the 6 inches of shreddings!  We didn’t want to pay for skating, so we just watched people fall.

Our 3 new Peruvian friends invited Megan and me to their place the next day for lunch, Easter Sunday.  I was so grateful!  So Easter was good.  It was my first Easter away from home, so different, but turned out good.  My host mom doesn’t do anything to celebrate Easter, but I went to church in the morning by myself and then treated myself to the holiday by purchasing a giant hunk of chocolate which was gone entirely by the time I reached my apartment.  Good day! 

In Argentina, there's never a dull day.

I have done loads of fabulous Argentine-y things in the past month since I’ve updated this.  Today I promised myself I would update, however I have zero motivation nor desire to muster back to the depths of my brain to recall the more eventful events of my month that you would actually care about.  Instead, I will leave out all the grand and spectacular adventures I’ve been having and instead ramble about something you don’t care about, but that I find rather humorous.  Today.  A typical day in the life.  With my luck here, I promise you there is never a dull moment.

I naturally awakened this morning at 6:14, three minutes before my alarm due to the fact that Argentines don’t believe in shutting windows even when it’s 40 degrees.  They don't even use screens in the windows!  After delighting in the half a bowl of corn-flakes that my host mom leaves out for me each night, I merrily skipped to school.  Had you jumped inside my head, you would surely hear the musical hit "I love life. Life loves me. Everything in the world makes me happy.  Let’s go to Disneyland” from the Princess Diaries soundtrack.  I was in a jolly mood.  15 blocks later, I arrived at the 17 floored University, took the elevator up to my class, and thanks to my silly putty that I keep handy in bag, stayed awake and alert for my morning class, Sociologia, with argentines.  The whole class was told to read the (illegal photocopied texts that they make you buy) with a dictionary at hand because the material has quite dense vocabulary.  Super!  I was then instructed to read it with a Spanish English dictionary as well as a regular “What the crap does that word mean” dictionary. 

Next, came my short-little-no-big-deal trip to the gym that I almost didn’t take.  At this gym, I have a personal trainer (man who works there and yells at me for using machines incorrectly.  Apparently you aren’t supposed to just “move stuff around”.  After being corrected on 10 machines I felt rather stupid and pulled out a mat to do crunches.  He can't correct my machine-usage if I'm using a machine!  But of course.  It is possible to use the floor wrong too.  My head wasn't "to the ceiling" - psh, whatever that means.  Anyways, side note:  I attended a dance class today at the gym on the top floor.  If you have seen the movie Center Stage where they take a dance class in NYC, this was EXACTLY that.  We danced to a song called “Sexy” and I don’t think I’ve heard a man (the instructor) ever yell the word “Foxxy” so many times.  Twas superb.  Really!  I was loving it.

Then, I am on the old-school elliptical.  The music was jammin, maybe I was going to fast, mabye I was bouncing a little, dancing a little.... Besides the point, I roll my ankle.  It hurt worse than something that is considered painful.  It caused a scene and stuff went down.  The personal trainer that thinks I’m stupid made me lie on my back while he put my foot in the air, moving it, hurting it, not helping at all.  Of course, I choose to sprain my ankle the one day that I didn’t shave my legs.  Whoops!  Lo siento, sir!  Okay lets, be honest, 80% of the days it could happen and my legs would look exactly the same.  But still.  It was the fourth of my leg where it’s been… a while.

I say “todo bien… no pasa nada!” (I’m totes fine) and leave.  Why did I not take a taxi? . . . Because I am a moron.  I limp half way home.  Then I see that the post office would be another 10 blocks.  Stupidly, “todo bien” was still in my head so I went.  After over an hour of waiting to mail 3 postcards because of course that’s how Argentina rolls, I begin walking again.  Pathetically limping again.  I am wearing my bright blue work out shorts and tye-dyed T-shirt and feeling unnecessarily paranoid, with my backpack on backwards.  After being lectured after the robbery for dressing so “stupid American-like” I was paranoid and convinced that EVERYONE who saw me limping knew I had just came from the ATM and was walking(limping) like a vulnerable dying bird with bundles of cash in my possession.  A dying bird that couldn't chase after anyone who tried to steal my backpack.  It was the longest 30 blocks of my lfie.  I stopped to buy fruit from a stand on the street.  The man literally pointed at my ankle/limp and laughed.  Crossing streets was just my favorite.  Crossing a 6 laned road takes me approximately 6 times longer in my current condition.  Then, the light changes and cars slam on their brakes and honk and I just watch them go by as I inch my way to the other side.  But now, I am soooo close, I don’t need a taxi.  No big deal.  I can do it.  Stupid, stupid, Karen. 

I was literally laughing/crying out loud to myself while walking down the street. 

When I got home, my host mom was super great and gave me ice and a banana.  I had to convince her that I don’t need to go to the hospital.  However, when I mentioned that maybe I will shower today, she took the ice away, put a placemat on the floor so I wouldn’t fall again (she’s super great) and even turned on the water.  I think she was a little overly excited at the news that I might take a shower and become clean...

And here I am.  Typing this because I am unable to move from my bed and have not much else to do.  I will spend my night continuing to convince my mom here that I am fine, a klutz, do this all the time, and do not need to go to the hospital.  

That’s thus far, a day in the life.

:) Enjoy your day!!!

I'll type a real update in a couple days.  I went to Uraguay, saw paintings by Picaso, and loads more.