First week of classes and some great carousing!

My first week of classes was this last week.  Since I didn’t go around taking pictures inside of my classrooms (or outside, for that matter) all I can really do is recount the experience.  Sorry for the lack of thousand-word images in this here blog (though there’ll be some towards the end from my weekend!)

My very first class scared me.  Literally.  I was anxious and nervous and all of that as I went into my Tango class (both classroom and practical, so we learn about the dance’s history as well as some of the dance).  It was at FLACSO, where my CIEE study abroad program is based, so I felt a little more at home.  Also, that class is with 100% other American students…so I felt even more at home.  Turned out it was nothing to worry about.  The class was very relaxed and enjoyable.  I found something that REALLY distracts me when I’m trying to pay attention is the temperature.  Not so much if it is cold (I assume)…VERY MUCH a problem when it’s too warm.  And the AC was broken in our classroom.  So here I am, sweating and needing feeling like the air was super heavy…trying to completely ignore those facts and interpret what the teachers are saying.  Eventually we changed classrooms, and things were much better.  When we changed classrooms, we pushed all the desks to the side and got into the dance a bit!  I’ve come to find Argentinean Tango and Milonga wonderful dances.  They have a really enjoyable and relaxed feel.  They’re also very unlike the American Tango.  The step is much more complicated, the feel is way different, and the hold is entirely different.  Even the potential music choices can be somewhat particular to each dance. 

The number one thing that I have noticed in Argentinean classes is that they are long.  Very long.  My Tango class meets once a week, but lasts for 3 hours in a block.  I’m thrilled to report that professors give you a 15 minute break usually, as well, in which you can walk around and relax.  At least, at UCA (Catholic University) and at FLACSO they do.  This brings me to the university as of yet unmentioned in this post…UBA. 

UBA is the University of Buenos Aires, the free-for-all-Argentines public university.  UBA is actually quite prestigious – many professors there are very known the world over.  In one of my UCA classes I need a book by Mario Rapoport.  The very next day I found that I am actually enrolled in a class in UBA taught by Mario Rapoport.  Whoa.  My UBA class was a sociology class about the social history of America Latina.  Pretty cool sounding, except I couldn’t hear the professor all class.  Other than that and the classroom being kind of warm…it was an enjoyable experience.  But I ended up dropping that and many classes for the very reason that I couldn’t not hear or understand the professor.  The UBA buildings are old and well-worn.  They have all kinds of problems.  I’ve had people walk in and beg for money during class.  All of that considered, I REALLY want to have at least one class at UBA.  The experience seems like a truly different and valuable one. 

UCA is a private university and as such has pretty nice buildings and facilities.  The one class I am keeping at UCA is a political science course about 1880-1980 or something like that in the history of Argentina.  It is actually half taught by one professor, and after the break, another professor comes in.  The first half caught me by surprise – the students and the professor got into yelling matches for most of the class.  When political topics came up (and they do a LOT when you are discussing history and political science), it seemed like everybody had something to say.  It was all fairly good natured.  The best way I can describe it is something like a middle school classroom.  I enjoyed it a lot after I become a bit more accustomed.  The professor (both, actually) were very aware of us North American students, and constantly made references to the history of our nation to help everybody understand.  At one point during the yelling match, I even made a contribution of my perspective about obligatory voting (you have to vote in Argentina, 18+).  I didn’t yell, of course, but the teacher quieted people so I could say something.

I could go on and on about my first week of classes, but I don’t have the time or patience to carry on like that.  Suffice to say that it was very enjoyable and that I am excited to have a full term of these classes.  One more important point: This is going to be a very hard term.  There is a lot of reading (and listening) and writing to be done in Spanish, and these things take me a lot of time in general. 

On Friday after classes a friend and I met up to go visit a few art museums.  We didn’t end up doing that, actually.  Instead we fairly direction-less-ly wandered down some major streets and through some parks.  It was completely successful.  We saw some beautiful plazas – stunning monuments – and a wondrous baby turtle. 

Saturday involved a trip with another friend to an art museum for real, the Xul Solar.  I  thoroughly enjoyed the hour or so spent looking at all of the water colors and artifacts in the collection of this famous artist.  It was fascinating.  Afterwards we met up with another pair of friends who were perusing Recoleta and made our way to the Hippy Fair in la Plaza Francia.  I had already been there twice before with groups of friends (when I visited a different art museum and the cemetery), but it was still quite enjoyable and relaxing.  We ended up sitting around as a group of Americans in the grass a lot.  Then I went home, and we all met up later that night to eat cookies, drink mate and wine and gaze at the moon.  The ‘supermoon,’ as it were, because it was the closest to the earth it’s been in 18 years.  It was VERY bright and luminous, and I found that also very enjoyable.  Even if I was falling asleep a lot of the time.

And now it’s Sunday, homework day.  I’m trying to catch up on everything.  Laundry is being done, reading is getting…some attention, this blog is being written (photos on facebook are being posted), cookies being eaten, I have a cold (now taking vitamin C), I slept a lot (all the way through church, sweet, good thing there’s a 7:00 service), and I still have some messages I wish to respond to today.  Productive day.  Day to myself, mostly.  I like this.

Tomorrow I only have one class, Tango!  Then I have to prepare some things to continue our Visa-change process the next day.  I should get in another post before the long weekend (Thursday and Friday+the regular weekend!) about my new classes that start this week.  I’m excited.

I just want to thank and acknowledge everybody that is praying for me and thinking of me.  It does not go unnoticed, and I feel it every day.  Thank you for the love and the care.  I miss every one of you and wish I could show you all something of Argentina.

Rain in Buenos Aires? Found a church! Cemetery in Recoleta.

So, this post is meant to take care of last weekend in full.  I'm so far behind in my blogging (and my epic adventures are about to be much more few and far between because classes started on Monday.  (another post on that soon).

So, on Saturday I got a great sleep in.  Or the night before, that is.  When I came home from the Friday escapades, apparently a bunch of people went out dancing and stuff.  Well, I didn't really hear about this and I'm extremely happy that I just went home and slept.  Because I needed it.  It feels weird to write this because it is again Saturday and I just got an awesome sleep in.  I guess throughout the week I'm generally pretty sleep deprived and I need to rest and repair on Friday night.  *shrug*.

On LAST Saturday the weather was very surprising.  It changed and we had something of a storm in Buenos Aires.  The wind was quite strong (very Oregon-coast-esque) and the rain wasn't heavy but there was rain.  I loved it.  It just reminded me of home...except that it was so much warmer.  Warm rain, warm wind...I put on a sweatshirt Saturday night, which is the first article of clothing more than one layer of t-shirt (or a button-up with undershirt) that I had put on since I arrived in Argentina.  Whoa.  I didn't really need it though, even when it was the middle of the night and I was outside waiting for a bus.  It still wasn't really cold.  So Saturday night I ended up heading over to a friend's place to meet up with a large group of other american students.  Two of them brought their guitars, voices, and talents, and we had a merry time singing songs together and generally conversing about Argentina.  It was really relaxed and really enjoyable.  OH, and Sara bought PEANUT BUTTER.  So I got my first taste of PEANUT BUTTER in Argentina.  I miss Peanut Butter, obviously, because it hardly even exists here.  Almost nobody uses it, and it's very hard to find.  And then it's not the same...it's just...different.  Dulce de leche reigns here, and I miss peanut butter.  A lot.  But I got to taste some!

The next day I headed out to the Cementario en Recoleta, a ways from where I live.  As I waited outside for friends to show up, a couple came up to me and asked me if I was from Oregon. They asked because I had an Oregon State shirt on (obviously, go beavs!).  Upon my affirmative answer, we had a cool little conversation.  One of them is from Portland and is in Argentina just finishing up the term.  She went to PSU.  The other dude was from some other place in Oregon, I don't remember, and ...well...it was cool to connect with them!  They're the first people that I've met FROM Oregon on this whole trip.  Some girl in the program that I don't know goes to UO, but she is from Arizona or some other place.  DOESN'T COUNT.  Especially if she's a duck.  Anyway, rant over.

Then we headed in.  It definitely put me in awe, seeing this incredibly antiquated yet still modern cemetery..filled with historic figures.  I didn't know what to say a lot of the time, so I just snapped a ton of pictures off.  After visiting the tomb of Eva Perón we jumped onto a tour in Castellano.  We decided quickly that we didn't want to be the lame tourists on the English tour.  Well...cool.  Except the guide was this old guy that was pretty hard to understand.  Oh well, I still learned a FEW things and enjoyed it until we abandoned it and went on to the nearby feria.

WHATUP EVITAAAAAAAAA.  oh wait...

After this I traveled a long way and, in a rush, got ready to go to church.  Two friends of mine and I were going to la Iglesia del Centro, which is in fact about 7 blocks from where I live. SWEET.  I rushed to meet up with them early, at about 5:35, only to find the church and discover that we couldn't go in until 6:30.  So we assumed the service was going to be at 6, then found out 6:30....and when we got in after killing some time around my beautiful neighborhood we found out that the service wasn't till 7.  Actually, as we sat and waited, we found out it's more like 7:30.  BUT WE MADE IT.  It's a Baptist church, and upon entering we had a few good welcoming conversations to get started.  It was wonderful.  I felt at home among believers during worship, during the sermon, during prayer...it was great.  The worship was AWESOME.  So many people raising their hands to my Lord and singing it out...in Castellano.  Filled with His Glory.  The sermon was great too, and I quickly discovered that I could understand almost every word the pastor said (which is a big deal). The only thing that I found kind of hard to deal with was the length of the whole service.  It went over 2 hours, and I will definitely need to do some adjusting to that.  It's long.  However, everything here seems to be longer.  I'm referring to the entire school system.  Classes are so long.

Getting into that church like that has been a direct and powerful answer to prayer.  Absolutely yes.  Not just my prayer.  All week I've been missing it and wanting to go back.  And I get to tomorrow :D

That's my weekend, and the next day classes began.  My next post (also coming soon) is going to be about classes and THIS weekend.  And stuff.

I don't care what you say, Gauchos > Cowboys

Sooooooo on Friday the CIEE study abroad group took a day trip to San Antonio de Areco, which is outside of Buenos Aires.  The town itself is just some small little place, but it has Pampa near it, and that's what we visited.  The bus was incredibly comfortable, and I enjoyed a good ol' chat with my pal Michael.  We discussed a common theme between us - directly translating things that aren't meant to be directly translated.  This time: popular song lyrics.  OH FUN.  Seriously though, I was doubled over at times.  Lady Gaga just doesn't go too well in Spanish. 

NOTE: There are millions of pictures on Facebook of these escapades.  The pics included here are just to make my blog more complete and look pretty.

Anyway, upon arrival I broke out my frisbee and a bunch of people joined me...i got another sweet throwing-around session in.  SO much fun.  I missed it so much.  Then we played some soccer, and I took a place as goalie (se dice arquero aquí).  That way I could go easy on my foot.  Well, going easy on my foot and not being good at goalie saw me get scored on like 3 times before I retired.  Lame.  I’m a better defender or midfielder or forward.  So basically I’m bad at goalie. 

We spent most of the day just kind of chilling here and there, chatting and enjoying ourselves in the beautiful weather.  We had some Choripan (Chorizo+pan), which I found wonderful.  Also Café con leche and things like that.  Super relaxed. 

Before dinner we watched (and some were chosen to participate) in some traditional Gaucho dancing (folclore).  I took video (see Facebook).  It was pretty impressive, and I enjoyed the show quite a lot.

After that, a pair of friends and I waited for a while to ride on the horses (they were in high demand) and eventually settled for the last carriage ride instead.  Worth it.  It was about 20 minutes of passing through la pampa…which is completely beautiful.  When we arrived back at the main buildings we found ourselves 10 minutes late to a show of Gaucho skill.  And was it impressive.

These gauchos spent loads of time hanging off the side of their horses and performing stunts of the insane type.  One guy coaxed his horse to permit him to casually lie with it…and on and on.  Then some of these dudes played a traditional game (called Pato I believe)…two teams of three, two goal things to toss the ball-thing through.  The teams toss the ball back and forth (it has a net of leather handles on it) and then try to score.  The other team tries to snag it out of the air or make the other team drop it, or just make their scoring attempt fail.  And back and forth, turnover turnover turnover.  It got pretty intense at times.  Did I mention it was on horseback?  Again, some film along with a good amount of picture are on facebook.  Go check them out.

That's all for THIS post.  I apologize for the tardiness of these posts.  I should put up another one or two soon, possibly today...a lot has gone on.

Tigre

So.  I'm going start getting more brief and to the point with these blogs.  Because...I have to.  I'm going to be in classes soon and my free time meter will drop to LOW.  So...

Tigre.  On Tuesday a group of friends and I shot north a ways to Tigre, a rather touristy destination.  It's located by the river/canal and is a less populated, more rural location.  Also very beautiful and relaxed feeling.  After some serious issues with getting all together and leaving in the morning, we made our way by train (SUPER cheap).  We made a stop in San Isidro, a suburb of Buenos Aires of a very chill air.  Chill.  Minus the calor.  Beautiful town.  See the photos here and on Facebook.

The Tren de la Costa (which was supposed to be...and was, very beautiful) was CROWDED and full.  Oh well.  When we got there we gathered our peeps all together and hit up a nice relaxing boat tour.  It lasted about an hour and a half or more, including a ciesta when we got off the boat and walked around a bit.  Most of us wanted to sleep.  Some even did.  It was a very comfortable and gentle boat ride.  The canal/river is pretty interesting and full of good sights.

I don't have a lot to say about this day elsewise...we spent a while tossing about my frisbee.  That was valuable time to me, because I love frisbee and haven't gotten to throw around for a good long while.  Very fun :)  My purple Chameleon disc got it's initiation.  As a discraft ultrastar it flew very true.  Lovely.

To steal a method of getting through a lot with few words from another blogger here, let me summarize best as I can:

Heat.
Sweatiness.
Coca-Cola.  And Pizza.
Hot.
Calor.
Fishers.
Joking around lots.
Cheap Mcdonalds cone (YES).
Standing forever on the train ride home.
Humongous Cena de...pizza.  More pizza.
Shower.  (Thank you Dear Lord)
Great sleep.

Yeah.  Pretty much in that order.  But not entirely.

Tomorrow I'm headed to San Antonio de Areco to check out the life of Gauchos.  This day trip signifies the end of our "orientation" activities and such.  I'm really excited.  Until next time,

Cariños.

Feria and Jardín Botánico

Mientras empiezo escribir este blog, estoy pensando en escribirlo en castellano.  ¿Por qué, me preguntas?  PORQUE ESTOY EN ARGENTINA Y ESTOY USANDO CASTELLANO CADA DÍA Y QUIERO HACERLO EN ESTA MANERA, te respondo.  But I can't do that to all of my poor ingles-hablantes back in the states, now can I?

So, changing Chrome's spellcheck to English, I shall attempt to appease all of thee.

Sunday I woke and since I had nobody to go to Church with (all out of the city, traveling) nor a church picked out, I opted to not go to touristy mass en la plaza de mayo and instead to spend a while looking for a church online.  This wasn't exactly fun, but I found a bunch of churches that interest me that are within travel distance for a Sunday morning.  Maybe.  We'll see how that goes.  I am sure God will put me where He wants me, but I have definitely been feeling a great want for communion with other believers.  It's a big hole in my life lately, though it is only due to having a whirlwind of events and such passing by.  Things will normalize with the first week or so of classes.  After that I ended up retrieving my backpack from a friend who still had it from after the concert.  We proceeded to meet up with another friend and wander about the Feria.  Every weekend there is a "Feria" on a street about 150 feet from my front door.  Up and down la calle Defensa you can't drive cars - it's blocked off.  Street vendors and performers and musicians pack the street up and down, and it's awesome.  Since it was Carnaval weekend this Feria was stepped up a bit, I do believe.  I spent quite a while going up and down the street just checking things out.  I was very wary about spending money, but I ended up buying a few things.  I bought a CD of fully danceable Tango music (:D :D :D), some Argentine Churros (filled with Dulce de Leche, covered in chocolate, a donut, insanely cheap, 6 pesos/$1.50USD), and a small antiquated silver cross.  I think it's beautiful, and the next chance I get to look about the Feria I am going to search for a suitable cadena (chain).  I started to look for one, but I realized that I needed to take some time with it.  I spent quite a while looking for just the right price.  Funny story with that, too.  I saw the one I wanted, asked how much, and was told 30 pesos because it's silver.  Sure, that's a decent price.  I'll pay that, I thought.  I told the man I would probably return.  And 20 minutes later or so, I did.  Though there was a different vendor manning the booth this time.  I asked again how much for the cross - this new man told me 90 pesos without flinching, looking right in my eyes.  Well, I told him what was up and got it for 30.  He backed down as SOON as I said the other man told me 30.  hehe.  In retrospect I should have told him the other man told me 20 pesos or something like that.  But anyway.  Beautiful cross.  Some pictures:

This dude stood UBER still.  It was frustrating because I took video to prove he was a man...and he didn't budge.  So I gave up.

Literally the ONLY Stop sign I have seen in Argentina.

Alright, that's a lot of people.

If you know any Spanish, this is pretty interesting to you.  Probably.  I have higher resolution if you wantsa read it.  Just ask me.

Monday I had nothing planned to do, so after passing several hours about the house, I headed down to the Zoo to meet a friend there and peruse a bit.  As soon as I got there and we met up it was easy to see that it was FULL.  Must be because of Carnaval weekend...well...maybe another time.  Also, it was much more expensive than I had thought.  Ohhh well, there was another interesting attraction just across the street.  El Jardín Botánico awaited!  The name translates to Botanical Garden or something very similar.  It was very beautiful.  I took lots of pics, which you can see on Facebook.  Here are a few contributions to make my blog look pretty:

There were a million cats at the Jardín.  It was ridiculous and very interesting to see...and very adorable.  My friend Sarah was always making "awwwwww" and "eeeeeee' and "oooohhhhhh" sounds.  ALL the time.  It was funny, but warranted.  They were some really nice cats :)  I enjoyed their company.  Also-BEAUTIFUL AMAZING WONDERFUL sculptures everywhere.

I spent some time getting some good macro shots.

Tree wrapped around a metal pole.  Very cool.

Sleeping Argentino, intending to relax and read.

That concludes this blog.  Beauty and fun.  Relaxed days.  Next post is gonna be about my adventure to Tigre and the following few days!