Hi everyone! Today I have a day off due to this holiday called “Feria” something. Something or other about fairs. Anyway, I just woke up and I can already feel the heat. Today it’s 97 degrees farenheit. I really oughta get to a beach.
I have been very busy, but haven’t forgotten about my blog! I got a journal and have been jotting down things to share with you all. So here’s a new slew of information!
I’ll start off by saying that I love Spanish. I really do. I love speaking Spanish, and even though it’s frustrating, I’m really loving class here. At home, there is rarely a class that I look forward to going to, but I really enjoy my Spanish class here for the most part. It is so interactive, it’s not like any class I’ve ever taken before. The methods are extremely effective. Yesterday was my final exam for beginner level Spanish class (PS I totally aced it). Friday will be the oral exam, and Monday I will move on to intermediate. I’m kind of upset that I didn’t choose to start in intermediate, because I feel like I could have handled it, and then now I would be up to intermediate 2, but what can you do?
It’s still hard doing daily life in Spanish. Yesterday I was in a store, asking for things in broken Spanish, when one of the saleswomen asked me if I wanted to speak English. I let out such a sigh of relief. It can just be so hard sometimes! It’s weird too, because the moment I start speaking English to someone I totally forget where I am. I feel just like I’m in New York , speaking as I normally would. It’s happened a few times that I ask someone something in English after having been speaking with somebody in English previously, and then I just continue speaking English, forgetting that I’m in Argentina!! Then the person looks at me all funny and when I try to figure out why, I realize “DUH! They have no idea what I’m saying!” This has happened a few times and it’s really confusing and weird. I get really disoriented sometimes!
A lot of people around here actually do speak English too. They know very few words, or simple sentences, and sometimes more. You wouldn’t know this by walking on the street, because a lot of the time they won’t speak English to you. Once you get them talking though, they’ll say that their English is very “bahsick”, but I’m always astounded by the amount they consider “basic”. It seems to me like they can communicate pretty well with their “basic” skills! Everybody in Argentina is heavily exposed to English though. They have a decent foundation. Argentines have told me that they know English from movies, tv shows, and music. This makes a lot of sense because everything seems to be imported! If you turn on the tv you will see just about every show that you see in the US, usually dubbed in Spanish, but also with Spanish subtitles a lot of the time. The other day I flipped through Los Simpsons, True Blood, Dexter, and a bunch of familiar films. They play a lot of music from the US, and I hear it everywhere I go. I don’t know how they stand it, I would be so frustrated if my country was totaly imported from another, but this is what they know. Even bars and clubs and gyms are named things like Always Gym or Cold Beer Bar, or other such names. All this and they still have a negative reaction to Americans a lot of the time….
I’m still amazed and in love with the dogs here. A few days ago I counted 12 dogs with a dog walker, and they were all big fluffy things! I want to die of the cuteness. There’s a husky that sometimes I pet on the way to school, he sits in a big group of dogs tied to a pole on the sidewalk up the street from my school, and when I walk by, this little dog yaps at me but the husky just looks at me and I pat his head. Too cute. It seems that a lot of people in the wealthier neighborhoods have maids of some sort. If I leave for class early, I see all these women walking dogs in their uniforms. Some of the uniforms look like scrubs, and I thought that they were all nurses for a while! Some of them have aprons draped over the front. It’s strange to see these kinds of workers, something we don’t generally have in the US.
Do you know that nobody walks around with coffee here? You either sit and spend time at a cafe for your coffee, or you don’t order coffee at all. It’s not at all common to take food out of any establishment. There is rarely carry out coffee or drinks or those things that we are used to stopping for at home. I suppose you can go somewhere for a sandwich or pastry during the lunch hour, but generally, people sit down and order (which by the way, always comes with a small table fee). When you eat out, you are not really supposed to ask them to wrap your food up, unless it’s a significant amount. Also, if you order coffee with cream, expect that it will come with whipped cream!! I’ve figured that one out.
Luckily, I’m getting a little sick of the food here. That’s good, so that maybe I can start eating more salad and eat less of everything else before I flood my heart with fat. It seems like everything they eat here is fried. I don’t know how anyone keeps their shape. I’ve figured out that ham and cheese (jamon y queso) is a regular everyday food group, accompanied by steak of course and any other form of beef that you can think of. Meat pies and quiches are also a food group of their own. Eggs are served in everything except your breakfast dish! Basically it is a super high fat diet, and the only cooked vegetables I have been served have been baked in cheese.
A few days ago I went to this drum show called “La Bomba de Tiempo”. I had SO much fun!!! I’m trying to go to more authentic Argentine events, but when I got there, I realized that there were a lot of Americans there. However, it was a fantastic time. It was a huge standing room concert with the coolest African drum band performing. I absolutely love that type of music. I had a ton of fun, spoke a little bit of Spanish to some people, and hit the after party after that, which included a bunch of people playing their own drums to recreate the band’s efforts. It was really fun. A lot of the clubs here have multiple floors, and the top is generally a terrace or screened in roof with a whole bunch of really green plants. These places are so pretty! If only there was ever any airflow going on. You think there’d be on a terrace and all, but every day has been sweltering here. And it’s extremely humid.
Side note on the screened in roofs, I went to a dance club (boliche) on Saturday night, and after a little while, they were forcing everyone down from the top floor. I was confused as to why, when I caught a glimpse of them closing the doors to the upstairs area. There was sunlight streaming through!! Since Argentines party into the wee hours of the morning, the club had to close off the top part in order to keep it dark enough for people to stay. I left shortly after that, and it was bright outside. It was nearly 7 am, my ears were ringing, and it looked like the Walking Dead (I always feel the need to refer to the Walking Dead here) had gathered outside to stumble home. The streets were filled with 20-30 somethings making their way home. This place is crazy!
This upcoming weekend is a long weekend for me, and I’ll be traveling to Uruguay with some friends. I’m excited. I’m going to Montevideo by ferry and then bus, and staying in a hostel (that blissfully has a pool)! I hope I will enjoy it. When I get back, a whole new group of study abroad-ers will have arrived for the next part of classes. Things will change a lot, as there are so few of us now! I don’t know if I will be getting a roommate or not, but I think that I might. That kinda blows because I have been enjoying my room all to myself! But 5 more students (students that are fluent in Spanish, as their program is regular classes with locals) will be moving into my dorm. I am excited but also not. We’ll have to see how it goes.
I’m going to leave you off with a nice story of something that happened to me yesterday. I was down in the subway station, up by the ticket counter, rummaging through my things looking for coins. I had no cash on me, and could only find a few 25 cent coins and an American quarter in my wallet. A guy about my age walked up to the counter and ordered 1 ticket, then glanced at me. He said something in Spanish that I figured was ” do you have enough?” and so I said in Spanish “I don’t know”. So he handed me the ticket that he had just bought, and bought himself a new one. It was so kind and nice! I talked to him when we got down to the tracks, and I found out that his English was “very bahhsick”. We had a conversation in Spanglish on the train ride home, and when he got off at his stop he gave me the Argentine kiss on the cheek. It was very sweet!
I think I’ve covered everything. If anyone knows anything about Montevideo, send me the info!
Lots of love,
Lauren