I have this urge now to write in Spanish - it's a sort of tick my fingers have; my thoughts are often in Spanish; my prayers sometimes are; once, I even dreamt in Spanish (THAT <- was bizarre). Here's to the first week, a resúmen of the goings-on. (I missed the All-American tradition of the Superbowl... so the title is a tribute to that. I don't even know if 1st and 23 happened then. Oh well. You understand my point.)
Towards the beginning of this week, I had trouble sleeping the night. I attribute that not to being away from home, but rather throwing my body into this shock - like heat-shocking bacteria - and dealing with 35 degree weather to dealing with 100+ degree weather. The humidity here the first few days was impeccable: almost surreal. Walking along one of the main avenues la Avenida Cabildo I seriously felt like I was in an enormous Finnish sweat-house (#bezzerwizzer s/o @Joey, @Jonathan, @René, @Margaret, @Brian). But it felt incredible to wear shorts and a tank top; flip flops and sunglasses and being originally from Connecticut, I didn't mind the moisture.
Anyways, to continue with my overly scientific metaphor of considering myself a bacterium that has been heat-shocked, we'll just go with it. I have acculturated pretty well so far, I think (not to mount the high horse; My High Horse (On the left)); I would attribute it scientifically to this process of heat-shock. It basically means that you put a culture of bacteria in a hot water bath and then a cold water bath and then again in hot water for specific periods of time and this change of temperature causes a shock to the cell which allows the passage of foreign material through the membrane (that would otherwise be impenetrable). This is done sometimes to add a sequence of DNA that the scientist is interested in observing through its manifestation (or lack there of). Hopefully my metaphor makes more sense now. If not, here it is straight up: I'm being changed in my perspectives and opinions by this experience day by day because of this shock. Although to be completely frank, I don't think it is quite a shock I feel, although that's probably because I'm still in a honeymoon stage of being enamored by everything - even though I can tell you many things that don't sit well with me. However, I am continually reminding myself that things are not good or bad they are just different.
I got lost a few times the first couple of days, but now I think I have myself pretty much oriented as to how streets intersect and the like: the next challenge is public transportation. I had a bit of experience this Thursday as I went downtown to get a criminal background check for the Republic of Argentina: they determined I was fit for deportation. So now I'm back home.
I'm kidding. It's the first step towards getting a student visa thus mandatory to simply have documentation. So my host Eduardo and I got on el colectivo (bus) on Thursday morning around 7 AM to hitch a ride to the Subte (subway) that would take us all the way up Cabildo to La Plaza de Mayo and La Casa Rosada (the Pink House... like the White House...). Everything went smoothly with that and my fears of being able to do the traveling on my own was abated. Until that night when I had to do it alone. ISA had scheduled the group to have our first lesson in Tango. It was grand. Absolutely grand. I had a wonderful time and cannot wait to take the class for credit once the semester actually starts. Sooo about getting to the class... . BAM. Whipped out my handy-dandy METROGUÍA and looked up the street I needed to get to and which buses I could take, walked myself to the corner where I knew buses came and went and looked for the stop. (1.5 hours ahead of schedule). Found the stop. Stood. Waited. Waited. Waited. Waited. SAW THE BUS. Hailed it. Hopped on. Asked if they went "there". "NO". Oh. Got off. Waited. Waited. SAW ANOTHER. Hailed. Hopped on. Asked. "NO". Oh. Got off. Waited. Waited. Waited. Waited. Waited. SAW ANOTHER. Hailed. Hopped on. Asked. "NO - go on the OTHER side of the street to catch bus 15 going the way you want :) ". Oh. OH. OH.
Got off. Waited. Crossed street. Waited. Waited. Waited. Then finally this girl helped me out, we hailed the next bus, asked if it went to la Avenida Scalabrini Ortiz. Yes. (JACKPOT). Hopped on. Sat down.
This girl's name was not Mafalda, although I rather like that name and she will be referred as such. She seemed to be studying in Belgrano but she never said what. She spoke English pretty well although we conversed more in Spanish. She was wearing a peculiar (whenever I say peculiar I think of Alice in Wonderland; have no idea why) outfit, old rose (very fashionable) but it was like a light grey satin bottom with the old rose top dress (?) and grey flats. She had wild blue eye-shadow that was just wretched, but what do I really know of the BsAs make-up fashion for 2012. So Mafalda and I were talking, she lives in Palermo and would not say where after I did, just a street name but still. Seemed rather suspicious to me. (Hand over the purse of course.) We exchanged telephone numbers after some difficulty and said maybe we'd see each other around and go shopping at the outlets. Okay, chau. No problem, although I felt a little uneasy about Mafalda later, thinking of her tacky outfit, her 70s makeup and her rather worn shopping bag. I started to wonder.... but no need for that. A lesson learned for reservations in conversation with strangers.
Week one of intensive Spanish class is under my belt, that is likely expanding from all the empanadas I have been eating lately; 4 hours of class a day, and an added 45 minute recreo period broken into a 15 minute and 30 minute break. Five hours is a long time; I find my mind wandering to my watch at times and I will remember middle school - how every class was 49 minutes or so - I would get over four classes in in this period of time that I am devoting solely to learning Spanish. So somehow it goes by relatively quickly, but that might be because I look at the cityscape that sprawls out before us on the 10th floor of this building. I have found myself increasingly successful at comprehension of oral Spanish, but written Spanish trips me up on transition phrases. As for my oral part, I will proceed to make a fool of myself speaking tonight when I meet Andy's friends. We are about to get started... it is midnight. And I have an ISA excursion tomorrow all day at El Tigre which is a delta about 45 minutes north from the University (I just opened about 3 new Safari browser windows because I pressed Command + "n" for the " ˜ " instead of Option + "n"). Hopefully with a little warmth in the veins I'll be able to be as suava as the porteños themselves. This is definitely something I looked forward to before arriving - was meeting the locals my age and actually making friends.
I've been around people so much here - obviously this gigantic city is going to have that quality - that I just need a TIME-OUT every once in a while. Like now. At midnight. But, when in Rome... especially a city that never sleeps... . This is all part of the experience. Doing things like this, making plans or being spontaneous. Dealing with fatigue because of an opportunity that shouldn't be rejected. If I rejected this offer to go out, I would likely close off any other chance to do so - and that is most certainly the antithesis of this trip. I want to meet people. I want to talk to them and the only way I can get actual interaction other than the lady at the grocery store check out or the mozo that serves us at a restaurant is to do things like this. (Before all my classes with locals start).
So, Cheers to that; Cheers to you; Cheers to health; Cheers to love; Cheers to money; and Cheers to time to enjoy them all.
Angela
ps. I will be editing this post and working on uploading photos to this here blog. Otherwise you are referred to my facebook photo album: "When in Rome: Argentine Style". Gracias.
pps. I am maneuvering this blog site in Spanish, and I admit there are quite a few words I don't know, so trying to set up a gadget on here that syncs Photobucket or Flickr is just not cooperating. I swear I'm trying.
Week one of intensive Spanish class is under my belt, that is likely expanding from all the empanadas I have been eating lately; 4 hours of class a day, and an added 45 minute recreo period broken into a 15 minute and 30 minute break. Five hours is a long time; I find my mind wandering to my watch at times and I will remember middle school - how every class was 49 minutes or so - I would get over four classes in in this period of time that I am devoting solely to learning Spanish. So somehow it goes by relatively quickly, but that might be because I look at the cityscape that sprawls out before us on the 10th floor of this building. I have found myself increasingly successful at comprehension of oral Spanish, but written Spanish trips me up on transition phrases. As for my oral part, I will proceed to make a fool of myself speaking tonight when I meet Andy's friends. We are about to get started... it is midnight. And I have an ISA excursion tomorrow all day at El Tigre which is a delta about 45 minutes north from the University (I just opened about 3 new Safari browser windows because I pressed Command + "n" for the " ˜ " instead of Option + "n"). Hopefully with a little warmth in the veins I'll be able to be as suava as the porteños themselves. This is definitely something I looked forward to before arriving - was meeting the locals my age and actually making friends.
I've been around people so much here - obviously this gigantic city is going to have that quality - that I just need a TIME-OUT every once in a while. Like now. At midnight. But, when in Rome... especially a city that never sleeps... . This is all part of the experience. Doing things like this, making plans or being spontaneous. Dealing with fatigue because of an opportunity that shouldn't be rejected. If I rejected this offer to go out, I would likely close off any other chance to do so - and that is most certainly the antithesis of this trip. I want to meet people. I want to talk to them and the only way I can get actual interaction other than the lady at the grocery store check out or the mozo that serves us at a restaurant is to do things like this. (Before all my classes with locals start).
So, Cheers to that; Cheers to you; Cheers to health; Cheers to love; Cheers to money; and Cheers to time to enjoy them all.
Angela
ps. I will be editing this post and working on uploading photos to this here blog. Otherwise you are referred to my facebook photo album: "When in Rome: Argentine Style". Gracias.
pps. I am maneuvering this blog site in Spanish, and I admit there are quite a few words I don't know, so trying to set up a gadget on here that syncs Photobucket or Flickr is just not cooperating. I swear I'm trying.
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