WE'RE GOING TO LOLLAPALOOZA IN CHILE!!!!!!!

Friday, March 23^rd, 2012

Whilst hanging out on Thursday, Ryan and I talked about our plans for Semana Santa and I happened to mention that while I was going to Mendoza, I was totally jealous of the people going to Lollapalooza in Chile. Little did I realize that within 48 hours of discussing this, I’d be one of those people too.

On a whim, we made the decision to look into making Lollapalooza happen. Originally, the buses seemed to be booked, but we found one that had enough space finally. Ok, it was decision time. The bus tickets alone were almost $300, in addition to the festival tickets, the hostel, food and additional costs that always pop up. I called up my financial guru—aka Mom—and asked for a summary of my statement. Prognosis: you can go on this trip, but if you do, you’re kinda done with trips and you’d better live pretty frugally unless you don’t want to buy that return ticket back to the US. Alright. Given that we have just one more long vacation at the end of April, I’m willing to sacrifice that to go to Lollapalooza. And we can hope like hell that a ~$500/month budget will hold out ‘til the end of July…You may think that’s crazy, but even that can be modest.

After SIX attempts to purchase my bus ticket on plataforma10.com, it finally worked. Now we needed tickets to the festival. And I learned the hard way that you should always verify the exchange rate before you just guess. Because I was way off on the rate between CLP and USD…oops. In case you’re curious, 85.000 (which is 85,000) CLP = ~$180 USD. So yeah, I just dropped almost $200 on concert tickets, which originally cost 30.000 CLP had I bought them when they first came out, but I didn’t even have that thought a month ago…

Ryan and I justified it by the fact that this will be the type of experience that we will remember and cherish for the rest of our lives. Plus when you consider that it probably costs $30 to see these bands anyways, it’s not a bad offer…we just had to pay it all at once.

What are those bands? Well, I’m hoping to see:

Thievery Corporation, Bassnectar, Pretty Lights, MGMT, Band of Horses, Foo Fighters, Bjork, TV on the Radio, and SKRILLEX! Just kidding, I hate Skrillex. 

Overall, with bus, tickets and hostel, we paid $420. Not too bad, but reeeeeeeeeeally a lot more expensive than had we booked this a month ago (and had I not booked Mendoza first...), but I’m not even sure that would have been possible. Every vacation here, I’ve booked by the seat of my pants.

Oh and did I mention that I’m going to Mendoza, city of wine nestled in the Andes, just 3 days after this happens?

HOLY CRAP IN A PITA. Not real. BEST EASTER EVER. And I’m non-theist! And actually, this may just be the best week of my life…*

Moral of the story is:

• If you want to go to a music festival, buy the tickets eaaaaarrrrllllyyy even if you’re not 100% sure. You can always sell them to someone else, or just realize, oh yeah, this is gonna be awesome, why wouldn’t I go?
• Don’t buy bus tickets in the wrong order…(Had I booked this correctly, I could have saved myself about $600 pesos and ~40 hours of travel by bus…crap…)
• Live fearlessly, with vigor. The money matters, but don’t let it tell you no if your heart wants otherwise. Because I want to go to Lollapalooza like crazy.

*Until the end of July/first part of August…you know what I’m talking about.

Chinatown. Or, two blocks of Asian stuff.

Thursday, March 22^nd, 2012

I’ve made note that one of my stressors here is the fact that because I have so much more free time here due to my schedule and having less homework, I feel bad when I just stay home and hang out, write or chat with my host family. I should be out living right?! Well, I’m trying this: Thursdays after class, I’ll try and have some kind of “café date” with a friend, then Friday, I’ll go to a museum or other place of interest, then Saturday I can do some combination of both and Sunday I’ll do homework and catch up with friends or write more. Like I’ve said before, I’m not on vacation, so it’s not obligatory to seize every single moment, every single day. And in fact, this isn’t even possible. I enjoy being at home, as this is where I get the most interaction with the Spanish language outside of class, so it’s not like I’m alone in my room napping until dinner every day. It’s no different than me hanging out in my room at Gamma Phi after getting done with class.

So, given all this, I decided to make plans to visit Barrio Chino, which I see every day, but had yet to visit. I invited Ryan, because it had been a while since Bariloche and I didn’t want to already lose contact. He gladly accepted and we met right by the grandiose entrance to Chinatown. We passed through the first block, amused by all the trinkets typical in any Chinatown, or just in regular China. While normally, I have to fight my shopping urges, this time it was simple because I just don’t have the money or the need for such things. That, and the fact that I was distracted by our conversation.

We stopped in an Asian grocery store chock full o’ the typical Asian goodies that are as enticing as they are repulsive. I got tempted down the candy aisle, but I couldn’t find my favorite Japanese candy (think M&M’s meets Skittles—weird, I know, but SO incredible). Down the drink aisle, I searched hopelessly for a beverage with apples and cucumber that I remember fondly from Hong Kong. I still have yet to find this again…And so we left empty handed.

Not much later, we reached the end of a block and realized that we were getting out of the neighborhood, so we rounded back and went in another direction, only to realize that again, we were outside the boundaries. Alright, so we’re not in Chinatown in San Francisco…this Chinatown is so tiny that you can make your way through it in an hour, with browsing. As we ambled along a street we’d already been down (but this time on the other side…), I saw a melon popsicle from Korea that my roommate recommended I try. OH. MY. GOD. Melona popsicles are my soul. Korea you’ve done it again—how do you do everything so perfectly? The flavor is the classic Asian fruity flavor that you understand if you’ve tasted it before—so sweet and so saturated with the exact flavor of X fruit that the next time you eat the actual fruit, you think “oh, is that it??”. Then the texture…oh man the texture…so creamy and perfect. Though it was a popsicle, there was no hint of ice or hardness. Things this delicious should not be allowed to exist. I basically had a foodgasm on the corner and Ryan was giving me the “girl, you crazy” look until he tried it. I regret trying it, though, because now I think about it all the time and I have never seen these in the US (at least not in my neck of the woods) and I will be sad knowing they exist but I can’t have them again.

Yeah, that’s right…I fantasize about Korean popsicles. Judge me.

After the popsicle, there was nothing more in the neighborhood that could possible beat it, so we headed to a café/bar/restaurant to chat and grab a bite. As is typical at a meal in Argentina, we talked forever. The conversation started off as a simple question as to how Ryan got his study abroad scholarship from the State Department, and this led to its very complicated explanation and a million tangents during and after. We realized we couldn’t tell one story without telling another, nor could we answer a question without first asking ten more. And so it goes with me and talking here. And anywhere.

If you couldn’t tell by my utter honesty on my blog, I am a very open, direct and candid person who values the art and intrigue of a real conversation. I understand that not every talk can be a life-changing, friendship-building spill session, but at the same time, why not shoot for that more often? Why are we so afraid of telling the truth, being vulnerable and sharing the details that matter? The fact is that EVERYBODY has vulnerabilities and details worth knowing. Sometimes these are exploited and for this, I understand why you can’t trust everybody immediately, so it takes time. But if the other person is comfortable and interested, then obviously I am too and I’m not afraid to invite them to see the rest of the iceberg, so to speak. This can make me come off as too serious and very intense to some people, which is an odd juxtaposition with how ridiculous and silly I can be—but it’s all part of the Nikkiness. Which you have taken time to read, so I thank you. Maybe you too are beginning to understand the paradox.

Although I was in no mood to end the conversation, I had to get back home for dinner and I was already running late. As we waited for my train, Ryan told me yet another complicated story and as he was reaching the conclusion, my train came…Thus I realized we’d need more time to finish the story some other day. What I didn’t realize was that this would be another 20 hour bus ride—but instead of going to Bariloche… 

Notes on Argentine Culture #10: Climate Change and the Environment

While Juan was cooking dinner, I was attempting to start my short essay about environmental problems in Argentina (which really should be a book vs. a two page paper…). I started to ask him about attitudes in Argentina about the environment and climate change and learned that while it’s clearly a problem, people are still pretty uninformed and nobody is making any concerted efforts to change.

First take this simple example—there are mounds of dog turds and garbage on every street. People solve this problem not by training their dogs nor by installing more garbage cans, but by washing it all away. With water. Hoses flow all morning, every morning while owners of stores and concerned apartment renters spray it all away. Sometimes they just abandon the hoses and let them run for who knows how long and that’s why the gutters are always full. I’m not saying we don’t waste water in the US, but this is a blatant waste of otherwise decent water. Water is a precious resource that’s more and more expensive here, and I’m shocked to see people every morning throwing it and their money away. The solution is obvious—stop letting dogs drop a load in the street whenever they feel like it (maybe the doo-doo bag is demeaning to carry, but if you can’t handle it, you shouldn’t have a dog) and rework the dismissive attitudes porteños have towards garbage. Buenos Aires, architecturally, is a lovely city filled with trees along every road, but this effect is vastly overshadowed by the heaps of garbage and meaningless graffiti scrawled over everything. Even the Obelisk and gates to the Casa Rosada have graffiti and trash surrounding it! And it’s hard to respect a city whose own population treats it like a dumpster…

The issue of recycling is also very interesting. It doesn’t really exist here. You’re not going to see any blue or green bins indicating you can throw your paper, plastic or glass here. This, ironically, despite the fact that so many things here can be recycled because there’s fewer products here with frivolous and unrecyclable packaging. We’re not great at it in the US, but we’re trying. However, there are unofficial recycling sorters here—the cartoneros. The cartoneros come from very desperate economic conditions and have been relegated to sort through the garbage to find recyclable materials, which they then recycle for money or resell to people who can find a use for it. It’s not necessarily because they care about Earth—it’s because they have absolutely nothing. It’s heartbreaking to see them at night, sorting through the trash, as many of those hands sifting through belong to children. Seeing a group of people whose wellbeing depends on what I and everyone else in Buenos Aires throws away is a double whammy—I’m lucky to even have the privilege to throw things away…

Then there’s the fact that Argentina is obviously a very rich, diverse country, environmentally speaking. From the salt flats up north, Río de la Plata region to the east, Pampas in the center to Patagonia and the vineyards of the Andes from the west to the glaciers in the south, Argentina has a lot to lose if the climate starts to change too much or if its citizens keep polluting it so. What is Argentina but the incredible sum of its environments?

It is here that I will point out that I’m aware that most of the detrimental effects of climate change have been caused by countries that will not experience these effects at their worst—it will mostly be countries (or islands) that have contributed little, but will be impacted severely regardless. However, while we’re still awaiting these effects, Argentina is doing a lot of immediate damage in the form of industrial, agricultural and chemical pollution and beyond.

Thus, Argentina is caught in an interesting place—it’s fairly rich in resources and environments that people travel to visit specifically, but it is also still developing, meaning that these precious resources and habitats are being exploited for financial gain—which contributes to both immediate environmental damage as well as the triggers of climate change. Much like in virtually every other place in the world…While the government does have some campaigns for protection, education and sustainable development, I have yet to see any of these actually functioning. Plus, let’s face it, the bureaucracy here is so corrupt and ineffective, it makes our bureaucracy in the US look like everything is running perfectly. 

While these attempts at change by the government have failed, new policies about subsidies and increasing prices have contributed more to people making changes that affect the environment. Unfortunately it seems that when it comes to the issue of climate change, people don’t respond until they have to—and this usually means they’re responding to changes in price. People are starting to use less electricity and water, not because they are thinking about Earth, but because they’re thinking about their utilities bill. It’s a start, though…

But I don’t want to overshadow the people who are informed and taking action. This is demonstrated by people from interior provinces who in 2008, for example, protested the government’s decision to install more mining operations at the expense of the glacial area within the Andes. But despite their pleas, it happened anyway. In Buenos Aires, there are some groups that are attempting to spread awareness and encourage people to make those small, easy changes that can make such a huge difference—but despite these efforts, the environment isn’t front page news. No wonder I was unable to compile enough information to complete a research paper I attempted my sophomore year about this exact topic…

So, what does all of this mean? Have you seen Wall-E? Well, if that’s the way of explaining how truly disastrous the future will be to children, then you can imagine how little hope I have as an adult studying this topic. I don’t want to say we’re doomed, but we are doomed if we don’t figure this out and change our ways worldwide.

And speaking of Wall-E, they could really use him all over this city…

Nikkilude #8: Crybaby

If you’ve been keeping up (or have ever seen a Pixar movie with me) you know everything makes me cry. It’s not hard. I’m one of the few people still affected by violence, hardship and the cruelties of life, as well as the beauty, happiness and solace we find in it, too. If emotions were on a scale from 1-10 (1 being utter depression and 10 being sheer bliss), I’m generally crying from 1-3 and 7-10. Plus, I’m of the belief that crying is ok. It’s cathartic. I hate to cry in front of people, but if I must, then I must. People of the world, stop trying to make me stop crying. I’m not defective, I’m merely releasing pent up emotion in the only way possible.

So—I cry when I’m happy and sad, but I also cry when I am absolutely frustrated. And this is where this entry gains its relevance. If that square peg won’t fit in the round hole, I am up to my ears in tears.

Tuesday morning (at the ripe hour of 8am) I have my course with Argentines. Today was Tuesday and I was already frustrated because the colectivo took sooooo much time, thereby making me late despite the fact that I left reasonably early. While lateness is a given in Argentine culture, it’s forbidden in school, so I slinked to a seat in shame, upset by the fact that I’d missed 20 minutes of content and didn’t really know what was going on.

By the time I gained my bearings, our professor left for some breakfast she was attending, and our “substitute professor” entered and admitted that he was terrible at being sympathetic to foreign students so he would continue with his normal mode of speech which was indistinguishable and filled with words I was unfamiliar with. Ok, I can handle that, and I’m trying to accustom myself to the normal mode of speech here, which is just this, so I’ll pick up what I can. We continued with our review of the provinces, cities and activities in Argentina. We started going through Buenos Aires (Capital Federal) and the professor seemed to be amused by making me search hopelessly on a city map for intersections whose locations I didn’t know. Then students would make commentary and I know they weren’t making fun of me, but I had NO IDEA what they were saying because in addition to not being able to hear them at all, none of their words were distinguishable. A textual representation of how most people speak here would be this: “Síesunquilomboacá???(words I don’t know)???¿todobienno? Yeah, cause that’s not confusing. I enunciate everything and speak loudly, so anyone that mumbles and speaks quietly effectively renders me deaf—especially when they’re speaking Spanish, in which case I’m rendered deaf AND dumb.

The professor could see that I was getting confused so he would repeat himself in English. But if there’s anything I hate more than people mumbling everything, it’s that. Oh you don’t understand me? Let me just dumb it down for you in English. This happens a lot in stores or on the street. People ask me something or vice versa and then when they respond or I have to respond, I get confused because I can’t hear them very well due to background noise or the fact that they speak softly, a million miles an hour. But instead of speaking up or slowing down a little, they just say “oh you don’t speak Spanish, then?” I DON’T SPEAK SPANISH WHEN I CAN’T FREAKING HEAR WHAT WORDS YOU’RE SAYING. And then I get pissed off and feel stupid. I know it’s a little presumptuous to expect people to change their manner of speech for little foreign me, but at the same time, obviously I’m not from Argentina, so why do they act so taken aback? If somebody with okay-ish English was giving me the “uh oh I don’t understand you” face, I’d slow down and use different vocab, because even though their goal is fluency, you can’t be fluent if everything is flying over your head.

So with 20 minutes left in class, I could feel the tears coming on because I was starting to doubt my ability to be in this class because in addition to hardly knowing any details about Argentina’s provinces, I can’t understand any of the students, as nice as they are. Then that transgressed into me doubting my ability to leave this country with a solid grasp of Spanish. While I have already improved tremendously, it’s still difficult to understand movies without subtitles and it takes me at least 3 minutes to get accustomed to someone’s manner of speaking. And I would feel like I failed if I left here still having to think about conjugating verbs and making sure that there was concordance between masculine and feminine nouns and adjectives. I left class thinking: “what if I never get to the point where I can understand the students or the professor?”. Because to me, that translates as somewhat of a failure being that I’ll be here for 6 months total.

I tried to hold it together by telling myself it hasn’t been even 2 months yet, so I still have a lot of time and everybody improves so much when they study abroad. But at the same time, I’ve had students in my Spanish classes that had studied abroad before and they still sucked as much as I did. So how do I know for sure that I’ll really “get it”? Everybody makes it sound like this effortless, magical transition, and all you have to do is live abroad and you’ll magically be fluent, but that’s not how it happens. It’s hard and it doesn’t happen overnight. You get overwhelmed, you make mistakes, you don’t understand and your confidence gets shaken. This has never stopped me from trying to speak, because generally I succeed in communicating, but for this stupid class, I’d had enough.

I trudged to the ISA office, trying to hold back tears, wanting to cry more for feeling embarrassed about crying in the street. Everything takes effort in life, and I can handle this when it’s an effort that I’m in control of, like a project or something creative—but when it’s an effort out of my hands, like when I’m learning a new skill and I suck at it, I get so incredibly frustrated. I just wanna do it now and do it right. It’s a flaw, I know, to not be able to accept failure or inability to do something—some people are more inspired by their failure and at times, I am too. But usually I get upset with myself if I really can’t do it well and then I assume that I’m just a failure overall. Dramatic, yes, I know, I know, but as a person who generally succeeds and does things well 90% of the time, that 10% where I just fail is hard for me to take. I’m learning to handle it better, but for now, let me cry in the corner.

Seafood? Sí, food!

Sunday, March 18^th, 2012

Our weekend in Rosario also included a short jaunt to the beach. Before the end of the boardwalk, I was already sweating and my plan to attempt homework on the beach was a failed one. But it seemed that by the time we arrived and sat for 20 minutes, it was already time to leave, even though it had been 3 hours…is time already going by that quickly?

We were dropped off in the city where we had just over an hour to enjoy ourselves. We attempted to find a feria, but we’d already visited the one we were nearest to and the next location was too far of a walk. But alas, we kept walking and encountered some great sights. We realized we needed to eat lunch and settled for a somewhat seedy looking place on the water. Olivia was dying for some fresh seafood and was thusly somewhat startled to see a GIGANTIC fried fillet of who knows what arrive as her milanesa de pescado. You want seafood? Well, here’s a mountain of it…

We had about 30 minutes to eat and walk back to the bus stop so we ate everything in 3 bites and ran back to our meeting place for the bus. We arrived sweating and hoping we hadn’t been left only to find that it would be an additional 20 minutes before the bus even showed up. HURRY UP AND RUN FASTER OR ELSE WE’RE GONNA MISS THE BU—it’s not here yet.

Angela and I enjoyed ourselves on the brink of exhaustion and crazy when we hit a huge traffic jam coming into the city. My iPod was dead, so we started singing, “aaaall that she wants is another bay-beh she’s gon’ tomorrow and aaaall that she wants is another bay-beh ye-ehhhhhhh” which happened to be playing on the radio blaring on the bus.

And that was our excursion to Rosario. Just enough time to say we went, but not enough time to actually say much else about it, unfortunately. Imagine a more tranquil, Parisian architecture-ized version of Buenos Aires filled with sudden parks and statues everywhere and that’s the basic idea. I wish I’d had more time…

United by Crepes

Saturday, March 17^th, 2012

While I totally failed to make it out for an evening of debauchery, the three people I was planning on meeting up with more than made up for my absence. So much so that they were actually absent when our bus to Rosario was leaving. Whoops! Somehow they’d all dismantled their alarms…Suddenly I was glad that I ended up staying home

As they trudged to Retiro to get on the next bus to Rosario, we were well on our way. During the trip we watched El Secreto de Sus Ojos and Nueve Reinas—both spectacular displays of Argentine cinema. The former is an intense memoir of solving the rape/homicide case that defined the lives and careers of all characters. While it is somewhat psychologically grueling, it’s a must see. It was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars several years ago and is highly regarded everywhere, especially in Argentina. The latter is a movie I’d watched with my host family before and this too is a great showcase of Argentina. Primarily because it’s focused upon thieves, scams, lunfardo and of course, Ricardo Darín (is there an Argentine movie he’s not in?!).

After a short trip, we arrived in Rosario to our luxurious (I’m being facetious) all you can eat lunch at an international buffet. I was seriously convinced I was back in Korea, because we ate at the exact same kind of place there and like always with buffets, you think there’s a lot of delicious food, but really, there’s just infinite disappointing choices. I kept my place to mostly vegetables but caved in to a crepe.

While waiting in line for a crepe, I recognized the girl in front of me from when I was trying to register in a translation course with Argentines (clearly to no avail) and decided to ask how she’d fared with it. Being that the crepe line was long, this led to a full blown conversation where we realized that we’d like to spend more time hanging out because we shared a lot of the same desires as to what we wanted to do in Argentina, as well as the same frustrations. And voila, a friend was made.

For most of my life, it seems that the most significant people are those that I happen to begin friendships with haphazardly—a chance trip to the dumpster at the same time, a conversation on the street corner of San Juan and Defensa or the recognition that we both felt uncomfortable at our first collegiate party…Sometimes you don’t realize it at the moment, or when you are good friends you can barely remember what happened exactly that brought you to where you are today, but you never know when that moment could be an important moment. It’s strange how your life can change based on where you were standing or what you happened to be doing at 11:38 pm on August 10^th, 2010. I’ll never get over this idea.

But I digress…

We returned to check into our hotel and my darling Angela was sitting in the lobby looking at me in that calm, confused, amused, almost pissed off way she does. We haven’t been friends for that long, but already I’m getting used to her expressions.

One quick shower later and we were back on the bus to head to the national flag monument which happens to be the largest monument to a flag in the world. I must say it rightfully earns this title. Photos will show you what I lack the verbage to say…

Rosario also happens to be known for its ice cream (can we just say that Argentina in general is known for beef, wine and now ice cream?). So after we admired the flag monument we satisfied the urge, although I was disappointed because the ice cream was a little less Argentine and a little more U.S.-y (I can’t say American because everyone in this continent is also American). We continued down Córdoba looking at all the stores and street vendors. Nothing really struck my fancy until we came upon a Tango sextet doing a life performance. It’s not that I love to tango or that I even like the music, it’s just simply a lovely sound that I frequently hear echoing through the streets of Argentina and this group was incredible. Olivia, Angela and I shelled out $5 pesos each to buy the CD so that we could have a souvenir from not just Rosario, but from Argentina in general.

Time kept passing and on our walk we encountered something exquisite—a sudden park (Rosario is full of these). But not only was it a beautiful park complete with several statues and a fountain, but it was covered in origami butterflies. There was no explanation as to why they were there or what they meant, but the total vision of all the folded butterflies was spectacular. Granted I’m an origami fan, but can you really say you’ve stumbled upon a park covered in it?

I gotta learn how to fold butterflies…

When the pre-func turned into the func

Friday, March 16^th, 2012

As you’ve probably noticed in my entries, I tend to have a different outlook on partying, compared to most other people my age. It’s not that I judge them in the sense that I think alcohol is bad (I drink too) or that I’m secretly jealous that they’re “cooler” than me. It’s just that I really fail to see how drinking copiously or otherwise intoxicating yourself all the time can be that much fun for years and years of your life—especially in a bar or club. Trust me, I’ve had some wild nights and I do like to imbibe, but I much prefer to party at a friend’s house where I know everybody and there’s space for talking, walking, playing games, etc—especially because I’m all about the conversation when I’m drunk. Bars are fun, but for the most part I don’t understand the outrageous prices, I can barely hear anybody even if they’re right next to me, and I really don’t like to be surrounded by groups of obnoxious idiots that I don’t know. Especially drunk, screaming girls. I can’t handle it. I would go out more to the clubs if I could just dance, but it never happens that a girl can dance by herself in a club. So, you see my dilemma. Instead of asking me to go to a bar, ask me to a house party and I’ll happily go and show you how I can have a good time.

But this Friday night, I was finally convinced that I needed to go out to a bar and see if it was worth the fuss and maybe just let off a little steam. The plans were set and I had my token bottle of New Age ready to go to prefunc at my house (because like I said, I’m not gonna spend $7 for one drink). Two glasses of wine later, I was starting to really feel it and I was starting to doubt if my friends were at the same bar and nobody seemed to be sending and receiving texts, so it was a lost cause. Around midnight I decided I wasn’t in the mood to take a bus by myself to this bar and stay out until 5 am. So Juan poured himself a beer and we turned the pre-func into the func.

For the next 3 hours, we talked about life. Really. I don’t know how else to describe it. We seemed to cover every topic from stupid to serious, simple to complicated. Somehow I managed to keep up and express myself properly. Maybe this is how it feels to flirt with fluency. You can’t give too much credit to a drunken conversation past midnight, but at the same time, this is what you lack in a bar. Maybe it’s weird that I was drinking and chatting with my host “dad”, but keep in mind he’s only turning 29 this year. And come on, everybody wants to party with their host family because that’s the crazy thing to do.

I felt really bad about seemingly “ditching” my friends, but I feel like I do this all the time in the US, too. “Yeah, I’ll meet you at Delt when I’m done here!” 3 hours later, I’m still talking to somebody I walked by in the hallway…oops. And that’s celebrated in Argentina. Obviously nobody likes getting ditched and people are bound to get mad if you never show up to things that you say you will attend…but at the same time, here, you don’t just end a conversation because there’s something else on your agenda. You’ll get to it when you get to it, and nobody feels guilty about it, whereas in the US, if we talk for an extra hour, we feel stressed because now we’re an hour behind, whereas here, it’s just a dent in the continuum of time that exists. There’s been several times where I was really late for something because I was chatting with my host family, or I had to stay up late finishing homework because the sobremesa after dinner lasted for 2 hours, but I don’t care. I can’t think of a time where after a conversation I felt like it hadn’t been worth it. Sure there’s a bunch of “talkers” here that talk without saying anything, but for the most part, I’m very intrigued by what people have to say—especially my host family. And all of it is practice for me. A practice in listening, responding, speaking, learning and processing—in Spanish. Not only that, but it’s a way to get to know others, myself and the culture.

Party stories are fun, but after the tenth one (or the first one ten times…) are they really that interesting? Yes, they do make good souvenirs sometimes, but I’d rather fill my hypothetical suitcase with something different. Its contents are found here, in this blog…

Description of my Classes

Latin American Film—You guessed it. We watch films made in Latin America (for example, Ciudad de Deus, Amores Perros, Nueve Reinas, XXY, El Secreto de Sus Ojos, etc.) then make commentary in class through discussion as well as oral presentations and writing assignments. The professor is very passionate about discussions and making us think critically about the content of the film. Additionally, she’s pretty stoked to have some Brazilians in our class. While there is reading, there’s no more than 5-10 pages/movie and it helps give you a background. Further, there’s not a lot of boring lecture, so it’s easy to stay engaged, but still feel like you’re learning a lot. Sometimes it’s hard to follow the movies, but that’s because I lack colloquial speech and slang. Recommend? Absolutely.

Latin American Cultural Studies—Obvious once again. We’re studying Latin American culture from the cultural studies perspective, which takes many different disciplines into account. Lara Mirkin was my professor for intensive month and she too is passionate about the city and conveying information to make sure we understand without making us feel stupid because she knows that a lot of times you can ask “do you understand?” and we nod yes, but we have no idea. Plus our class has a wide array of levels, so sometimes for me it may be a little easier, but it’s still very interesting and I really want to learn more about this subject because there are few opportunities to ever learn about it in the US despite it being our neighbor to the south…Recommend? Yes.

La geografía turística de Argentina—This is my course with argentines. We cover not only the physical geography of Argentina in every province, but also the social, cultural and economic character of each province as well. This is important because if you’re providing services to tourists, you have to understand the situations beyond “oh it’s pretty here!”. This sounds easy, but it is actually difficult because thus far, we have just been going through all the provinces, naming off interesting things to do and important cities. I can barely name all the provinces, much less give you a basic description of them—but I kind of can. Obviously, all the students have a pretty good idea (think of it as people from the US knowing all 50 states and being able to imagine their geography and cities, important places in each state—something probably most of us could do…maybe…) so for them, it’s easy. But our class is small with a few international students, so hopefully I can keep up! Recommend? Well if you’re a Geography/Spanish major that needs a course with Argentines and you have a high level of Spanish—yeah!

Latin American History in the 20^th Century—This might be my favorite class. I admittedly have a serious problem when it comes to enjoying history. If it happened before the 19^th century, I have trouble recalling it, and it often seems incredibly tedious and overly centralized in Europe. WE GET IT, IT’S THE “CENTER OF CIVILIZATION” (despite it basically destroying the Earth physically and spiritually and screwing its peoples for centuries…)—but seriously, what else was happening in the world back then!? Hugo Pomposo is chock full-o knowledge on history and recalls everything from memory without notes. He is wildly interesting and puts things in a perspective I have never heard before. Additionally, this subject is also very repressed in the US, so I really have no way of learning it in this manner. We know that in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue (and then raped and pillaged tons of villages). But we don’t know what on earth happened after that much farther south than Florida…And it’s insanely interesting. Recommend? Absolutely, absolutely.

Argentine Cultural Studies—Luis Amaya is crazy. He might be drunk. I’m not sure. What I am sure is that he brings an interesting dynamic to a subject that has already been fascinating since day one here. He too is not necessarily keen on lecturing for hours and hours, rather he goes (stumbles, runs…you know, however he can get there) around the room asking students about certain topics that we’re discussing—asking us to explain them, give examples, give our own opinions. Everything is on the spot. He’s not one bit hesitant to point out flaws with the culture or ask us to consider just what in the world is going on with X. He wants to show us the repressed aspects, in addition to the beautiful aspects of this complex culture. Recommend? Yes!

As for the style of teaching, I love it. I am enthusiastic about this type of learning. All too often in the US we are given a block of information copied down in pages and pages of a notebook then forgotten until the day before the test. In all of my classes here, I’m constantly engaging with the material because most of the professors admit they’d die if they had to listen to themselves talk for an hour and a half, so why should we be subjected to it? Everything is a discussion, or a critical thinking session.

As for the homework load, I’m about to die in ecstasy of not suffocating under a mountain of 40 page PDFs, 10 readings for each class. I do have reading, and it’s all in Spanish, so it’s not simple, but I’m at a high enough level that I can cruise at a nice reading speed. Additionally, we have a lot of short papers to write. But instead of summaries, like in the US, they call for us to digest the information and come up with a response to it. So this not only means you read it, but that you understand it and can find its strengths and flaws, then respond in Spanish. Because in case you didn’t realize, all of my classes are completely in Spanish.

Everyone thinks that when you study abroad, you take easy-peasy classes and screw around all day. Maybe these classes are easier because we’re coming from the context that, ok, this is not my first language, so obviously the structure of the class has to be different. But at the same time, I think there’s a difference between easy classes versus classes with lighter work-loads that still require you to think critically in a foreign language. It’s by no means easy, but it’s nowhere near the workload I’m used to slaving over back in the US. For some people, this means “easier” and “I’m going to party all the time”. But for me, it means I have more time to think about, learn, appreciate and engage with the material as well as have more free time to just relax and chat with my host family.

The best part, though? We don’t have class on Friday!!!!!!!!!

I never want to hear you complain about clogged servers on registration day again.

Thursday, March 15^th, 2012

FINALLY. I finally have a solution to my crisis with my classes that was going on all this week. Monday was our registration day and I woke up nice and early to log in and sign up for my classes. But wait. I never received that email with my account information. It’s kind of hard to log in without that…By 9:30 I was in “I’m not panicking yet, but I don’t really like where this is going” mode until Angela told me the format of how to log into our school’s site. Oh. Magically mine worked (there were many other students that had received the email but nothing worked for them). 10 seconds later, I had all my classes added and it was a grand time. I arrived to the university with students in a panic. A lot of people had not had the same luck that I did and weren’t registered and some classes were already full.

I was thinking everything was fine and dandy until I realized by Thursday, two of my classes just weren’t going to cut it. I was at the 6 class capacity, so I had to drop one anyway, but neither class pleased me and I wanted to switch into the Latin American film class. I tried to make the switch online, but suddenly, my user name and password were invalid. What? I used this 3 days ago and didn’t make any account changes. How does that happen?? NOOOO!!!! I need to get out of these classes and into the other one. But it was not working.

Here’s the deal with technology in Argentina…I’m not saying it’s bad, because they do have it and when it works, it works. But in a lot of aspects, this type of technology is out of reach. We get it for cheap in the US because we buy it from China. Argentina has much different import policies. So it’s not that you can’t get the latest iPhone, it’s that it might be harder to find and by god you are going to pay through your nose for it because it’s not made in Argentina. The other side to technology here is the functionality of it. Like I said, when it works, it works. But when it doesn’t, well, I hope you weren’t trying to do anything important. Some technology is outdated, untrustworthy or just downright temperament. And that’s the rub. Things can stop entirely without warning and without remorse, but then start working with just as little notice. The world keeps going, though. For this, Argentines are incredibly flexible and creative in this sense.

After 4 visits to “the guy”, my account FINALLY worked. Somehow I was in the system on Monday, then by Thursday, I was apparently not a student at the university. Oh. Yeah. Ok, sure… Luckily, the film class I wanted had 15 extra spots, so I didn’t have to be on a waiting list. The good part of this whole debacle was that while initially I was very anxious and fearful that I wouldn’t get my class or that the solution to this would be tedious, after Monday, I just stopped caring.  After making my inquiry with the school and checking up on it, there was absolutely nothing else I could do, so I hoped for the best, then just stopped caring. It will work when it’s supposed to, if it’s supposed to I told myself. And guess what—it did!

The only bad thing was that I realized I didn’t want to be in the literature class after buying the $120 peso textbook for it and nobody would buy it off me…If you’re interested in reading Foucault or 19th century Spanish lit, let me know. I hate that I dropped the class for it being “too hard”, but at the same time, do I want to read ~40 pages a week of advanced text in Spanish? No. No I don’t. There’s a difference between challenging yourself and resigning yourself to a semester of highlighting every other word to look up on wordreference. This class would be difficult in English, too…

For more about my classes, however, see my other entry, “Description of my classes”. Original, no?

Notes on Argentine Culture #9: General Observations

·         Stray animals are much more common here. Whilst I was in Bariloche, I saw millions of stray dogs every day. The odd difference is that stray animals here are somehow well kept. They don’t look like flea-bitten, rabies-ridden heaps of shredded fur with red eyes and missing body parts like they do in the US. Sometimes, you can look at the dog and seriously ask yourself if it’s stray or if this is the inspiration for that Baja Men song…You might even be overcome with the urge to pet it. In Buenos Aires, it’s more stray cats than dogs, and sometimes they are the mewing balls of disease you’d imagine (saw one with a missing eye once L ). But the people have taken pity on the kitties, as in many famous public areas (botanical gardens or the Recoletta cemetery), they are cared for.

·         The kissing—Argentina, like some other places in the world, has a custom of greeting or bidding farewell with a kiss on the cheek. Here, it is one kiss, on the right cheek. When I say kiss, I don’t mean with lips and romance and jealous girlfriends every time you meet up with someone. I mean, you more or less “kiss” merely by touching cheeks. And it’s not just if you’re in the mood to do this, or you only do it to one person. For example, if I was having a birthday party with 20 guests, in addition to me kissing all 20 guests that arrived, each new arrival would kiss all the guests already there. So lucky guest 20 would have to go around the room and kiss 19 people. And the first person to leave would have to do the same. Sometimes it’s ridiculous when there’s a lot of people (ie: more than 3) but it’s a tradition I love and that I’m planning on bringing to the US with me even if it makes people uncomfortable.

And yes, to answer your question, men kiss men, women kiss women, women kiss men and men kiss women. It doesn’t matter if your straight, gay, single, married, depressed, old, young ugly, crazy or any other variation—you’re not arriving or leaving without a kiss.

·         NO—“No” is only 1/3 of an answer here. Even with conviction in your voice, you have to say no at least 3 times before it really means no. Without conviction, it will never mean no. So if you’re undecided, it’s probably going to come off to whoever is asking as a yes—so be careful with men and more dessert. This is different than in the US where no can mean “ABSOLUTELYNONOTEVERNOPEWHYWOULDYOUEVENASK” or it can mean “OMGYESIWASHOPINGYOUWOULDASKMEBUTIDON’TWANTTOLOOKLIKEIDIDWANTITSOI’MGOINGTOSAYNOANDHOPEYOUUNDERSTANDTHATITMEANS100%YES” and whoever’s asking has to decipher the real answer. Here they’re going to assume the latter until you clearly assert the former. Sometimes it’s kinda nice because I can cave into things and blame it on the asker; but other times, like with men, it’s like by the 8^th no, I’m going to kill someone. 

·         Jews!—Ok this is not a note on Argentine culture but on Israeli culture. I didn’t realize that all Israelites have a 2 year term in the military. After their tour is up, they generally go travel somewhere for several months as they’ve “earned it”. Additionally, they generally all speak English. I know US-Israel relations make that statement seem obvious, but I never met anyone from Israel before! I mention this because 90% of everybody in my hostel in Bariloche was from Israel. And they told me there’s always a Jew somewhere in every corner of the world…And just like the stereotype goes, they ARE hilarious.

·         Students—Students here seem to be really friendly to the foreigners, which was surprising because Argentina’s general attitude towards us (especially as tourists) seems to not be so favorable. They seem eager to meet international students as well as help us with anything we have questions about. They aren’t afraid to admit the flaws of Argentine politics or agree with us on aspects of their culture that make no sense.

 

·         Text books—Are suuuuuuuuper cheap!! Why? Because they’re not the 398^th 2012, 5 minutes from now edition. They are a series of articles and other relevant materials compiled by your professor and printed en masse by the university. They’re essentially just spiral notebooks that can be really big or small, depending on the type of class. My priciest book was $67 pesos, so that’s ~$16 USD. The better part is that because they’re organized specifically for your class by your professor, there’s not extraneous material and you don’t have to skip around. You’re basically just holding a big syllabus in your hands. And you can write in them all you want because it’s not like you’re going to sell it back to Amazon or the bookstore…

I feel like I'm in kindergarten again...

Monday, March 12, 2012

You know which room the class is in right? And make sure to say hi to the teacher. Don’t be scared! Don’t forget your lunch. If you don’t understand something, ask! It’s a little confusing sometimes, ok? And be safe and don’t talk to strangers. But make lots of new friends! I love you! Have a great first day of your second semester, junior year of college (in Argentina)!!!!

I feel a little like I’m in kindergarten. I feel nervous. I feel unsure. I’m sure sometimes I speak Spanish like a kindergartener, so maybe that’s how it’s supposed to be...so as I approached the 10^th floor (out of 17, mind you—attending college in a skyscraper is different), I started to feel a little a little queasy in the elevator. I hope my classes aren’t too hard, but not too easy. What if I don’t make any friends? What if, what if, what if?!

But I tried to give myself a little more confidence by reminding myself that I’d already been here for a month and had taken the refresher “intensive month” course, so really I was that much farther ahead. How all the new-arrivals for the semester that had only been here for a week were doing so well, I have no idea. I would have been in full meltdown mode.

Because when you think about it, it’s not just going to class. It’s taking the right transportation to get there, which in Argentina sometimes functions flawlessly, but other times, not. With that comes the earned confidence about your mode of transportation—not having to look down at your crinkled paper that says the bus number and where the stop is and not gazing at the map for the whole journey just to make sure you’re really going the right direction down Cabildo. Additionally, it’s about functioning in an entirely different language. You’re taking classes with mostly Americans (but with a few people from all over the world sprinkled in, too), but in class that doesn’t matter and your only way to communicate is through Spanish. Your only way to understand is in Spanish—especially if you’re in a class with Argentines as I am. It’s basically turning your life on its head while still taking notes, doing homework and studying for tests, even if you feel like you have no idea what’s going on.

So in addition to all the usual doubts and difficulties of attending college, those are transposed into a new culture and context. And like always, I feel like the one person who cares about my classes and is passionate about learning the material, while most of my peers are thinking about when it’s going to be Friday so they can get drunk. Which I’m sure they did, because much like “syllabus week” in the US (which, IMHO, is syllabus day because after day one, my profs aren’t still discussing the syllabus…) there wasn’t a lot going on yet and we still had to buy our books.

Feliz cumple, Ana!

Saturday, March 10^th, 2012

Today was my host mom’s birthday, and much like women turning 30 in the US, she was a little unsure about the idea. And while I’m only 21, I remember being a lot younger thinking that 30 was so old, but in reality, it’s still so young. Especially because Ana could still pass for being in her 20s easily.

After returning from Bariloche, I headed to a librería (think school supply shop) to find some colored paper to make her a card. In addition to having AWFUL greeting cards here, I think in the course of my life, I’ve made 90% of the special-occasion cards that I’ve given to friends and family and Ana was no exception. I encountered a surprise at the librería when I found origami paper for one peso! I’m far from being even mediocre at origami, but when I have time, I love to practice my favorite folds and attempt some new ones. I’m a master at cranes so I bought 10 sheets for .50 USD and started thinking of a way I could use them for Ana’s card. Also, being a school supply fanatic, I couldn’t help but purchase them for my first day of school. I got everything for $50 pesos and while this isn’t necessarily a bargain, it’s still pretty cheap and totally worth the school supply high.

Once I returned from the store, I saw the kitchen in an organized disarray. Ana was baking her own birthday cakes! Cakes. Plural. She was making cheesecake, lemon meringue and some kind of nutty/coffee crumble cake. All of these by the magic of her hands. She generally always makes everything from scratch. I know we all have these nostalgic romantic fantasies about a “home cooked meal from scratch” and mine are no different. I’ve never had a from-scratch cheesecake. The closest I’ve gotten is a prepackaged crust and prepackaged cheesecake mix. This pales in comparison to the genius of Ana’s cooking. The worst part is that she never believes me on how incredible her culinary skills are. Probably because for her, it’s completely normal and she’s been doing it since childhood. But for me, almost never do I see “pure” ingredients going into a handmade cake. The convenience to make a cheesecake in less than 20 minutes is invaluable—but you’re always going to sacrifice taste and increase your chemical intake.

While I wanted to help her, I seemed to only be getting in the way and given that I didn’t have the recipe memorized, I wasn’t going to be much help. Plus with the food processor going every 2 minutes, it was hard to keep a conversation so instead, I passed the day Skyping with mi novio <3

After an afternoon of being overly social with my boyfriend, I realized that I probably appeared to be anti-social to my host family. Towards the end of our conversation, I began to hear people arriving to our house for Ana’s birthday and I opened my bedroom door into Ana’s family standing in the kitchen, huddling over food and adoring Ana’s niece.

The birthday party was interesting because while it was distinctively Argentine in terms of the conversation, hand gestures and manner of speech, if you only saw a photo of it, it would look like any familial get-together in the US due to the variety of food and drink in addition to the warmth (and loudness) of everyone towards each other. Later on in the evening I brought out my Rebel to photograph the priceless face of Ana’s niece, Sofia, but also because nobody else had a camera and I am on my mission to take more photos. The thing was that I wanted to snap candid photographs; capture the expressions and genuine Argentine sentiments. But I couldn’t do this because in addition to being one of the least conspicuous cameras around, Rebels are also incredibly noisy. You can definitely hear every snapshot. But regardless, I tried my best.

After the “family” birthday party, there was the party with Ana’s friends at a neighborhood bar. Obviously, I only knew Ana, Juan and the few people from the family party that happened to be here too. Once my roommate left around 2ish, I felt a little awkward because I’m not sure how to start a conversation in Spanish in a bar when I’m not drunk and I can barely hear anything with a group of people I don’t know, staring at me like “uhh, are you supposed to be here?”. But finally I had the guts to talk to Ana’s brother who introduced me to his friend who was intrigued by my being from the US. And then he asked me to dance.

When it comes to structured dance, I understand that if the man knows how to dance, you’re supposed to let him lead, and I try. I really try, but because I don’t know what to anticipate, it’s hard for me to just go with the flow, because I don’t know where the flow is coming from, nor where it’s going. For this, I probably looked like a Lego trying to dance, and my new friend laughed at me just telling me to relax. I have no idea what the exact style of dance was, but it involved this movement of shaking your bum without actually shaking your bum. It was in the hips and legs—kind of like bellydancing (which I learned the secret to this summer at my local library!). During a faster paced song, I was snatched away by the jumping, screaming group of women who I was glad to “be a part of”.

By 4 am, I was starting to get a little delirious despite the fact that I’d only had half of a beer 2 hours ago. I asked a noticeably more intoxicated Juan if I could go back to the house and he said sure. Given that we’d driven here and it was now 4am, I was a little nervous about walking home completely alone in Nuñez, but at the same time, there was no way I could wait any longer.

Finally rounding the corner to the apartment, I crashed in my tiny bed smelling of humidity and cigarettes—a smell that will always have a hint of BA to it, but a smell that I will never be fond of no matter how good the night was…

Notes on Argentine Culture #8: ¿Chocolate para tu amante?

I know I´ve already spilled my guts about how disgusted I am with guys in clubs here, but I thought I´d take an entry to explain general things I´ve observed about male Argentine attitudes towards love, sex and romance, as well as how I´ve responded to them.

First of all, for all of you who told me I needed to be single before I came here (myself included)--that can be the best advice, but also the worst. The best in the sense that if you’re single you don´t spend time driving yourself crazy thinking about the one you love (which I do every minute of every day); the worst in the sense that if you aren´t committed to someone else you might actually get swindled by these men who are only looking to trick you.

Romance here is so prevalent here as to not really mean anything. People here make out on the colectivo as though the world were ending outside the bus. Obviously the world is carrying on as normal as ever past the swinging doors...If I could describe myself in one word it would be passionate (or romantic...), so I understand these people--however, when you put such passion in the face of the public all the time, it loses its value. Suddenly being 14 with your novio on a street corner means you´re Romeo and Juliet. But only to you and your boyfriend. To everybody else, you´re just two nobodies...Men say "I love you" to me on the street. And trust me, once I drop the L-word, I´m sure I sound like a broken record with it, but to use it to effectively solicit sex or to make a sale is a cardinal sin to this hopeless romantic. Thus, I wonder what men actually say to women that they truly love and how do they actually know it´s the real thing? True there is a difference between te amo and te quiero, with te amo being the true, passionate, romantic love, but even this is starting to lose sentiment.

I started thinking about this when I was buying my host family some chocolates in Bariloche. At first the employee seemed friendly and informative as I told him I was a student in BA, but then he asked jokingly if the chocolates were for my amante (“lover”). This just sounded awkward because they were for the complete opposite of a lover—my “family”. So I blurted out “No!” which obviously prompted him to assert that I did indeed have an amante. I explained that they were for my host family and that while I would like to send some to my lover, he’s in the US, so by the time they arrived, they wouldn’t be so fresh. Then he corrected me and said that an amante was not a novio (boyfriend) and insisted that I get an amante in Argentina because I won’t get to see my boyfriend for several months.

While he was probably just joking around, at the same time, he was actually being kind of serious and I was getting annoyed. Yeah, sure I need a lover in Argentina. Should it be you, chocolate store guy?! Get real. Yes, I do go insane knowing that I can’t even hold hands with my boyfriend for the next 4 months and for some people, that would make a really good excuse to cheat or start an “affair”. But to me that’s one of the most disrespectful things you could do to someone you love. I have no tolerance for cheating and I would never do it. No matter how you “justify” it, you’re still essentially saying (with your actions) that despite how much a person means to you, a moment of physical pleasure is worth more than everything they have to offer. Maybe that’s dramatic, but really, why is cheating becoming such a permissible act? Why is that OK and expected in Argentina? Part of me wants to find out, but I feel like I already know the answer.

I’m not saying I don’t enjoy the physical, because I do, but I’m not an animal. Six months without even being able to kiss him seems impossible, and for some, I’m so young, why waste time waiting? I’m in my prime to be physical and not care. The thing is, that’s not who I am. And if anyone understood even a small fraction of why I decided to stay with him through my experience here, they too would call me a complete idiot if I gave him up simply for some fleeting physical experience that meant nothing. Maybe love is blind, but at least it’s guided by something other than a fleshy compass…

Maybe I’m mistaken, but the reality seems to be that I really feel that most guys are just trying to sleep with me and have blatantly disrespected the boundaries I have spelled out by saying that I have a boyfriend. Men have tried to project their physical desires onto me, making it seem like they should be my desires because I’m the one about to go without for 4 more months. We always joked about me meeting my soulmate down here and the wedding invitations arriving in Spanish. But that idea seems ridiculous given the attitudes here on sex, intimacy, gender roles and love that absolutely do not match up with mine. That, and then there’s the small fact that I maybe kind of met him already back in the US…oops…

Pickpocket attempt #1

Saturday, March 10^th, 2012

We’d survived the 2^nd 20 hour bus ride and arrived ahead of schedule at Retiro. All I had to do was make it to the train and walk the 5 blocks back to my house and I was golden. I was quite cautious outside the bus station as in addition to my backpack, I had my small, gimpy suitcase squeaking behind me. We were close to the train station when out of the corner of my eye I saw a woman approaching me and felt something on my back. GET THE #^%$ AWAY FROM ME YOU CRAZY PUTA! NO NO NO NO NO!!!!!!!!! I’VE BEEN MUSTARD TRICKED!!!!!!! Except instead of mustard, it was actually sunscreen*. In case you don’t know what that means, here’s what’s up:

The “mustard trick” is when someone spills something on you or squirts it on your back as you walk by. Your natural reaction is “huh? what’s that?!” leaving you distracted and more likely to make a fatal mistake that ends with you getting pickpocketed unknowingly while the accomplice tries to “help” you wipe off the mustard. The worst part is, in BA, the accomplice can be a kid or a woman, which makes the victim feel like they are actually just trying to help. That’s never the case. And sadly in this city, every time somebody offers to help me, I assume they’re trying to rob me so I always say NO and skitter away.

But luckily I’d been told about the mustard trick and as soon as I saw the woman I screamed “NO NO NO!” and ran away. While there’s a 110% chance of getting pickpocketed in this city, the good news is that most of these occur without violence so it wasn’t like I started running and she ran after me. If they can’t get you, they’ll wait around for another victim.

While waiting for the train, I had Angela help me wipe off the sunscreen and felt like I was having a non-panic-attack-panic-attack. I wasn’t panicking, but I was in total disbelief over what had just happened and reeling over how lucky I was that nothing got stolen. I didn’t have any money, but I had an iPad, iPod, Canon Rebel, Canon point and shoot and my cell phone. It’s stupid to have all those things on your person, what would you bring on a 20 hour bus ride to Patagonia, you know?

When I made it home, I was still a little shaken. I thought about the woman approaching me and immediately felt enraged. I know some of those people steal because they have no other option, but at the same time, is that really true? It’s hard to know for sure. Additionally, it makes me feel that no matter how much I can come to know and like this city, I will never accept it as a home because I distrust everybody and can never let my guard down for one second, making it stressful to do any and everything. I sometimes don’t even feel safe walking around alone in the daytime. More reasons why I get homesick sometimes…

*Sunscreen is really expensive here, so why they’re using that to fling mercilessly on people they want to rob, I’m not sure. Classy pickpockets…who knew…

Last days in paradise

Wed/Thurs/Friday March 7^th-9^th, 2012

While I don’t want to say we just sat around and did nothing, our last 2 days in Bariloche were pretty relaxed as we were short on cash and all three of us were going in and out of being sick (very strange…). We shopped around for souvenirs, ate MORE helado and chocolate, went to a chocolate museum, enjoyed the sun and walked around the streets browsing. Looking back, I wish we’d done one more excursion type thing, but being that I left with $8 pesos in my wallet and in debt $20 pesos to Angela, I guess I can’t have too many regrets.

For our last night we met up with Toshy and Elan who had managed to make their way down after a week of camping in San Juan de los Andes. Once again we met up in the plaza and took the bus to Cervecería Blest, which is a small local brewery. The ambiance was exactly what we were hoping for as we were greeted by a chill waitress who didn’t judge us for ordering 2 pizzas. After trying the beer sampler, Toshy and Elan got a pitcher of the red while I enjoyed my cider beer. It was truly nectar of the gods status. Hands down the best beer of my life. It was pretty much just juice, though…We took in the fresh air, full moon, sparkling lights and succulent final colors of summer and felt like the luckiest SOBs in the world, because not only we were enjoying some of the best brews and pizza around, we were friends in Patagonia, and that warrants some warm, fuzzy feelings.

But all good things must come to an end and Friday we headed back to the bus station for our 20 hour return trip. I kicked off the ride with some cool liquid drum and bass as I stared into infinity, watching Bariloche disappear from my sight…

At some point during the ride, we had to stop for a small mechanical fix and I didn’t get pissed off. Normally, I would have thought “omg are you serious we have to stop this is stupid get me outta here I’m gonna kill someone if this takes more than five seconds why is it broken didn’t they check it before we left how stupid it’s not that hard just fix it so we can go just GOOOOOOOOO” (note the non-use of commas).  But as soon as the announcement was made, I calmly got off the bus and thought back to the text I’d sent Juan about how I told him I’d let him know when we arrived in BA—not a big deal to say in English—but in Spanish, I had to use the subjunctive and now I realized why. I heard a cracking sound come out from somewhere and assumed it was a metaphor for my mind opening itself up to the subjunctive mindset. It felt so good. Now only 12 hours to go!

And in case you’re wondering, they showed the exact same movie line-up that they did on our trip to Bariloche. So that’s right—I saw Grown Ups twice. Don’t worry, I already hate myself enough for it that you don’t have to. 

NBD--it's just more trees and lakes and perfection

Tuesday, March 6^th, 2012

Circuito Chico was our destination for the day and we set off on what we hoped was the right bus to the end of town to pedal our hearts out on the legendary bike path. For $90 pesos you can rent bikes that take you on a 20 mile loop around Lago Moreno and all its breathtaking views. We started off with enthusiasm and were immediately met with the first spectacular vista of the lake. The water again was an unreal crystal sapphire blue. We looked like the world’s biggest tourists as we grabbed our cameras every 4 seconds, but every angle was a good shot, so we had to take the photos. Immediately following the first vista, however, was a huge hill. Ok, I can tackle this…slow and steady…then I rounded the corner and saw yet another huge hill. Alright just keep chugging—no who am I kidding this sucks I think my heart’s going to explode! And why am I wearing leggings and a long sleeve shirt? Those have GOT to go. I guess since I haven’t worked out in a month I’m a little out of shape…that and I really never ride bikes, so that made it extra challenging. But at the same time, the air was so fresh and the views were so beautiful that I didn’t mind the extra work.

And this carried on for the next 5 hours—photos, beautiful views and the horrifically steep and drawn out hills. The final stretch was almost unbearable, but we made it and felt like we’d not only accomplished something physically worthwhile, but spiritually worthwhile. There’s biking and then there’s biking in Patagonia…

We were all exhausted after our biking adventure so we all wanted a nap. The problem was that I couldn’t fall asleep. But I wasn’t exactly awake…2 sweaty, tossing and turning hours later I decided to get out of bed because now I was starving. We all agreed that we were running low on cash so instead of going out, we opted for grocery shopping and cooking at the hostel. In classic Nikki fashion, I concocted a Nikki original: Nikki’s hodge-podge dinner featuring all the food groups individually. I didn’t actually make a meal where the ingredients fused together, but hey I like having eggstomatoescheeseandcrackersandavocado with an almost mimosa for dinner. It’s healthy, filling and delicious. Try and tell me otherwise!

Eating Mexican food with Chileans in Argentina

Monday, March 5^th, 2012

Today, we had high hopes of going to a legendary breakfast place called The Map Room (as a geography major, my heart fluttered a little). Unfortunately, The Map Room is now room for rent, as it is no longer open. Oh. So we had lunch at Friends’ Café instead. Fitting, no?

But really eating that breakfast was just an excuse to make us look like we weren’t having ice cream for breakfast, and that’s really what we were after. We went back to Del Tourista for more ice cream and I caved to chocolate almond and white chocolate. What a divine combination. While Gus and Angela pondered their choices, I was sitting with Ryan and he noticed there was a Chilean guy he had met on the bus (you know, when it was filled with 100 people…) standing by the chocolate counter so he waved and said hi. Alejandro and his wife Carolina walked over and we started a cheery conversation about Bariloche, Chile and the basic “get to know you” kinds of things. They were perhaps the most congenial couple I’ve ever met and Ryan boldly asked them what they were doing for dinner that night so that we could all spend more time together. They accepted the invitation and we planned to meet in the plaza at 8. We practically left the chocolate store skipping and giggling like children because we were so excited to have met such wonderful people.

And that’s just the kind of place Bariloche is. While it completely plays up the fact that it’s a tourist destination, it’s the kind of place where it’s OK to be a tourist. You have so many opportunities to meet people from anywhere in the world that are happy to meet you too. It’s the bigger, international version of McCall, Sun Valley and some places in BC, Canada. Sure, you shouldn’t go talking to strangers and sometimes it’s the exact people that you should stay away from that try and entice you more, but this isn’t the movie Taken. It’s a small town known for its outdoor activities and kind people that are down for a conversation anytime. If you’ve been keeping up, you know this is the polar opposite of Buenos Aires which is one of the world’s largest cities filled with questionable people and thieves galore in addition to little tolerance for anyone who’s not a Porteño. The scenery and attitude reminded me so much of the West Coast that I got incredibly homesick every time I breathed in or opened my eyes (i/e every second). There’s a lot to be said for the cosmopolitan metropolises like Buenos Aires, but I immediately felt a sense of comfort and relief in Bariloche and almost wished I was studying abroad there instead. I always thought I was an urban girl, and I am…but I’m also from a friendly-sized city chock full o’ mountains, rivers, lakes and greenery where the air is clean no matter where you’re standing—and I’m realizing that I don’t think I can ever compromise these things in the long term wherever I choose to live—despite the fact that I always made fun of people who said exactly that.

8 o’clock rolled around and we were greeted once again by our Chilean friends. We deliberated for several minutes about whether or not we should return to the parilla or try the Mexican restaurant we’d seen earlier in the day. We decided on Mexican because we couldn’t say no to the idea of eating a burrito…something I’ve been longing for ever since I got here. When I get back to the US, I’m seriously going to eat beans and rice every day. We practically owned the downstairs as there was nobody else eating there.

While I can’t necessarily name specific things we talked, we grazed over politics, the economy, Chile vs. Argentina, significant others (Alejandro was always in love with Carolina [and they knew each other from childhood], but she always went for guys with darker skin until one day she realized she loved him too and they’ve been married for 11 years J). These are the kinds of conversations I live for. When we were finished with dinner and the sobremesa afterwards, we took photos in hopes that they would capture the moment and how we all felt, and maybe they did. We swapped contact info and then parted ways outside the restaurant and it felt like saying goodbye to family. That, to me, seems like the real Latin America and I hope I can find more of it. Carolina and Alejandro, you are by far one of the best memories I will have in Bariloche.