Y no dejamos de comer

Sunday, June 3^rd

Lara is one of my favorite Argentines. She was my professor for my intensive in month in February, and I continued to have class with her in the regular semester, so in a way she’s “been there” throughout my entire experience here. The only thing she loves more than Buenos Aires is literature—so, yeah, saying she’s a gem is an understatement. I felt a little bad for the other students in our Latin American Cultural Studies class, because there are 3 of us from her intensive month class and it’s clear that she doesn’t mind playing favorites, especially when those favorites give her gum, candy and actually participate in the class.

One day before class, she asked me to talk to her in the other room and I thought, oh god, did I have a grammatical trainwreck that she overheard?? No. She was inviting me and a few other students over to meet her family and have a leisurely afternoon of snacks and chatting. As a big fan of snacks and chatting and Lara, I was all in.

The day finally came and after the most convoluted bus-catching affair (come on 29, I waved my 2-liter Coke at you while I was running and you still didn’t wait for me?!) I arrived to Lara’s place and was greeted by her man candy, Pablo, who might be too good to be true—he’s funny, listens to good music and is too nice. While I arrived perfectly on time by Argie standards, everybody else was already there, so I felt like I was late. Luckily we were still going strong on snacks, though. As the afternoon went on, we all ate a little more, laughed a little louder and talked a little more. Meeting Lara’s precious little daughter was great too. She laughed, cooed and danced—and absolutely refused to go to bed because she was missing out on all the fun.

While it escapes me what all we talked about (though I’ll never forget Lara reading the opening paragraph of Catcher in the Rye…), I left feeling happy, full and fortunate to know these 3 people in a city of 3 million. I’ve generally always maintained a pretty close rapport with my teachers, and Lara is no exception. She is passionate, intelligent and congenial. Indirectly, she was there in my lowest moment of the experience (when I first arrived), and she helped me celebrate one of my highest moments, merely sharing food, stories and time with her family. I have to come back to Argentina, even just to share a coffee with her—that curly hair and rrrrrrrolling r’s and all.

Oleeeeee, ole, ole, ole, Messiiiiiiii, Messiiiiiii

Saturday, June 2^nd, 2012

Admittedly, I am not a soccer fan. At all. But I would feel a little ashamed of myself knowing that I was in Argentina and didn’t catch one single match, so the Argentina v. Ecuador game was the perfect opportunity. For one thing, it was WAY cheaper than I thought it would be, ~$50, and nobody was stabbed after the game in the typical soccer rivalry violence.

We set out for River Stadium knowing basically how to get there, but then we realized it would be impossible to get lost because there were hundreds of people walking to the stadium decked out in Argentina’s flag and colors. I’ve never really been a sports fan or had “school spirit”, but it was pretty cool to see so many people rooting for their team (and therefore their country). Not to mention, I love the Argentine flag, and it was everywhere. You’d think it was 9 de Julio (Arg. Independence day).

We finally got there (after much ado over which entrance we needed) and while it was horribly windy and cold, with seats made of concrete (that probably haven’t been cleaned since they were made) we were excited, especially as we watched more and more fans pour in. Because it wasn’t a very important game, there was only one section for Ecuador, which they filled in nicely, even coordinating their thunderstick colors to match their flag.

As we waited for the match to start, I realized that the soccer field looked gigantic, but tiny at the same time. When I watch soccer on TV (which is practically never) the fields always look so huge. Like it would take you 10 minutes to run the whole field. But all those aisles up, and it looked like the pee-wee fields I used to play soccer in when I was 9. Then when the players filed onto the field, it seemed immense again as they looked like little specks against the vast greenness. I couldn’t even get a non-blurred photo of the game because the zoom was that close up.

It didn’t take long before I really started getting into the game, but obviously my slight interest was nothing compared to the passion of the people around me. I had a family sitting next to and behind me, and the 10 and 14 year old boys were screaming things that would have gotten my mouth rinsed with soap for things as simple and harmless as failed passes. LA CONCHA DE TU MADREEEEEEE!!!!!! QUE PUTOOOOO! Or just getting mad when anyone on the Argentine team had the ball and didn’t immediately pass it to Messi.

And while I’m about as versed in soccer as I am in molecular biology (which is to say I am not), I was well aware of the god-like status Lionel Messi possesses in the soccer world. Normally he plays for FC Barcelona, but being that he is Argentine, he plays for the national team when appropriate. Normally I am never drawn to athletes because I think they’re over-glorified, over-paid and over-idolized and while I’ll admit they’re talented, I have never liked watching sports so on me, their talent is lost. But Messi…alright I understand the hype because that guy was a one man soccer show. I’m not even really sure he needed any of the other players. His skills are incredible. He could maneuver a ball through just about any situation, at full speed. No wonder the whole world is obsessed with him.

Being that Messi is unstoppable, Ecuador put up their best fight but were unable to score any goals and we won. The crowd went craaaazy. But being that Ecuador is just Ecuador, the crowd was fairly calm. Had this been a Boca/River game (aka the 2 clubs in BA) there probably would have been gunshots and butterfly knives. Who knows. Though we did have to wait until all the Ecuador fans had cleared the stadium to ensure their safety. Which seemed less safe, as the more we waited, the more people seemed to curse the slow Ecuadorians. And despite how offensive and racist porteños can get, they’re in my top 3 things to listen to when they get like that. Sometimes you’d swear they’re speaking Italian/bird/sign language all at once. Nope. Solamente el castellano porteño. It’s a souvenir I wish I could bring with me, because listening to English just sucks now that I’ve heard Argentine Spanish…that's going to be hard to cope with when I get back to the US...but for now DALE ARGENTINAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Back to La Boca

Friday, June 1^st, 2012

Ok, it’s terrible to admit it, but it had been a while since I’d been to La Boca neighborhood (more specifically, El Caminito, where all the houses are painted) and I was up for a tourist adventure to get some more pictures.

I KNOW El Caminito is the venus flytrap of tourism in BA, but, I wanted to re-explore it and see if there was supposed to be more to it than taking pictures in what they want you to believe is the most Buenos Aires-y part of the city. Maybe even find out a little bit of its history…

Nope. We were snapping away on our cute little colored Canons being accosted by every single vendor, restaurant owner and anyone else trying to make a buck off the tourists passing by. It was so uncomfortable. You could be the ugliest person on earth and they’d still swarm you saying how beautiful you are, so being even kind of attractive, it took us 5 minutes to walk 5 feet.

The more and more I travel, the more and more I feel uncomfortable being a tourist because even though there are certain things you have to see, like La Boca, there are other things you have to discover or enjoy from your own point of view without being interrupted by wide-eyed tango dancers hoping to score $30 for a photo with tango poses that I don’t even know how to dance. It feels fake. Obviously tourism can make or break a local/national economy and I do the “touristy” things in almost every city I visit, but something I’ve realized that in 4 months, I’ve visited more sites in Argentina and Buenos Aires then some of the natives themselves—but before I toot my own horn about that, I realize that it could be because even thinking about being surrounded by gobs of tourists in your own city/country might be the most unbearable thought so as to prevent you from ever going to see these attractions. But then other attractions, like our bike ride through Circuito Chico in Bariloche, are just so spectacular that touristy or not, you have to experience it. It wasn’t about buying screen-printed t-shirts and snapping some kind of clichéd photo, but rather breathing in fresh air and scraping our jaws off the floor after every curve, presenting a new and incredible view. Unfortunately Boca does not offer this type of experience…

As we were walking, I happened to catch the eye of a service worker cleaning up some gated up mess, and while normally I avoid talking to guys like this (because they give me that “I’d love to defile you, little foreign girl” look), he gave me a nice smile and said buen día. As Melanie was having a crisis with all her photos turing out pure white, I shot the breeze with the Peruvian. Sometimes conversations like this can be uncomfortable because you can usually still see the “omg I’m talking to a 20 something pretty gringa girl!” look in their eyes and catch them throwing out a few creepy lines, but I still like to have them because it’s always a great way to practice my Spanish and hear new, interesting perspectives. In five minutes of talking we were already discussing religion and the social condition of Peruvians in Argentina (which is poor). And as I bid the Peruvian adieu, I tried to think of the last time I talked with a trash-worker about religion and social justice in the states, which was about, oh…never. It’s what I love most about this country, and really what I love about life—the conversation.

But another reality about life in Argentina set in, and with the sun getting a little too low, we knew it was time to leave La Boca. Like a pro, I hailed the 64 and as we passed through the neighborhood I noticed other little houses exactly like the ones in the famous Caminito—the only difference was that these houses weren’t painted. And I started to wonder if a coat of paint could really make that much difference, because nobody was snapping pictures of these houses, despite the fact that they probably represent the real Boca more than anything en el Caminito.

The problem with "How I Met Your Mother"

It is such a good show that when I have free time at the house, I watch it instead of writing...But I'm working now...more to come...