Algunas observaciones

I went to Ushuaia this past weekend, but I'm waiting for some photos before I write about it. Instead, I'm going to share some observations of Argentina, Buenos Aires and Latin America.

• Don't tell anyone in Florida but Argentina has tastier orange juice. Baggio Pronto Naranja por favor! 
• Argentines are more politically involved than Americans. Nestor Kirchner, the former president and husband of the current president, died a few days ago. My host family is in total shambles. A friend's host family cracked a bottle of champagne. There is no middle ground. You love or hate politicians. Me parece que el mitad no existe con respeto al gobierno.
• Argentine women either wear make-up like it's cake frosting (not an exaggeration) or nothing at all. 
• Argentine men don't know what tweezers are. Ears, noses and of course eyebrows, well, you know. This gets me in trouble on the bus and subway. Guys think I'm checking them out when I'm really just in awe at the fluidity of their unibrows.
• I think listening to Spanish music has blown my speaking ability through the roof. Too bad I didn't discover this sooner.
• Argentina knows snacks. Argentina has to be the snack capital of the world. Kiosks (little stores about the size of a bathroom that prettttttty much only sell snacks and cigarettes) have impressive shelves of alfajores, alfajores, chocolate bars and alfajores. Finding cheddar cheese singles in a grocery store is next to impossible (and incredibly expensive) but there are aisles and aisles of jams, dulce de leche, cookies, crackers, dips, candies, chocolates, cereals, sodas and alfajores.
• Yogurt comes two ways: firme and cremoso. Cremoso yogurt has the consistency of milk and firme jiggles like Jell-O. 
• A guy told me in Ushuaia that if you understand Argentine Spanish, you can understand it all except maybe not Chilean. I believe it. Or at least I hope he's right. I'd bet my car that any one from back home with no knowledge of Spanish would think they were hearing Italian. A few reasons- they talk with their hands, including the little hand at mouth kiss thing thing; they put -issimo on the end of adjectives for emphasis, buenissimo, riquissimo, lejissimo; and there are as many Italian last names here as there are Spanish. My family's last name is Albergucci. Doesn't get much more Italian than that. 
• Alfajores and orange juice is my new favorite combo. If you've been living a deprived life and have never experienced an alfajor, I'm sorry. If you're family, no worries- I'm bringing back boxes and boxes. Alfajores are a cookie filled with dulce de leche, covered in chocolate and sometimes sprinkled with nuts. I love Terabusi, Milka and Negro/Blanco. Om nom nom nom!
• Pizza here has to be eaten with a fork. Hands not an option. 
• E M P A N A D A S.
• I think food is here a bit overrated but I will be living a sad life without empanadas, medialunas, milanesa napolitana, alfajores and queso untable. Luckily all but the last two can be recreated at home.
• Argentina is Latin America but the coffee sho ain't. I think good Latin American coffee ends in Venezuela. Triste. Por lo menos tenemos maté!
• Argentines get the most out of their things. This is one life lesson I'm super happy to have learned. They wear clothes over and over and over before washing. They reuse bags- paper and plastic- over and over again. They take care of the things they have and make everything last. My host mom's Fiat has 900,000 kilometers on it. That's about 600,000 miles. Yeah.
• After studying Spanish for a few years, I've come to realize that my Spanish speaking world is dominated by a 3-letter word. Que. It means what and that and sometimes how. It also triggers the subjunctive- a linguistic mood that doesn't exist in English. Que importante!

Ushuaia blog coming soooon!

Beautiful Boca

This weekend we went to La Boca. La Boca has a very unique reputation. It is known as one of the more dangerous areas of Buenos Aires but it is a crucial part of tango, art and futbol history. La Boca is located on the river where many factories and lots of poverty are found. But when tango music and dance were thriving among the city's lower classes and growing into the seductive dance it has become, neighborhoods like Boca were crucial to the dance's development. 

There are also several famous artists that found inspiration in the area's river society. There is a group of artists from the area collectively known as 'pintores de la Boca'. Among them is Abraham Vigo and Facio Hebequer but  the most famous is Benito Quinquela Martin.

 

Barcas en el Riachuelo by B. Q. Martin

 

Lastly, La Boca is home to the Boca Juniors. In Argentina, especially in Buenos Aires, you are either a River Plate fan or Boca Juniors fan. Even those who swear allegiance to Tigre, Estudiantes or other teams will have a Boca or River Plate preference. Boca and River Plate are the equivalent of Yankees or Red Sox in the United States. Most will tell you that Boca Juniors is the team of the lower classes while River Plate is for the upper classes. River fans says Boca fans are riding the bandwagon while Boca claims their superiority because Diego Maradona repped the blue and yellow during his youth. As you may or may not know, Diego Maradona is the infamous former Argentina national coach some say lead  Argentina to their embarrassing performances in the 2010 World Cup and played on the World Cup Champion team of the 1980's. The rivalry is so strong that until a year ago, there was NO red (River's color) advertising in Estadio de la Boca Juniors. Even today the Coca-Cola marquee around the stadium is black and white.

Click the link to see Maradona in one the sport world's most controversial moments:

The hand of God? 

 Katherine and I practicing goal celebrations

La Boca, though filled with glowing murals, is polluted, poverty-stricken, prone to crime and was especially devastated when the peso crashed in 2001. We went to an alfajor bakery that was started by a few families who refused to let the slaughtered economy ruin their lives and the futures of their children. They have been a profitable alfajor company for 8 years now and use their rags to riches story to inspire tourists and neighbors. 

 Amigos at the alfajor bakery

We also went to a book cooperative that uses cardboard to bind journals, poetry books and books for kids. The cooperatives pays cartoneras 25 centavos for each box they bring in. Then, they make and decorate books that are sold on site and in several bookstores in Buenos Aires. Cartoneras are people who earn their living by sorting through the city's trash for cardboard. Buenos Aires does not have an all-inclusive recycling system and though many mayor's have tried, they simply cannot create one because it would take away the livelihood of so many people. 

 Our visit to Boca was so much fun and I must applaud our co-director Gaby (who also works for an eco-friendly/off the beaten path tour company) for leading us on a tour of Boca that showed us how residents brighten their neighborhood by working to overcome economic and social crises. 

Here are a few of my favorite shots from the trip:

Feliz dia

Hoy es Dia de la Madre en Argentina. Se ha anunciado por semanas y las florerias alrededor de la ciudad explotaron ayer! Este Dia de la Madre es un poco mas especial para mi familia argentina. Este ano es el primer ano que Luz es una mama y Lily una abuela entonces estan preparando un gran almuerzo para todo!

Entonces, ¡Feliz dia de la madre a todas las mujeres que han sido una influencia en mi vida!

Granny, Nana, Betty, Mel, Gretchen, Pegeen- ellas amo!

Un gran abrazo y beso para Mandy y Olive.

Y lo mas importante de todo- te amo a Mom!

Nuestros vecinos

Last weekend the group went to a city just outside of BsAs called Tigre.  Tigre's location on the Rio Parana (no worries, there are no piranha!) makes it a delta. Part of the city has roads but many residents live on the river and depend on boats for transportation. There's a boat bus, a grocery boat, a police boat, a fire boat, a trash boat- boats for everything! We arrived at the boat station, boarded and set off cruising down the river dropping off and picking up people along the way. It was so  neat! I'm sure there are places like this in the U.S. but I've never been so this was a new experience.

Collectivo (bus) boat

Grocery boat

When we arrived at our destination, everyone went straight for the coffee, maté and of course the hammock! One thing that I love about my program is that when we go on these excursions, we don't take the typical tourist approach. Having only 13 kids, our group is small enough to be accommodated and entertained by families. Our trip to Tigre was no exception. We spent the day with a family that one of our directors has been friends with for years. They taught us about life on the delta, fed us delicious milanesa sandwichitos, filled us with pasta frola and made us a part of the family for the day. 

We also went rowing! Many people in Tigre row for exercise as well as transportation. Rowing is such a great work out! We spent an hour singing and racing down the river which ultimately led to sore backs, buff biceps and a few blisters!

Then we had a few hours of absolute nothingness. And it was GREAT! We sunbathed, swam, read, played chess, practiced Spanish and enjoyed maté. I've said it before and I'll say it again- nature takes on a new level of amazingness when you live in a concrete jungle! There were bugs! And dirt! And fresh air! And more bugs! And flowers! And a day with no schedule is beautiful! No racing to catch the subway, fighting for a taxi, dividing everything by 4 (peso to dollar conversion), hustling to university or dodging dodgy sidewalks and doggie gifts.

After rowing, we all learned a lesson about the importance of being prepared and why we should have paid more attention to those geography terms from third grade. In our pre-Tigre e-mail, we were given a list of things to bring that included long pants and water proof shoes. But what exactly qualifies as water proof? Flip flops are water proof. So are rain boots and my choice- Chacos. No, no, no. By water proof they meant mud boots. What we thought was going to be a walk through the woods and maybe splashing in creeks turned into mud up to our knees, blade grass battle wounds and a now-hysterical mix of paranoia, whining and giggles. How did none of us hit up Google before this adventure? When I think of delta, I think of foot-deep water that is neither ocean nor river (c'mon Ellen, this ain't Brunswick!) Not blade grass over my head, mysterious depths of mud and fighting for the life of my adidas. When we arrived back in civilization 45 minutes later, several people and most of our clothes went straight to the river for a bath. For every complaint there were at least 73 laughs- one of those, 'this will be funny one day' kind of experiences. Lesson = learned.

This is the BEST picture that has been taken so far on this trip. Danielle shrieked when here foot sank into a foot of mud and almost lost her shoe when she tried to pull her foot out. This IS teamwork!

Dressing in layers = always a good idea

This weekend we did an API sponsored service project. We went to a home for abused and abandoned teenage girls and painted the dining room, staff office and laundry room. The walls definitely needed paint and the girls were really happy to have our help and company. They loved the boys in our group the most but made sure the ladies always had music blaring to pass the monotony of painting!

It was hard work painting so many walls with so many corners and doors but there was plenty of choripan and alfajores to keep us happy! And of course, just knowing that we were brightening their day was enough! When we left, the girls screamed te amos and I love yous to the boys and when I kissed the house mother goodbye she looked at me with the sweetest expression and said 'muchissimas gracias mi amor!'

My time here in Buenos Aires is winding down. The reality of returning is starting to set in. It's a bizarre mix of roller coaster-like emotions. I've gotten everything I ever wanted out of Buenos Aires but I know there's more. So much more. I'm motivated to hustle through my last semesters, work hard, save hard, practice more Spanish and do whatever it takes to move on to wherever life may lead. I know the first couple of months back home is going to be hard. There will depressed days and separation anxiety. I know there are only a few people that can even remotely understand this experience. But I also know Buenos Aires will be as much a part of my future as it will be of my past.